Month: August 2018

Turkish Lira Plummets Amid Deadlock in US Talks

Posted on by SeeEU

The value of the Turkish lira hit a record low Thursday amid reports of a deadlock during talks in Washington between Turkey and the United States.

The lira has fallen more than 10 percent since last week, when Washington imposed sanctions against two Turkish ministers who have detained American Pastor Andrew Brunson.

“I would assume the Americans have now understood that they have the upper hand over Turkey,” said analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners. “They have got Turkey where it hurts, i.e., the threat of financial sanctions.”

Analysts say international investors were already jittery over Turkey’s debt-fueled growth and rampant inflation, along with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s unorthodox economic policies.

Then on Monday, a sell-off in the lira was touched off by reports that the Trump administration was considering ending Turkey’s duty-free access to the U.S. market. The lira recovered a bit upon news of the diplomatic visit but began to slide again when initial reports of a U.S.-Turkish agreement were contradicted.

“Just a series of errors have killed investors’ confidence. The Brunson case and American sanctions were the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Yesilada said.

Under house arrest

Washington is demanding Brunson’s immediate release. He has been under house arrest while standing trial on terrorism charges. Washington dismissed the allegations as baseless, accusing Ankara of hostage-taking. U.S. diplomats are also reportedly pushing for the release of a number of jailed American citizens, along with three local employees working at U.S. diplomatic missions in Turkey.

“The kind of progress that we want is for Pastor Brunson, our locally employed staff and other Americans to be brought home. That’s the real progress that we’re looking for, and obviously, we’re not there yet,” U.S. State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Tuesday.

The Turkish delegation in the U.S., led by Deputy Foreign Minister Sedat Onal, is pushing for concessions from Washington over Turkish state lender Halkbank. The bank is facing a significant fine after a New York court this year convicted a senior executive, Mehmet Hakan Atilla, of violating U.S. Iranian sanctions. Ankara is also lobbying for the return of Atilla, who is serving a 32-month sentence in a U.S. jail.

Media reports that Ankara reneged last month on a deal for Brunson’s release have severely undermined Turkey’s bargaining position, said international relations expert Soli Ozel of Istanbul’s Kadir Has University.

“The non-release of the priest was a breach of contract in Washington’s eyes, and that’s why the response was furious. All those who were aligned to make things well with Turkey have turned against Turkey,” Ozel said.

‘New economic model’

In a bid to restore calm to the financial markets, Berat Albayrak, Turkey’s minister of finance and treasury, announced that a “new economic model would be unveiled” Friday.

His statement said the program would seek to rein in debt-fueled growth and target inflation — critical demands imposed by international investors. In the wake of the announcement, there was a momentary pause in the lira’s decline before it continued to fall.

Analysts point out that the continuing slide of the Turkish currency indicates that time is not on Ankara’s side.

“It’s do or die. Essentially, we are at the very brink of a currency or balance-of-payments crisis,” Yesilada said. “We are inches away from a major run on the Turkish lira. Foreign investors and domestic consumer confidence are at zero.

“Nothing less than a statement from the White House that the crisis has been resolved and no more sanctions are in the pipeline for Turkey would end the painful collapse of the currency. Statements from Ankara won’t do it. Ankara doesn’t have any credibility.”
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Kenya Banks on Human Milk to Reduce Newborn Mortality

Posted on by SeeAF

Joshua Okumu’s wife, Mary Mwanja, died during childbirth 18 years ago at Pumwani Maternity Hospital in Nairobi. But their daughter survived. 

When he picked up his newborn baby at the nursery, grief-stricken and shocked, Okumu was not entirely sure how to feed her.

“So when I reached home, I started feeding her with a packet of milk called Tuzo,” he said. “By that time, Tuzo was not diluted like nowadays. So, that is what I was using to feed the small baby when I took her from the hospital. If the mum was there it would have been healthier to be fed by her mum.”

For Kenyan widowers like Okumu, there will soon be another option: human donor milk. 

Pumwani is getting Kenya’s first breast milk bank, which will be only the second of its kind on the continent. The other one is in South Africa. 

The bank is a joint initiative by Kenya’s Ministry of Health and PATH, a U.S.-based nonprofit health organization. It will open in September for donations and offer free breast milk by prescription for babies who cannot get it from their mothers.

​’Next best option’

Dr. Elizabeth Kimani Murage, head of maternal and child well-being at the African Population and Health Research Center, is behind the project.

“The World Health Organization recommends that if the mother’s own breast milk is not available for the baby for any reason, the best next option would be the donor milk,” she said. “So the recommendation is to make donor milk available to such vulnerable babies.”

The milk bank aims to help orphaned and malnourished babies get the nutrients essential to healthy development.

Murage said mother’s milk has an enormous impact on child survival, especially during the first month of life.

“Despite improvements in infant mortality, neonatal mortality is reducing at a very slow rate, so those are the children we want to target,” she said. “According to the Every Newborn Action Plan [from the World Health Organization and UNICEF], we should actually reduce neonatal mortality to 12 deaths per 1,000 live births. But, you see, we are very far [from that goal]. We are at 22.”

There are misconceptions and concerns about hygiene and the spread of disease to newborns in the use of donated milk. Murage noted that all donors’ health would checked at the hospital and that the milk would be pasteurized to ensure that only safe and healthful breast milk is given to babies in need. 
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Feds: Man Offered $500 for Killing of ICE Agents

Posted on by SeeUS

A Massachusetts man has been charged with offering $500 to anyone who would kill a federal immigration officer.

Federal prosecutors in Boston on Thursday said 33-year-old Brandon Ziobrowski is charged with using interstate and foreign commerce to transmit a threat to injure another person.

Authorities say on July 2 the Cambridge man tweeted: “I am broke but will scrounge and literally give $500 to anyone who kills an ICE agent.”

Ziobrowski also allegedly tweeted repeatedly that he wanted to “slit” U.S. Sen. John McCain’s throat.

Ziobrowski was arrested Thursday in New York and is scheduled to make an initial appearance in federal court there before being transported back to Massachusetts.

It could not immediately be determined if he has a lawyer.
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Latina Press Officer Helen Aguirre Ferre Leaves White House

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Helen Aguirre Ferre, one of the most prominent Latinos serving in the White House, has left her job as director of media affairs.

White House spokeswoman Lindsay Walters said Thursday that Aguirre was taking up a new position as director for strategic communications and public affairs at the National Endowment for the Arts. She said Aguirre would start her new job in the next two weeks.

