Month: September 2019

Recent efforts by the governments of Australia and New Zealand to tackle online extremism has renewed the debate over the threat of radicalization on the internet, with some analysts seeing new opportunities for states and tech giants for a joint action. Australian officials earlier this week enacted what they are calling the world’s first law to curb online extremism, as authorities ordered five websites to remove extremist content or face prosecution. The offending websites are all based outside Australia, the country’s eSafety commission told the Financial Times. The commission is charged with investigating and removing such content. In neighboring New Zealand, a self-avowed white supremacist in March opened fire at two mosques and gunned down 51 people while livestreaming his actions on Facebook. On Monday, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey met with Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern in Wellington to discuss what his company can do to help eliminate violent extremist content on its platform. FILE – People visit a memorial for victims of a shooting at the Masjid Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, March 18, 2019. The meeting was a part of Ardern’s efforts through Christchurch Call, a pledge by 18 countries and eight technology companies in Paris on March 15 to collaborate to eradicate violent extremist content from the internet. “It is in fact the prime minister of New Zealand and the Australian movement in the parliament who have stepped up to do something a little more sharp and more defined,” said Farah Pandith, former U.S. special representative …

Italy has agreed to allow rescue ship Ocean Viking to disembark 82 migrants in the southern port of Lampedusa, the SOS Mediterranee charity which runs the vessel said Saturday. “The Ocean Viking just received instructions from the Maritime Rescue Coordination Centre of Rome to proceed to Lampedusa,” SOS Mediterranee tweeted. “An ad hoc European agreement between Italy, France, Germany, Portugal and Luxembourg has been reached to allow the landing,” said French Interior Minister Christophe Castaner, referring to the division of the migrants between the five countries. “We now need to agree on a genuine temporary European mechanism.” Castaner added. The Ocean Viking was on its second mission and was shuttling between Malta and Italy for nearly two weeks, seeking a port to land the migrants. Medecins Sans Frontieres (Doctors Without Borders), which runs the ship jointly with SOS Mediterranee, said the group comprised 58 men, six women and 18 children. The Ocean Viking had rescued 356 migrants on its first mission.   Italy is trying to set up an automatic system for distributing migrants rescued in the Mediterranean between European countries, diplomatic sources said recently. Such a deal would put an end to the case-by-case negotiations over who will take in those saved during the perilous crossing from North Africa, which has seen vulnerable asylum seekers trapped in limbo at sea for lengthy periods. France and Germany have given their green light to the new system, which could also involve Luxembourg, Malta, Portugal, Romania and Spain, Italy’s Repubblica and Stampa …

The International Organization for Migration reports it has repatriated 127 African and Asian migrants stranded in Libya under difficult, brutal conditions. Tripoli’s Mitiga International airport was shut down last Sunday after being hit by missiles. For safety reasons, IOM’s chartered plane with 127 migrants aboard took off earlier this week from Misrata, about a two-hour drive east of the Libyan capital. From there, the passengers, which included women and children, flew to Istanbul and then onwards to their home countries.  Missions from 15 countries in Africa and Asia, including Gambia, Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast, Bangladesh and Egypt were involved in the complex, risky operation. IOM spokeswoman, Safa Msehli told VOA stranded migrants is a reference to those those who either are held in Libyan detention centers or are living freely in urban areas across the country. “In detention centers across Libya we have close to 5,000 migrants that are still detained.  In Libya alone, according to IOM Libya’s DTM (Displacement Tracking Matrix), there are over 600,000 migrants, a lot of whom – not only due to the current context of war – but a lot of whom have arrived in Libya and remain without a solution,” Msehli said.   Libya’s detention centers are notorious as places where refugees and migrants are subject to horrific forms of abuse, including torture and rape, as well as the lack of sufficient food and medical care. Migrants and refugees in urban areas are vulnerable to exploitation, trafficking and kidnapping for ransom. Despite all the …

