Month: September 2017

Vatican Denounces Ousted Auditor Who Says He Was Forced out

Posted on by SeeEU

The Vatican on Sunday denounced its ousted auditor general for revealing that he resigned under threat of arrest for what he says were trumped-up charges.

In a statement, the Vatican admitted that Libero Milone resigned in June after Vatican investigators determined his office had “illegally hired an outside company to conduct investigations into the private lives of Holy See personnel.”

Milone told reporters Saturday that he was told on June 19 that Pope Francis had lost confidence in him. He said he was subsequently subject to an “aggressive” interrogation by Vatican police who seized material from his office and told him to resign or face arrest.

“They wanted me to confess to something. I don’t know what, because I acted within the confines of the statute,” he told Sky TG24 and other media.

The Vatican said Milone had exceeded his mandate, freely tendered his resignation and was treated with full respect by investigators. It said it was “surprised and saddened” that Milone had violated the terms of his departure, which had called for secrecy about the reasons behind it.

Milone’s resignation had raised eyebrows because he was only two years into a five-year term, and had been seen as a key part of Francis’ efforts to reform the Vatican’s finances. Along with Cardinal George Pell, he was tasked with overseeing the Holy See’s budgets and making sense of the finances of the Vatican’s various departments.

Pell recently returned to his native Australia to face trial on historic sex abuse allegations, which he denies. His secretariat for the economy, which includes Milone’s office, is being run by underlings for now.
…

your ad here

Thousands Rally Across Catalonia for Independence from Spain

Posted on by SeeEU

Thousands of Catalan separatists are rallying in public squares in Barcelona and other towns in support of a disputed referendum on independence of the northeastern region from Spain.

Many are carrying pro-independence flags and signs calling for the Oct. 1 independence vote that the Spanish government calls illegal and has pledged to stop.

The crowds have been asked by secessionist politicians to print and distribute posters supporting the vote.

Carme Forcadell, the speaker of Catalonia’s regional parliament, told a Barcelona crowd, “I ask you to go out and vote! Vote for the future of Catalonia!”

Spain’s Constitutional Court has suspended the local law calling for the referendum and police have cracked down on preparations for the vote.

Separatists have pressed ahead anyway, vowing to declare independence if the “Yes” wins.
…

your ad here

Trump Issues More Threats Against N. Korea

Posted on by SeeUS

U.S. President Donald Trump has responded to insults from North Korea’s foreign minister with more threats.

“Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won’t be around much longer!” Trump said on Twitter.

North Korea’s foreign minister brought a dictionary full of insults for Trump when he addressed the U.N. General Assembly on Saturday.

Ri Yong Ho said he needed to respond to Trump, who on Tuesday called North Korean leader Kim Jong Un “Rocket Man” and said he was on a suicide mission with his nuclear program.

 

Ri called Trump “a mentally deranged person full of megalomania” who is on a suicide mission of his own.

 

“In case innocent lives of the U.S. are lost because of this suicide attack,” Trump will be held totally responsible,” he said, in response to the U.S. president’s threat to “totally destroy” North Korea if it attacks the United States or one of its allies.

 

“During his eight months in power, he has turned the White House into a noisy marketing place full of crackling sounds of abacus beads, and now he has tried to turn the U.N. arena into a gangsters’ nest where money is respected and bloodshed is the order of the day,” Ri said, in an apparent criticism of Trump’s billionaire businessman roots.

Sees itself as victim

Ri sought to portray his country as the victim of U.S. threats and aggression. He condemned earlier remarks by President Trump in which he promised “fire and fury like the world has never seen” after North Korea threatened to fire missiles at the U.S. island territory of Guam in August.

“What else could be a bigger threat than the violent remarks… coming from the top authority of the world’s biggest nuclear power?” Ri asked.

 

“The very reason the DPRK had to possess nuclear weapons is because of the U.S.,” he said, using the acronym for the country’s formal name.

But he appeared to almost mock Washington for saying that it hopes not to have to use a military option.

 

“Although they talk about “fire and fury,” “total destruction” and whatever, every time they have to add various conditions such as, “hopefully this will not be necessary,” “that is not our first option” and so on,” Ri said.

 

Ri also lashed out at Japan and South Korea, calling them “stooges” of Washington.

 

On September 3, Pyongyang conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test to date.

The regime said it was the successful launch of a hydrogen bomb mounted on an intercontinental ballistic missile. The foreign minister waxed poetic about it to the General Assembly.

 

“The ICBM marked with sacred name of DPRK flew over the universe above the endless blue sky, the warhead of our rocket left its trace on the blue waves of the Pacific Ocean and the tremendous explosion and vibration of the hydrogen bomb were recorded by this planet,” Ri said.
…

your ad here

Turkish FM Visits 2 Turks Jailed in US for May Brawl

Posted on by SeeEA

Turkey’s top diplomat has visited two Turks imprisoned in the United States for their alleged involvement in an infamous brawl that has raised tensions between the two countries.

Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu tweeted that he visited Sinan Narin and Eyup Yildirim late Saturday and said he passed on “our nation’s love and greetings.” The men were photographed in orange jumpsuits with the minister.

 

The two defendants are among 19 suspects accused of attacking protestors outside the Turkish ambassador’s Washington home in May during a visit by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Turkey has said the demonstrators were outlawed Kurdish militants.