In a statement, Aguirre said she looks forward to “continuing to advance the President’s agenda in support of American communities through the National Endowment for the Arts which provides support to nonprofit cultural institutions nationwide.”

Aguirre had held the White House job since the start of the Trump administration after serving as the Republican National Committee’s director of Hispanic communications. During her tenure, the White House removed the Spanish-language content from its website, a departure from the two previous administrations.

President Donald Trump’s engagement with Latinos has been complicated. During his campaign, Trump turned off many Latinos with his harsh anti-immigration rhetoric, including disparaging Mexican immigrants as criminals and rapists. He criticized rival Jeb Bush for answering a reporter’s question in Spanish, saying the former Florida governor “should really set the example by speaking English while in the United States.”

Aguirre’s departure follows that of another high-profile Latino, Carlos Diaz-Rosillo, who in June left his job at the White House as deputy assistant to the president and director of policy and interagency coordination to become a senior deputy chairman at the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Before joining the administration, Díaz-Rosillo had taught at Harvard in the Government Department. He did not reply to a message from the AP requesting comment.

The recent changes leave these Latinos serving closest to Trump: Mercedes Schlapp, White House director of strategic communications; Jennifer Korn, special assistant to the president and deputy director for the Office of Public Liaison; Juan Cruz, senior director for Western Hemisphere affairs at the National Security Council.
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Zimbabwe Opposition Official Free on Bail

Posted on by SeeAF

A Zimbabwe opposition leader, who had fled the country to seek political asylum in neighboring Zambia, has been freed on bail after being deported back to Zimbabwe. But his lawyers say their client was abducted.

Movement for Democratic Change Alliance senior official Tendai Biti was taken in handcuffs by police Thursday to the Harare Magistrates Court. “[Spirits] are very, very high. We keep on fighting,” he told VOA.

Prosecutor Justin Uladi read the charges against Biti and accused the politician of announcing false election results, saying opposition leader Nelson Chamisa had won Zimbabwe’s July 30 polls. The state said Biti took part in the violence that rocked Harare during last week’s opposition protest and destroyed property worth $345,000.

After the state and the defense finished their statements, Magistrate Francis Mapfumo granted Biti $5,000 bail. He was supposed to surrender his passport. On top of that, Magistrate Mapfumo ordered Biti to report to police twice a day.

Even though her client was granted bail, attorney Beatrice Mtetwa of Zimbabwe Lawyers for Human Rights, said she would challenge Biti’s arrest in court on Friday.

“Because there is a court order from a Lusaka court where he is supposed to have been today if he had not been abducted,” she said. “He was not brought here in terms of the country’s extradition laws or SADC [Southern African Development Community] protocol on extradition or Zimbabwe’s Criminal Mutual Assistance Act. He was not brought in terms of the law. You will hear tomorrow what happens in court.”

Biti, who fled to Zambia Wednesday and was deported Thursday, is one of the several senior opposition officials Zimbabwe police say are wanted in connection with election related offenses.

On Friday the opposition is expected to challenge the outcome of Zimbabwe’s July 30 general elections, which the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission said was won by incumbent President Emmerson Mnangagwa.
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Experts: Americans Vulnerable to Malign Social Media Messaging

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While U.S. lawmakers press Twitter and Facebook to better police their platforms against Russian social media trolls and ponder tougher sanctions against Moscow, American voters remain vulnerable to divisive messaging and misinformation before midterm elections in November, experts told VOA.

“All of us, left and right [politically], are all very susceptible to being fooled by disinformation,” said Claire Wardle, director of First Draft News, a project at Harvard University’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy that provides tools to fight false content on the Internet and social media.

“There are many people who are trying to spread misinformation.We all have to be much more skeptical of the information we are consuming and to be aware, particularly if it’s content that makes us have an emotional reaction,” Wardle added.

Last month, Facebook shut down 32 fake accounts that posted polarizing messages on race, gender, and fascism. In 2016, Russian trolls flooded Facebook, Twitter and other platforms with similar content, reaching millions of Americans.

One Russia-linked Twitter handle, 4MYSQUAD10, now deactivated, posted: “White America Does The Crime, Black America Gets The Time. WTF? #BlackLivesMatter #racism.”

Another, TEN_GOP 2545, posted: “Muslim bus driver throws all passengers out of the bus, so he has space and time to pray.”

“As humans we respond to fear,” Wardle said. “A lot of disinformation is driven by fear — other people you should be fearful of and then wanting to protect yourself, our family and your community.”

Last week, social media researchers told the Senate Intelligence Committee Russian efforts to polarize the American people are as pernicious as ever.

“Russian manipulation did not stop in 2016. After Election Day, the Russian government stepped on the gas,” New York-based Graphika CEO John Kelly said.

“Foreign actors will continue to aim future disinformation campaigns at African-American voters, Muslim-American voters, white supremacist voters,” Oxford University researcher Philip Howard told the panel. “I expect the strategy will remain the same: push disinformation about public issues and prevent particular types of voters from participating on Election Day.”

Political scientist Keneshia Grant may have had a firsthand brush with Russia’s use of social media to inflame racial tensions in the United States before the 2016 election, and believes American voters are still in Moscow’s crosshairs for malign messaging.

“There were minority communities targeted. I believe that targeting is still happening and that it has been getting more sophisticated over time,” said Grant, who teaches at Washington’s Howard University, a predominantly-African American institution.

In 2016, Grant noticed her Twitter account suddenly gained a group of mysterious and silent followers. She believed they were studying her posts to learn to craft messages to effectively target black Americans.

“There were 20-30 accounts of individuals who were trolling to see what I might say and, I suppose, to use that information to seem credible with other black users of Twitter,” she said. “I was one of the people who got an e-mail [from Twitter] saying you have interacted in some way with someone we believe to be fraudulent.”

Weeding out fake accounts

Social media companies have trumpeted their efforts to weed out fake accounts and bad actors. While commendable, Grant said it’s not enough.

“Americans have a responsibility to know that Russians are attempting to interfere in elections, and then to take the additional steps to figure out where information comes from that they are consuming.Not just consume it, but think about it,” she said.

Wardle concurred, but noted that social media trolls exploit a basic human tendency: giving credence to information or messaging that supports one’s outlook or ideology.

“People want to believe information that supports their worldview, whether that’s a belief on gun control or immigration or whether you’re more a dog person than a cat person,” she said, adding that counteracting that tendency will require holding people to account when they wittingly or unwittingly spread erroneous content.

“If we want to drive on roads that aren’t covered in garbage, we have to take responsibility for not throwing Coke cans out of the window,” she said.

