The global health crisis is taking a nasty political turn with tensions worsening between governments locked down to keep the coronavirus at bay and people yearning to restart stalled economies and forestall fears of a depression.Protesters worrying about their livelihoods and bucking infringements on their freedom took to the streets in some places. A few countries were acting to ease restrictions, but most of the world remains unified in insisting it’s much too early to take more aggressive steps.In the United States, there was clear evidence of the mounting pressure. The Trump administration says parts of the country are ready to begin a gradual return to normalcy. Yet some state leaders say their response to the pandemic is hindered by a woefully inadequate federal response. Washington state’s Democratic governor, Jay Inslee, even accused President Donald Trump of encouraging insubordination and “illegal activity” by goading on protesters who flouted shelter-in-place rules.”To have an American president to encourage people to violate the law, I can’t remember any time during my time in America where we have seen such a thing,” Inslee told ABC’s “This Week.” He said it was “dangerous because it can inspire people to ignore things that actually can save their lives.”Trump supporters in several states ignored social distancing and stay-at-home orders, gathering to demand that governors lift controls on public activity. The largest protest drew thousands to Lansing, Mich., on Wednesday, and others have featured hundreds each in several states. The president has invoked their rallying cry, calling on several states with Democratic governors to “LIBERATE.”With the arc of infection different in every nation and across U.S. states, proposals have differed for coping with the virus that has killed more than 165,000.Restrictions have begun to ease in some places, including Germany, which is still enforcing social distancing rules but on Monday intended to begin allowing some small stores, like those selling furniture and baby goods, to reopen. Authorities in Spain, which had some of Europe’s strictest restrictions and a virus death toll only exceeded by the U.S. and Italy, said children will be allowed to leave their homes beginning April 27. Albania planned to let its mining and oil industries reopen Monday, along with hundreds of businesses including small retailers, food and fish factories, farmers and fishing boats.The death toll in the U.S. climbed past 41,000 with more than 746,000 confirmed infections, while the global case count has passed 2.38 million, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University of national health reports. The European Center for Disease Control said the continent now has more than 1 million confirmed cases and almost 100,000 deaths from the coronavirus.The actual extent of the pandemic is likely to be significantly higher due to mild infections that are missed, limited testing, problems counting the dead and some nations’ desires to underplay the extent of their outbreaks.The International Monetary Fund expects the global economy to contract 3% this year. That’s a far bigger loss than 2009’s 0.1% after the global financial crisis. Still, many governments are resisting pressures to abruptly relax lockdowns.”We must not let down our guard until the last confirmed patient is recovered,” South Korea’s President Moon Jae-in said Sunday.In Britain, which reported 596 more coronavirus-related hospital deaths on Sunday, officials also said they’re not ready to ease efforts to curb the virus’s spread. U.K. minister Michael Gove told the BBC that pubs and restaurants “will be among the last” to leave the lockdown, which is now in place until May 7. France’s health agency urged the public to stick to social distancing measures that have been extended until at least May 11 and Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said people could be required to wear masks on public transportation, and suggested no one plan faraway summer vacations even after that.The streets are empty in the shopping district in downtown Washington, DC, April 4, 2020. (Photo: Diaa Bekheet)Trump is pushing to begin easing the U.S. lockdown in some states even before his own May 1 deadline, a plan that health experts and governors from both parties say will require a dramatic increase in testing capacity nationwide. But Pence insisted in television interviews Sunday that the country has “sufficient testing today” for states to begin reopening their economies as part of the initial phases of guidelines that the White House released last week. The Trump administration has repeatedly blamed state leaders for delays, but governors from both parties have been begging the federal government for help securing in-demand testing supplies such as swabs and chemicals known as reagents. Republican Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio made a direct appeal to Washington: “We really need help … to take our capacity up,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, said his state can’t begin lifting restrictions until it is able to test more people daily. “Right now, we’re not even close as a nation, let alone as a state, to where we should be on testing,” he said. Trump pushed back in a tweet before his scheduled Sunday evening briefing at the White House. “I am right on testing. Governors must be able to step up and get the job done. We will be with you ALL THE WAY!” he wrote.Economic concerns that have increasingly collided with measures to protect public health are now popping up throughout the U.S. The streets are empty in the usually crowded shopping district of Georgetown, one of the very busy shopping areas of Washington, DC, April 4, 2020. (Photo: Diaa Bekheet)Business leaders in Louisiana have slammed New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell for imposing restrictions that they say have unfairly shuttered economic activity outside the city. A full-page ad in Baton Rouge’s “The Advocate” newspaper on Sunday urged an easing of lockdowns, even as the New Orleans Times-Picayune featured nearly nine pages of obituaries in a city hard-hit by the virus.States including Texas and Indiana have announced plans to allow some retail and other activity to resume and some restrictions were either lifted or set to be on beaches in Florida and South Carolina. But in New York, where the daily coronavirus death toll hit its lowest point in more than two weeks on Sunday, officials warn that New York City and the rest of the hard-hit state aren’t ready to ease shutdowns of schools, businesses and gatherings. Geopolitical and religious tensions stretching back centuries have further complicated the global response to the virus. But Jordan’s King Abdullah II said the outbreak has made “partners” out of “our enemies of yesterday, or those that were not friendly countries yesterday — whether we like it or not.””I think the quicker we as leaders and politicians figure that out, the quicker we can bring this under control,” he told CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
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Month: April 2020
Trump Says Getting Close to a Deal with Democrats on Coronavirus Stimulus
U.S. President Donald Trump said Sunday that Republicans were “close” to getting a deal with Democrats on another legislative package to help alleviate economic damage done by the coronavirus pandemic.At a White House briefing, the president suggested there could be a resolution by Monday.
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South Sudan Frees Some Prisoners
With the threat of the coronavirus infecting thousands of prisoners held in extremely overcrowded South Sudanese facilities, Human Rights Watch (HRW) is urging the country’s prison authorities to release pre-trial detainees and prisoners who have served most of their terms. According to HRW, the country’s prisons and detention sites are overcrowded, unsanitary, and have inadequate medical care: the perfect breeding ground for spreading the pandemic. Closing the borders, imposing a travel ban, and suspending all mass gatherings are all positive moves taken by the government to control the spread of coronavirus said HRW researcher in South Sudan, N yagoah Tut Pur, but prisoners are still at great risk of becoming infected.Many of them sleep in overcrowded hallways or bunk beds, increasing the risk of infection. Prison authorities should ease overcrowding by releasing non-violent prisoners, said Tut.“Those who are in pre-trial detention for non-violence and less offenses, they should consider older people, older prisoners as well as prisoners with underlining conditions and prisoners with disabilities and those who do not pose a general risk to the public,” Tut told South Sudan in Focus.She also suggested that detention facilities run by the National Security Service (NSS) be closed. “Beyond prisons we have also focused on National Security Service detentions because the NSS do not have the constitutional mandate to detain civilians, but they still do. And now we have called on the government to ensure those unlawfully detained by NSS are released and that NSS facilities are shut down,” Tut told VOA.General Henry Kuany Aguar, Director General for the National Prison Service, said he distributed a circular to all states instructing prison authorities to release 1400 inmates to ease overcrowding. “The number of prisoners is big. We requested them to [get] bail, they can be bailed. They are not convicted, they are not investigated, nothing proves somebody is innocent or convicted so we are requesting let these people be bailed,” Aguar told South Sudan in Focus. Kuany also recommended juvenile detainees and prisoners with six months or less remaining on their sentence be released.Major General Anthony Oliver Lege, spokesperson for the National Prison Service, insists prison authorities are implementing measures to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. “We make sure that we avoid coming together even though the nature of the prisons of course they will stay in one place but we are trying to say to them the value of social distancing is very important,” Lege told South Sudan in Focus.South Sudan also ended prison visitation hours to control the spread of the pandemic.Prison authorities in the Unity state capital Bentiu as well as in Yirol and Yei have already released some prisoners to ease overcrowding, according to Lege.
