Month: May 2017

DC Roundup: Trump on Russia, McCain on Russia, WH Staffer Resigns

Posted on by SeeUS

Developments in Washington, D.C., on Tuesday include President Donald Trump sending a series of early morning tweets that Russia must be laughing at the U.S. over investigations, longtime Republican Senator John McCain calling Russia a bigger challenge than Islamic State; the U.S. successfully testing a missile defense system, and the White House communications director resigns:

Trump: Russians Must Be Laughing at US Probes of Moscow Election Meddling — U.S. President Donald Trump says that Russian officials “must be laughing” at the United States with its escalating investigations into Moscow’s meddling in last year’s election, which he claimed was “a lame excuse” adopted by opposition Democrats to explain losing the White House.

McCain: Russia, Putin ‘Greatest Challenge We Have’ — U.S. Senator John McCain said Monday he views Russia and its president, Vladimir Putin, as the “greatest challenge we have,” even more so than that posed by the Islamic State group. Speaking during a visit to Australia, McCain told the Australian Broadcasting Company Russia has tried to “destroy the very fundamental of democracy” with efforts to influence the U.S. presidential election and others elsewhere in the world.

White House Communications Chief Resigns — The White House communications director has resigned in what could be the first of several changes in President Donald Trump’s senior staff as he attempts to shape a response to investigations of his aides’ links to Russia.

WATCH: White House press secretary Spicer talks about Trump-Merkel relationship

Trump: Germany Not Adequately Contributing to NATO — U.S. President Donald Trump has reiterated his accusation that Germany does not pay its fair share of dues in NATO, three days after a meeting with the country’s leader that the White House said went well.

US Successfully Tests Missile Defense System — The Pentagon says its first-ever missile defense test involving an ICBM was a success. “The intercept of a complex threat-representative ICBM target is an incredible accomplishment,” Vice Admiral Jim Syring of the Missile Defense Agency said. Tuesday’s test involved two separate missile launches. A simulated attack intercontinental ballistic missile was fired from a tiny island in the Pacific. A second missile was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

WATCH: ICBM missile test

Senate Democrats Ask Trump for Answers on China Trademarks — A group of Senate Democrats sent a letter to President Donald Trump on Tuesday, requesting information about a raft of trademark approvals from China this year that they say may violate the U.S. Constitution’s ban on gifts from foreign governments. Alan Garten, chief legal officer of The Trump Organization, did not respond immediately to a request for comment. He has previously said that Trump’s trademark activity in China predates his election and noted that Trump has stepped away from managing his company.

Overlooked and Insidious: Back-bay Flooding Plagues Millions — Nearly five years after Superstorm Sandy delivered a wake-up call, the problem of back-bay flooding is coming into sharper focus. Studies are under way, money is starting to flow toward the problem, and the realization that destruction of wetlands for development along such shores is partly to blame is leading to discussion about building codes. ButPresident Donald Trump’s budget proposal, released last week, would cut a combined $452 million from the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and the Homeland Security department for research grants, flood mapping and analysis.

Path Cleared for Congress to Consider US Arms Sale to Riyadh — U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has authorized the State Department to notify Congress of the Trump administration’s sale of precision-guided munitions for Saudi Arabia to use in its Yemen campaign, a senior U.S. diplomat said on Tuesday. The notification is one of the last steps in the arms sale process and triggers a formal 30-day review to allow members of Congress to attempt to pass legislation to stop any sale.

State Dept. Defends Trump for Not Publicly Mentioning Human Rights in Saudi Arabia — A senior State Department official has defended President Donald Trump at an on-camera briefing for not mentioning human rights during his recent speech in Saudi Arabia. On Tuesday, a reporter asked Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Stuart Jones what he would say to critics who say the president’s speech on countering terrorism in Riyadh basically gave Saudi Arabia and other countries in the region a “free pass” on human rights abuses. “I think the fact that, you know, you can argue that by taking it out of the public debate and having those conversations directly and quietly will be more effective.”
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UN Refugee Agency Cites 5 for Fraud, Threats at Kenya Camp

Posted on by SeeAF

The U.N. refugee agency said Tuesday it has turned to Kenyan police for possible criminal prosecution of three staffers for allegedly carrying out threats, intimidation and fraud against refugees and other personnel at a camp in northwest Kenya.

U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees spokesman Babar Baloch says the move, which has led to one arrest so far, follows an internal investigation launched after allegations of wrongdoing involving those three and two more staffers at the Kakuma refugee camp emerged between April 2016 and January 2017.

Baloch said staff members allegedly sought payments of $500 to $2,500 from refugees for various services that should be free, threatened other workers and intimidated the camp’s occupants.

Revelations of illegal activities by refugee camp employees are uncommon from the Geneva-based agency. It said in a statement that in response it had launched an independent management review, an unspecified “information campaign” and efforts to “deepen anti-fraud awareness and prevention measures.”

“Protecting lives is at the core of UNHCR’s work, which makes the betrayal of trust we have seen in this case so galling,” Assistant High Commissioner for Refugees George Okoth-Obbo said in the statement. 

Two of the staffers have resigned and internal “disciplinary processes” were under way against the others, UNHCR said.

As the allegations emerged, the agency said it suspended normal resettlements from Kakuma, a 25-year-old camp now housing 172,000 refugees — mostly from South Sudan.
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US Starts Providing Weapons to Syrian Kurds

Posted on by SeeEU

The United States said Tuesday that it had begun distributing arms to Syrian Kurdish militia members battling to help retake Raqqa from Islamic State, moving ahead with a war plan that has angered NATO ally Turkey.

Pentagon spokesman Major Adrian Rankine-Galloway said the Kurdish fighters received small arms and vehicles from the U.S. military. He said he thought the arms were distributed earlier Tuesday.

Another U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the distribution of the arms had started in the past 24 hours, based on authority given by President Donald Trump earlier this month.

There was no immediate reaction from Turkey, which has warned the United States that its decision to arm Kurdish forces fighting Islamic State in Syria could end up hurting Washington.

Turkey views the YPG as the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which has fought an insurgency in southeast Turkey since 1984 and is considered a terrorist group by the United States, Turkey and Europe.

U.S. partner

The United States regards the YPG as a valuable partner in the fight against Islamic State militants in northern Syria.

Washington says that arming the Kurdish forces is necessary to recapturing Raqqa, Islamic State’s de facto capital in Syria and a hub for planning attacks against the West.