 

Narin and Yildirim were arrested in June and charged with multiple counts of assault. The indictment also accused 15 bodyguards, including the head of Erdogan’s security detail.
…

your ad here

Iraq’s Kurds to Vote on Independence Amid Fears of Unrest

Posted on by SeeEA

‘For the sake of the sacrifices and blood of the martyrs, let’s all say yes for Kurdistan independence,” reads a large billboard in the center of Kalak, a small town in Iraq’s northern Kurdish region. “Independence is not given, it’s taken!” reads another banner hanging below a cluster of red, green, yellow and white Kurdish flags.

 

Iraq’s Kurds are set to vote Monday in a referendum on support for independence that has stirred fears of instability across the region as the war against the Islamic State group winds down. The Kurds are likely to approve the referendum, but the non-binding vote is not expected to result in any formal declaration of independence.

 

International opposition

The United Sates and the United Nations have condemned the referendum. Turkey, which is battling its own Kurdish insurgency, has threatened to use military force to prevent the emergence of an independent Kurdish state, and Baghdad has warned it will respond militarily to any violence resulting from the vote.

 

Initial results from the poll are expected on Tuesday, with the official results announced later in the week.

 

Denied independence when colonial powers drew the map of the Middle East after World War I, the Kurds form a sizable minority in Turkey, Iran, Syria, and Iraq. They have long been at odds with the Baghdad government over the sharing of oil revenues and the fate of disputed territories like the city of Kirkuk, which are expected to take part in the vote.

 

“There are pressures on us to postpone, to engage in dialogue with Baghdad, but we will not go back to a failed experiment,” Masoud Barzani, the Kurdish regional president, said to roars of applause at a rally of tens of thousands in Irbil, the capital of the Kurdish region, on Friday evening.

 

But beneath the sea of flag-waving, the Kurdish region continues to be plagued by endemic corruption and economic decline.

 

Among the portraits on Kalak’s main street is that of Amen Jadr Mahmoud’s 18-year-old son, Gaylan, one of the more than 1,500 Kurdish fighters, known as the peshmerga, killed in the fight against the Islamic State group. “His death was noble, he died fighting for Kurdistan,” Mahmoud said.

 

But even Mahmoud, a die-hard nationalist who lost four other relatives to fighting with Iraqi government forces decades earlier, has misgivings about the Kurdish region’s political leadership.

 

“If we have a state then we will build institutions that will let us change the faces of the main parties,” he said. “Once we have a state we can get rid of them or at least prevent them from stealing so much.”

 

Military allies

The Kurds have been a close American ally for decades, and the first U.S. airstrikes in the campaign against IS were launched to protect Irbil. Kurdish forces later regrouped and played a major role in driving the extremists from much of northern Iraq, including Mosul, the country’s second largest city.

“The Kurdish contribution to the ISIS fight, it can’t be overstated,” said U.S. Army Col. Charles Costanza, a commander at a coalition base just outside Irbil, using another acronym for the extremist group. “We couldn’t have done Mosul without the Kurds.”

 

But the U.S. has long been opposed to Kurdish moves toward independence, fearing it could lead to the breakup of Iraq and bring even more instability to an already volatile Middle East.

 

Mahmoud and other Kurds who support independence view the international opposition as a betrayal.

 

“My son was fighting Daesh on behalf of the entire world,” said Mahmoud, using an Arabic acronym for IS. “And now the international community is ignoring us.”

 

The Kurds’ sense of sacrifice and betrayal is rooted in decades of war and oppression, in which they repeatedly rose up against the Baghdad government and were often brutally repressed.

 

During the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, the Kurds sided with Iran against Saddam Hussein, who punished them with a scorched-earth campaign involving chemical weapons that killed an estimated 50,000 people. A no-fly zone imposed by the U.S. in the early 1990s largely halted the killings, and allowed the Kurds to develop de facto autonomy, which was formalized after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

 

Sense of urgency

In the years after the American invasion, the Kurdish region emerged as a rare success story. The peshmerga insulated the region from the insurgency and sectarian killings that plagued much of the rest Iraq, and oil revenues fueled an economic boom, leading to talk of a new Dubai.

 

That all changed in 2014, when IS rampaged across northern Iraq, at one point approaching within a few miles of Irbil. The collapse in global oil prices later that year led to a severe economic downturn, exposing a government riddled with corruption and an economy dominated by a bloated public sector. Barzani, whose term expired in 2015, has prevented parliament from meeting for two years, and many opponents of the referendum see it as a cynical attempt to hold onto power.

 

Meanwhile, as the peshmerga halted the IS advance and then began to push back with the help of U.S.-led airstrikes, they seized territory equivalent to 50 percent of their autonomous region, further raising tensions with Baghdad. The oil-rich city of Kirkuk, with large Kurdish, Arab, Turkmen and Christian communities, is divided over the referendum and has seen low-level clashes in the days leading up to Monday’s vote.

 

Hoshyar Zebari, a longtime Kurdish political figure and former Iraqi foreign minister, acknowledges that the referendum is partly an attempt by Kurdish leaders to cement their legacy, but says it is also rooted in Baghdad’s failings and in Iran’s growing influence over the central government.

 

“The new Iraq is broken,” he said. “If we miss this opportunity for independence, it will never happen again in our lifetimes.”
…

your ad here

In Photos: Germany Election

Posted on by SeeEU

Germany’s national election Sunday is widely expected to give Chancellor Angela Merkel a historic fourth mandate and the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party seats in parliament for the first time in 60 years.
…

your ad here

Merkel Win Seen As Inevitable, But Fears Mount of Late Far-Right Surge

Posted on by SeeEU

Germans headed to the polls Sunday in federal elections that will decide in effect whether Angela Merkel should serve a historic fourth term as Chancellor.

Merkel’s center-right Christian Democratic Union, along with its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, appear to be heading to a handsome victory, according to eve-of-poll surveys. The two parties are expected jointly to win between 36 to 39 percent of the vote.