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Escape of Ebola Patient in Congo Sparks Fear of Further Infection
An Ebola flare-up in eastern Congo may spread again after a patient escaped from a clinic, complicating efforts to contain the disease that has infected six people since last week, the World Health Organization said on Sunday.The Democratic Republic of Congo was two days away from declaring the end of the world’s second-largest Ebola epidemic when a new chain of infection was discovered on April 10, following more than seven weeks without a new case.Since then, health authorities have sought to contain any renewed spread of infections.But on Friday a 28-year-old motorbike taxi-driver who had tested positive for Ebola ran away from the center where he was being treated in the town of Beni.”We are using all the options to get him out of the community,” said Boubacar Diallo, deputy incident manager for the WHO’s Ebola response operation. “We are expecting secondary cases from him.”Decades of conflict and poor governance have eroded public trust in authorities in Congo. Despite Ebola having killed more than 2,200 people since August 2018, research shows that many communities believe the disease is not real.Small outbreaks are common towards the end of an epidemic, but health workers need to ensure the virus is contained by tracking, quarantining and vaccinating the contacts of new cases.”We do not have any details yet. All have been working with the authorities, youths and civil society to find him. Search is ongoing,” Diallo said by WhatsApp message.A 15-year-old girl also tested positive for the virus on Friday, Diallo said, taking the total number of confirmed new cases since the flare-up to six.Beni’s deputy mayor Muhindo Bakwanamaha said the local authorities have not so far been able to track down the escaped patient. “Since he is out of treatment he will die, and create a lot of contacts around him,” he said.Two new vaccines have had a major impact in containing Ebola, but militia attacks have prevented health workers from reaching some areas hit by the virus.Congo’s battered health system is simultaneously fighting measles and cholera epidemics, as well as the global coronavirus pandemic. The country has recorded 327 cases of COVID-19 and 25 deaths.
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Rescued Migrants to Quarantine on Ferry Off Italy
Some 180 migrants rescued at sea will be held in isolation on an Italian ferry off the coast of Sicily, the coast guard said Sunday.Italy has refused to take in saved migrants due to the coronavirus epidemic, saying the outbreak, which has killed over 23,000 people, meant it could no longer be considered a port of safety.Thirty-four people pulled to safety by Spanish NGO rescue vessel Aita Mari were being transferred Sunday to the Rubattino ferry, which is anchored outside the port of Palermo and staffed by 22 Red Cross volunteers.They join 146 migrants who were transferred to the ferry on Friday from the The Alan Kurdi rescue vessel, run by the German NGO Sea Eye. They will be tested for the virus and redistributed among EU countries once the 14-day isolation period is up, according to Italian media reports.The 180-metre long Tirrenia ferry can carry 1,471 passengers, and has 289 cabins, a medical center, restaurant, bars, and a children’s play area.
It was not clear whether the migrants would be confined to individual cabins.
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Released Chinese Lawyer Barred from Returning Home after Quarantine Period Ends
A prominent Chinese human rights lawyer who was released two weeks ago after spending 4 ½ years in prison for subversion has been prohibited from reuniting with his family for the second time, after a 14-day quarantine period amid the COVID-19 pandemic.Wang Quanzhang’s wife and rights groups fear the authorities are using the coronavirus pandemic as a pretext to continue holding him indefinitely under de facto house arrest, as has happened to many Chinese right activists who completed their prison terms.Wang, a lawyer who had defended political activists and members of the banned Falun Gong sect, was released April 4 but was barred from returning home by the authorities, who took him to his hometown, Jinan, in the eastern province of Shandong, 400 kilometers south of Beijing, for compulsory quarantine.The authorities told him upon his release that he would be freed after 14 days of quarantine. However, on Sunday, the day he should be free to go home, Wang was still barred from returning to Beijing, where his wife and 7-year-old son live, his wife, Li Wenzu, said.She said Wang told her by phone Saturday that he was unable to come home because he had “just come out and needed to get used to [everything].” She questioned whether he was speaking of his free will.“Did this really come from him?” she asked, “I am shocked, they said he’d be freed after 14 days but now his freedom of communications and personal freedom continue to be limited.”FILE – Li Wenzu, wife of prominent Chinese human rights lawyer Wang Quanzhang wears a sweater with her husband’s portrait printed with the words “Release Quanzhang” after Wang’s sentencing, at her house in Beijing, Jan. 28, 2019.Li said since his release, her husband has been living under surveillance and was only able to call her under the supervision of police, who controlled the content and length of their conversations. She said Wang told her that outspoken online postings she had written that were critical of authorities “were causing him trouble” and told her to delete them.“This is not the Wang Quanzhang I knew,” she said. “His courage and strength appeared to have been taken away by some supernatural power … The pain is like a knife stabbing into my bleeding heart.”Chinese rights activists are often released from prison into de facto house arrest or enforced restriction to their villages, where they are obliged to remain for years, leading New York University School of Law China expert Jerome Cohen to dub the practice “non-release release.”Rights lawyer Jiang Tianyong, who was officially released from jail in February 2019, was taken by security police to his home village in rural Henan province, where he has remained under 24-hour police surveillance since.Rights groups Sunday condemned Wang’s prolonged, extralegal detention.Human Rights Watch China researcher Yaqiu Wang said the authorities’ treatment of the lawyer is “a complete travesty of justice” and “is part of the authorities’ most recent scheme of using the coronavirus as a pretext to restrict the freedom of human rights activists, lawyers and independent journalists.”“The Chinese government seems determined to silence Wang indefinitely, through first sham prosecutions and now this completely bogus reason for him to be ‘quarantined.’ Who knows what reasons authorities will come up with after the pandemic is passed to continue to restrict Wang’s movement and freedom of speech,” she said.William Nee, a China researcher at Amnesty International said Wang’s “continued non-freedom is appalling, but not at all surprising.”“The suppression of [the rights lawyer] community, combined with the Communist Party’s systematic use of incommunicado detention, torture and ill-treatment, harassment of family members, show trials, and post-release surveillance has given the international community a clear warning of what to expect under China’s understanding of ‘rule by law,’” he said.Francine Chan, executive director of Hong Kong’s China Human Rights Lawyers Concern Group, said the authorities’ treatment of Wang is just “a manifestation of the continued suppression of human rights lawyers” since the notorious 2015 crackdown on lawyers and activists that Wang was swept up in.Detained in August 2015, Wang was sentenced to jail in January 2019 on the blanket charge of “subversion of state power” after 3 ½ years of incommunicado detention where he was at risk of torture.Wang was one of more than 300 lawyers and activists detained in a wave of crackdown on rights lawyers which started in July 2015. He was the last lawyer of the group to be convicted.
