St. Bernards are known for helping to rescue distressed travelers in the mountains, but the tables were turned Sunday in northern England. Sixteen volunteers from the Wasdale mountain rescue team took turns carrying Daisy, a 55 kilogram St Bernard, from England’s highest peak, Scafell Pike. The mountain rescue team spent nearly five hours rescuing Daisy, who had collapsed Friday evening while descending the mountain with her owners. Rescue workers said Daisy was displaying signs of pain in her rear legs and was refusing to move. After consulting with a veterinarian’s office, they administered some pain relief and adjusted their stretcher, which is designed for humans, to be more dog friendly. They also packed a few treats to help settle her down. “Having team members with their own pampered pooches at home, and also our much-adored search dog Jess, we recognize the distress that both an animal can feel and also that of their owners,” the team said. They said Daisy was recovering from her ordeal. Scafell Pike, 978 meters (3,209 feet) above sea level, is in the Lake District National Park in Cumbria. The Wasdale Mountain Rescue team relies on donations to fund their mountain safety efforts.
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Month: July 2020
Details Emerge About Defector at Center of N. Korea COVID Claims
South Korea has acknowledged that a North Korean defector, who had been accused of rape in the South, may have sneaked past South Korean border guards before apparently swimming back to his North Korean homeland. At a briefing Monday, South Korean military officials said they found the man’s bag near a drainage ditch he apparently used to get under a barbed wire fence on the northeastern island of Ganghwa, which is separated from North Korea by a portion of the Han River Estuary. The 24-year-old, who fled North Korea in 2017, had recently been accused of raping another defector and was the subject of an arrest warrant in the South, according to South Korean media reports. He had also recently lost his job, the reports say. But South Korean health officials said the re-defector was not registered as a COVID-19 patient or as someone who had come in contact with infected individuals. That undermines North Korea’s accusation that the man may have brought the coronavirus into the communist country. Apparently referring to the same person, North Korean state media on Sunday said a “runaway” suspected to be carrying the coronavirus returned to the North on July 19th “after illegally crossing the demarcation line” that separates the two Koreas. It was the first time North Korea has acknowledged a possible coronavirus infection. North Korea has declared a state of emergency and imposed a lockdown around Kaesong City, the border town where the re-defector was found. Why admit it now? Even though 16 million coronavirus infections have been reported worldwide, North Korea had long insisted it was completely free of the virus – a claim most outside observers said was practically impossible. North Korea shares a 1,400-kilometer-long border with China, where the virus originated. Although the North formally closed its borders in February, much of its trade with China is informal and hard to control. Many analysts said North Korea may be using the incident to finally acknowledge a coronavirus outbreak, even while blaming South Korea. South Korean army soldiers spray disinfectant to help reduce the spread of the new coronavirus in a class at Cheondong elementary school in Daejeon.“This would make for an extremely convenient way for the regime to admit the existence of COVID-19 in the country,” wrote Benjamin Katzeff Silberstein, a North Korea specialist at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. “The message is: our anti-epidemic measures, such as closing the northern border, were flawless. But one case still slipped through the cracks,” he said. “Having a first confirmed case coming in from the south relieves the regime of any awkwardness vis-a-vis China.” The move could also have a domestic message, says Go Myong-Hyun, a research fellow at the Seoul-based Asan Institute for Policy Studies. “They’re trying to send a message that North Korea is under siege, that there is a lot of infection going on outside of North Korea, and that the regime is trying their utmost to keep the country clean and effective,” he said. In recent months, North Korea has hurled aggressive rhetoric at the South, accusing it of prioritizing relations with Washington over Pyongyang. “It goes along with the spin that South Korea is not to be trusted,” says Go. “They are trying to attach this negative image of an infection, virus, and pandemic along with South Korea and the defectors at the same time.” Border security lapses The defector incident has also raised concerns about possible security lapses along the 250-kilometer border that separates North and South Korea. A politburo meeting convened Saturday by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un chastised the “loose guard performance in the frontline area” where the runaway occurred and vowed possible “severe punishment,” according to state media. When North Koreans flee their country, they usually do so via the border with China, since the border between North and South Korea is one of the most heavily fortified in the world. But somehow the defector at the center of North Korea’s coronavirus claims appears to have crossed the inter-Korean border twice. The defector, surnamed Kim, detailed his 2017 escape from North Korea in a pair of YouTube interviews last month with another defector. “I decided to escape because of poverty,” he said in the interview that surfaced Monday. Kim said it took more than seven hours to reach South Korea. The journey, he said, included crossing a minefield, going through barbed wire and electric fences, and swimming across the Han River. The number of North Korean defectors reaching the South has steadily fallen in recent years, as North Korea and China tighten border controls. The coronavirus has only made things more difficult. During the second quarter of this year, the number of incoming defectors reached an all-time low, with only 12 reaching the South. North Koreans who have fled to the South rarely return. Since 2015, only 11 North Korean defectors have gone back to the North, South Korea’s Unification Ministry said Monday.