Germany’s second largest party, the center-left Social Democrats, who were junior partners in Merkel’s outgoing government, is likely to scrape just a 23 percent share, which if accurate would be the party’s worst electoral performance since 2009.

But the big question remained as voters braved a gray wet day to bring a three-month election season to an end: whether reactionary nationalists would enter Germany’s Bundestag for the first time since the Nazi era, marking a sharp departure for a country that has limits on political speech and is wary of any dramatic expressions of nationalism.

Pollsters are predicting the far-right Alternative for Germany will breach the five percent vote threshold required to gain seats, something it failed to do in 2013. Most analysts are expecting the AfD to secure ten percent of the vote — that would translate into 60 Bundestag seats, making the AfD Germany’s third largest parliamentary party.

Some analysts, though, are wondering if the AfD may garner more votes than have been forecast. They worry the party’s support may have been underestimated — especially in parts of west Germany like the industrial Rhur valley, once the center of German coal-mining and steel-making.

Helmut Jung, a consultant with the GMS polling agency, has warned of what he calls a high “non-disclosure quotient” among AfD-leaning voters, who may have hidden their true political preference. “The more the party is stigmatized as extreme rightwing, the more reluctant conservative voters are to admit that they support it,” Jung argues.

Pollsters have a history of underestimating AfD support. Before last year’s regional elections in Saxony-Anhalt AfD was forecast to attract support from 18 per cent of voters — instead the populists grabbed nearly a quarter of the vote.

Some analysts note that the AfD and its supporters have dominated social media, which may be a better gauge of the party’s growing strength. AfD drives more Twitter traffic than any other German party and it boasts more Facebook followers than either the CDU or Social Democrats.

In an interview with The Washington Post Sunday, AfD’s co-leader Alexander Gauland said the party’s fortunes had improved thanks to Merkel’s 2015 open-door policy for war refugees from the Middle East. “The ‘refugees welcome’ policy of Angela Merkel alienated a lot of people, a lot of voters, as you can see in the demonstrations against Merkel. We call it ‘Merkel muss weg’ demonstrations, or ‘Merkel must go,’”he said.

Asked about the surge in extremist violence against minority groups in Germany, Gauland said: “We have nothing to do with the extremism. We have nothing to do with violence against people.”

But critics accuse the AfD of providing a home for neo-Nazis and other extremists.

The emergence of the AfD as a parliamentary force would complicate Merkel’s choice of coalition partners if she is indeed victorious Sunday. She may decide to rule out inviting the Social Democrats to act again as junior governing partners in order to avoid the AfD becoming the official opposition in the Bundestag, say CDU insiders. Being designated the official opposition would give the AfD parliamentary privileges other parties would prefer to deny it.

That would force her to turn to the revived pro-market Free Democrats, who failed to secure any Bundestag seats in 2013, and the Greens in an arrangement being nicknamed the Jamaica Coalition because of the parties’ colors.

Both parties have recently formed coalitions with the CDU at the regional level but the Free Democrats are opposed to greater EU political integration and centralization, something Merkel has endorsed. Their leader, the 38-year-old Christian Lindner, has made it clear that he won’t budge on the issue of EU reform. “If we can’t make a difference, then it is our responsibility to go into the opposition,” he said recently.

Pressure is also building from within his party on Martin Schulz, the Social Democrats’ leader, not to enter into a coalition arrangement. Party insiders say that their election campaign floundered because they were unable to differentiate themselves from Merkel’s Christian Democrats.

Fearful of an AfD surge, Germany’s leading politicians across the political spectrum have been urging the public to come out to vote. Four years ago, 29 percent of Germany’s 61.5 million registered voters did not cast a ballot.

“Those who don’t vote let others decide the future of the country”, the country’s president Frank-Walter Steinmeier wrote in an article for the newspaper Bild am Sonntag. “Perhaps it has never been so noticeable that elections are also about the future and democracy of Europe,” he added.
…

your ad here

France Holds Senate Election

Posted on by SeeEU

France is electing about half of its senators Sunday, in an important vote for President Emmanuel Macron’s reform plans, threatened by his declining popularity just four months after his election in May.

Macron’s centrist Republic on the Move! party, which emerged just last year, won a large majority in the lower house of parliament in June elections, but is unlikely to enjoy a similar margin in the Senate.

Surveys suggest the conservative Republicans party will consolidate its majority in the chamber of 348 seats.

Under such a scenario, Republic on the Move! is likely to seek alliances in the Senate with other centrists and moderate Republicans and Socialists to approve Macron’s business-friendly economic reforms.

In France, senators are not chosen by the public but by about 75,000 elected officials, such as mayors, legislators, regional and local councilors, who cast ballots in town halls across the country.

Results of the senatorial race are expected Sunday night. Nearly 2,000 candidates are competing for 171 Senate seats.
…

your ad here

US Launches Spy Satellite From California

Posted on by SeeUS

A spy satellite for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office has been launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket carrying the classified NROL-42 satellite lifted off at 10:49 p.m. PDT Saturday. All systems were going well when the launch webcast concluded about three minutes into the flight.

National Reconnaissance Office satellites gather intelligence information for U.S. national security and an array of other purposes including assessing impacts of natural disasters.

U.S. officials have not revealed what the spacecraft will be doing or what its orbit will be.

United Launch Alliance is a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.
…

your ad here

Secretary Price to Stop Chartering Flights for Official Business

Posted on by SeeUS

Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price said Saturday he will stop flying private planes on official business while an internal review of the flights is being done and that he welcomes the review.

