Officials with the Suez Canal Authority (SCA) said Monday the massive container ship that had been blocking the canal has been freed and is making its way down the waterway.Video from the scene shows the 400-meter ship, the Ever Given, moving down the canal, with tugboats on its side and at its stern. Numerous ship horns could be heard blowing, signaling the end of the crisis. The ship became jammed diagonally across a southern section of the canal in high winds on March 23, halting shipping traffic on the shortest shipping route between Europe and Asia.Suez CanalEgypt was eager to resume traffic along the Suez Canal, which brings in between $5 billion and $6 billion in revenue each year. According to a study by German insurer Allianz, each day of the blockage in the canal could cost global trade between $6 billion and $10 billion.Some maritime firms responded to the delays by deciding to divert ships around the Cape of Good Hope, at the southern tip of the African continent.After further dredging and excavation over the weekend, efforts by rescue workers from the SCA and a team from Dutch firm Smit Salvage worked to free the ship using tug boats in the early hours of Monday, two marine and shipping sources said.
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Month: March 2021
Indians Gather for Holi Celebrations as Virus Cases Surge
Hindus threw colored powder and sprayed water in massive Holi celebrations Monday despite many Indian states restricting gatherings to try to contain a coronavirus resurgence rippling across the country.
Holi marks the advent of spring and is widely celebrated throughout Hindu-majority India. Most years, millions of people throw colored powder at each other in outdoor celebrations. But for the second consecutive year, people were encouraged to stay at home to avoid turning the festivities into superspreader events amid the latest virus surge.
India’s confirmed infections have exceeded 60,000 daily over the past week from a low of about 10,000 in February. On Monday, the health ministry reported 68,020 new cases, the sharpest daily rise since October last year. It took the nationwide tally to more than 12 million.
Daily deaths rose by 291 and the virus has so far killed 161,843 people in the country.
The latest surge is centered in the western state of Maharashtra where authorities have tightened travel restrictions and imposed night curfews. It is considering a strict lockdown.
Cases are also rising in the capital New Delhi and states of Punjab, Karnataka, Gujarat, Tamil Nadu, Haryana and Madhya Pradesh.
The surge coincides with multi-stage state elections marked by large gatherings and roadshows, and the Kumbh Mela, or pitcher festival, celebrated in northern Haridwar city, where tens of thousands of Hindu devotees daily take a holy dip into the Ganges river.
Health experts worry that unchecked gatherings can lead to clusters, adding the situation can be controlled if vaccination is opened up for more people and COVID-19 protocols are strictly followed.
India, with a population of more than 1.3 billion, has vaccinated around 60 million people, of which only 9 million have received both doses of vaccine so far.
However, more than 60 million doses manufactured in India have been exported abroad, prompting widespread criticism that domestic needs should be catered to first.
The government said last week that there would be no immediate increase in exports. It said vaccines will be given to everyone over 45 starting April 1.
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Clean, Hot Water Installed at All eSwatini Clinics
For more than a year, nurse Lindiwe Magongo has seen to the needs of 600 patients per week at her small clinic near the capital of eSwatini, the nation formerly known as Swaziland.And until very recently, she’s fought both ordinary health issues and the global coronavirus pandemic without the most basic health care tool: clean, hot water.Doctors say handwashing, hygiene and sanitation are key to curbing the spread of illness. The coronavirus, which causes the COVID-19 disease, has claimed nearly 700 lives in this nation of just over one million people. But before the pandemic hit, 82 percent of clinics in this small, landlocked southern African nation lacked this vital tool. In recent months, a multinational initiative has installed an outdoor solar-powered handwashing station in every clinic.On a recent weekday, Magongo beamed at the new handwashing station at the gate of her clinic. Dozens of emaSwati, as the people of eSwatini are called, had lined up before the clinic opened, and were now filing in after washing their hands.It is not just a concrete structure consisting of a heavy sink and a durable solar water heater, she said — though it is, literally, that.To her, it represents possibility. Magongo says the hot water station is also used to clean the clinic and brew tea for staff. Patients can take water home if they like.“I will call it a sculpture,” she said. “Because the water is going to be here for quite some time. We are saving a lot because this is economically accessible to use and no electricity failures. Even if we experience power cuts, this service continues to work. So, in that sense, it is economical, and it’s going to be here for quite some time. We’re really, really grateful.”VOA asked acting Prime Minister Themba Masuku what seems like an obvious question: why didn’t the government do this before? Why wait for foreign donors?Masuku said it’s not that easy for a cash-strapped government with limited manufacturing capabilities and an unreliable electricity supply. When the pandemic hit, he said, eSwatini struggled to acquire basic items like masks. “One of the priorities was to build the clinics first,” he said. “Because you can’t put this stuff here without clinics. As we were building the clinics, as we have 92 of them now, those public health facilities, the stakeholders came in, they wanted to assist and we gladly accepted that. So, everything is prioritized. Health is one of our major priorities. And this is why we thought building the clinics before we get the hot water would be ideal.”At her small clinic in Ezulwini, Magongo said it also breaks what she described as a stigma around handwashing.“Whenever we wash hands, it means we are going to eat,” she said. “Going and washing hands all the time — it’s un-African. We grow up knowing that, it is un-African to keep on washing hands. Why? There’s always that why, why, why do you keep on washing your hands? This is going to break (the stigma). And COVID-19 has also helped us in breaking that.”A year ago, Australian solar energy entrepreneur Robert Frazer landed in eSwatini for two weeks of meetings. Then the pandemic struck, and as he sat in lockdown halfway across the world from his Sydney home, he thought: why not do something?In that year, his company — with extra funding from the German government — has installed 92 of these $3,500 stations.“There was a very obvious need, and we had the products, we had the relationships, the expertise, to actually deliver a project that would really make a difference in a very short amount of time,” he told VOA. “And actually, to be frank, for a reasonably small amount of money.”Frazer stresses that he’s not running a charity — they’re a for-profit company, and this project has paved the path for a $100 million solar-storage project in eSwatini.Health Minister Lizzy Nkosi says hand hygiene is a key weapon against the infection — and one that eSwatini needs while it launches its mass vaccination campaign in the coming weeks.“It’s not only bringing hot water in places where we would never have dreamt we would have hot water, but is reinforcing age-old infection prevention measures that the ministry employs every time, whether we have an outbreak of measles, of diarrhea, any outbreak,” she said.”Don’t take clean, hot water for granted,” she said.