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Vietnam Evacuating Tourists from Area with New Coronavirus Cases
Vietnam is evacuating tourists from the Danang area after several people tested positive for COVID-19, as governments in many parts of the world try to stop the spread of the virus that has killed nearly 650,000 people. A Vietnamese government statement said the evacuations of 80,000 people, mostly local tourists, will take at least four days. The country remains closed to foreign tourists. Vietnam on Saturday reported its first locally transmitted cases since April, putting the government on high alert. In Australia, authorities in the southeastern state of Victoria reported a record 532 new cases Monday and warned a lockdown there could be extended beyond its original six-week timeline. “As it stands right now, we are seeing too many people for whatever reason attending work with symptoms,” said Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews. “That just cannot continue. Otherwise, these restrictions will be in place for longer than they should be and I’m sorry to say, we will see more people die, particularly in aged care.” The rest of Australia is virtually free from new confirmed coronavirus cases, with Victoria and neighboring New South Wales accounting for nearly all new infections. The United States leads the world in the number of confirmed cases with more than 4.2 million, and on Sunday added 55,000 new cases and more than 500 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University statistics. The southeastern state of Florida, which has been among the leaders in a surge in cases during the past month, added 9,300 cases on its own Sunday to move into second place among U.S. states. Only California, with a much higher population, has more. Just behind Florida are New York and Texas. FILE – Amid concerns of the spread of COVID-19, Alma Odong wears a mask as she cleans a classroom at Wylie High School in Wylie, Texas, July 14, 2020.Health experts blame the leap in the number of cases on businesses and public attractions reopening too soon, and not enough people wearing masks and social distancing. Major League Baseball’s Miami Marlins delayed what would have been a Sunday departure from the city of Philadelphia as the team tries to contain an outbreak with several players already testing positive. The Marlins are traveling to Baltimore on Monday hours before the scheduled start of their game there. Marlins manager Don Mattingly said the players who had tested positive remain under quarantine in Philadelphia. “There’s nothing we can really do,” Marlins pitcher Robert Dugger said Sunday. “It’s out of our control. We just do the best we can with the masks and social distancing and all that, and hope for the best.” Baseball opened its 2020 season last week, three months late, and will play 60 games instead of the usual 162. Many of the league’s 30 teams have reported multiple players testing positive for COVID-19. Spain is safe for tourists, it said Sunday, rebuking Britain for imposing a two-week quarantine on all travelers entering the country from Spain because of the coronavirus pandemic. “Spain is safe, it is safe for Spaniards, it is safe for tourists,” Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya told reporters. She said Spain would try to persuade Britain to exclude the Balearic and Canary Islands from the quarantine measure, contending that the prevalence of the virus in the two popular travel destinations was much lower than in Britain itself. A year ago, Britons made up about a fifth of foreign visitors to Spain, meaning the British quarantine could deal a blow to the Mediterranean country’s efforts to jump start its economy after months of lockdown because of the virus. But the number of COVID-19 cases has risen in Spain in the last few weeks, prompting Britain to announce late Saturday it was taking Spain off its safe-travel list. Hours later, the quarantine took effect.
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US Consulate in Chengdu, China Closes on Beijing’s Orders
China says it has taken control of the former U.S. consulate in the southwestern city of Chengdu, in a tit-for-tat response to the closure of its consulate last week in Houston, Texas. The foreign ministry announced that the consulate shut its doors at 10 a.m. (0200GMT) local time, the exact time Chinese authorities ordered its closure and just moments after the U.S. flag was lowered for the last time. Minutes later, a group of officials entered the building and took over the premises. The U.S. Embassy in Beijing bid farewell to the Chengdu outpost in a retrospective video posted on its Twitter account, saying “We will miss you forever.”今天，我们告别美国驻成都总领事馆 。我们会永远想念你们。 U.S. Consulate General in Chengdu, July 27, 2020.Washington ordered China to close the Houston office “to protect American intellectual property and Americans’ private information.” As the Chinese consulate closure in Houston took effect last Friday, a group of men who appeared to be U.S. officials were seen breaking-in to the facility through a back door. Wang said on Saturday that violated international and bilateral agreements and China would respond, without specifying how. The tit-for-tat closures further escalated the tensions between the two countries over issues from trade and industrial espionage to human rights.
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Serbia Seeks to Purchase More Warplanes to Strengthen its Armed Forces, Potentially from Russia
Serbia is seeking to further strengthen its armed forces by purchasing more warplanes, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said Sunday. Vucic made the statement while visiting an army tank brigade in Sremska Mitrovica in Serbia’s autonomous province of Vojvodina. “We cannot keep track of the gifts and donations that certain NATO counties in the neighborhood are getting from the United States, Germany and other countries and therefore we must fight alone to preserve the peace alone and to preserve our future alone,” Vucic said. Vucic did not specify what warplanes Belgrade plans to buy but said the intention is the safety of his country and the stability and peace in the Balkan region. “We, as a military neutral country, want to preserve our military neutrality, which means that we look after our sky alone, to look after our country alone. We will invest money and I believe that we, by not wanting to participate in any sort of race, will always be able to guarantee safety, stability but also peace,” Vucic continued. Pro-government media reported that Serbia had officially asked the United States for 20 fighter-bombers, but Washington had not responded to the request. The report, however, speculated that in case of a U.S. refusal, Serbia was likely to purchase “Sukhoi-25” attack aircraft from Russia. “The Americans, Turks and Germans are taking care of their beloved child,” Vucic said, referring to Kosovo. He said Washington had recently equipped Kosovo’s security forces with armored vehicles. Although claiming Serbia’s military neutrality, Belgrade has recently received a sophisticated anti-aircraft system from Russia, including fighter jets, attack helicopters, and armored vehicles. Serbia has also obtained military drones from another ally, China. The U.S. has said that it would impose sanctions against Serbia if Moscow sends more arms to the country, which could threaten the security of neighboring NATO members.
