The bodies of 16 of the 39 Vietnamese who died when human traffickers carried them by truck to England last month were repatriated to their homeland on Wednesday and have been taken to their families.The bodies arrived on a flight that landed in Hanoi, Vietnam’s capital, the news website VNExpress reported. The website published photos of ambulances that transported the bodies to their home provinces south of Hanoi.The bodies were found Oct. 23 in the English town of Grays, east of London. Police say the victims were aged between 15 and 44.The 31 men and eight women are believed to have paid human traffickers for their clandestine transit into England. Several suspects have been arrested in the U.K. and Vietnam.Hoang Lanh, father of 18-year-old victim Hoang Van Tiep, said by phone Tuesday that he had been informed by a local government official that his son’s remains would be brought home Wednesday, along with those of six other victims from Dien Chau district in Nghe An province, including Tiep’s cousin Nguyen Van Hung.“It’s bittersweet, I can’t believe I would have to welcome my son back like this,” Lanh said. “I’m devastated but I am happy to have him back with us soon.”Hoang Thi Nhiem, Tiep’s sister, said her family had received her brother’s body shortly before noon.“We are very sad, but we are happy now that he has been brought back to the place where he was born to be with his family and surrounded with love from the family,” she said. “He wouldn’t be able to rest in peace if he had still been in England.”Another victim’s family expressed their sadness ahead of receiving the bodies of their loved one.“I have been sad for a month and I can’t eat anything,” said Nguyen Thanh Le, father of 33-year-old Nguyen Van Hung. “My son died far away from his home and I had to wait for a long time, but today his body is coming back and tomorrow is the funeral.”The British ambassador to Vietnam, Gareth Ward, said Wednesday that the two countries will continue to work together “to prevent human trafficking and protect vulnerable people here.’“We will continue working with Vietnamese authorities to investigate the criminal acts that led to this tragedy,” he said in a video statement. “In the coming time, I plan to visit the affected communities to express my condolences and reinforce the British government’s commitment to preventing anything like this from happening again.”Legal proceedings in the case are continuing in England.On Monday in London, a trucker who allegedly was the driver of the vehicle in which the 39 bodies were found pleaded guilty to plotting with others to assist illegal immigration and acquiring criminal property.Northern Irish truck driver Maurice Robinson accused of being part of an international people-smuggling ring, wasn’t asked to enter pleas to 39 counts of manslaughter and conspiracy to traffic people. Police say he drove the cab of the truck to the English port of Purfleet, where it picked up the container, which had arrived by ferry from the port of Zeebrugge in Belgium.Also Monday, British police said they had arrested a 36-year-old man on suspicion of manslaughter, conspiracy to traffic people and conspiracy to assist unlawful immigration. Two other men have been arrested in Britain and Ireland in connection with the case
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Month: November 2019
South Sudan Criticizes US Recall of Ambassador
The South Sudanese government said Wednesday that it was disappointed with the State Department’s decision to recall the U.S. ambassador to the country.
Ambassador Thomas Hushek was recalled Monday in what was widely viewed as a signal of Washington’s displeasure over South Sudan’s failure to meet an extended deadline for forming a unity government, a critical component of a peace deal aimed at ending a bloody five-year civil war in the eight year-old nation. South Sudan Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Mawien Makol called the U.S. diplomatic move “a double standard,” adding that South Sudan’s president and opposition party had agreed that “outstanding issues [in the peace process] have to be given time.”
Makol said Washington’s message to South Sudan had been that “peace should be done inclusively” and that “all stakeholders to the peace must agree to the implementation of the peace.”
The State Department has confirmed the recall of Hushek for consultations.
Earlier this month, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo tweeted criticism of South Sudan’s failure to form a unity government, adding: “The U.S. will reevaluate its relationship with the Government of South Sudan & work to take action.” Plea for supportSouth Sudan is urging the Trump administration to reconsider its position “and to come back on board and support this country,” Makol told South Sudan in Focus, adding that President Salva Kiir needed support from “longtime partners like the United States” and that Washington’s stance “does not help the [bilateral] relations.”
“[T]he people of South Sudan support the extension of the 100 days [for forming a unity government],” Makol said.
A second extension of the pre-transitional period was approved by parties to South Sudan’s revitalized peace deal earlier this month. The Trump administration warned it would sanction anyone blocking the road to peace in the country.
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From Europe, Exiles Keep Eye on Ethiopia’s Fledgling Democracy
Dozens of Ethiopian activists, journalists and politicians have lived in exile for many years, having fled their country when dissident voices were repeatedly suppressed and jailed over the past few decades. Ahead of elections set to take place in their homeland in six months, the first since the previous government collapsed in 2018, the exiles are closely watching the current unrest and are contemplating how they can help.Kinfu Assefa remained active as a journalist even after being forced to move to the Netherlands. From there, he has seen the changes at home, and he worries about the strength of Ethiopia’s democratic institutions. “I didn’t see proper preparation for the upcoming elections,” he said. “Neither the ruling party nor the opposition groups have done anything so far to mobilize the nation. Activists and exiled journalists could contribute a lot towards a positive development in the country. We can engage ourselves to ongoing changes through dialogue and discussion. We can contribute a lot through knowledge transfer, for instance.” Ahmed’s reformsPrime Minister Abiy Ahmed released many political prisoners and won the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize for ending hostilities with Eritrea in the past year and a half. His reforms also opened up more space for civil society organizations. FILE – Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed speaks during a session with members of Parliament in Addis Ababa, Oct. 22, 2019.Activist Bekele Wocheya has been living in exile in Britain for the past 14 years, working with civil society organizations. Because of his experience, he co-founded the Ethiopian Institute for Leadership, Communication and Organization, in the hope of strengthening civil society ahead of the elections.
“The agenda of the country should be set by ordinary citizens, folks on the ground, who are actually having life on a daily basis, who are exposed to problems,” Wocheya said. “So it is they who should decide what is important for them. It’s not the elites who are further away from the reality that should decide the agenda of the day. So it’s important for me and others to stay and bring support in organizing folks.” Activist won’t return
Many new parties will stand in the elections scheduled for May 2020. One is Ginbot 7. Outlawed by the previous government, it merged with seven other political parties.
Seblework Tadesse was part of Ginbot 7, but her political activism landed her in prison for 18 months. Facing possible arrest again, she moved to Australia. Despite political reforms in Ethiopia, she does not see herself going back and running for office.
“I myself was engaging in Ethiopian politics from an early age,” Tadesse said. “And I’m lucky, I had a chance to be part of that. I know it’s not easy. It’s very hard.” She said she would like to mentor more young women and encourage their interest in the country, its politics, economy and social structure. Ethiopia is plagued by ethnic tensions and violent unrest that analysts warn could disrupt the election if they are not resolved.
