February 2018 - Page 5 of 22

Efforts to Negotiate Syria Cease-Fire Continue at UN Security Council

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEA

The U.N. Security Council failed to reach consensus Friday on a draft resolution implementing a 30-day cease-fire across Syria and lift sieges on towns, and said they would reconvene Saturday to vote.

Council diplomats had planned to vote Friday morning, but twice postponed as negotiations to incorporate Russian concerns and amendments into the text dragged on without agreement.

“We have been close, but not able to close the gap completely,” said Swedish Ambassador Olof Skoog, who is leading the negotiations with his Kuwaiti counterpart.

A visibly frustrated and weary Skoog said they would not give up because the situation on the ground demands a cease-fire. He said work would continue into Friday night and the council would reconvene at noon New York time on Saturday to vote.

U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who was not present at Friday’s negotiations, tweeted that it was “unbelievable that Russia is stalling a vote,” adding that “The Syrian people can’t wait.”

The joint Swedish-Kuwaiti effort demands at least a 30-day cessation of hostilities to allow in aid and evacuate the critically ill and injured. It also calls for the lifting of sieges in four specific locations, including eastern Ghouta.

“We are working on it, and we are not giving up,” Skoog told reporters. “I hope we will adopt something forceful, meaningful, impactful tomorrow.”

“We are so close,” council president Kuwaiti Ambassador Mansour al-Otaibi told reporters. “We are working to have a consensus draft resolution.”

He said the main sticking point was over language in the first operating paragraph of the draft, which says the truce would not apply to terrorist groups including the Islamic State, al-Qaida and the Nusrah Front.

Russia has pressed for language that adds “associated” groups and entities to that wording, but other members have resisted out of concern as to how broadly that could be interpreted. For instance, Russia regards the civil society first responders the White Helmets as having links to terrorists, whereas most other countries strongly disagree.

The 10 elected members of the council expressed their unity earlier in the day for the need to quickly adopt and implement the cease-fire, standing publicly together outside the Security Council to support it.

“We’ve really taken our responsibility,” Netherlands Ambassador Karel van Oosterom told reporters of the elected members. “We’ve tried to cross the bridge of the different interests that are there.”

Meanwhile, Syrian government warplanes supported by Russia pounded the rebel-held enclave of eastern Ghouta for a sixth straight day Friday, killing at least five people, opposition activists and a war monitor reported.

Fighting has escalated there as the Syrian military and its allied forces appear to be launching an all-out operation to retake the area, which is one of the last near Damascus still under control of the armed opposition.
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African Migrants in Israel Protest Deportation Plans

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEA

Thousands of African migrants in Israel are facing growing uncertainty as a looming deadline for deportation approaches.

“We are refugees, we are not criminals!” chanted dozens of protesting migrants, some of them symbolically wrapped in chains.

The slogan goes to the heart of the tug of war between some 40,000 Africans who entered Israel illegally over the past 12 years and the Israeli government, which describes them as economic migrants and “infiltrators.”

Ovdat Ishmail, who came from Eritrea, says Israel’s plan to deport the Africans is wrong.

“We did not come to Israel seeking work, we are not economic migrants, and we are not infiltrators,” he said, adding that they are refugees who fled from war-torn Eritrea and Sudan.

Israel rejects the refugee claim and says it has made the Africans a fair offer: They can take $3,500 and a one-way plane ticket to Rwanda by early April, or face imprisonment.

Most of the migrants say they prefer prison in Israel to returning to Africa where their lives will be in danger. About a dozen asylum-seekers were thrown in jail this week.

Ishmail says they were rounded up without warning and didn’t even have a chance to gather their belongings.

The crackdown has been condemned by Israeli human rights groups, which say that since Israel was built by refugees from the Holocaust, the country has a moral obligation to help those facing a similar fate.

Anat Ben Dor, director of the Refugee Rights Clinic at Tel Aviv University, said Israel is obligated under international law to protect the refugees, since sending them back to Africa poses a threat to their lives.

Ben Dor also noted that Rwanda denies the existence of any agreement to take them in. She says those refugees who have gone there from Israel have no civil rights and are often mistreated and expelled.

But Israeli officials insist that Rwanda is a safe destination for the Africans, whom they see as a menace. The government accuses them of undermining the Jewish character of the state and bringing poverty and crime to the streets of South Tel Aviv.

Parliament member Yoav Kish of the ruling Likud party dismisses any connection between the migrant crisis and the Holocaust.

He accused human rights activists of cynically distorting the truth, saying the Jewish people do not need self-righteous lessons in morality.
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Is Turkey Using Infrastructure Projects to Stifle European Criticism?

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEU

When the first jet airplane lands Monday at Istanbul’s newest airport, it will mark a milestone in what analysts see as a Turkish drive to accomplish with contracting dollars what it has not been able to achieve with traditional diplomacy.

Long frustrated in its bid to join the European Union, analysts say President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has increasingly stressed trade and investment initiatives during his travels to European capitals, making his country second only to China in large-scale construction projects while muting the criticisms of Turkey’s human rights record that have blocked accession to the E.U.

Istanbul’s third airport, when it officially opens in late October, will be able to handle up to 200 million passengers a year, outstripping most other global transport hubs and establishing Turkey as a crucial gateway linking Europe and Asia.

European investment has been key to many of Turkey’s mega-projects, such as the airport and a multi-billion-dollar wind turbine farm announced this week, and Erdogan is aggressively looking for more.

“Our bilateral trade volume with Italy amounted to nearly $20 billion last year,” he declared ahead of a scheduled visit to meet the pope at the Vatican earlier this month. “However, our potential is much higher than that. We aim to increase our bilateral trade volume to $30 billion in 2020.”

Italian companies have benefited from a number of Turkey’s initiatives, winning several lucrative defense and construction contracts including for one of the world’s tallest and widest suspension spans, Istanbul’s Yavuz Sultan Selim Bridge, which was completed in 2016.

The deals have been a boon for European companies during a period of austerity across the continent. Analysts say this point has not been lost on Turkey and that it increasingly sees such partnerships as useful tools in its efforts to quiet criticism over human rights and its military incursion into neighboring Syria.

“Ankara is buying anybody and everybody with these infrastructure projects and everybody is happy with it,” said political scientist Cengiz Aktar.