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NY Governor Says 2 Conservative Newspapers Fueling COVID Surge
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo is blaming the surge in coronavirus cases in Arizona, Florida and Texas on two conservative-leaning newspapers – The Wall Street Journal and The New York Post. Cuomo told reporters Sunday that the infection rate in New York – the nation’s former COVID-19 epicenter – is low because of what he says was an “intelligent, phased reopening.” He said what both papers have recommended for the rest of the country has proved to be a failure. “The Wall Street Journal, New York Post — they continue to beat a horse that is dead. …‘The infection rate is low; reopen faster,’” Cuomo said. “Florida listened to the New York Post. Texas listened to the Wall Street Journal. Arizona listened to the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post. That was wrong. That was wrong.” Cuomo said 500 people tested positive and three died Saturday in New York while the new cases in Florida, Texas and Arizona number in the thousands. A New York Post editorial Sunday night blamed Cuomo’s administration for an order in March that nursing homes accept patients even if they have COVID-19, a policy the newspaper called “nuts” and possibly responsible for needless deaths. “If we’re annoying him that much, it means one thing — he knows we’re right,” the paper said. Florida reported another 9,300 COVID-19 cases Sunday, moving it into second place among U.S. states with the highest number of cases. California, the most populous U.S. state, is on top; New York is third followed by Texas. Health experts blame the leap in the number of cases on businesses and public attractions reopening too soon and not enough people wearing masks and social distancing.Health care workers take information from people in line at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site during the coronavirus pandemic, in Miami Beach, Fla., July 17, 2020.The manager of Major League Baseball’s Miami Marlins postponed his team’s return to Florida by one day, meaning instead of being able to practice for the team’s opening home game against the Baltimore Orioles on Monday, the Marlins will arrive at the ballpark just hours before the game. Several Marlins players who tested positive for COVID-19 are in quarantine in Philadelphia. “There’s nothing we can really do,” Marlins pitcher Robert Dugger said. “It’s out of our control. We just do the best we can with the masks and social distancing and all that, and hope for the best.” Baseball opened its 2020 season last week, three months late, and will play 60 games instead of the usual 162. Fans are, for now, not allowed in the ballparks. Spain is safe for tourists, it said Sunday, rebuking Britain for imposing a two-week quarantine on all travelers entering the country from Spain because of the coronavirus pandemic. “Spain is safe, it is safe for Spaniards, it is safe for tourists,” Foreign Minister Arancha Gonzalez Laya told reporters. She said Spain would try to persuade Britain to exclude the Balearic and Canary Islands from the quarantine measure, contending that the prevalence of the virus in the two popular travel destinations was much lower than in Britain itself. A year ago, Britons made up about a fifth of foreign visitors to Spain, meaning the British quarantine could deal a blow to the Mediterranean country’s efforts to jump start its economy after months of lockdown because of the virus. But the number of COVID-19 cases has risen in Spain in the last few weeks, prompting Britain to announce late Saturday it was taking Spain off its safe-travel list. Hours later, the quarantine took effect. It immediately upset travelers, with one British tourist saying, “Everyone is panicking.” South Africa reported 12,000 new coronavirus cases Sunday. Its response to the pandemic, however, is being hampered by corruption allegations surrounding its $26 billion economic relief package. An investigation is under way. South Africa has the fifth largest number of COVID-19 infections in the world, with more than 434,000 cases. The U.S. has the most cases at 4.2 million, followed by Brazil with 2.3 million, India with 1.3 million, and Russia with more than 800,000, according to Johns Hopkins University.
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Australian Regulator Sues Google Over Expanded Personal Data Use
Australia’s competition regulator has launched court proceedings against Alphabet’s Google for allegedly misleading consumers about the expanded use of personal data for targeted advertising.The case by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) in Federal Court said Google did not explicitly get consent nor properly inform consumers about a 2016 move to combine personal information in Google accounts with activities on non-Google websites that use its technology.The regulator said this practice allowed the Alphabet Inc unit to link the names and other ways to identify consumers with their behavior elsewhere on the internet.Google did not immediately respond to a request for comment.The move by the ACCC comes amid heightened attention in much of the world on data privacy. U.S. and European lawmakers have recently stepped up their focus on how tech companies treat user data because of privacy concerns.”We are taking this action because we consider Google misled Australian consumers about what it planned to do with large amounts of their personal information, including internet activity on websites not connected to Google,” ACCC Chairman Rod Sims said in a statement.The regulator alleges Google used the combined data to boost targeted advertising – a key source of income – and that it did not make clear to consumers about changes in its privacy policy.The regulator did not say what it wanted the court to do, adding that it has filed the claim on a “confidential basis pending claims by Google.”