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Heart of Asia Conference on Afghanistan Kicks Off in Dushanbe
A regional ministerial conference called the Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process (HoA-IP) started Monday in Tajikistan’s capital Dushanbe to try to advance the goal of ending the decades long conflict in Afghanistan.Afghan President Ashraf Ghani, who arrived early Monday to attend the annual conference, also met his Tajik counterpart Emomali Rahmon on the sidelines.The meeting is just the latest in a flurry of diplomatic efforts to jumpstart a peace process that has been stalled for months.The gathering is taking place as a May 1 deadline, negotiated separately between the United States and Taliban, to withdraw all foreign forces from Afghanistan, looms. President Joe Biden told reporters in his first press conference last week that it was “going to be hard to meet the May 1 deadline.”However, Biden said he could not envision U.S. troops staying in Afghanistan past next year.“It is not my intention to stay there for a long time,” the U.S. leader said. The Taliban have warned that any deviation from the deadline might result in the group restarting its attacks against foreign forces.“Any responsibility for the prolongation of war, death, and destruction will be on the shoulders of those whom committed this violation,” the group’s spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said in a statement.Taliban stopped direct attacks on the U.S. and NATO forces once it signed an agreement with the U.S. in Doha in February of 2020. However, it increased its attacks on Afghan forces, taking the level of violence to a 10 year high at times.The increase in violence has been a major deterrent in progress in peace talks between the Afghan government and Taliban, which officially started on September 12, 2020. Under the agreement the U.S. signed with the Taliban, the militant group was supposed to negotiate with the Afghan government and other factions to find a resolution to the conflict, but the two sides have made scant progress and have yet to agree on the agenda for the talks. The Taliban are under intense international pressure to reduce violence or announce a ceasefire.Following another regional conference on Afghanistan hosted by Russia earlier this month, the U.S., Russia, China, and Pakistan, issued a joint statement calling on all parties in Afghanistan to reduce violence and for the Taliban to forego their ‘spring offensive,’ the yearly renewal in attacks after a winter lull, in order to facilitate peace negotiations.The Taliban sent signals that it may be ready to yield. “We have floated a plan under which all related sides will reduce violence. But this is not a cease-fire,” Taliban spokesman Mohammad Naeem told VOA earlier this month.To create momentum for the peace talks, the U.S. has recently proposed several ideas, including creating a transitional government that includes the Taliban. Afghan President Ghani, who took office for the second time last year and still has four more years to go, has strongly rejected that proposal, calling elections the only way to form a new government.HoA-IP was launched in 2011 in Istanbul, Turkey, to help find a solution to the challenges facing Afghanistan. Fifteen countries participate in this process, while another 17 countries and 12 regional and international organizations support it.Around 50 countries and international organizations are attending the ninth conference of its kind. Participants will issue a statement at the end.The Dushanbe conference comes in advance of another meeting in Turkey organized by the United Nations which both Taliban and the Afghan government are likely to attend. The Turkey conference, expected in the next couple of weeks, is being viewed as a game changer in the Afghan peace process.