A successful referendum was held in November, granting the Sidama ethnic group self-determination. But it took several postponements before the vote could go ahead peacefully.
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US Teen’s TikTok Video on Xinjiang Goes Viral
A TikTok post by a young woman, pretending to give eyelash curling advice while actually condemning China’s crackdown on Muslims in Xinjiang, has gone viral on the Chinese-owned app that has been accused of censoring anti-Beijing content.The clip by US teen Feroza Aziz, who describes herself as “17 Just a Muslim”, had millions of views across several social media platforms by Wednesday.But Aziz said she has been blocked from posting on the hugely popular video platform TikTok for a month after uploading Sunday’s clip slamming China, a claim disputed by the app.Part three to getting longer lashes #tiktok#muslims#muslimmemes#Uyghurmuslims#freepalestinepic.twitter.com/OoFpDpYPvj— feroza.x (@x_feroza) November 25, 2019Human rights groups and outside experts say more than one million Uighurs and other mostly Muslim minorities have been rounded up in a network of internment camps across the fractious region of Xinjiang.China, after initially denying the camps existed, describes them as vocational schools aimed at dampening the allure of Islamist extremism and violence through education and job training.Aziz starts her video telling viewers: “The first thing you need to do is grab your lash curler.”US Warns China’s Detention of Uighurs to Counter Terrorism Will Backfire
A senior U.S. official has rejected China’s claim that the mass internment of Uighurs and other Muslim minorities in China’s Xinjiang region is part of a counter-terrorism program and says it will backfire. The United States co-hosted an event on the sidelines of the U.N.
However, she soon changes the subject, saying: “Then you’re going to put it down and use the phone you’re using right now to search what’s happening in China, how they’re getting concentration camps, throwing innocent Muslims in there, separating families from each other, kidnapping them, murdering them, raping them, forcing them to eat pork, forcing them to drink, forcing them to convert.”This is another Holocaust, yet no one is talking about it. Please be aware, please spread awareness in Xinjiang right now,” she adds, before returning to the eyelash curling tutorial.A previous account owned by Aziz, reportedly from New Jersey, was blocked by TikTok over another alleged violation, but the app denied the current profile had been frozen.”TikTok does not moderate content due to political sensitivities,” a spokesperson told AFP.”In this case, the user’s previous account and associated device were banned after she posted a video of Osama Bin Laden, which is a violation of TikTok’s ban on content that includes imagery related to terrorist organizations. Her new account and its videos, including the video in question, were not affected.”As of Wednesday morning, the post had more than 1.5 million views and 501,900 likes, and 600,000 comments.Two follow-up videos in which Aziz again addressed the Xinjiang camps had both received more than 7,000 views.The eyelash-curling clip had reached far more people on Twitter, where versions of the same video received more than 6.5 million views.Aziz told Buzzfeed: “As a Muslim girl, I’ve always been oppressed and seen my people be oppressed, and always I’ve been into human rights.”Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang decline to comment.”How could I know what’s happening on the (social media) account of one individual?” Geng said at a regular press briefing, adding that Beijing has always urged Chinese companies to comply with international rules and local laws.
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Former US President Jimmy Carter Released from Hospital
Former U.S. president Jimmy Carter has been released from the hospital after undergoing surgery to relieve pressure on his brain, according to a non-profit group founded by Carter.The Carter Center said in a statement the 95-year-old was discharged from Emory University Hospital Tuesday in the southeastern U.S. city of Atlanta, Georgia.The 39th U.S. president was admitted more than two weeks ago to relieve pressure on his brain caused by bleeding that started after recent falls.The center said the surgery was successful and that he and his wife, Rosalynn, “look forward to enjoying Thanksgiving at home in the town of Plains (Georgia), where he will continue to recover.”After one of several falls this year, Carter required hip replacement surgery.While in Nashville, Tennessee to help build a home for Habitat for Humanity, Carter received 14 stitches in his forehead after falling on October 6.He was briefly hospitalized after fracturing his pelvis on October 21.Carter has also been cancer-free after receiving an ominous diagnosis for metastatic melanoma in 2015.Carter, a Democrat who served in the White House from 1977 to 1981, is the oldest living former president in American history.
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Sudan Strives to Stop Violence Against Women
Sudan has joined a global campaign aimed at stopping violence against women. Sudan’s efforts at the national level involve the broad participation of artists, politicians and civil society.For the first time in three decades, Sudan has joined the international 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence campaign sponsored in the country by the Ministry of Social Welfare, Woman and Child Affairs.At a press briefing, Social Affairs Minister Lina Alshiekh praised women participating in political change in Sudan and the social activity of females. She says its impact would be widespread.Sudanese Women Refugees Trained in Mediation, Survival Skills
Mary Okumu is a U.N. consultant on gender issues who is active in promoting women?s roles in peace making. She's also the executive director of ?El Taller,? a human rights group working in East Africa that plays an active role in mediation, conflict resolution, health education and survival skills.
As part of her work, Okumu helps train Sudanese women living in refugee camps in Kenya and Sudan.
Alshiekh says the government launched the 16 Days campaign nationwide to defeat violence against women. This year, she says, they’re intending to develop efforts and resources to enhance health, economics, and the social situation for women, girls and children in the towns, cities and the camps.
Decades of poor economic conditions and civil war resulted in thousands of displaced women relocating to refugees camps in the west and the east of Sudan.Hundreds of Sudanese women face trial under Sudanese criminal law every year. The laws were introduced in 1991, the same year the international campaign began.The laws allow police to arrest women for their clothing, appearance on the streets and how they behave in public with men. The punishment varies from public whippings to detention and fines.Campaign participant Aisha Abdualazeez is from Sudan’s Blue Nile state, which suffered decades of war under former President Omar al-Bashir’s government. She said her participation in this campaign is to help women in war zones.Sudanese Women Seeking Divorce Find Themselves in Prison
Most of the two dozen women in Rumbek's prison are there for committing adultery, often not for love, but to provoke their husbands to divorce them. The region's customary laws make it virtually impossible for women to file for divorce, but that could change. Southern Sudan, at peace after 21 years of civil war with the north, is drafting a new constitution that challenges traditional rules about marriage and divorce.
Even from her prison room, which she shares with 12 other women, Deng Maker is…
Abdualazeez says she participates in the campaign because she has witnessed some of the violence against women. She says that as a girl who has lived in conflict areas, she knows how women are repressed and used sexually.
Sudanese women also are affected by a law that legalizes the marriage of 10-year-old girls and female genital mutilation.
The international campaign runs every year from November 25th through December 10.
