Thousands of mostly young people gathered Friday in Berlin to demand more action on climate change, part of a global day of action for the environment.Defying gray skies, the participants, many on bicycles, brought placards and banners to a rally near the iconic Brandenburg Gate. Most wore face masks as a COVID-19 precaution. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.Germany is a focal point for the demonstrations in Europe because it holds the six-month rotating presidency of the European Union, which together with Britain accounts for 22 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions caused by humans.The climate has made headlines around the world recently, from melting Arctic ice to record Siberian heat to wildfires in California and elsewhere.German climate activist Luisa Neubauer told the crowd, “We’re here because we know that climate justice is possible as long as we keep fighting for it. That’s why we’re here today.”Fridays for Future activists protest calling for a “Global Day of Climate Action” in Berlin, Germany, Sept. 25, 2020.The demonstration was one of 3,000 scheduled to be held around the world Friday, as part of the youth activist movement “Fridays for Future.” COVID-19 restrictions forced many of the activities online.In Stockholm, the person considered to be the founder of the movement, teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg, was in her usual location, in front of the Swedish parliament. She told a reporter the main goal of the protests was to raise awareness and sway public opinion on the urgency of climate issues.She said, “We need to treat the climate crisis as a crisis. It’s just as simple as that. The climate crisis has never once been treated as a crisis, and unless we treat it as a crisis, we won’t be able to so-called ‘solve’ it.’ ”In 2018, at age 15, Thunberg began skipping school on Fridays and going to the parliament to hold demonstrations for legislation on climate change. Soon, she was joined by others, and the protests eventually went viral through social media.
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Month: September 2020
Раскрыты доходы пропагандонов обиженного карлика пукина
Сколько же должны получать наши фейкомёты, чтобы врать на всю страну и заниматься пропагандой? Коль все они предпочитают отдыхать в Европе, значит они не идейные, так сколько стоит их совесть, если она еще осталась? И вот теперь мы с вами наконец узнали, за какие суммы они якобы любят страну, хотя это просто работа, ничего личного
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Для распространения вашего сообщения или видео в Сети Правды пишите сюда, или на email: pravdaua@email.cz
Лучшие предложения товаров и услуг в Сети SeLLines
Ваши потенциальные клиенты о нужных им товарах и услугах пишут тут: MeNeedit
Сеть Правды работает по технологии MassReaders, и объединяет более 5’000 популярных сайтов разнообразной информационной тематики, которые ежедневно публикуют свежие, интересные и актуальные статьи на украинском, русском и английском языках.
Огромная ежедневная аудитория Сети повзволяет быть эффективным каналом распространения информации, влиять на общественное мнение читателей и фантастически повышать Индекс Цитирования политиков и их программ, а также товаров и услуг предпринимателей.
У сайтов есть мобильные версии и представительства в социальных сетях. А также читатели имеют возможность подписаться на получение актуальной информации и привлекательных предложений с помощью электронной почты.
Для предпринимателей, производителей и коммерсантов предлагаем публикацию рекламных сообщений, которые могут содержать:
– информацию о новых продуктах или акциях вашей компании;
– напоминания о ваших продуктах или услугах (анонсы, обозрения, статьи, в т.ч. видеоматериалы);
– информацию для укрепления репутации вашей компании и торговой марки;
– информацию для увеличения узнаваемости вашего бренда;
– информацию для повышения лояльности к вашей компании и торговой марке;
– информацию, которая вызывает дополнительную стимуляцию целевой аудитории для осуществления покупки.
Предлагаем регулярное (возможно ежедневное) распространение ваших пресс-релизов, новостей, анонсов, youtube видео, акаунтов в социальных сетях и других информационных материалов с помощью Сети Правды
Нова Пошта співпрацює з агресором і поставляє вату з хакерського проекту пукіна wildberries.ua
Wildberries.ua – це хакерський проект ображеного карлика пукіна для викрадення грошей українців і втюхування їм вати.
Аналогічні шахрайсько-пропагандистські сайти запущені у Вірменії, Білорусі, Казахстані, Киргизії, Польщі, та Словакії.
Центальний офіс знаходиться у столиці путляндії, а з метою прикриття на сайті вказана назва і адреса фіктивної польської фірмочки із копійочним статутним капіталом.
З пустіючого бюджету путляндії ображений карлик пукін виділив аж 1 мільярд доларів на дану спецоперацію. Але, за давньою кацапською традицією, 70% коштів було розкрадено ще до початку реалізації проекту. Звідси такий млявий дизайн, поганий асортимент, лише расейська мова фронтофісу і усе інше.
Та виконавці даної пакості не засмучуються, вони хочуть поповнити свій бюджет за рахунок обманутих лохів-покупців, а також витягнути з них дані їх платіжних карток, щоб потім вкрасти з них усі наявні там гроші.
Просунуті українські користувачі з першого погляду зрозуміли обман і залишили наступні відгуки в мережі: только упоротый .. в таком сортире что-то купит, магаз для бомжар. Але значна кількість недосвідчених покупців можуть втратити свої кошти. Тому ми усіх попереджуємо:
Wildberries.ua – це хакерський проект пукіна для викрадення грошей і втюхування вати. А Нова Пошта співпрацює з агресором і поставляє вату з хакерського проекту пукіна wildberries.ua.УКРАЇНЦІ – БУДЬТЕ УВАЖНІ!!!
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Для поширення вашого відео чи повідомлення в Мережі Правди пишіть сюди, або на email: pravdaua@email.cz
Найкращі пропозиції товарів і послуг в Мережі Купуй!
Ваші потенційні клієнти про потрібні їм товари і послуги пишуть тут: MeNeedit
Мережа Правди працює за технологією MassReaders, та об’єднує понад 5’000 популярних сайтів різноманітної інформаційної тематики, які щодня публікують свіжі, цікаві і актуальні статті українською, російською та англійською мовами.
Величезна щоденна аудиторія Мережі дозволяє бути ефективним каналом поширення інформації, впливати на громадську думку читачів і фантастично підвищувати Індекс цитуваня підприємців, політиків та їх пропозицій і програм.
Усі сайти мають мобільні версії і представництва в соціальних мережах. А також читачі мають можливість підписатися на отримання актуальної інформації і привабливих пропозицій за допомогою електронної пошти.
Для виробників та комерсантів пропонуємо публікацію рекламних повідомлень, які можуть містити:
– інформацію про нові продукти або акції вашої компанії;
– нагадування про ваші продукти чи послуги (анонси, огляди, статті, відеоматеріали);
– інформацію для зміцнення репутації вашої компанії і торгової марки;
– інформацію для збільшення впізнаваності вашого бренда;
– інформацію для підвищення лояльності до вашої компанії і торгової марки;
– інформацію, що викликає додаткову стимуляцію цільової аудиторії для здійснення покупки.
Пропонуємо регулярне (можливе і щоденне) поширення ваших прес-релізів, новин, анонсів та інших інформаційних матеріалів за допомогою Мережі Правди
Ображений карлик пукін втюхує стару неефективну протигрипозну вакцину, як вакцину від Covid-19
Ображений карлик пукін взявся бути промоутером чудодійних ліків і навіть приплів свою дочку, яку він ретельно приховує, яка ніби-то уже спробували цю вакцину на собі.
Але як завжди, щось пішло не так. Світове лікарське співтовариство обман розкрило. І путляндія отримала чергові фінансові та іміджеві збитки!
Воістину ще раз підтверджується стародавня мудрість: застав дурня молитися, то він собі лоба розіб’є!
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Для поширення вашого відео чи повідомлення в Мережі Правди пишіть сюди, або на email: pravdaua@email.cz
Найкращі пропозиції товарів і послуг в Мережі Купуй!
Ваші потенційні клієнти про потрібні їм товари і послуги пишуть тут: MeNeedit
Мережа Правди працює за технологією MassReaders, та об’єднує понад 5’000 популярних сайтів різноманітної інформаційної тематики, які щодня публікують свіжі, цікаві і актуальні статті українською, російською та англійською мовами.
Величезна щоденна аудиторія Мережі дозволяє бути ефективним каналом поширення інформації, впливати на громадську думку читачів і фантастично підвищувати Індекс цитуваня підприємців, політиків та їх пропозицій і програм.
Усі сайти мають мобільні версії і представництва в соціальних мережах. А також читачі мають можливість підписатися на отримання актуальної інформації і привабливих пропозицій за допомогою електронної пошти.
Для виробників та комерсантів пропонуємо публікацію рекламних повідомлень, які можуть містити:
– інформацію про нові продукти або акції вашої компанії;
– нагадування про ваші продукти чи послуги (анонси, огляди, статті, відеоматеріали);
– інформацію для зміцнення репутації вашої компанії і торгової марки;
– інформацію для збільшення впізнаваності вашого бренда;
– інформацію для підвищення лояльності до вашої компанії і торгової марки;
– інформацію, що викликає додаткову стимуляцію цільової аудиторії для здійснення покупки.
Пропонуємо регулярне (можливе і щоденне) поширення ваших прес-релізів, новин, анонсів та інших інформаційних матеріалів за допомогою Мережі Правди
Virginia Governor Northam, Wife Test Positive for COVID-19
The governor of the eastern U.S. state of Virginia announced Friday that he and his wife have tested positive for COVID-19.
Governor Ralph Northam said they were notified Wednesday that a staff member who works in the living quarters of their official residence developed symptoms and subsequently tested positive, after which the couple had their own tests done.
He said his wife, Pamela, is experiencing mild symptoms, while he remains asymptomatic.
The couple is isolating for 10 days, during which the governor is continuing his work.
Crews are also cleaning the governor’s mansion, and the Northams are working with state health officials on contact-tracing efforts to make sure anyone they may have been in contact with is aware of their positive tests.