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Spain Looks at Human Trafficking Side of Prostitution
Adebi works in the shadows on La Rambla, Barcelona’s famous boulevard. In normal times, she tries to attract tourists or locals who are out for a night out on the city. The 36-year-old has lived in Spain for 10 years but when she arrived in her adopted home from Nigeria, prostitution was hardly what she had in mind. “I wanted to come here and do domestic work, you know, send money back home. It has not been like that,” she told VOA. Adebi, who did not want to use her real name, is like many other women who have been tricked into prostitution by well-organized sex trafficking gangs, who demand that the women pay off a debt by selling themselves for sex. Prostitution has boomed in Spain since decriminalizing the practice in 1995. The country became known as the brothel of Europe after a 2011 United Nations report said it was the third biggest capital of the sex trade after Thailand and Puerto Rico. The sex trade is worth $25 billion per year and about 500,000 people work in unlicensed brothels, according to data from Eurostat, the European Union Statistics agency. About 80% of these women are victims of sex traffickers, say Spanish National Police officials. New legislation Now, Spain’s leftist coalition government wants to ban prostitution by bringing in a new law that would attempt to penalize anyone profiting from the sex trade. “We are on the right path, which has to end in national legislation against prostitution and trafficking, which says that our sexuality is available to men that we are a commodity which is bought and sold,” said Spanish Deputy Prime Minister Carmen Calvo last week. “There is trafficking because there is prostitution; if there is no prostitution there is no trafficking. We are abolitionists.” Prostitution occupies something of a legal limbo in Spain; selling yourself for sex is not illegal but profiting from it is. According to Spanish law, sex trafficking is when one person moves, detains or transports someone else for the purpose of profiting from their prostitution using fraud, force or coercion. Previous attempts to bring in a national law have floundered because political parties could not agree. Calvo has the support of the far-left Unidas Podemos party, the junior partner in the coalition government, but seeks to win over the opposition conservative People’s Party and regional parties. More harm than good? Nacho Pardo, a spokesman for the Committee to Support Sex Workers, CATS, believes banning prostitution will harm the very people it is designed to help.
“This will not eradicate prostitution. It will not offer people working in prostitution and it will help the mafias in the same way as happened in the US when prohibited alcohol,” he told VOA in a telephone interview. “I think it will be catastrophic.” CATS helps about 2,000 prostitutes in southeastern Spain each year, of which about 10% were victims of sex trafficking, says Pardo. He said many women, men and transsexuals from Africa and South America, became involved in the sex trade in Spain because sex traffickers insisted they pay off debts. The traffickers demand payment for the cost of smuggling the sex workers and finding them work, but advocates say the alleged debts in reality amount to swindling and extortion. Nigerian women form the largest group of Africans who operate in Spain, Pardo said. Romanians form the largest group of foreign prostitutes in Spain, followed by women from the Dominican Republic and Colombia. “Most feel deep shame about being involved in the sex trade,” he said. FILE – Women hold a giant banner reading ‘Abolition of prostitution’ during a demonstration to mark the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women in Madrid on Nov. 25, 2019.Rocío Mora, who has been campaigning against sex trafficking for three decades, is the director of Apramp, which helps protect, help and reintegration women who are in prostitution. She says her team sees almost 300 women per day who are victims of sex trafficking. “Since 1985 we have been calling for abolition of prostitution. In a country which believes in the state of law, no person should be sold for their body,” she told VOA. “There is now a need for a comprehensive law that criminalizes those who profit from what is a form of violence against women.” Back on the streets of Barcelona, Adebi says all women were forced to have sex with clients, often under threat. She says some Nigerian women were told they had run up debts of up to $60,000 but despite plying their trade for years, they never worked it off. “Women are fined for being late, not looking good, buying cigarettes from a place which is not the sex club they are working in, anything,” she says. “That whole film with Richard Gere was a myth. There is no such thing as Pretty Woman.”
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Stuck Ship Thrusts Sleepy Suez Canal Village into Limelight
The sleepy farming village of Amer overlooks the Suez Canal, one of the world’s most important waterways. Last week, the village was suddenly thrust into the limelight after a massive container ship, the Ever Given, got stuck nearby.
The contrast between tranquil village life and the busy artery of global shipping is stark.
Farmers in Amer eke out a living tending to small fields and livestock, while before them pass behemoths of world trade — vessels carrying millions of dollars’ worth of cargo.
But the canal is also a source of intense pride for residents of the area, including the nearby town of Suez. They call it “our canal” and the older ones still remember then-President Gamal Abdel Nasser’s decision in 1956 to nationalize the canal despite fierce pressure from Western powers.
“I was five or six years old, celebrations were everywhere,” said Abdel-Wahab, 71, who works as a waiter in Suez. “It was like you freed your son who was taken against your will.”
The village, along with other areas along the western bank of the canal, was abandoned during the 1967 Mideast war and its residents were only allowed to return in the 1970s.
They are now rooting for canal authorities as they battle to dislodge the vessel.
It was a windy morning when the Ever Given — one of the world’s largest container ships — got wedged sideways in a single-lane stretch of the canal last Tuesday.
Amer resident Fatima was feeding poultry on the roof of her three-story home when she saw the massive ship sitting motionless in the canal. At first, she didn’t think it was unusual.
“Sometimes, one vessel stops for a reason or another,” the elderly woman said Sunday,
Dressed in a dark blue jalabiya, or traditional loose-fitting garment, she was sitting at the gate of her house with a neighbor. The women were chatting and drinking tea.