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Native Americans Played Pivotal Role in the First Thanksgiving
Every year in November, Americans get a day off to give thanks. The Thanksgiving Day holiday originated centuries ago, with a harvest celebration in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1621. For many Americans, the holiday is also a time to celebrate the arrival of the first immigrants to the the New World. But historians say it is important to remember that without the help of the Wampanoag tribe, Europeans back in those days may not have survived to celebrate. VOA’s Cristina Caicedo Smit reports.
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Quake Kills at Least 27 in Albania, State of Emergency Declared
The death toll from the strongest earthquake to hit Albania in more than three decades rose to at least 27 on Wednesday, as the country observed a day of mourning.
Among the deaths, which included children, were at least 12 people killed in the coastal city of Durrës, at least 14 in Thumanë, and at least one in Kurbin. Officials say the death toll could increase further, with several people still unaccounted for. Hundreds of others were admitted to the hospital with injuries.
The government declared the state of emergency for the areas affected the most, as rescue crews continued to work to pull people from the rubble.
Albania Quake video player.
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The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake was a magnitude 6.4 with an epicenter 30 kilometers northwest of the capital, Tirana. Three hours after the initial quake, a magnitude-5 aftershock struck in the Adriatic Sea.
Several buildings were also destroyed in Durrës and Thumanë.
“For the moment, when all energies are going towards search and rescue, it is impossible to have a detailed account of material damage,” said Defense Minister Olta Xhaçka, adding this was the worst earthquake to hit Albania, since 1979. Some 40 people were killed in that earthquake.Citizens rest at a makeshift camp in Durres, after an earthquake shook Albania, Nov. 26, 2019. Escaped the worst
Prefect of Durrës Roland Nasto told VOA there are nine sites “in the city where crews continue to work to find people,” suggesting the toll might rise.
“[Tomorrow] we will start the process of finding shelter for people who today are under open skies and who will spend the night in tents, some of them – due to the trauma — even refusing to be sheltered in arenas or gyms, afraid to be somewhere with a ceiling,” Prime Minister Edi Rama said on Tuesday.
He later visited Thumanë to assess the damage.
“We want our loved ones to be dug out of the rubble as soon as possible,” said a Thumanë resident, who told VOA’s Albanian Service her cousin and his wife were missing.
Another resident said, “We are trying to find people that are dead or alive. We are afraid to go inside the buildings for fear that they will crumble.”
President Ilir Meta and opposition leader Lulzim Basha also visited areas affected by the quake.
Show of solidarity
Aid and support has poured into the affected areas, with people offering their homes and sending care packages from different parts of Albania. Kosovo’s outgoing government allocated $550,000 for relief efforts and Kosovo’s Security Force sent specialized teams and enlisted help from private companies.
Rescue teams and specialized crews were dispatched from neighboring Kosovo, Italy and Greece.
“Two groups of specialized crews have come from Kosovo, two from Greece, two from Italy, and we expect a specialized group of 40 from Italy,” Nasto said.
Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias, who was visiting North Macedonia Tuesday, later in the day visited Albania to offer “any assistance needed to face the catastrophic situation.”
The European Commission said on Twitter that its stands by Albania “at this difficult time following the earthquakes.”
“We have mobilized immediate support to help local authorities, and rescue teams from Italy, Greece and Romania are already on their way,” a statement on Twitter said.
Help also arrived from France, Turkey, Serbia, and the United States.
The U.S. Embassy also sent a statement of condolence.
“The United States stands with our friends in Albania, just as Americans and Albanians have always stood by each other during difficult times. We will continue to closely monitor the situation and stand ready to offer our support,” the Embassy said.
On Wednesday, Pope Francis said he was praying for Albania.
“I would like to send a greeting and express my closeness to the dear Albanian people, who have suffered so much these days,” the pope said. “Albania was the first country in Europe that I wanted to visit. I am close to the victims, I pray for the dead, for the wounded, for the families, may God bless them, the people that I love.”
The Albanian diaspora also was rallying to help, holding several fundraisers to send money to one of the poorest countries in Europe.
“I am so heartbroken for my people back home, for those who have lost lives and loved ones,” New York City Assemblyman Mark Gjonaj, an Albanian American, told VOA.
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US Military Aid Life or Death’ for Kyiv
The House impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump is focused on whether the White House delayed promised U.S. military aid to Ukraine until its leader agreed to do the president a political favor. While lawmakers investigate the president’s role in the matter, VOA’s Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine takes a closer look at that military aid at the center of the controversy and why it’s so critical for Ukraine
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Cambodia’s Hun Sen Tells Trump he Welcomes Better Relations
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has responded positively to a letter from U.S. President Donald Trump that encouraged him to promote democracy and improve strained relations between the two countries.
A letter from Hun Sen, dated Tuesday and shared online Wednesday by members of his government, accepted Trump’s invitation to a meeting of Southeast Asian leaders in the United States early next year, as well as an offer for the two countries’ foreign policy teams to hold talks.
Washington has long criticized Hun Sen’s government for its poor record on democratic and human rights. Hun Sen, in power for 34 years, has accused the U.S. of seeking “regime change” to oust him.
Trump’s Nov. 1 letter assured Hun Sen that the U.S. does not seek regime change. The president counseled Hun Sen to “put Cambodia back on the path of democratic governance.”
“I am reassured by your explicit statement whereby you seek genuine engagement to pursue democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law rather than through regime change,” Hun Sen wrote.
Hun Sen has a reputation as an authoritarian leader and has said he intends to serve until 2028. He has been quick to crack down on any opponents, accusing them of seeking a color revolution'' of the sort that upended established regimes in Eastern and Central Europe and the Middle East.difficulties“ in recent years.
There are some signs he seeks to polish up his image, including the recent release from detention of members of the opposition.
He faces external political pressure that ballooned after last July's general election, in which his Cambodian People's Party won all 125 National Assembly seats. The European Union and others charged that the election was unfair and unfree because the sole credible opposition party, the Cambodia National Rescue Party, was dissolved in November 2017 by Cambodia's Supreme Court.
The EU is now considering whether to end duty-free and quota-free imports from Cambodia because of concerns about its poor record in human and labor rights. A cutoff could badly hurt Cambodia's economy, especially the clothing and footwear industry that is the country's top export sector, employing nearly 800,000 people in about 1,000 garment and shoe factories. In 2018, the Southeast Asian country shipped nearly $10 billion worth of products to the United States and Europe.
Trump's letter recounted positive elements of the U.S. Cambodian relationship in the past, while acknowledging
“With regards to the bilateral relations between our two countries, I concur with you that they have gone through periods of ups and downs,” Hun Sen wrote. “However, I am of the view that we should not become hostage of a few dark chapters of our own history.”