U.S. officials have told Reuters that the United States was also looking to boost intelligence cooperation with Turkey to support its fight against the PKK.

It was unclear whether the effort would be enough to soothe Turkey, however.

Ankara worries that advances by the YPG in northern Syria could inflame the PKK insurgency on Turkish soil. It has also voiced concern that weapons given to the YPG would end up in the hands of the PKK.
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Poland Extradites Austrian Accused of Killing Civilians in Ukraine

Posted on by SeeEU

Poland has extradited an Austrian accused of killing unarmed civilians and captured troops in Ukraine.

Austrian authorities will identify the suspect only as Benjamin F.

He was arrested last month on a European warrant while trying to cross into Ukraine from eastern Poland.

He is suspected of committing the killings last year while fighting against pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.

Ukraine has been struggling to put down a three-year-old uprising that has killed more than 10,000 people.

Efforts to secure a lasting cease-fire have failed.
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Hungary Seeks Talks with New York State on Soros School

Posted on by SeeEU

The Hungarian government said Tuesday it was seeking to engage with New York state about the status of Budapest-based Central European University, founded by billionaire George Soros.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo sent letters to Prime Minister Viktor Orban and President Janos Ader advocating for CEU, saying recent changes to Hungary’s higher education law “attempts to close the university for no legitimate reason.”

“CEU is an important collaboration between New York and Hungary,” Cuomo said in the letters obtained by The Associated Press. “I hope that this important partnership will be allowed to continue with the guarantee of CEU’s independence.”

Foreign Ministry spokesman Tamas Menczer said the ministry was working with Cuomo’s office to schedule a meeting about the university.

CEU, founded in 1991, is accredited in New York state, but doesn’t have a campus there, one of the new rules in the amended law. CEU issues diplomas accepted in Hungary and the U.S.

The legal amendments adopted in April also call for bilateral agreements between Hungary and the home countries of foreign universities operating in the country. In the case of the United States, Hungary is also seeking agreements with the schools’ home states.

The changes could force CEU to move, although Rector Michael Ignatieff reiterated Tuesday that the school is determined to stay in Budapest.

“We hope that in the course of the next few months, this absurd effort by the government to shut us down will be taken away,” Ignatieff told reporters. “Budapest is our home, we’re staying here and it’s business as usual.”

The U.S State Department, however, has said the U.S. “has no authority or intention” to negotiate about CEU or other American universities with a presence in Hungary.

A Foreign Ministry official is expected to travel in about two weeks to Maryland to speak with officials there about McDaniel College, Menczer said. Established in 1867 as Western Maryland College, the college also has operated a campus in Hungary since 1993.

Cuomo’s office said a meeting with Hungarian officials also was tentatively scheduled for June.

The conflict over CEU is part of a wider dispute between Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Soros, whose idea of an “open society” is at odds with Orban’s desire to turn Hungary into an “illiberal state.”
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Macedonia’s New PM Vows to Pursue Economic Reform, EU & NATO Membership

Posted on by SeeEU

Macedonian Prime Minister Zoran Zaev vowed on Tuesday to step up economic reforms and pledged to speed up the country’s bid to join the European Union and NATO, as he presented the program of his new cabinet in parliament.

Macedonia has been without a functional government since 2015, after a wiretapping scandal brought down the previous administration. Zaev’s Social Democrats have now formed a coalition with parties representing the country’s ethnic Albanians.

“I will lead a reformist government,” Zaev told parliament.

“Our goal is opening membership talks with the EU as soon as possible and NATO membership as soon as possible,” he said.

Parliament is expected to approve the new cabinet on Wednesday.

The government will be hoping to lead Macedonia out of its worst political crisis since 2001, when Western diplomacy brought it back from the brink of civil war during an ethnic Albanian insurgency.

Efforts to advance towards membership of the EU and NATO have stalled due to a row with Greece over Macedonia’s name, which it shares with a northern Greek province.

Of the 25 ministers in Zaev’s government, seven are ethnic Albanians, who make up one-third of the country’s population.

“Our goal is economic growth of 5 percent on average in the period of the mandate,” Zaev said.

Academic and former professional soccer player Dragan Tevdovski will lead the finance ministry, aiming to bring down the 24 percent jobless rate and implement measures to curb debt and make the pension system sustainable.

The new foreign minister will be veteran diplomat Nikola Dimitrov, formerly the Yugoslav republic’s ambassador to the United States and at one point its negotiator with Greece in talks over the country’s name.

Greece regards Skopje’s use of the name as a territorial grab, and in protest it has been blocking Macedonia’s accession into the EU and NATO.

Dimitrov will oversee the U.N.-sponsored negotiations with Greece that have been stalled for several years due to the political and debt crises affecting the two countries.

Macedonia also has domestic ethnicity issues to tackle. As part of the coalition deal an ethnic Albanian was elected last month to be the speaker in parliament. That prompted protests by nationalists who stormed the parliament building and beat some deputies including Zaev.

After Zaev gave written guarantees to the president not to undermine Macedonia’s constitutional order or sovereignty, the nationalists agreed to participate in the work of the parliament.
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Serbia’s PM Vucic Steps Down to Assume Presidency

Posted on by SeeEU

Serbia’s Prime Minister Aleksandar Vucic stepped down Tuesday, a day before he assumes the country’s presidency, which he won in a decisive election victory last month.

He announced his departure in a brief letter of resignation sent to parliament and will take the oath of office Wednesday, succeeding Tomislav Nikolic.

Vucic, who is also head of the ruling conservative Serbian Progressive Party, is moving to a largely ceremonial post, but he is expected to wield considerable power through his control of the Progressives and their allies in the coalition government.

Until the appointment of the new prime minister, which is expected by mid-June, Serbia’s Foreign Minister and First Deputy Prime Minister Ivica Dacic will serve as the caretaker head of the government.

On Tuesday, Vucic told Reuters Global Markets Forum he would strive to boost economic ties among the countries in the region, most of which are still recovering from armed conflicts of 1990s, with an ultimate goal of joining the European Union.

To join the EU, Serbia, Bosnia, Montenegro, Macedonia, Albania and Kosovo must undertake deep reforms, some of which may take decades. Vucic said that until that happens, the region should create a regional economic alliance.

“That will mean a unique market of 20 million people, which will become one of the most important markets on the continent,” he said in Belgrade. In addition, he said, “it will economically strengthen our position regarding the EU.”