Like other villagers, they did not want to give their full names for fear of getting in trouble with the authorities who have restricted media access to the area.
Almost a week after the accident, tug boats and dredgers, taking advantage of high tides, partially floated the Ever Given on Monday, but it remains unclear how long it would take to set it free.
The pointed bow of the Panama-flagged, Japanese-owned vessel remains stuck on sandy clay along the canal bank. Experts said that despite the partial success, the worst option — having to remove containers from the vessel to lighten the load — is not yet off the table.
The giant ship carries some 20,000 containers. Taking them off would likely add even more days to the canal’s closure, further disrupting a global shipping network. A prolonged closure would cause delays in the global shipment chain. The canal handles some 10% of the world trade flow.
Last year, some 19,000 vessels passed through it, according to official figures.
The closure could affect oil and gas shipments to Europe from the Middle East. Already, Syria has begun rationing the distribution of fuel in the war-torn country because of delayed shipments.
Over the past week, the salvage efforts have been the main topic of conversation in Amer, home to several thousand people who grow clover and cabbage and tend to water buffaloes, cows, goats and sheep.
“We have not seen anything like that before,” Abdel-Wahab, the waiter, said of the Ever Given’s misfortune.
Journalists have been visiting the village, in part to get a better view of the vessel.
“For sure, you’re coming for the ship,” whispered a farmer to a reporter. His donkey cart was sitting in the middle of a narrow road just a few dozen meters (yards) from the vessel.
“It’s there, standing like the mountain,” said another man when asked how to get closer to the ship.
Villager Mohammed Said, 72, who works in Suez as a garbage collector, said the grounding of the Ever Given is unique in the canal’s history, and that he hopes the vessel can be dislodged quickly.
“It’s a tragedy impacting not only Egypt, but the whole world,” he said.
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Mexico Revises COVID Death Toll Count Upwards by 60%
Mexico has revised its coronavirus death toll figures, increasing the tally by 60% to make Mexico’s death count second only to the United States and overtaking Brazil as the place with the second highest death count. The new statistics are staggering as the Mexican population of 126 million is far below the populations of the U.S. and Brazil. The Mexican health ministry released the data Saturday that raised the country’s COVID death count to more than 321,000. The U.S. death toll from the coronavirus pandemic is more than 549,000, while Brazil’s is more than 312,000, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Public health analysts had warned that Mexico’s death count was likely higher than previous figures had indicated because the country’s healthcare system was overwhelmed by the pandemic, resulting in few available intensive care beds that led to many people dying at home whose deaths had not been included in the COVID count. The new numbers follow a government review of death certificates. While the United States’ vaccination campaign against COVID-19 is well under way, daily rates of infection remain high. Anthony Fauci, the White House’s top adviser on the pandemic, expressed concern Sunday that this could be the result of states lifting some restrictions too early — especially around Spring Break. “I think it is premature,” Fauci told CBS, speaking of some states lifting restrictions as vaccination rates rise, warning that there is “really a risk” of seeing a third epidemic wave. Answering reporters’ questions Sunday, U.S. President Joe Biden said he believes rates may be plateauing, instead of decreasing, because people are “letting their guard down.” Last Thursday, Biden pledged to put 200 million shots into arms in his first 100 days as president. On Sunday, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported Sunday that more than 51.5 million Americans have received at least one coronavirus shot and 93.6 million have received both of their shots. Shots in Little Arms: COVID-19 Vaccine Testing Turns to KidsPandemic will require vaccinating children tooAt the same time, the U.S. has been confirming roughly 60,000 new cases of the virus daily for the past few days. A plateau of cases at such a high number is concerning. “I remain deeply concerned about a potential shift in the trajectory of the pandemic. The latest CDC data continue to suggest that recent declines in cases have leveled off at a very high number,” said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the CDC. Earlier Sunday, Dr. Deborah Birx, who had served as the Trump White House’s coronavirus response coordinator, told CNN that she believes the U.S. death toll of nearly 550,000 could have been much lower if officials in cities and states had taken more aggressive steps to mitigate the disease’s spread by learning lessons of the first surge. “There were about 100,000 deaths that came from that original surge,” Birx said. “All of the rest of them, in my mind, could have been mitigated or decreased substantially.” In Venezuela, opposition leader Juan Guaido announced on Twitter that he has tested positive for the virus and is currently in isolation. Como Presidente Encargado, pero también como venezolano, y sobre todo como ser humano, quiero informarle responsablemente al país que, tras cuatro días de cuarentena producto de algunos malestares y pese a haber tomado precauciones, he dado positivo para Covid-19.— Juan Guaidó (@jguaido) March 28, 2021The announcement follows news that the Facebook page of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has been frozen, according to a spokesman for the social media giant, because the page contained misinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic. Maduro violated Facebook policy when he posted a video without any medical evidence, promoting Carvativir, a drink made with the herb thyme, as a cure for the coronavirus, a Facebook spokesman told Reuters. He described the drink as a “miracle” medication capable of neutralizing the coronavirus without any side effects. Neighboring Brazil is averaging 2,500 deaths a day from COVID-19, according to Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. The South American nation is on pace to reach 4,000 deaths a day, six experts told The Associated Press, a level that would rival the worst seen in the U.S., which has about one-third more people. The U.S. set a record of 4,477 deaths on January 12, 2021, according to Johns Hopkins data. “Four thousand deaths a day seems to be right around the corner,” Dr. José Antônio Curiati, a supervisor at Sao Paulo’s Hospital das Clinicas, the biggest hospital complex in Latin America, told the AP. President Jair Bolsonaro appeared on television last week to declare 2021 “as the year of the vaccine.” Brazil’s Supreme Court backed some states that have implemented nightly curfews, which the Bolsonaro administration fought, saying that only the federal government can impose such restrictions. The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported late Sunday that there are more than 127 million global COVID-19 infections.