He said contemporary Cambodia owes its prosperity in part to “the contribution of the American people and government from the peaceful democratization, to the nation building, social governance, and the generous market access.”
Hun Sen has rarely had such warm words for the United States in recent years as Cambodia has leaned toward China, which has become its major political and economic backer, and with which it also has increasingly close military links. A late 2017 crackdown on the media and political foes saw an opposition leader arrested for alleged treason because he had taken part in
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Namibia Votes as Ruling Party Faces Unprecedented Challenge
Polls opened Wednesday in Namibia, where the ruling party faces its biggest challenge since independence nearly three decades ago. The resource-rich southern African nation’s registered 1.3 million voters were choosing the president and National Assembly members.
The ruling SWAPO has been shaken by a corruption scandal and the weakening economy. Meanwhile, more than 700,000 of the country’s 2.5 million people have registered for relief during a drought that affects the region.
President Hage Geingob faces a challenger from within his own party who is running as an independent. Dr. Panduleni Itula has been appealing to youth; some 46% of them are unemployed. The election includes more than 400,000 voters born since Namibia gained its independence from South Africa.
Itula made a last-minute legal challenge to Namibia’s use of electronic voting machines in this election but it was rejected. The country was the first in sub-Saharan Africa to use the machines.
Geingob after voting on Wednesday called elections a contest, not a war, the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation reported.
An unprecedented runoff election might be needed if no presidential candidate can get over the 50%-plus-one vote threshold.
In the last election, in 2014, SWAPO won 80% percent of the vote, its highest share ever, while Geingob won 87% of the presidential vote.
The ruling party was shaken this month when two cabinet ministers resigned after Iceland’s biggest seafood company, Samherji, was accused of paying bribes to local politicians and officials for access to Namibia’s fishing quota, a key economic resource along with mining.
Political analysts have said they do not expect the scandal to have a big impact on the vote as many people already had made up their minds.
Other candidates include Namibia’s first female presidential candidate, Esther Muinjangue.
The official opposition Popular Democratic Movement, led by McHenry Venaani, has largely been campaigning around the issue of SWAPO’s two-thirds majority in parliament, which Venaani says has fueled impunity and graft.
The Landless People’s Movement led by Bernadus Swartbooi has focused on land expropriation in Namibia, which has one of the world’s highest inequality rates.
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Foreign Drugs, Rebels Give Philippines New Causes to Bolster Defense
The dispatch of two Philippine coast guard ships to the Sulu Sea might normally register as a quick blip on the radar of world maritime movement. But shipments of illegal drugs and support for violent Muslim rebels cross that sea from other countries into the Philippines, which struggles to contain both. The Chinese navy is growing stronger not far away, too, and China disputes tracts of sea with the Philippines.The Philippines has historically had a weak defense, especially at sea. Research database GlobalFirePower.com ranks the Philippine armed forces 64th strongest in the world. Neighbors China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan and Vietnam all rank higher.
Manila’s Sulu Sea patrol, which started November 18 and will also cover the adjacent South China Sea, shows the country is accelerating its defense buildup because of the offshore threats, , analysts believe. The severity of problems that reach the archipelago from abroad are giving officials extra willpower now, they say.
“If it’s not done fast, we won’t have a very potent, a very credible deterrent armed forces or coast guard, so we have to put our money where our mouth is,” said Aaron Rabena, research fellow at Asia-Pacific Pathways to Progress Foundation, a Manila research organization.
Drugs and rebels
Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte said in March that illegal drug use had worsened in part because supplies were being smuggled in, domestic news website Philstar Global reported. He swore when elected in 2016 to eradicate drugs, and his critics say thousands of drug suspects have already been killed without trial.
FILE – Filipino men place their hands over their heads as they are rounded up during a police operation as part of the continuing “War on Drugs” campaign of Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte in Manila, Philippines, Oct. 7, 2016.“Maybe Duterte realized his war on drugs cannot be won without stopping the inflow of drugs coming from Latin America and coming from the Mekong region, because a lot of drugs have been shipped in the back door and it’s quite difficult to police,” said Eduardo Araral, associate professor at the National University of Singapore’s public policy school. “So, fighting the drug war requires upgrading the coastal capabilities of the coast guard.”
The coast guard said on its website it helped last week detain the captain and crew of a merchant ship carrying 53,000 metric tons of a “toxic substance” from South Korea.
Sympathizers of the Middle Eastern terrorist group Islamic State use the Sulu Sea to reach Muslim antigovernment rebels in the southern Philippines, Duterte said last year. Violence there since the 1960s has killed more than 120,000 people.
Despite a 2014 peace accord with one dominant rebel group and the later creation of a semiautonomous Muslim region, terrorist attacks still flare up around the southernmost major Philippine island, Mindanao. In June, for example, suspected suicide bombers hit a military camp and killed three soldiers.
Checking China
And in the South China Sea, known in Manila as the West Philippine Sea, hundreds of Chinese vessels gathered near a Philippine-held islet in waters the two sides contest. A Philippine fishing vessel capsized in June after colliding with a Chinese ship. The Philippines holds 10 islets in disputed tracts of the sea.
“The fact they put priority into the Sulu Sea is important because it really is probably second only to the West Philippine Sea in importance when you look at it from the perspective of maritime activity,” said Jay Batongbacal: international maritime affairs professor at University of the Philippines. “There’s a lot of activity there, so it’s good that they’re pouring resources into it.”
Long-term modernization
Philippine officials have pledged military modernization since 1995 with an act of Congress approved that year, but budgeting has always been inconsistent. Duterte’s predecessor used arbitration rather than a stronger defense to resist China at sea, Rabena said.
The threats from offshore are giving those pledges extra impetus now, experts say. A three-way deal to patrol the Sulu Sea together with neighbors Indonesia and Malaysia should add to that momentum, Rabena said.FILE – Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte speaks during his fourth State of the Nation Address at the Philippine Congress in Quezon City, Metro Manila, July 22, 2019.Last year Duterte earmarked $5.6 billion for defense modernization through 2022. Earlier this month an Armed Forces of the Philippines official told a House of Representatives briefing the country should raise defense spending to 2% of GDP, which was $331 billion last year. Its current 1.1% lags the regional average.
An expanding tax base is expected to help fund military improvements, Araral said.
Defense has been “accelerated” further by hardware donations from abroad, he said. Washington has donated military equipment in the past. Japan, another country that wants to hold off China at sea, has pledged to send the Philippines two patrol vessels and lend it five surveillance planes.
The United States is helping the coast guard now develop a training center in several phases. There’s already a classroom, engine maintenance laboratory and barracks for outboard motor maintenance. The U.S. Embassy in Manila said in October. U.S. Coast Guard teams will offer training.