Vucic also said he would try to renew talks about normalizing relations with Kosovo, Serbia’s former southern province, which is predominantly ethnic Albanian and declared independence in 2008 following a bloody war and NATO bombing of then-Yugoslavia in 1999.

With the backing of its traditional ally Russia, as well as several other countries, Serbia remains firmly opposed to Kosovo’s independence.
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Kenyans Forced Off Tea Highlands by British Colonialists Seek Justice

Posted on by SeeAF

In a roadside cafe in Kenya’s majestic highlands, Elly Sigilai cradled a steaming mug of tea and recalled how 17 relatives died after British colonialists ousted them in 1934 to plant tea on their family land.

The 79-year-old is one of hundreds of elderly Kenyans seeking to sue the British government for alleged displacement and torture by its colonial predecessor, in a case that could encourage other former colonies to press similar claims.

“Those on this list died from malaria and sleeping sickness,” said Sigilai, a neatly folded piece of paper in his hand naming the dead in his family, including two brothers and a sister. “They were sent to a valley infested by tsetse flies to die.”

Survivors and their descendants hope to win “significant” compensation from Britain’s High Court and the return of swaths of land, largely owned by international tea companies, said George Tarus, a legal adviser to the government of Nandi County in Kenya’s North Rift region, which is financing the case.

“We became beggars in our own land,” Sigilai said, removing a faded baseball cap and putting it on the table by his tea.

“We love it,” he said of the commodity which is grown in and around Kericho, 260 kms (162 miles) northwest of Kenya’s capital. “But it has brought a lot of misery to my community.”

Around 200 people have already come forward with evidence to support the case, Tarus said.

“All land within Nandi belongs to the county and we want it all to be given back to us,” he said.

Kenya’s 47 counties manage leaseholds on their land.

A British foreign office spokeswoman declined to comment on the legal proceedings.

The case could be politically important for millions of voters ahead of Kenya’s elections in August, with some politicians already starting to stoke tensions over land.

More than 1,200 Kenyans were killed following a disputed 2007 poll, largely in the Rift Valley where resentment over the loss of land during the colonial era still festers.

Much of the land vacated when the British left Kenya in 1963 after 43 years was sold to the political elite who could afford to buy it, rather than returned to its original owners.

Atrocities

Kenya was one of Britain’s most important colonies with hundreds of settlers moving into the best agricultural land to grow tea, coffee and tobacco, forcing Africans into reserves and employing them as cooks, guards and gardeners.

The British displaced hundreds of Nandi and Kipsigis families — sub-tribes of Kenya’s third-largest ethnic group, the Kalenjin — from the Rift Valley highlands for tea plantations.

“They have to pay for what they did to us,” said Moses Mosonet, 83, a Nandi, his eyes coated with a milky veneer.

“They can take their tea and leave us with our land,” he said, seated outside his home, which overlooks lush, hilly tea estates in Nandi, some 70 km north of Kericho, not far from the African reserve where his parents were taken eight decades ago.

Kenya is the world’s largest exporter of black tea, an industry which employs more than 3.5 million Kenyans, directly and indirectly, the national trade union says.

London-based Finlays, one of the tea companies whose land is being targeted, declined to comment.

Dozens of villages were decimated, the potential plaintiffs say, and those who opposed the displacement tortured and exiled.

“Serious atrocities were committed,” said Philemon Koech of Lilan and Koech Associates, which won a tender from Nandi County government in March to pursue a civil case for reparations. “If such things like the torture of the people and their subsequent displacement were to happen in present day, we would be dealing with the International Criminal Court [ICC].”

More than 5,200 other elderly Kenyans won almost 14 million pounds ($18 million) in compensation from Britain in a 2013 out-of-court settlement for abuse by colonial forces during the 1950s Mau Mau insurgency.

Evidence

Gathering evidence will not be easy, particularly as the annexation of African land was legal under British colonial law, said Gitobu Imanyara, a Kenyan human rights lawyer.

“There can hardly be anyone alive to corroborate some of the claims,” he said.

Once the evidence is collected, British lawyer Karim Khan, who specializes in international criminal law and international human rights law, has agreed to assess its worth.

“I will advise on the merits or otherwise of a case under English law,” he told Reuters by phone. “I can’t possibly say that there will definitely be a case in the High Court until I have advised on the evidence.”

Khan is well-known in Kenya for successfully defending deputy president William Ruto against charges of crimes against humanity in the ICC from 2013 to 2016.

While the undulating manicured tea bushes, extending as far as the eye can see, evoke painful memories for the elderly, the younger generation are more skeptical about the case.

“If they tell the multinationals to leave who will employ us?” asked Justus Ngetich, 30, a taxi driver in Bomet, some 70 km south of Kericho. “It is all about power and politics, not about the well-being of the people. We shall just sit here and watch the tea estates change hands from the whites to blacks.”
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Uganda Rights Officials Note Little Government Action on Abuses

Posted on by SeeAF

Last year, Uganda’s Ministry of Gender, Labor and Social Development worked with Parliament to enact and implement the Children Amendment Act, which prohibits corporal punishment in schools.

Of 93 recommendations made by the Uganda Human Rights Commission, this is the only one that government departments have fully complied with in the past five years.

“If there is no compliance and we keep on making the same recommendations and piling new ones and nothing is being done, that means the violations that we have assessed and recommendations we have made to address those violations are not implemented,” said Katebalirwe Amooti Wa Irumba, who chairs the commission. “The violations will continue. In fact, they will become even worse.”

Chief among those concerns, the commission said, was the issue of torture by security forces.

The commission said it documented more than 1,000 cases of torture by police and 275 by the army from 2012 to 2016. The alleged abuses ranged from electric shocks and beatings to mock executions and the denial of food to detainees. These things occurred despite Uganda’s enactment of the Prevention and Prohibition of Torture Act of 2012.

“We shall do whatever is possible to make sure that we stop this act, and any officer who is involved in torture … will be arrested and taken to courts of law,” said Asan Kasingye, police spokesperson.

Other recommendations from the commission included a minimum wage mandate and categorization of skin treatments, lotions, sunglasses and hats that are appropriate for persons with albinism as essential drugs provided free of charge.

The Human Rights Commission is itself a government agency and has raised the issue of noncompliance with parliament.

The chairperson of the parliamentary human rights committee told VOA that lawmakers would hold hearings with government departments to find out why they were not making progress on the commission’s recommendations.

Colonel Shaban Bantariza, the deputy government spokesman, said funding was a problem.