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Federal Officers, Protesters Clash in Violent Weekend Across US
Protests took a violent turn in several U.S. cities over the weekend with demonstrators squaring off against federal agents outside a courthouse in Portland, Oregon, forcing police in Seattle to retreat into a station house and setting fire to vehicles in California and Virginia.A protest against police violence in Austin, Texas, turned deadly when police said a protester was shot and killed by a person who drove through a crowd of marchers. And someone was shot and wounded in Aurora, Colorado, after a car drove through a protest there, authorities said.The unrest Saturday and early Sunday stemmed from the weeks of protests over racial injustice and the police treatment of people of color that flared up after the May 25 death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Floyd, who was Black and handcuffed, died after a white police officer used his knee to pin down Floyd’s neck for nearly eight minutes while Floyd begged for air.In Seattle, police officers retreated into a precinct station early Sunday, hours after large demonstrations in the city’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. Some demonstrators lingered after officers filed into the department’s East Precinct around 1 a.m., but most cleared out a short time later, according to video posted online.At a late-night news conference, Seattle police Chief Carmen Best called for peace. Rocks, bottles, fireworks and mortars were fired at police during the weekend unrest, and police said they arrested at least 45 people for assaults on officers, obstruction and failure to disperse. Twenty-one officers were hurt, with most of their injuries considered minor, police said.In Portland, thousands of people gathered Saturday evening for another night of protests over George Floyd’s killing and the presence of federal agents recently sent to the city by President Donald Trump. Protesters breached a fence surrounding the city’s federal courthouse building where the agents have been stationed.Police declared the situation to be a riot and at around 1:20 a.m., they began ordering people to leave the area surrounding the courthouse or risk arrest, saying on Twitter that the violence had created “a grave risk” to the public. About 20 minutes later, federal officers and local police could be seen attempting to clear the area and deploying tear gas, however protesters remained past 2:30 a.m., forming lines across intersections and holding makeshift shields as police patrolled and closed blocks abutting the area. Multiple arrests were made, but it wasn’t immediately clear how many.In the Texas capital of Austin, 28-year-old Garrett Foster was shot and killed Saturday night by a person who had driven through the march against police violence.Austin Police Chief Brian Manley said a car turned onto the block where protesters stood and honked its horn. The driver and several witnesses told police that Foster approached the driver and pointed an assault rifle at them.In video streamed live on Facebook, a car can be heard honking before several shots ring out and protesters start screaming and scattering for cover. Police could then be seen tending to someone lying in the street.Manley said the driver called 911 to report the incident and was later taken into custody and released. Police didn’t immediately identify the driver.Sheila Foster, Garrett’s mother, said she was told her son was pushing his fiancée, who uses a wheelchair, through an intersection when the suspect was driving “erratically” through the crowd. She said she was told the driver shot her son three times.In the Denver suburb of Aurora, Colorado, meanwhile, a protester shot and wounded someone after a car drove through a crowd marching on an interstate highway, police said. The wounded person was taken to a hospital in stable condition. Police didn’t release many details about the shooting, including whether the person who was shot had been in the car. Police said on Twitter that demonstrators also caused “major damage” to a courthouse.Protesters in Oakland, California, set fire to a courthouse, damaged a police station, broke windows, spray-painted graffiti, shot fireworks and pointed lasers at officers after a peaceful demonstration Saturday evening turned to unrest, police said.In Virginia’s capital, Richmond, a dump truck was torched as several hundred protesters and police faced off late Saturday during a demonstration of support for the protesters in Portland. Police declared it to be an “unlawful assembly” at around 11 p.m. and used what appeared to be tear gas to disperse the group. Five people were arrested in the incident and charged with unlawful assembly. A sixth person was also arrested and charged with rioting and assault on a law enforcement officer.In downtown Atlanta on Sunday, federal agents examined damage to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility where windows were shattered late Saturday. The FBI and the Department of Homeland Security, FBI spokesman Kevin Rowson said in an email. No arrests had been announced.And in Baltimore, people from a group of nearly 100 demonstrators spray-painted anti-police messages on a Fraternal Order of Police building and adjacent sidewalks on Saturday night, The Baltimore Sun reported.|
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Trump Postpones Plans for Yankee Stadium First Pitch
President Donald Trump won’t be throwing out the first pitch at Yankee Stadium next month after all.Trump tweeted Sunday that he won’t be able to make the trip because of his “strong focus” on the coronavirus, vaccines and the economy. Trump said in the tweet: “We will make it later in the season!” He had announced at a briefing Thursday on Major League Baseball’s opening day that he’d be at Yankee Stadium on Aug. 15 to throw out the first pitch.Trump has been trying to show voters that he is taking the virus seriously by holding briefings and canceling Republican convention events set for Jacksonville, Florida. Florida is among several states where the virus is raging.
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More Than 60 Killed in Attack in Sudan’s Darfur Region, UN Says
More than 60 people were reported killed and nearly 60 others wounded Saturday during an armed attack in a village in Sudan’s restive Darfur region, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said late Sunday.The attack in Masteri village in the West Darfur state “was one of the latest of a series of security incidents reported over the last week that left several villages and houses burned, markets and shops looted, and infrastructure damaged,” the U.N. body added in a statement. It did not cite the source of its information.There was no official word from the government on the incident, and Reuters was not able to reach officials for comment.On Sunday, Sudan said it would deploy joint forces from various state security services in Darfur after renewed violence there recently, SUNA, the state news agency, reported.The forces will be deployed to the region’s five states “to protect people and secure the agriculture season,” Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok said during a meeting in Khartoum with a delegation of women from Darfur. No further details were given.The country’s Security and Defense Council stressed the importance of “using the force necessary to save lives and property, confront all forms of lawlessness and support equal citizenship rights,” it said after a meeting Sunday.In a separate incident, at least 20 people died and 22 others were injured after gunmen from an unidentified militia attacked a village in the state of South Darfur, witnesses and a local community leader said on Saturday.On Sunday, three people, including a woman, were killed during a renewed dispute between farmers and shepherds in the Al-Jarf area in North Darfur state, SUNA reported, adding that security forces intervened and separated the two sides.Recent violence by militias in North Darfur prompted authorities to declare a state of emergency July 13.”The escalation of violence in different parts of Darfur region is leading to increased displacement, compromising the agricultural season, causing loss of lives and livelihoods and driving growing humanitarian needs,” the United Nations said.The conflict started in Darfur, in the west of Sudan, in 2003 after mostly non-Arab rebels rose up against the Khartoum government. Government forces and mainly Arab militia, which moved to suppress the revolt, were accused of widespread atrocities. Some 300,000 people were killed in the conflict, according to U.N. estimates.Omar al-Bashir, Sudan’s ousted leader, is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity in Darfur.Sudan’s transitional government is negotiating with some main rebel groups in Darfur aiming to reach a peace deal.
