Month: June 2017

US Sets New Visa Rules for 6 Mainly Muslim Nations, Refugees

ITafLeave a comment

The Trump administration on Wednesday set new criteria for visa applicants from six mainly Muslim nations and all refugees that require a “close” family or business tie to the United States. The move came after the Supreme Court partially restored President Donald Trump’s executive order that was widely criticized as a ban on Muslims.

Visas that have already been approved will not be revoked, but instructions issued by the State Department say that new applicants from Syria, Sudan, Somalia, Libya, Iran and Yemen must prove a relationship with a parent, spouse, child, adult son or daughter, son-in-law, daughter-in-law or sibling already in the United States to be eligible. The same requirement, with some exceptions, holds for would-be refugees from all nations that are still awaiting approval for admission to the U.S.

Grandparents, grandchildren, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, brothers-in-law and sisters-in-law, fiancees or other extended family members are not considered to be close relationships, according to the guidelines that were issued in a cable sent to all U.S. embassies and consulates late on Wednesday. The new rules take effect at 8 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on Thursday (0000GMT on Friday), according to the cable, which was obtained by The Associated Press.

As far as business or professional links are concerned, the State Department said a legitimate relationship must be “formal, documented and formed in the ordinary course rather than for the purpose of evading” the ban. Journalists, students, workers or lecturers who have valid invitations or employment contracts in the U.S. would be exempt from the ban. The exemption does not apply to those who seek a relationship with an American business or educational institution purely for the purpose of avoiding the rules, the cable said.  A hotel reservation or car rental contract, even if it was pre-paid, would also not count, it said.

Consular officers may grant other exemptions to applicants from the six nations if they have “previously established significant contacts with the United States;” “significant business or professional obligations” in the U.S.; if they are an infant, adopted child or in need of urgent medical care; if they are traveling for business with a recognized international organization or the U.S. government or if they are a legal resident of Canada who applies for a visa in Canada, according to the cable.

On Monday, the Supreme Court partially lifted lower court injunctions against Trump’s executive order that had temporarily banned visas for citizens of the six countries. The justices’ ruling exempted applicants from the ban if they could prove a “bona fide relationship” with a U.S. person or entity, but the court offered only broad guidelines – suggesting they would include a relative, job offer or invitation to lecture in the U.S.  – as to how that should be defined.

Senior officials from the departments of State, Justice and Homeland Security had labored since the decision to clarify the ruling and Wednesday’s instructions were the result. The new guidance will remain in place until the Supreme Court issues a final ruling on the matter. Arguments before the justices will not be held until at least October, so the interim rules will remain in place at least until the fall.

Shortly after taking office, Trump ordered the refugee ban and a travel ban affecting the six countries, plus Iraq. He said it was needed to protect the U.S. from terrorists, but opponents said it was unfairly harsh and was intended to meet his campaign promise to keep Muslims out of the United States.

After a federal judge struck down the bans, Trump signed a revised order intended to overcome legal hurdles. That was also struck down by lower courts, but the Supreme Court’s action Monday partially reinstated it.

The initial travel ban led to chaos at airports around the world, but because the guidelines exempt previously issued visas, similar problems are not expected.  After a judge blocked the original ban, Trump issued a scaled-down order and the court’s action Monday further reduced the number of people who would be covered by it. Also, while the initial order took effect immediately, adding to the confusion, this one was delayed 72 hours after the court’s ruling.

Under the new rules, would-be immigrants from the six countries who won a coveted visa in the government’s diversity lottery – a program that randomly awards 50,000 green cards annually to people from countries with low rates of immigration to the United States – will also have to prove they have a “bona fide relationship” with in the U.S. or are eligible for another waiver or face being banned for at least 90 days. That hurdle may be a difficult one for those immigrants to overcome, as many visa lottery winners don’t have relatives in the U.S. or jobs in advance of arriving in the country.

Generally, winners in the diversity lottery only need prove they were born in an eligible county and have completed high school or have at least two years of work experience in an occupation that requires at least two other years of training or experience.
…

your ad here

Top Vatican Cardinal Charged With Sex Offenses in Australia

ITeuLeave a comment

Australian police charged a top Vatican cardinal Thursday with multiple counts of historical sexual assault offenses, a stunning decision certain to rock the highest levels of the Holy See.

 

Cardinal George Pell, Pope Francis’ chief financial adviser and Australia’s most senior Catholic, said in an early morning appearance at the Vatican that he would take a leave of absence as the Vatican’s finance czar and would return to Australia to fight the charges. He denied the accusations and denounced what he called a “relentless character assassination” in the media.

Victoria state Police Deputy Commissioner Shane Patton said police have a summons for Pell to appear in an Australian court to face multiple charges of “historical sexual assault offenses,” meaning offenses that generally occurred some time ago. Patton said there are multiple complainants against Pell, but gave no other details on the allegations against the cardinal. Pell was ordered to appear in Melbourne Magistrates Court July 18.

Allegations denied 

Pell, 76, has repeatedly denied all abuse allegations made against him. The Catholic Church in Australia, which issues statements on Pell’s behalf, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the charges.

 

“It is important to note that none of the allegations that have been made against Cardinal Pell have, obviously, been tested in any court yet,” Patton told reporters in Melbourne. “Cardinal Pell, like any other defendant, has a right to due process.”