Price defended the practice of using private planes on Fox News. A spokeswoman has said Price tries to fly commercial whenever possible.

The HHS inspector general’s office says the agency is reviewing Price’s charter flights to see if they violated government travel regulations.

Price, a former Republican House member from Georgia, chartered flights to a resort in Maine where he was part of a discussion with a health care industry CEO. That was according to a report in Politico. He also chartered flights to community health centers in New Hampshire and Pennsylvania.

Price said all the flights were work-related and used for official business, including for trips related to the opioid crisis or the recent hurricanes.

“But we’ve heard the criticism,” Price said. “We’ve heard the concerns. And we take that very seriously and have taken it to heart.”

Congressional Democrats last week chastised Price, saying he wasted taxpayer money by chartering five private flights last week for official business when cheaper travel options were available.

To Democrats, Price’s expensive travel smacked of hypocrisy given President Donald Trump’s campaign pledge to “drain the swamp” of money and influence in Washington and Price’s long-standing criticism of government waste.
…

your ad here

Theologians Accuse Pope of Heresy, Seek a Correction

Posted on by SeeEU

Several dozen tradition-minded Roman Catholic theologians, priests and academics have formally accused Pope Francis of spreading heresy with his 2016 opening to divorced and civilly remarried Catholics.

In a 25-page letter delivered to Francis last month and provided Saturday to The Associated Press, the 62 signatories issued a “filial correction” to the pope — a measure they said hadn’t been employed since the 14th century.

The letter accused Francis of propagating seven heretical positions concerning marriage, moral life and the sacraments with his 2016 document “The Joy of Love” and subsequent “acts, words and omissions.”

Two initiatives

The initiative follows another formal act by four tradition-minded cardinals who wrote Francis last year asking him to clarify a series of questions, or “dubbia,” they had about his 2016 text.

Francis hasn’t responded to either initiative. The Vatican spokesman didn’t immediately respond to an email seeking comment late Saturday.

None of the signatories of the new letter is a cardinal, and the highest-ranking churchman listed is someone whose organization has no legal standing in the Catholic Church: Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior of the breakaway Society of St. Pius X. Several other signatories are well-known admirers of the old Latin Mass, which Fellay’s followers celebrate.

Effort is significant

But organizers said the initiative was nevertheless significant and a sign of the concern among a certain contingent of academics and pastors over Francis’ positions, which they said posed a danger to the faithful.

“There is a role for theologians and philosophers to explain to people the church’s teaching, to correct misunderstandings,” said Joseph Shaw, a spokesman for the initiative, signatory of the correction and senior research fellow in moral philosophy at Oxford University.

When it was released in April 2016, “The Joy of Love” immediately sparked controversy because it opened the door to letting civilly remarried Catholics receive Communion. Church teaching holds that unless these Catholics obtain an annulment — a church decree that their first marriage was invalid — they cannot receive the sacraments, since they are seen as committing adultery.

Francis didn’t create a churchwide pass for these Catholics, but suggested, in vague terms and strategically placed footnotes, that bishops and priests could do so on a case-by-case basis after accompanying them on a spiritual journey of discernment. Subsequent comments and writings have made clear he intended such wiggle room, part of his belief that God’s mercy extends in particular to sinners and that the Eucharist isn’t a prize for the perfect but nourishment for the weak.

Shaw said none of the four cardinals involved in the initial “dubbia” letter, nor any other cardinal, was involved in the “filial correction.”

Organizers said the last time such a correction was issued was to Pope John XXII in 1333 for errors, which he later recanted.
…

your ad here

EPA Recovers Material From Houston-area Superfund Sites

Posted on by SeeUS

The Environmental Protection Agency says it has recovered 517 containers of “unidentified, potentially hazardous material” from highly contaminated toxic waste sites in Texas that flooded last month during Hurricane Harvey.

The agency has not provided details about which Superfund sites the material came from, why the contaminants at issue have not been identified and whether there’s a threat to human health.

The one-sentence disclosure about the 517 containers was made Friday night deep within a media release from the Federal Emergency Management Agency summarizing the government’s response to the devastating storm.

A dozen sites

At least a dozen Superfund sites in and around Houston were flooded in the days after Harvey’s record-shattering rains stopped. Associated Press journalists surveyed seven of the flooded sites by boat, vehicle and on foot. The EPA said at the time that its personnel had been unable to reach the sites, though they surveyed the locations using aerial photos.

The Associated Press reported Monday that a government hotline also received calls about three spills at the U.S. Oil Recovery Superfund site, a former petroleum waste processing plant outside Houston contaminated with a dangerous brew of cancer-causing chemicals. Records obtained by the AP showed workers at the site reported spills of unknown materials in unknown amounts.

Local pollution control officials photographed three large tanks used to store potentially hazardous waste completely underwater Aug. 29. The EPA later said there was no evidence that nearby Vince Bayou had been impacted.

PRP Group, the company formed to clean up the U.S. Oil Recovery site, said it does not know how much material leaked from the tanks, soaking into the soil or flowing into the bayou. As part of the post-storm cleanup, workers have vacuumed up 63 truckloads of potentially contaminated storm water, totaling about 315,000 gallons.

It was not immediately clear whether those truckloads accounted for any of the 517 containers cited in the FEMA media release Friday. The EPA has not responded to questions from AP about activities at U.S. Oil Recovery for more than a week.

Waste pit underwater

About a dozen miles east, the San Jacinto River Waste Pits Superfund site is on and around a low-lying island that was the site of a paper mill in the 1960s, leaving behind dangerous levels of dioxins and other long-lasting toxins linked to birth defects and cancer. The site was covered with floodwaters when the AP surveyed it Sept. 1.