Pakistan said Saturday four of its soldiers were killed and another was injured when “terrorists” from across the Afghanistan border opened fire at two locations. The deadliest of the shootings occurred in the remote Dir district where Pakistani troops were building a border fence when they came under attack from the other side, killing three soldiers and injuring another. The military’s media wing said another soldier was killed when “miscreants” from the Afghan side ambushed a routine border patrol party late Friday in North Waziristan district. It added that two of the assailants were also killed in an exchange of fire. Cross-border militant attacks are not uncommon on Pakistani troops constructing a fence along the country’s nearly 2,600 kilometer border with Afghanistan. Islamabad began the unilateral fencing of the largely porous frontier two years ago to plug hundreds of informal crossings that were encouraging terrorist infiltration in both directions. Military officials expect the massive border project will be in place by end of next year, addressing to a large extent mutual concerns of illegal crossings of both militants and drug traffickers. Pakistan has complained that anti-state militants linked to the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or TTP, have taken refuge in “ungoverned” Afghan border areas after fleeing Pakistani security operations and orchestrate attacks from those sanctuaries. Earlier this week, the United States designated TTP chief Qari Wali Noor Mehsud a global terrorist for directing deadly attacks against Pakistan. Mehsud’s whereabouts are not known but his predecessor, Mullah Fazlullah, was killed in June of …

The World Food Program has launched its biggest relief operation this year to aid thousands of Rohingya refugees whose possessions have been swept away in the torrential rains that hit Cox’s Bazaar in Bangladesh this week. In the space of 24 hours, the WFP has delivered food to 16,000 Rohingya refugees who have lost everything in the heavy rains that have wreaked havoc in the camps.  The agency reports it also has provided food aid to more than 800 people from the host community displaced by the flooding. Bangladesh is a low-lying country prone to flooding during the monsoon season, which is set to last until October.  However, the amount of rain that battered the region in just one day this week is by any measure extreme and devastating. WFP spokesman Herve Verhoosel told VOA a colleague on the ground has described the depth of grief experienced by families who have lost the few belongings they have managed to acquire in the camps.  More than 700,000 Rohingya refugees have fled violence and persecution in Myanmar since August 2017, many with nothing more than the clothes on their backs. Citing one family as an example, Verhoosel described the refugees’ predicament as dire. “The family lost everything because all that was in the house was basically washed away, what they used as a bed or what they used to cook.  Everything was basically lost.  They have nothing to cook [with].  They have nothing to sleep [on].  Most of their clothes have been …

Leaders of the United Auto Workers union have extended contracts with Ford and Fiat Chrysler indefinitely, but the pact with General Motors is still set to expire Saturday night.    The move puts added pressure on bargainers for both sides as they approach the contract deadline and the union starts to prepare for a strike.    The contract extension was confirmed Friday by UAW spokesman Brian Rothenberg, who declined further comment on the talks.  The union has picked GM as the target company, meaning it is the focus of bargaining and would be the first company to face a walkout. GM’s contract with the union is scheduled to expire at 11:59 p.m. Saturday.  Picket lines posted   It’s possible that the four-year GM contract also could be extended or a deal could be reached, but it’s more likely that 49,200 UAW members could walk out of GM plants as early as Sunday because union and company demands are so far apart.  FILE – An employee inspects a Cadillac Escalade as it nears the final process of assembly at the General Motors plant in Arlington, Texas, July 14, 2015. Picket line schedules already have been posted near the entrance to one local UAW office in Detroit.    Art Wheaton, an auto industry expert at the Worker Institute at Cornell University, expects the GM contract to be extended for a time, but he says the gulf between the sides is wide.    “GM is looking through the windshield ahead, and it looks like nothing but land mines,” he …

The leaders of South Sudan and Sudan have agreed to reopen border areas between their countries in a bid to boost trade and the free movement of people. The agreement between new Sudanese Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir, reached late Thursday, is significant because several border areas remain closed, including Heglig in South Sudan’s former Unity State, Kafiakinji in Raja in South Sudan, and El-Khurasana in Sudan’s Western Kordofan state. South Sudan’s deputy minister of foreign affairs, Deng Dau Deng, said he and Sudan’s foreign minister, Asma Mohamed Abdalla, touched on the disputed, oil-producing region of Abyei during their talks.   “Of course the issue of Abyei is a fundamental issue because we want a final status on the resolution on the conflict of Abyei. The current government in Khartoum and the sovereign council and the Cabinet are very open in addressing the issues that are outstanding between South Sudan and the Republic of Sudan,” said Dau. Dau said Hamdok also met with the leaders of various Sudanese rebel groups during a two-day visit to Juba that ended Friday and reaffirmed his government’s commitment to ending hostilities with the rebel groups. A Sudanese government delegation and the rebel groups signed a declaration of principles in Juba and agreed to hold peace talks next month. Dau said part of the reason for Hamdok’s visit to Juba was to cement that process. South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir (C-R) and Sudan’s Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok (C-L) are seen …