 

The charges are a new and serious blow to Pope Francis, who has suffered several credibility setbacks in his promised “zero tolerance” policy about sex abuse.

Mishandled cases

For years, Pell has faced allegations that he mishandled cases of clergy abuse when he was archbishop of Melbourne and, later, Sydney. 

His actions as archbishop came under intense scrutiny in recent years by a government-authorized investigation into how the Catholic Church and other institutions have responded to the sexual abuse of children. Australia’s Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse, the nation’s highest form of inquiry, has found shocking levels of abuse in Australia’s Catholic Church, revealing earlier this year that 7 percent of Catholic priests were accused of sexually abusing children over the past several decades. 

 

Last year, Pell acknowledged during his testimony to the commission that the Catholic Church had made “enormous mistakes” in allowing thousands of children to be raped and molested by priests. He conceded that he, too, had erred by often believing the priests over victims who alleged abuse. And he vowed to help end a rash of suicides that has plagued church abuse victims in his Australian hometown of Ballarat.

Cardinal himself accused

 

But more recently, Pell himself became the focus of a clergy sex abuse investigation, with Victoria detectives flying to the Vatican last year to interview the cardinal. It is unclear what allegations the charges announced Thursday relate to, but two men, now in their 40s, have said that Pell touched them inappropriately at a swimming pool in the late 1970s, when Pell was a senior priest in Melbourne. 

 

Australia has no extradition treaty with the Vatican, but the Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney issued a statement on behalf of Pell, saying he would return to Australia to clear his name.

When Francis was asked last year about the accusations against Pell, he said he wanted to wait for Australian justice to take its course before judging. 

“It’s true, there is a doubt,” he told reporters en route home from Poland. “We have to wait for justice and not first make a mediatic judgment — a judgment of gossip — because that won’t help.”

 

Given Francis’ credibility is on the line, any decision to keep Pell on as prefect while facing charges would reflect poorly on Francis, given he remains one of the pope’s top advisers.
…

your ad here

Conditions in Irbil: Safe Yet Tense

ITeuLeave a comment

Voice of America correspondent Hediye Levent studied the changing conditions Irbil, Iraq.
…

your ad here

Ukraine Alleges Moscow Behind Massive Cyberattack

ITeuLeave a comment

A Ukraine official claimed Wednesday that Russia was behind the previous day’s cyberattack that crippled computers in government ministries and power grid facilities, banks, even at Kyiv’s international airport. 

Oleksandr Turchinov, secretary of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, made the allegation after Tuesday’s cyberattack that ultimately hit companies around the world in an incident that was similar to a ransomware attack last month that targeted hospitals in Britain.

The cyberattack, which Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman called “unprecedented,” was caused by a variant of a computer virus known as Petya, which threatens to wipe the infected computer clean of data unless the user pays a ransom in untraceable bitcoins. But the ransomware was just a ruse, according to some experts; the real goal of the hackers was to destroy data, they say.

No proof or claim of responsibility

While there is no proof or claim of responsibility behind Tuesday’s attack, Ukraine officials cited strong circumstantial evidence linking the widespread assault to Russia.

Russia was blamed for a massive cyberattack on neighboring Estonia in 2007, and U.S. authorities, as well as private firms, have blamed Russia for carrying out a number of cyberattacks in connection with United States’ 2016 presidential election. Kyiv has blamed previous cyberattacks on its infrastructure and power grid on Russia, which annexed Ukraine’s Crimea peninsula in 2014.

The attacks also followed the assassination Tuesday of a Ukrainian military intelligence officer in a car bomb in Kyiv. Authorities have called the bombing an act of terrorism. That Wednesday was Constitution Day, a public holiday in Ukraine, led some to speculate that the Petya cyberattacks were a “present” from Russia.

Other experts have noted, however, that the attacks hit targets in other European countries. Russian state oil giant Rosneft reported it had fallen victim to the same ransomware virus.

Burden of proof

Anton Nossik, often called “the father of the Russian internet” and the founder of Lenta.ru and many other known Russian news sites, has doubts about links to Moscow.

“The burden of proof lies with the Ukrainian authorities, who never bothered to provide any evidence before voicing accusations,” Nossik said.

He said Ukrainian authorities should have listened to information technology experts’ warnings about ransomware threats, such as the so-called WannaCry cryptoworm that attacked computer systems worldwide in May.

“Exploit tools are out there in the open, any school kid can use them against whoever forgot to patch his OS. If some government offices happen to neglect the very basic safety measures, they are vulnerable, and Kremlin is not to blame,” Nossik said.

Doubts expressed

Alexander Litreev, a Russian internet security expert, also expressed doubts that the attack was state-sponsored.

“I do not know why the Ukrainian authorities have drawn conclusions about Russia’s involvement in this cyberattack, at the moment, there is no information to confirm or deny these statements. There are no signs of Russian involvement yet,” Litreev said.

While Litreev said he did not yet see signs of state involvement, he did say “the code was written by professionals.”

“The primary purpose, in my opinion, was to hit the largest number of devices possible,” he said.

According to Litreev, fraud was the primary goal for the WannaCry ransomware, but not for Petya.