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Report: Trump Aware of Whistleblower Complaint Before Releasing Ukraine Aid
U.S. President Donald Trump learned about a whistleblower complaint regarding his relations with Ukraine before he decided to unfreeze nearly $400 million in military aid, according to a New York Times report published Tuesday.The Times cited two people familiar with the matter, saying White House lawyers told Trump about the complaint in late August as they worked to determine whether they were required to send it to Congress.That battle formed the early stages of what has become the focus of the impeachment inquiry now playing out in the House of Representatives. Lawmakers received the complaint in late September and made a version of it public. Since then, the Democrat-led House Intelligence committee has held both private and public sessions to hear testimony from current and former diplomats and other officials to examine allegations Trump withheld the aid to Ukraine to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to commit to an investigation of one of Trump’s potential opponents in the 2020 election, Democrat Joe Biden.The House Judiciary Committee, which will decide whether to send articles of impeachment to the full House for a vote, announced Tuesday it would hold its first hearing December 4 and invited Trump to attend.The hearing will look into what the committee calls the “Constitutional Grounds for Presidential Impeachment.”The guidelines established by Democratic leaders say Trump and his lawyers would be given the chance to question the panel of still-to-be-named legal experts who will appear as witnesses.Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler sent a letter to the White House inviting Trump to attend, calling it “not a right, but a privilege or a courtesy.”FILE – Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee Jerrold Nadler waits to speak during a media briefing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Oct. 31, 2019.”The president has a choice he can make: he can take this opportunity to be represented in the impeachment hearings, or he can stop complaining about the process,” Nadler said in a separate statement. “I hope that he chooses to participate in the inquiry, directly or through counsel as other presidents have done before him.”Nadler assured Trump that he “remains committed to ensuring a fair and informative process.”Nadler is giving the White House until Sunday night to respond.U.S. Ambassador to the E.U. Gordon Sondland testified last week that a number of senior Trump administration officials were “in the loop” about Trump’s efforts to pressure Ukraine.They include Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney and former National Security Adviser John Bolton.They have balked at testifying. A federal judge ruled Monday that Trump does not have the power to stop former White House counsel Don McGahn from complying with a subpoena to appear before the House committees.Trump, who insists he did nothing wrong, tweeted Tuesday that he “would love to have Mike Pompeo, Rick Perry, Mick Mulvaney and many others to testify about the phony impeachment hoax,” calling it a “Democratic scam that is going nowhere.”Trump’s Republican defenders say no matter what the president did, it does not rise to the level of impeachment.Trump alleges that when Biden was vice president, he threatened to withhold loan guarantees to Ukraine unless Kyiv fired a prosecutor investigating the Burisma gas company, on whose board Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, sat.No evidence of wrongdoing by the Bidens has ever surfaced. Charges of Ukrainian election interference are based on a debunked conspiracy theory that originated in Russia.
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South Korea Fires Warning Shots at North Korean Ship
South Korea says it has fired warning shots to repel a North Korean merchant ship that violated their disputed western sea boundary.South Korea’s military says it believes the North Korean ship crossed the sea boundary on Wednesday due to bad weather and an engine problem.It says it’s the second time that South Korea has fired warning shots to drive back a North Korean ship in the area since South Korea’s current liberal government took office in 2017. The first incident happened in September.Ties between the two Koreas are strained amid a stalemate in U.S.-led diplomacy on ending the North Korean nuclear crisis.North Korea said Monday its troops conducted artillery firing drills near the sea boundary, drawing formal protests from South Korea.
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Possible New Doping Sanctions Loom for Russia
Top Russian officials decried the recommendations by a World Anti-Doping Agency committee to suspend Russia from international competition over tainted athlete doping probes — the latest in a drawn out saga over accusations of Russian state sponsored doping that has roiled global sport since 2014.Russian athletes, unsurprisingly, joined in expressing bitterness about the WADA recommendations. But while some argued the suggested WADA penalties were unduly harsh, others blamed a failure in Russian sport leadership for risking their chance to compete in the next two Olympic Games and perhaps beyond.The recommendations, issued by WADA’s Compliance Review Committee on Monday, alleged evidence of tampering of some 2000 athlete probes at Moscow’s RUSADA testing facility, and called for a four-year suspension of Russia from international competition, including the Olympic Games.Reacting to the pronouncement at a news conference on Tuesday, Russia Minister of Sport In this file photo dated Wednesday, July 24, 2019, Russian Sports Minister Pavel Kolobkov speaks to the media in Moscow, Russia. Russia has sent a formal response to the World Anti-Doping Agency, Tuesday Oct. 8, 2019.The charges, argued Lavrov, were carried out by those who “wish to show Russia as guilty in anything and everything.”The Kremlin was more sanguine. A spokesman merely noted that President Vladimir Putin — who has gladly cast Russia’s return to sporting glory as a symbol of the country’s rising global status under his 19-year rule — had no plans to meet with government sporting officials over the issue.WADA is expected to make a final decision regarding the committee’s recommendations on December 9. Whatever the outcome, Russia would have a right to appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport for a final ruling.Athletes reactYet athlete anger was also palpable — with leading athletes lashing out at both WADA and Russia’s sporting bureaucracy for failing to lift a doping cloud that has hung over Russian athletics ever since a 2015 WADA investigation detailed widespread cheating at international events.Indeed, just days prior to this week’s WADA committee recommendations, World Athletics, the sport’s global governing body formally known as the IAAF, provisionally suspended top figures from Russia’s Track and Field for helping champion Russian high jumper Danil Lysenko avoid doping tests earlier this year.The charges prompted the immediate full suspension of efforts to reinstatement Russia’s track and field association following its 2015 suspension. Until the most recent violation, the talks reportedly had been making headway.In a letter addressed to Russia’s Minister of Sport and head of Russia’s Olympic Committee, acclaimed high jumper In this Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2019 file photo, Gold medalist Mariya Lasitskene, who participates as a neutral athlete, poses during the medal ceremony for the women’s high jump at the World Athletics Championships in Doha, Qatar.While Russia has acknowledged problems with doping to a degree, it has also argued the country is being unfairly singled out — with Russian athletes being punished en masse for the sins of a few.In turn, the International Olympic Committee made allowances for Russian athletes who undergo additional drug screening to compete as neutral athletes, without state uniform or flag or anthem, at the 2016 and 2018 Olympics.In a statement released Tuesday, the IOC criticized Russia over the doping probe manipulations while suggesting bad actors at RUSADA had sabotaged what it otherwise saw as a good faith effort by Russian Olympic Officials.”The report does not indicate any wrongdoing by the sports movement in this regard, in particular the Russian Olympic Committee or its members,” noted the IOC statement.“In this context, the IOC welcomes the opportunity offered by WADA to Russian athletes to compete, “where they are able to demonstrate that they are not implicated in any way by the non-compliance.”Yet some Russians — including leading sporting legends — expressed exasperation over the Russian government’s continued inability to weed out drug offenders and make peace with WADA.“The fact that there are more honest and clean athletes in our country than lying and irresponsible ones is a fact,” wrote Yelena Isinbayaeva, the former two-time Gold medal winner.“So why is it that we still can’t seem to separate these two groups — the honest from the deceitful?” Access of the Moscow RUSADA laboratory doping probes was one of two key condition to WADA’s so-called “roadmap to return” to international competition.Yet from President Putin on down, Russian officials have been loathe to meet WADA’s other supposed requirement: that Russia admit it engaged in a massive doping effort with support from the government and security services to help secure medals — most notably at the Russia-hosted Sochi 2014 Winter Games, in which Russia placed first among nations.Russian officials and, to a degree athletes, argue geopolitics have helped hype the hysteria around Russian doping — with sport long ago joining Ukraine, Syria, election interference, and a myriad of other issues that currently infect Russian relations with the West.Given the political stakes involved, observers puzzled out possible motives behind the latest manipulation of athlete probes at the Moscow lab — with the popular sports.ru website coming to what it admitted was an uncomfortable conclusion: someone in the Russian government had chosen to gamble the Olympic dreams of young Russian athletes rather than admit past doping transgressions.“We don’t have sport in a traditional sense — in Russia, it long ago became a special-operation for winning medals,” said the editorial.“Our manipulation of the database — is, by fact, an admission. It’s proof of a government doping system.”