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Video Tribute Honors Oklahoma Bombing Victims Amid Outbreak
Survivors and loved ones of the 168 people who were killed in the Oklahoma City bombing were not able to gather Sunday to mark the 25th anniversary of the attack, but that did not stop them from remembering.Because the annual remembrance ceremony was canceled due to coronavirus restrictions, those the victims instead were honored with a video tribute that included the reading of the names of those who died followed by 168 seconds of silence.Ordinarily, the city would have gathered Sunday at the memorial where the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building stood before it was destroyed by a truck bomb on April 19, 1995. Gates to the memorial mark time, 9:01 and 9:03 a.m., with a reflection pond between them representing 9:02, the minute the explosion permanently altered lives and the nation. Stylized, empty metal chairs represent each person who died, and the “Survivor Tree,” a gnarled American elm that withstood the blast, now stands on a small hill and shades the memorial below. It was “extremely difficult” to not be able to attend in person, said Ryan Whicher, whose father, U.S. Secret Service Agent Alan Whicher, was killed in the bombing. “I’m not with my sisters today, I’m not with my mother today,” in Oklahoma City, he said by phone from Baltimore, where he now lives.”But it’s all for the right reasons. … Everyone is making sacrifices. I don’t think it’s fair for us in this coronavirus (environment) to feel we should be treated any differently,” he said.The prerecorded video, which included remarks by former President Bill Clinton, who was president at the time of the bombing, U.S. Sen. James Lankford, Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt and Tony award-winning actress and singer Kristin Chenowith, an Oklahoma native, drew praise from Whicher and state District Judge Cindy Ferrell Ashwood, whose sister, U.S. Housing and Urban Development attorney Susan Ferrell, died in the blast.”They did just an extraordinary ceremony under extraordinary circumstances, it was just remarkable,” Ashwood said of the video put together by the Oklahoma City National Memorial and Museum.”The main thing I missed today was not being with our family” in Oklahoma City said Ashwood, who lives about 40 miles (64 kilometers) east of the city, in Chandler.Kari Watkins, the director of the memorial, said this year’s social distancing restrictions are necessary but unfortunate, as survivors and victims’ family members often only see each this one time each year.”It’s just a nice time for them to come and be together,” she said. “They’ll miss that, but they’ll have another time when it’s safe to gather and we’ll come back together and do something, whenever that day is.”The city’s mayor, Holt, said in the video that bombing “was, ultimately, an act of extremist political violence. I ask you to consider this morning that this sacred place is a sober reminder that humanity is capable of such evil things.”He told The Associated Press in the run-up to Sunday that the 25th anniversary of the attack was particularly notable because it marked a transition of the event from one of personal experience to one of historical significance.”The march of time is relentless, and every year that passes, fewer and fewer people have a direct connection to it,” Holt said. “The 25th is another time for us here in Oklahoma City to refocus on what makes the event and the site relevant in the decades to come.”For Holt, that meant spreading the message that political violence is never the answer.”People in Oklahoma City sort of have a special obligation to stand for the idea that we have much more in common than we have different,” he said.The attack was carried out by two U.S. citizens — former Army soldier Timothy McVeigh and his co-conspirator, Terry Nichols — who hated the federal government. It occurred two years to the day after the federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas, that left at least 76 members of the religious sect, including some children, dead.McVeigh was ultimately convicted, sentenced to death and executed by lethal injection in 2001. Nichols was sentenced to life in prison for his role in what many experts refer to as the deadliest act of domestic terrorism on U.S. soil.
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North Korea Denies Sending ‘Nice Note’ to Trump
Pyongyang has refuted a claim by Washington that Kim Jong Un sent a “nice note” to his American counterpart Donald Trump. A statement from North Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs released Sunday called Trump’s claims “ungrounded” and accused Washington of exploiting the two leaders’ relationship. “The relations between the top leaders of [North Korea] and the U.S. are not an issue to be taken up just for diversion nor it should be misused for meeting selfish purposes,” the statement said. The statement followed remarks from Trump at Saturday’s coronavirus briefing, in response to a question about North Korea’s recent testing of short-range missiles.“I received a nice note from him recently. It was a nice note. I think we’re doing fine,” Trump said. FILE – U.S. President Donald Trump shakes hands with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as they meet at the demilitarized zone separating the two Koreas, in Panmunjom, South Korea, June 30, 2019. (KCNA via Reuters)Trump and Kim have corresponded multiple times and met in person three times in the past year and a half but talks broke down last year after the U.S. refused to relax sanctions and provide other concessions. A recent letter from Trump to Kim last month offered American help to North Korea in fighting the coronavirus pandemic. A response from Kim’s sister and senior official, Kim Yo Jong, acknowledged the special relationship between the two leaders but cautioned against being optimistic about bilateral relations.
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Elections Continue in Mali Despite Virus, Violence Fears
Parliamentary elections went on as planned in Mali Sunday, despite threats of Jihadist violence and fears of spreading the novel coronavirus. Low voter turnout was expected Sunday for the run-off legislative elections. The first round of elections, held on March 29th after repeated delays, was marred by intimidation and jihadist attacks — including the kidnapping of opposition leader Soumaila Cisse. Voter turnout in the first round of elections was just over 12% in the capital city of Bamako, according to government officials. Many are expected to stay inside, heeding guidelines to avoid large gatherings and keep distance between people. Mali has reported over 200 cases of COVID-19 and 13 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. These are the first elections to fill Mali’s 147-seat parliament since 2013. Elections were initially scheduled to take place in late 2018 but were delayed due to security concerns, which has left many Malians questioning why Sunday’s vote was not delayed as well. President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was elected in 2013, addressed the nation last week wearing a face mask, saying that the decision to continue with the vote as scheduled was not made by his government, but instead determined by an independent commission in the country. Thousands of Malians have died as the country suffered sporadic attacks by jihadists as well as cases of inter-ethnic violence since unrest began in 2012.