As for the origin of the attacks, Litreev said it is too early to determine what person or group might have been involved.

“We can’t tell for sure if this is the work of a state, a small group of people, or even a single person. We are looking into it,” he said.
…

your ad here

European Officials: Islamic State ‘Renewing Itself’ Despite Battlefield Losses

ITeuLeave a comment

European security officials are increasingly worried that Islamic State’s reach will not fade even as the terror group loses its grip on Mosul and Raqqa, the twin capitals of its now-collapsing, self-declared caliphate.

Instead, they warn of an organization that has carefully reinvented itself in order to take the fight directly to the West, with Europe in the crosshairs.

“Despite the recent setback for the Islamic State on the battlefield, the group has reached a new level of capability,” Manuel Navarrette, the head of Europol’s European Counterterrorism Center, warned during a recent visit to Washington.

“ISIS has shown the capability to strike at will, at any time, at almost any chosen target,” he said, using an acronym for the group.

Making the situation even more ominous, according to Navarrette, is that IS appears to be able to turn potential recruits into operatives faster than ever.

“We have never seen this before,” he said.

“Most of them pledge allegiance just the day before,” added European Union Counterterrorism Coordinator Gilles de Kerchove. “They mount attacks close to the places where they live.”

This is a view shared by many European officials, some of whom have been taking their message directly to their counterparts in the U.S.

They describe a terror organization that has found a way to become more capable, leaving those responsible for stopping them with almost no room for error.

These officials point to recent attacks in Manchester, London and Paris, and attempted attacks in Belgium, as a sign of what is to come.

“ISIS is renewing itself, modernizing continuously,” said Dick Schoof, the National Coordinator for Security and Counterterrorism for the Netherlands.

Growing online presence

And perhaps nowhere has IS’s drive to evolve been more worrisome than online where, according to Schoof, the group’s supporters and recruiters have been getting “more professional,” moving beyond social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube.

“They are even more effective in the dark web, in the hidden part of the internet,” Schoof warned, building on what he described as already “strong and effective media apparatus and marketing apparatus.”

Also worrisome for European security officials is that many of these online efforts appear to have increasingly downplayed IS’s brand of extremist Islamist ideology and even Islam itself.

Rather, the “initial push factor,” as some officials call it, has been heavy doses of peer pressure, with the ideology coming into play late in the process, if at all.

‘Terror diaspora’

Such concerns seem to contrast with the steady warnings by U.S. officials of a looming “terror diaspora” in which foreign fighters who once flocked to the Islamic State turn their wrath on their homelands, especially in the West.

“The so-called caliphate will be crushed,” former FBI Director James Comey told U.S. lawmakers in September 2016. “The challenge will be that through the fingers of that crush are going to come hundreds and hundreds of very dangerous people.”

While not trying to minimize the dangers, European counterterrorism officials say such fears have yet to manifest in their countries.

“The more I look at this, the more I believe we won’t have a massive return. We won’t have a high number of returnees,” said EU Counterterrorism Coordinator de Kerchove.

European officials say of the approximately 5,000 citizens and residents who traveled to Syria and Iraq to join Islamic State, about half are believed to be dead. And they think many others will fight for IS in Iraq and Syria until the very end, or leave for new territories outside the West in which they can fight.

“Most of them will be killed, I think,” de Kerchove said, further describing efforts by IS to sneak fighters into Europe with migrants as “not very significant.”

There also is high confidence that the vast majority of Europeans who went to fight with IS are now known to the various intelligence agencies, their identities entered into the EU’s Schengen Information System, making them available to local police and border agencies.

Fears persist

But there are concerns that despite the progress, Europe remains vulnerable.

“Some foreign fighters are still coming back,” one European diplomatic official told VOA on condition of anonymity, given the sensitivity of the intelligence.

And many more already have successfully returned.

The EU estimates as many as 1,400 foreign fighters, nearly a third of those who left to fight, are already back in their countries of origin, although at least some of them are thought to be women and children who accompanied would-be jihadists.

“This is one of the main factors that helps explain the wave of attacks, both thwarted and successful, that have hit Europe,” said Seamus Hughes, deputy director of the George Washington University Program on Extremism, during a congressional hearing Tuesday.

European officials say many of the plots have been foiled, and studies note there has been a decrease in the number of attacks involving foreign fighters following the November 2015 attacks on Paris.

“Law enforcement, intelligence officials in the West have been very good at trying to disrupt attacks by the foreign fighters,” according to Kim Cragin, a senior research fellow in counterterrorism in the National Defense University’s Center for Complex Operations.

“The question is whether or not these law enforcement officials can actually sustain this level of effort.”
…

your ad here

In South Sudan, One Hospital Delivers New Limbs, New Life

ITafLeave a comment

Solomon was just 7 years old when he woke up missing a leg.

And he was one of the lucky ones.

Weeks later, Solomon was back on two feet with the aid of an artificial leg, fitted at a hectic hospital, turned into a limb-making factory, in the South Sudanese capital of Juba.

The hospital is in horribly high demand in a country born of war that remains littered with mines and explosive devices, with civil war still raging all around.

Most of South Sudan’s estimated 60,000 amputees have suffered war-related injuries, be it gunshot or landmine wounds.