“We are slow, not because we don’t like, but we can’t afford to make the necessary increments,” Bantariza said, citing such “competing priorities” as transportation, education and health spending.

The parliamentary committee said it would also look at what the Human Rights Commission called Uganda’s unmet international obligations.

For example, the commission said ratifying the Optional Protocol to the U.N. Convention Against Torture would provide for additional mechanisms to prevent torture and ill treatment by obliging Uganda to open up all detention sites to scrutiny at both domestic and international levels
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Bomb Kills 13, Hurts 24 in Baghdad; IS Claims Responsibility

Posted on by SeeEA

A car bomb exploded outside a popular ice cream shop in central Baghdad just after midnight on Monday, killing 13 people and wounding 24, hospital and police officials said.

The Islamic State militant group claimed responsibility for the attack, which Iraqi officials said involved apparently remotely detonated explosives inside a parked car. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.

The attack came just days into the holy month of Ramadan when Muslims fast during daylight hours. After sundown, families break their fast and Baghdad’s restaurants and cafes quickly fill up.

Videos posted to social media showed chaotic scenes on the streets surrounding the blast. A number of wounded lay on the ground, others propped themselves up on the colorful park benches outside the ice cream shop. One young girl, wearing a ribbon and bow in her hair, wandered the scene dazed.

Ramadan is often marked by an uptick in violence in Iraq.

Last year, Baghdad was rocked by a huge truck bomb attack that targeted a popular retail district in the city center where young people and families were shopping for new clothes ahead of the holiday that marks the end of Ramadan. The blast killed hundreds in the single deadliest event in Baghdad since Saddam Hussein was toppled in 2003. The IS group also claimed responsibility for that bombing, which ultimately led to the resignation of Iraq’s interior minister.

Tuesday’s attack comes as Iraqi troops are slowing pushing IS fighters out of their last strongholds in the northern city of Mosul. Iraqi commanders say the offensive, which recently entered its eight month, will mark the end of the IS caliphate in Iraq, but concede the group will likely increase insurgent attacks in the wake of military defeats.
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French President Holds ‘Extremely Frank’ Talks With Russia’s Putin

Posted on by SeeEU

France’s new president, Emmanuel Macron, hosted his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, at the Palace of Versailles near Paris Monday. In what he called “extremely frank, direct” talks, Macron criticized Russian media outlets for efforts to influence the French presidential election. He also questioned brutal treatment of the gay and lesbian community in Chechnya and Russia’s role in eastern Ukraine and Syria. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
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DC Roundup: Memorial Day Events, Trump ‘Confidence’ in Kushner, Merkel on Ties

Posted on by SeeUS

Developments over the weekend concerning President Donald Trump include holding his first Memorial Day events, saying he has “total confidence” in his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, regarding the ongoing Russia investigation, speaking out against a hate crime against Muslims in Portland, Oregon, as well as a spokeswoman for German Chancellor Angela Merkel saying she remains committed to trans-Atlantic relationships:

WATCH: Trump lays wreath at Arlington Cemetery, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Marking Memorial Day, Trump Notes Ongoing Battle on Terror — U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday paid tribute to “a new generation of American patriots” who, he said, “are fighting to win the battle against terrorism.” They are “risking their lives to protect our citizens from an enemy that uses the murder of innocents to wage war on humanity itself,” added Trump.

WATCH: Trump at Arlington Cemetery ceremony

US Observes Memorial Day, Honoring Its War Dead — The U.S. is celebrating Memorial Day to honor its war dead. President Donald Trump, in his first Memorial Day as the U.S. leader, laid a wreath Monday at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier at Arlington National Cemetery just outside Washington. Officially, Memorial Day, observed on the last Monday in May, has been set aside to honor all who died during military service throughout U.S. history.

Trump Says Has ‘Total Confidence’ in Son-in-law, Key Adviser Kushner — .S. President Donald Trump is defending Jared Kushner, his son-in-law and a senior White House adviser, who news reports say attempted to establish a back-channel communications link to Russian officials in the weeks before Trump assumed power in January. “Jared is doing a great job for the country,” Trump told The New York Times late Sunday. “I have total confidence in him. He is respected by virtually everyone and is working on programs that will save our country billions of dollars. In addition to that, and perhaps more importantly, he is a very good person.”

Help or Hindrance? Trump’s Effect on Midterm Elections — Congressional investigations have long timelines. House Republicans do not. 239 House Republicans are facing down a November 2018 mid-term election, which will determine whether they get to keep their jobs. They have to weigh the merits – and the costs – of supporting President Donald Trump.

Spokesman: Merkel Remains Committed to Strong Trans-Atlantic Ties — German Chancellor Angela Merkel remains committed to strong trans-Atlantic relations, her spokesman said Monday, after the German leader suggested that the United States is no longer a reliable partner. “Because trans-Atlantic relations are so important to this chancellor, it is right from her viewpoint to speak out honestly about differences,” spokesman Steffen Seibert said Monday during a news conference.

Attack on US Train Brings Statements Against Hate — Days after U.S. President Donald Trump told Muslim leaders of the need to unite to stamp out terrorism and extremism, a man on a train in the northwestern U.S. city of Portland, Oregon, targeted two teenagers with an anti-Muslim rant, then killed two people and wounded another who confronted him. In a tweet Monday, President Trump called the attack “unacceptable.”
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Car Bombing Kills 13 in Iraq

Posted on by SeeEA

A car bomb has exploded outside a popular ice cream shop in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, killing at least 13 people and wounding 24 others.

The bombing late Monday comes just three days into the holy month of Ramadan, when Muslims flock to cafes and restaurants after a whole day of fasting.

Islamic State militants claimed responsibility for the attack, which Iraqi officials said involved apparently remotely detonated explosives inside a parked car.

Islamic State was also responsible for a big truck bombing during Ramadan last year that killed hundreds of people.
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Chicago Startup Founded by Military Veterans ‘Cultivating Peace’ in Afghanistan

Posted on by SeeUS

At Café Bar-Ba-Reeba on Chicago’s north side, there is one key ingredient that could make or break Executive Chef Matt Holmes’ menu.

“We feature it in our paeallas, which are our signature dish here at Café Bar Ba Reeba, as well as use it in a dessert and some other dishes as well, so its incredibly important to have high quality saffron,” Holmes explained to VOA from his test kitchen above the restaurant, where he was preparing one of those signature dishes.

Saffron has long been one of the world’s most expensive spices, at times traded as currency. The saffron “crocus” that produces the spice grows mostly in parts of Europe, Iran and India.