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World Cruise, Begun Before Virus Pandemic, Approaching Spain
Passengers on a luxury liner’s around-the-world cruise, begun before the globe was gripped by the coronavirus pandemic, are finally approaching the end of their odyssey after 15 weeks at sea. The ship, the Costa Deliziosa, was heading Sunday toward a port in Spain before ending its journey in Italy — both countries devastated by the coronavirus outbreak. Costa Crociere, an Italian cruise company, said that the Deliziosa, which set sail from Venice in early January with 1,831 passengers, had no cases of COVID-19 aboard. The Deliziosa, a nearly 300-meter (1,000-foot) vessel, will disembark 168 Spanish passengers on Monday at Barcelona’s port. Then the Deliziosa will head to its final destination, Genoa, Italy, where it is expected to let off the remaining passengers, Italians and those of other nationalities, on Wednesday. A company spokesman said a passenger left the ship earlier in the week in Marsala, Sicily, for health issues and had a COVID-19 test, which was negative. Being on the liner for weeks during the pandemic “was not surreal, it was incredible,” said passenger Carlos Paya’, who lives in Valencia, Spain, and is sailing with his wife. He added that they have family members in Spain. “The news that was arriving from home was causing us all a lot of worry and grief,” he told The Associated Press by text message Saturday evening. “For us it was a stroke of good luck to be where we were.” “From Perth [Australia] given the growth of the pandemic, and of course for those of us who have children in Spain, we would have preferred to return,” he added. “Other passengers, on the other hand, given their old age, wanted to stay on board knowing that the boat was safe and secure.” French authorities had rebuffed a request by Costa for permission to disembark several hundred passengers from France and nearby countries at Marseilles. “The health situation on board the ships, with 1,814 guests and 898 members of the crew, doesn’t present any problem for public health and no case of COVID-19,” Costa’s statement said. While people infected with the coronavirus often experience mild or moderate symptoms, possible complications like pneumonia can put their lives at risk. The Deliziosa was originally due to return to Venice on April 26. After the U.N. World Health Organization pandemic alert in March, the ship, which had just made a port call in Fremantle, western Australia, made only technical and refueling stops, before the journey back toward the Mediterranean, which took it through the Suez Canal, according to the company. Passenger Jean-Pierre Escarras, from Marseilles, shot a video of their cabin that their daughters shared on social networks, in which he says: “This is our place of confinement. We are lucky to have a window.” The couple said that after a stop in Sydney, the ship’s activities were “reduced or sometimes canceled. We haven’t been able to get out on land since March 14 — that’s 34 days.” The passengers said that ports in Oman, along the Suez Canal, as well as in the Seychelles and Indian Ocean ports, refused to let the ship dock. The Spanish passenger, Paya’ praised the captain and crew. Costa said the passengers were confined to their cabins only for the period until the ship heard back that the ill guest who got off in Sicily had tested negative. It didn’t say how long that period lasted. The company said, because the ship is Italian-flagged, it followed Italian precautionary measures used in the pandemic, including safety distancing between guests such as managing the numbers of who could enter food areas at any one time, and transmitting entertainment to cabin TV sets. A French woman whose in-laws are aboard the Costa Deliziosa garnered about 100 signatures on an online petition to urge the French government to intervene to get them home. But French authorities barred the Deliziosa from disembarking more than 1,000 passengers before its final destination in Italy. The regional administration for Bouches-du-Rhone in southern France cited a nationwide ban on allowing foreign cruise ships to dock, as part of France’s virus-related confinement measures. Italy has also barred foreign cruise ships as it battles the virus outbreak. The French administration has granted exemptions to six other cruise ships in recent weeks to allow French passengers to get off, but refused this time, saying the previous stops overstretched local police and health authorities already mobilized to fight France’s severe virus crisis. Last month, two other Costa cruise ships pulled into Italian ports, including one that earlier had aboard passengers who tested positive for COVID-19 before being disembarked in France. It was unclear if or where the passengers who were due to finally step aboard land after weeks of sailing aboard the Deliziosa would be quarantined as a precaution.
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Iran’s Guard Acknowledges Encounter with US During Drill
Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard acknowledged Sunday it had a tense encounter with U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf last week, but alleged without offering evidence that American forces sparked the incident. The incident Wednesday saw the U.S. Navy release video of small Iranian fast boats coming close to American warships as they operated in the northern Persian Gulf near Kuwait, with U.S. Army Apache helicopters. In the Guard’s telling, its forces were on a drill and faced “the unprofessional and provocative actions of the United States and their indifference to warnings.” It said the Americans later withdrew. The Guard released no video or evidence to support its allegation. It also accused American forces of blocking Iranian warships on April 6 and April 7 as well. Lt. Pete Pagano, a spokesman for the U.S. Navy’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet, said the Navy stood by its earlier description of the incident Wednesday. “Regarding any other interactions with our ships, U.S. forces continue to remain vigilant and are trained to act in a professional manner,” Pagano told The Associated Press in reference to the Guard’s claims of other recent incidents. The incident comes amid still-heightened tensions between Iran and the U.S. despite the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Armed men boarded a Hong Kong-flagged tanker ship Tuesday off the coast of Iran near the crucial Strait of Hormuz, holding the ship for a short time near the Iranian coast before releasing it. Though Iran has not acknowledged the incident, private security firms say the Guard was behind the seizure. In a tweet Sunday, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif kept up his criticism of President Donald Trump, claiming Iran soon would export ventilators despite facing one of the world’s worst outbreaks. “All you need to do is stop interfering in the affairs of other nations; mine especially,” Zarif wrote. “And believe me, we do not take advice from ANY American politician.”
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Scores of Civilians Killed in Worsening Inter-Ethnic Violence in DR Congo
The U.N. Human Rights Office reports scores of civilians are being killed, wounded and abducted in worsening Inter-ethnic violence between the Hema and Lendu in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s Ituri Province.More than 150 people have been killed in Djugu and Mahagi territories in Ituri province since early March, raising the number of civilian deaths this year to more than 200. In addition, the U.N. Human Rights Office reports scores of other civilians have been wounded and abducted in this inter-ethnic conflict.The agency says attacks by CODECO fighters, a militia tied to the Lendu ethnic group, have escalated against the Hema people after their commander was killed on March 25 by the DRC Military.U.N. human rights spokesman, Rupert Colville, says 23 civilians were killed in the latest attack last week in the village of Koli.“The brutality of the attacks with perpetrators using machetes to kill women and children, raping, looting property, destroying houses, killing livestock, suggests the aim is to inflict lasting trauma on the affected populations, forcing them to flee, and so gain control over the territory, which is rich in natural resources.”The Lendu, who are mainly farmers and Hema, a herding and trading people, have been fighting sporadically for decades over valuable resources in their gold mining and oil rich province. Tens of thousands of people have been killed and hundreds of thousands displaced.After a decade-long lull, fighting between the two groups re-emerged in late 2017. A U.N. report published January, found that widespread systematic attacks by the Lendu against the Hema civilian population may constitute crimes against humanity.Colville says the current leaders of the Lendu community have largely distanced themselves from the attackers. And, he notes the Hema and other ethnic groups in the area generally have shown restraint.“But we are worried that if the attacks continue without a decisive response from the security forces to defend the civilian population, those communities may form self-defense militias and that would increase the likelihood of a descent into all out inter-communal violence, which would be absolutely catastrophic.”The U.N. Human Rights Office is calling on the authorities to strengthen the presence of security forces in the region. It is urging officials to thoroughly investigate alleged abuses and human rights violations and to hold the perpetrators to account.