As civil war devastates the world’s youngest country — it celebrates its sixth anniversary next month — it has become increasingly difficult for amputees to gain good treatment.

Second chance

Solomon came to his first artificial limb after an open fracture turned into a life-threatening infection, which forced doctors to amputate.

When he woke from surgery in a remote hospital in South Sudan’s Bentiu, he was far away from the capital with little chance of rehabilitation or help adjusting to his new life.

“I was put on a flight to Juba, where I am receiving a new, artificial leg,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from his current home at the Physical Rehabilitation Reference Center.

It is the country’s biggest hospital for prosthetic orthotic treatment, treating about 30 patients a day.

“Amputations have gone up since the beginning of the civil war in 2013, but even with increased need, access to some areas is impossible due to active fighting and many people who have lost limbs might never be able to get out and receive help,” said Emmanuel Lobari, who as head of technicians oversees the production of all the prosthetic limbs.

Both hospital and factory, the center produces an average of 50 prostheses each month — all hand-made and custom fit.

Durable, affordable

“We use polypropylene to make the limbs, a material that has proved to be both durable and affordable,” physiotherapist Daniel Odhiambo said.

A Kenyan, he is one of a handful of expatriate staff at the hospital, employed by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).

“The prostheses last for an average of two years and it’s usually the foot, made out of a softer material, that wears out the fastest. The leg itself can last up to 10 years.”

Making a limb — from melting the plastic-like polypropylene to shaping it into a leg — is a quick process in the hospital’s small, modern factory and can be done within a day.

“It’s the fitting and the patient’s adaption that take up to 10 days,” Lobari said.

Lobari is South Sudanese, like most of the hospital’s 30 staff, all of whom received Red Cross training.

The organization first started treating amputations in 1979 during Ethiopia’s civil war, and developed the polypropylene technology that has since spread across all conflict zones.

Odhiambo has worked in many places, including Afghanistan, Yemen and Iraq. He recently took up his second mission in Juba.

“Here in South Sudan, I mainly see war wounds and they are very different from civilian wounds,” he said.

Nearly 250,000 mines and explosive devices were found and destroyed in South Sudan so far in 2017, according to the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS). South Sudan slipped into civil war in 2013, two years after becoming independent from Khartoum, and some 4 million people, one third of the population, have fled to neighboring countries in its wake.

For those left behind, risk is part of daily life. The worst case Odhiambo has seen is an 18-year-old boy, who was brought to the clinic with both legs blown off by a landmine, pieces of muscle hanging out of the wound and shrapnel fragments stuck deep in his flesh.

“He was in consistent pain and it took months to build the right prosthesis, but I stayed with him through the whole process. I told him not to give up. He had his whole life ahead of him still.”

A resilient nation

Simon has been coming to the hospital for several months and can still vividly recall the day he was attacked, when several bullets were shot through his leg.

“I thought I was going to die, but my family took me to a small hospital where my leg was amputated,” he said.

Simon is from the north of the country then moved to Juba to get better care.

Three in four patients at the center are male. The women and children at the hospital underwent amputations after suffering different traumas, such as war injuries, crocodile bites, road accidents or infections.

It helps patients such as Solomon, just starting a new life with his first prosthesis, to meet older patients like Simon.

“The boy is still young, but he can see that he’s not alone with his injury,” Odhiambo said.

“The one difference I’ve noted working in South Sudan is that people here accept their fate easier than any others. They are resilient and want to go on with their lives. I even see it in Solomon,” Odhiambo said. “People have suffered, but they don’t lose their drive and motivation.”
…

your ad here

Construction on Wetlands Ramps Up Water Stress in Zimbabwe

ITafLeave a comment

Unspooling the rope tied to a metal bucket, Shylet Nhari listened to the repeated clangs of the tin striking the walls of the well as her bucket made its way down.

When she pulled the container back up, she found it filled with undrinkable, muddy water. Water levels in the well are dwindling fast and not being replenished, she said.

Nhari, 46, lives in Westlea, a middle-class suburb of the Zimbabwean capital and an area built on wetlands. Like many residents, she has no piped water and relies on the well, which has become more erratic in the face of longer drought.

“Since 2015, our wells here started having problems in storing groundwater for longer periods as they began to dry up quickly,” she said.

Residents like Nhari, and a growing number of newcomers to Harare, find themselves in a bind. They need somewhere to live, and developers are all too ready to sell them land in wetland areas. But as construction covers more wetlands, water sources are drying up.

Wetlands — which include bogs and swamps — are essential to the well-being of the city, environmentalists say. They can ease the impacts of a changing climate by helping maintain groundwater levels, and protect areas from the worst impacts of floods by absorbing excess water.

Permit needed

By law, anyone intending to build on a wetland must apply for a permit from the government’s Environmental Management Agency (EMA).

In January, EMA threatened to evict wetland residents in Masvingo, one of the country’s oldest towns, saying their homes had been built without government approval.

But in Westlea, Nhari is skeptical about the likelihood of enforcement.

“I have lived here for close to 10 years and have not seen any resident being questioned for building on this so-called wetland,” she said. She added that she didn’t know how wetlands function and why they are important.

According to EMA spokesman Steady Kangata, 27 wetland areas in Harare and Chitungwiza, a town 25 kilometers (15 miles) from the Zimbabwean capital, have been partially built on.

