Month: August 2019

The apparent suicide while in federal custody of well-connected U.S. financier Jeffrey Epstein is being investigated by the FBI and the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General. Epstein, who had friendships with U.S. President Donald Trump, former President Bill Clinton and Britain’s Prince Andrew, was facing the possibility of 45 years in prison if convicted on charges of orchestrating a sex trafficking ring and sexually abusing dozens of underage girls. Media reports said Epstein had been placed on suicide watch after a suspected earlier attempt to kill himself, but was removed from the watch at the end of July.   The New York Times reported that Epstein was supposed to have been checked on every 30 minutes, but that procedure was not being followed the night before he was found dead. Financier Jeffrey Epstein looks on during a bail hearing in his sex trafficking case, in this court sketch in New York, July 15, 2019. U.S. Attorney General William Barr said in a statement he was “appalled” by Epstein’s death while in federal custody. “Mr. Epstein’s death raises serious questions that must be answered,” Barr said. Epstein was being held without bail at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Manhattan.   Epstein to plead guilty in 2008 to Florida state prostitution charges, for which he served a 13-month term and most days was freed to work at his office in south Florida. He also was required to register as a sex offender and pay restitution to the underage girls he abused. …

Russia’s communications regulator, Roskomnadzor, says it has asked Google to take measures to prevent the advertising of “illegal mass events” on its video-hosting site, YouTube. Roskomnadzor said on Sunday that it had sent a letter to Google saying that Russia would consider it interference in its sovereign affairs and a hostile influence should the U.S.-based tech giant fail to respond to the request. The announcement comes a day after tens of thousands of opposition supporters gathered outside Moscow’s center for a sanctioned rally demanding fair municipal elections. Hundreds of people later gathered in more central parts of the city, prompting police to detain more than 250 people, according to the independent watchdog OVD-Info. Police detain a man during a protest in Moscow, Russia, Aug. 10, 2019. OVD-Info said 79 people were also detained in St. Petersburg, 13 in Rostov-on-Don, two in Bryansk, and two more in Syktyvkar as “solidarity” rallies attracted smaller crowds there and in other cities. Earlier on Sunday, Andrei Klimov, head of the Committee for the Defense of State Sovereignty in Russia’s upper house of parliament, the Federation Council, said that “foreign opponents took advantage of information and computer technologies in order to manipulate Russian citizens who attended” the unauthorized Moscow protests, TASS news agency reported. In July, Roskomnadzor fined Google 700,000 rubles ($11,000) for failing to censor content blacklisted by the agency in accordance with strict Russian Internet laws.   …

NEW DELHI — India’s main opposition Congress party on Saturday appointed Sonia Gandhi to serve as interim president until it elects a new party chief.    The party accepted the resignation of her son Rahul Gandhi, who quit in July after Congress’ crushing defeat in national elections. He continues to be a member of Parliament.  A party working committee then asked Sonia Gandhi, 72, to take over in a stop-gap arrangement, party spokesman K.C. Venugopal said.    Sonia Gandhi handed the top party post to her son in 2017 after she suffered health problems. The party has long been led by the politically powerful Nehru-Gandhi family.    Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party won 303 out of 542 seats in the lower house of Parliament, while the Congress party won 52 seats in April-May elections.    In January, Rahul Gandhi inducted his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra into politics as a party general secretary months before the national elections.    Several Congress leaders want Vadra, 47, to  succeed Rahul Gandhi as party president.  She has in the past helped her mother and brother campaign in their constituencies in northern Uttar Pradesh state.    Rahul Gandhi’s father, Rajiv Gandhi, his grandmother, Indira Gandhi, and his great-grandfather, Jawaharlal Nehru, have all served as prime minister since India’s independence from British colonialists in 1947.    Rahul Gandhi entered politics in 2004.  …