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Malawi President Vows to Close in on Corrupt Officials
Malawi’s new President Lazarus Chakwera says over $1 billion was stolen through corruption during former president Peter Mutharika’s administration. In his state of the nation address Saturday night, Chakwera said the plunder is contained in the recent Auditor General’s report which looks into how the government managed its finances for the past two years. Chakwera has vowed to apprehend, without mercy, those involved in corruption.President Chakwera said, among other things, the report shows that $10 million could not be accounted for, $1 million was used to pay for projects which were not completed and $400,000 was used for fuel without corresponding documents. Chakwera said the scale of the plunder is worse than a 2013 corruption scandal known as Cash gate in which about $32 million government money was looted through dubious contracts, during the administration of former president Joyce Banda. Chakwera said his government will not have mercy on those who were involved in the plunder of government finances. He says “although I earlier said that those involved in malpractice should just refund the money, doing so is not enough, because the amount of taxpayers’ money which has been stolen is too big. So it is wrong to say that those involved should only be forgiven.” Chakwera said he has already instructed the Minister of Justice to discuss with relevant stakeholders like the Malawi Police Service Anti-Corruption Bureau and the Judiciary to expedite cases of theft and corruption. This, he said, includes cross-checking all civil servants workers earnings against wealth they have. He says, “For those in government that have questionable wealth, it will be frozen for investigations.” Chakwera’s national address came a day after former president Mutharika distanced himself from a scandal in which three people including Mutharika’s bodyguard were arrested for helping Mutharika avoid paying $7 million in import duties on 1.2 million bags of cement. Mutharika said in statement, Friday he did not instruct anyone to buy him cement of that amount and that he has no personal projects to cater for such a volume of cement bags. However Mutharika’s denial of his involvement in the tax free cement import deal contradicts his spokesperson Mgeme Kalirani who told a local newspaper in June that Mutharika was entitled to import the goods tax-free. Some commentators view Mutharika’s statement on Friday as a plan to avoid arrest. Political analyst Humphreys Mvula told VOA it’s time for the Chakwera administration to show that no one is immune in the fight against corruption. “The only time we are going to fight corruption is when we hold those people in the highest offices accountable,” he said. “We should not look at Mutharika as just a former president. But now that his immunity has gone, if he was involved or leads, lead to his office, he should be arrested. It is the only time in life that people will be afraid of corruption.” Meanwhile, the Malawi Police Service through its Fiscal and Fraud section are probing the cement importation deal. President Chakwera initiated the crackdown on corruption after Mutharika lost the June 23rd presidential vote. Several people have so far been arrested in connection to offenses committed during Mutharika’s administration. The former ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), now in the opposition, says the campaign amounts to political persecution — allegations the new administration denies.
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Global Conflict Mediation Proves Elusive for Trump
Since President Donald Trump announced an America First approach on foreign policy in his inaugural address in January 2017, critics have accused him of abandoning international norms and forsaking U.S. global leadership, while supporters say he has boldly taken on foreign policy challenges that his predecessors have failed, including defeating a global terrorists network and challenging a rising China.
“His America First agenda has secured the elimination of two most-wanted terrorists, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi and Qassem Soleimani, the destruction of the ISIS caliphate, and sustained strong political and economic pressure on adversaries like Iran, Venezuela, and Russia,” Ken Farnaso, the Trump campaign’s deputy national press secretary, told VOA.
But, for a president who once promised to bring his “Art of the Deal” business savvy to settling foreign disputes, and has spent considerable diplomatic resources on them, Trump has yet to deliver in his efforts to mediate peace in conflict hot spots around the world — from the Balkans to the Nile Basin.
Trump the mediator
Trump, the one-time New York real estate businessman and reality TV star, has inserted his administration in dispute negotiations, some of which began in his first year in office. He has more than once offered to mediate between India and Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir, which New Delhi has rejected. India has also rebuffed Trump’s offer to mediate its border feud with China.We have informed both India and China that the United States is ready, willing and able to mediate or arbitrate their now raging border dispute. Thank you!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 27, 2020In trying to mediate between Israel and Palestine, and Kosovo and Serbia, Trump picked up on efforts by past administrations. Other efforts at intervention, including getting involved in the feud over a hydroelectric dam between Egypt and Ethiopia, are entirely of his own making.
So far, none of these initiatives has borne agreements accepted by the disputing parties. Israel is FILE – This frame grab from a video obtained from the Ethiopian Public Broadcaster July 24, 2020, shows an aerial view of water levels at the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in Guba, Ethiopia.Meanwhile, the June 27 Washington summit between the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia — once envisioned to be a triumphant opportunity to show that the Trump administration can supplant the European Union in brokering a final peace deal between two Balkan countries who went to war in the late 1990s — was abruptly canceled days before the event after Kosovo announced its president was indicted on war crimes. The indictment against Hashim Thaci was filed by the country’s prosecutor’s office in April, and announced as Thaci was already on his way to the Washington summit.
These lesser-known Trump administration mediation efforts have added to an already sizable list of negotiations currently at an impasse, including with North Korea, China and the Taliban in Afghanistan.
Honest broker?
Analysts say the president’s bid to facilitate resolution of these long-running disputes have stalled partly because he is not seen as an honest broker attempting to placate both sides in sensitive talks.
This is most apparent in the administration’s Middle East peace plan led by Trump’s son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner, that was released in January 2020. The plan was drawn up without any Palestinian involvement and its leaders have rejected it. Critics say negotiations had a distinctive pro-Israel tilt from the start.