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Police: Attackers Damage Hindu Temple in Pakistan
Assailants in Pakistan damaged a nearly century-old Hindu temple in the garrison city of Rawalpindi before fleeing the scene, police said Monday. The vandals damaged the door and the stairs of the temple in the attack, which took place on Saturday night. The temple was not yet reopened for the Hindu community for worship and was still undergoing renovation, according to local police official Mohammad Toseef Sajjad. The renovation had temporarily been halted for the Hindu festival of Holi, when Hindus throw colored powder and spray water on each other to mark the advent of spring. Until the renovations started, the temple had remained abandoned. Nearby shop owners had encroached on much of the land that the temple was built on. There were no further details. So far, no one has claimed responsibility for the attack. In general, Muslims and Hindus live peacefully in the predominantly Muslim Pakistan, but there have been attacks on Hindu temples in recent years. Most of Pakistan’s minority Hindus migrated to India in 1947 when India was divided by Britain’s government. The latest attack, months after a mob demolished a Hindu temple in the country’s northwest, drew criticism on social media.
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Obama Family Matriarch, 99, Dies in Kenyan Hospital
Sarah Obama, the matriarch of former U.S. President Barack Obama’s Kenyan family has died, relatives and officials confirmed Monday but did not disclose the cause of death. She was at least 99 years old. Mama Sarah, as the step-grandmother of the former U.S. president was fondly called, was a philanthropist who promoted education for girls and orphans. She passed away around 4 a.m. local time while being treated at the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral hospital in Kisumu, Kenya’s third-largest city in the country’s west, according to her daughter Marsat Onyango. “She died this morning. We are devastated,” Onyango told The Associated Press on a phone call. She will be remembered for her work to promote education to empower orphans, Kisumu Governor Anyang Nyong’o said while offering his condolences to the people of Kogelo village for losing a matriarch. “She was a philanthropist who mobilized funds to pay school fees for the orphans,” he said. Sarah Obama, was the second wife of President Obama’s grandfather and helped raise his father, Barack Obama, Sr. The family is part of Kenya’s Luo ethnic group.In this Tuesday, Feb. 5, 2008, file photo, Sarah Obama, step-grandmother of then U.S. Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama, sits in the living room of her house in the village of Kogelo, near the shores of Lake Victoria, in western Kenya..President Obama often showed affection toward her and referred to her as “Granny” in his memoir, “Dreams from My Father.” He described meeting her during his 1988 trip to his father’s homeland and their initial awkwardness as they struggled to communicate which developed into a warm bond. She attended his first inauguration as president in 2009. Later, Obama spoke about his grandmother again in his September 2014 speech to the U.N. General Assembly. For decades, Sarah Obama has helped orphans, raising some in her home. The Mama Sara Obama Foundation helped provide food and education to children who lost their parents — providing school supplies, uniforms, basic medical needs, and school fees. In a 2014 interview with AP, she said that even as an adult, letters would arrive but she couldn’t read them. She said she didn’t want her children to be illiterate, so she saw that all her family’s children went to school. She recalled pedaling the president’s father six miles (nine kilometers) to school on the back of her bicycle every day from the family’s home village of Kogelo to the bigger town of Ngiya to make sure he got the education that she never had. “I love education,” Sarah Obama said, because children “learn they can be self-sufficient,” especially girls who too often had no opportunity to go to school. “If a woman gets an education she will not only educate her family but educate the entire village,” she said. In this Wednesday, Nov. 7, 2012, file photo, Sarah Obama, step-grandmother of President Barack Obama, speaks to the media about her reaction to Obama’s re-election, in the garden of her house in the village of Kogelo, western Kenya.In recognition of her work to support education, she was honored by the United Nations in 2014, receiving the inaugural Women’s Entrepreneurship Day Education Pioneer Award. Details on preparations for her burial will be announced later, said her daughter. Sarah Obama was Muslim and it’s not clear whether she will be buried according to her faith’s practices that dictate she should be buried within 24 hours of death.