The Ukrainian president’s envoy for peace talks with Russia-backed separatists expressed concern Friday that the leaders of France and Germany will push Ukraine to make unacceptable concessions to Russia. Ukraine and Russia have been locked in a bitter standoff since 2014, when Russia annexed the Crimean Peninsula and threw its weight behind separatists in eastern Ukraine. Hopes for a solution to the separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine, which has claimed more than 13,000 lives, were revived after political novice Volodymyr Zelenskiy was elected Ukrainian president in April. FILE – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy speaks during a meeting with law enforcement officers in Kyiv, Ukraine, July 23, 2019. But his envoy, Leonid Kuchma, told The Associated Press he is concerned that France and Germany, who are mediating the talks, will push Zelenskiy to make trade-offs, such as approving a plan for the separatists to hold local elections in the areas they control without any oversight by the Ukrainian government. “I don’t have a lot of hope,” Kuchma said when asked about a much-anticipated meeting of Zelenskiy with the leaders of Russia, France and Germany. “Zelenskiy will have a very hard time — it will be one against three people.” As the first step toward seeking a solution to the conflict, Zelenskiy negotiated a major prisoner exchange with Russian President Vladimir Putin in which 35 people from both sides were released and flown home Saturday. Some of the prisoners had been incarcerated in Russia for five years. European leaders including German Chancellor …

Renan Toussaint in Port au Prince, Jean Robert Philippe and Jacquelin Belizaire in Washington contributed to this report WASHINGTON / PORT-AU-PRINCE, HAITI – Haitian Senator Willot Joseph, a member of the ruling PHTK party (Pati Ayisyen Tet Kale), admitted Friday that he accepted a $100,000 bribe from Prime Minister-Designate Fritz William Michel in exchange for a yes vote on his nomination. The stunning admission was made during an interview with Haitian news site Gazette Haiti. Parlement/Corruption/ Affaire 100 000 us:- Le Sénateur Wilot Joseph dont le nom est cité dans ce scandale n’y voit aucun inconvénient. Pour le Sénateur qui répondait à un Journaliste de RCH 2000, il n’est pas question de refuser de l’argent en ces temps si durs. pic.twitter.com/oo9GzeAXEE — Gazette Haiti (@GazetteHaiti) September 13, 2019 “I don’t have any problem with [accepting] money that comes my way without having to sign for it, or any kind of paper trail. I take it and I don’t have to be hypocrite [about it] with anyone,” Joseph said. The senator criticized his colleagues who denied taking bribes after a public accusation made by Senator Saurel Jacinthe on Wednesday, as the Senate was preparing to vote on the prime minister’s nomination. The vote was postponed without setting a new date. “They are slick, I don’t see anything wrong with receiving money during difficult times,” Joseph said.   The allegation Haitian Senator Saurel Jacinthe alleges that Senate Leader Carl Murat Cantave offered him cash in exchange for a yes vote on the …