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Orthodox Churches Hold Diminished Easter Services Amid Pandemic
Orthodox Christians observed the Easter holiday amid extraordinary coronavirus-related restrictions on services that forced many parishioners to watch services on TV or online. Church leaders have struggled to figure out how to observe the April 19 holiday — the holiest day in the Orthodox calendar — while avoiding spreading the coronavirus. Some local parishes have defied orders from public health officials and church leaders and vowed to allow people to attend services in person. In Russia and Ukraine, two of the biggest Orthodox denominations, priests in St. Petersburg and Kyiv held services beginning late on April 18 that were televised and shown online. Police deployed outside churches in Ukraine to ensure that anyone who came remained outside and observed regulations calling for social distancing and a ban on large gatherings. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy urged Ukrainians to celebrate from home. Most church leaders complied and agreed to broadcast their services. One exception was the famed Kyiv Pechersk Lavra monastery, where police regulated entry to the church to one worshipper at a time. The complex was placed under quarantine after more than 90 of its monks were identified as infected with the coronavirus. At least two have died. The monastery is controlled by a rival Orthodox denomination in Ukraine that is loyal to the Russian church in Moscow. The Russian Orthodox Church ordered churches to close their doors to large groups during the week leading up to the holiday. Patriarch Kirill led the Russian church’s main service on April 18 at Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral. In an Easter sermon, he said Orthodox Christians should not despair in difficult circumstances and should not panic. President Vladimir Putin, who has regularly attended the nighttime rituals in the past, did not attend this year. Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Putin stayed at his suburban presidential residence and lit a candle at a chapel on the property. The most contentious debate over Orthodox Easter occurred in Georgia, where church leaders and the government agreed to allow parishioners to attend dusk-to-dawn Easter vigil services. The agreement meant worshippers were allowed to attend overnight services in large cathedrals despite a curfew, but they were required to maintain a distance of 2 meters. Those who attend small churches had to remain outside. Dozens went to the main cathedral in Tbilisi, where Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II said that the virus had caused fear among many people. In Bulgaria, the government urged people not to attend services but didn’t ban them. Hundreds flocked to outdoor services late on April 18, but many opted to watch on television. “In the current situation, we must be better and more humble,” Prime Minister Boyko Borisov wrote in Facebook. “Let’s do everything we can to be proud of our decisions and actions in years to come.” Easter for the world’s 300 million Orthodox Christian is celebrated about a week after Roman Catholic and Protestant Christians observe the holiday.
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2.3 Million COVID Cases Around the World
Coronavirus cases rose to 2.3 million around with world, with the U.S. seeing steady increases but several other countries reporting declining numbers. The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center says over 735,000 cases and nearly 40,000 deaths have been recorded in the United States, now the epicenter of the virus that first broke out in China late last year. China on Sunday reported 16 new cases. South Korea, which early this year saw one of the first outbreaks outside of mainland China, reported only eight new cases — the first time the country has recorded new cases in the single digits in months. The World Health Organization said Sunday there is “no evidence” that people who have endured COVID-19 are immune to it, dashing hopes of the creation of an antibody COVID test. The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that 163 people who had the coronavirus have been re-infected. Amid the global pandemic, musician Lady Gaga curated “One World: Together at Home” a two-hour virtual concert Saturday night, featuring a broad range of celebrities sending messages of hope.The Rolling Stones, Stevie Wonder, Lizzo, Oprah and Stephen Colbert were among the celebrities and entertainers who participated in a worldwide television broadcast Saturday to honor health care workers who are battling the contagion, often at great risk to their lives. Indian Movie Star Shahrukh Khan, Chinese pianist Lang Lang, and Nigerian singer Burna Boy were also among the dozens of entertainers from across the globe who participated. Global Citizen, a nonprofit organization, planned the event with the WHO. Meanwhile, a group of 13 countries has called for global cooperation to reduce the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic, as infections and fatalities continue to climb worldwide. The countries, which include Britain, Indonesia, Germany, Singapore, Turkey and Canada, said in a joint statement released Saturday that “It is vital that we work together to save lives and livelihoods.” The collective, which also includes Italy, Brazil, France, Mexico, South Korea, Morocco and Peru, vowed to “work with all countries to coordinate on public health, travel, trade, [and] economic and financial measures in order to minimize disruptions and recover stronger.” The United Nations Economic Commission for Africa said the pandemic could claim 300,000 lives in Africa this year. But the World Health Organization estimates there are fewer than 2,000 ventilators available for the hundreds of millions of people in 41 African countries, fueling concerns that chronic shortages of ventilators and other essential supplies could be catastrophic.
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Australia Demands Transparency from China in Proposed Global COVID-19 Review
Australia is demanding transparency from China in a proposed international investigation into the origins and spread of COVID-19.Chinese authorities have been under pressure over their handling of the coronavirus outbreak. U.S. President Donald Trump said Saturday that China should face consequences if it was “knowingly responsible” for the pandemic.Beijing has dismissed this criticism and has insisted it has been open about the contagion and did take responsible steps to warn the world about the dangers of COVID-19. The virus is thought to have originated at an animal market in Wuhan.However, Australia has now joined calls for an independent investigation into the origins of COVID-19 and how it spread around the world with such devastating speed.Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne has told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. that China’s actions should be thoroughly investigated.“The key to going forward in the context of these issues is transparency, transparency from China most certainly, transparency from all of the key countries across the world who will be part of any review that takes place,” said Payne. “I think it is fundamental that we identify, we determine an independent review mechanism to examine the development of this epidemic, its development into a pandemic, the crisis that is occurring internationally.”The government in Canberra is adamant that any global review should not be undertaken by the World Health Organization.Australian officials have said some of its response to the coronavirus outbreak “was not helpful.”Australia went against WHO’s advice in early February when it banned travelers arriving from mainland China. Canberra later closed Australia’s borders and imposed strict lockdown measures. Health Minister Greg Hunt said Australia was winning in its campaign against COVID-19 but the battle was far from over.WHO has called for countries to work together to fight the pandemic.There are now more than 6,600 cases of the new coronavirus in Australia and 70 people have died from the virus.
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Director of Wuhan Laboratory Dismisses Claims COVID-19 Originated There
In line with Chinese government and Communist Party officials, the director of Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory has aggressively dismissed claims that it could be the source of the coronavirus outbreak, calling it “impossible” and labeling them as “conspiracy theory.”In an interview Saturday with the English-language state broadcaster CGTN, Yuan Zhiming said “there’s no way” the virus spread from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, specifically its P4 laboratory, which handles dangerous viruses.”From my personal understanding of virology, there is no evidence to prove that the virus has trace of artificial or synthetic origins,” Yuan said. “Besides, some scientists believe that to synthesize a virus requires extraordinary intelligence and workload, which exceed the intelligence of normal humans and exceed what the current human society can handle. So, I have never believed that we humans now have the capability at this time to synthesize such a virus.”None of the institute’s staff had been infected, Yuan said, adding the “whole institute is carrying out research in different areas related to the coronavirus.”Beijing has been criticized for lack of transparency in its handling of the pandemic, with the United States investigating whether the virus originated in the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a high-security biosafety laboratory, where Yuan is also a researcher.The official tally of infections in Wuhan has been questionable from the very beginning, with the government frequently changing its counting criteria at the peak of the outbreak. Finally, last week, Wuhan authorities admitted mistakes about counting the death toll and raised the figure by 50 percent.Although the origin of COVID-19 is yet to be determined, some scientists suspect the virus was transmitted to humans from animals at a wet market in Wuhan.