A negotiation is a conversation between two equal parties, said Halah Ahmad, a policy analyst with Al-Shabaka, a transnational Palestinian think tank, in an interview with VOA. “The Palestinians have not been brought to the table as an equal party in negotiations with the Trump administration, and the stipulations of the administration really cast aside international consensus and decades of U.S. foreign policy.”FILE – A demonstrator holds a Palestinian flag in front of Israeli forces as Palestinians protest against President Donald Trump’s Mideast initiative, in Jordan Valley in the West Bank, Feb. 25, 2020.In September 2019, after making a personal promise to Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi to mediate the feud over the Nile dam, Trump appointed U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin as the lead person.
Mnuchin has hosted a series of meetings between Ethiopian, Egyptian and Sudanese officials in Washington, including two in the Oval Office with Trump. The controversy is over the future of a giant hydroelectric power plant being built by Ethiopia on the Blue Nile tributary in the northern Ethiopia highlands. At issue is control of the flow of the Nile as Ethiopia fills up the dam’s reservoir.
But Trump’s coziness with Egypt’s Sissi, who he once referred to as “my favorite dictator” and with whom he has spoken twice this month to reiterate the U.S.’s commitment to “facilitating a fair and equitable deal” on the dam, planted doubts about Washington’s neutrality. Ultimately, Ethiopia walked out of what was supposed to be the final round of talks in February, rejecting U.S.’s “characterization” in the draft agreement, signed off by Cairo, that the negotiation on filling and operating the dam is “completed.”
The U.S.-drafted agreement gave Cairo unrealistic expectations that created difficulties in the ongoing negotiations, said Addisu Lashitew, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington research group. “It promised Egypt a legally binding treaty and a guaranteed water release from the [Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam], which Ethiopia fears will undermine its ability to use the Nile waters in the future,” Lashitew told VOA.FILE – President Donald Trump welcomes visiting Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi to the White House, in Washington, April 9, 2019.In the Balkans, since December 2018 Trump has urged leaders of Kosovo and Serbia to strike a deal and offered to host them at the White House. While Trump’s support of Kosovo’s sovereignty follows previous administrations’ stance, Democratic lawmakers have expressed concerns that Trump wants a deal at any cost, ahead of the interests of its long-standing ally.
In April, Congressman Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and Sen. Bob Menendez, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo criticizing the administration’s “heavy-handed” approach and “lack of balance between Belgrade and Pristina,” the capitals of Serbia and Kosovo, respectively.
Economy first
Analysts say the president employs a transactional approach in dispute resolution, which includes – for example — drumming up $50 billion in investment in the Middle East, enticing Ethiopia with World Bank projects and facilitating “economic normalization” between Serbia and Kosovo.
Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations and professor of international affairs at Georgetown University, told VOA that this “economy first” approach may work in the business world that Trump came from, but the difference between real estate deals and diplomacy is vast.
“It’s not just one person talking to another person. It’s two or more societies attempting to get to yes,” Kupchan said. “Domestic politics, ideology, history, culture – they all enter the picture. It’s not just a clear cost-benefit economic analysis.” FILE – Serbs holding Serbian flags take part in a ceremony marking the historic Battle of Kosovo, at a memorial in Gazimestan, on the outskirts of Pristina, Kosovo, June 28, 2020.While the president’s persona is built around the idea that he is “the master deal maker of all time,” the reality is that he goes into these disputes without any deeper understanding of the historical complexities and ethnic divisions behind them, Norman Ornstein, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington, told VOA.
“So, the likelihood of having success where others who did have that sophistication were unable to do so, is very, very low,” Ornstein added.
Thorny disputes
For sure, these are long-running and thorny disputes. A Middle East peace deal has eluded all U.S. presidents since Jimmy Carter mediated the Camp David Accords in 1978. Bill Clinton’s administration invested vast amounts of resources to help Israel and the Palestinians implement the Oslo Accords signed at the White House in 1993. Yet by the time Clinton left office, the peace process had collapsed and a new round of Israeli-Palestinian violence had begun.
Despite a bold speech to the Muslim world in Cairo in 2009 and a Nobel peace prize “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy” in the same year, Barack Obama was unable to advance the goal of a two-state solution.
Meanwhile the European Union has tried to resolve the Kosovo-Serbia feud for the past decade, with negotiations going into a stalemate shortly after the Brussels Agreement in 2013. Divisions also run deep on the Nile Dam feud and decade-long negotiations have yielded little more than the heated rhetoric of “hydro-hegemony” and threats of a “water war.” FILE – President Donald Trump speaks during a working lunch with leaders of NATO members countries that have met their financial commitments to the the organization, in Watford, England, Dec. 4, 2019.Despite the president not yet delivering on these peace deals, his allies highlight other foreign policy victories: Securing a trade deal with Canada and Mexico, pressuring NATO allies to spend more for defense, and persuading the British government to ban Huawei equipment from their 5G network, effectively cutting the Chinese tech giant out of its 5G future.
Moreover, his supporters argue that because of Trump’s policies abroad, Americans are better off than they were four years ago.
“The administration has stood up to Russia with tough sanctions and rallying of our partners in Europe, while its maximum pressure strategy has put the mullahs in Iran off-balance. China has been challenged–and there is broad, bipartisan support for that,” said James Carafano, Vice President for national security and foreign policy at the Heritage Foundation to VOA.
Alen Mlatisumaa and Margaret Besheer contributed to this story.
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Банду обиженного карлика пукина трясет: крысы устраивают привычную показуху
Банду обиженного карлика пукина трясет: крысы устраивают привычную показуху.
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Обанкротившийся газпром отчаянно пытается демонстрировать бодрость духа. Ведь публике не интересно, какой там идет вал сокращений расходов и как режут не только сами расходы, но и структуру компании, но внешне надо выглядеть молодцом
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“Это почти Украина и Майдан”: «коллективный страх» пукина перед народом растет…
“Это почти Украина и Майдан”: «коллективный страх» пукина перед народом растет…
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Концентрированные страхи обиженного карлика пукина: «путинизм» не стал национальной идеей и приходит к своему логическому завершению, как и период правления «вечного правителя»
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Народ, просыпайся! Хабаровск просит помощи!