“I want to see people recognize that when they click share’ [on social media], they have a responsibility for the information they are putting out,” she added. “So when crazy Uncle Bob is sharing false information, rather than saying, ‘well, that’s just crazy Uncle Bob,’ we should call him out and say that it’s not healthy for us to live in a society where we are sharing false information.”

The Harvard researcher noted that other regions of the world, like Eastern Europe, have been grappling with false information campaigns for far longer than the United States.

“After the election of 2016, when Americans all of a sudden woke up to misinformation, I think the rest of the world did a slow hand-clap and said ‘welcome to the party, America.'”

Some American schools have introduced curriculum to teach students to think more critically about the information they receive and to identify propaganda and malign messaging. Such classes should become standard, according to a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

“We are asymmetrically vulnerable [to disinformation campaigns] because of the First Amendment and democracy, our whole system is based on information,” Maine independent Senator Angus King said.

“Our kids are growing up with these [high-tech] devices,” he added, “but not necessarily taught how they can be manipulated by their devices. I think there ought to be standardized courses in high school called digital literacy’ and increasing the public’s awareness that they are being conned.”
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Warren Buffett’s Son Announces $30M Illinois Investment

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The foundation of billionaire investor Warren Buffett’s son plans to invest $30 million in a central Illinois campus of facilities to help people with drug addiction and bring together social services.

The (Decatur) Herald and Review reports Macon County Sheriff Howard Buffett announced plans Wednesday in Decatur. Crossing Healthcare, which serves primarily low- and moderate-income residents, will own four new facilities including a residential rehabilitation building and outpatient treatment center.

Howard Buffett says the investment “will address the health of our community at multiple levels.”

Howard Buffett was appointed sheriff in September and was an executive at Archer Daniels Midland. Warren Buffett has helped the Howard G. Buffett Foundation by giving his Berkshire Hathaway stock. The foundation has donated millions of dollars to projects in central Illinois.
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US Welcomes Decision by Congo’s Kabila Not to Run for Presidency

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The United States has welcomed the decision by Democratic Republic of Congo President Joseph Kabila to not seek re-election, saying the ruling party’s move to name a candidate other than Kabila “represents a significant step forward for Congolese democracy.”

“We are encouraged by this sign that he (Kabila) intends to uphold his commitments to the Congolese constitution and the terms of the December 2016 St. Sylvestre agreement by not seeking a third term,” State Department spokesperson Heather Nauert said in a statement.  

“The Congolese people must be free to express their views and choose from the candidates without fear of violence, threats, or intimidation,” Nauert added.  “We call on DRC’s National Independent Electoral Commission and Congolese authorities to take the necessary steps to guarantee credible elections on December 23, 2018.”

Kabila has said he will support former Interior Minister Emmanuel Ramazani Shadary in the upcoming presidential election.

Kabila should have stepped down at the end of 2016 when his second term expired, but he invoked a constitutional clause allowing him to remain in office as a caretaker.

The uncertainty fueled political tensions and sparked anti-Kabila protests that were violently suppressed.

The country of 80 million people has never had a peaceful transition of power since it gained independence in 1960 from European colonial powers

 
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US Imposes New Sanctions on Russia for Poisoning Former Russian Spy in Britain

Posted on by SeeEU

The United States has announced new sanctions on Russia in connection with its alleged attempt to poison a former Russian spy and his daughter in Britain. The State Department Wednesday said Russia is being sanctioned because it used a chemical weapon in violation of international law. Former Russian spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter were poisoned by Novichok, a military-grade nerve agent, in Britain in March. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports the sanctions are to go in effect in about two weeks.
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Gaza Border Fight Intensifies in Night of Rockets, Airstrikes

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Palestinian militants fired dozens of rockets into Israel and the Israeli military carried out scores of air strikes as fighting near the Gaza-Israel border intensified overnight into Thursday.

Air raid sirens sounded almost nonstop in southern Israel from sundown Wednesday, warning residents to stay in shelters as more than 80 rockets were fired in their direction. At the same time, Israeli aircraft struck 140 targets belonging to the Hamas Islamist group that controls the Gaza Strip.

The flare-up came after officials on both sides had talked about potential progress in U.N and Egyptian efforts to broker a truce to end months of simmering violence.

Israeli media reported several residents of Sderot and other border towns were wounded by rocket fire.

In Gaza, one Hamas militant was killed in the air strikes, as was a Palestinian woman and her 18 month old child, Palestinian officials said. At least five other civilians were also wounded.

“I am deeply alarmed by the recent escalation of violence between Gaza and Israel, and particularly by today’s multiple rockets fired towards communities in southern Israel,” said U.N. Middle East envoy Nickolay Mladenov in an overnight statement.

The U.N., he said, has engaged with Egypt in an “unprecedented effort” to avoid serious conflict, but warned “the situation can rapidly deteriorate with devastating consequences for all people.”

Gaza has been controlled by Hamas for more than a decade, during which time it has fought three wars against Israel, most recently in 2014. Though neither side appears keen on another full-blown conflict.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called off a trip to Colombia this week to attend to the Gaza truce talks and was to convene his decision-making security cabinet Thursday to discuss the situation.
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In Britain, Slavery Cases Hit Record, Convictions Barely Budge

Posted on by SeeEU

A record number of people were charged with modern slavery offenses in Britain this year, prosecutors revealed Thursday, but activists said the number of convictions had not increased significantly since a tough new law was introduced in 2015.

Britain’s Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) said 239 suspects had been charged with modern slavery offenses over the past year, up 27 percent from the year before.

Yet the number of convictions did not increase significantly: 185 people were found guilty over the same period, four more than last year, but down from 192 in 2016.

“We have yet to see any significant increase in the rate of convictions of those who traffic and enslave people,” said Kate Roberts, head of the Human Trafficking Foundation. “This underlines the importance of empowering and supporting victims to speak out and come forward to the authorities.”

​World leader against trafficking

Britain has been regarded as a world leader in the fight against trafficking since passing the 2015 Modern Slavery Act to fight a crime estimated to affect 40 million people worldwide.

The legislation introduced life sentences for traffickers, measures to protect people at risk of being enslaved, and made large companies inspect their supply chains for forced labor.

But activists say it has not yet made a serious dent in the trade in Britain. The government last month ordered a review of the law as it released data showing that modern slavery costs the country up to 4.3 billion pounds ($5.6 billion) annually.

The CPS said slavery cases were often complex, with investigators facing hurdles from language barriers to victims not recognizing they are slaves, or being scared to speak out. The average time to complete a slavery prosecution has doubled to almost three years since 2015, according to the CPS.