Northam said the best thing people can do is “take this seriously.”
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Ginsburg is First Woman, Jewish Person to Lie in State at US Capitol
U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg became the first woman to lie in state in the U.S. Capitol when her body was moved there Friday morning. After her casket arrived on the plaza outside the Capitol’s National Statuary Hall, a private ceremony for her family and invited guests began at the hall, where her casket will rest on the same wooden platform built for the casket of President Abraham Lincoln after his assassination in 1865. Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, his wife, Jill, and Biden’s running mate, Kamala Harris, are attending the tribute. Democratic presidential candidate former Vice President Joe Biden, center, and his wife Jill Biden stand as the flag-draped casket of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in state in Statuary Hall of the U.S. Capitol, Sept. 25, 2020.The coronavirus outbreak restricted the number of people who were invited to the ceremony. Lawmakers who were not invited to the private ceremony are able to pay their respects before her body is removed later Friday.A statement by the U.S. Supreme Court said Ginsburg, who is also the first Jewish person to lie in state at the Capitol, will be buried next week in a private ceremony at Arlington National Ceremony. Ginsburg has lain in repose for two days at the Supreme Court.President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump pay respects as Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg lies in repose at the Supreme Court building, Sept. 24, 2020, in Washington.U.S. President Donald Trump was met with boos and chants of “vote him out” as he and his wife, Melania, appeared Thursday at the Supreme Court to pay their respects to Ginsburg. The president, wearing a face mask, made no remarks as he stood briefly a short distance from Ginsburg’s casket at the top of the court building’s steps. Vice President Mike Pence paid his respects to Ginsburg as she lay in state at the Supreme Court on Wednesday. Ginsburg was honored Wednesday with a private ceremony in the Supreme Court’s Great Hall attended by her family and fellow justices. Her casket was then moved to the front steps for the public to file past and pay their respects until Thursday night. Rosa Parks
Civil rights icon Rosa Parks lay in honor in the Capitol’s historic Rotunda after her death in 2005, a distinction given to eminent private citizens. Ginsburg died last Friday at age 87 of metastatic pancreatic cancer, ending a 27-year tenure on the nation’s highest court. Her status as leader of the court’s liberal minority, along with her pre-jurist work seeking legal equality for women and girls in all spheres of American life, made her a cultural icon, earning her the nickname “The Notorious R.B.G.” Her death has sparked a political battle over her replacement. Trump and Senate Republicans vowed to name and confirm a new justice before the November 3 presidential election, which would give the court a solid 6-3 conservative majority. Trump announced Tuesday that he will name his nominee for the lifetime appointment on Saturday.
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Eight in 10 Britons Ignore COVID-19 Self-Isolation Rules, Survey Finds
A new survey indicates more than 80% of people living in Britain with COVID-19 symptoms or who have had contact with someone who has tested positive are ignoring self-isolation guidelines.
The survey, released Friday and conducted by Kings College London and the National Health Service (NHS), found that only 18.2% of people who reported having symptoms of COVID-19 in the previous seven days have stayed isolated since their symptoms developed, and only 11.9% requested a COVID-19 test.
The research also shows fewer than half those surveyed were able to identify the symptoms of COVID-19, the respiratory disease caused by the new coronavirus.
The research also found that only 10.9% of people told to self-isolate after close contact with a COVID-19 case had done so for 14 days as required.
In a statement, the survey’s senior author, Kings College researcher Dr. James Rubin, said the research indicated that while the public seems to have good intentions to adhere to the test, trace and isolate guidelines, financial constraints are the most common reason given for non-compliance, among other factors.
Britain this week introduced fines of up to $12,780 for breaking self-isolation rules, and it is offering nearly $640 in support payments to low-paid workers who lose income from quarantining.
The study shows other reasons for non-compliance ranged from not knowing government guidance to being unable to identify the symptoms.
Kings College says the data was collected through surveys conducted among 30,000 people living in Britain between March and August of this year.
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HOLD for NOON – Cambodian Garment Workers Struggle After EU Withdraws Trade Perks
The Cambodian government is shoring up its finances as the withdrawal of some European Union trade preferences leaves its mark on an economy already struggling with the COVID-19 pandemic and an exodus of Western businesses.
Hardest hit is the $7 billion garment, textiles and footwear industry, where about 700,000 workers earn a basic $190 a month, including $7 for transportation and rent, producing for big name brands such as Levis Strauss, H&M, and Adidas, six days a week.
The government has allocated a $1.2 billion spending package to help offset losses from the partial withdrawal of trade preferences under the ‘Everything But Arms’ program — which provides duty- and quota-free access to the EU market for all products other than arms — that went into effect last month ((https://www.voacambodia.com/a/eu-trade-sanction-against-cambodia-s-crackdown-enters-into-force-/5541730.html)) and the impact of the pandemic which has taken a heavy toll on a once-thriving industry.
Phen Kosal, who has worked at Hung Wah Cambodia garment factory producing clothing for export for the last six years, says the EBA partial withdrawal was having a dreadful impact on her work prospects amid layoffs, loss of overtime and reduced hours.
“Now, I am begging for the government’s help because of this issue. I’m also in debt with the banks and finance institutions, which is why I’m desperately seeking help.”
Her sentiments were echoed by Sao Chen, who works at the Meng Da Footwear factory. He estimated that overall earnings – including his own – were down 20%, while many workers had been laid off for four to six months.
“The main problem we are facing today is some workers are the only breadwinners feeding an entire family at home. Sometimes their monthly income is only $100 to $200 and they spend everything on rent, food, kids’ school – and there are many more costs.”
EBA trade preferences go to least developed countries that meet international standards of democracy and human rights.FILE – Prime Minister Hun Sen, center, leans over a garment worker during a visit to a factory outside Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Aug. 30, 2017.However, a ban preventing the main opposition party from contesting elections in 2018 amid a crackdown on dissent and the independent press resulted in a victory for Prime Minister Hun Sen’s long-ruling Cambodian People’s Party in every contested seat.
That upset the EU – Cambodia’s largest trading partner, accounting for 45% of 2018 exports – prompting the withdrawal of the preferences. The partial withdrawal has hit about 20% of Cambodia’s exports to the EU, and early estimates say this will cost business about $130 million.
Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia data show that 450 garment and footwear factories in Cambodia had suspended work, while 83 factories closed in the first half of this year, affecting about 150,000 workers.
GMAC Secretary General Ken Loo said the EU had erred by withdrawing those preferences on August 12, amid the COVID -19 pandemic, which has had a much greater impact on the Cambodian economy.
“Numerous brands and retailers in Europe and North America have canceled or delayed orders due to the drop in retail sales in Europe from the pandemic,” he said.
“Consequently, millions of Cambodian citizens could fall back into poverty due to this crisis.”
There are other issues affecting the economy. The ports are crammed with goods once destined for the EU. High debt levels among small borrowers in the microfinance industry and a sharp drop in remittances from workers abroad amid the pandemic have also taken a toll.
Meas Sok Sensan, spokesperson of the Ministry of Economy and Finance, put a brave face on the withdrawal telling the government-friendly news portal Fresh News this did not mean Cambodia would lose export markets in Europe.
“Europe is still Cambodia’s exporting destination. The EBA partial withdrawal means some Cambodian goods are no longer on the tax exemption list anymore,” he said.
While brands, however, can move to another country, as many Western expat businessmen and NGOs did after the elections, their workers cannot.
“I think this issue is going to make for some job losses for the worker if we don’t have the orders or if the brand does not stay in the country,” said Athit Kong, president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers’ Democratic Union.
“I think the parties need to work together to maintain and to keep this benefit for the country, and especially for the workers,” he said.
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ECOWAS Could Lift Mali Sanctions on Friday
The 15-nation Economic Community of West African States, or ECOWAS, could announce Friday if it will lift crippling sanctions on Mali.Incoming interim Malian President Bah Ndaw is to be sworn in Friday in the capital, Bamako for an 18-month term.On the eve of the ceremony, Ndaw met with former Nigerian President and ECOWAS mediator Goodluck Jonathan. Jonathan said ECOWAS could announce Friday whether the official appointments satisfy the organization’s conditions to lift crippling sanctions.Jonathan told reporters Wednesday the soldiers now in charge are doing a job in line with ECOWAS leadership aims. He said the sanctions against Mali could be lifted following Friday’s swearing-in ceremony.Ndaw is the leader of the junta that took control of the country after ousting President Boubacar Ibrahim Keita.
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London Police Officer Fatally Shot While Detaining Suspect
A London police officer was shot and killed early Friday inside a London police station while detaining a suspect, officials said.
In a statement, London’s Metropolitan Police said the incident occurred at 2:15 am London time at the Croydon Custody Center on the city’s south side.
The British Broadcasting Corporation reports the 23-year-old suspect as being detained, he produced a weapon, shot the officer, and then turned the weapon on himself. Officials say no police weapons were fired.
Police say the suspect is being treated at a London hospital, where he is in critical condition. The officer has not been identified while police notify his family.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, on Twitter, offered his condolences to the officer’s family and colleagues as did London Mayor Sadiq Khan.
Britain has strict firearms laws, and it is rare for police officers there to be shot and killed.
The BBC reports the Croydon officer is the 17th on the London police force to have been killed by a firearm since the World War II.
The broadcaster reports since the beginning of the 20th century, only 73 police officers have been shot and killed by criminals in Britain, excluding all deaths in Northern Ireland. The majority of the deaths – more than 50 – have occurred since 1945.
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Palm Oil Labor Abuses Linked to World’s Top Brands, Banks
Jum’s words tumble out over the phone, his voice growing ever more frantic.