To prevent contaminated soil and sediments from being washed down river, about 16 acres of the site was covered in 2011 with an “armored cap” of fabric and rock. The cap was reportedly designed to last for up to 100 years, but it has required extensive repairs on at least six occasions in recent years, with large sections having become displaced or been washed away.

The EPA has not responded to repeated inquiries over the past two weeks about whether its assessment has determined whether the cap was similarly damaged during Harvey.

The companies responsible for cleaning up the site, Waste Management Inc. and International Paper, have said there were “a small number of areas where the current layer of armored cap is thinner than required.”

“There was no evidence of a release from any of these areas,” the companies said, adding that sediments there were sampled last week.

The EPA has not yet released those test results to the public.
…

your ad here

Mattis Visits South Asia Amid US Shakeup of Afghanistan Policy

Posted on by SeeUS

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is set to travel to South Asia for the first time since Donald Trump announced his new strategy for the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan. The plan calls for thousands more U.S. troops, as well as an expanded role for India, where Mattis will hold high-level meetings. VOA’s Bill Gallo is traveling with the Pentagon chief and has this report.
…

your ad here

West Signals It’s Wary of Iran’s Ballistic Missile Test

Posted on by SeeEA

Western leaders reacted warily to Iran’s announcement Saturday that it had successfully tested a new medium-range ballistic missile.

U.S. President Donald Trump tweeted Saturday, “Iran just test-fired a Ballistic Missile capable of reaching Israel. They are also working with North Korea. Not much of an agreement we have!”

Trump was referencing the 2015 Iran nuclear deal that lifted U.N. economic sanctions on Iran in exchange for its cessation of some of its nuclear activities.

France, another signatory to the deal, reacted in a foreign ministry statement. “France demands that Iran halt all destabilizing activities in the region and to respect all provisions of Resolution 2231, including the call to halt this type of ballistic activity,” it said.

Israel, frequently the target of Iran’s rhetorical aggression, also weighed in.

Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman called the test a “provocation” aimed at the United States, Israel and their allies. He added that the test was “proof of Iran’s ambition to become a world power in order to threaten the countries of the Middle East and democratic states around the world.”

Iran’s state media on Saturday aired footage of the test and in-flight video from the nose cone.

It was not clear, however, when and where the test launch of the Khorramshahr missile was conducted. The missile has a range of 2,000 kilometers and can carry several warheads.

President Hassan Rouhani said Friday at a military parade that Iran would strengthen its missile program without seeking any country’s permission.
…

your ad here

African Refugee School in Cairo Struggles to Educate Children

Posted on by SeeAF

Teachers and volunteers in Egypt are using patience and kindness in the bid to educate some of the children of the many refugee families from nearly a dozen African countries. International organizations like the UNHCR, church groups and other local NGOs also contribute in the struggle to educate the children, as Edward Yeranian reports for VOA from Cairo.
…

your ad here

African Hope School

Posted on by SeeAF

The school, in a suburb of Cairo, Egypt, educates and nurtures refugee children, many of whom have lost both of their parents.
…

your ad here

Turkish Parliament OKs Army’s Cross-border Operations in Iraq, Syria

Posted on by SeeEA

Turkey’s main opposition united with the government Saturday to overwhelmingly pass a motion giving its military a mandate to carry out operations in neighboring Iraq and Syria.

The parliament met in an emergency session two days ahead of an independence referendum by Iraqi Kurds. Addressing parliament, Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli warned that the Kurdish referendum would bring very dangerous consequences, perhaps even clashes even in global terms.

“Pulling out just a brick from a structure based on very sensitive and fragile balances will sow the seeds for new hatred, enmity and clashes,” Canikli said.

He added that all options and methods were on the table regarding the independence vote and that Turkey would not hesitate to use them.

Ankara strongly opposes the referendum, fearing it could fuel secessionist demands within its own large restive Kurdish minority.

On Saturday, the head of the Iraqi armed forces met with his Turkish counterpart in Turkey’s capital, Ankara, for talks on the forthcoming referendum. Baghdad shares Ankara’s opposition to the vote.

Turkish armed forces carrying out drills on the Iraqi Kurdish border received new reinforcements. The army has been holding military exercises there for the past six days.

Turkish forces were also being beefed up on the Syrian border, with Ankara again warning it would not allow Syrian Kurds to create their own independent state.
…

your ad here

Court Ruling Favors Ghana in Ocean Border Dispute With Ivory Coast

Posted on by SeeAF

The International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea on Saturday drew an ocean boundary favoring Ghana in a dispute with its neighbor Ivory Coast, opening the way for development drilling to resume on Ghana’s multibillion-dollar TEN deepwater oil and gas project.

The decade-old row between the two West African neighbors has slowed the development of oil fields and at times soured relations between the two oil producers, who also together grow 60 percent of the world’s cocoa.

“The Special Chamber unanimously finds that Ghana did not violate the sovereign rights of Cote d’Ivoire,” said Judge Boualem Bouguetaia, president of the Special Chamber.

An official at the court said that the boundary delineated by the tribunal did not correspond with the claim of either party. However, the angle appeared to be very close to the line claimed by Ghana and politicians welcomed the news.

“The judgment is very consistent with Ghana’s position all along and so we are thankful to God,” Vice President Mahamudu Bawumia said on local television on Saturday, describing the dispute as “friendly and brotherly.”

Ivorian officials were not immediately available to comment.