In Chitungwiza, 14 out of 15 wetlands have been built on, and 13 of Harare’s 29 wetlands have been taken over for construction, Kangata told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“Approximately 60 percent of Harare’s and Chitungwiza’s wetlands have been invaded or taken over for construction purposes. All these constructions on wetlands are unlawful,” Kangata said.

The Westlea wetland is an area of 123 hectares (304 acres). It has 87 houses, the first of which was built in 2008, according to the Harare Residents Trust, a nongovernmental organization.

Nhari moved into her home in 2009 with her husband, after he bought a 600-square-meter plot from a private landowner. She says she has a deed of sale to prove it, but what she doesn’t have is water.

Less water absorbed

Environmental experts say residents like Nhari are the source of their own problems.

“A wetland acts like a sponge which absorbs water and then recharges underground water so that the water table remains high. Construction disrupts this process,” said Sandra Gobvu of Environment Africa, a nongovernmental organization that works in southern Africa to promote sustainable development.

When wetland areas are concreted over, much less water is absorbed, Gobvu added.

Wetlands also help control flooding by absorbing excess water and releasing it gradually into water bodies, she said.

“If we preserved them in their natural state, wetlands would actually help us adapt to the changing climatic conditions,” said Barnabas Mawire, Environment Africa’s Zimbabwe country director.

He thinks that while Zimbabwe’s widespread water problems are due to a number of factors, wetland destruction plays a role.

“Climate change will make future efforts to restore or rehabilitate wetlands more difficult, especially if we continue to destroy them at this rate,” said Mawire.

Environmental activists in Zimbabwe say they are struggling to keep up with the rate of wetlands encroachment.

“It is hard to measure the proportion of construction work occurring on wetlands here, because daily we wake up to new building activities emerging around many wetlands,” said Liberty Chiura, a member of the Zimbabwe Environmental Law Association.

Meanwhile, landowners say they are not acting illegally by selling wetlands plots.

“We don’t just wake up and start pegging land at wetlands for people without binding permits from local authorities,” said Elton Javangwe, a private landowner based in Harare.

“This is part of a farm I bought and later decided to subdivide before selling housing stands, after local authorities and EMA regularized it,” Javangwe said.

Uninformed, defiant

Mawire said that some construction on wetlands is authorized.

“Developers know they have to apply to the Environmental Management Authority for permits to build, and they do get these permits at times,” he said.

“However, there are many other people who invade pieces of land without any knowledge that there are wetlands and start construction. And there are others who know but deliberately ignore what the law says and go on to build,” Mawire added.

He said that as people migrate from the countryside and demand for land in urban areas increases, new residents are unlikely to be aware of the risks of building on wetlands, to themselves and the broader community.

“The developer might know, but sadly for many people, they only realize the consequences once they finish building and start experiencing floods, cracks and collapse of infrastructure,” said Mawire.

Failure to abide by Zimbabwe’s laws governing wetlands can result in a fine of up to $500, imprisonment of up to two years, or both.

Minister of Environment, Water and Climate Oppah Muchinguri has the power to serve a written order to stop development on any wetland.

“As government, we are accountable for handling wetlands and we have to accept accountability where we would have failed,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

“We now have an interministerial task force to investigate the building of properties on wetlands and take possible action in order to protect our threatened wetlands, [which are] crucial to restoring water basins,” Muchinguri added.
…

your ad here

Militants Withdraw Threat to Attack Niger Delta Oil Industry

ITafLeave a comment

A militant group in Nigeria’s oil-rich southern Niger Delta has withdrawn its threat to launch attacks on oil facilities beginning this week.

Early in June, the New Delta Avengers, a previously unheard of group, issued a statement saying it would fight for a greater share of proceeds from crude oil sales to go to the impoverished region.

But in an open letter, the group withdrew its threat Wednesday.

“NDA has decided to shelve our planned attack on major oil facilities in the region from June 30, 2017,” said the group.

“We have decided to give peace a chance,” it said, stating that its decision was made to help local community leader Edwin Clark continue efforts to end regional violence.

The New Delta Avengers were apparently named in a nod to the Niger Delta Avengers, who last year crippled the OPEC member’s oil production. Crude oil sales account for two-thirds of government revenue.

The attacks last year deepened a recession in Africa’s biggest economy that was largely caused by low oil prices. The government has been holding peace talks with Niger Delta communities to end the violence, and there have been no major attacks this year.
…

your ad here

Italy Threatens to Block Ships Carrying Migrants

ITeuLeave a comment

Italian officials say their government has told the European Commission in Brussels it is considering stopping ships that are not Italian-registered from disembarking at its ports migrants who were rescued while trying to cross the Mediterranean from Libya.

The dramatic move comes after nearly 11,000 asylum-seekers and economic migrants, mainly from African nations, arrived on Italian shores in a four-day period from war-wracked Libya. In a letter to the commission, Italy’s ambassador to the EU, Maurizio Massari, said the situation has become “unsustainable.”

In a meeting Wednesday, Massari informed Dimitris Avramopoulos, the EU’s commissioner for migration, that his government is now considering denying landing rights to any ships that aren’t flying the Italian flag or are not part of the EU interdiction and rescue mission in the Mediterranean.