Between sobs, he says he’s trapped on a Malaysian plantation run by government owned Felda, one of the world’s largest palm oil companies. His boss confiscated and then lost his Indonesian passport, he says, leaving him vulnerable to arrest. Night after night, he has been forced to hide from authorities, sleeping on the jungle floor, exposed to the wind and the rain. His biggest fear: the roaming tigers.
All the while, Jum says his supervisor demanded he keep working, tending the heavy reddish-orange palm oil fruit that has made its way into the supply chains of the planet’s most iconic food and cosmetics companies like Unilever, L’Oreal, Nestle and Procter & Gamble.
“I am not a free man anymore,” he says, his voice cracking. “I desperately want to see my mom and dad. I want to go home!”
An Associated Press investigation found many like Jum in Malaysia and neighboring Indonesia – an invisible workforce consisting of millions of laborers from some of the poorest corners of Asia, many of them enduring various forms of exploitation, with the most serious abuses including child labor, outright slavery and allegations of rape. Together, the two countries produce about 85 percent of the world’s estimated $65 billion palm oil supply.
Palm oil is virtually impossible to avoid. Often disguised on labels as an ingredient listed by more than 200 names, it can be found in roughly half the products on supermarket shelves and in most cosmetic brands. It’s in paints, plywood, pesticides and pills. It’s also present in animal feed, biofuels and even hand sanitizer.
The AP interviewed more than 130 current and former workers from two dozen palm oil companies who came from eight countries and labored on plantations across wide swaths of Malaysia and Indonesia. Almost all had complaints about their treatment, with some saying they were cheated, threatened, held against their will or forced to work off unsurmountable debts. Others said they were regularly harassed by authorities, swept up in raids and detained in government facilities.
They included members of Myanmar’s long-persecuted Rohingya minority, who fled ethnic cleansing in their homeland only to be sold into the palm oil industry. Fishermen who escaped years of slavery on boats also described coming ashore in search of help, but instead ending up being trafficked onto plantations — sometimes with police involvement.
The AP used the most recently published data from producers, traders and buyers of the world’s most-consumed vegetable oil, as well as U.S. Customs records, to link the laborers’ palm oil and its derivatives from the mills that process it to the supply chains of top Western companies like the makers of Oreo cookies, Lysol cleaners and Hershey’s chocolate treats.
Reporters witnessed some abuses firsthand and reviewed police reports, complaints made to labor unions, videos and photos smuggled out of plantations and local media stories to corroborate accounts wherever possible. In some cases, reporters tracked down people who helped enslaved workers escape. More than a hundred rights advocates, academics, clergy members, activists and government officials also were interviewed.
Though labor issues have largely been ignored, the punishing effects of palm oil on the environment have been decried for years. Still, giant Western financial institutions like Deutsche Bank, BNY Mellon, Citigroup, HSBC and the Vanguard Group have continued to help fuel a crop that has exploded globally, soaring from just 5 million tons in 1999 to 72 million today, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The U.S. alone has seen a 900 percent spike in demand during that same time.
Sometimes they invest directly but, increasingly, third parties are used like Malaysia-based Maybank, one of the world’s biggest palm oil financiers, which not only provides capital to growers but, in some cases, processes the plantations’ payrolls. Financial crime experts say that in an industry rife with a history of problems, banks should flag arbitrary and inconsistent wage deductions as potential indicators of forced labor.
“This has been the industry’s hidden secret for decades,” said Gemma Tillack of the U.S.-based Rainforest Action Network, which has exposed labor abuses on palm oil plantations. “The buck stops with the banks. It is their funding that makes this system of exploitation possible.”
As global demand for palm oil surges, plantations are struggling to find enough laborers, frequently relying on brokers who prey on the most at-risk people. Many foreign workers end up fleeced by a syndicate of recruiters and corrupt officials and often are unable to speak the local language, rendering them especially susceptible to trafficking and other abuses.
They sometimes pay up to $5,000 just to get their jobs, an amount that could take years to earn in their home countries, often showing up for work already crushed by debt. Many have their passports seized by company officials to keep them from running away, which the United Nations recognizes as a potential flag of forced labor.
Countless others remain off the books and are especially scared of speaking out. They include migrants working without documentation and children who AP reporters witnessed squatting in the fields like crabs, picking up loose fruit alongside their parents. Many women also work for free or on a day-to-day basis, earning the equivalent of as little as $2 a day, sometimes for decades.
The AP is not identifying most of the workers or their specific plantations to protect their safety, based on previous instances of retaliation. Many of the interviews took place secretly in homes or coffeeshops in towns and villages near the plantations, sometimes late at night.
The Malaysian government was contacted by the AP repeatedly over the course of a week, but issued no comment. Felda also did not respond, but its commercial arm, FGV Holdings Berhad, said it had been working to address workers’ complaints on its own plantations, including making improvements in recruitment practices and ensuring that foreign laborers have access to their passports.
Indonesians such as Jum make up the vast majority of palm oil workers worldwide, including in Malaysia, where most locals shun the dirty, low-paying jobs. The two nations share a similar language and a porous border, but their close ties do not guarantee safe employment.
Unable to find a job at home, Jum says he went to Malaysia in 2013, signing a contract through an agent to work on a Felda plantation for three years. He endured the harsh conditions because his family needed the money, but says he asked to leave as soon as his time was up. Instead, he says, his contract was extended twice against his will.
He says he initially was housed with other Indonesians in a crude metal shipping container, sweltering in the tropical heat. Later, his bed consisted of a bamboo mat next to a campfire, with no protection from the elements and the snakes and other deadly animals foraging in the jungle.
“Sometimes I sleep under thousands of stars, but other nights it is totally dark. The wind is very cold, like thousands of razors piercing my skin, especially during a downpour,” he says. “I feel that I was deliberately abandoned by the company. Now, my hope is only one: Get back home.”
He has lived this way too long, he tells the AP over the phone — scared to stay, and scared to leave.
“Please help me!” he begs.
A half-century ago, palm oil was just another commodity that thrived in the tropics. Many Western countries relied on their own crops like soybean and corn for cooking, until major retailers discovered the cheap oil from Southeast Asia had almost magical qualities. It had a long shelf life, remained nearly solid at room temperature and didn’t smoke up kitchens, even when used for deep-frying.
When researchers started warning that trans fats like those found in margarine posed serious health risks, demand for palm oil soared even higher.
Just about every part of the fruit is used in manufacturing, from the outer flesh to the inner kernel, and the versatility of the oil itself and its derivatives seem endless.
It helps keep oily substances from separating and turns instant noodles into steaming cups of soup, just by adding hot water. It’s used in baby formula, non-dairy creamers and supplements and is listed on the labels of everything from Jif Natural peanut butter to Kit Kat candy bars.
Often hidden amid a list of scientific names on labels, it’s equally useful in a host of cleansers and makeup products. It bubbles in shampoo, foams in Colgate toothpaste, moisturizes Dove soap and helps keep lipstick from melting.
But the convenience comes with a cost: For workers, harvesting the fruit can be brutal.
The uneven jungle terrain is rough and sometimes flooded. The palms themselves serve as a wind barrier, creating sauna-like conditions, and harvesters need incredible strength to hoist long poles with sickles into the towering trees.
Each day, they must balance the tool while carefully slicing down spiky fruit bunches heavy enough to maim or kill, tending hundreds of trees over expanses that can stretch beyond 10 football fields. Those who fail to meet impossibly high quotas can see their wages reduced, sometimes forcing entire families into the fields to make the daily number.
“I work as a helper with my husband to pick up loose fruit. I do not get paid,” said Yuliana, who labors on a plantation owned by London Sumatra, which has a history of labor issues and is owned by one of the world’s largest instant-noodle makers.
Muhamad Waras, head of sustainability at London Sumatra, responded that wage issues and daily harvesting quotes are regularly discussed and that workers without documents are prohibited.
The AP talked to some female workers from other companies who said they were sexually harassed and even raped in the fields, including some minors.
Workers also complained about a lack of access to medical care or clean water, sometimes collecting rain runoff to wash the residue from their bodies after spraying dangerous pesticides or scattering fertilizer.
While previous media reports have mostly focused on a single company or plantation, the AP investigation is the most comprehensive dive into labor abuses industrywide.
It found widespread problems on plantations big and small, including some that meet certification standards set by the global Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil, an association that promotes ethical production — including the treatment of workers — and whose members include growers, buyers, traders and environmental watchdogs.
Some of the same companies that display the RSPO’s green palm logo signifying its seal of approval are accused of continuing to grab land from indigenous people and destroying virgin rainforests that are home to orangutans and other critically endangered species. They contribute to climate change by cutting down trees, draining carbon-rich peatlands and using illegal slash-and-burn clearing that routinely blankets parts of Southeast Asia in a thick haze.
When asked for comment, some product manufacturers acknowledged the industry’s history of labor and environmental problems, and all said they do not tolerate any human rights abuses, including unpaid wages and forced labor. Most stressed they were working toward obtaining only ethically sourced palm oil, pushing governments to make systemic changes, and taking immediate steps to investigate when alerted to troubling issues and suspending relationships with palm oil producers that fail to address grievances.
Nestle, Unilever and LÓreal were among the companies that noted they had stopped purchasing directly from Felda or its commercial affiliate, FGV. Eliminating tainted palm oil is difficult, however, because labor problems are so endemic and most big buyers are dependent on a tangled network of third-party suppliers.
While some companies, such as Ikea, Colgate-Palmolive and Unilever, directly confirmed the use of palm oil or its derivatives in their products, others refused to say or provided minimal information, sometimes even when “palm oil” was clearly listed on labels. Others said it was difficult to know if their products contained the ingredient because, in items such as cosmetics and cleaning supplies, some names listed on labels could instead be derived from coconut oil or a synthetic form.