“These cases are growing in size and complexity, that’s why we have given our prosecutors extensive extra training,” said the director of public prosecutions Alison Saunders in a statement.

Cuts in resources

Government cuts to resources for police and prosecutors have also hampered the pursuit of justice, said Klara Skrivankova, U.K. and Europe program manager for Anti-Slavery International.

“The government needs to reverse these cuts and increase investment into tackling modern slavery to see any significant increase in traffickers being sent to jail and their victims being free for good,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

Britain is home to about 136,000 modern slaves, Australian human rights group Walk Free said last month, a figure about 10 times higher than a 2013 government estimate.
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Saudi-Canadian Dispute Doesn’t Extend to Oil

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Saudi Arabia’s oil supplies to Canada will not be impacted by a dispute between the two countries, the kingdom’s energy minister said Thursday, reassuring customers after Riyadh froze new trade with Canada and ruled out mediation efforts.

The world’s largest oil exporter has a “firm and long-standing policy” that petroleum supplies are not influenced by political considerations, Khalid al-Falih said in a statement.

“The current diplomatic crisis between Saudi Arabia and Canada will not, in any way, impact Saudi Aramco’s relations with its customers in Canada.”

Canada’s demand

Saudi Arabia, infuriated by Canada’s demand last week that jailed rights activists in the kingdom be released immediately, expelled the Canadian ambassador Sunday, blocked imports of Canadian grain and ended state-backed educational and medical program in Canada.

Bilateral trade between Canada and Saudi Arabia is worth nearly $4 billion a year. Canadian exports to Saudi Arabia were about $1.12 billion in 2017, or 0.2 percent of the total value of Canadian exports.

Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir ruled out any mediation efforts and called on Ottawa Wednesday to “fix its big mistake,” saying the kingdom was considering implementing more measures against Canada for interfering in Saudi Arabia’s domestic affairs.

Trudeau olive branch

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau later appeared to extend an olive branch, saying he would keep pressing Saudi Arabia on civil liberties but also saying the Gulf Arab state had made some progress on human rights.

“Diplomatic talks continue … we don’t want to have poor relations with Saudi Arabia. It is a country that has great significance in the world, that is making progress in the area of human rights,” Trudeau said.

Saudi Arabia has in recent months detained several women’s rights activists, some of whom had previously campaigned for the right to drive and an end to the kingdom’s male guardianship system, the latest to be swept up in a government crackdown on activists, clerics and journalists.

Since rising to power in 2015, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has courted Western allies to support his reform plans to modernize and open up the kingdom, offering billions of dollars in arms sales and promising to fight radicalism in the kingdom.

Prince Mohammed has launched a campaign of social and economic change, but has not eased the absolute monarchy’s total ban on political activism. He has taken a more aggressive stance toward archrival Iran, began a three-year war in Yemen and led a boycott of fellow Gulf Arab state Qatar.

In addition to the trade freeze, Riyadh has stopped sending patients to Canadian hospitals and suspended educational exchanges, moving Saudi scholars to other countries.
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Chinese Media Say US Tariff Moves Reflect ‘Mobster Mentality’

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Chinese state media on Thursday accused the United States of a “mobster mentality” in its move to implement additional tariffs on Chinese goods and warned that Beijing had all the necessary means to fight back.

The comments marked a ratcheting up in tensions between the world’s two largest economies over a trade dispute, which is already affecting industries including steel and autos and is causing unease about which products could be targeted next.

Beijing late on Wednesday said it would slap additional tariffs of 25 percent on $16 billion worth of U.S. imports, in retaliation against news the United States plans to begin collecting 25 percent extra in tariffs on $16 billion worth of Chinese goods beginning August 23.

“The two countries’ trade conflict, which is merely push and shove at the moment, is likely to escalate into more than just a scuffle if the U.S. administration cannot marshal its mobster mentality,” state newspaper China Daily said in an editorial.

“China continues to do its utmost to avoid a trade war, but in the face of the U.S.’s ever greater demand for protection money, China has no choice but to fight back,” it said.

So far, China has now either imposed or proposed tariffs on $110 billion of U.S. goods, representing the vast majority of its annual imports of American products. Big-ticket U.S. items that are still not on any list are crude oil and large aircraft.

“China has confidence in protecting its own interests [and] has many means,” state broadcaster CCTV said on its early-morning news show.

Another commentary, written by China Institute of International Studies research fellow Jia Xiudong and published in the overseas edition of the People’s Daily newspaper, said the United States was trying to “suppress China’s development.”

China should consider “unconventional methods” such as the stimulus plan used by Beijing during the global financial crisis if needed to sustain economic growth, the Global Times newspaper, a tabloid published by the ruling Communist Party’s People’s Daily, said in a commentary.
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Suspect in Lemonade Stand Stickup is Arrested

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North Carolina authorities arrested a juvenile Wednesday they say robbed a 9-year-old lemonade vendor of $17 at gunpoint, a stickup that prompted an outpouring of sympathy and donations for the young entrepreneur.

Tony Underwood, a spokesman for the Union County Sheriff’s Office, said detectives had obtained security camera footage of a person who matched the suspect’s description in an area near where the holdup occurred. Underwood said a juvenile, identified as a male in the agency’s news release, was arrested without incident.

The suspect’s identity was being withheld under North Carolina law. Detectives working with the state’s Department of Juvenile Justice obtained petitions charging the juvenile with robbery with a dangerous weapon and possession of drug paraphernalia, authorities said.

A judge issued a secure custody order for the suspect. Underwood said the order means the suspect will be confined until his next custody hearing in juvenile court.

The young vendor, whose first name is Mark, told sheriff’s deputies he was held up at gunpoint Saturday while selling lemonade at a traffic circle not far from the entrance to his community in Monroe, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) southeast of Charlotte. Investigators subsequently said they were seeking a male suspect.

A business card that one customer collected from the lemonade stand said Mark also works as a lawn mower, dog walker and professional ring bearer.

A person who responded to a text sent to the telephone number listed on Mark’s business card said Tuesday that the boy was selling lemonade again Sunday at a community pool and had collected more than $250 in donations.

Home-improvement chain Lowe’s subsequently gave the boy a new, $1,100 riding mower on Monday after spokeswoman Sarah Lively said officials at the company’s headquarters near Charlotte saw news reports about the robbery.
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Prosecutor: Man at Compound Trained Kids for School Shooting

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A father arrested at a ramshackle New Mexico compound where 11 children were found living in filth was training youngsters to commit school shootings, prosecutors said in court documents obtained Wednesday.