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US Reportedly Sent Millions in Masks, PPE To China
The U.S. government encouraged American companies to send masks and personal protection equipment, or PPE, worth millions of dollars to China earlier this year, according to a Washington Post report Saturday.The newspaper’s report said the White House was oblivious to the danger the coronavirus posed to the U.S. and the rest of the world.The move, the newspaper said, “underscores the Trump administration’s failure to recognize and prepare for the growing pandemic threat.”The Post said its findings are based on a “review of economic data and internal government documents.”The newspaper said an analysis of the value of the masks and other items sent to China in January and February showed it grew by more than 1,000 percent in comparison to the same time last year, jumping from $1.4 million to approximately $17.6 million. There was also three-digit inflation for the shipments of ventilators and protective garments.“People right now, as we speak, are dying because there have been inadequate supplies of PPE,” Representative Lloyd Doggett, a Democrat from Texas, told the Post.In early February, the U.S. State Department announced it had shipped more than 17 tons of donated medical supplies to China that front-line U.S. medical workers are now requesting as they battle COVID-19 disease, including masks, gowns, respirators and more, the Post reported.In late February, when the Chinese death toll had reached nearly 3,000, the U.S. Commerce Department published a flyer telling U.S. companies how to sell “critical medical products” to China and Hong Kong. The quick selling process was shut down March 4 as the pandemic continued to grow, according to the Post.The newspaper account said “some White House officials” believe China deliberately played down the seriousness of the outbreak because it wanted to “corner the market” on masks and PPE.The Post report says, however, that the U.S. is facing “severe shortages” of testing kits and PPE, forcing doctors and nurses “to resort to makeshift gear” that increases their odds of exposure to the virus.China has denied hoarding equipment. The Post reports that China “has provided 120 countries and four international organizations with surgical masks and other forms of equipment.”
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Research Finds Traces Of COVID-19 In Raw Sewage
Australian researchers are developing a new sewage test that could help identify coronavirus hot spots.They believe the sewage test could be a reliable early warning system to detect cases of COVID-19, highlighting not just specific areas where the disease is present, but the approximate number of people infected.Samples of raw effluent at two wastewater plants in the state of Queensland were found to contain genetic fragments of the disease.It’s hoped the study will help officials when they start to wind back restrictions on public movement by highlighting coronavirus hot spots.Australia has closed restaurants, bars and many shops, while imposing fines on those who flout rules on public gatherings of more than two people.Professor Kevin Thomas, an environmental health scientist at the University of Queensland, says the test would give a broad indication of how well the pandemic is being contained.“We think some of the advantages and benefits of also using wastewater testing alongside conventional testing is that it can tell us whether COVID (19) has infected a community at a very early stage, and at the same time it can tell us when a community is relatively free of COVID-19,” he said. “Then we can, of course, monitor changes over time to evaluate whether the measures that we are all placed under at the moment to try to flatten the curve.”Research published by the journal Nature Medicine recently found people excrete traces of COVID-19 two to three days before they show symptoms. The analysis of sewage could potentially allow the authorities to identify clusters of the new coronavirus before those infected have even realized they are unwell.Federal health minister Greg Hunt says the sewage surveillance scheme is “extremely encouraging” and has the potential to further strengthen Australia’s response to the global COVID-19 pandemic.The sewage test study is a collaboration between the University of Queensland and the government’s science agency, the CSIRO, and builds on research in the Netherlands and the United States.Widespread testing could begin within weeks.There are more than 6,500 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in Australia, and so far 69 people have died with the virus.
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COVID-19 Cases Top 1,000 in Crisis-Prone Cameroon
More than a thousand COVID cases have been confirmed in conflict-prone Cameroon, provoking fears that the situation may get out of hand if the virus spreads to refugee camps and areas where internally displaced persons from the country’s separatist crisis and Boko Haram terrorism live. Rights groups are asking for humanitarian assistance, saying resources are already stretched tackling Boko Haram terrorism, separatist conflicts, the spillover of the carnage in neighboring CAR and now, COVID-19.Cameroon’s prime minister, Joseph Dion Ngute, in a declaration broadcast on all local radio and TV stations, said schools that were closed March 17 will remain closed for at least the next 45 days, since COVID-19 cases have increased from barely a hundred in March to over 1,000 on April 18.”The resumption of classes on the indicative date of 1st June,” he said. “It is understood that this measure is subject to change, depending on the evolution of the pandemic.”Ngute called on Cameroonians to remain indoors, practice hygiene methods and wear masks if they must go out. He said COVID-19 has killed 23 Cameroonians and 180 have recovered, while more than 800 are still being treated in already-overcrowded health facilities.Strained resourcesCameroon Civil Society Group leader Edward Nfor said the country may not be financially and materially able to handle its increasing COVID-19 cases because it’s also tackling Boko Haram terrorism on its northern border with Nigeria, separatist conflicts in the English-speaking regions and the spillover of the carnage in neighboring Central African Republic.”With the COVID just coming in, I find it very difficult for the state of Cameroon,” he said. “There are alarming numbers of refugees coming in from the Central African Republic and the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Just imagine that the COVID-19 enters into these refugee camps. I find Cameroon in a very delicate situation.”Issa Tchiroma, Cameroon employment and vocational training minister, said Cameroon finds itself in a difficult situation because most of its resources are already invested in crisis and humanitarian assistance.Cameroon has not disclosed how much it spends in the separatist conflict that has killed 3,000 people since 2017 and in the war against Boko Haram terrorism.Already affecting exportsAntonio Pedro, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa director for central Africa, said exports that Cameroon relies on for income are already affected by the spread of COVID-19.”We have seen oil prices go down from $65, 60 to 30. Coffee, cocoa, wood, palm oil — the demand in the major importing countries will go down, and prices are also being revised downwards,” he said.In a report published April 17, the International Rescue Committee describes Cameroon as one of the world’s most forgotten crises, facing three distinct emergencies, from armed violence in the northwest and southwest to an influx of refugees from Nigeria and Central Africa Republic.The IRC said that more than 700,000 people in some places have been forced to flee their homes and are living in cramped, crowded informal camps, meaning COVID-19 will spread rapidly throughout the population.The IRC said that Cameroon, with almost 4 million people in need of humanitarian aid and the highest COVID-19 caseload across the Sahel and East Africa, faces increased danger from the pandemic. And with 2.5 million people already in need of urgent medical care without the outbreak, the health system is clearly ill prepared to handle a rapid escalation in cases, despite the best efforts of the government and its partners.
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Folk DJ Gene Shay Dies of the Coronavirus at 85
Gene Shay, a folk DJ who spent a half-century on the Philadelphia airwaves and helped promote the careers of Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell and countless others, has died of complications of the coronavirus.Shay, 85, who had been hospitalized in recent weeks, died Friday, according to WXPN-FM station manager Roger LaMay. His weekly “Folk Show” ran on various stations in the city from 1968-2015, the last 20 of them at WXPN.”He was a giant in terms of his impact on artists and the music. And to do it for close to 60 years is extraordinary,” LaMay said.Shay, being introduced into the Philadelphia Music Alliance Walk of Fame by David Bromberg in 2013, said he put unknown talent on the air in the hope they could find an audience and perhaps a record deal.”I play people who have a glint of something, some spark . . . (and) just let them play good music where other people can hear them,” Shay said. “That is one of the great joys of my life.”Shay also helped start the popular Philadelphia Folk Festival, where he long served as emcee, and the organization that runs it, the Philadelphia Folksong Society.Shay’s daughter, Rachel Vaughn, told The Philadelphia Inquirer on Saturday that Shay died at Lankenau Medical Center in Wynnewood.Shay, born Ivan Shaner, joined WRTI at Temple University in 1962 and later worked at many of the city’s top stations. He also worked a day job much of his life as an ad man, and according to the Music Alliance wrote the original radio commercials for Woodstock.He famously brought Dylan to town for a show at the Philadelphia Ethical Society in May 1963, before the release of Dylan’s second album. About 45 people turned out and Dylan made $150, Shay often recalled.Shay’s wife, Gloria Shaner, died in 2018. He lived in Lower Merion and is also survived by another daughter. His WXPN colleagues did not know if he had ever legally changed his name.”He was so generous in spirit,” LaMay said. “I loved the guy.”