“I understand why companies are struggling because palm oil has such a bad reputation,” said said Didier Bergeret, director of social sustainability at the Consumer Goods Forum, a global industry group. “Even if it’s sustainable, they don’t feel like talking about it whatsoever.”
In response to the criticism, Malaysia and Indonesia have long touted the golden crop as vital to alleviating poverty, saying small-time farmers are able to grow their own palm oil and large industrial estates provide much-needed jobs to workers from poor areas.
Nageeb Wahab, head of the Malaysian Palm oil Association, a government-supported umbrella group, called the allegations against the industry unwarranted. He noted that all the companies in his association, which are most of the country’s mid- and larger operations, must meet certification standards.
“I am surprised with all the allegations made. All of them are not true,” he said. “There may be violations by some, but definitely it is isolated and not from our members’ plantations.”
But Soes Hindharno, spokesman for the Indonesian Ministry of Manpower and Transmigration, told the AP that many Indonesian workers who cross over to Malaysia illegally to work on plantations “are easily intimidated, their wages are cut or they are threatened with reporting and deportation.” Some have their passports seized by their employers, he said.
He added that many of the concerns raised by AP about labor conditions in Indonesia had not been brought to his level, but said any company found not following government rules and regulations could face sanctions, including having their operations shut down.
The AP traveled to Jum’s Felda plantation in Malaysia earlier this year to meet with him, but calls to his cell phone went unanswered. Fellow workers confirmed he no longer slept in the barracks and instead, vulnerable with no identity papers, had to hide from the police.
Jum’s co-workers at least had a roof covering their heads, but their shelter resembled a barn. The filthy kitchen had a hotplate and just a few pots and pans. Only two outdoor squat toilets were functional, forcing many men to share, and a mold-covered cement trough served as a communal basin for washing. Pesticide sprayers were stacked along the metal walls, just feet from their bunks.
The men said they were forced to work unpaid overtime every day. One complained of abdominal pain, saying he was too sick to go to the fields and had been asking the company to give him back his passport so he could return home. He said he was told he must pay more than $700 to leave – money he did not have.
“We work until we are dying,” said a worker sitting in a room with two other colleagues.
Their eyes filled with tears after learning Felda was one of the world’s largest palm oil producers.
“They use this palm oil to make all these products,” he said. “It makes us very sad.”
And the global pandemic has only complicated matters, limiting the flow of workers and contributing to even greater labor shortages in Malaysia.
The workers AP interviewed came from Indonesia, Malaysia, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, the Philippines and Cambodia, along with Myanmar, which represents the newest army of exploited laborers.
Among the latter are stateless Rohingya Muslims such as Sayed.
Decades of oppression and outbreaks of violence have sent nearly a million Rohingya fleeing Myanmar in the last five years. Sayed was among those who escaped by boat — only to be held hostage, he said, and tortured by human traffickers in a jungle camp in Thailand.
After his relatives paid a ransom, Sayed said he was sent to Muslim-majority Malaysia, where thousands of Rohingya have sought refuge. He heard about a job paying workers without permits the equivalent of $14 a day, so he jumped into the back of a truck with eight other men and watched for hours as the busy highways narrowed to a dirt mountain track surrounded by an endless green carpet of palm oil trees.
Once on the plantation, Sayed said he lived in an isolated lean-to, dependent on his boss to bring what little rice and dried fish he was given to eat. He said he escaped after working a month and was later arrested, spending a year and a half in an immigration detention center, where guards beat him.
“There is no justice,” he said. “People here say, ‘This is not your country, we will do whatever we want.’”
Shamshu, who also is Rohingya, said he, too, made a run from his plantation after realizing he would never get paid. But that didn’t end his troubles.
Shamshu had a U.N.-issued refugee card, which can provide some protection even though Malaysia does not recognize it as a legal document, but he and others said it’s common for authorities to tear them up. He said he was stopped by police and spent four months in prison and then six months in an immigration detention center, where he was flogged.
During one beating, he described how a guard smashed his face against a wall, while two others pinned his arms and legs. Similar stories were repeated to the AP by several other migrant workers, including Vannak Anan Prum, a Cambodian who published a graphic novel in 2018 depicting his abuse.
“There is still a scar … and I still have pain,” Shamshu said of his caning. “I think it was connected to electricity because I passed out.”
In some of the worst cases of abuse, migrant workers said they fled one kind of servitude for another, detailing how they were trafficked, sold and enslaved not once, but twice.
Five men from Cambodia and Myanmar told the AP strikingly similar stories about being forced to work on Thai fishing boats for years at different times. They said they managed to break free while docking in Sarawak, Malaysia, before being scooped up by police and quickly sold again onto plantations.
“In Cambodia, I often heard my parents talking about the hardship of their lives under the Khmer Rouge regime, but I myself have met this hardship, too, when I worked at the Thai fishing boat and at the Malaysian palm oil plantation,” said Sren Brohim, 48, who escaped by offering to fish for free in exchange for a boat ride home. “Working at these two places was like working in hell.”
Rights groups confirmed being double-trafficked is not uncommon, especially five to 10 years ago, when recruiters and human traffickers would wait along the coast for runaway fishermen.
Last year in Malaysia, another Cambodian man who said he spent five years enslaved at sea and four more on plantations was among those who surfaced. Instead of being repatriated as a victim of human trafficking, rights groups said he was jailed for months for being in the country illegally.
A Burmese man, Zin Ko Ko Htwe, said he also was brought to a plantation after escaping from a boat in 2008 and spent several months working there, without being paid. He decided to run one day, but said his supervisors chased him down, pulled out a gun and surrounded him.
“Come out!” he recalled them yelling. “If you don’t, we will kill you!”
Ko Htwe was taken back to the plantation, where he said his bosses tied his hands together and, at gunpoint, told him to kneel before the other workers as a warning. He eventually managed to escape but didn’t make it home until 2016 — nearly a decade after he left.
“We gave our sweat and blood for palm oil,” Ko Htwe said. “We were forced to work and were abused.”
When Americans and Europeans see palm oil is listed as an ingredient in their snacks, he said, they should know “it’s the same as consuming our sweat and blood.”
The palm industry’s dominance is perhaps best grasped by viewing its footprint from 35,000 feet in the air. Trees planted in neat rows stretch across miles of flatlands in both countries, straddling coffee-colored rivers and eventually ringing terraced mountains for as far as the eye can see, creating a patchwork of green nearly the size of Kansas.
It’s easy to understand the allure, considering that crops like rapeseed, sesame and corn require a lot more land while producing far less oil.
Malaysia and Indonesia started ramping up commercial production in the 1960s and ’70s, supported by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, which saw palm oil as an engine for economic growth in the developing world. Today, following advances in transportation and capabilities in refining, the two countries have a near-monopoly on the global supply, even as production expands across Africa and Latin America, where a litany of labor abuses also have been reported.
China and India have become major customers, and the crop now is being eyed as a potential energy source for power plants, ships and airplanes, which would create even more demand.
“If the whole Western world would stop using palm oil, I don’t think that would make any difference,” said Gerrit van Duijn, a former refineries manager at Unilever, one of the world’s largest palm oil buyers for food and personal care products.
The trees take only three or four years to mature and then bear fruit year-round for up to three decades. But most companies can’t maintain the pace of expansion without outside funding. Every 10,000 acres of new planting requires up to $50 million, van Duijn estimates.
Asian banks are by far the most robust financiers of the plantations, but Western lenders and investment companies have poured almost $12 billion into palm oil plantations in the last five years alone, allowing for the razing and replanting of ever-expanding tracts of land, according to Forest and Finance, a database run by six nonprofit organizations that track money flowing to palm oil companies. The U.S institutions BNY Mellon, Charles Schwab Corp., Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase & Co., and Citigroup Inc., along with Europe’s HSBC, Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse and Prudential, together account for $3.5 billion of that, according to the data.
Other contributors include U.S. state pensions and teachers’ unions, including CalPERS, California’s massive public employees fund, and insurance companies such as State Farm, meaning that even conscientious consumers many unwittingly be supporting the industry just by visiting ATMs, mortgaging homes, insuring cars or investing in 401K retirement accounts.
Bank of America, HSBC, Standard Chartered, Deutsche Bank, Credit Suisse, CalPERS and State Farm responded by noting their policies vowing to support sustainability practices in the palm oil industry, with many also incorporating human rights into their guidelines. JPMorgan Chase declined comment, and BNY Mellon, Citigroup and Prudential did not respond. Charles Schwab called its investment “small.”
Some, including Norway’s government pension — the world’s largest sovereign wealth fund, worth about $1 trillion — have divested or distanced themselves from palm oil companies in recent years.
But Norway and many big-name banks and financial institutions around the globe continue to maintain ties with Malaysia’s biggest bank, Malayan Banking Berhad. More commonly known as Maybank, it has provided almost $4 billion in financing to Southeast Asia’s palm oil industry between 2015 and 2020, or about 10 percent of all loans and underwriting services, according to Forests and Finance.
Though the group accuses Maybank of having some of the loosest social and environmental assessment policies in the industry, its shareholders include institutions such as the Vanguard Group, BlackRock and State Street Corp.
The biggest gains for banks affiliated with palm oil come from big-ticket financial services, such as corporate loans. But some of the same institutions also offer banking services for workers, handling payrolls and installing ATM machines inside plantations.
“And this is where banks, such as Maybank, may find themselves at the heart of a forced-labor problem,” said Duncan Jepson, managing director of the global anti-trafficking nonprofit group Liberty Shared. “Financial institutions have ethical and contractual obligations to all their clients, as set out in the customer charters. In this case, that means both the palm oil company and its workers.”