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Man Wanted in Utah ‘Extreme Stalking’ Arrested in Hawaii
U.S. prosecutors have arrested a Hawaii man they accuse of sending hundreds of unwanted service providers and others to a Utah home, including plumbers and prostitutes.Loren Okamura was arrested Friday in Hawaii following his indictment last month on charges of cyberstalking, interstate threats and transporting people for prostitution, court documents show.Okamura, 44, targeted a father and her adult daughter, sending the woman threatening messages and posting her picture and address online, authorities said. One posting said the homeowner wanted drugs and prostitutes at the house in a quiet, middle-class neighborhood in a Salt Lake City suburb.The Gilmore family was “tormented” during the year-plus that the “extreme cyberstalking” endured, U.S. Attorney John Huber said Tuesday at a news conference.Investigators had been focused on Okamura as the suspect since January when the Gilmores were granted a protective injunction in Utah. It took investigators time to gather enough evidence to charge Okamura because of his use of encryption and apps that made him appear anonymous, Huber said.”For all the good that technology offers us in our modern lifestyles, there is also a darker, seedier side to it,” Huber said. “That’s what you have here.”Huber declined to disclose the relationship between the victim and Okamura, but said it was not random. He noted that most stalkers had a previous intimate relationship with their victims and said, “those dynamics are present in this case.”A sealed indictment was issued on Oct. 2, but Okamura wasn’t arrested until Friday as police struggled to find him because he doesn’t have a permanent address or job and is “savvy” with technology he used to mask his phone’s location.A team of Utah officers flew to Honolulu and teamed with FBI agents on a 15-hour search Friday for Okamura that ended when they arrested him without incident at a supermarket, said Sgt. Jeff Plank of the Utah Department of Public Safety, who was assigned to the FBI’s cybercrime task force.Okamura’s federal public defender, Sharron Rancourt, didn’t immediately return a phone message and emails seeking comment.Okamura is scheduled to be in court in Hawaii on Wednesday for a detention hearing.Prosecutors say Okamura’s online stalking began sometime in 2018 and led as many as 500 unwanted people to go to the house, according to Gilmore. Okamura sent food deliveries, repair services, tow trucks, locksmiths, plumbers and prostitutes to “harass and intimidate” the family, costing the service providers thousands of dollars in lost business, according to the charging documents.Utah police went to the North Salt Lake house more than 80 times over a four-month period from November 2018 to February 2019. The activities affected the entire neighborhood, prosecutors say.Okamura sent the woman extensive and repeated texts and voicemails.In May, the woman received a threatening email telling her she should “sleep with one eye open and keep looking over her shoulder.” The email told her, “You should just kill yourself and do your family a favor,” charging documents show.Prosecutors say they have records from Okamura’s cellphone and Apple ID to support the charges. His arrest was first reported by Hawaii News Now.Walt Gilmore didn’t immediately return messages Tuesday.
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Pennsylvania Ends Future Child Sex Abuse Charges Time Limits
Pennsylvania enacted legislation Tuesday to give future victims of child sexual abuse more time to file lawsuits and to end time limits for police to file criminal charges.Gov. Tom Wolf signed new laws he said will help repair “faults in our justice system that prevent frightened, abused children from seeking justice when they grow into courageous adults.”The legislative package was based on recommendations in last year’s landmark grand jury report about the cover-up of hundreds of cases of child sexual abuse in six of Pennsylvania’s eight Roman Catholic dioceses over much of the 20th century.However, Republicans with majority control of the state Senate blocked the two-year window, which was a top priority of victim advocates, victims and state Attorney General Josh Shapiro.They all want the state to temporarily lift time limits that currently bar now-adult victims of child sexual abuse from suing their perpetrators and institutions that may have helped hide it.About two dozen states have changed their laws on statutes of limitations this year, according to Child USA, a Philadelphia-based think tank that advocates for child protection.Wolf, a Democrat, signed bills to invalidate secrecy agreements that keep child sexual abuse victims from talking to investigators, and to increase and clarify penalties for people who are required to report suspected child abuse but fail to do so.Wolf signed the bills at Muhlenberg High School in Reading, the home district of state Democratic Rep. Mark Rozzi, a champion of the legislation and who has spoken publicly about being raped as a 13-year-old boy by a Roman Catholic priest.”We know our work is not done today, it’s going to continue,” Rozzi said.Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, center, accompanied by Rep. Jim Gregory, R-Blair, left, and Rep. Mark Rozzi, D-Berks, speaks before Gov. Tom Wolf signs legislation into law at Muhlenberg High School in Reading, Pa., Tuesday, Nov. 26, 2019The grand jury report prompted a lengthy battle in the Legislature that pitted victims and their advocates who sought the two-year window to file claims over past abuse against top Senate Republicans, who argued it would be unconstitutional and instead offered the slower alternative of amending the state constitution.The multi-year amendment process has begun, but the bill must again pass both the House and Senate in the 2021-22 legislative session before voters will decide its fate.Shapiro, a Democrat, said the eliminated time limits means prosecutors could file charges against only two priests after the report was issued. Shapiro said that if the new legislation had applied, some 100 priests could have been charged.Wolf and Shapiro urged lawmakers to take up the two-year window for lawsuits rather than wait for the constitutional amendment process to play out.”By waiting, we are robbing the very victims who made this day possible, we are robbing them of the only closure before them,” Shapiro said. “Think about the many Pennsylvanians who have a story to tell about sexual abuse. Why should anyone who’s been a victim of sexual abuse or its cover-up be made to suffer while others get three or four more years of a free pass?”The main bill in the legislative package ends any statute of limitations, in future cases, for criminal prosecution of major child sexual abuse crimes. Current law limits it to the victim’s 50th birthday.Victims would have until they turn 55 to sue, compared to age 30 in current law. Young adults ages 18-23 would have until age 30 to sue, where existing law gives them just two years.Police could file criminal charges up to 20 years after the crime when young adults 18-23 years old are the victims, as opposed to 12 years after the crime for victims over 17 in current law.Other state have previously amended their laws.In New Jersey, lawmakers expanded the civil statute of limitations from two years to seven years. The bill opened a two-year window, which starts on Dec. 1, to victims who were previously barred by the statute of limitations. It also allows victims to seek damages from institutions.New York raised the victim’s age for which prosecutors can seek a felony indictment from 23 to 28. The law also gave anyone a year starting in August to file child sex abuse lawsuits against individuals and institutions, and civil lawsuits going forward can be filed until the victim is 55, up from 23.