EL PASO, TEXAS — More than 100 people marched through the Texas border city of El Paso on Saturday, denouncing racism and calling for stronger gun laws one week after 22 people were killed in a mass shooting that authorities say was carried out by a man targeting Mexicans.     Chanting “Gun reform now,” ” El Paso strong” and “Aqui estamos y no nos vamos” — Spanish for “Here we are and we are not leaving” — the marchers included Hispanic, white and black people dressed in white to symbolize peace and carrying 22 white wooden crosses to represent the victims of the shooting at an El Paso Walmart.    The man charged in with capital murder in the attack, Patrick Crusius, 21, told investigators he targeted Mexicans at the store with an AK-47 rifle, an El Paso detective said in an arrest affidavit. Federal prosecutors have said they’re weighing hate-crime charges.    Jessica Coca Garcia, who was among those wounded in the shooting, spoke to those gathered at the League of United Latin American Citizens’ “March for a United America.”    “Racism is something I always wanted to think didn’t exist. Obviously, it does,” Coca Garcia said after rising from a wheelchair. Bandages covered gunshot wounds to her leg.    “I love you, El Paso,” she said, her voice cracking. “This is where I’m going to stay.”     Former U.S. Representative Beto O’Rourke, who is seeking the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, also attended and spoke to the crowd.     O’Rourke, who is from El Paso, has blamed …

Written by Eugen Tomiuc with reporting by RFE/RL’s Romanian Service, Hotnews.ro, G4media.ro, and Digi24.ro.  Romanians rallied in Bucharest and other cities across the country Saturday to mark the first anniversary of a massive anti-corruption protest that the government violently quelled.  The demonstrations came amid public outrage over the authorities’ response to the kidnapping and killing last month of a 15-year-old girl, a case that revealed deep flaws in the police system of the European Union and NATO member state.    About 20,000 people turned up for a rally outside government headquarters in central Bucharest, filling much of Victoria Square into the evening, according to G4media.ro.    Protests had also been urged over social media for Brasov, Cluj, Constanta, Iasi and other large cities, under slogans such as, “We don’t forget what you did last summer,” “We’re watching you” and “Reset Romania.”   FILE – A tear gas canister explodes as riot police charge using canon to clear the square during protests outside the government headquarters in Bucharest, Romania, Aug.10, 2018. 2018 crackdown    Last year, about 100,000 Romanians, many of them expatriates, gathered on Aug. 10 in front of the same government building to protest the leftist government’s moves to reverse anti-graft reforms and weaken the judiciary in one of the EU’s most corrupt countries.    Riot police then used water cannons and tear gas in a display of violence unseen since the early 1990s.    Television footage of protesters and bystanders with hands up being chased and beaten with batons sparked fury across the …

JERUSALEM – The Israeli army said its troops fatally shot four heavily armed Palestinians on the Gaza border early Saturday, alleging one of them had crossed and thrown a grenade at soldiers.    Separately, security forces said they had arrested two Palestinians suspected of killing an off-duty Israeli soldier in the occupied West Bank earlier this week.    There have been frequent clashes along the Gaza border since the Palestinians began organizing regular mass protests there in March 2018. But Saturday’s exchange was unusual because of the weaponry the Israeli army said was involved on the Palestinian side.    “The terrorists were equipped with AK-47 assault rifles, RPG grenade launchers and hand grenades,” an army statement said.     A spokeswoman said the army “opened fire after one of the terrorists scaled the barrier and hurled a grenade at the soldiers.”    No Israeli casualties were reported.  ‘Uniforms’   Army spokesman Jonathan Conricus said the four Palestinians were all wearing “uniforms” — without elaborating — and were equipped with food and a medical kit as well as the rifles.    A Hamas statement condemned Israel’s killing of the four Palestinians as a “crime.”    But the Islamist rulers of the Palestinian enclave made no claim of responsibility and did not say whether the four were members of its armed wing.    FILE – Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, July 14, 2019. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeated his government’s stance that Hamas is responsible for all attacks emanating …