Народ, просыпайся! Хабаровск просит помощи!
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Протесты в Хабаровске не стоят на месте, сначала они просили освободить Фургала, потом добавилась отставка обиженного карлика пукина и прогоняют Дегтярева, а теперь же просят всю россию поддержать их. Ведь именно Хабаровский край – это символ протеста сейчас в стране, где люди должны добиться справедливости, а мы должны им помочь
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Чемодан, вокзал, Самара! Хабаровск послал подальше путинского холуя дегтярева
Чемодан, вокзал, Самара! Хабаровск послал подальше путинского холуя дегтярева.
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В Хабаровске в субботу прошла новая многотысячная акция в поддержку арестованного экс-губернатора Сергея Фургала. По некоторым оценкам, шествие и митинг стали самыми массовыми за две недели протестов: на улицы вышли от 40 до 50 тысяч человек
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«Зазвенел набат»: пукинское “слезание с нефтегазовой иглы” обернулось крахом промышленности путляндии…
«Зазвенел набат»: пукинское “слезание с нефтегазовой иглы” обернулось крахом промышленности путляндии…
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Очередная наглядная демонстрация того как путляндия “слезает с нефтегазовой иглы”: промышленность падает второй месяц подряд…
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Americans Await New Stimulus Bill as COVID Cases Continue to Rise
With more than four million confirmed cases of COVID-19 across the country, many U.S. states are pausing reopening efforts, leaving those who remain unemployed unsure about their futures. Senate Republicans plan to introduce another coronavirus relief bill this week. VOA’s Esha Sarai has more.
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White House Looks to Cover 70% of Jobless Workers’ Previous Wages
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin says a new coronavirus economic aid package being unveiled Monday would pay the country’s 16 million unemployed workers 70% of their one-time salaries, but tough negotiations lie ahead with opposition Democrats over the scope of more assistance to offset the severe economic effects of the pandemic. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin speaks with reporters about the coronavirus relief package negotiations, at the White House, July 23, 2020, in Washington.Mnuchin, on the “Fox News Sunday” show, called the 70% wage replacement figure “a very fair level.” However, the new figure, if eventually adopted by Congress, would sharply cut the national government’s current $600-a-week boost to less generous state unemployment benefits that expire Friday, to perhaps $200 a week. “I think workers understand you shouldn’t be paid to stay home,” Mnuchin said. On CNN, Trump economic adviser Larry Kudlow called the 70% figure “quite generous.” The White House and its Republican allies in Congress have sought to cut the federal unemployment benefits to end a significant effect of the bigger payments that have been in effect since March: about 60% of the unemployed workers over the last four months have been receiving jobless payments that were bigger than what they were earning when they were working. Watch related video by VOA’s Esha Sarai:Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 6 MB480p | 8 MB540p | 11 MB720p | 22 MB1080p | 45 MBOriginal | 55 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioAmericans Await New Stimulus Bill as COVID Cases Continue to RiseOne mid-May report reported that a fifth of the unemployed workers declined requests from their employers that they return to work because their wages were lower than what they were collecting in jobless benefits.
Kudlow said the overall $1 trillion economic aid package would include another round of $1,200 checks to most adults in the U.S. and payments to businesses to retain employees rather than cut the size of their workforces. In this illustration photo taken May 08, 2020, a COVID-19 Unemployment Assistance Updates logo is displayed on a smartphone against the backdrop of an application for unemployment benefits, in Arlington, Virginia.But Democratic lawmakers are demanding that the $600-a-week boost in payments to the jobless workers be kept in place through the end of 2020. They are pushing for an overall coronavirus aid package totaling $3 trillion, the figure approved by the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives in mid-May. “I see no reason why we can’t move quickly,” Mnuchin said. But Senator Mitch McConnell, the Senate Republican majority leader, said late last week that completion of a new deal could take weeks. Meanwhile, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows told ABC’s “This Week” show that the administration is “hopeful” that it can announce new therapies to treat the coronavirus “in the coming days.” “The president has been very clear — whatever amount of money and whatever amount of time needs to be invested, we’re doing that,” Meadows said. “We’re not going to have a solution to this,” he said. “It’s not masks. It’s not shutting down the economy. Hopefully it is American ingenuity that will allow for therapies and vaccines to ultimately conquer this.” FILE – Emergency Medical Technicians (EMT) arrive with a patient while a funeral car begins to depart at North Shore Medical Center where the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) patients are treated, in Miami, Florida, July 14, 2020.Meadows’s comments came after Trump acknowledged last week that the virus will “get worse before it gets better” after previously downplaying the surge in new infections in the U.S. The U.S. has recorded nearly 4.2 million coronavirus cases and more than 146,000 deaths, with both figures more than any other national figures across the globe.
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China, Pakistan Reject Biowarfare Development Collusion
Pakistan and China have refuted as “absurd” and “fabricated” media reports that the two close allies are jointly conducting secret research to develop biological weapons in breach of global treaties.
An Australian publication, The Klaxon, alleged in its investigative report last week that Beijing and Islamabad have entered a covert three-year deal “to expand potential bio-warfare capabilities, including running several research projects related to the deadly agent anthrax.”
The report quoted multiple intelligence sources as saying that China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology had “lent all financial material and scientific support” to set up the secret facility in Pakistan. “The Wuhan lab was providing “extensive training on manipulation of pathogens and bio-informatics” to Pakistani scientists “to help Pakistan develop its own virus collection database,” it said.