It’s unprecedented. Thousands of Nigerians have joined a lawsuit seeking to block members of the Senate from using public money to buy luxury cars. The suit was initiated by rights groups that became tired of government corruption. More than 6,700 Nigerians have joined suit that aims to prevent parliament from releasing 5.5 billion naira — equal to about $15 million — that would enable leaders of the Senate to purchase luxury vehicles. Three domestic rights groups originated the suit, which was filed with the Nigerian Federal High Court. One of the NGOs leading the lawsuit is civic organization BudgIT. It tracks government spending in an effort to fight corruption. Shakir Akorede, the group’s communications associate, spoke on the class action suit. “This is living the luxury life by the so-called representatives of the people. How in any way does this plan show the seriousness, the commitment on the part of the government to solve our socioeconomic crisis?” Akorede asked. The activists are calling the luxury car allocation unjust, unfair and unconstitutional, a waste of taxpayers’ money. News of the allocation spread across social media, creating widespread anger. The Nigerian Senate’s spokesman, Dayo Adeyeye, told local media that the news is a rumor and that he hadn’t heard about the allocation. He added, however, that government officials are entitled to purchase cars and that he cannot imagine himself in a car used by a former senator. Senators have become accustomed to purchasing new cars with every new term. But political scientist …

A federal appeals court in New York has restored a lawsuit by restaurant workers, a hotel event booker and a watchdog who say President Donald Trump has business conflicts that violate the Constitution. The lawsuit tossed out in 2017 by a lower-court judge was restored Friday by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The lower court had concluded that the plaintiffs did not have standing to sue. The appeals panel rejected that reasoning. Trump has called the lawsuit “totally without merit.” The lawsuit alleged Trump’s “vast, complicated, and secret” business interests were creating conflicts of interest. Justice Department lawyers had argued that the plaintiffs did not suffer in any way and thus had no standing to sue. Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington first filed the lawsuit. …

U.S. President Donald Trump has arrived in Baltimore, the eastern U.S., majority-black city he recently called a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” where “no human being would want to live.” Trump was there Thursday to address Republican congressional leaders attending an annual retreat. Before he left the White House, Trump ignored a reporter’s question about what he would say to the residents of the city, instead saying only that it was going to be “a very successful evening.” Demonstrators gather near the U.S. House Republican Member Retreat where President Donald Trump is speaking, in Baltimore, Sept. 12, 2019. Ahead of the president’s visit, activist groups planned to protest “racism, white supremacy, war, bigotry and climate change,” organizers told The Baltimore Sun. On Thursday, several hundred protesters lined the route Trump’s motorcade took to the city’s Inner Harbor area, where Trump was to speak. Trump has denied charges of racism on his attacks on the city and its congressman, Elijah Cummings. “There is nothing racist in stating plainly what most people already know, that Elijah Cummings has done a terrible job for the people of his district, and of Baltimore itself,” he tweeted in July. …

With a go-ahead from the Supreme Court, the Trump administration Thursday began enforcing a new rule denying asylum to most migrants arriving at the southern border — a move that spread despair among those fleeing poverty and violence in their homelands.     A spokeswoman for the Department of Homeland Security agency that manages asylum cases said the policy would be effective retroactive to July 16, when the rule was announced.     The new policy would deny refuge to anyone at the U.S.-Mexico border who passes through another country on the way to the U.S. without first seeking asylum there.    The Supreme Court cleared the way, for now, to enforce it while legal challenges move forward.  Previous asylum request is key   Migrants who make their way to the U.S. overland from places like Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador would be largely ineligible, along with asylum seekers from Africa, Asia and South America who try to get in by way of the U.S.-Mexico border.    Asylum seekers must pass an initial screening called a “credible fear” interview, a hurdle that most clear. Under the new policy, they would fail the test unless they sought asylum in at least one country they traveled through and were denied. They would be placed in fast-track deportation proceedings and flown to their home countries at U.S. expense.    “Our Supreme Court is sentencing people to death. There are no safeguards, no institutions to stop this cruelty,” the immigration-assistance group Al Otro Lado said in a statement.    The Mexican government likewise called the high court’s action “astonishing.” The …