The allegations against Siraj Ibn Wahhaj came to light as authorities awaited word on whether human remains discovered at the site were those of his missing son, who is severely disabled and went missing in December in Jonesboro, Georgia, near Atlanta.

The documents say Wahhaj was conducting weapons training with assault rifles at the compound near the Colorado border that was raided by authorities Friday.

Prosecutor Timothy Hasson filed the court documents while asking that Wahhaj be held without bail after he was arrested last week with four other adults facing child abuse charges.

“He poses a great danger to the children found on the property as well as a threat to the community as a whole due to the presence of firearms and his intent to use these firearms in a violent and illegal manner,” Hasson wrote.

Prosecutors did not bring up the school shooting accusation during initial court hearings Wednesday for the abuse suspects. A judge ordered them all held without bond pending further proceedings.

In the court documents, authorities said a foster parent of one of the 11 children removed from the compound had told authorities the child had been trained to use an assault rifle in preparation for a school shooting.

Taos County Sheriff Jerry Hogrefe previously said adults at the compound were “considered extremist of the Muslim belief.” He did not elaborate, saying it was part of the investigation.

Terror ties

Aleks Kostich of the Taos County Public Defender’s Office questioned the new accusation of a school shooting conspiracy against by Wahhaj, saying the claim was presented with little information beyond the explanation that it came from a foster parent. 

Kostich believes prosecutors are not certain about the credibility of the foster parent, whom he has no way of reaching to verify the claim, he said.

The human remains were being analyzed by medical examiners to determine if they are those of Abdul-ghani Wahhaj, the missing boy.

Earlier this year, his grandfather, Imam Siraj Wahhaj, posted a plea on Facebook for help finding his grandson.

The elder Wahhaj heads the Masjid At-Taqwa in Brooklyn, a mosque that has attracted radical speakers to over the years. He met Mahmud Abouhalima when he came to the site to raise money for Muslims in Afghanistan. Abouhalima later helped bomb the World Trade Center 1993.

In a Georgia arrest warrant, authorities said 39-year-old Siraj Ibn Wahhaj had told his son’s mother that he wanted to perform an exorcism on the child because he believed he was possessed by the devil. He later said he was taking the child to a park and didn’t return.

He is accused in Georgia of kidnapping the boy.

The arrest warrant issued there says the missing boy has a condition caused by lack of oxygen and blood flow around the time of birth. He cannot walk and requires constant attention, his mother told police.

New Mexico compound

For months, neighbors worried about the squalid compound built along a remote New Mexico plain, saying they took their concerns to authorities long before sheriff’s officials raided the facility described as a small camping trailer in the ground.

The search at the compound came amid a two-month investigation that included the FBI. Hogrefe said federal agents surveilled the area a few weeks ago but did not find probable cause to search the property.

That changed when Georgia detectives forwarded a message to the sheriff that he said initially had been sent to a third party, saying: “We are starving and need food and water.”

Authorities found what Hogrefe called “the saddest living conditions and poverty” he has seen in 30 years in law enforcement. He said Wahhaj was armed with multiple firearms, including an assault rifle. But he was taken into custody without incident.

The group arrived in Amalia in December, with enough money to buy groceries and construction supplies, according to Tyler Anderson, a 41-year-old auto mechanic who lives nearby.

He said he helped them install solar panels after they arrived but eventually stopped visiting.

Anderson said he met both of the men in the group, but never the women, who authorities have said are the mothers of the 11 children, ages 1 to 15.

“We just figured they were doing what we were doing, getting a piece of land and getting off the grid,” Anderson said. 

As the months passed, he said he stopped seeing the smaller children playing in the area and didn’t hear guns being fired at a shooting range on the property.

Jason Badger, who owned the property where the compound was built, said he and his wife had pressed authorities to remove the group after becoming concerned about the children.

The group had erected the compound on their acreage instead of a neighboring tract owned by Lucas Morton, one of the men arrested during the raid.

However, a judge dismissed an eviction notice filed by Badger against Morton in June, court records said. The records did not provide further details on the judge’s decision.

After the raid, Anderson looked over the property for the first time in months.

“I was flabbergasted from what it had turned into from the last time I saw it,” he said.
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UN Urges Israel, Hamas to ‘Step Back From Brink’

Posted on by SeeEA

U.N. Mideast envoy Nickolay Mladenov urged Israel and Hamas to step back “from the brink” after both sides exchanged rocket fire Wednesday.

“The situation can rapidly deteriorate, with devastating consequences for all people,” Mladenov said.

Militants fired around 70 rockets into Israel from Hamas-controlled Gaza. Israel responded with airstrikes, killing at least one Palestinian and wounding five others, according to the Gaza health ministry. 

The violence came even while both sides expressed some optimism that a truce could be worked out to help avoid another war between Israel and Hamas.

“We can say that actions led by the United Nations and Egypt are in advanced stages and we hope it could yield some good from them,” the deputy Hamas chief for Gaza, Khalil al-Hayya, told Al Jazeera television.

A senior member of the Israeli parliament said he “very much hopes we are on the brink of a new day on the matter of Gaza.”

Palestinians have held weekly protests along the Israeli-Gaza border since March, when Israel began preparations for marking its 70th anniversary as a state.

Israeli soldiers have killed at least 158 demonstrators, many of whom were militants that Israel said were trying to sneak across the border.

Israel accused Hamas of organizing the protests as a cover for terrorism, a charge Hamas denies.
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Palestinian-American Congressional Candidate Source of West Bank Pride

Posted on by SeeEA

The Michigan primary victory of Rashida Tlaib, a Palestinian-American who is expected to become the first Muslim woman to serve in the U.S. Congress, triggered an outpouring of joy in her ancestral village on Wednesday.

Relatives in Beit Our al-Foqa, where Tlaib’s mother was born, greeted the news with a mixture of pride and hope that she will take on a U.S. administration widely seen as hostile to the Palestinian cause.

“It’s a great honor for this small town. It’s a great honor for the Palestinian people to have Rashida in the Congress,” said Mohammed Tlaib, the village’s former mayor and a distant relative. “For sure she will serve Palestine, for sure she will serve the interests of her nation. She is deeply rooted here.”

Rashida Tlaib, a former state lawmaker, defeated five other candidates to win the Democratic nomination in her Michigan district in Tuesday’s primary. She will run unopposed, setting her up to take the spot held since 1965 by John Conyers, who stepped down in December citing health reasons amid charges of sexual harassment.