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Czech Billionaire Kellner Among Alaska Crash Victims
A helicopter headed to the U.S. state of Alaska for a skiing trip crashed on Saturday killing the pilot and four others, according to authorities. Among the five people who died in the late Saturday helicopter crash is 56-year-old Czech Republic’s richest man, billionaire Petr Kellner. Kellner’s company, financial and telecommunications firm PPF Group, confirmed his death Monday. “We announce with the deepest grief that, in a helicopter accident in Alaska mountains on Saturday, March 27, the founder and majority owner of the PPF group, Mr Petr Kellner, died tragically,” PPF said in a statement. Alaska police said Benjamin Larochaix, also of the Czech Republic, and Alaskans Sean McMannany and Zachary Russel were killed in the crash. One other person was hospitalized. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash, which happened near Knik Glacier in Alaska’s backcountry. A spokeswoman for Tordrillo Mountain Lodge said that three of the passengers were guests and two were guides. The lodge advertises itself as a base for wilderness adventures, including heli-skiing.
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Aladdin’s Cave of Goods Stranded in Suez Logjam
An Aladdin’s cave of goods, from IKEA furnishings to tens of thousands of livestock, is stuck in a maritime traffic jam caused by the Suez Canal blockage. More than 360 vessels have been stranded in the Mediterranean to the north and in the Red Sea to the south as well as in holding zones since giant container ship MV Ever Given was wedged diagonally Tuesday across the Suez, a lifeline for world trade.Industry experts have estimated the total value of goods marooned at sea at between $3 billion and $9.6 billion. Suez Blockage Sets Shipping Rates Racing, Oil And Gas Tankers Diverted Suspension of traffic through narrow channel linking Europe and Asia has deepened problems for shipping lines About 1.74 million barrels of oil a day is normally shipped through the canal, but 80% of Gulf exports to Europe pass through the Sumed pipeline that crosses Egypt, according to Paola Rodriguez Masiu of Rystad Energy.According to MarineTraffic, about 100 ships laden with oil or refined products were in holding areas Sunday.Crude prices shot up Wednesday in response to the Suez blockage before dropping the next day.Sanctions-hit Syria, however, on Saturday announced a new round of fuel rationing after the hold-up delayed a shipment of oil products from ally Iran.Apart from goods, about 130,000 head of livestock on 11 ships sent from Romania have also been held up.”My greatest fear is that animals run out of food and water and they get stuck on the ships because they cannot be unloaded somewhere else for paperwork reasons,” Gerit Weidinger, EU coordinator for NGO Animals International, told British newspaper The Guardian.Egypt, for its part, has sent fodder and three teams of vets to examine livestock stuck at sea, some bound for Jordan.Sweden’s IKEA said it has 110 containers on the stricken Ever Given and other ships in the pileup.”The blockage of the Suez Canal is an additional constraint to an already challenging and volatile situation for global supply chains brought on by the pandemic,” an IKEA spokesperson said.The Van Rees Group, based in Rotterdam, said 80 containers of tea were trapped at sea on 15 vessels and said there could be chaos for the company as supplies dried up.Dave Hinton, owner of a timber company in northwest England, said he had a consignment of French oak stuck on a ship.The oak had been sent from France for reprocessing into veneered flooring in China and was on its way back to a customer in Britain, Hinton said.”I’ve spoken to my customer and told him the bad news that his floor was blocking the Suez Canal. He didn’t believe me, he thought I was pulling his leg,” he told BBC radio Friday.Shipping giants such as Denmark’s Maersk have rerouted ships to the longer journey around South Africa’s Cape of Good Hope, adding at least seven days to the travel time.Even if the Ever Given were dislodged, Maersk estimated Saturday it would take between three and six days for the stranded ships to pass through the canal.The company said that 32 Maersk and partner vessels would be directly affected by the end of the weekend, with 15 rerouted, and the numbers could increase unless the canal was reopened.According to Lloyd’s List, up to 90% of the affected cargo is not insured against delays.
