Coffee giant Starbucks temporarily closed 8,000 stores around the United States Tuesday afternoon, so it could train its 175,000 employees on racial tolerance. The move comes after the arrest of two black men at a Philadelphia café sparked nationwide outrage. Some say the Starbucks incident spotlights lingering problems of racial discrimination in the U.S. VOA’s Jesusemen Oni reports.
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Starbucks closed 8,000 of its stores Tuesday to give 175,000 employees about four hours of anti-bias training.

The sessions were part of the company’s response to the April 12 arrests of two black men at a Starbucks in Philadelphia. 

Rashon Nelson and Donte Robinson had not purchased anything and told a store manager they were waiting for a friend to join them. They were asked to leave and an employee called the police, which led to their arrest. The scene was recorded on cellphones and quickly spread on social media, prompting sharp criticisms of Starbucks along with protests and calls to boycott the coffee chain.

Tuesday’s sessions involved asking employees to discuss with small groups of their colleagues aspects of race and bias and how they can make people feel like they belong.

There were exercises of personal reflection asking people to think about when they have thought about their own race, how it has affected their day-to-day lives and interactions with other people. 

Questions included evaluating how in the case of speaking to someone of the same race, or the case of speaking to someone of a different race, how easy or hard is it to talk about race, feel comfortable using their natural language and gestures, to be respected without having to prove their worth and express dissatisfaction with something without being told they seem angry.

“Without assigning good or bad, do you notice ways you treat people differently?” read one question.

Participants were also shown a series of videos including Starbucks executives discussing bias with experts, a company-funded documentary about the history of how African-Americans have been denied access in public places in the United States and employees describing instances in which they made assumptions about customers based on appearances.

Starbucks President and CEO Kevin Johnson acknowledged what he called the “disheartening situation that unfolded in Philadelphia” in one video and said the company’s mission is to be a “place where everyone feels welcome.” He said the focus of the training was not to be “color blind” by pretending race does not exist, but rather to be “color brave” and discuss race directly.

The training was developed with the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, the Perception Institute and other social advocacy organizations, and included contributions by the rap music artist Common.

Similar unconscious bias training has been used by police departments, companies and other organizations to help address racism in the workplace and encourage workers to open up about implicit biases.

In one video, Common told employees that while people usually seek similarities with others, there are great advantages to learning to love what makes you different from other people.

“It’s a life skill to make someone else in your presence feel welcome. You do that by not only loving what makes them the same as you, but by appreciating what makes them different from you,” he said.

Starbucks has announced policy changes following the Philadelphia incident, mainly that it will no longer require people to buy anything in order to be welcome in the company’s stores. It also promised to give employees more training in the coming year, and to provide each store with a list of local resources for mental health and substance abuse services, housing shelters and protocols for calling authorities.

“Today was a starting point. We have much to do,” said Rosalind Brewer, chief operating officer and group president.

Nelson and Robinson reached an agreement with Starbucks for an undisclosed amount of money and offers of a free education. They also accepted from the city of Philadelphia a symbolic $1 each and a promise to launch a $200,000 program for young entrepreneurs.
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The U.S.-North Korea summit appears to be back on track, but Pyongyang is showing increased impatience at comments coming out of Washington that what leader Kim Jong Un really wants, even more than his nuclear security blanket, is American-style prosperity.

It’s a core issue for Kim and a message President Donald Trump shouldn’t ignore as they work to nail down their summit next month in Singapore.

Kim is as enthusiastic as Trump to see the summit happen as soon as possible, but the claim that his sudden switch to diplomacy over the past several months shows he is aching for U.S. economic aid and private-sector know-how presents a major problem for the North Korean leader, who can’t be seen as going into the summit with his hat in his hand.

The claim is also quite possibly off target. 

North Korea is far more interested in improving trade with China, its economic lifeline, and with South Korea, which it sees as a potential gold mine for tourism and large-scale joint projects. Getting the U.S. to back off sanctions so he can pursue those goals, along with the boost to his legitimacy and whatever security guarantees he can take home, is more likely foremost on Kim’s mind. 

Even so, the North’s perceived thirst for U.S. economic aid has consistently been the message coming from Trump and his senior officials. All Kim needs to do, they suggest, is commit to denuclearization and American entrepreneurs will be ready to unleash their miracles on the country’s sad-sack economy.

“I truly believe North Korea has brilliant potential and will be a great economic and financial nation one day,” Trump tweeted Sunday. “Kim Jong Un agrees with me on this.” 