“The Europeans get what they really want; they want to continue trade with Turkey,” he said. “And to get the juicy infrastructural projects — they are very happy with this. This is why they keep appeasing Turkey. And all these laments about what is happening to the rule of law in Turkey, this is just crocodile tears.”

Competition for those contracts in Europe is fierce, according to analysts.

“These mega projects, construction infrastructure, tunnels etc., are incredibly lucrative,” said political analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners.

“The loans taken out by the building consortium are given treasury guarantees,” he said. “The cost is lower than a typical market loan. There is a revenue guarantee in dollar terms, so whether the project is profitable, does not make a difference – the government makes up the difference. It’s like a treasure room, there is no way you can lose money on these.”

Arms deal with Britain

Separately, Britain and Turkey have struck up a deep trade relationship, largely based on weapons sales, with Britain’s BAE developing a military stealth jet for the Turkish armed forces. At the same time, London has voiced little criticism of Turkey over that country’s human rights record or military operations in Syria.

On Wednesday, the deputy chair of Turkey’s ruling AK Party, Mehdi Eker, spoke at a meeting in the British parliament and voiced appreciation for Britain’s stance on Turkey’s ongoing military offensive in Syria against a Kurdish militia.

“New realism”

Ankara has already coined the phrase “new realism” to define its diplomatic strategy with European countries. Analysts suggest Turkish foreign policy is increasingly sidelining its relations with the European Union and instead focusing on bilateral relations with individual European countries, shaped by pragmatism.

“Relations seem to be based on the idea, ‘let’s put our problems aside, not dwell on them, agree to disagree or whatever,'” said political columnist Semih Idiz of the Al Monitor website. “But there are practical issues that have to be addressed.”

“For all the bad vibes at the moment, there are construction and strategic arms deals being signed between Turkey and France and Italy,” he said. “And after, the post-Brexit situation will undoubtedly speed up Turkish-British relations, not only because Turkey needs good allies in Europe, but because Britain needs the alternative markets and alternative partners.”

Idiz went on to say there are “a lot of areas for Turkish diplomacy to move in” as he referred Britain’s pending exit from the European Union.

Critics are increasingly citing the adage, “He who pays the piper calls the tune,” in describing Europe’s relations with Turkey. They say as long as Ankara has the money to dish out lucrative and seemingly endless contracts to European companies, then its “new realism” foreign policy with Europe seems set to continue.
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Amnesty Says Politics of Fear, Hate Being Normalized by Some Leaders

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEU

Rights group Amnesty International’s annual report documents human rights violations in nearly 160 countries and claims 2017 saw the politics of hate and fear normalized by some of the most powerful leaders in the world. VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo has this report.
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Second Russian Athlete Tests Positive for Doping at Olympics

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEU

A second Russian athlete has failed a doping test at the Pyeongchang Games, a day before the International Olympic Committee’s executive board is to decide whether to reinstate the country for Sunday’s closing ceremony.

Russian Bobsled Federation president Alexander Zubkov told The Associated Press on Friday that a drug-test sample that pilot Nadezhda Sergeeva gave on Sunday was positive.

The Russian delegation at the Pyeongchang Olympics said in a statement that the substance found was trimetazdine, a medication used for angina sufferers that is listed by the World Anti-Doping Agency as a banned substance affecting the metabolism.

“She confirms she took no such medication and the team confirms she was not issued any medication,” said Zubkov, a former bobsledder who himself was stripped of two Olympic gold medals for the Russian doping scheme at the 2014 Sochi Games. “Federation representatives at the Olympics” are starting to prepare a defense, he said.

Zubkov also said a sample she had given five days earlier was negative.

“I can tell you that on the 13th it was clean, but on the 18th it gave a positive result for the heart medication,” he said.

The IOC said later Friday it had been informed of the positive test by the Russian delegation.

Sergeeva’s crew finished 12th in the women’s bobsled competition on Wednesday, after she had given the sample that later came back positive.

The Russian team was barred from the Olympics in December for doping at the Sochi Games, but the IOC invited 168 athletes from the country to compete under the Olympic flag. The IOC set out the criteria for Russia to be reinstated, and the latest doping cases are a setback.

“This won’t win us any extra credit,” Russian delegation leader Stanislav Pozdnyakov said in comments reported by Russian media. “Unfortunately this case speaks to negligence by the athlete. She has let us down.”

A group of influential anti-doping organizations has called on the IOC not to reinstate Russia in time for the closing ceremony.

The Institute of National Anti-Doping Organizations says the IOC “can’t merely ‘wish away’ the most significant fraud in the history of sport,” adding that “by failing to impose a meaningful sanction on the ROC (Russian Olympic Committee), the IOC would be culpable in this effort to defraud clean athletes of the world.”

Earlier this month, Sergeeva told the AP that competitors from other countries had warmed to her after she passed IOC vetting for Pyeongchang, which included an examination of her drug-testing history.

“I don’t know why, but they’ve started talking to us more than ever before. I feel it. Maybe it’s a sign to them that we’re clean,” Sergeeva said. “There’s a lot of people coming up and saying, ‘We’re happy you’re here.’”

At the time, she was training in a T-shirt with the words “I Don’t Do Doping.” Sergeeva used to compete in track and field as a heptathlete before switching sports in 2010.

It is the fourth doping case of the games. Russian curler Alexander Krushelnitsky was stripped of his bronze medal Thursday after testing positive for the banned substance meldonium. Slovenian hockey player Ziga Jeglic and Japanese speedskater Kei Saito also left the games after testing positive.

Trimetazidine, the substance found in Sergeeva’s sample, has been detected in previous doping cases. Chinese swimmer Sun Yang, an Olympic gold medalist, was banned for three months in 2014 by his country’s sports authorities after testing positive for the substance.

Sun said he had been prescribed the drug for a medical condition and hadn’t known it was banned. The perceived leniency of that three-month ban led to Sun receiving criticism from swimmers from other countries at the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, where he won another gold medal.

Russia’s bobsled program has been in the spotlight for drug use for several years.

Zubkov and four other bobsledders were disqualified from the 2014 Sochi Games for doping, though four other bobsledders have been reinstated. Another gold medalist, Dmitry Trunenkov, was banned last year for failing a doping test.