Jepson said abnormal paycheck deductions are commonplace industry-wide, which should trigger investigations by the banks’ risk management teams into possible money-laundering.
In a statement, Maybank expressed surprise at the criticism of its standards, saying that “we reject any insinuation that Maybank may be involved in any unethical behavior.” The bank said it had not received any complaints about worker paychecks and “does not arbitrarily make deductions to client accounts unless instructed or authorized to do so by the account holder.” It said it would immediately investigate any complaints brought forward. It also pushed back against allegations that it has loose social governance standards.
Asked for comment on their investments, BlackRock reiterated its commitment to sustainable practices, Vanguard said it monitors companies in its portfolio for human rights abuses, and State Street did not respond.
Jepson’s organization filed a petition with the U.S. government earlier this year, citing allegations of child and forced labor, and seeking a ban on all palm oil imports from Sime Darby Plantation. The giant Malaysian-based producer told the AP that it has taken several steps to address labor concerns, including setting up a multilingual worker helpline. Two similar petitions were filed last year by other groups against FGV Holding, Felda’s commercial arm.
FGV Holdings, which employs nearly 30,000 foreign workers and manages about 1 million acres, has a 50/50 joint-venture with American consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble Company. FGV Holdings has been under fire for labor abuses and was sanctioned by the RSPO certification group two years ago.
Nurul Hasanah Ahamed Hassain Malim, FGV’s head of sustainability, noted that while the company is striving to make improvements, the issues raised stretch beyond just FGV and that the government also should play a role in protecting migrant workers.
“It is an industry issue. And I would say that it’s not only specific to plantations — you would see that in other sectors as well,” she said.
Several workers at different companies, including Jum’s plantation, showed the AP their pay stubs and ledgers documenting daily wages. Some noted they were regularly docked for not meeting quotas or shorted on their salaries every month, sometimes for years, to pay off the brokers who recruited them. In one case, more than 40 percent was subtracted from a Malaysian employee’s earnings, including a deduction for electricity.
Some months, Jum and the others said they made as little as $10 a day. Most labored the same hours, doing identical jobs, but said they never knew what amount to expect until checking the Maybank accounts where their salaries were deposited each month.
Karim, a Bangladeshi worker who arrived in Malaysia legally 12 years ago after being promised a position in an electronics company, said he wound up working for a subcontractor on many large plantations owned by the biggest companies.
“I have been cheated five times in six years,” he said, adding that once when he asked for his unpaid wages, his boss “threatened to run me over with his car.”
Many of these conditions should not be a surprise to companies buying palm oil and those helping finance the plantations.
The U.S. State Department has long linked the palm oil industry in Malaysia and Indonesia to exploitation and trafficking. And a 2018 report released by the Consumer Goods Forum found indicators of forced labor on estates in both countries — essentially putting the network’s 400 CEOs on alert. Its members include palm oil customers like Nestle, General Mills Inc., PepsiCo Inc., Colgate-Palmolive Company and Johnson & Johnson.
Many large suppliers have pledged to root out labor abuses after pressure from buyers who have denounced it. But some workers said they are told to hide or coached on what to say during auditors’ scheduled visits when only the best conditions are often showcased for sustainability certification.
It’s a system that keeps those like Jum from ever being seen.
Soon after his phone call with the AP pleading for help, Jum decides to slip away from his plantation, without even telling his friends goodbye. Instead, he sends them an abrupt text saying he’s had enough and will try to find an illegal boat home to Indonesia.
It’s a dangerous plan. The risk of getting caught or dying at sea is all too real. He could simply disappear.
Days pass with no word. But finally, Jum emerges: He has reached the Malaysian coast, but doesn’t have enough money to pay smugglers for the trip home. He is huddled in a small metal hut to avoid being spotted, wiping away tears and running his hands through thick tangles of black hair.
“If I get caught,” he tells the AP on a video call, “I’m afraid that I will not be able to see my mother again.”
Jum is hiding in a popular corridor for migrants without papers, and authorities are aggressively patrolling the area. Smooth-talking brokers also are on the hunt, waiting to pounce on vulnerable workers and promising safe passage for a price that often climbs once a trip begins.
Jum has always shielded his family from his troubles and the thought of turning to them for help fills him with shame. But as the days continue, he has no choice: He makes the call and they borrow the money needed to finally bring him home.
When it’s time to go, Jum spends the night in the forest with a group of fellow Indonesians also nervous about the risky crossing. He readies himself to plunge into the disorienting blackness of the South China Sea before dawn to swim to the waiting boat, one of the most treacherous legs of the journey.
Once Jum climbs aboard, totally spent, he quickly realizes to his horror that the man who extracted $600 in exchange for transport all the way to his village has disappeared. He tries to ask what happened but is silenced and told to hand over his phone unless he wants it tossed into the water.
“No questions!” the captain screams at him. “Do you want to live or die?”
Jum spends the journey relentlessly scanning the water for lights from border patrol vessels that could catch them as the boat is slammed by waves powerful enough to capsize it. He doesn’t relax until he touches Indonesian sand.
He is safe. But he also is broke, and his family remains thousands of miles away. He looks for work, but no one will hire him without proper identification papers — his Indonesian ID card, which says he is 32, expired years ago – so he relies on strangers for food and shelter.
After a stretch of silence, Jum finally reaches out to the AP again – crying, wracked with hunger. The AP asks if he wants to be put in touch with the local International Organization for Migration office, which takes him to a shelter and designates him as a victim of trafficking. He is quarantined due to a mounting number of coronavirus cases until at last — three months after fleeing his plantation — he is placed on a plane home.
His excitement at seeing his family is muted by the humiliation he feels returning empty-handed after working on the plantation for seven years. But it doesn’t matter to them.
“For my parents, the most important thing was that I came back home safe and healthy,” he says. “I felt so relieved when my feet stepped back in my home village. It’s a great relief, like someone who just escaped punishment. … I feel like a free man!”
With just an elementary school education, Jum’s only job now is tending a neighbor’s rice fields for almost no money. It’s a problem many migrant workers face: Are their families better off when they’re away? At least then there’s one less mouth to feed, and they’re able to send a little cash home.
Brokers often jump on those who have returned home to such little opportunity, trying to lure them away again with renewed promises of riches.
So it’s no surprise when the phone call comes from an agent in Malaysia who already has obtained Jum’s new number.
Come back, the agent assures him. Things will be better this time. Just come back.
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4 Wounded in Paris Knife Attack, Suspect Arrested
Paris police say a suspect believed to have wounded four people in a knife attack near the former offices of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo has been arrested.A Paris police official said that while authorities initially thought two attackers were involved, they now believe it was only one person, who was detained near the Bastille plaza in eastern Paris.
It is unclear what motivated the attack Friday or whether it had any link to Charlie Hebdo, which moved offices after they were attacked by Islamic extremists in 2015.
Police did not release the identities of the attackers or the wounded, who include two people in “absolutely urgent” condition, the official said. The official was not authorized to be publicly named.
Prime Minister Jean Castex cut short a visit to a suburb north of Paris to head to the Interior Ministry to follow developments.
The trial in the Charlie Hebdo attacks is currently underway across town. Murmurs broke at the terrorism trial of 14 people, including 3 fugitives, accused of helping the attackers in the January 2015 killings, as the news filtered through.
The widows of the Charlie Hebdo attackers are scheduled to testify Friday afternoon.
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Louisville Protests for Second Night After Grand Jury Decision in Breonna Taylor Case
Protests erupted for a second night Thursday in Louisville, Kentucky, in the aftermath of a grand jury’s decision not to bring homicide charges against any of the three white police officers who carried out a drug raid that led to the shooting death last March of Breonna Taylor, a Black woman who was an emergency medical worker.Demonstrators took to Louisville’s downtown streets Thursday night to express their anger and frustration with the grand jury’s decision. Some protesters smashed windows. Police said at least 24 people were arrested.More than 100 protesters took refuge in the First Unitarian Church after the start of a night-time curfew.Earlier Thursday, there were some tense moments when a group of armed white people confronted the protesters, but no shots were fired.Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer said at a news conference Thursday, “What do we do with this pain?” The mayor added that there is “no easy answer to that question.”Taylor was killed when police entered her apartment on a “no-knock” drug raid, authorized to allow police to burst into a dwelling without warning to keep evidence from being destroyed.However, Kentucky Attorney General Daniel Cameron said Wednesday that a neighbor of Taylor’s heard police announce their presence before entering Taylor’s apartment and that their entry was not deemed a “no-knock” raid.Cameron said the officers “were justified in their use of force” after Taylor’s boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, who says he heard no announcement by the police, opened fire at them first when they entered the apartment, thinking they were intruders.No drugs were found in Taylor’s apartment.Attention is being focused on Taylor’s shooting and other cases following the death earlier this year of George Floyd, a Black man who died while in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Floyd’s death sparked protests around the world about social injustice.
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North Korea Apologizes for Killing of a South Korean Official
South Korea said on Friday that North Korea’s leader has apologized for the killing of a South Korean official.Yonhap news agency quotes the South’s presidential palace as saying Kim Jong Un called the incident “unexpected” and “unfortunate,” and apologized “for disappointing President Moon and South Koreans.”The North’s approach was extremely unusual. No North Korean leader has apologized to the South on any issue before.On Thursday, the 47-year-old South Korean fisheries official who had been reported missing on Monday was interrogated in the North’s waters before being shot dead and his body cremated, the South’s military said, adding that the reason the man was shot remained unknown.”Our military strongly condemns such an atrocity, and strongly demands North Korea provide an explanation and punish those who are responsible,” General Ahn Young-ho from South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said.South Korean military said the man had disappeared from a patrol boat and he was likely trying to defect to the North.