It is a staple in cuisine throughout Asia, the Middle East and the Mediterranean, but less so in the United States, where saffron — while a $60 million market  has limited appeal.

But Rumi Spice, Holmes’ saffron supplier, is hoping to change that.

“We are named after Juhalladin Rumi, he was a 13th century poet and philosopher who was born in present day Afghanistan, and a Sufi mystic,” says founder Kimberly Jung.  “One of his most famous sayings is, ‘Where there is ruin, there is hope for treasure.’”

Veterans inspired by relationships

Kimberly Jung, Keith Alaniz and Emily Miller are three of the founders of Rumi Spice, U.S. military veterans who served in Afghanistan who returned with more than just combat experience.

“I was never able to resolve just going to Afghanistan, spending time, and then leaving and never thinking about the place again, especially when you form relationships with people who live there,” says Alaniz.

Those relationships inspired the business strategy for Rumi Spice — increasing demand in the U.S. for saffron produced by Afghan farmers they met in Herat province. Saffron has very limited demand in Afghanistan, leaving the market for it outside the country.

“Afghanistan has essentially been cut off from the international market for 30 years,” says Alaniz.  “They are producing a great product but they aren’t able to get a fair value for their goods because they are not able to export it anywhere.”

Another challenge

Afghanistan’s enduring instability isn’t the only challenge to getting Afghan saffron to market.

“Near to 20 years we’ve been growing saffron, there are still no certificates for our saffron product,” says Abdullah Faiz, chancellor of Heart University, which is working with Purdue University in Indiana to develop a “department of food technology,” with Afghan saffron farmers in mind.

“The department of food technology will teach and give training for the farmers to produce the saffron with hygiene quality,” says Faiz, adding that it could help increase demand for Afghan saffron in new markets.

Quality, taste is key

A lack of international certification hasn’t stood in the way of Rumi Spice, which conducts rigorous tests to make sure the saffron it is importing is clean and pure before arriving in the United States.

The quality and taste of Rumi Spice saffron is what attracted Matt Holmes as a customer.

“It’s much higher potency,” says Holmes.  “So while we pay a premium to use Rumi, it actually goes a longer way, so that’s another benefit of using a higher quality product  you can stretch how much you are using each time.”

Famous investor

“Our supply is outpacing our demand,” says Alaniz, “which is good for us because it keeps our prices low at the moment, but we hope to increase more demand here in the U.S. so we can purchase more saffron.”

“The good thing about Rumi is they have a premium product that’s fantastic to use,” says Chef Matt Homes.  “You are kind of doing double duty with the program that they have with helping farmers in Afghanistan and helping women, being a positive influence instead of just selling a product, so you really get the best of both worlds.”

These are qualities investors also are noticing.  Rumi Spice was recently featured on the U.S. reality television show “Shark Tank,” where entrepreneur Marc Cuban committed $250,000 for a 15 percent stake in the company, signaling his faith in Rumi Spice, and the future potential for saffron grown in Afghanistan.

 
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Moreno: Assange is a ‘Hacker’ But Will Continue to Receive Haven

Posted on by SeeEU

Ecuador’s new President Lenin Moreno described WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as a “hacker” but said he would continue to receive asylum in the South American country’s embassy in London.

“Mr. Assange is a hacker. That’s something we reject, and I personally reject,” Moreno told journalists on Monday. “But I respect the situation he is in, which calls for respect of his human rights, but we also ask that he respects the situation he is in.”

Moreno’s tone is a sharp break from that of his predecessor Rafael Correa, who had said Assange was a “journalist and granted him asylum in London in 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden over rape allegations. And Moreno’s right-wing opponent in the election had promised to kick Assange out of the embassy if he won.

Since taking power, Moreno has also warned Assange “not to intervene in the politics” of Ecuador or its allies.

Assange, who denies the allegations, feared Sweden would hand him over to the United States to face prosecution over WikiLeaks’ publication of thousands of classified military and diplomatic documents in one of the largest information leaks in U.S. history.

Even though Sweden dropped the charges earlier this month, authorities in London have warned Assange that he would be arrested if he left the embassy that his been his home for five years.

 
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Garang Widow Asks South Sudan Soldiers to Lay Down Arms

Posted on by SeeAF

The widow of South Sudan liberation hero John Garang is calling on government soldiers to forsake President Salva Kiir.

Rebecca Nyandeng told VOA’s South Sudan in Focus the country’s internal conflict benefits mainly the president, who she said is amassing wealth while soldiers go without paychecks.

“I am appealing to soldiers of the SPLA not to fight one another, to come back for peace, and leave this senseless war for President Salva,” Nyandeng said Monday.

The SPLA, which fought for South Sudan’s independence from Sudan, split into pro and anti-government factions at the start of the war in December 2013.

Nyandeng said if government solders put down their arms, Salva Kiir “will not be able to stay in power.”

According to the United Nations, more than 1.8 million South Sudanese have fled the country since fighting broke out in late 2013.  Another 1.9 million are internally displaced from their homes.

Earlier this month, a U.N. report said South Sudanese pro-government forces killed at least 114 civilians between July 2016 and January 2017 in Yei town.

The Human Rights Division of the U.N. Mission in South Sudan said the crimes, including indiscriminate shelling of civilians, targeted killings and burning of civilian property “may amount to war crimes.”
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Paris Mayor Says ‘Solution’ Found for Black Feminist Event

Posted on by SeeEU

The mayor of Paris said Monday that a “clear solution” has been found with organizers of a festival for black feminists, an event that had aroused her ire because four-fifths of the festival space was to be open exclusively to black women.

Mayor Anne Hidalgo had strongly criticized and threatened to cancel the upcoming Nyansapo Festival a day earlier because it was “forbidden to white people.”

 

In a new series of tweets on the topic, Hidalgo said her “firm” discussion with organizers had yielded a satisfactory clarification: the parts of the festival held on property would be open to everyone and “non-mixed workshops will be held elsewhere, in a strictly private setting.”

Three-day event

 

MWASI, the Afro-feminist collective sponsoring the three-day event, responded to the mayor’s latest comments by saying it hadn’t changed the festival program “an inch.”

 

“That’s what was planned from the beginning,” the collective said of how the public and private spaces would be assigned.

Anti-racism associations and far-right politicians in France both had criticized the event over the weekend for scheduling workshops limited to a single gender and race.

 

France defines itself as a country united under one common national identity, with laws against racial discrimination and to promote secularism to safeguard an ideal that began with the French Revolution.