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Middle-School Engineering Students Compete to Design City of the Future

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeUS

More than 40,000 middle-school-aged engineering students from around the world recently competed to design the city of the future. The competition started in the fall of 2017 and culminated in a grand-prize ceremony this week in Washington. Arash Arabasadi has more.
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American Oncologist Asks Help to Stop Turkey’s Attacks on Afrin

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeUS

While oncologist Edress Othman works to save cancer patients here in the U.S., his own family faces death back in Afrin, Syria. The doctor, who has lived in the United States for nearly two decades, says his family feels betrayed by Washington for not asking Turkey to stop its attacks on their city. Saleh Damiger of VOA’s Kurdish service spoke with the doctor and filed this report.
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International Agriculture Fair Opens Saturday in Paris

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEU

The annual international agriculture fair opens Saturday in France’s capital, Paris. The 10-day event will promote agriculture as a collective effort involving farmers, decision-makers, institutions and communities. The show is divided into four sectors, focusing on livestock breeding, growing crops and gardening, products from French regions and territories, and agricultural services and professions. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports the fair opens amid farmers’ protests over their declining income.
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Corruption Index Shows Africa Still Struggling, but Senegal, Ivory Coast Star Performers

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeEU

Corruption is getting worse in many parts of the world, according to the nongovernmental group Transparency International, with Africa still the worst performing region. The organization’s Corruption Perceptions Index does offer some surprises however, with some bright spots in West Africa, while highlighting alarming declines in some European nations. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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Trump ‘Thinking’ About Pulling Immigration Agents From California

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeUS

President Donald Trump said Thursday that he may pull the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency out of California, an idea so unlikely that some of his staunchest critics dismissed it as an empty taunt against the state over immigration policies.

Withdrawing ICE, partially or completely, runs counter to Trump’s record of dramatically increasing deportation arrests and pledging to beef up the agency with an additional 10,000 employees. The administration has been threatening more — not less — immigration enforcement in California in response to a new state law that sharply limits cooperation with federal authorities.

The president’s suggestion, however impractical, was his latest attention-grabbing statement to pressure so-called sanctuary jurisdictions, which the administration claims are a magnet for immigrants who commit crimes.

Pulling ICE out

“Frankly, if I wanted to pull our people from California you would have a crime nest like you’ve never seen in California,” he said at the White House during a meeting with state and local officials on school safety and gun violence. “All I’d have to do is say is, ‘ICE and Border Patrol, let California alone,’ you’d be inundated. You would see crime like nobody has ever seen crime in this country.”

“If we ever pulled our ICE out, and we ever said, ‘Hey, let California alone, let them figure it out for themselves,’ in two months they’d be begging for us to come back. They would be begging. And you know what, I’m thinking about doing it,” he continued.

Withdrawing ICE from the state with the largest number of people in the country illegally, two of its largest detention centers and thousands of investigators had never been floated or seriously considered.

ICE referred questions to the White House, where spokesman Raj Shah said the administration wanted California “to actually enforce immigration law rather than get in the way of it.”

The National ICE Council, the union representing detention officers and an early supporter of Trump’s presidential bid, didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

ICE street presence

Thomas Homan, ICE’s acting director, has been saying for months that limits on cooperation in local jails would lead to a more active street presence of deportation officers.

“California better hold on tight,” he told Fox News last month. “They’re about to see a lot more special agents, a lot more deportation officers in the state of California. If the politicians in California don’t want to protect their communities, then ICE will.”

Last Friday, as ICE announced results of an operation in the Los Angeles area that included more than 200 arrests, Homan declared, “Fewer jail arrests mean more arrests on the street, and that also requires more resources, which is why we are forced to send additional resources to those areas to meet operational needs and officer safety.”

Gangs and MS-13

Trump told the group that included Attorney General Jeff Sessions that his administration has targeted members of the violent MS-13 gang but has been “getting no help from the state of California.” Of MS-13, he said, “They actually have franchises going to Los Angeles.”

Capt. Patricia Sandoval, a Los Angeles police spokeswoman, said MS-13 was “not one of the most active gangs in LA” and the city’s police chief said in a statement Wednesday that they have “been able to shrink MS-13’s sphere of influence in Los Angeles.”

“While it would be foolish to minimize the lethal brutality of street gangs and in particular MS-13 here in Los Angeles, we have seen a steady decline in gang membership and gang crime in the city,” said Chief Charlie Beck. “We have made our biggest impact, by arresting and incarcerating individuals who engage in violent crime and not the general deportation of the residents they victimize.”

Nicole Nishida, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County sheriff’s department — the nation’s largest — said there are “no known MS-13 members or structures” within their territory, which spreads across nearly 4,000 square miles (10,360 sq. kilometers).

The Justice Department has threatened to deny millions of dollars in federal grants to communities that refuse to share information with federal immigration authorities. Many cities have defied the threats, with lawsuits pending in Chicago, Philadelphia and California over whether the administration has overstepped its authority.

The administration stepped up criticism of California after Jan. 1, when a law took effect to largely prohibit state and local law enforcement agencies from detaining people at ICE’s request unless they have been convicted of any of hundreds of crimes outlined in a 2013 state law.

U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a California Democratic, said Trump’s comments were mean-spirited.

“President Trump today renewed his attacks on California with more insults and threats. The president’s obsession with our state is growing more outrageous by the day,” she said.

ICE critics dismiss Trump’s idea

Some of ICE’s strongest critics in California dismissed the idea.

His erratic comments reflect an obsession with criminalizing immigrants and shows a deep lack of knowledge of California and immigration laws,” said the Coalition for Humane Immigrant Rights, an advocacy group in Los Angeles.

State Sen. Kevin de Leon, a Los Angeles Democrat who authored the new law, said, “The president’s plan sounds perfectly fine but we know that will never happen and we’ll work with ICE to remove actual dangerous criminals from our neighborhoods.”

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, a Democrat and frequent Trump critic, didn’t directly address the president’s comments. He issued a brief statement saying the state works with federal law enforcement daily and its efforts are geared toward stopping drug dealers, sex traffickers and other public safety threats.
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Embassy Attack Stokes Fears About How Fragile Balkan Stability Really Is

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeUS

As investigators tried to piece together the motive in a grenade attack on the U.S. Embassy in Montenegro, concerns that the incident could shatter improved stability in the Balkans showed just how fragile the situation remains as the West and Russia battle for influence in the region.