Libya as migrants’ gateway to Europe

Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni has accused fellow EU nations of “looking the other way,” and not doing enough to assist Italy with the surge in migrants crossing the Mediterranean. Libya has become the main gateway to Europe for migrants and refugees from across sub-Saharan Africa, and also from the Arabian Peninsula, Egypt, Syria and Bangladesh.

Many are fleeing war and persecution, but most who are using Libya are seeking to escape poverty. Italy has become the main point of arrival for all of those rescued off the coast of Libya. Stranded refugees often are picked up by boats operated or funded by private charities and non-government organizations.

An intense debate has erupted in Italy about whether ships operated by mainly international NGOs have effectively been in league with the people-smugglers, and thus inadvertently enabling the trade to continue

Nearly 11,000 arrivals in four days

There has been a dramatic rise, partly thanks to good weather, in the number of migrants attempting the short but perilous Mediterranean crossing. In the four-day period through Tuesday (June 24-27), 8,863 migrants landed in Italy, including more than 5,000 on Monday alone, according to the International Office for Migration. Another 2,000 landed on Tuesday.

In the first five months of this year, 60,228 migrants arrived in Italy by boat. The IOM reported that 1,562 died at sea. At the current rate, and with months of good sailing weather ahead, the number of migrants is on track to exceed the 200,000 who landed in Italy in 2016.

Around 15 percent of those arriving this year are Nigerian. Twelve percent are Bangladeshi; Guineans account for 10 percent and nine percent are Ivorians.

 

Other EU nations have closed their borders to migrants, hoping to block them from moving north. Poland and Hungary have refused to host some asylum seekers to help ease the burden on Italy and Greece, another front line country. Greece has seen a huge decline in asylum-seeking numbers since the EU concluded a deal with Turkey to curb refugees and migrants using Turkish territory to head to Europe.

The surge in migrants this week prompted Italy’s interior minister, Marco Minniti, to cancel a trip to Washington to address the growing humanitarian crisis, which is quickly morphing into a political one for the country’s left-leaning coalition government. In municipal elections this month the coalition lost ground to center-right parties such as Matteo Salvini’s Northern League, which has called for a “stop to the invasion.”

Domestic opposition growing

Italy’s right-wing Forza Italia party has campaigned for the denial of landing rights to ships carrying migrants. And even the maverick radical Five Star Movement is moving to a more anti-immigrant position, calling for a halt to any new migrants being lodged in Rome.

Italy is now asking for the European Commission to change EU asylum procedures and allow Italy to stop new migrant landings or reduce them dramatically. But it is not clear whether a denial of landing rights would comply with international seafaring law or commitments Italy made when it signed the 1951 Refugee Convention.

After meeting Ambassador Massari on Wednesday, EU migration commissioner Avramopoulos praised Italy’s exemplary behavior to date and agreed: “Italy is right that the situation is untenable.” 

Other EU member states must “step up” and contribute financial support to Italy, Avramopoulos said, along with aid to African nations like Libya to try to reduce the numbers of people leaving for Europe.

“Now is the moment to deliver, and we will hold them to this,” the commissioner said.

Avramopoulos made almost exactly the same remarks in February, and similar promises have been made by other EU officials. The bloc’s 28 national leaders also agreed last week that “front line” countries Italy and Greece should receive more help with the arrivals.

Last month, the interior ministers of Germany and Italy urged the European Union to set up a border mission along Libya’s frontier with Niger in a bid to stop mainly African migrants from reaching Europe. In the past, the EU has tried to curb the migrant flow by working with various authorities in Libya, which is divided between rival governments and their militia backers, but to little avail.

In a sign of the deepening chaos in the north African country, a five-vehicle United Nations convoy was ambushed Wednesday 30 kilometers from the Libyan capital Tripoli. Several U.N. employees were held for a while, then released. Local media reported the ambush was staged in an attempt to gain the release of three drug-runners arrested by a vigilante force in Tripoli.
…

your ad here

Myanmar Rebels Accuse Army of Arresting Journalists to Hide Reality of War

ITasLeave a comment

The arrests of three journalists who visited a ceremony held by the Ta’ang National Liberation Army (TNLA) in northern Myanmar this week are part of a deliberate attempt to block information about the conflict, a spokesman for the group said, alleging that dozens of similar cases have occurred this year with civilians.

TNLA Major Tar Parn La said in an interview with VOA the Myanmar military wants to “cut off the connection between” the group and the public.

“That’s why they are trying to stop the media,” he said. “It means you are not allowed to contact the rebels and not allowed to expose the real situation of the war to the people.”

The TNLA, which is one of several ethnic armed groups in Myanmar engaged in intermittent clashes with the military, with a new bout of fighting occurring as recently as this past week, condemned the arrests in a separate statement.

Tar Parn La said the arrests are part of a pattern this year and that so far more than 30 civilians have faced action for possessing photos of the group or their territory in Namhshan Township in northern Shan State. In some instances, the images were just downloaded from the internet.

The journalists are Lawi Weng – also known as Thein Zaw – from the Irrawaddy news magazine, and Aye Nai and Pyae Phone Naing from the Democratic Voice of Burma media group.