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has laid Washington’s road map out in more detail.

“We can create conditions for real economic prosperity for the North Korean people that will rival that of the South,” he said earlier this month in a televised interview. “It won’t be U.S. taxpayers. It will be American know-how, knowledge, entrepreneurs and risk-takers working alongside the North Korean people to create a robust economy for their people.” 

Pompeo suggested that Americans help build out the North’s energy grid, develop its infrastructure and deliver the finest agricultural equipment and technology “so they can eat meat and have healthy lives.”

Kim has emphatically not agreed to any of that. 

Under Trump’s “maximum pressure” policy, international sanctions on North Korea are stronger than ever. Sanctions relief would open the door for more trade with China, South Korea and possibly Russia – partners North Korea trusts more than it trusts Washington – and potentially unlock access to global financial institutions. 

The last thing Kim wants is to give up his nuclear weapons only to have his country overrun with American businessmen and entrepreneurs.

To Pyongyang’s ears, that scenario is less an offer than a threat. 

Despite its very real need for foreign investment, Kim’s regime has good reason to be wary of economic aid in general. Opening up to aid inevitably involves some degree of increased contact with potentially disruptive outsiders, calls for change, loosening of controls and restrictions – all of which could be seen as a threat to Kim’s near absolute authority.

North Korea’s message on that has been clear. 

Almost as soon as Pompeo started talking about his plan to rebuild North Korea’s economy, Kim Kye Gwan, the North’s first vice foreign minister, shot back that Pyongyang has no interest in that kind of help, saying, “We have never had any expectation of U.S. support in carrying out our economic construction and will not at all make such a deal in future, too.” 

State media unleashed another attack on the idea Sunday, calling Fox News, CBS and CNN “hack media on the payroll of power” for airing programs that featured U.S. officials talking about how large-scale, nongovernmental economic aid awaits North Korea if it moves toward verifiable and irreversible denuclearization.

The North’s media have been careful not to criticize Trump directly. 

But the issue is sensitive enough that the North has also stepped up its response in ideological terms, stressing the superiority of the socialist system and the value of independence, while warning against the underhanded scheming of the “imperialists,” which in North Korea speak is interchangeable with “Americans.”

“It is the calculation of the imperialists that they can attain their aims without firing a single shot if they make the people degenerate and disintegrate ideologically and foment social disorder,” said an editorial Sunday in the ruling party’s newspaper.

The commentary went on to call the capitalist way of life “ideological and cultural poisoning” and concluded, “Unless such poisoning is prevented, it would be impossible to defend independence and socialism and achieve the independent development of each country and nation.”
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The Trump administration plans to shorten the length of validity for some visas issued to Chinese citizens, the State Department said Tuesday, as President Donald Trump works to counter alleged theft of U.S. intellectual property by Beijing.

The changes begin June 11. The State Department said that under the new policy, U.S. consular officers may limit how long visas are valid, rather than the usual practice of issuing them for the maximum possible length.

The State Department did not provide specifics. But a U.S. official said that according to instructions sent to U.S. embassies and consulates, Chinese graduate students will be limited to one-year visas if they are studying in fields like robotics, aviation and high-tech manufacturing. China identified those areas as priorities in its “Made in China” 2025 manufacturing plan.

The instructions also say that Chinese citizens seeking visas will need special clearance from multiple U.S. agencies if they work as researchers or managers for companies on a U.S. Commerce Department list of entities requiring higher scrutiny. Those clearances are expected to take months for each visa application, the official said. The official wasn’t authorized to comment publicly and requested anonymity.

The application process itself won’t change, the State Department said.

The changes come as Trump seeks to crack down on China’s trade practices, especially those related to cutting-edge industries that Beijing wants to dominate. On Tuesday, Trump renewed his threat to place 25 percent tariffs on $50 billion of Chinese goods, in retaliation for what his administration says are China’s unfair trade practices.

The changes were foreshadowed in Trump’s national security strategy issued in December. That document said the U.S. would review and tighten visa procedures “to reduce economic theft by non-traditional intelligence collectors.” It specifically mentioned possible restrictions on visas for foreign students studying science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
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An annual U.S. government report finds religious freedom “under assault” around the world, notably in what the State Department calls countries of concern — Russia, Iran, North Korea and Myanmar. U.S. officials on Tuesday announced Washington will host in July its first-ever ministerial meeting with “like-minded” allies to advance religious freedom. VOA State Department correspondent Nike Ching has the story.
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