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Why is Italy Seeing Fewer COVID Cases Than Its Neighbors?
Coronavirus cases are surging across most of Europe. France, Spain and Britain are seeing precipitous increases. But some countries, notably Italy and Germany, have yet to see a second wave of the pandemic, although their numbers are also rising, but far less steeply.In the past two weeks, Italy recorded slightly fewer than 35 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants, compared to nearly 315 in Spain, around 200 in France, and 76.5 in Britain, where the number of people testing positive for the coronavirus is now almost three times as many as at the end of August, according to British government data.Italy was the first European nation to be struck by the coronavirus pandemic and suffered one of the world’s worst death tolls earlier this year. But the rolling average of new cases in Italy the past week has remained at just under 1,500 infections a day. In Britain, it is nearly 4,000 a day, and more than 10,000 in both France and Spain.For British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, the reason for Britain’s big surge in infections is because it is a “freedom-loving country.” Britons are less inclined to follow government-dictated rules voluntarily, he noted this week. But he is now urging them to do so, with the added incentive of tough fines if they fail to comply.Johnson’s comments that the British are more liberty-loving than Italians or Germans prompted outrage in Italy.“Italians also love freedom. But we also care about seriousness,” Italian President Sergio Mattarella said.But many public health officials and infectious disease experts say there is, in fact, little evidence that Italians or Germans have been any better at voluntarily observing mask-wearing rules than the British, French or Spanish, especially when it comes to the young.Disdain for pandemic rules was evident among young Italians this summer. In Lazio villages and towns surrounding Rome, and further afield in Umbria and Marche, traditional piazza gatherings outside bars for an evening aperitivo were full of young people with masks pulled down, despite their close proximity to each other, VOA found on several trips over the past three months.“The clock stopped for us for months,” Paolo, 25, an unemployed college graduate, told VOA. “No longer,” he added, downing a beer in a village square in Sutri, half an hour’s drive from Rome.In northern Lazio in August, frustrated town mayors and the provincial president of Viterbo issued a joint statement urging citizens to obey the rules, warning that police had been instructed to enforce mask-wearing and social-distancing regulations.“There is no evidence that individual and social behaviors like the use of masks, social distancing or no gatherings have been better in Italy than elsewhere,” Dr. Nino Cartabellotta, a leading public health expert, told digital news website The Local this week.Other experts disagree and maintain voluntary compliance has been higher in Italy than many other European countries, especially in large cities in the north of the country, which were especially hard-hit by the pandemic earlier in the year.Either way, Italian police are ready to enforce the rules more rigorously than their counterparts in Britain, who have been reluctant to do so on grounds that they do not have the workforce.On Monday, Italy’s Interior Ministry announced that police had carried out more than 50,000 checks nationwide on people to ensure they were observing rules and visited nearly 5,000 businesses to ensure compliance with pandemic protocols.More than 200 people were fined by police for non-compliance. Three companies were ordered to shut.Early lockdown, states of emergencyAside from more rigorous police enforcement, many infectious disease experts suspect Italy is seeing a slower uptick in cases largely because it is reaping the benefits of ordering a nationwide lockdown earlier than other European countries, and because the government has reopened far more gradually and cautiously than its neighbors.Many restrictions are still in place or are reintroduced quickly when case numbers warrant. Italian authorities closed schools much quicker than other European countries earlier in the year, and they have been much slower in reopening them.In mid-August as confirmed case numbers climbed, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte moved quickly to shutter bars and nightclubs.Italy’s central government has been able to move quicker than some other European governments when pandemic circumstances warrant it, largely due to state-of-emergency powers that allow Conte to rule by decree. The government secured parliamentary approval for a six-month state of emergency on January 31, when the first two cases of coronavirus were confirmed in Rome.In July, the state of emergency was extended to the end of October, and Conte has made it clear he is ready to ask Parliament for another extension of special powers, which make it easier for ministers and regional governors to declare red zones, close businesses and direct more resources to hospitals.Emergency powers allowed the government to move quickly last month to require Italian vacationers returning from viral hot spots overseas to undergo coronavirus tests on arrival at airports and seaports or within 72 hours after arriving at their homes.Contact tracingExperts also credit the slower uptick in case numbers in Italy to better contact tracing and ensuring that self-isolation requirements are observed.Italy is testing about 100,000 people a day, far fewer than Britain, which is testing around 250 million daily. But Italian authorities have been more effective in tracing the contacts of those infected, said Italy’s deputy health minister, Pierpaolo Sileri. He credits Italy’s testing and tracing system in helping to avoid the dramatic resurgence of the virus seen elsewhere in Europe.Italian government officials say more than two-thirds of Italians who tested positive for the coronavirus in the past few weeks took tests not because they had symptoms but because they were identified through contact tracing.Track and trace in Italy is the responsibility of local and regional health authorities — a far more decentralized approach than that adopted in Britain, whose centralized system has struggled to trace the contacts of those infected.According to Bing Jones, a doctor in the English town of Sheffield who is involved in test and tracing, few contacts are identified.“We probably are at less than 10% and falling,” he told Britain’s Independent newspaper.Germany’s test-and-trace method is also managed at local and regional levels and being credited with helping to keep a viral resurgence at bay. According to a recent study of Britain’s Imperial College, an effective testing and tracing system can reduce the reproduction rate of the virus by around a quarter.Italian and German public health officials warn that their countries are unlikely to escape a second wave of the pandemic. They just hope they can do a good job subduing it more quickly.
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Lawmakers Criticize Changes at US International Broadcasting Networks
U.S. Agency for Global Media CEO Michael Pack is the first presidential appointee to serve in a new position created by Congress to modernize U.S.-funded broadcasting efforts worldwide. Since taking charge in June, the U.S. international broadcasting CEO has drawn bi-partisan criticism for removing agency broadcasting chiefs and initiating a security review that resulted in some foreign Voice of America journalists losing their visas. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson reports.
Camera: Adam Greenbaum, Independent support group @VOAJournalists
Produced by: Katherine Gypson, Victoria Sneden and Tressie Rhodes
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British Bars, Restaurants Close Early to Curb Virus Surge
Last call came early Thursday at pubs and bars in England and Wales, as Britain tightened the rules to try to curb a coronavirus surge.The new restrictions, announced Tuesday by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, mean that any establishment serving food or drink must close by 10 p.m. (2100 GMT).The new rules apply in Scotland from Friday, while Northern Ireland is still considering a curfew.British pubs traditionally close at 11 p.m. But some stay open later, depending on their location and the day.”I don’t think it’s gonna help, it’s too little too late, as usual,” Joyce, a skeptical drinker in her 50s at a pub in the East London neighborhood of Dalston, told AFP.”You’re just displacing the problem,” she said.Britain announced 6,634 new cases Thursday, the biggest daily number since the pandemic began. Britain is performing about 220,000 tests a day.Across the English Chanel, European Union health officials urged member states Thursday to “act decisively” to put in place and utilize measures to stop the spread of the coronavirus and a potential surge in cases like the one earlier this year that prompted widespread lockdowns.“We are at a decisive moment. All member states must be ready to roll out control measures, immediately and at the right time, at the very first sign of potential new outbreaks,” said Stella Kyriakides, commissioner for health and food safety. She added, “This might be our last chance to prevent a repeat of last spring.”More than 3 million cases have been reported across the EU and Britain since the pandemic began, according to the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control.Kyriakides noted some EU countries are experiencing higher numbers of new infections than they had in March at the peak of the outbreak in the region, saying, “It is abundantly clear that this crisis is not behind us.”France’s health ministry reported Thursday the number of people hospitalized in intensive care units due to the coronavirus surpassed 1,000 for the first time since early June.In the Netherlands, health officials said Thursday the number of new infections rose to 2,544, a record high for a single day.Poland’s health ministry also reported a record daily rise in cases and attributed the trend to people making more contact with others after restrictions were lifted.Sweden, which opted not to put in place many of the stricter coronavirus lockdown measures seen elsewhere in Europe, is experiencing a situation Prime Minister Stefan Lofven called worrying.”The caution that existed in the spring has more and more been replaced by hugs, parties, bus trips in rush hour traffic, and an everyday life that, for many, seems to return to normal,” Lofven told reporters.He said people will be glad about the right steps they take now and suffer later for what is done wrong.Lofven urged people to follow social distancing guidelines and hygiene measures, and said, if necessary, the government would introduce new measures to stop the spread of the virus.A similar message about the need for continued vigilance and good practices came Thursday from Indonesia’s COVID-19 task force as that country saw another record increase in new cases. COVID-19 is the illness caused by the coronavirus.”Over time, we’ve seen that the people have lowered their guards,” task force spokesman Wiku Adisasmito told reporters. “It’s almost like they don’t have empathy even when they see every day so many new victims.”The governor of the capital, Jakarta, extended coronavirus restrictions there until October 11 in order to help hospitals cope with demand.In Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Thursday that the country is returning to a full lockdown, effective Friday, and lasting for two weeks as its infection rate spirals out of control.Schools, entertainment venues and most businesses will be closed, while restaurants will be limited to delivering food. Residents will be required to stay within 500 to 1,000 meters of their homes, except for work and shopping for food and medicine, while outdoor gatherings will be strictly limited to 20 people.