A 43-year-old Serbian war veteran threw an explosive device onto the U.S. Embassy compound in Podgorica overnight Thursday before blowing himself up outside the compound, the Balkan country’s police said.

The U.S. State Department said it did not know the motive or whether the assault was meant to be a suicide attack.

But regional experts said it highlights how volatile the situation remains just below the surface in Montenegro, the NATO security alliance’s newest member, and the region as a whole.

“Since Jan. 1, we’ve seen a political assassination in Kosovo, a bombing attack in Montenegro, and Russian-trained paramilitaries assisting the rearming of the Dodik regime in Bosnia. The temperature keeps rising in the Balkans but few in Brussels or Washington seem concerned,” said Jasmin Mujanovic, a political analyst and author of Hunger And Fury: The Crisis Of Democracy In The Balkans, based in Durham, North Carolina.

“We will have to see how this develops, as a political point and narrative especially, within the context of the broader confrontation between Russia and the EU and NATO in the region; the target is highly symbolic and charged in that regard, especially given the attacker’s apparent military background. And also because of Montenegro’s only recent NATO accession, the apparent Russian [attempted] coup to thwart it, and the looming elections which are paving the way for the return of [former Prime Minister] Milo Dukanovic,” he added.

Although it’s at the center of a historically volatile part of Europe, Montenegro split from Serbia in 2006 without the violence that accompanied similar moves by other republics in the former Yugoslavia, such as Bosnia-Herzegovina, Croatia, and Kosovo.

Podgorica has recognized nearby Kosovo as a sovereign country, something Serbia has refused for a decade to do, yet it also has a sizable Russian population, attracted by its coastline and fair weather.

Still, the Balkan nation of around 600,000 is in the process of tightening cooperation with Washington after becoming the newest NATO ally in June. Its access to the Adriatic makes it a strategic asset for the security alliance, but the move has irked the Kremlin, which is fighting to maintain influence in the region.

Montenegrin officials have accused several Serbian and Russian citizens of plotting a coup in 2016 parliamentary elections, claiming they planned to assassinate the prime minister and install a pro-Russian leadership to halt the NATO bid.

‘Constant decline of democracy’

The embassy incident also came while Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was on a two-day visit to neighboring Serbia, which is juggling its close, warm ties with Moscow with an effort to join the European Union.

“The security situation in the Western Balkans did not worsen in the past years in terms of violence, firearms use, or stability in general. However, the region continues to be a volatile geopolitical arena, with different players involved,” said Marika Djolai, a conflict, peace, and development consultant and a London-based member of The Balkans In Europe Policy Advisory Group.

“Issues such as corruption, money laundering, trafficking of drugs, people, and firearms continue to reinforce fragility and threaten stability. There is a trend of constant decline of democracy where the security continues to be an additional burden rather than part of a solution for this problem, showing clear disconnect,” she added.

Very short fuse

Even if it may no longer be the powder keg it once was, analysts warned, the Balkan region remains a crisis zone with a very short fuse.

Kosovo, which celebrated a decade of independence earlier this month, is still deeply divided between its dominant majority ethnic-Albanian population and its minority Serbs. The depth of that rift was seen in January with the assassination of a relatively moderate Serbian politician in the northern Kosovar city of Mitrovica and reactions that included Kosovo Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj’s suggestion of “institutions beyond Kosovo.”

Mitrovica is a divided city, a front line in the extended standoff between Belgrade, which does not recognize Kosovo, and Pristina. Hardly a month goes by without an incident there, despite the presence of EU and NATO forces.

In Bosnia-Herzegovina, reports of paramilitary formations and news of major arms purchases by the Bosnian Serb police from neighboring Serbia have raised fears that the frozen Yugoslav civil war may be thawing.

Meanwhile Macedonia, which also has a sizable ethnic-Albanian minority, last year almost descended into chaos when scores of demonstrators stormed parliament and attacked several lawmakers after an ethnic Albanian deputy was elected speaker, part of a two-year political crisis that sparked four elections, none of which produced a stable government.

“To prevent political radicalization and ethnic polarization that could ignite armed conflicts, a more vigorous Western Balkan strategy led by Washington is urgently needed,” according to Janusz Bugajski, a senior fellow at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) in Washington.

“Drift and delay in dealing with the Western Balkans can give a false sense of security. After years of relative peace and progress, a new crisis can erupt when ambitious nationalist politicians and foreign governments are intent on provoking armed conflicts to gain power or expand their influence,” he added, saying it was too early to determine the impact of the Montenegro attack on policy or the region.
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KIPP Charter Schools Co-Founder Fired, Misconduct Alleged

Posted on 02/23/2018 by SeeUS

The co-founder of one of the nation’s leading system of charter schools has been fired amid allegations of sexual misconduct.

KIPP announced Thursday that it had fired Mike Feinberg after an independent investigation found “credible evidence” to support three allegations of sexual misconduct. In a statement, the enterprise Feinberg co-founded in Houston 24 years ago said the investigation was triggered by an allegation last spring of sexual abuse of a student in the late 1990s.

The investigation by the law firm WilmerHale couldn’t confirm the allegation conclusively, but it uncovered evidence of sexual harassment by Feinberg against an adult KIPP alumna employed by KIPP Houston in 2004, which led to a financial settlement.

KIPP said Feinberg denied the allegations. A telephone call to his suburban Houston home Thursday night rang unanswered.
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Trump Seeks to Clarify Call for Arming Teachers to Deter School Shootings

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeUS

President Donald Trump sought to clarify his idea of arming educators in the classroom to deter school shootings, saying he wants to look at the possibility of giving “concealed guns to gun adept teachers with military or special training experience.”

A day after an emotional exchange at the White House with victimized students and parents of school shootings, Trump, in a pair of tweets, said “only the best 20% of teachers, a lot, would now be able to immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions.”

At the White House listening session Wednesday, Trump said “If you had a teacher who was adept with the firearm, they could end the attack very quickly.” He added that “This would be obviously only for people who were very adept at handling a gun, and it would be, it’s called concealed carry, where a teacher would have a concealed gun on them.”

Also spreading former military service members throughout schools “could very well solve your problem,” Trump said in the White House State Dining room. “We’re going to be looking at it very closely.”