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Dozens Killed as Mozambique Attack Survivors Evacuated
Dozens of people were killed during coordinated jihadi attacks in Palma in northern Mozambique, the defense ministry said Sunday, four days after the raids were launched.”Last Wednesday, a group of terrorists sneaked into…Palma and launched actions that resulted in the cowardly murder of dozens of defenseless people,” defense ministry spokesman Omar Saranga told a news conference Sunday.Seven of those were killed in an ambush during an operation to evacuate them from a hotel where they had sought refuge, Saranga said.In the last three days, government security forces have prioritized “the rescue of hundreds of citizens, nationals and foreigners,” he said, without giving a breakdown of the numbers.The unknown number of militants began attacking the town, a gas hub in the province of Cabo Delgado, on Wednesday, forcing nearly 200 people to take refuge at the Amarula hotel with others taking cover in the nearby tropical forest. The 200 civilians were temporarily taken to the heavily guarded gas plant on the Afungi Peninsula on the Indian Ocean coast south of the Tanzanian border before being moved to Pemba. Some residents of the city of about 75,000 people also fled to the peninsula, home of a multi-billion-dollar gas project being built by France’s Total and other energy companies.A ship that left Afungi on Saturday landed in Pemba around midday, according to police patrolling the city port. According to a source close to the rescue operation, about 1,400 people were on board. The evacuees included non-essential staff of Total and Palma residents who had sought refuge at the gas plant.Several small boats packed with displaced people were on their way to Pemba and expected to arrive overnight or Monday morning, according to humanitarian aid agencies.Airport officials in Pemba said humanitarian aid flights had been suspended to free up space for military operations.Caritas, a Catholic aid agency that is active in the province, also reported new arrivals to Pemba, about 250 kilometers (150 miles) south of Palma.Shot in their homes”Now we await the arrival of people who are most vulnerable so that we can provide assistance,” the local head of Caritas, Manuel Nota, told AFP. Human Rights Watch said the militants indiscriminately shot civilians in their homes and on the streets.”A rescue operation is currently under way. An unknown number of people died as they tried to flee Amarula hotel,” Human Rights Watch regional director Dewa Mavhinga told AFP, adding their rescue convoy “was attacked by the insurgents.”The militant attack on Palma is the closest yet to the major gas project during a three-year Islamist insurgency across Mozambique’s north.Since October 2017, extremist fighters have raided villages and towns in the region, prompting nearly 700,000 to flee their homes.The violence has left at least 2,600 people dead, half of them civilians, according to the U.S.-based data-collecting agency Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED).A South African worker was killed in the Palma violence, according to a government source in his native country.’Appalling violence’Martin Ewi, a senior researcher with the Pretoria-based think tank, the Institute for Security Studies, said that more than 100 people were unaccounted for. “That’s what we know so far, but it so confusing,” Ewi said.While local media reports said British workers may also have been caught in the attack, Britain’s Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office said its embassy in Maputo was in “direct contact with authorities in Cabo Delgado to urgently seek further information on these reports.””The UK wholeheartedly condemns the appalling violence in Cabo Delgado. It must stop,” Minister for Africa, James Duddridge, tweeted.The U.S., whose troops are helping to train Mozambican troops to fight the insurgency, said Sunday it “continues to monitor the horrific situation in Palma,” adding one American citizen who was in Palma had been safely evacuated.The embassy announced earlier this month that American military personnel will spend two months training soldiers in Mozambique.
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Al-Shabab Issues Threats Ahead of Elections in Djibouti
The leader of Somalia’s al-Shabab militant group is calling for lone wolf attacks against American and French interests in Djibouti ahead of key presidential elections in the Horn of Africa country. In newly released audio, Ahmed Omar Abu Ubaidah accuses the leaders of Djibouti of turning the country into a military base “from where every war against the Muslims in East Africa is planned.”Abu Ubaidah specifically called on the youth in Djibouti to “carry out individual lone wolf martyrdom operations” to expel the French and Americans.” “Make American and French interests in Djibouti the highest priority of your targets,” the audio posted by al-Shabab media says. Abu Ubaidah said his group was ready to offer “safe refuge” and “prepare and train” those willing to migrate from Djibouti if they cannot fulfill the “individual obligation of jihad.”The United States Africa Command (AFRICOM), which has a base in Djibouti, responded to the new message from the al-Shabab leader. A spokesperson, Colonel Christopher Karns, told VOA Somali that the U.S. Africa Command is aware of the recent audio release from al-Shabab calling for attacks on U.S. and French interests in Djibouti. “U.S. Africa Command takes these statements seriously,” Karns said. “Al-Shabab remains a persistent threat to U.S. interests in East Africa. This is why it remains important to apply continued pressure on the al-Shabab network and isolate the threat it presents to the region and beyond,” he added.The United States completed the withdrawal of most troops from neighboring Somalia in January following an order from then-President Donald Trump. The number of U.S. military personnel in Somalia ranged from 650 to 800 people. U.S. troops supported and mentored an elite Somali unit known as the Danab “lightning” brigade. The U.S. military has also been conducting airstrikes against al-Shabab. There have been no confirmed strikes in Somalia since President Joe Biden took office. Earlier this month, Somali military officials expressed concern about the reduction of strikes against al-Shabab, which they fear could give the militant group additional momentum. Karns said airstrikes remain an option. “We will not telegraph actions or our intentions. It would not be in al-Shabab’s best interests to incite a response from us,” he said. “We remain committed to security in East Africa and are postured to respond to threats.” Al-Shabab previously attacked Djibouti on May 24, 2014 in a double suicide explosion at a restaurant frequented by Westerners, killing three people. Djibouti voters go to the polls on April 9 for presidential elections. Incumbent Ismail Omar Guelleh is seeking a fifth term in office. Djibouti officials could not immediately be reached for comment on the new threat.Djibouti has a military contingent serving as part of the African Union’s peacekeeping mission in Somalia.