Paris mayor steps in

On Sunday, Hidalgo had said she would call on authorities to prohibit the cultural festival and might call for the prosecution of its organizers on grounds of discrimination.

“I firmly condemn the organization of this event in Paris (that’s) ’forbidden to white people,’” Hidalgo had written.  

 

Telephone calls to MWASI were not immediately returned Monday.

 

The group describes itself on its website as “an Afro-feminist collective that is part of the revolutionary liberation struggles” and is open to black and mixed-race women.

The program for the first annual Nyansapo Festival, which is set to run July 28-30 partly at a Paris cultural center, stated that 80 percent of the event space only would be accessible to black women.

Rights group condemns festival

Other sessions were designed to be open to black men and women from minority groups that experience racial discrimination, and one space was scheduled to be open to everyone regardless of race or gender.

 

Organizers said on the event’s website that “for this first edition we have chosen to put the accent on how our resistance as an Afro-feminist movement is organized.”

Prominent French rights organization SOS Racism was among civil rights groups condemning the festival, calling it “a mistake, even an abomination, because it wallows in ethnic separation, whereas anti-racism is a movement which seeks to go beyond race.”

 

The International League Against Racism and Anti-Semitism (LICRA), meanwhile, called the festival a “regression” and said American civil rights icon “Rosa Parks must be turning in her grave.”

 

 

‘Burkini party’

 

Identity politics remain a recurrent hot potato in a nation where collecting data based on religious and ethnic backgrounds is banned and the wearing of religious symbols — such as face-covering veils — in public is prohibited.

This approach, known to the French as “anti-communitarianism,” aims to celebrate all French citizens regardless of their community affiliations.

Last week, several women attempting to stage a “burkini party” were detained in Cannes after a ban against the full-body beachwear favored by some Muslim women was upheld in a fresh decree.
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Marking Memorial Day, Trump Notes Ongoing Battle on Terror

Posted on by SeeUS

U.S. President Donald Trump on Monday paid tribute to “a new generation of American patriots” who, he said, “are fighting to win the battle against terrorism.”

They are “risking their lives to protect our citizens from an enemy that uses the murder of innocents to wage war on humanity itself,” added Trump.

He made the remarks in a Memorial Day speech at the 253-hectare Arlington National Cemetery just after he laid a wreath to honor the more than 300,000 military veterans who are buried there.

Trump is expected at any time to announce a decision on a Pentagon request for an increase in the number of U.S. troops for the continuing war in Afghanistan.

Barack Obama, in the final months of his presidency, did not make a decision on the Defense Department request, preferring to hand it off to the incoming president who would be commander-in-chief by the time any additional forces would head to what has become America’s longest-running military campaign.

The United States invaded Afghanistan following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaida, which had been given protection by the Taliban-led government in Kabul.

While the Taliban were driven from the capital and Afghanistan now has a democratically-elected government, strongly backed by Washington diplomatically and militarily, the hardline Islamic militancy is still fighting and recently has been inflicting heavy casualties on Afghan forces.

The conflict, overall, has killed nearly 2,400 American military personnel plus more than 1,100 coalition soldiers. That death toll pales in comparison to the estimated 170,000 fatalities among local fighters and civilians in Afghanistan and across the border in Pakistan.

There are currently about 8,400 U.S. troops in Afghanistan and commanders have requested an additional 5,000.

Although NATO’s formal combat role in the country ended in 2014, it has a total of 13,000 troops in Afghanistan and is considering an increase in the number.

“Sending a few thousand more U.S. and other NATO troops to Afghanistan will have at most a marginal effect. It may stabilize the front lines of a war where the main battles are in the rear, politics, governance, geo-economics, and diplomacy,” said Barnett Rubin, associate director of the Center on International Cooperation at New York University.

He added that a troop increase could be helpful if there is also an aggressive push for a political settlement, “but instead the military wants to postpone negotiation until we and the government are in a better position.”

Afghan defense officials and military commanders say they do not need more foreign fighters, rather more advisers for training, better equipment and engineering technology.

Rubin, a former top adviser on Afghanistan at both the State Department and United Nations, told VOA that Washington’s “priority is not the stability of Afghanistan, but maintaining a long-term military presence there to strike threats in the region, and the countries of the region will keep the war going as long as necessary to make the U.S. withdraw.”

The Taliban currently control about 40 percent of Afghanistan.
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Students Tackle Tough US Defense Problems

Posted on by SeeUS

There are more than 100 entrepreneurship courses at Stanford University. But only one involves students running into the ocean fully dressed or donning explosives device uniforms.

In the Hacking for Defense class, students tackle problems facing troops and defense agencies. They are expected to go out in the field to understand what it is like to be a soldier struggling with mapping technology or a returning veteran dealing with multiple injuries.  

“They work on some of the toughest real world problems they are ever going to see,” said Steve Blank, one of the class instructors.

“With all due respect to Google and Dropbox and Facebook and Twitter, which they all have opportunities in the valley to go work for as graduates here, these are some problems that make those look trivial by comparison,” he said.

Agencies within the Department of Defense give the class problems. The students could be challenged with finding ways to help veterans with multiple injuries or figuring out a technology so that Navy Seal divers don’t have to come up for air as frequently.

Students interview people as part of a methodology for turning ideas quickly into solutions, known as “minimum viable products.” They constantly test their hypotheses for a solution and from the interviews often learn they have to start over again. This methodology, dubbed the “Lean Launchpad,” is used by the National Science Foundation’s Innovation Core program for commercializing science.

The Stanford students also have to learn how decisions are made inside the organization.

“Deployment means, where is the money coming from?” said Blank. “Who do you have to convince? Is it the general, is it some program manager? Is it a series of people. Who is actually going to build it?”

Eye-opener

The unusual 10-week course is an eye-opener for the students who learn up close the challenges facing national security. In addition to Stanford, the class is now taught at eight other universities.

Benji Nguyen, a public policy student from Austin, Texas, is working on cyber security at U.S. ports as part of USTRANSCOM, which manages transportation in the United States.

 

He’s talked about the class with his parents.

“When I told them I was working with the military to help solve a problem, they were really excited about it actually,” he said.

 

For U.S. students, the Hacking for Defense class gives them a unique chance to serve their country; but, it also has attracted a surprising number of foreign-born students, said Blank.

 

“I was surprised by the number of foreign students from Singapore, China and India who were just interested in learning the same methodology and take it home from wherever they are,” he said.