Government claims journalists broke the law

Zaw Htay, a government spokesman, told news outlets this week the three are to be charged under the Unlawful Associations Act, a colonial-era statute dating back to 1908 that has been used as a tool of repression in Myanmar’s borderlands.

The Irrawaddy reported on Wednesday that the three were charged and remanded to prison in Shan State’s Hsipaw Township, with a court date set for July 11.

The U.S. embassy said in a statement that “journalists need to be able to do their work, as a free press is essential to Myanmar’s success.” Rights groups have called for their immediate release.

Both the Irrawaddy and the Democratic voice of Burma reported in exile before setting up in the country after it embarked on a transition from military rule in 2011. The transition included reforms abolishing censorship and led to elections in 2015 that elevated pro-democracy champion Aung San Suu Kyi to power.

Criticism of Aung San Suu Kyi

But despite benefiting from years of media coverage while under house arrest in Yangon, Suu Kyi has proved a poor advocate for free expression, critics say. Since forming her government in April last year, she has done only a handful of interviews, most out of the country.

Her image has suffered further from a rash of online defamation cases against critics of her administration. In April, the advocacy group PEN Myanmar conducted a survey of freedom of expression to mark the one-year anniversary of Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy-led government. It received a score of 8 points out of a possible 60.

PEN Myanmar’s scorecard made several recommendations, including allowing journalists more access to “conflict and frontline areas.” Many of these regions require government permission to visit, but it is rarely if ever granted.

Major Tar Parn La said the TNLA issued an invitation to the media to attend a ceremony to mark the International Day against Drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. The event, which involved the large-scale incineration of narcotics, occurred at 8:00 am on Monday. He said after attending, doing interviews and breaking for lunch, the three journalists left. They were arrested a few hours later.

Four others in the convoy, including drivers and a monk, were also arrested, he said. Whether they too will be charged remains unclear.

He said they spent two to three days in detention before being transferred to Hsipaw. The government had said they would be transferred to another town, Lashio, but authorities there seemed uninformed.

“We don’t know where they are,” said Lashio deputy police officer Sai Ko Ko. “We can’t ask the military where they detained them.

Though Tar Parn La sees the arrests as an attempt to restrict the free flow of information, he remains puzzled by the thinking. The group is not a signatory to the Nationwide Ceasefire Agreement and has been branded a terrorist outfit by the military, but the TNLA attended peace talks in the capital Naypyitaw in May, where exchanges with reporters and government officials flowed freely.

“I myself I was there,” he said. “In Naypyitaw I gave a lot of interviews, met a lot of media, but we don’t understand why when the media comes to our land they are arrested.

In good health

An editor at the Democratic Voice of Burma said they have not been able to contact the journalists yet, but the Irrawaddy reported, citing police and a colleague, that they appear to be in good health.

Media watchdogs in Myanmar have sent letters to the authorities about the arrests.

Thiha Saw, the director of the Myanmar Journalism Institute, said the implications of the case are far-reaching. The outcome could warn off those who want to interview groups that have not signed the ceasefire agreement.

“The case will have a huge impact in reporting on the peace process,” he said. “The best case scenario is that they will be released.”

 
…

your ad here

China Frees 3 Activists who Probed Ivanka Trump Supplier

ITamLeave a comment

Chinese authorities have released on bail three activists who had been detained after investigating labor conditions at a factory that produced shoes for Ivanka Trump and other brands.

The three activists walked out of a police station in Ganzhou, a city in southeastern Jiangxi province, on Wednesday, the final day of their legally mandated 30-day detention period limit.

 

The activists were working with China Labor Watch, a New York-based group, and were investigating Huajian Group factories in the southern Chinese cities of Ganzhou and Dongguan.

 

One of the activists, Hua Haifeng, carried his 3-year-old son in his arms as he walked out with his wife and other family members.

 

“I will speak to everyone in a few days’ time after we organize. I’m happy to be out. I just want to spend some time with my family,” Hua told The Associated Press. “I appreciate the media following my case the last month but I’m not ready to speak yet.”

 

Hua declined further comment but said he had not been mistreated. People released in politically sensitive cases tend to have conditions attached to their release that restrict them from speaking to the media.

 

China Labor Watch said the three men were released on bail pending trial. “China Labor Watch hopes that the court will provide the investigators with a fair trial,” the group said in a statement.

 

Hua and his colleagues at the labor group were preparing to publish a report alleging low pay, excessive overtime, crude verbal abuse and possible misuse of student labor at Huajian Group factories.

 

The company has denied allegations of excessive overtime and low wages. It says it stopped producing Ivanka Trump shoes months ago.

​The activists disappeared or were detained in late May. The labor group said two were taken away from a hotel room while the third was detained by customs officials in the southern city of Shenzhen while en route to Hong Kong.

 

The three activists’ detention prompted the U.S. State Department to call for their immediate release. At the time, Hua Chunying, spokeswoman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said the men had been accused of using secret recording devices to disrupt normal commercial operations and would be dealt with under Chinese law.

 

“Other nations have no right to interfere in our judicial sovereignty and independence,” she said, adding, “the police found these people illegally possessed secret cameras, secret listening devices and other illegal monitoring devices.”