While celebrating her win, Tlaib was embraced early Wednesday morning by her mother, Fatima, who briefly wrapped a Palestinian flag around Tlaib’s waist. “My mom is really, genuinely excited,” Tlaib said of her victory.

The eldest of 14 children born to Palestinian immigrants in Detroit, the 42-year-old Tlaib advocates progressive positions associated with the Bernie Sanders wing of the Democratic Party, such as universal health care, a higher minimum wage, environmental protection and affordable university tuition. 

As a state lawmaker, she sought to defend Detroit’s poor, taking on refineries and a billionaire trucking magnate who she accused of polluting city neighborhoods. On the campaign trail, she criticized the influence of “big money” on politics and took aim at President Donald Trump, whom she famously heckled in 2016 while he was delivering a speech in Detroit. 

While noting her Palestinian heritage, her website makes no mention of her views on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. In a 2016 op-ed explaining why she disrupted then-presidential candidate Trump, she described herself as an “American, parent, Muslim, Arab-American, and woman.”

In an interview on Wednesday, Tlaib said her grandfather emigrated from Palestine to Brazil during the U.S. depression and eventually moved to Detroit to find better opportunities. “My dad grew up in Jerusalem,” she said. “When he was 19, he joined his father here. At 27, my grandmother grabbed him by the ear and took him to Palestine and said, ‘You are going to marry a good Arab woman.’”

While Tlaib would be the first Muslim woman to occupy a seat in the U.S. Congress, she would not be the first Palestinian-American. A lawmaker from western Michigan, U.S. Rep. Justin Amash, a Republican, is the son of a Palestinian refugee father and Syrian immigrant mother. He is a Christian.

In the West Bank, family members were jubilant as news of Tlaib’s victory came in early Wednesday. Relatives served baklawa, a sweet pastry, and grapes, figs and cactus fruits from their garden to visitors celebrating her win.

Tlaib’s uncle and aunt were speaking on an iPad with her mother, Fatima, back in Michigan.

“Thank God. Thank God,” her mother said. “This is for the Arabs and Muslims all over the world.”

She said her daughter detests Trump and that “God willing” she will defeat him and become the next U.S. president. “She stood up to him during his campaign. God willing, she will do it again and win.”

The first visitor was Mohammed Tlaib, the former mayor, who predicted his 5-year-old daughter, Juman, will grow up to be like her famous American relative. “Look at her. She is beautiful, smart and strong like her. From now on, I will name her Rashida,” he said.

The family’s story is typical of many Palestinians, with relatives scattered across the West Bank, Jordan and the United States. Mohammed Tlaib said some 50 people from the small village have immigrated to the U.S. and now have children in schools and universities in America. Relatives said Tlaib’s late father was from east Jerusalem.

“They are Americans, like other Americans, and have deep roots here. So we expect them to serve their occupied and embattled country there,” he said.

Trump is widely loathed by the Palestinians following his decision last December to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital. 

The Palestinians, who seek the West Bank, east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip for an independent state, see Trump as unfairly biased toward Israel. They have cut off most contacts with the Trump administration and pre-emptively rejected a peace plan expected to be unveiled by the White House in the near future.

The Tlaib family home in the West Bank is located near Road 443, an Israeli highway cutting through the territory that is largely off limits to Palestinian motorists. The home is near a towering military checkpoint, and relatives said that like many Palestinians, they are unable to build on their property because Israel will not give them a construction permit.

Rashida Tlaib’s uncle Bassam, 54, said the family always believed she had a bright future and has high hopes for her career in Washington. 

“She told the family that she wants to run for election to defend human rights, women rights, immigrant rights and the Palestinian rights,” he said, adding that the Democrats are much better for the Palestinians than the Republicans. “There is a space in the Democratic party to defend Palestinian issues,” he said

Her aunt, Fadwa Tlaib, who was visiting from Jordan, described her niece as a strong advocate for the weak. “She hates to see anyone take the rights of others. She supports human rights, women’s rights. She empowered girls in the family,” she said.

She said that Rashida Tlaib is part of a new, more powerful and politically involved generation of Palestinian-Americans who are better educated and integrated than their immigrant parents.

“Our kids are having better opportunities, better educations, here and in the U.S., and they have a much brighter and more influential future,” she said.
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Mosul Woman Raising 23 Grandkids Orphaned by IS Conflict

Posted on by SeeEA

When Iraqi forces announced the recapture of Mosul from Islamic State (IS) militants in July 2017, the joy of victory and the hope for a return to normalcy echoed across the country. But for Sana Ibrahim, who lost all of her children during IS rule, things would never be the same again.

Now, at 61, Ibrahim has to take care of 23 grandchildren left behind from her three sons and two daughters killed in the brutal conflict.

“IS destroyed us and left us nothing,” said Ibrahim, surrounded by her grandchildren. “They assaulted my home and killed my children.”

Before IS took control of Mosul in June 2014, Ibrahim and her family lived in the city’s densely populated district known as Old Mosul. She said her house was now among thousands of other buildings destroyed by war.

Mosul is Iraq’s second-largest city, with a population of more than 1 million, and the largest city once controlled by IS across Iraq and Syria.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared the city free of IS in July 2017. The jihadist group has since been routed out of all territories it once controlled in Iraq, and it struggles to hold the remaining small pockets of territory it has in eastern Syria.

​’Now, I am in pain’

“Before IS, I was living at peace. True, I was worried for my children, but at least I was feeling comfortable. Now, I am in pain, and I have to take care of the young and the old in my house,” Ibrahim told VOA.

She said her two older sons were killed by IS in 2016 after the group found they were members of the Iraqi security forces. Her younger son, 20, was shot by a sniper. Her two daughters were hit by airstrikes as they were fleeing the city in 2017.

Her children’s bodies are still missing, and local officials have told Ibrahim that they are still searching for them.

The nine-month campaign to recapture Mosul came at a great cost for its residents. An Associated Press investigation has estimated that about 11,000 people were killed in the battle. The Norwegian Refugee Council last month revealed that around 54,000 houses in the city and surrounding areas are still uninhabitable, and 383,934 people remain displaced.

Iraqi officials have said reconstructing the city is beyond their capacity and requires an international effort.

An international conference in Kuwait earlier this year collected about $30 billion, mostly in credit and investments, to help rebuild Iraq’s economy and infrastructure. However, that amount fell far short of Iraq’s hope for $90 billion for post-IS recovery.

No longer willing to wait for help, many residents have started borrowing money to rebuild their homes, especially in Mosul’s historic Old City, which has suffered the most damage.