“…We can now restart work on the additional drilling planned as part of the TEN fields’ plan of development and take the fields towards their full potential,” said Paul McDade, chief executive of London-listed oil company Tullow Oil, the lead operator of the project.

Tullow said in a statement it now expected to resume drilling around the end of the year, which would allow production to start to increase towards the full capacity of the floating production, storage and offloading vessel of 80,000 barrels per day (bpd) from around 50,000 bpd currently.

Kosmos Energy, Anadarko Petroleum Corporation, Ghana National Petroleum Corporation and PetroSA also have stakes in the TEN project.

The ruling, while expected since Ghana’s claim was based on the customary equidistant line, comes as a huge relief for Ghana which is counting on oil revenues to boost its economic growth back to the levels hit before a 2014 fiscal crisis.

Ivory Coast had been seeking compensation for oil field developments in the area but the tribunal rejected this claim.

Analysts had predicted that a loss for Ghana would have resulted in complicated contract renegotiations and loss of significant revenue that could worsen the economy, dogged by high public debt. Tullow has said it has already invested around $4 billion in the TEN project.

Ghana, also Africa’s second largest gold producer, discovered oil in 2007, prompting its western neighbor which had been pumping oil for decades to revive a claim to some of its territorial waters. Several rounds of talks failed to result in a deal on the border which, like many other African sea borders, had until now never officially been set.
…

your ad here

Kurdistan Leader: Independence Vote Could Lead to Talks with Baghdad

Posted on by SeeEA

The president of the Kurdistan Regional Government in northern Iraq, Massoud Barzani, said Monday’s referendum on independence would not result in an immediate change, but instead would trigger talks with Baghdad about an independent future.

Barzani told VOA’s Persian service that following the referendum — which has widespread support among Iraqi Kurds — the Kurdish government would begin discussions with Iraqi officials on such issues as border demarcation, division of natural resources and a timeline for declaring independence. Barzani estimated the transition time would be one to two years.

Barzani said the Kurdish forces known as Peshmerga, who are collaborating with Iraqi forces against Islamic State militants, would continue their work, in what he called “the same epic battle as before.” He said there was “no truth” to the American objection that Kurdish independence would damage the fight to eradicate IS.

On Friday, a senior Kurdish official said that the referendum would go ahead Monday, unless the regional government was offered a strong package of guarantees on its future self-determination.

Solid guarantees

“The leadership in Kurdistan and the people of Kurdistan need a strong package,” Falah Mustafa, foreign policy chief of the Kurdistan Regional Government, told VOA in an interview on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly.

Such a package would guarantee that after a one- or two-year delay, the international community would recognize Kurdistan’s right to self-determination and “accept the will of the people of Kurdistan and the outcome of the referendum,” he said.

Mustafa said a strong package would provide a clear guarantee on the future of Kurdistan and “not a return to the same old formula that we have suffered from in Iraq.”

The Trump administration is firmly against the referendum and has tried to deter the Kurds from holding it, warning it could have “serious consequences.”

“I remain hopeful that there is a very good package on the table in which an alternative might actually be the better path for all sides, but again, we will see,” special U.S. presidential envoy Brett McGurk told reporters Friday in New York.

Mustafa said the Kurdish leadership was very seriously considering the U.S. package and that a delegation would travel to Baghdad on Saturday to see whether any agreement was possible.

The U.N. secretary-general, Security Council and many world leaders have also expressed concern that the time is not right for the Kurds to seek statehood, warning it could lead to more instability in an already volatile region.

Neighboring Turkey, which has a large, active Kurdish population, has threatened sanctions, and in a show of force it is holding military drills near the border with Kurdistan. Iran has also said it would consider countermeasures.

‘Disappointed’

“We are disappointed at the reaction of the international community,” Mustafa said, adding that the Kurds have earned their right to be a recognized nation.

“We have shown the international community that we are a partner for peace; we have been a great partner in the fight against ISIS; we have been a great partner in hosting refugees and IDPS [internally displaced persons]; and in the protection of minorities. Where does that stand now?” he asked.

“This referendum is not to declare independence the day after,” Mustafa emphasized. “We understand the complexities. Therefore, we say that this is beginning of a process — a process of serious and meaningful negotiation with Baghdad in order to address all issues so we end it peacefully.”

There is tremendous support for the referendum in Iraqi Kurdistan, and nearly 1 million people are registered to vote. There have been huge rallies leading up to the ballot, including one Friday night that local media reported drew a crowd of 40,000.

VOA Persian service’s Ali Javanmardi in Irbil, Iraq, contributed to this report.
…

your ad here

Leaders Air Grievances at United Nations Gathering

Posted on by SeeAF

There were some verbal fireworks at the U.N. General Assembly Saturday as the foreign minister of North Korea responded to President Donald Trump and a senior Indian official lashed out at Pakistan.

One of the most anticipated speeches of the week was North Korean foreign minister Ri Yong Ho.

He did not disappoint.

Ri called Trump “a mentally deranged person full of megalomania” who is on a suicide mission of his own, and peppered his 22-minute address with other choice words and insults. Delegates audibly applauded at the end.

In his speech Tuesday, the U.S. president called North Korean leader Kim Jong Un “Rocket Man” and said he was on a suicide mission with his nuclear program.

 

Ri wasn’t the only one who used the podium to level a verbal attack on an adversary.

 

India’s foreign minister, Sushma Swaraj, began with the spiritual greeting of “Namaste” and then launched into a vocal takedown of neighbor and rival Pakistan.

 

“Why is it that today India is recognized as IT [technology] superpower in the world and Pakistan is recognized only as the preeminent export factory of terror?” Swaraj asked.