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Trump: He and China’s Xi Want Things to ‘Go Well’ in Hong Kong
U.S. President Donald Trump said Tuesday he and Chinese President Xi Jinping “want to see it go well in Hong Kong” amid ongoing trade talks to end a bitter trade dispute between the two countries.”I have a very good relationship, as you know, with President Xi. We’re in the final throes of a very important deal, I guess you could say one of the most important deals in trade ever. It’s going very well but at the same time we want to see it go well in Hong Kong,” Trump said.Trump’s Oval Office remarks came as Washington waits to see if the president will sign legislation passed by the House and Senate to support Hong Kong protesters.The legislation has angered China, who has called it interference in an internal affair. Trump has been non-committal about whether he would sign the measure into law as he tries to close a deal with China to end the 16-month trade war.Trump did suggest, however, that the issues behind the unrest in Hong Kong would eventually be resolved.”I think that President Xi can make that happen,” Trump said. “I know him and I know he’d like to make it happen.”Trump raised questions about his commitment to standing up to defend freedoms in Hong Kong in August when he described the mass street protests there as “riots” that China must address.Trump again referred to “riots” on Friday, but he has also urged China to handle the protests humanely, while warning repeatedly of their impact on trade negotiations.Riot police stand guard as lawyer and newly elected district councillor arrive at the Polytechnic University to meet the left-over protesters in Hong Kong, Nov. 25, 2019.The U.S. legislation requires the U.S. State Department to certify at least annually that Hong Kong retains enough autonomy to justify favorable U.S. trading terms that have helped the semi-autonomous city maintain its position as a world financial center.The measure also threatens sanctions for human rights violations.Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was asked at a Washington news conference Tuesday whether he expected Trump to approve the legislation.Pompeo said he did not want to “get out in front of what he will do before too long,” but added that the State Department would comply with whatever it was required to do by statute.Any veto by the president can be overridden by two-thirds votes in both the Senate and the House.The bill will automatically become law on Dec. 3 if Trump chooses to do nothing.
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Rescuers Scramble to Save Lives After 6.4-Magnitude Quake in Albania
Rescuers were pulling survivors and dead bodies from piles of rubble in Albania on Tuesday after a 6.4-magnitude earthquake struck the country’s coastal area. The U.S. Geological survey placed the quake’s epicenter about 30 kilometers north of the capital Tirana and at a depth of about 20 kilometers. The earthquake was followed by about 100 aftershocks, including three with preliminary magnitudes of about 5. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports the death toll is rising.
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France Mourns Soldiers Killed in Mali
France said Tuesday it is determined to continue fighting terrorism, despite losing 13 of its soldiers during a counterinsurgency operation in Mali. The deaths of the soldiers late Monday represent France’s biggest military loss in three decades. The 13 troops were killed during a counterterrorism combat operation in Mali, when the two helicopters the troops were on slammed into each other.French President Emmanuel Macron announced his deep sadness over their deaths, and France’s National Assembly observed a minute of silence.French Defense Minister Florence Parly described the men as exceptional soldiers and heroes, who fought for liberty until the end. She said support from allies strengthened France, allowing it to continue the fight against terrorism.Forty-one French soldiers have been killed in Mali since France launched its Barkhane counterinsurgency operation against Islamist militants in the Sahel in 2014.The latest deaths draw attention to the roughly 4,500 French troops stationed across West Africa — raising questions about whether they are stretched too thin.France is supporting a so-called G-5 Sahel alliance, grouping five area countries against armed extremist groups. But experts say the militant groups are strengthening. Regional forces and U.N. peacekeepers have come under attack. Some commentators say France does not have enough military support and the G-5 Sahel alliance has yet to achieve even a symbolic victory.
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Bride Price Custom Honored in Nigeria, Despite Concerns
Critics say the widespread African tradition of giving cash and gifts to a bride’s family before marriage, known as a “bride price,” degrades women by putting a required, monetary value on a wife. In Nigeria, the financial pressure in a recent case ended in suicide, underscoring those concerns. But supporters of the bride price tradition uphold it as a cherished cultural and religious symbol of marriage, as Chika Oduah reports from Yola, Nigeria.
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House Oversight Panel Sues Barr, Ross Over Census Documents
The House Oversight Committee sued two top Trump administration officials Tuesday for refusing to produce documents related to a decision to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.The panel’s chairwoman, Rep. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., said Attorney General William Barr and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross “have not produced a single additional document” since the Supreme Court blocked the administration’s efforts to include the citizenship question last June. The House later voted to hold Barr and Ross in contempt of Congress.FILE – U.S. Attorney General William Barr speaks at the Justice Department in Washington, July 15, 2019.Maloney, who was elected oversight chair last week, said the lawsuit follows the example set by the panel’s late chairman, Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings.Cummings “believed with all his heart that the Constitution requires Congress to ensure that the rapidly approaching Census is conducted in a professional manner that promotes accuracy, ensures integrity and is free from partisan politics — and I couldn’t agree more,” Maloney said.The lawsuit marks the latest action by Democrats to use their House majority to aggressively investigate the inner workings of the Trump administration, including an impeachment inquiry of President Donald Trump.Trump abandoned the citizenship question last summer after the Supreme Court said the administration’s justification for the question “seems to have been contrived.” Trump directed agencies to try to compile the information using existing databases.The Justice and Commerce departments did not immediately comment on the lawsuit, although officials have previously said the documents Democrats are demanding are subject to executive privilege.31,000 pages of documents FILE – U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross listens during a Cabinet meeting in the Cabinet Room of the White House, July 16, 2019.The administration has produced more than 31,000 pages of documents to the House regarding the census issue, and senior officials from both agencies, including Ross, have spoken on the record about the matter.Maloney said the committee has continued its investigation and obtained new documents and information from other sources.Lawmakers need the documents being withheld by Justice and Commerce, in part, to determine whether Congress should take emergency action to protect the census from partisan political interference, Maloney said.The census is set to begin in Alaska in January and across the country in April 2020.