 

Some students go on to create companies out of their class project.

When he took Hacking for Defense last year at Stanford, Payam Banazadeh, the chief executive of Capella Space, said his team interviewed more than 150 people, asking, “What are your pain points? What keeps you up? If you had money to spend, what would you spend it on?” The team was working on satellites that can gather data even with cloud cover and darkness.

“If their answers matched our technology, then you had a real customer,” said the Iranian-born entrepreneur.  

Recently, Capella raised $12 million in funding. It counts the Department of Defense among its customers.
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Campaigning Starts in Kenya

Posted on by SeeAF

In Kenya, the official campaign period has begun as the electoral body clears candidates to run for the presidency. The commission is calling on the candidates to maintain peace during the August polls.

Kenya’s presidential campaign has begun with 70 days to the August elections. So far the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission has cleared seven candidates and rejected three because of logistical issues.

Addressing Jubilee Party supporters Monday in Nairobi, Deputy President William Ruto said he and the president would make a re-election bid.

“As you are aware today President Uhuru Kenyatta is going to present his papers to the IEBC given to him by Jubilee Party so that he can compete for the presidency on August 8th and we thank you for coming to escort him to the commission,” he said.

Kenyatta, who is seeking a second term, was the seventh candidate cleared by the IEBC.

The main opposition coalition led by former Prime Minister Raila Odinga was one of the presidential hopefuls to be cleared Sunday. Odinga, running for president for the fourth time, is expected to be Kenyatta’s main challenger.

Electoral commission chairman Wafula Chebukati warned leaders against incitement.

“You have signed the accord of conduct both as political parties as well as candidates and as a commission we shall not hesitate to take any action if you breach that code of conduct. We want this country to be peaceful before, during and after this election,” said Chebukati.

The opposition agreed to hold a peaceful campaign. Odinga called on the commission to deliver an election that represents the will of the people.

“IEBC must leave up to its billing which is not only deliver free and fair but to ensure that those elections are truly free and fair,” he said.

Kenya is still haunted by the 2007 presidential election, won by Mwai Kibaki in a hotly-disputed vote. Post-election violence killed more than 1,100 people and forced the top parties into a power-sharing government.

Kenyatta’s election in 2013 was peaceful, but was marred by accusations that he and Ruto had helped to organize the 2007 violence. The International Criminal Court eventually dropped charges of crimes against humanity for both men, citing a lack of evidence.
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Manchester Bomber’s Mosque Comes Under Scrutiny

Posted on by SeeEU

The mosque where the Manchester bomber prayed is coming under the spotlight after it emerged at least two other British recruits of the Islamic State also worshipped there.

One of the recruits, Khalil Raoufi, died fighting in Syria in 2014. The other, Ahmed Ibrahim Halane, is living in Denmark, where he holds citizenship and is banned from re-entering Britain.

Halane’s sisters, Zahra and Salma Halane, who traveled to Syria to become “jihadi brides,” are believed also to have worshipped at the mosque, say local Muslims.

Last week, trustees of the Didsbury Mosque and Islamic Center issued a statement condemning as an act of cowardice the Manchester Arena bombing by 22-year old British-Libyan Salman Abedi. The bombing left 22 people dead and 100 injured.

The trustees detailed clashes Abedi had with imam Mohammed Saeed over sermons he delivered denouncing IS in 2015. Saeed said Abedi looked at him “with hate” after he gave a sermon criticizing IS and militant Libyan group Ansar al-Sharia. Saeed said most of the mosque’s members supported the condemnation of IS, although a few signed a petition criticizing him.

Saeed said he reported his worries about Abedi’s friends to the police. Manchester police say the mosque is not under investigation.

Inconsistent statements

Mosque elders have been inconsistent in their remarks about Salman Abedi and his attendance at the mosque. Saeed acknowledged the suicide bomber was a regular worshipper until the 2015 argument over IS. But mosque chairman, Muhamad el-Khayat, said last week while other family members were regulars, Salman Abedi “himself we did not know, maybe we have seen him once.”

The bomber’s father Ramadan was a member of the anti-Gadhafi Libyan Islamic Fighting Group that had ties to Osama bin Laden but whose

leaders insist they never affiliated to al Qaida . Ramadan called worshippers to prayer at the Manchester mosque before he moved back to Libya after the ouster of Muammar Gadhafi. He is being held by a vigilante militia in Tripoli along with one of his sons, who the militia says has confessed to IS membership and was involved in a plan to assassinate U.N. envoy to Libya Martin Kobler.

Mosque elders have also appeared defensive. They have refused to allow the media into the mosque and tried to block a Muslim reporter from the BBC from entering to pray.

During Friday prayers, el-Khayat told worshippers the media interest in the mosque, which has been receiving threats and hate mail and is being guarded by police, had been overwhelming. He said the elders fear being misinterpreted.

“We strongly continue to condemn the horrendous crime that was committed,” he said. He praised Britain as a hospitable country for Muslims.

But his remarks aren’t silencing mounting criticism from Muslim activists opposed to militant Islamic ideologies. They say the mosque must bear some responsibility for Abedi’s radicalization because of the conservative Salafi brand of Islam it espouses.

Providing platform for hate

Maajid Nawaz, who helped found the London-based counter-extremist group, Quilliam, has accused the Didsbury mosque of hosting preachers who expressed anti-Semitic and anti-liberal views.

Speaking on London radio station LBC, Nawaz, a British-Pakistani, refused to praise the mosque for its condemnation of IS, saying “the biggest danger to our community at the moment is extremist preachers like this, using mosques that tolerate extremist preachers like this, that breed jihadist terrorists.”

“Until we can separate these extremists from our community and isolate them, don’t blame the rest of society for wondering whether every Muslim is an extremist, when our mosques are hosting the extremists themselves,” he added.

There has been fierce debate in Britain in recent years about the role mosques play, unwittingly or not, in the process of radicalization. In 2015, Conservative peer Baroness Warsi, a Muslim, claimed most radicalization is happening online and not at mosques.

But two British government reports have warned extremists take advantage of mosques and other institutions, including universities, to spread a “poisonous narrative.”

In a recent study of British IS recruits for the Henry Jackson Society, British research institute analyst Emma Webb warned some mosques have “functioned as spaces in which extremists could socialize with each other and form relationships” and where extremists can begin the process of recruitment.

She told VOA some family members of British IS recruits complain that by providing a platform, even for non-violent Salafi ideology, some mosques are playing a role in the radicalization process.