Jewish settlement construction in Israeli-annexed east Jerusalem has spiked since President Donald Trump took office in 2017, according to official data obtained by The Associated Press. The data also showed strong evidence of decades of systematic discrimination, illustrated by a huge gap in the number of construction permits granted to Jewish and Palestinian residents. The expansion of the settlements in east Jerusalem, which Israel seized along with the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 Mideast war, threatens to further complicate one of the thorniest issues in the conflict. The refusal to grant permits to Palestinian residents has confined them to crowded, poorly served neighborhoods, with around half the population believed to be at risk of having their homes demolished. Palestinian Jamil Masalmeh uses a power tool to destroy an apartment he had added to his home years earlier, in the Silwan neighborhood of east Jerusalem, Sept. 9, 2019. Peace Now The data was acquired and analyzed by the Israeli settlement watchdog Peace Now, which says it only obtained the figures after a two-year battle with the municipality. It says the numbers show that while Palestinians make up more than 60% of the population in east Jerusalem, they have received only 30% of the building permits issued since 1991. The fate of the city, which is home to holy sites sacred to Jews, Muslims and Christians, is at the heart of the decades-old conflict. The Palestinians want east Jerusalem to be the capital of their future state, while Israel views …

Climate-change activists plan to disrupt Heathrow Airport with drones on Friday morning, despite the arrest of five of their members in a pre-emptive strike by London police.  The Heathrow Pause group aims to ground flights by illegally  flying drones within five kilometers (three miles) of an airport, to put pressure on the government to take tougher steps to reduce carbon emissions.  Police arrested three men and two women from the group on Thursday on suspicion of conspiracy to commit a public nuisance in relation to operations at the airport.  But Heathrow Pause said it would go ahead anyway.  “The action will carry on exactly as planned, peacefully and nonviolently, regardless of today’s events — we have contingency measures in place,” it said in a statement on Thursday.  Earlier this week, police said they were confident the action would not lead to a repeat of the chaos seen at Gatwick last December, when drone sightings grounded planes in the run-up to Christmas.  But they warned that attempted disruption of the airport and flying drones without permission in the exclusion zone were serious crimes.  The activists say they are not looking to endanger life, and aim to conduct the action and alert authorities before the airport opens.  Heathrow has said the demonstration is counterproductive  and criminal, adding that despite talks between the two sides, the campaigners disagree with the airport’s belief that aviation can and should be decarbonized.  …

U.S. marine mammal biologists have declared an “unusual mortality event” in the deaths of nearly 300 ice seals off Alaska’s northwest coast. The cause of the deaths is not known. The fisheries arm of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration says the declaration covers ringed, bearded and spotted seals. All three types of seals use sea ice in varying ways. NOAA Fisheries has received reports of 282 dead seals in the Bering and Chukchi seas since June 1, 2018. That’s nearly five times the average number of reported seal strandings. The deaths have mostly occurred from June to September in both years. Declaration of an unusual mortality event allows the agency to use more resources to investigate the deaths. …

This article originated in VOA’s Persian Service. Iran says it has sold oil on a tanker near Syria’s coast to a private company in defiance of U.S. efforts to stop such a sale, fueling debate among observers about whether the ship has offloaded any crude. In a tweet posted Wednesday, Iranian Ambassador to Britain Hamid Baeidinejad said his nation’s tanker had sold its oil at sea to the unnamed private company “despite numerous American threats.” U.S. ally Britain had seized the tanker July 4 under its former name of Grace 1 in the waters of the British territory of Gibraltar, on suspicion the tanker planned to deliver Iranian oil to Syria in violation of EU sanctions on the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad. Gibraltar allowed the tanker, under its new name of Adrian Darya 1, to leave its waters Aug. 18 after saying British authorities had received written assurances that Iran would not deliver the oil to Syria. Iranian officials denied providing such assurances, and the Adrian Darya 1 sailed toward the Syrian coast before turning off its transponder Sept. 2. The Trump administration, which unilaterally banned all Iranian oil exports in May to pressure Tehran to stop perceived malign behaviors, appealed unsuccessfully to Britain not to release the tanker and later sanctioned the vessel Aug. 30. در جلسه امروز با وزیر خارجه انگلیس، تاکیدگردیدکه اقدام مقامات انگلیس علیه نفتکش حامل نفت ایران خلاف حقوق بین الملل بود.تحریمهای اتحادیه اروپا قابل تعمیم به کشورهای ثالث نیست.علیرغم تهدیدات بیشمار آمریکا،نفتکش …

Some Rwandans who used to be wildlife poachers have turned into conservationists. For VOA, reporter Eugene Uwimana has more from the Gorilla Guardians Village, located near Volcanoes National Park in Northern Rwanda   …