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White House Moves to Weaken EPA Rule on Toxic Compounds
The Trump White House has intervened to weaken one of the few public health protections pursued by its own administration, a rule to limit the use of a toxic industrial compound in consumer products, according to communications between the White House and Environmental Protection Agency.The documents show that the White House Office of Management and Budget formally notified the EPA by email last July that it was stepping into the crafting of the rule on the compound, perfluoroalkyl and polyfluoroalkyl substances, used in nonstick and stain-resistant frying pans, rugs, and countless other consumer products.The White House repeatedly pressed the agency to agree to a major loophole that could allow substantial imports of the PFAS-tainted products to continue, greatly weakening the proposed rule. EPA pushed back on the White House demand for the loophole, known as a “safe harbor” provision for industry.Pushed again in January, the agency responded, “EPA opposes proposing a safe harbor provision, but is open to a neutrally-worded request for comment from the public” on the White House request.A ‘national priority’The rule is one of the few concrete steps that the Trump administration has taken to deal with growing contamination by PFAS industrial compounds. The EPA has declared dating back to 2018 that consumer exposure to the substances was a “national priority” that the agency was confronting “aggressively.”Delaware Sen. Tom Carper, the ranking Democrat on the Environment and Public Works Committee, who obtained the documents revealing the White House intervention, and public-health advocates say the White House action was led by Nancy Beck, a former chemical industry executive now detailed to President Donald Trump’s Council of Economic Advisers.In this image from video, Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., speaks on the Senate floor at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., March 25, 2020.In a letter sent Friday to the EPA, Carper charged the White House pressure amounts to unusual intervention in what had been the EPA’s in-house efforts to regulate imports tainted with the compound. Trump has nominated Beck to lead the Consumer Product Safety Commission, a government panel charged with protecting Americans from harm by thousands of kinds of consumer goods.Asked about the White House actions, EPA spokeswoman Corry Schiermeyer said in an email that “consulting with other federal agencies on actions is a normal process across government,” and that “EPA is often required to engage in an interagency review process led by OMB.””It is routine for the agency to receive input from all of our stakeholders, including our federal partners,” Schiermeyer wrote.The EPA did not respond to a question about whether Beck led the White House intervention. Emails sent for comment to the White House, the White House Office of Management and Budget and Beck were not immediately answered.Carper obtained pages of back-and-forth proposed changes, redline drafts and other communications between the White House Office of Management and Budget, the EPA and others on the draft rule. No authors are listed in many of the final rounds of White House edits, drafts and proposals and EPA’s responses.Carper wrote to EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler on Friday to object to the White House push for weakening of the rule, newly revealed in the documents. Carper said it appeared that Beck, who was moved to the White House from a top regulatory job at the Trump EPA, “sought to make it more difficult for EPA to use its authority … to protect Americans from these harmful substances.”Raising the technical barWhile thousands of kinds of PFAS compounds are still in use in the United States, the new EPA rule would set up agency oversight of imports of products that use a few kinds of the compounds that manufacturers agreed to phase out in this country starting in 2006. Those versions remain in production in some parts of the world.In addition to the safe harbor loophole, another change sought by the White House would raise the technical bar for EPA to consider blocking any of the tainted products.The agency agreed to rewrite the rule to include a third White House request, narrowing the range of imported products that would fall under the rule.The official public comment period for the current form of the rule ends Friday, moving the proposal close to crafting of its final form. Congress, impatient for the Trump administration to start bringing the PFAS compounds under federal regulation, has ordered the administration to get a final rule out by mid-summer.Even if the rule goes out in its current form, applying to fewer kinds of product imports, “it would certainly be better than where we are without it,” although “scaled back significantly from what it was originally,” said Richard Denison, lead senior scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund advocacy group, and a longtime monitor of the EPA’s regulation of toxic substances.But if the final rule includes the other two key changes being pushed by the White House “it could even do more damage than good,” Denison said.Industries also would be likely to push for those two exceptions in regulations of future substances, Denison said. “Those two provisions would establish precedence that the EPA has never used for 40 years.”Array of health problemsIndustries produce thousands of versions of the man-made compounds. They are used in countless products, including nonstick cookware, water-repellent sports gear, cosmetics, and grease-resistant food packaging, along with firefighting foams.Public health studies on exposed populations have associated them with an array of health problems, including some cancers, and weakened immunity. The advent of widespread testing for the contaminant over the past few years found it in high levels in many public water systems around the country. The administration initially sought in 2018 to suppress a federal toxicology warning on the danger of the compounds, then publicly vowed action.
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Prosecutor: 44 Jihadists Found Dead in Chad Prison
A group of 44 suspected members of Boko Haram, arrested during a recent operation against the jihadist group, have been found dead in their prison cell, apparently poisoned, Chad’s chief prosecutor announced Saturday.Speaking on national television, Youssouf Tom said the 44 prisoners had been found dead Thursday.An autopsy carried out on four of the dead prisoners revealed traces of a lethal substance that had caused heart attacks in some of the victims and severe asphyxiation in the others, he said.The dead men were among a group of 58 suspects captured during a major army operation around Lake Chad launched by President Idriss Deby Itno at the end of March.”Following the fighting around Lake Chad, 58 members of Boko Haram had been taken prisoner and sent to Ndjamena for the purposes of the investigation,” said Tom.”On Thursday morning, their jailers told us that 44 prisoners had been found dead in their cell,” Tom said, adding that he had attended the scene.”We have buried 40 bodies and sent four bodies to the medical examiner for autopsy.” An investigation was ongoing to determine exactly how the prisoners had died, he said.A security source, speaking on condition of anonymity told AFP that “the 58 prisoners were placed in a single cell and were given nothing to eat or drink for two days.”Mahamat Nour Ahmed Ibedou, secretary general of the Chadian Convention for the Protection of Human Rights (CTDDH), made similar accusations.Prison officials had “locked the prisoners in a small cell and refusing them food and water for three days because they were accused of belonging to Boko Haram,” Ibedou told AFP. “It’s horrible what has happened.”The government denied the allegations.”There was no ill-treatment,” Chad Justice Minister Djimet Arabi told AFP by telephone.”Toxic substances were found in their stomachs. Was it collective suicide or something else? We’re still looking for answers,” he said, adding that the investigation was still ongoing.One of the prisoners was transferred to hospital on Thursday, but he was “faring much better” and had rejoined “the other 13 prisoners still alive and who are doing very well,” the minister said.Earlier this week, the minister told AFP the captured men had been transferred to Ndjamena on Tuesday evening and handed over to the court system for trial.The military operation against Boko Haram killed more than a thousand of the group’s militants and cost the lives of 52 soldiers, a Chadian army spokesman said. The operation ran from March 31 to April 8.It was launched in response to a devastating attack on Chadian troops on March 23 on a base at Bohoma, in the Lake Chad marshlands, that killed 98 soldiers. It was the largest one-day loss the army had ever suffered.Since then, Idriss has warned his allies in the region that Chad’s army will no longer take part in operations outside the country.The force, considered one of the best in the region, has fought Boko Haram in the Lake Chad region as part of the Joint Multinational Force with Nigeria, Cameroon and Niger.But on Friday, French Defense Minister Florence Parly said Chad remained committed to the G5 Sahel anti-jihadist force operating in the region.