 

Ivanka Trump’s brand has declined to comment on the allegations or the detentions. Marc Fisher, which produces shoes for Ivanka Trump and other brands, has said it is looking into the allegations. Ivanka Trump’s lifestyle brand imports most of its merchandise from China, trade data show.

 

The detentions came as China has cracked down on perceived threats to the stability of its ruling Communist Party, particularly from sources with foreign ties such as China Labor Watch.

 

Faced with rising labor unrest and a slowing economy, Beijing has taken a stern approach to activism in southern China’s manufacturing belt and to human rights advocates generally, sparking a wave of reports about disappearances, public confessions, forced repatriation and torture in custody.

 

 
…

your ad here

Zimbabwe Pastor and Anti-Government Activist Freed on Bail

ITafLeave a comment

A Zimbabwean pastor and anti-government activist who was arrested for addressing protesting university students has been freed on bail.

Evan Mawarire was released Wednesday. He had been in police custody since Monday. He is charged with disorderly conduct in a public place and is free on $200 bail.

 

Mawarire rose to prominence in July 2016 when he used social media to organize the Zimbabwe’s biggest anti-government protest in a decade.

 

He later left for the United States after a court dismissed charges against him, claiming his life was in danger. He returned to Zimbabwe in February.

 

He is due to appear in court on Sep. 25 on other charges of allegedly subverting a constitutionally elected government.

 

 
…

your ad here

Former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to Speak in Boston

ITamLeave a comment

Former United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is speaking at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum in Boston this week.

 

The museum says the U.N.’s eighth secretary-general will discuss global issues and his diplomatic career at a forum moderated Wednesday by David Gergen, a CNN senior political analyst and co-director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School.

 

Ban held office from January 2007 to December 2016. During that time, the South Korean-born diplomat focused his efforts on climate change, gender equality and poverty, among other issues, and introduced new measures aimed at making the United Nations more transparent, effective and efficient.

 

Prior to becoming secretary-general, Ban served as foreign policy adviser and national security adviser, respectively, to the South Korean president.

 

 
…

your ad here

Conflict Emergencies Increase World Hunger

ITafLeave a comment

A World Food Program review of the global hunger situation in 2016 finds conflict emergencies in the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere are hampering United Nations efforts to achieve zero hunger by the year 2030.

In its review 2016: A Year in Fighting Hunger, the World Food Program reports that 795 million people in the world went hungry last year. The organization’s spokeswoman Bettina Luescher tells VOA the Sustainable Development Goal to eliminate hunger by 2030 does not, for now, appear realistic.

“As you know, the world is a mess,” she said. “We have more emergencies than ever. We have more refugees than ever and we are struggling on all fronts to help the people be able to feed themselves.”

Last year, WFP assisted more than 82 million people with food or cash. While that is a lot, Luescher agrees it is far from enough. She says escalating conflicts are making the work of aid agencies much harder.

She says countries that had been making progress in development have gone backwards because of conflict. She points to South Sudan as an example of a country, which on the eve of independence appeared poised to prosper after decades of civil war.

“And look what happened,” she said. “They went back to fighting and for the first time in six years, this year, we saw in some areas of South Sudan, a famine again. And, that is just unbelievable in this time in our new century. It is just unbelievable. So, the conflicts have to stop.”

Luescher says it takes money to fight hunger. Unfortunately, she says international support is waning at a time of burgeoning emergencies. She says WFP urgently needs one $1 billion to fight four looming famines in Yemen, Somalia, South Sudan and in northeast Nigeria.

She says it will be extremely difficult to save people dying from hunger without help from international donors.

 

 
…

your ad here

Serbia’s Next Premier: EU Membership, Modernization Priority

ITeuLeave a comment

Serbia’s prime minister designate said Wednesday her future government’s goal is membership in the European Union along with modernization of the troubled Balkan country.

 

Ana Brnabic told Serbian parliament that the government will lead a “balanced” foreign policy, seeking good relations with Russia, China and the U.S.

 

Lawmakers are expected to vote her government into office later this week. If confirmed, Brnabic will become Serbia’s first ever female and openly gay prime minister.

 

“The time before us will show how brave we are to move boundaries,” Brnabic said in her speech. “Now is the moment to make a step forward and take our society, country and economy into the 21st century.”

 

She warned that “if we don’t take that chance, we can hardly count on another one again.”

 

When President Aleksandar Vucic nominated the U.S.- and U.K.-educated Brnabic to succeed him as prime minister earlier this month, it was seen as an attempt to calm Western concerns that Serbia was getting too close to Russia despite its proclaimed goal of joining the EU.

 

Her government retains most ministers from Vucic’s Cabinet, including some hard-line pro-Russia officials such as new Defense Minister Aleksandar Vulin. This has raised fears that Serbia will remain under strong Russian influence despite Brnabic’s pro-Western record.

 

In her speech, Brnabic made no mention of the growing military cooperation with Russia under Vucic, but said her government will continue to participate in the EU and U.N. global missions and maintain cooperation with NATO.

 

Brnabic insisted that “all this is confirmed in our strategic orientation toward the European Union, which represents the values that we stand for.”

 

“That is the place where Serbia should be,” Brnabic said.
…

your ad here

What’s so Great About Texas?

ITamLeave a comment

Old and new residents of Houston — the nation’s most diverse city — describe what makes them proud to be Texans.
…

your ad here