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US House Democrats Crafting New $2.2 Trillion COVID-19 Relief Package
Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives are working on a $2.2 trillion coronavirus stimulus package that could be voted on next week, a key lawmaker said Thursday, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi reiterated that she is ready to negotiate with the White House.With formal COVID-19 relief talks stalled for nearly seven weeks, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Richard Neal said new legislative efforts got under way this week after Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said in congressional testimony that lawmakers needed to provide further support for an economy reeling from the pandemic.”The contours are already there. I think now it’s about time frame and things like that,” Neal told reporters when asked about the potential for new legislation.He predicted a vote could come within days.”I assume, since the House is scheduled to break for the election cycle, then I think next week’s … appropriate,” said Neal, adding that Pelosi would determine when a legislative package might be introduced.House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy dismissed the new initiative as partisan. Pelosi also faces pressure from moderate House Democrats who say they want to see bipartisan aid proposals that have a chance of becoming law.”If it’s a messaging exercise, it’s worthless,” Rep. Dean Phillips, a freshman Democrat from Minnesota, told CNN. He said the effort risked looking like Senate Republicans who had unsuccessfully pushed their own partisan coronavirus aid bill.”Many of us are getting sick of that,” Phillips said.Stocks reacting positively to the announcements from Congress, with the S&P reaching a session high shortly after, before paring some gains.Formal talks between Pelosi, Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows broke down without a deal on August 7, with the two sides far apart. Pelosi and Mnuchin have since spoken by phone.”We’re ready for negotiation,” Pelosi told reporters Thursday, saying she had last spoken to Mnuchin on Wednesday.Pelosi and Schumer, who initially sought a $3.4 trillion relief package, have since scaled back their demands to $2.2 trillion. Neal said a new legislative package would be somewhere near $2.2 trillion. Some media reports said it could be $2.4 trillion.But it was not clear whether the White House would agree to such a sum. Meadows has said that Trump would be willing to sign a $1.3 trillion relief package.Meanwhile, Senate Republicans, who have not been involved directly in the negotiations, initially proposed a $1 trillion bill, which was rejected by many Republicans who thought it too large and by Senate Democrats who said it was too small.Senate Republicans later tried and failed to bring a smaller $300 billion bill to the floor.
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Experts: China’s ‘Coercive’ Labor Policy Pushing Uighurs Out of Traditional Livelihoods
While more details are emerging about the alleged coercive labor of Uighurs and other minorities in Xinjiang region, some China observers say Beijing’s efforts are strategically calculated to change the traditional livelihood of rural residents by pushing them off the land into state-controlled wage-earner jobs.China last Thursday published Employment and Labor Rights in Xinjiang, detailing its “poverty alleviation efforts” that human rights groups have branded as forced labor.The white paper said that every year, from 2014 to 2019, government-run “vocational training” projects provided training sessions to an average of 1.29 million urban and rural workers, of which 451,400 were in southern Xinjiang where more than 80% of the local population are Uighurs. It claimed that of the 103,300 farmers and herders from southern Xinjiang’s Hotan prefecture, 98,300 of them found work thanks to the training program.FILE – Chinese flags line on a road leading to a facility believed to be a re-education camp where mostly Muslim ethnic minorities are detained, on the outskirts of Hotan in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region, May 31, 2019.To increase the level of employment in the long run, the paper proposed to “change people’s outdated mindset” in the region. It further said that local authorities in Xinjiang have turned to a policy of encouraging “surplus rural labor” to work in or near their hometowns.According to Adrian Zenz, a senior research fellow in China studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, the publication last week was the first official admission by China that its abuses of Muslim minorities included forced labor. The policy, he said, aims to convert Uighur pastoralists and farmers to wage laborers.”It puts them into closed labor environments where the state has far more control over them and often removes them from their families, promoting intergenerational separation and more state control over the next generation (which grows up in boarding schools),” Zenz told VOA.A similar policy has been implemented in Tibet, where thousands of residents dubbed “surplus laborers” were uprooted from their rural lands into state-run training centers.”In the first seven months of 2020, the region had trained over half a million rural surplus laborers through this policy. This scheme encompasses Tibetans of all ages and covers the entire region,” he said.Unlike Kazakh and Kyrgyz ethnics who mostly have nomadic lifestyles in Xinjiang, Uighurs are primarily identified with their settled peasantry and traditional handcraftsmanship.FILE – Watchtowers are seen on a high-security facility near what is believed to be a re-education camp where mostly Muslim ethnic minorities are detained, on the outskirts of Hotan, in China’s northwestern Xinjiang region, May 30, 2019.According to the 2000 Chinese government census, 80.56% of the Uighurs are considered rural population working as farmers and herders. The remaining 19.44% of them are urban dwellers with more diverse occupations ranging from traditional handcrafters and small-business vendors to restaurant owners and government employees.China since 2016 has faced international condemnation for cracking down on minorities in Xinjiang, and the detention of 1 million to 1.8 million of them under harsh conditions. Rights organizations say the indigenous people are also exposed to coercive birth prevention, political indoctrination, enforced disappearances, comprehensive surveillance and destruction of their cultural sites.The Chinese government, however, is rejecting the accusations, saying it is running a “transformation-through-education centers” campaign in Xinjiang. Chinese officials have called the camps “vocational training” facilities for people who were exposed to “ideas of extremism and terrorism.” In other occasions, the officials have said the camps teach the people skills needed to undertake new jobs. US actionOn Tuesday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted 406-3 in favor of the “Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act,” a bill that bars all goods from Xinjiang because of coerced labor concerns. If enacted into law, the bill will put greater responsibility on companies to prove that their products have not been made with forced labor in a region that produces nearly 85% of China’s cotton.FILE – Foreign Ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin gestures for questions during the daily briefing in Beijing, July 23, 2020.”Xinjiang affairs are purely China’s internal affairs. The U.S. is in no position and has no right to interfere. The issue of ‘forced labor’ is a lie made by some institutions and people of the U.S. and some Western countries,” China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Wang Wenbin said Wednesday.Wang said the bill is seeking to hamper the progress his government has made in the region while encouraging ethnic division.Demographic changeEthnic conflict between Uighurs and Han Chinese in Xinjiang has been rising in recent years as Uighurs accuse the Chinese government of using economic development programs in Xinjiang to encourage a huge influx of majority Han migrants to the region. The proportion of Han in the region has reportedly risen from nearly 9% in 1945 to about 40% today, triggering among Uighurs the fear of a demographic change in their areas.FILE – A mural showing Uighur and Han Chinese men and women carrying the national flag of China decorates the wall of a home at the Unity New Village in Hotan, in western China’s Xinjiang region, Sept. 20, 2018.According to James Millward, a professor of Chinese history at Georgetown University, many Uighurs were engaged in entrepreneurship in the past, including running small businesses in cities across Xinjiang or elsewhere in China. However, these options have been more difficult for them in recent years because of increased police persecution, discrimination in eastern Chinese cities, and being forced out of Xinjiang’s capital, Urumqi.”The recent white paper is celebrating the fact that 70 years after taking over control of the region, the CCP now is attempting to train and employ poor people through internment and coercive means, having failed for decades to address discrimination against Uighurs by the Xinjiang Production Construction Corps (86% Han, 90% funded by Beijing) or provide free education to some of its poorest citizens,” Millward told VOA.Xinjiang Production Construction Corps (XPCC), or Bingtuan in Chinese, was founded in 1954 by the Chinese Liberation Army after the CCP took over Xinjiang in 1949. XPCC is a hybrid organization of military structure and business enterprise with independent administrative authority over a dozen cities, divisions and regimental farms in Xinjiang.The U.S. government this July announced sanctions on XPCC for its direct involvement in human rights abuses in Xinjiang. Washington also designated Chen Quanguo, the current first party secretary of the XPCC, along with two other former and current top commanders of the XPCC, for their connection to human rights abuse in the region.