​Return would be difficult

Ibrahim, who is renting a house in a Palestinian neighborhood, said she wanted to go back to her home in the Old City. But settling there will not be easy for her in a patriarchal community where women faced restrictions even before IS jihadist rule.

Her husband, Mouafaq Hamid Ibrahim, 71, cannot help because he is suffering from Alzheimer’s. Her 23 grandchildren, ages 2 to 16, are still young and depend on donations from some of Mosul’s wealthy families to pay for their education.

Despite the difficulties, Ibrahim told VOA she was proud that all her grandchildren were passing their exams this year.

“I don’t want my grandchildren to get on Mosul streets and turn into beggars. I want them to one day enter colleges and find prestigious jobs,” she said.
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German Drugmaker Sues to Halt US Execution

Posted on by SeeUS

German drugmaker Fresenius Kabi is suing to halt a planned execution in Nebraska, claiming the U.S. state illegally obtained the company’s drugs to use for the lethal injection procedure.

Fresenius Kabi filed the lawsuit Tuesday evening, saying the state was planning to use two of its drugs on August 14 to put to death convicted killer Carey Dean Moore.

Moore is sentenced to death for the 1979 murder of two taxi drivers. He is not contesting his execution order, but it could nevertheless be delayed by the lawsuit. 

If carried out, the execution would be Nebraska’s first in 21 years and its first-ever lethal injection.

The state plans to use four drugs — the sedative Diazepam, the powerful narcotic painkiller fentanyl citrate, the muscle relaxer cisatracurium and potassium chloride, which stops the heart.

Fresenius Kabi believes it is the source of the latter two drugs and is asking a federal judge to issue an order either temporarily or permanently blocking the state from using the injectable medications.

“While Fresenius Kabi takes no position on capital punishment, Fresenius Kabi opposes the use of its products for this purpose and therefore does not sell certain drugs to correctional facilities,” the company said in its civil complaint.

“These drugs, if manufactured by Fresenius Kabi, could only have been obtained by defendants in contradiction and contravention of the distribution contracts the company has in place and therefore through improper or illegal means.”

The drugmaker claims that with state executions regarded negatively among the majority of the European public, it could suffer “great reputational injury,” if its drugs are used for capital punishment.

The state of Nebraska has released limited information about the drugs and has not disclosed their source — reflecting a general dilemma for U.S. states that continue to carry out the death penalty via lethal injection.

Injectable drugs have become harder to acquire amid public opposition and a reluctance — or outright hostility — among drug manufacturers to sell their products to prisons for use in executions.

“Nebraska’s lethal injection drugs were purchased lawfully and pursuant to the State of Nebraska’s duty to carry out lawful capital sentences,” the state attorney general’s office said in a statement.

Last month, a similar lawsuit by drugmaker Alvogen at least temporarily halted an execution in Nevada.
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Предлагаем в аренду помещение на проспекте Карла Маркса в Днепре

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Аренда помещения на углу проспекта К.Маркса и ул. Артема под любой вид деятельности.

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Помещение имеет два входа: один с улицы Артема (парадное), второй – со двора (подъезд).

Фасад дома, по планам мерии, подлежит реконструкции в ближайшее время.

Почти 10 лет помещение сдавалось под отделение коммерческого банка.

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New York Moves to Cap Uber, App-Ride Vehicles

Posted on by SeeUS

New York’s city council on Wednesday dealt a blow to Uber and other car-for-hire companies, passing a bill to cap the number of vehicles they operate and impose minimum pay standards on drivers.

The city of 8.5 million is the biggest app-ride market in the United States, where public transport woes and astronomical parking costs have helped fuel years of untamed growth by the likes of Lyft, Uber and Via.

But that growth has brought New York’s iconic yellow cabs to their knees. Since December, six yellow cab drivers have committed suicide. Those deaths have been linked, at least in part, to desperation over plummeting income.

The bill stipulates a 12-month cap on all new for-hire-vehicle licenses, unless they are wheelchair accessible, as well as minimum pay requirements for app drivers — regulated by the Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC).

It makes New York the first major city in the United States to limit the number of app-based rides and to impose pay rules for drivers.

A recent TLC-commissioned study recommended a guaranteed income of $17.22 an hour for drivers — $15, plus a supplement to mitigate against rest time.

New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, a progressive Democrat, vowed to sign the bill into law, proclaiming that it would “stop the influx of cars contributing to the congestion grinding our streets to a halt.”

“More than 100,000 workers and their families will see an immediate benefit from this legislation,” de Blasio said.

Around 80,000 drivers work for at least one of the big four app-based companies in New York, compared to 13,500 yellow cab drivers, according to the recent TLC-commissioned study.

The increased competition has slashed the value of yellow cab taxi licenses, from more than $1 million in 2014 to and less than $200,000 today.
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Cameroonian Lawyer Looks to Unseat Africa’s Longest-Ruling Leader

Posted on by SeeAF

Aside from Cameroon’s President Paul Biya and main opposition leader Joshua Osih, no candidate for the October election is creating as much hype as 66-year-old lawyer Akere Muna.

Muna, the former vice president of the anti-corruption group Transparency International, says he is the best candidate to fight the deep-rooted corruption that has hindered Cameroon’s development, despite rich natural and human resources.

A 2015 Transparency International report labeled Cameroon as one of the most corrupt African nations, alongside Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and South Africa. Transparency said corruption creates and increases poverty and exclusion. It also said whistleblowing is key to fighting graft, but many people are afraid to come forward.

“Under my government, there will be zero tolerance for corruption,” Muna said. “Absolutely zero tolerance. This country is tailor made for any type of corrupt practices. The World Bank report on public expenses of 18th May says so. Procurement — prices bloated; meetings — prices bloated; missions, travel — prices bloated. Every single way they have to spend money, they increase it by prices.”

But Ngolle Ngolle Elvis, a close aid of President Biya, says Muna is wasting his time.

“A good policy such as the fight against corruption should not be manipulated upon or should not be distorted or should not be rendered a mockery by those who do not understand the moral foundations, the legitimacy of that policy,” Ngolle said.

Ngolle says Biya has made the fight against corruption a public policy, and points to the arrests of scores of Biya’s former colleagues, including former Prime Minister Inoni Ephraim.

However, Biya’s critics say he uses corruption to go after political opponents, an allegation Ngolle refutes.

“There is nothing to tell me that it is politically motivated, and I think that the initiative is a deliberate public policy which is intended to make Cameroon a better country. If there are manipulators, we would know how to take care of those manipulators,” Ngolle said.