Some material for this report came from RFE/RL.  Republican and Democratic lawmakers joined forces to oppose moves by the White House that critics fear could lead to sharp cuts in foreign aid for international health, narcotics and peacekeeping initiatives, and development assistance.    Members of the House Foreign Affairs and Senate Foreign Relations committees sent a letter Friday to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) expressing “deep concern” after it had instructed the State Department and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to freeze about $4 billion in their budgets until it reviewed any money that hadn’t yet been spent.    Critics have said the freeze could be the first step in making cuts to foreign aid.  The lawmakers sent the letter to the OMB seeking to head off such a move and threatening a response if the administration moved ahead with cuts. They also pointed out that, under the Constitution, it is Congress that appropriates money, which they said was “essential” to U.S. global leadership and security.    “Slashing crucial diplomacy and development programming would be detrimental to our national security while also undermining Congress’ intended use for these funds,” said the letter, signed by Sens. James Risch, R-Idaho, and Robert Menendez, D-N.J., and Reps. Eliot Engel, D-N.Y., and Michael McCaul, R-Texas.  ‘Direct affront’   In the letter, the lawmakers wrote, “It would be inappropriate for any administration, under any circumstance, to attempt to override Congress’ most fundamental power. Such action would be precedent-setting and a direct affront to the separation …

Amanda Browder works with fabrics of all kinds. But, instead of creating clothing for people, she “dresses up” buildings with her unique style of installation art. Maxim Moskalkov has the story.   …

More than a year has passed since protests against changes to Nicaraguas pension program turned into a full scale socio-political crisis. The government crackdown by President Daniel Ortega has resulted in more than 200 deaths, and forced more than 65,000 people to leave the country. Among them journalists who say they’ve been targeted. But even though they’re not there, many of these journalists are still sending the news back home. VOA reporter Cristina Caicedo Smit has the story.   …

For many years, the United States has been issuing advisories, warning potential travelers about countries plagued by terrorism or armed conflict.  But now, Amnesty International, Japan, Uruguay and other countries are warning about the danger of travel to the U.S., citing gun violence. This sparked a response from President Donald Trump, as VOA’s Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.   …

This story originated in VOA’s Russian Service. Some information is from AFP. WASHINGTON — The fundraising chief for prominent Russian opposition figure Alexei Navalny says a Moscow court’s decision to freeze financial assets of the jailed activist’s anti-corruption watchdog is a laughably predictable outcome that says more about the group’s success in exposing widespread corruption than the money laundering charges it’s now facing. A Moscow district court Thursday froze the assets of Navalny’s Foundation for Fighting Corruption (FBK), which was set up to spotlight the excessively lavish lifestyles of top government and Kremlin officials. “It is actually very funny,” Leonid Volkov told VOA’s Russian Service just hours after criminal charges landed, pointing out that the investigation coincides with a crackdown that has seen Navalny jailed and thousands of people detained at some of the largest free-election rallies Moscow has seen since Putin’s 2012 term began. “It has already been noted that when someone needs to be accused of murder, the call always comes from MP Lugovoi, who is actually accused of murder in Britain,” said Volkov, referring to former KGB officer Andrei Lugovoi, a member of the State Duma committee on security and countering corruption, who stands accused in the 2006 poisoning of former Russian intelligence officer Alexander Litvinenko. FILE – Russian opposition activist Alexei Navalny, right, argues with a man in a military uniform, left, as opposition activist Leonid Volkov, center, listens during a rally in Novosibirsk, Siberia’s biggest city, Russia, June 7, 2015. Russian ‘projection’ Shortly after Thursday’s court ruling …

Prosecutors on Friday filed a terrorist threat charge against a 20-year-old man who said he walked into a Missouri store wearing body armor and carrying a loaded rifle and handgun to test whether Walmart would honor his constitutional right to bear arms. The incident, just days after 22 people were killed during an attack at another Walmart in El Paso, Texas, caused a panic at the Springfield, Missouri, store. Dmitriy Andreychenko walked through filming himself with his cell phone Thursday afternoon. No shots were fired and Andreychenko was arrested after he was stopped by an armed off-duty firefighter at the store. “Missouri protects the right of people to open carry a firearm, but that does not allow an individual to act in a reckless and criminal manner endangering other citizens,’’ Greene County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Patterson said in a statement announcing the charge. Patterson compared the man’s actions to “falsely shouting fire in a theater causing a panic.” Dmitriy Andreychenko, 20, panicked shoppers fled a Walmart in Springfield, Missouri, after Andreychenko, carrying a rifle and wearing body armor walked around the store. If convicted, the felony charge of making a terrorist threat in the second degree is punishable by up to four years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000, according to the prosecutor’s office. The charge means he showed reckless disregard for the risk of causing an evacuation or knowingly caused fear that lives were in danger. “I wanted to know if Walmart honored the Second Amendment,” …