At one point, Trump asked: “Does everybody like that idea?”

A few people raised their hands. The president then asked who opposed it and more hands went up from the approximately 40 people in the room, mainly students, family members and educators directly affected by school shootings.

Later at a CNN town hall event in Florida that included survivors of last week’s shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, where a 19-year-old former student has been charged in the killing of 17 people, Senator Marco Rubio told the audience he does not support arming teachers.

Under questioning by students, parents and teachers, Rubio also said tighter gun laws alone will not prevent future shootings, while he does support a minimum age for buying rifles and a ban on an accessory called a bump stock that can allow the weapons to shoot more bullets more quickly.

Scott Israel, the sheriff in the county that includes Parkland, said trained deputies would carry rifles on school grounds, but rejected the idea of giving guns to teachers.

Trump is set to hold another meeting on school safety Thursday at the White House, this time with state and local officials.

During Wednesday’s event, the president also called for an end to gun-free zones near schools, declared his administration “is going to be very strong on background checks” and that it will also examine raising the minimum age for purchase of guns (28 states have no such restrictions).

“If he’s not old enough to go buy a beer. He should not be able to buy a gun. It’s just common sense,” said Stoneman Douglas student Samuel Zeif.

“It should have been one school shooting and we should have fixed it and I’m pissed. Because my daughter, I’m not going to see again,” said Andrew Pollack, whose daughter, Meadow, was shot nine times and died. “King David Cemetery, that is where I go to see my kid now.”

Pollack questioned, “How many children have to get shot?”

Some students from the school declined invitations to attend Wednesday’s White House event and instead rallied at Florida’s state Capitol in Tallahassee to call for gun control reforms.

The president also referred to shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz as a “sick guy…who should have been nabbed.” Cruz is being held without bond on 17 counts of premeditated murder at the Broward County jail.

Trump put more emphasis on the mental health issue than gun control in his remarks, saying “there’s no mental institution, there’s no place to bring them” in many communities.

Since 1990, there have been 22 shootings at elementary and secondary schools in the United States, in which two or more people were killed (not counting gunmen who committed suicide).

The president on Tuesday ordered the Justice Department to look at outlawing bump stocks, which were used in the shooting in Las Vegas, Nevada, last October that killed 58 people and wounded 851 others.

The Trump administration and lawmakers are facing a backlash — including from some of the student survivors of the latest school mass shooting — that they are too focused on the mental health of gunmen rather than the weapons they carry.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll released this week said 86 percent of respondents who identified themselves as Democrats said stricter gun control laws could have prevented the Florida shooting, while 67 percent who identified as Republicans said stricter laws could not have prevented the massacre.

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US, S. Korea Military Exercises Could End Outreach to Nuclear North

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeUS

The resumption of U.S.-South Korea joint military exercises, which were postponed until after the PyeongChang Olympics and Paralympics end in late March, could also mark the end of the current diplomatic outreach to North Korea.

The annual joint exercises include the Key Resolve strategic simulation drill, where U.S. and South Korean troops and military assets are deployed to respond to potential North Korean threats, and field exercises called Foal Eagle. Past drills involved nearly 20,000 American troops, 300,000 South Korean forces, and an array of bomber aircrafts, fighter jets and warships.

Needed deterrence

Military leaders deem these conventional exercises to be essential to maintain defense readiness and deterrence against the growing North Korean nuclear threat. It is also standard practice for every country in the world to conduct ongoing training for soldiers that are continually being drafted or deployed.

“All militaries train. The Korean People’s Army in North Korea trains. The PLA (People’s Liberation Army) trains in China. That’s what militaries do,” said North Korea security analyst Daniel Pinkston, a lecturer in international relations with Troy University in Seoul

North Korea has called these joint exercises threatening rehearsals for invasion.

South Korean President Moon Jae-in negotiated a delay in this year’s exercises to ensure the safety of the winter Olympics games being held close to the inter-Korean border. North Korea’s participation in the Olympics has also been accompanied by a pause in its missile launches and nuclear tests. In the year prior, Pyongyang conducted numerous provocative tests, after publicly setting the goal to develop a functional nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile that can target the U.S. mainland.

In response, the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump has led an international effort to impose harsh sanctions on the North that cut off much of its income, including banning its lucrative coal and mineral exports.

Freeze for freeze

Moon’s diplomatic outreach has enacted what is basically a temporary “freeze for freeze” proposal, suspending both the U.S.-South Korea joint drills and North Korean provocations that China and Russia have been advocating to reduce regional tensions.

Washington has so far rejected any proposals to further suspend conventional military exercises that it argues are defense oriented and legal under international law, while it says North Korea’s nuclear program threatens its neighbors and the world.

There is, however, speculation that Washington and Seoul may try to reduce the size and scope of the exercises to make them less threatening to the North, perhaps by eliminating decapitation simulations that practice targeting leadership in Pyongyang, or excluding U.S. nuclear capable bombers from participating in the drills.

“The question is what level of the exercises is adequate for military preparedness and for robust deterrence purposes, and how do you calibrate it in a way that is nonthreatening,” said Pinkston.

But Pyongyang has warned it would respond to the resumption of the joint drills, possibly by resuming provocative nuclear and missile tests, even if it means triggering further sanctions.

“The North Korean authority must do its own calculation about gains and losses about such an action in protest to the resumption of the military exercises. So it is all up to Kim Jong on government,” said Bong Young-shik, a political analyst with the Yonsei University’s Institute for North Korean Studies in Seoul.

Olympic engagement

North Korea’s official KCNA news agency on Monday said restarting the drills would be a “provocative act” that would undermine Pyongyang’s recent efforts to “defuse tension and create a peaceful environment.”

Moon’s Olympic engagement efforts with the North, including marching together at the opening ceremony and fielding a unified women’s hockey team, has reduced inter-Korean tensions and brought about an invitation from the North Korean leader to host the South Korean president in Pyongyang for a leaders summit.

By participating in the Olympics, Pyongyang also embarked on what critics called a “charm offensive,” meant to improve its threatening image and weaken support for economic sanctions imposed for its continued nuclear violations.

Moon’s diplomatic outreach, however, has so far been unable to bring Washington and Pyongyang into direct talks to resolve the nuclear standoff. The U.S. will not engage in official negotiations until the North agrees to give up its nuclear program, which Pyongyang refuses to do, insisting that its nuclear weapons are needed to prevent a U.S. invasion.