Recovered funds

Cameroon has complained about lengthy judicial processes and difficulties tracing embezzled funds in foreign banks. In 2016, the government said it had recovered $4 million in stolen public funds. The state estimates more than $150 million has been stolen.

Muna says he already is working on what he calls an African platform to bring back the stolen money.

“I made a proposal, which was adopted by the heads of state of the African Union,” Muna said. “It was my proposal. My proposal was that all the moneys that are found in foreign banks, which are frozen, should be transferred to African Development Bank, because what I am saying that those banks that are keeping that money are complicit with the kleptocrats who stole the money from Africa because they knew that they were taking this money illegally and they took it. So they are handling illegal goods.”

Activist Edward Nfor praises Muna’s lofty ideas, but says competing in Cameroon’s politics will be more than a challenge for the anti-corruption campaigner.

“He has never come out on a public debate or on a political debate before. He has never been on any political platform,” Nfor said. “So, I do not see how he can win elections in this country. In fact, he is well known at international circles. But politically speaking, in this country, Akere Muna is a non-figure in politics, and I know the English community is against his standing for elections, especially during this crisis.”

Muna says his being from Southwest Cameroon — where insurgents are fighting for an English-speaking state — will help spur dialogue to end the simmering conflict.

Split opposition

But some argue the conflict has divided the population.

Political science student Joseph Foyong says the opposition is too split to challenge Biya.

“The Anglophone crisis has taken a good part of the population that might have voted in favor of Akere [Muna]. His percentage might have swollen if the situation in the northwest and southwest regions of Cameroon was stable,” Foyong said. “If Akere and other prominent opposition candidates like Joshua Osih, Maurice Kamto came up with a single opposition candidate to face Paul Biya, Akere may have been having some hopes.”

Cameroonian voters will get a better sense of the anti-corruption campaigner’s chances as Muna and the other presidential candidates begin campaigning for the October election.
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With a Positive Spin, Chinese News Outlets Cover Africa

Posted on by SeeAF

In Rwanda, a Chinese-owned garment factory provides jobs to hundreds of local workers. In Ethiopia, a Chinese-built railway makes life easier for business owners and travelers. In Zambia, a Chinese-funded television project will bring satellite TV to 500 villages.

Each of these stories, published by Xinhua, China’s state-run news organization, typifies the country’s coverage of Africa.

Rather than focus on corruption or disasters, China’s news about Africa emphasizes positive angles, especially when it comes to the Communist Party’s deepening involvement across the continent.

It’s a media strategy that highlights China’s mutual interests with Africa and reflects its broader approach to soft power, even if the whole story isn’t told.

​Positive news angles

In Chinese media, “what comes across is the government’s interests,” Emeka Umejei, a research associate in the Department of Journalism and Media Studies at Wits University in Johannesburg, South Africa, told VOA.

Chinese news organizations don’t perpetuate outright disinformation, Umejei said, but coverage of Africa is shown in a positive light when stories implicate China. That amounts to propaganda, according to Umejei, because the goal isn’t just to inform, but also to shape perceptions of the ruling Communist Party.

Unlike Western outlets, which tend to focus on corruption, misdeeds and transgressions, Chinese media highlight good things happening in Africa.

One example is Kenya’s Standard Gauge Railway, a project financed, built and managed by China.

Local media have reported on a range of concerns tied to the railway’s impacts on Kenya’s wildlife, economy and workers.

Last month, the Sunday Standard, one of Kenya’s largest and most reputable newspapers, published an exposé on the treatment of African workers involved with the railway.

In the report, the Standard alleged widespread racism, discrimination and mistreatment of Kenyans, based on interviews with locomotive drivers and other workers.

The news wasn’t acknowledged in Chinese media. Instead, its coverage of the SGR has focused on the benefits the project brings to Kenya.

In a recently published opinion piece, He Wenping, a senior research fellow at the Charhar Institute, a think tank focused on China’s foreign relations, underscored how well the SGR has moved people and freight.

“The Mombasa-Nairobi Railway has also greatly facilitated the mobility of people between Mombasa and Nairobi, and the freight transport time has been shortened from more than 10 hours to more than 4 hours, thus reducing the logistics costs by over 40 percent,” she wrote.

​Paying dividends?

Some research suggests that China’s soft power campaign and media strategies are working.

Afrobarometer, an African research network, reported in 2016 that about two-thirds of Africans see China’s influence as “somewhat” to “very” positive. And more African countries now see China — not the U.S. — as the biggest foreign influence.

In 2017, Pew Research found that 72 percent of Nigerians viewed China favorably — a higher percentage than any other country polled. More than half of respondents in Senegal, Tanzania, Tunisia and Kenya also reported favorable sentiments.

Chinese media

Chinese news organizations are large, centralized and well-funded.

Xinhua is the country’s official news agency, with English reports published across the web via a network of affiliates.

In research published in 2011, Junhao Hong, a professor at the University of Buffalo, concluded that Xinhua evolved from a pure “propaganda machine” in the late 1970s to a multifaceted enterprise concerned with generating revenue, serving the Communist Party’s interests and producing news for a worldwide audience.

Xinhua’s distribution partners include state media in Africa. Fana Television, a state broadcaster in Ethiopia, has republished or relied on reporting from nearly 20 Xinhua news stories since the beginning of the year.

China Central Television, or CCTV, is the most dominant broadcast news organization. In March, the Communist Party announced it would merge CCTV with two other broadcast entities to streamline operations and enable what Umejei called a “unified narrative.”

‘Win-win’ coverage

In China, “investigative reporting isn’t allowed,” Umejei said.

That means the powerful aren’t held to account. But it also creates space for uplifting stories that show another side of Africa. It’s an approach that resonates with African audiences, Umejei said, given what can come across as a fixation in Western media on Africa’s problems.

Unrelenting stories about conflict, famine, disease and corruption have led to criticism that Western portrayals of Africa, at times, play to outmoded stereotypes, perpetuate myths and underrepresent positive developments.

China has taken a different tact with what Umejei calls a “win-win” media strategy that puts both Africa and China in a flattering light. The strategy also complements China’s approach to soft power in Africa, wherein it frames itself as a benevolent partner with similar goals and challenges.

But critical coverage has an important role in the new ecosystem, according to Umejei.

Investigative journalism is “good for Africa” because it holds powerful people accountable, he said.
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Thinking Forward: A Discussion with International Young Leaders

Posted on by SeeAF

Half of the world’s population is under the age of 30. What does the future hold for them? What are their major concerns? Who is listening to them? We will explore the social and economic issues confronting young people in an English-language town hall including young leaders from Africa, South and Central Asia and other parts of the word.
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