The U.N. refugee agency says fighting over Libya’s capital of Tripoli has displaced more than 105,000 people since April, when a Libyan commander launched an offensive to take the city from the U.N.-backed government. The UNHCR tweeted on Friday that its relief aid could only reach about 2,200 out of 21,000 displaced families and that those displaced “continue to be in need of support, peace and stability.” Libya has been plagued with political instability since the ouster and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Qaddafi in 2011. In April, the self-styled Libyan National Army of commander Khalifa Hifter launched an offensive on Tripoli. Although Hifter, who is based in eastern Libya, boasts support from key Arab governments, his military campaign has so far resulted in a stalemated conflict.   …

Cameroon has instructed its military to be on the alert as Equatorial Guinea says it is building a border wall to stop Cameroonians and West Africans from illegally entering its territory. Equatorial Guinea’s announcement comes as officials of the Central African Economic and Monetary Community (CEMAC) regional economic bloc, of which Equatorial Guinea is a member, are encouraging the free movement of people and goods to boost economic growth in the region. Thirty-two-year old Cameroonian merchant Kome Pascal imports wine from Equatorial Guinea. He also exports cement, roofing sheets and farm produce from Cameroon to the neighboring nation.  “I feel very bad because goods will not come again into Cameroon and farmers who sell in Equatorial Guinea, what do they expect them to do with their goods,” he told VOA. “Building that particular wall is not going to permit Cameroonians to sell their goods.”  When Equatorial Guinea said it was building the wall and erected milestones on the border near the Cameroon town of Kye-Ossi, Cameroon army chief Lieutenant General Rene Claude Meka visited the border. Meka said he was told the neighboring state was not respecting territorial limits and was encroaching on Cameroon land. He said the Cameroonian army would not tolerate any unlawful intrusion. Anastasio Asumu Mum Munoz, Equatorial Guinea ambassador to Cameroon, was called up by Cameroon’s minister of external relations on Thursday to explain his country’s plans for the border. Ambassador Munoz said his country plans to build a wall, but that reports that the its …

Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha said Friday he is not quitting despite facing mounting criticism for failing to properly take his oath of office. Prayuth led the inauguration of his Cabinet in a ceremony presided over by the king on July 16. However, he omitted a phrase in the oath of office in which he was supposed to pledge to uphold every aspect of the constitution. The omission has raised questions over whether the inauguration was legally valid. Prayuth told reporters Friday that he was continuing to conduct his duties “to the best of my abilities because I am the prime minister.” The oath of office is required under Article 161 of Thailand’s Constitution, which includes the complete oath and states it must be said to the king before Cabinet ministers take office. Prayuth’s failure to recite the oath in full, which also led to other ministers making the same error because they repeated what he said, was pointed out by opposition politician Piyabutr Saengkanokkul during a Parliament session on July 25. Legal activist Srisuwan Janya filed a complaint over the issue to the Office of the Ombudsman on Monday which has been accepted for consideration. Prayuth led a military junta that seized power in 2014 and was dissolved with the inauguration of the new Cabinet. The junta had ruled with a heavy fist and regularly cracked down on its critics. It also introduced new election laws to favor Prayuth’s return as prime minister. Mongkolkit Suksintaranont, a leader of a …