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Hundreds of Parishioners Attend Orthodox Easter Vigil in Georgia
Hundreds of Christian parishioners went to churches in ex-Soviet Georgia to attend Orthodox Easter Vigil despite a state of emergency and calls from the government and doctors to stay home amid outbreak of the coronavirus.Dozens went to the South Caucasus country’s main Sameba (Saint Trinity) cathedral in Tbilisi, where 87-year-old Catholicos-Patriarch Ilia II held the service.More attended services in big churches across the country, although some bishops in different regions called on their flocks to stay at home, encouraging them instead to tune in to Easter services streamed live on TV or Facebook.Crowds were unusually small everywhere compared with the tens of thousands who normally attend this service every year.The Catholicos-Patriarch said in his Easter address that the problem of the new virus had caused fear among many and their gaze had turned to God.”We should not be afraid of temptation, the Christian takes problems with gratitude and sees God’s hand in everything … and at the same time tries to find the right solution in the current situation,” he said.Holy FireHoly Fire had been brought to Georgia on Saturday night by a charter flight from Jerusalem, where the ceremony in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which symbolizes the resurrection of Jesus after his death on the cross, was attended only by Christian clergymen for the first time in centuries.A clergyman and believers wearing protective masks hold candles outside a church during an Orthodox Easter service, amid the coronavirus disease outbreak in Marneuli, Georgia, April 19, 2020.Worshippers came to the Sameba cathedral in Tbilisi before the 9 p.m. start of curfew and planned to stay on church premises until its end at 6 a.m.Violators face a 3,000-lari ($1,000) fine.”It took me more than three hours to come here and I will stay till the morning as my presence demonstrates my dedication and my belief,” Mariam, a 27-year-old Tbilisi resident, said.Almost everyone, including some priests, were wearing face masks.The Georgian Orthodox Church Patriarchy said earlier this month that all Easter services would be held in a traditional manner, but parishioners would be required to maintain social distancing between each other to stem transmission of the virus.Sacrament from same spoonThe Patriarch and majority of Georgian priests were reluctant to call on their flocks to stay at home and have continued to provide the holy sacrament from the same spoon to parishioners, which critics said threatens efforts to contain the coronavirus.Georgia has in place a state of emergency until May 10 entailing a 9 p.m.-to-6 a.m. curfew, closures of restaurants, cafes, shops, a ban on public transport and on gatherings of more than three people. Grocery stores, pharmacies and petrol stations remain open.Government officials and doctors have pleaded with citizens to refrain from mass gatherings and to stay at home during Easter celebrations.The Caucasus republic of 3.7 million people has reported 388 cases of COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the coronavirus, and four deaths as of early Sunday.
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Experts: Pyongyang’s Anti-Virus Measures Put Stability Over Public Health
Experts fear North Korea could be using its tough anti-virus measures to gain tighter centralized control over its people by prioritizing regime stability over public health.“What I’m seeing is that there seems to be a premium placed on population control, regime-strengthening stability, and not the public health of the population,” said W. Courtland Robinson, a professor focusing on North Korea’s public health at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.North Korea has been taking tough measures to fend off the virus, even as it says the country has no cases of COVID-19. The highly contagious virus has spread rapidly from Wuhan, China, where the first cases emerged, to infect more than 2.3 million and kill nearly 160,000 people worldwide as of Saturday evening, according to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center.Pyongyang FILE – People wear face masks amid the concern over the spread of the coronavirus in Pyongyang, North Korea, April, 1, 2020.Pyongyang apparently issued its strict anti-virus measures with notice of penalties for violation rather than as advisory guidelines issued for people to follow voluntarily to reduce health risks.North Korean leader Kim Jong Un said in February that A nurse explains details about COVID 19 and ways to prevent contracting it at the Phyongchon District People’s Hospital, April 1, 2020, in Pyongyang, North Korea.He said many North Koreans would not report the flu-like symptoms of COVID-19 for fear of being “rounded up and isolated and possibly detained in prison in ways that are not conducive to their health.”Experts said North Korea could use COVID-19 as an excuse to try reining in “jangmadang,” the unofficial markets stocking a wide range of goods, such as food, clothing and other household items. Such a move would prevent commercial activities outside state-controlled channels.“One of the things they may also be trying to do is to reinstitute some centralized control over the population that the markets have really taken away from the regime,” Gause said.North Koreans became increasingly reliant on the markets that emerged in the 1990s amid a famine that left an estimated 2 million dead. People became more dependent on the markets in 2019 after the regime slashed state-distributed rations.Gause said any restrictions on the markets would help the regime prevent people from gathering and sharing information in the marketplaces.At the same time, the epidemic provides the regime a justification to impose tighter control over the markets as it resorts to self-sufficiency after failing to obtain sanctions relief from the U.S, he said.In January, Kim announced that the country would focus on self-sufficiency.’Better narrative’“This virus could be used as an explanation of why they were cutting themselves off from the world,” Gause said. “It’s a better narrative [for the regime] to say, ‘We’re protecting you from this deadly virus’ than ‘We’re turning our back economically on the world because our supreme leader [Kim] was unable to get a deal with the United States.’ ”Gause said, however, controlling the markets would be temporary as Kim’s vision of the economy in the future does not involve centralized regulation.William Brown, a former CIA analyst and an expert on North Korea’s economy, said North Korea’s current desire to control the markets may reflect the economic impact it feels from closing the border with China, its primary trading partner.“The North Korean government may try to stop the markets because [it] might be afraid of soaring prices, price inflation,” Brown said. “The North Korean government tends to stop this kind of price jump by putting a price cap on it. But the price cap destroys the market.”After shutting the Chinese border, a move that blocked what is normally 90% of North Korea’s trade, imports from China fell to $198 million. North Korea’s exports to China dropped 75% to $10 million, Brown wrote in an article on 38 North, a website devoted to analyzing North Korea.The figures “do not include Chinese pipeline deliveries of crude oil, which are assessed to be about 50,000 tons a month, worth $10 million to $20 million at current prices,” according to the article.Drop in consumer goods“What’s happened in January and February is a drop in [North Korea’s] imports of consumer goods,” Brown said. “That has more direct impact on the population.”Fewer imports of Chinese soybeans, for example, mean North Korea could experience supply shortages and price increases.Restricting or closing the markets could possibly lead to “pockets of starvation,” Brown said.“If they destroy the markets, then we go back to the scenario like the ‘90s, where if there’s a food shortage, there is no mechanism for moving the food around,” Brown said. “And then you could have pockets of starvation, not whole-scale famine but pockets of starvation.”
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