“It is a politically motivated and fake story, composed of distortion of facts and fabrications that quote anonymous sources,” said a Pakistan Foreign Ministry statement issued Sunday.
It insisted that “there is nothing secret” about the facility referred to in the report, saying the laboratory is being used for research and development on emerging health threats, surveillance and diseases outbreak investigation.
The ministry noted that Pakistan has been “strictly” abiding by its international obligations and has been sharing information about the laboratory in question with states parties to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC). The international treaty forbids member nations from developing, producing and stockpiling biological agent or toxin.
“The attempt to cast aspersions about the facility is particularly absurd against the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has highlighted the need for better preparedness in the areas of disease surveillance and control and international collaborations in that regard,” the Pakistani statement lamented.
The Chinese Embassy in Pakistan also denounced as “fabricated” the Australian media report.
“It is totally irresponsible, vicious-intentioned to smear China and Sino-Pak relations. As a responsible nation, China always lives up to its obligations to BWC,” the diplomatic mission tweeted Sunday.
Pakistan and China have traditionally maintained close political, economic and defense relations. The two neighboring countries have over the past six years further cemented bilateral ties, with Beijing investing billions of dollars in major infrastructure and energy development projects in Pakistan.
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Greek Businesses Move to Boycott Trade with Turkey over Hagia Sophia
Turkey’s decision to convert the ancient Hagia Sophia monument back into a mosque has sparked a war of words between Athens and Ankara. However, as Greece intensifies its diplomatic scramble to slap sanctions on Turkey, Greek businesses have launched a campaign to boycott goods and services from the neighboring country.Vassilis Korkidis, a leading representative of commerce in Greece, is blunt about the need, as he puts it, to strike back at Turkey.We recognize the ongoing works and efforts of the government to counter the recasting of Hagia Sophia, he said. However, until that materializes into something concrete, Korkidis said, Greek businesses should waste no time in boycotting trade with their Turkish partners.Even on a personal level, he says, consumers should follow suit. They can do so immediately, he said, boycotting Turkish goods, which bear the numbers 868 and 869 on the barcodes of imported products.Despite age-old animosity between the two countries, trade relations have grown substantially in recent years. Greece’s annual exports to Turkey total about $1.6 billion, significantly more than the $1.2 billion in imports from Turkey.Whether Greeks will heed the trade boycott remains unclear, especially as the economy here has been thrown into chaos by the COVID-19 pandemic.However, the anger, sadness and resentment toward the Hagia Sophia recast weighs heavily in this largely Eastern Orthodox country — so much in fact, that experts say any short-lived trade gain is offset by bigger losses.In this Presidential Press Office handout picture, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan attends Friday prayers at Hagia Sophia Grand Mosque in Istanbul, July 24, 2020.Korkidis explained, “We may enjoy a generous trade surplus, he says, but when you factor in the resources that Greece has to pull together to fend off continued flows of illegal migration from Turkey, and the huge military costs now racking up to safeguard against Turkish provocations — well all of that wipes out any semblance of a surplus.”The issue of Hagia Sophia is just the latest of a string of crises Greece is facing from its fellow NATO member, Turkey. Relations have been aggravated for years over land and sea rights in the Aegean, as well as thousands of illegal migrants continuing to stream into Greece from Turkey. In recent weeks, also, tensions have soared as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed to begin drilling for oil and gas in waters Greece considers its own. Greek business associations say they are already reaching out to partner organizations across Europe to institute build an even broader boycott against Turkey.It is clear that the West is becoming increasingly unnerved by the actions of Turkey, Korkidis said. It is high time, he said, that Erdogan’s government stops using cultural issues to advance its political agenda.The trade boycott is just one of many grassroots movements and protests, swelling in Greece.On Sunday, alone, church bells tolled anew across the nation while tens of thousands of people packed into houses of prayer, singing hymns in honor of the Hagia Sophia, the seat of Eastern Christianity for about a thousand years before Ottoman Turks conquered its host city, then known as Constantinople.Protesters burn a Turkish national flag outside of a church during a gathering in Thessaloniki, July 24, 2020, against turning the historic Hagia Sophia in Istanbul to a mosque after serving for more than 80 years as museum.In more worrying signs, though, teams of far-right nationalists fanned out across a city in northern Greece, torching a Turkish flag. The Greek government condemned the move. Still, it stoked nationalist and patriotic passions with a fresh round stinging remarks against the country’s age-old foe by Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.He said Turkey is a troublemaker threatening peace and security in the region, he says, but we have shown, that we can defend our borders, the European Union’s frontiers.Greece believes the Hagia Sophia conversion is part of a bigger plan by Turkey to reassert itself as a regional and energy superpower.Turkey says Greece is significantly overreacting. Even so, Greece insists it is not taking any chances, keeping its forces on code-red alert, ready to wage war if further provoked on any front.
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Генпрокурор-косметолог. Хто така ірина венедіктова і кому вона віддано служить?
Генпрокурор-косметолог. Хто така ірина венедіктова і кому вона віддано служить?
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Як подружжя викладачки й поліцейського нажило статків на 7 мільйонів гривень?
Хто вони – друзі, соратники й заступники генпрокурорки?
Та кого торкнеться каральний турборежим, увімкнений офісом генпрокурора і Державним бюро розслідувань?
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Агент Казбек тобто дегенерат портнов та його злочини проти України (частина 3)
Агент Казбек тобто дегенерат портнов та його злочини проти України (частина 3)
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Хотелки карлика пукина, бубочкин фарс, швейцарский счёт и санкции против СП-2
Хотелки карлика пукина, бубочкин фарс, швейцарский счёт и санкции против СП-2
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