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US Vows ‘Consequences’ for Russian Actions
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken says there will be “costs and consequences” for Russia for its allegedly malign activities against the United States.“We will take the steps necessary to defend our interests” at the time of the U.S.’s choosing, Blinken said in a CNN interview that aired Sunday but was taped last week as he completed talks with other NATO diplomats in Brussels.He said there was “a shared commitment” among Western allies to be “clear-eyed” about Moscow’s actions and hold the Kremlin accountable.The top U.S. diplomat said officials “are in the process” of considering what sanctions or actions Washington plans to take against Moscow, and in consultation with other NATO countries.“We are stronger when we can do it in a coordinated way,” he said.While the U.S. and Russia agreed quickly to extend a nuclear arms control deal that was set to expire shortly after U.S. President Joe Biden assumed power, the U.S. is blaming Russia for other actions, including allegedly placing a bounty on U.S. troops in Afghanistan, meddling in the November election that Biden won and hacking into U.S. computer systems.Blinken’s remarks in the CNN interview echoed those of Biden, who has taken a tougher stance against Russia than that of his predecessor, Donald Trump.In an interview on ABC News two weeks ago, Biden said he considers Russian President Vladimir Putin to be a “killer.”Biden said in the interview, “The price he’s going to pay, well, you’ll see shortly,” while adding that he, Biden, wants to be able to “walk and chew gum at the same time, and there are places where it’s in our mutual interest to work together.”“That’s why I renewed the (arms reduction) agreement with them. That occurred while he’s doing this,” he said, apparently referencing Putin’s election interference efforts. “But that’s overwhelming, in the interest of humanity, that we diminish the prospect of a nuclear exchange.” Russia has denied meddling in the U.S. election and orchestrating the cyber hack that used U.S. tech company SolarWinds to penetrate U.S. government networks. In addition, it has rebuffed reports it offered bounties to Taliban militants to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan or tried to poison Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny. A U.S. intelligence analysis concluded that Putin likely directed a campaign to try to help Trump win a second four-year term in the White House.It is not clear what actions Biden could be considering against Russia; but he could invoke any of several penalties, including freezing the U.S. assets of any entities found to have directly or indirectly interfered in a U.S. election or engaged in “cyber-enabled” activities from abroad that threaten U.S. national security.In addition, a 1991 law allows the U.S. president to bar U.S. banks from lending to a country that used chemical weapons, such as is alleged in the Navalny case.
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Plastic Pollution Packs the Surface of Bolivian Lake
It can take hundreds of years for plastic containers to break down, if ever at all. Their presence reshapes entire ecosystems, and experts in Bolivia are calling for action to protect their communities. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has more.Producer: Arash Arabasadi
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Sudan, Rebel Group Sign Agreement on Separation of Religion and State
The Sudanese government and a major rebel group from its southern Nuba Mountains on Sunday signed a document which paves the way for a final peace agreement by guaranteeing freedom of worship to all while separating religion and the state. The signing is viewed as a crucial step in efforts by the power-sharing government headed by General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan to reach accords with rebel groups across the country and end decades of conflicts that left millions displaced and hundreds of thousands dead. Last year Sudan signed a peace agreement with many groups, including from the Western region of Darfur. But a key faction of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North (SPLM-N) led by Abdelaziz al-Hilu, did not join in last year’s agreement because it stuck to its demand that Sudan dispenses with sharia law and becomes a secular, democratic state. Sharia law was first imposed in Sudan in 1983, and maintained by the now deposed president Omar al-Bashir for the duration of his 30-year-long Islamist rule. The so-called ‘Declaration of Principles’ signed on Sunday in South Sudan’s capital Juba between Sudan and the rebel faction means talks on a final accord can now begin. The declaration stated that both sides agreed to “the establishment of a civil, democratic federal state in Sudan, wherein, the freedom of religion, the freedom of belief and religious practices and worship shall be guaranteed to all Sudanese people by separating the identities of culture, religion, ethnicity and religion from the state.” “No religion shall be imposed on anyone and the state shall not adopt official religion,” it said, without specifying that Sudan would become a secular state, a controversial issue in the country’s transition. Aman Amum, the Secretary-General of SPLM-N told Reuters on Sunday that reaching a consensus on the role of religion in Sudan’s politics was a breakthrough that would now accelerate talks towards a final peace settlement. Sudan had now “accepted the separation of religion from the state,” Amum said. It had been unclear whether Sudan’s military, which shares power with a civilian executive branch, would support any such moves after years of backing Islamists. Civilian prime minister Abdalla Hamdok signed a similar declaration with al-Hilu last year. Sudan has been wracked by conflicts for decades. After the oil-rich south seceded in 2011, an economic crisis fueled protests that led to the overthrow of Bashir in 2019. SPLM-N has been operating in a region inhabited by minority Christians and followers of African beliefs who complain of long discrimination under Bashir’s rule. Amum told Reuters both sides would start negotiating over other issues like power-sharing and the fate of combatants. After Sunday’s signing, only one rebel group — a faction of the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) – remains a major security challenge to the government in Khartoum.
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