The World Food Program’s partial aid suspension in Yemen has increased concerns for families. Mohammed Qaid worries for his four-day-old boy Nazeh.  Qaid has seven other children, and little hope that he can feed his family.  But this family is not the only household feeling the pinch of the recent reduction in food aid delivered to Sana’a.   Qaid is among the thousands of residents in the Yemeni capital, Sana’a, a Houthi stronghold, who is dependent on international humanitarian aid in the midst of the conflict.  The war has ravaged Qaid’s life, and his family now survives on scraps. “We’re now sort of dependent on restaurants’ leftover rice,” he told VOA.  “We pay dishwashers $0.80 for collecting leftover rice.”   Destitute and hungry, families have resorted to sending their children out to collect leftover rice granules.  Qaid tells VOA his young sons were crying the morning of the interview because he could not afford to pay the cost of two eggs, opting instead for tea.  Normally, Qaid’s family would have received a monthly basket from the World Food Program consisting of 75 kilograms of wheat, two bottles of cooking oil, sugar, and lentils.  That stopped when WFP shipments were held up due to a standoff between the agency and the Houthi authorities.  Both sides had disagreed over who would be responsible for monitoring the food routing system.  U.N. officials now say they have the Houthi’s agreement to implement a biometric registration system to prevent diversion of food aid.   FILE – Men deliver U.N. World Food Program (WFP) aid in …

South Korea has threatened to end a military intelligence sharing agreement with Japan as their tensions escalate over export controls. The agreement is a symbol of the countries’ trilateral security cooperation with their ally, the United States. Tensions erupted after Japan tightened export controls on key materials for South Korea’s semiconductor industry and decided to downgrade South Korea’s trade status. Seoul accuses Tokyo of weaponizing trade to retaliate over political rows stemming from their wartime history. Seoul is seen trying to pressure Washington into mediating the dispute between its allies. Japan says it wants to keep the agreement, whose renewal deadline is coming up on Aug. 24. A look at the military agreement between Seoul and Tokyo tested by a toxic relationship: The agreement The General Security of Military Information Agreement, or GSOMIA, went into effect in November 2016 as the two neighbors agreed to step up cooperation in the face of North Korea’s nuclear and missile threat.   It is automatically extended annually unless either side notifies the other of its intention to terminate in a 90-day prior notice. The deadline falls on Aug. 24. The agreement took years of discussion and a near-collapse. Any military cooperation with Japan is difficult due to strong resentment against Japanese brutality during its 1910-1945 colonization of the Korean Peninsula. South Korea and Japan can still share intelligence through the 2014 three-way intelligence pact via Washington, but that one is limited to North Korea’s nuclear and missile program. GSOMIA allows Seoul and Tokyo …

Investigators believe a man who stabbed four people to death and wounded two others targeted his victims at random during a bloody rampage across two Southern California cities, authorities said.    The 33-year-old man from the city of Garden Grove was “full of anger” when he carried out violent attacks and robberies at businesses and killed two men at his own apartment complex during the two-hour wave of violence Wednesday, police said. He was arrested as he walked out of a convenience store in the neighboring city Santa Ana, dropping a knife and a gun he had taken from a security guard he had just killed. Authorities planned to release his name Thursday afternoon. The violence appeared to be random and the only known motives seem to be “robbery, hate, homicide,” Garden Grove police Lt. Carl Whitney told reporters. “We know this guy was full of anger and he harmed a lot of people tonight,” Whitney said Wednesday. A body is removed at the scene of a stabbing in Garden Grove, California, Aug. 8, 2019. The attacker and four of the victims were described as Hispanic, while two victims were described as white, police said in a statement. Initially, all had been described as Hispanic. The two people who were wounded were listed in stable condition Wednesday night and were expected to survive. Romanian immigrant One of the dead was identified by his son as a hard-working immigrant originally from Romania. Erwin Hauprich said in a telephone interview that his …

The chief facilitator of negotiations between Venezuela’s socialist administration and opposition has downplayed the decision by President Nicolas Maduro to skip a scheduled round of talks. Dag Nylander of Norway’s Foreign Affairs Ministry told The Associated Press on Thursday he’s in contact with both sides about finding a date for talks to resume. Maduro on Wednesday night said he had decided not to send envoys to the Caribbean island of Barbados, where talks were to resume Thursday. That was to protest the Trump administration’s decision to freeze the Venezuelan government’s assets in the U.S. and threaten to retaliate against foreign companies that continue to do business with his government. Maduro’s government also said it would review the mechanism of the talks to ensure it contributes to an efficient solution to the problems Venezuelans face. “Norway is facilitating the negotiation process at the request of the principal political actors in Venezuela and schedules all meetings based on the availability of the parties. Accordingly we are in touch with them regarding the next meetings,” said Nylander, the head of the peace and reconciliation office at the Foreign Affairs Ministry. He added:  “The facilitation continues under the principle that the parties would like it to, and that there are realistic prospects of a negotiated solution that can benefit the Venezuelan people.” In announcing the sweeping move, National Security Adviser John Bolton said the dialogue between the government and opposition was being used by Maduro to buy time. “We will not fall for these …