“History does not give me much confidence that this will lead anywhere, especially when the bargaining position of the U.S. side is that the North does have to give up its weapon nuclear weapons and parts of its missile program,” said regional security analyst Grant Newsham with the Japan Forum for Strategic Studies in Tokyo.

The Trump administration recently indicated a willingness to support Moon’s efforts and engage in exploratory talks. U.S. officials on Tuesday said Vice President Mike Pence, who led the U.S. Olympic delegation at the Olympics opening ceremony, was planning to meet with Kim Yo Jong, the sister of the North Korean leader at the games, but North Korea canceled the meeting at the last minute.

However the vice president also clarified that the U.S. “maximum pressure” approach, which includes increasing economic sanctions and maintaining the credible threat of military force as well, would remain in place until the Kim government agrees to give up its nuclear weapons.

Lee Yoon-jee in Seoul contributed to this report.
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African Asylum Seekers Facing Expulsion Have Embraced Israel

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeAF

Even as he faces a potential deportation from Israel, 30-year-old Eritrean asylum seeker Johny Goytiom Kafl brims with satisfaction as he looks out upon thousands of fellow protesters rallying against the impending expulsions, all while peacefully secured by police.

It’s such displays of civil action that he most admires about his adoptive home of the past nine years since he escaped one of the world’s most oppressive regimes, and then faced torture, kidnapping and abuse during his exodus throughout Africa.

“You are treated like a human being in Israel,” he said in fluent Hebrew. “Here I am not afraid. In Eritrea, I was afraid.”

Kafl, along with tens of thousands of other Africans, now fear their stay in the Holy Land is coming to an abrupt end. Israel has given many of them until April 1 to leave for an unnamed African destination – known to be Rwanda – in exchange for $3,500 and a plane ticket. Otherwise, they face open-ended incarceration.

Seven people from Eritrea were jailed this week, Israeli Interior Ministry spokeswoman Sabine Haddad said Thursday.

Israel considers the vast majority of the nearly 40,000 migrants to be job seekers and says it has no legal obligation to keep them. The Africans, nearly all from dictatorial Eritrea and war-torn Sudan, say they fled for their lives and face renewed danger if they return.

As the world grapples with the worst refugee crisis since World War II, the issue has struck a raw nerve in Israel – established on the heels of the Holocaust.

Critics at home and in the Jewish American community have called the government’s proposed response unethical and a stain on Israel’s image as a refuge for Jewish migrants.

The optics of black asylum seekers accusing the country of racism has turned into a public relations liability for Israel, and groups of Israeli doctors, academics, poets, Holocaust survivors, rabbis and pilots have all appealed to halt the plan. But the government remains steadfast, bristling at what it considers cynical comparisons to the plight of Jews in Nazi Germany.

The Africans started moving toward Israel in 2005 after neighboring Egypt violently quashed a refugee demonstration and word spread of safety and job opportunities in Israel. Tens of thousands crossed the porous desert border before Israel completed a barrier in 2012 that stopped the influx.

But Israel has struggled with what to do with those already in the country, alternating between plans to deport them and offering them menial jobs in hotels and local municipalities.

Kafl, like many of his compatriots, fled Eritrea to escape its lifelong military conscription in slavery-like conditions and fears death if he returns.

He has experienced both sides of Israel. His asylum request is still pending, and he has been locked up in a massive detention center in the remote southern desert. But he is also deeply grateful to the many Israelis who welcomed him and sympathized with his plight. He said he hopes to one day return the favor if the Eritrean regime is ultimately toppled.

“I knocked on the door of the country and said ‘save me.’ I will never forget the soldier who said ‘welcome,’ gave me food and called for a doctor. I got his kind of respect in Israel, not in Eritrea,” he said.

After the initial warm welcome, however, many turned against the migrants, particularly in the working class neighborhoods in south Tel Aviv, which have become known as “Little Africa.”

“They are abusing our democracy to live off our backs,” said Shefi Paz, who leads the local residents’ opposition. “They’ve ruined our community and ruined our lives.”

The government, dominated by nationalist parties, has denounced their prolonged stay and recently voted to begin deporting them to African countries with which they have reached secret agreements. They are believed to be Rwanda and Uganda, close allies of Israel, though they both deny any deal exists.

The government says it is going out of its way to accommodate humanitarian concerns. Women, children and families, for example, are exempt from the deportation order, as are those who escaped the genocide in Sudan’s western region of Darfur. It says it is expediting its refugee vetting process, and notes the Supreme Court has ruled the arrangement is legal and does not imperil those dispatched.

But that’s not what the migrants and their backers contend.

Sigal Rozen, of the Hotline for Refugees and Migrants advocacy group, said Israel’s processing has been disingenuous, noting that of the 15,000 African refugee status requests, only 11 have been approved.

She said the 4,000 migrants who accepted previous offers to go to Rwanda did not find refuge there. Nearly all had their travel papers seized and money taken and were then pushed into neighboring Uganda to embark upon a second refugee ordeal.

Unable to return home, they have been forced to traverse though Africa, where many reported being tortured, raped and starved in Libya en route to Europe. An Eritrean Christian who had left Israel was beheaded on a Libyan beach by the Islamic State group in 2015.

“How can Israel know if these people are genuine refugees if they didn’t check their asylum requests?” said Rozen. “As Jews, we are morally obliged to protect these people from the horrible things that they ran away from.”

At a parliamentary hearing Monday, Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely said Israel had no obligation toward what she called job seekers who imposed “unacceptable migrant terror that includes violence and sexual harassment” toward the people of south Tel Aviv.

Monim Haroon said it hurt to hear Israel refer to him as an infiltrator. Now a 28-year-old university student in Jerusalem, he fled Darfur five years ago and has lost family members in the genocide.

“I escaped my country because I wanted to stay alive and to say that I am just a migrant worker, that is very painful to me,” he said at a demonstration outside the Rwandan Embassy in Tel Aviv.

Lior Birger, a researcher who published a recent study of 19 migrants who voluntarily left Israel and managed to reach Europe, said Israel’s promises were not being kept. One Eritrean testified to being extorted in a Sudanese prison and then beaten in a Libyan torture camp and shoved into a small room with 800 people. Another said he watched his wife drown in the Mediterranean and later tried to kill himself. She said everyone had a uniform message: “Better a prison in Israel than dying on the way.”