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Most People Who Fled California Wildfire Allowed to Go Home
Most of the thousands of people who fled a raging California wildfire in the mountains north of Santa Barbara were told they could return home Tuesday as an approaching storm offered hope the flames would be doused.About 4,000 of the nearly 5,500 evacuees were affected when authorities reduced the size of the evacuation zone.The blaze had blackened more than 6.5 square miles (16.8 square kilometers) of the rugged Santa Ynez Mountains, but most of that acreage was scorched in its first hours Monday.Fire commanders described a fierce battle that saved homes as the blaze consumed brush in an area that hadn’t burned in 29 years.“We’ve had winds move up slope, down slope, across the slope,” Santa Barbara County fire Battalion Chief Anthony Stornetta said.Helicopters dropped water on the fire during the night, and daylight allowed air tankers to drop long strips of fire retardant to box in the flames.The fire began in Los Padres National Forest as winds gusted to 30 mph (48 kph) and higher.Miryam Garcia, 21, and her mother, Norma Ramos, 47, fled their home as flames approached.“I was just kind of praying that it didn’t get to our house,” Garcia said.She and her mother stayed overnight with friends and then went to a Red Cross shelter at a community center in Goleta, west of Santa Barbara.“Overwhelmed, not knowing what to do,” Garcia said.Red Cross official Tony Briggs said 34 people stayed overnight at the shelter, where face masks were being handed out.It wasn’t clear whether the shelter would still be needed on Thanksgiving, but Briggs promised to “do our very best to make this as good as we possibly can.”Firefighters were told the area had not received any rain in 180 days and vegetation was ready to burn.They were cautioned that roads into the rugged area may be too narrow for their engines, and that many residents had not left.Fire officials said as much as an inch of rain was expected to hit the area by midnight.The possible arrival of rain also posed hazards, ranging from shifting winds to debris flows from steep mountainsides.The dangerous cycle of fire and flood is a raw memory for many people in the region.In January 2018, a downpour on burned slopes just east of Santa Barbara unleashed massive debris flows that devastated Montecito, killing 23 people and destroying homes.A 1990 wildfire in the same area destroyed more than 400 homes.
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Report: South Sudan Rebels, Government Trade in Illegal Timber Sales
A United Nations report accuses South Sudanese rebel and government military commanders of illegally logging and selling teak and mahogany trees in the former Central Equatoria and Eastern Equatoria States. A rebel spokesman denies the allegation, while a spokesperson for the South Sudan Peoples Defense Forces declined to comment.A Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-in-Opposition spokesman denies rebels loyal to Riek Machar are doing business selling ecologically sensitive trees.”If there are still forces of IO in Kajo-Keji area, they are still waiting for the second phase [cantonment] and it is not that they are doing business as put across [in the U.N. report]. One thing the U.N. is doing is to put confusion when peace is moving on well like that,” Colonel Lam Paul Gabriel told South Sudan in Focus.In a 33-page, Nov. 22 report, the U.N. Panel of Experts said they received “credible information” indicating Major General Moses Lokujo of SPLA-IO Division 2B was “directly involved in the taxation of teak and mahogany” being illegally harvested in Liwolo, Kariwa, Kendire, Kala, Ajio, Lora Manglotore, Bori, Lowili and Katire payams, all of which are under the control of opposition forces.The report also said Lokujo has been active in transporting logs across South Sudan’s borders with the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. Gabriel said U.N. experts connected Lokujo to the illegal activity because of logging in Kajo-Keji.”The truth is, the logging is done by the community approved by the landlords,” Lokujo told South Sudan in Focus.Gabriel criticized the U.N. for calling teak logging illegal in rebel territory, saying the SPLA-IO has the right to serve civilians under their protection.”What do they mean like illegal in a controlled area of SPLA-IO? It is supposed to be legal because that thing moved through the community and it comes up to the level of government [IO leadership]. During war, there are those who are loyal to the government, and there are those who are loyal to the rebels, they will always be loyal to us and those with the government will be loyal to the government,” Lam told South Sudan in Focus.Gabriel was featured in a video documentary entitled, “The Profiteers,” for his role as a middle man who facilitated the transportation of timber from rebel-controlled areas in Yei, South Sudan, to Uganda.After the video was shared widely on social media, the SPLA-IO deputy spokesman recorded a Facebook live-video in which he denied any involvement in the timber business.The Panel of Experts report said opposition forces harassed community members who refused to follow their orders, leading many to flee to refugee camps in Uganda.Gabriel strongly disagreed with the U.N. findings, saying people were fleeing clashes between the SPLA-IO and competing rebels of the National Salvation Front (NAS).”After NAS attacked us in 2017 in Kajo-Keji and we lost, three quarters of these civilians — they went back to Uganda. We fought for seventeen days against the forces of Thomas Cirilo and all these IDPS there moved to Uganda. But the U.N. to restrict it to the harassment of the SPLA-IO, they have already taken sides with forces of Thomas Cirilo,” Lam told VOA.According to the U.N. panel, timber traders pay the SPLA-IO up to $600 for the right to log and $800 to transport logs through their territories.The logs are mainly sold in neighboring Uganda for $400 to $600 per log, according to “The Profiteers.”The U.N. experts said South Sudan Peoples Defense Force commanders in Pageri and Ajaci counties in the former Eastern Equatoria State have traded in timber since April 2017.The U.N. experts said the SSPDF, especially units of its Tiger Division deployed in Moli, are illegally cutting timber and taxing logging companies.The Panel says the beneficiary of the illegal logging was Major General Johnson Juma, head of administration and finance for the SSPDF.The Panel of Experts said illegal tree logging in South Sudan has left locals with no income in those areas.The South Sudan Peoples Defense Forces Spokesman Major General Lul Ruai declined to comment on the U.N. allegations.
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