Witnesses say fears of the Ebola virus have brought border traffic between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo to a virtual standstill. Long lines and lengthy delays at the border crossings have left many traders frustrated, but officials say health checks are necessary to stop the spread of the deadly virus.  Beatrice Irunga, a 35-year old Congolese trader, says no one can cross the border without washing hands and being checked for fever. The measures are necessary to prevent people from carrying the virus across the border. But trade-wise, Ebola fears have hit hard. Jemima Ibrahim, a Congolese trader who sells rice and oil in Rwanda, says the long delays at the crossing are costing her time and money. FILE – Women wash their hands in Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, July 31, 2019. “The loss is huge,” she said. “We buy goods here in Rwanda. To export them to Congo is becoming very hard.” Rwandan Claudine Irunga says she owns a shop in Goma, on the Congolese side, but can’t reach it because of the delays. “I left Goma in the morning,” she said. “My shop is open now, and here they are not allowing us to go regardless of every document you can have. I am so sad. They say the border is open, but just look.” The Rwandan government estimates that 80,000 people cross between Goma and the Rwandan city of Gisenyi each day. The government has not said the border is closed. However, it is …

Lebanon’s only English-language daily protested the country’s deteriorating economic and political conditions by publishing a blank edition Thursday, calling it an “alarm bell.”    Each page of The Daily Star’s Thursday edition bore a single phrase referring to one of the country’s problems, including government deadlock, rising public debt, increasing sectarian rhetoric and unemployment. The back page had a photo of a cedar tree, a national symbol, with a caption reading: “Wake up before it’s too late!” “We are sounding the alarm bell over the many challenges the country is facing,” the paper’s editor-in-chief Nadim Ladki told The Associated Press. “It’s a call on everyone — politicians, activists, ordinary people — to pull together in the same direction to resolve the crises and challenges.” Lebanon has been in the grip of an economic crisis for months, and the government has not met since a June 30 shooting in a mountain village that escalated tensions between the Christian and Druze communities. A man looks through a copy of the Lebanese local English-language newspaper, The Daily Star, in Beirut, Lebanon, Aug. 8, 2019. Rival groups in the Cabinet have been divided on how to proceed with the investigation of the shooting, which left two people dead. The U.S. Embassy issued a statement Wednesday saying it supports a fair and transparent investigation into the shooting in the village of Qabr Shamoun.     “Any attempt to use the tragic June 30 event in Qabr Shamoun to advance political objectives should be rejected,” the …

U.N. agencies have welcomed Colombia’s decision to grant citizenship to children born in the country to Venezuelan parents who were forced to flee their homeland to escape the political repression and economic hardship of President Nicolas Maduro’s government.  The U.N. refugee agency, International Organization for Migration and U.N. children’s fund have hailed Colombia’s action as a major step in combating statelessness. The measure, which was announced by the Colombian government earlier this week, will confer citizenship upon 24,000 children born in Colombia to Venezuelan parents since August 2016. Without this decision, the agencies note, these children would have great difficulty acquiring Colombian citizenship as many families are unable to obtain the necessary documentation. Also, they note registering the child at the Venezuelan consulate in Colombia is not possible as services are unavailable. Measure good for two years The UNHCR reports this exceptional and temporary administrative measure will be valid for two years. During this time, the Colombian authorities will provide documentary proof of Colombian nationality of children born to Venezuelan parents. UNHCR spokesman Charlie Yaxley says the measure will guarantee and protect the birth rights of these children and provide them with a viable future. “Stateless people can face a lifetime of exclusion and discrimination, often denied access to education, health care, and job opportunities,” Yaxley said. “Colombia’s decision is hugely positive for these children and their families. Worldwide, statelessness affects millions of people, leaving them without the basic rights and official recognition that most of us take for granted.” …