A recent poll by the respected Israel Democracy Institute found two-thirds of the Jewish public agreed with the planned expulsions. The migrants’ best hope may be the government’s lack of preparation. Prison authorities are skeptical they will be able to process the expected 15,000 to 20,000 to be jailed.

For many of the Africans, there is no good choice.

“I don’t care about the money and I never even planned to reach Israel. I was just looking for a safe area,” said Halofom Sultan, 37, who escaped Eritrea seven years ago and has been separated from his wife and two children since. “I hope there will be a change in my country and I can go back. Otherwise, I don’t know.”
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Some of Missing Nigerian Schoolgirls Rescued

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeAF

Authorities in Nigeria say some of the schoolgirls who were reportedly abducted since their school was attacked by Boko Haram militants earlier this week have been rescued.

The missing schoolgirls were discovered at a border town between the states of the Yobe and Borno Wednesday, two days after armed gunmen stormed the Government Girls Science Secondary School in the town of Dapchi in the northeastern state of Yobe.

People with direct knowledge of the matter said 91 students were found to be absent after a Tuesday roll-call at the school.

The disappearance has raised fears of another mass kidnapping by Boko Haram, which abducted 276 girls from a school in the village of Chibok in April 2014.

That abduction sparked a worldwide outrage and triggered formation of the Bring Back Our Girls movement. Nearly four years later, more than 100 of the Chibok girls are still missing.

Nigerian police and the regional education ministry have denied abductions have occurred, despite parental and other witness accounts that the girls are missing. The state ministry of education also denied the abductions, but closed the school for a week to allow students and their families to reunite.

Since Boko Haram began its insurgency in 2009, more than 20,000 people have been killed and 2 million others forced to leave their homes in northeastern Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country.

The group has used kidnapping as a weapon of war, abducting thousands of women and young girls, in addition to boys and men of fighting age.

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Graham, ‘America’s Pastor,’ Had Global Impact

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeUS

American evangelist Billy Graham died Wednesday at the age of 99. VOA’s Bill Gallo takes a look at the international legacy he leaves behind.
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Concerns Raised Over US Increasing Low-Yield Nukes

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeUS

A week after his inauguration, President Donald Trump ordered the Pentagon to review the U.S. nuclear arsenal. That review came back this month with an overarching theme of modernizing the U.S. nuclear triad — air, sea and land capabilities. But a more controversial issue emerged. VOA’s Plugged In with Greta Van Susteren examined the Nuclear Posture Review and the issue of low-yield nuclear weapons. VOA’s Steve Redisch reports.
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Trump Listens to Survivors of School Shootings

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeUS

U.S. President Donald Trump has met with American students, parents and teachers who have witnessed some of the many school shootings that have taken place in the past two decades. The meeting Wednesday afternoon at the White House focused on ways to make schools safe for students. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports.
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Amnesty Says Politics of Fear and Hate Being Normalized by Some Leaders

Posted on 02/22/2018 by SeeAF

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Activists Urge IGAD, AU to Pressure South Sudan’s Warring Parties

Posted on 02/21/2018 by SeeAF

A coalition of more than 200 civil society groups in South Sudan is urging the regional bloc Intergovernmental Authority on Development, the African Union and the international community to put more pressure on South Sudan’s warring parties to end the conflict ahead of the next phase of peace talks scheduled for March.

Round two of the talks ended February 17 in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, without an agreement.

The activists issued a statement Tuesday urging the IGAD and the international community to slap sanctions on parties who violate the Cessation of Hostilities agreement signed in December.

Geoffrey Lou Duke, member of the South Sudan Civil Society Forum, said the stakeholders at the talks were bogged down in pursuing individual interests.

“Significant time was wasted both in walkouts and relegating contentious issues to the last minute. We hope the next phase will be the final phase,” Duke told South Sudan in Focus.

The South Sudan government and opposition delegates spent nearly two weeks in Addis Ababa talking about how to fix pending issues in the August 2015 peace deal that collapsed in July 2016.

Under the timetable released by IGAD mediators this month, the parties were supposed to have struck a deal by February 17, but the talks broke down late last week with government and opposition delegations blaming each other.

Duke said that while some progress was made on security arrangements during the transition period, no agreement was reached on governance. He said the warring parties spent too much time on power sharing.

Koiti Emily, who represented youth in Addis Ababa at the High-Level Revitalization Forum, as the talks are known, said the IGAD should have done a better job.

Fix the problem

“All of them (South Sudanese leaders), have contributed either directly or indirectly to the situation we have. And they have to be constantly reminded that it is from that angle that they should be approaching the negotiations (and accept) that indeed they ought [need] to fix the situation and clean the mess that they created for us in this country,” Emily told South Sudan in Focus

Duke said he and other activists expected the next phase of talks to end in a final peace deal.

“Bodies like IGAD and the African Union gave strong statements urging the parties to respect the cease-fire agreement or face punitive measures, and we urge these bodies and the broader international community to not only keep their word but move beyond words to action if the parties violate the Cessation of Hostilities agreement again,” Duke told VOA.

The activists are calling on the Cease-fire and Transitional Security Arrangements Monitoring Mechanism (CTSAMM), the body tasked with investigating cease-fire violations, to take punitive measures against those who block peace efforts.

“We urge our citizens the world over to join us in identifying the spoilers of peace. We will categorically designate any party that violates the Cessation of Hostilities as an enemy of peace,” said Duke.

Emily said the parties were far from making compromises on tough issues.

“Besides the external pressure, it is important as citizens [that] we generate the equal internal pressure that will let our leaders know that it cannot be business as usual,” Emily said.

The civil society activist said South Sudan’s leaders had tainted the country’s image for too long. She and other activists called on all South Sudanese to work together to end the violence in their country.
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Explosive Device Kills 2 French Soldiers in Mali

Posted on 02/21/2018 by SeeAF

Two members of a French counterterrorism force in Mali were killed Wednesday when an improvised explosive device hit their armored vehicle in a border region with Niger, authorities said.

French President Emmanuel Macron’s office said a soldier and an officer were killed in the explosion. A statement by Defense Minister Florence Parly said those killed were part of a “vast operation” patrolling the border region with Niger. It did not specify the locality.