“It isn’t so much that they recruited them,” she argued, “but that they gave them an ideology that allowed them to think it was okay to kill Shi’ites and okay to hate certain people, so it made it easier for them to be recruited subsequently.”

 
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South Sudan Holds Trial for Troops Accused of Rape, Murder of Aid Workers

Posted on by SeeAF

South Sudanese soldiers accused of raping at least five foreign aid workers and killing their local colleague last year are due to stand trial in a military court on Tuesday, a key test of the government’s ability to prosecute war crimes.

Prosecutor Abubaker Mohammed, an army colonel, told Reuters that between 15 to 20 government soldiers face charges including murder, rape and looting during the attack on the Terrain hotel in the capital Juba on July 11, 2016.

U.N. investigators and rights group have frequently accused both the army and rebels of murder, torture and rape since the civil war began in 2013, and say the crimes almost always go unpunished.

“We want to eliminate these crimes within the army,” Mohammed said, adding he would examine the responsibility of senior officers.

“The commander is always responsible for the actions of the soldiers,” he said. “But … sometimes a soldier can go and commit an offense without the knowledge of the commander.”

The attack, one of the worst on foreign aid workers in South Sudan’s civil war, took place as President Salva Kiir’s government troops won a three-day battle in Juba over opposition forces loyal to former Vice President Riek Machar.

The three-year conflict has fractured the country along ethnic lines — Kiir is an ethnic Dinka, Machar is a Nuer – and forced a quarter of the 12 million-strong population to flee their homes.

During the hours-long attack on the hotel compound, victims phoned U.N. peacekeepers stationed a mile away and begged for help, but none came. The military head of the peacekeeping mission was fired and the political head resigned over the incident.

Survivors speak out

Murderers face a minimum of 10 years in jail with a fine paid to the victim’s family, or a maximum of the death penalty, Mohammed said. Rapists face up to 14 years.

Rebecca Chuol Ungdeng, whose aid worker husband John Gatluak was killed in the attack, said she feared returning for the trial.

“Why was he killed while he is not a soldier?” she said from exile in Uganda. “He has no enmity with anyone. Is it because he is Nuer?”

Mohammed said witnesses who could not travel to Juba could testify via video or send a representative.

However, five survivors said they had not been called to testify, raising questions about the government’s ability to carry out a fair trial.

Two of the rape victims said they might return to Juba to testify if their anonymity and safety was guaranteed.

“The most important outcome for me is to end the culture of impunity,” said a Western woman sexually assaulted by four soldiers. “I don’t think it should just be about us and about our case, but about this larger issue of bringing justice to these crimes [committed against] many other people as well.”

Another Western aid worker, raped by 15 soldiers, said the accused are likely low-ranking and may have been recruited when they were children.

“I’m much more angry at the senior levels of the army who were aware of the attack, who knew and did nothing, or more senior soldiers who were there seeing these things happening and did little,” she said.

The then-commander of the presidential guard, Marial Chanuong, declined to comment. An army spokesmen did not answer calls.
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Warplanes Carry Out 3 Strikes on Libya’s Derna, Witness Says

Posted on by SeeEA

Warplanes launched three airstrikes on the eastern Libyan city of Derna on Monday, a witness said, an apparent continuation of Egyptian raids on the

city that began last week after militants ambushed a bus and killed Egyptian Christians.

There was no immediate confirmation of Monday’s strikes from officials in Libya or neighboring Egypt, nor any claim of responsibility for the raid on the city at the eastern end of Libya’s Mediterranean coast.

However, Egypt has previously acknowledged conducting airstrikes on targets in Libya since Friday and said it would launch further raids if necessary. A powerful Libyan force in the east of the country says it has coordinated air raids with Cairo.

The witness said one attack hit the western entrance to Derna and the other two hit Dahr al-Hamar, an area in the south of the city.

Egyptian jets attacked Derna on Friday, just hours after masked militants boarded vehicles en route to a monastery in the southern Egyptian province of Minya and opened fire at close range, killing 29 and wounding 24.

Islamic State claimed responsibility for that attack in Egypt, the latest targeting the Christian minority there. Two church bombings also claimed by Islamic State killed more than 45 people last month.

According to Yasser Risk, chairman of state newspaper Akhbar Elyoum and former war correspondent with close ties to Egypt’s presidency, 15 targets were hit on the first day of strikes, including in Derna and Jafra, in central Libya, where what he called “terrorism centers” were located.

He said the targets included leadership headquarters as well as training camps and weapons storage facilities and 60 fighter jets were used for the earlier raids. Egypt struck Derna again on Saturday.

Egypt has carried out airstrikes on its neighbor occasionally since Libya descended into factional fighting in the years following the 2011 civil war that ousted Muammar Gaddafi.

Islamist militant groups, including Islamic State, have gained ground in the chaos, and Derna, a city of around 150,000 that straddles the coastal highway linking Libya to Egypt, has frequently served as one of their main bases.

Egypt has been backing eastern commander Khalifa Haftar, whose Libyan National Army has been fighting Islamist militant groups and other fighters in Benghazi and Derna for more than two years.

Libyan National Army spokesman Col. Ahmad Messmari told reporters in Benghazi late on Sunday that Haftar’s forces were coordinating with Egypt’s military in airstrikes and the weekend raids targeted ammunition stores and operations camps.

Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi said on Friday the air raids targeted militants responsible for plotting the attack, and that Egypt would not hesitate to carry out additional strikes inside and outside the country.
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Egypt, Libya Attack Militants who Murdered Egyptian Christians Last Week

Posted on by SeeEA

Egyptian and Libyan warplanes reportedly launched more airstrikes against Islamic militants who murdered 29 Egyptian Christians last week.

Witnesses say Monday’s attacks targeted the Libyan city of Derna, where Egypt says the militants have camps.

Egyptian military officials have not confirmed Monday’s attack. But a Libyan spokesman said two groups affiliated with al-Qaida were the targets.

Egypt’s air force began attacking the camps Friday, just hours after militants rounded up Christians in the Egyptian province of Minya and opened fire, killing 29 and wounding 24.

A governing Libyan faction in the east allied with Egypt, is taking part in the airstrikes.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov was in Cairo Monday, saying Moscow will back any initiative that will genuinely help in the fight against terrorism.

He met with Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry who said Cairo is closely coordinating with Russia in the fight, including stopping the terror financing and preventing countries from giving a safe haven to extremists.
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