 

“What has Pakistan offered to the world, and indeed to its own people, apart from terrorism?” she added.

 

“We produced scholars, doctors, engineers. What have you produced?” the minister continued. “You have produced terrorists. Doctors save people from death; terrorists send them to death.”

 

Conflicts

 

Syria’s deputy foreign minister Walid Mouallem touted his military’s recent advances in that county’s civil war, which is in its seventh year.

“The liberation of Aleppo and Palmyra, the lifting of the siege of Deir el-Zour, and the eradication of terrorism from many parts of Syria, prove that victory is now within reach,” Mouallem said.

He also criticized Turkey and the U.S.-led anti-Islamic State coalition for pursuing what he called aggressive polices against the Syrian people. Adding that their agendas were in “stark contrast to positive role played by Russia and Iran.”

Iraq’s Foreign minister Ibrahim al-Jafaari expressed Baghdad’s opposition to Monday’s planned Kurdish referendum on independence from Iraq.

“Between the federal government and regional government of Kurdistan, we have not accepted the constitutional decision adopted by the Iraqi Kurdistan region and we will not abandon the constitution,” he said.

Saudi foreign minister Adel Al-Jubeir condemned the Myanmar authorities policy of discrimination and their military campaign against Rohingya Muslims. He said Saudi Arabia has provided $15 million so far to assist the displaced with humanitarian aid.

 

The U.N. said Friday that 429,000 have fled to neighboring Bangladesh since violence erupted there on August 25.

 

Of the Saudi-led war in Yemen on Houthi rebels after they tried to oust the government, he said it was not a choice for the kingdom.

 

“Our coalition is helping the legal government of Yemen to save the Yemeni people and to recover its state,” Jubeir said. He said Riyadh supports a political solution to the more than two-year-old conflict.

But he did not address international concerns that the coalition was causing scores of civilian casualties and bombing hospitals and schools.

While President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo said his military is fighting terrorists in the center and east of the country.

Human rights groups and other monitors say a year of fighting between government forces and militant groups has led to scores of civilian deaths and unimaginable suffering. Over 1.4 million people have been displaced in the central Kasai provinces alone.

The annual gathering of leaders will wrap up on Monday.
…

your ad here

DRC’s Kabila Paints Violence in Kasai as War on Terror

Posted on by SeeAF

The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s president told the U.N. General Assembly annual gathering Saturday that his military was fighting terrorists in the center and east of the country.

The fighting in the central Kasai province has displaced more than 1.4 million people. Dozens of mass graves have been uncovered.

President Joseph Kabila blamed the violence on the Kamuina Nsapu militia, who he said was “sowing terror.” He is heard here through an interpreter.

“In Kasai, a mystical religious tribal militia is using the civilian population, including children, as a human shield, and has carried out attacks on persons and buildings symbolizing state authority,” Kabila said through an interpreter.

In March, U.N. experts Zaida Catalán, a Swede, and American Michael Sharp were slain while investigating human rights abuses in the province. Kabila said he regretted the barbaric killings and they would not go unpunished.

U.N. investigators have said they cannot preclude the involvement of different actors, including state security services, in the crimes.

In the country’s volatile east, Kabila said the army had made progress containing rebels from the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF).

Of the country’s presidential elections, which were supposed to take place in December, Kabila said DRC was moving toward them.

“This is an irreversible process, and this all is, and should be, taking place without external dictates or interference,” he said.

South Sudan’s First Vice President Taban Deng Gai also addressed Saturday’s session, making little mention of the continuing conflict and hunger afflicting his nation.

“Realization of peace takes time,” he said. “Attaining peace in South Sudan is a process; it requires our collective efforts.”

He said refugees and the displaced, of which the country has more than 3 million, were gradually returning to their villages. Nearly 4 million South Sudanese are facing severe hunger, but the vice president only alluded to the need for continued support to achieve a hunger-free country.
…

your ad here

Authorities in Somalia’s Puntland Region Tout Capture of Weapons-laden Boat

Posted on by SeeAF

Authorities in Somalia’s semi-autonomous region of Puntland said on Saturday they have seized a boat loaded with weapons, officials told VOA.

“We have captured the boat, named Al Faruq, loaded with different weapons, including anti-aircraft machineguns, AK47 rifles, pistols and ammunition,” said Mohamed Mohamud Hassan, the acting regional maritime police chief.

Hassan said Puntland police tracked the boat at sea as it tried to escape near Mareero coastal area nine kilometers east of Bosaso, the region’s largest port and commercial hub.

“The boat off-loaded some of its shipment and speed away when the security forces suspected the activity. The police seized both the weapons on the boat and that offloaded,” said Hassan.

Authorities displayed the seized weapons to journalists, saying they are investigating in an effort to determine who sent the shipment where it was destined.

“The police are investigating where the shipment came from… and who owned it, and we will issue a statement at a later date,” said Hassan.

Local media has quoted other Puntland police officials on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about the matter before the investigation is finished that the small vessel was tracked from Yemen by European maritime forces patrolling off Somalia’s sea lanes.

Hassan said the boat’s occupants had fled by the time security forces approached the vessel.

In the past, Puntland security forces have said they captured similar boats coming from Yemen that were carrying heavy weapons destined for the al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab rebels. This has raised concern about possible cooperation between the Yemen-based al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) and the Somali Islamist militant group.

The capture of these weapons comes a day after the Somali government repeated its plea for world leaders to lift an international arms embargo.

Delivering his speech to the United Nations General Assembly on Friday, Somalia Prime Minister Hassan Ali Khaire said his country needs a longstanding weapons embargo fully lifted so the national army can obtain heavy weapons to defeat al-Shabab.