The minister identified the victims as Emilien Mougin and Timothee Dernoncourt, from an armored regiment based in Valence but members of Operation Barkhane, an anti-terrorism force operating in the Sahel region of west Africa.

Islamic extremists and traffickers frequently cross or hide out in border regions between Mali and Niger and between Mali and Burkina Faso. It was not known who planted the explosive device.

Operation Barkhane, the 4,000-strong counterterrorism force started in 2014, is meant to fight extremist groups in the west African Sahel region, which also includes Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad and Mauritania. About 1,000 French soldiers are in Mali. The Barkhane troops are backed by fighter planes, drones and helicopters. Barkhane replaced the troops of a 2013 intervention in Mali to rout an al-Qaida affiliate in the north. Surviving fighters spread out across the region.

Macron praised the “courage” of the French soldiers and their determination to continue their mission, “which allows them to strike serious blows against the enemy.”
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Florida Students Anti-Gun Rally Spreads

Posted on 02/21/2018 by SeeUS

Hundreds of students from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, rallied Wednesday at the Florida Capitol in Tallahassee to pressure lawmakers to approve tougher gun control laws one week after one of the most deadly U.S. school shootings.

A gunman killed 17 people at the Parkland school, triggering a wave of protests by students in Tallahassee and elsewhere in the U.S. Teachers and Florida state representative Sean Shaw joined the students on the grounds of the capitol, where the Democratic lawmaker criticized a state House vote Tuesday along party lines against a bill to ban assault weapons. The vote drew the ire of student shooting survivor Florence Yared, who directed her comments to lawmakers who voted against the measure.

“Your children might become victims, too,” Yared said. “You have the power to change this, and if you don’t we will change you! We will vote you out,” she said emphatically to cheers and applause.

Student survivor Ryan Deitsch told the Tallahassee crowd, “The more [the lawmakers] don’t act, the more they don’t deserve to be in office. I can vote, and I know who I am not voting for!”

In Photos: High School Students Protest in Tallahassee

The mass shooting also has sparked a wave of rallies elsewhere in Florida and in other areas of the country in an attempt force local and national leaders take action to prevent such attacks.

Mothers from across Georgia converged Wednesday on the state capitol of Atlanta to attend a Moms Demand Action advocacy group rally. The rally’s purpose is to advocate for responsible gun ownership and not to ban guns.

More than 200 students at Montgomery Blair High School in the Washington suburb of Silver Spring, Maryland, walked out of school Wednesday to attend a planned protest for gun control at the U.S. Capitol. Protest organizers said students from two other suburban Maryland high schools, Richard Montgomery and Bethesda-Chevy Chase, also are participating in the demonstration.

And in Washington, hundreds of high school students rallied in front of the White House, chanting, “No more silence, end gun violence.” They held their hands in the air during 17 seconds of silence in observance of the victims.

The Stoneman Douglas students began taking buses over the past couple of days to Tallahassee to take part in Wednesday’s rally and to meet with legislative leaders.

“We [students] are the ones most involved in this,” student Ariana Ortega told VOA before boarding one of the buses. “We are the ones who lived through this whole tragic experience, and we are going to be the future leaders of America.”

Students were in the gallery of the Florida House on Tuesday as lawmakers rejected a Democratic proposal to consider a bill to ban assault rifles. Republicans accused the Democrats of forcing the issue after 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz allegedly used an AR-15 to carry out the Stoneman Douglas shooting.

Lizzie Eaton, a junior at Stoneman Douglas, called the legislature’s vote “heartbreaking.” But she said: “We’re not going to stop. We’re going to keep fighting for what we believe in. We’re not going to let this bring us down.”

In addition to Wednesday’s rally in Tallahassee, President Donald Trump will host parents, teachers, and students for what the White House calls a “listening session” on school safety. Survivors from the Parkland, Sandy Hook, and Columbine school massacres have been invited.

Students are also planning a March 24 rally in Washington and other major cities called “March for Our Lives.”

Music stars Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga and Cher have thrown their support behind the march. Actor George Clooney and his wife, Amal, a human rights attorney, said they are donating $500,000 to help pay for it, and media mogul Oprah Winfrey said she would match their contribution.

“Our family will be there on March 24 to stand side by side with this incredible generation of young people from all over the country,” Clooney said.

A Washington Post-ABC News poll released Monday said 86 percent of respondents who identified themselves as Democrats said stricter gun control laws could have prevented the Florida shooting, while 67 percent of Republicans said stricter laws could not have prevented the massacre.

More than three-quarters of both groups, however, said more effective mental health screening and treatment could have prevented the attack.

Overall, 77 percent of respondents said Congress is not doing enough to prevent mass shootings in the United States, while 62 percent said Trump was not doing enough.

Police say shooting suspect Nikolas Cruz confessed to gunning down 14 students and three adults at the high school he was expelled from last year. He was able to buy an AR-15 rifle to carry out the mayhem after clearing a background check.

In Washington, Democratic lawmakers often call for tighter controls on gun purchases, while Republicans often oppose them, saying they would violate the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution sanctioning gun ownership.

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Israeli Media: Netanyahu Confidant Turns State Witness in Corruption Probe

Posted on 02/21/2018 by SeeEA

Israeli media say a close associate of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has agreed to testify against him in a bribery scandal.

Shlomo Filber was arrested on suspicion of promoting the interests of Israel’s powerful telecom company in exchange for more positive news coverage of the prime minister.

Police have not confirmed that Filber has turned state’s witness, but Netanyahu quickly denied any wrongdoing and described the allegations as a witch hunt, madness and lies.

The new revelations follow a police recommendation last week that Netanyahu should be indicted for bribery and fraud in two other corruption cases.

Opposition leaders like Tzipi Livni are calling on the Israeli leader to resign.

Livni said Netanyahu is corrupt and is so preoccupied with trying to save his political life that he cannot effectively govern.

But Netanyahu’s right-wing coalition is standing behind him. Knesset member Yoav Kish of the ruling Likud party said unless there is an indictment, Netanyahu must be considered innocent until proven guilty.

The final decision on an indictment rests with the attorney general and could take months.

Netanyahu has been in office for nine years, but the latest developments have prompted many analysts to conclude that his days in power are numbered.
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