Al-Shabab is behind the spate in recent years of suicide bombings, and attacks on hotels, restaurants and military bases housing African Union troops and the Somali National Army.

““In Somalia, we have made significant strides in which we have weakened the capability of al-Shabab. To ensure the sustainability of such gains, we focused on strengthening the military capability of our national security forces. However, the arms embargo imposed against Somalia is a severe limitation toward this objective,” Khaire told the U.N. assembly.

Fadumo Yasin contributed this report.

 

 
…

your ad here

US-backed SDF Says it Took Syria’s Largest gas Field From IS

Posted on by SeeEA

U.S.-backed Syrian fighters captured Saturday the country’s largest gas field from the so-called Islamic State group in an eastern province that borders Iraq as they race with government forces to capture the energy-rich region, a senior official with the group said.

Nasser Haj Mansour of the Syrian Democratic Forces said the Conoco gas field and plant came under full control of the group on Saturday morning after days of fighting with the extremists. He added that SDF fighters also captured the nearby al-Izba gas field.

Another SDF spokesman, Brig. Gen. Talal Sillo, said the fighting in the area left 65 IS fighters dead while more than 100 gunmen surrendered. He added that IS had been controlling Conoco since 2014.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks the war in Syria, says SDF fighters have not yet taken the field in the province of Deir el-Zour, saying fighting is ongoing around it. It said IS fighters are launching a counteroffensive to slowdown the push by the SDF.

SDF fighters have been marching on the east bank of the Euphrates River in Deir el-Zour while Syrian troops are gaining in areas on the west bank of the river under the cover of Russian airstrikes. Earlier this week, Syrian troops crossed into parts of east bank but have concentrated their operations mostly on the west.

Deir el-Zour is a province rich in oil and gas and both sides have been racing to reach the fields. The next main target will be al-Omar oil field that is Syria’s largest and is also on the east bank of the Euphrates, and Syrian government forces are also speeding to capture it. Oil revenues are badly needed for future reconstruction of Syria that has been plagued by war since 2011.

On Thursday, Russia warned against targeting its special forces in Deir el-Zour raising concerns over direct clashes between rival forces backed by Moscow and Washington fighting for the energy-wealthy region.

The warning was followed by an acknowledgement from the Pentagon of an unprecedented face-to-face meeting between Russian and American military leaders, which occurred inside or near Syria, to address the rising tensions.

Russia has been a main backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad and joined the war two years ago tipping the balance of power in his favor.
…

your ad here

Trump Slams McCain for Opposing Latest Republican Attempt to Overhaul Health Care

Posted on by SeeUS

U.S. President Donald Trump criticized Senator John McCain at a political rally in Alabama Friday for opposing the Republican party’s latest attempt to repeal the nation’s health care law.

Speaking at a campaign event for Republican Senator Luther Strange, Trump said McCain’s opposition was “sad” and “a horrible, horrible thing.”

“It’s a little tougher without McCain’s vote,” Trump said, but added, “We are going to do it eventually.”

Trump continued to lash out at the senator from Arizona in a series of tweets Saturday morning, one of which said:

“John McCain never had any intention of voting for this Bill, which his Governor loves. He campaigned on Repeal & Replace. Let Arizona down!”

​

McCain announced his opposition Friday to Republicans’ last-ditch attempt to replace the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare, former President Barack Obama’s signature domestic achievement.

The 81-year-old senator, who is fighting brain cancer, said he could not “in good conscience” vote for the measure, which would repeal major parts of the law and replace them with block grants to the states to tailor their own health care programs.

McCain’s opposition deals a likely death blows to the bill and to years of Republican efforts to repeal and replace the law.

Many large medical organizations and a bipartisan group of governors are also opposed to the measure, maintaining that millions of people would lose insurance altogether or have their coverage reduced.

Trump appeared at Strange’s campaign rally after endorsing him last month. Strange is competing against opponent Roy Moore in a special runoff election to fill the Senate seat vacated when Jeff Sessions became attorney general.

Strange was appointed to the seat when Sessions left, but he must win the special election September 26 to keep it for a full term.

The president said Friday his support of Strange has bolstered his candidacy, but predicted on Twitter the race will be close.

Despite the president’s support, Moore, a former Alabama chief justice who was twice removed from the bench for disobeying judicial orders, has maintained a lead in the polls. He is campaigning on an anti-Washington platform and is known for unsuccessfully pushing for the public display of the Ten Commandments and opposing gay marriage.

During a debate Thursday night, Strange emphasized “the president supports me,” while Moore argued that Strange supporter Senate Majority Mitch McConnell and other members of the “elite Washington establishment” were trying to influence the race.

A super political action committee linked to McConnell has injected millions of dollars into the race amid Republican concern Moore would be a disruptive force in the Senate, or possibly lose to Democrat Doug Jones.   

Moore also has high-profile support, led by former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon and his conservative website Brietbart News. Additionally, Moore has the backing of former White House adviser Sebastian Gorka and former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin.

While Trump claims his support of Strange has narrowed Moore’s lead in the polls, the latest Real Clear Politics polling average completed on September 17 shows Moore with a nearly 9-point lead. 

Moore led Strange in the first round of Republican voting, although the margin was not wide enough to avoid a runoff election, which will be held next Tuesday.

Some political observers say the runoff will be an early test of Trump’s influence over his political base. Republican leaders are concerned about the impact a loss by Strange could have on Trump’s political strength ahead of the 2018 mid-term elections, as well as Republicans’ ability to advance Trump’s agenda in Congress.

 
…

your ad here