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Lawmakers Criticize Trump Administration Changes at US-funded Media Networks
U.S. lawmakers from both parties said Thursday that they feared the Voice of America and other U.S.-funded broadcasters were at risk of losing credibility with foreign audiences because of actions by new CEO Michael Pack.Pack, the first presidential appointee to serve in a new position that Congress created to streamline and modernize U.S.-funded broadcasting efforts, has faced bipartisan criticism for his actions since taking charge in June.Thursday’s hearing was the first time that lawmakers have had the opportunity to publicly examine Pack’s changes at the U.S. Agency for Global Media, the parent agency of VOA, Radio Free Asia, and other U.S.-funded broadcasters.Pack said he had a scheduling conflict and could not attend, despite a subpoena from House Foreign Affairs Chairman Eliot Engel, a Democrat from New York.”He has shown tremendous disrespect for the committee, our committee, and its role overseeing USAGM. He’s the wrong person for the job. He should resign. And if he doesn’t, the president should fire him,” Engel said.Audience of 350 millionUSAGM’s annual budget of around $800 million funds news programming that each week reaches an estimated 350 million people in 62 languages.Representative Michael McCaul of Texas, the ranking Republican on the committee, said Pack’s decision to not attend “ignored the will of Congress.”McCaul singled out USAGM’s decision to freeze $18 million in funding to the Open Technology Fund (OTF) as a particularly dangerous decision.“I believe his actions damaged support during the height of unrest in Hong Kong. And they are continuing to do so today in Belarus. Their tragic lack of support to freedom and democracy movements is also regrettable,” McCaul said Thursday.FILE – Michael Pack is seen at his confirmation hearing, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Sept. 19, 2019. Pack’s nomination to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media was confirmed June 4, 2020.Since arriving at the agency, Pack has fired the heads of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Radio Free Asia and the Middle East Broadcasting Network; attempted to replace the board of the Open Technology Fund, a group that uses federal grants to promote internet freedom technologies; and has not renewed J-1 visas for international journalists.Review of renewalsUSAGM announced a review of the J-1 renewal process in early July, resulting in work permits expiring for several foreign journalists working in VOA’s language divisions. At least five have left the United States.Witnesses at Thursday’s hearing included Grant Turner, the USAGM chief financial officer placed on administrative leave last month; Amanda Bennett, former VOA director, who resigned two days before Pack joined; Jamie Fly, former Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty president, who was dismissed by the incoming CEO; Karen Kornbluh, chair of the OTF’s board of directors; and Ryan Crocker, a former U.S. ambassador and board member of the OTF.They testified on how changes implemented since June affected the ability of the broadcasting networks to function and risked endangering the editorial firewall that shields the agency’s journalists from political interference in their reporting.FILE – Then-U.S. Ambassador to Afghanistan Ryan Crocker speaks during a press conference at the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, Dec. 10, 2011.“I am very worried that the cracks in the firewall are going to just destroy the whole image of USAGM,” said Crocker, who has served as the top U.S. diplomat in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Syria, Kuwait and Lebanon. “Our reputation for telling the truth has been a core element of our strength as a nation. Now, it is in danger, putting at risk not only our national values, but also our national security.”Witnesses said apparent firewall violations include the request to place editorials on the entities’ homepages; attempts by USAGM to attend editorial meetings on U.S. election coverage; the removal of Steven Springer, VOA’s standards editor; mass firings of agency heads; the nonrenewal of J-1 visas; and Pack’s statements in radio interviews that the agency would be “a great place to put a spy.”Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle and witnesses said those comments could endanger agency journalists.’Incredibly dangerous’“It’s incredibly dangerous for the USAGM head to start basically writing a press release that the Kremlin can then turn around and use the next week about USAGM journalists,” Fly said.Turner also raised concerns about damage to the credibility of the network, telling the committee, “Nothing in my 17 years comes even close to the gross mismanagement, the abuse of authority, the violations of law that have occurred since Michael Pack assumed the role of CEO at USAGM.”Pack, a former independent film and television producer and head of a conservative foundation, has defended his actions in interviews and in communications with USAGM staff, saying he wants to protect the agency’s editorial independence and make it more effective in achieving its mission.Pack has also said that government audits revealed serious, yearslong security problems that were left unaddressed by the agency’s previous leaders.In his confirmation hearing last September, Pack pledged to uphold U.S. law mandating VOA’s editorial independence.“The whole agency rests on the belief reporters are independent, that no political influence is telling them how to report the news,” Pack told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.Pack’s two-year confirmation process in the Senate ended up in a partisan battle after Senate Democrats alleged he misused funds for his documentary production company. However, Senate Republicans praised his experience as a filmmaker and former media executive.FILE – Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa, speaks during a House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing Sept. 16, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington.’Poor vetting procedures’On Thursday, Republican Representative Scott Perry of Pennsylvania defended Pack’s actions, pointing to a recently released Office of Personnel Management (OPM) report that found 40% of the agency’s staff had been improperly vetted over the past 10 years.“The reforms undertaken by Mr. Pack have undergone a significant amount of public scrutiny, as they should,” Perry said. “But USAGM’s poor vetting procedures over those last decades continue to threaten U.S. national security, and it’s entirely the fault of those who mismanaged the process.”Perry also criticized practices by OTF, which he said presented security risks and a misuse of government funds.Kornbluh disputed Perry’s comments.“I believe that the congressman has been misinformed,” she said. “The security claims are just not true.”Kornbluh said the funding freeze had caused OTF to halt 49 of its 60 ongoing internet freedom programs.Several committee members questioned the witnesses about the impact of Pack’s comments about spies within the agency.“Mr. Pack, without evidence, has made libelous claims, really, that were these journalists to go get a job somewhere else in another country, could threaten not only their livelihoods, but their safety,” Democratic Representative Joaquin Castro of Texas said.Who will trust them?“When somebody from the United States government has labeled a journalist a spy, who is going to go trust them in another country? Who is going to go hire them somewhere else? This man has acted incredibly recklessly, and even for that alone, he should be dismissed from his job,” Castro said.Fly made recommendations for ways to rein in the CEO’s powers, suggesting Congress pass new international broadcasting legislation to clarify the roles of the networks and how best to explain U.S. foreign policy to audiences.Lawmakers pledged to continue oversight of U.S. international broadcasting even as Congress deals with a myriad of issues related to the upcoming election and the pandemic.VOA’s Jessica Jerreat contributed to this report.
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Cameroon Journalists Say They Are Regularly Abused, Brutalized
Cameroon’s journalism association has called on authorities to immediately and unconditionally release journalists detained while covering anti-government protests this week.Police detained at least eight journalists covering Tuesday’s protests, searched the homes of four of them, and seized or destroyed their equipment. At least one journalist was still in custody Thursday.Tah Javis Mai, a freelance journalist, returned Thursday to his office in the English-speaking southwestern Cameroon town of Buea. Mai said he was arrested by police in the French-speaking coastal city of Douala on Tuesday while reporting on protests against President Paul Biya.”The men in uniform asked that why am I using my phone to film them,” Mai said in a telephone call from Buea. “I said I am on a Skype call. They took us to that brigade in Bonaberi. One drinking alcohol poured the whiskey on me. He asked me to drink, and I refused. He poured it on my head. We were in an airtight cell. A cell for about two people, we were 15 in number with no food. Our phones were confiscated. They took everything from us.” Mai said he was forced to sit on the ground for seven hours. He said he was released at 6 p.m. Wednesday after pressure from journalism associations and several international rights groups. Jude Viban, president of the Cameroon Association of English-Speaking Journalists, said Mai was arrested with seven other reporters in Yaounde and Douala.Those arrested included My Media Prime TV cameraman Tebong Christian, cameraman Rodrigue Ngassi of Equinox TV, Lindovi Ndjio of La Nouvelle Expression, and Polycarpe Essomba, Cameroon correspondent of RFI.”We have strongly condemned the arrest of our colleagues who went out to report and not to support the protest, and they were picked up arbitrarily and detained in facilities without communication, without access to their lawyers, without access to their colleagues,” Viban said. “This is terrible for our democracy and, unfortunately, it keeps happening. It is a very difficult period to be a journalist in Cameroon.” On Thursday, the National Syndicate of Cameroon Journalists reported that the homes of four journalists were searched by police. The report said phones, recorders and computers were seized. Rights activist Andelbert Mvomo said Cameroon is becoming notorious for its abuses on journalists, including beatings and rights violations. Such acts, he said, soil Cameroon’s image and disgrace its people.Cameroonian police and the minister of territorial administration did not react to the accusations when contacted by VOA. The Committee to Protect Journalists said Thursday that police were still holding one of the arrested journalists, Lindovi Ndjio. Samuel WaziziCPJ said it has not forgotten what happened to journalist Samuel Wazizi, who died in police custody in August 2019 but whose body has yet to be seen. The military said it was keeping Wazizi’s body for investigations.
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US-China-Russia Rift Simmers at UN
The growing rift between the United States and China and Russia was clearly evident on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly Thursday, threatening to overshadow international cooperation on the coronavirus response.This year’s assembly has been held online because of the pandemic, and its focus has been on confronting COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, through effective multilateral action.At a side event in the Security Council meant to complement that theme, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres expressed concern that the pandemic is unfolding against a backdrop of “high geopolitical tensions.”“The pandemic is a clear test of international cooperation, a test we have essentially failed,” Guterres told the videoconference of the U.N.’s most powerful body. Those tensions were on display in the council, as the foreign ministers of China and Russia referenced their divisions with the United States.Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is seen on a computer monitor at U.N. headquarters as he speaks during a virtual Security Council meeting during the 75th session of the U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 24, 2020.“In such a challenging moment, major countries are even more duty-bound to put the future of humankind first, discard Cold War mentality and ideological bias, and come together in the spirit of partnership to tide over the difficulties,” said Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi.His Russian counterpart said differences between some nations have been reignited and heightened by the impact of the virus.Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov is seen on a computer monitor at U.N. headquarters as he speaks during the 75th session of the U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 24, 2020.“A number of countries are increasingly tempted to look abroad to find those who are responsible for their problems at home,” Sergey Lavrov said. “There are obvious attempts by individual states to use the current situation to promote self-serving and fleeting interests and to settle scores with unwanted governments or geopolitical rivals.”Some U.S. allies were also seemingly critical of the United States and the Trump administration.Potential for cooperation“We need to refocus on the positive potential of cooperation instead of on putting our own countries first,” said German State Minister Niels Annen. “If one of us fails, all of us fail.”U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft was blunt in return, telling the entire council, “Shame on each of you” for focusing on “political grudges.” She zeroed in on China and reiterated President Donald Trump’s strong stance that Beijing should be held accountable as the source of the pandemic.U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Kelly Craft is seen on a computer monitor at U.N. headquarters as she speaks during the 75th session of the U.N. General Assembly, Sept. 24, 2020.“The actions of the Chinese Communist Party prove that not all member states are equally committed to public health, transparency and their international obligations,” she said. “This fact should deeply trouble all of the responsible nations of the world who are working in good faith to defeat COVID-19 and keep future pandemics from emerging.”China’s U.N. Ambassador Zhang Jun fired back, telling Craft, “Enough is enough.” Acknowledging that his country was the first “to be hit” by the virus, he said it had made a great contribution to the global response.He noted the U.S. has nearly 7 million of the world’s almost 32 million confirmed virus cases, and 200,000 deaths.“The U.S. should understand that its failure in handling COVID-19 is totally its own fault,” Zhang said.Rising tensions between Washington and Beijing have been evident this week, in both the speeches of their leaders to the General Assembly and on the sidelines.China targeted on virusOn Tuesday, Trump told the assembly that Beijing should be “held accountable” for having a domestic lockdown in the earliest days of the virus but allowing air travel from China to continue “and infect the world.”U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also took aim at China this week, saying the administration is in the process of determining how to label Beijing’s repression of Uighur Muslims — as “crimes against humanity” or “genocide.” Such terms carry enormous weight in international law and relations.In remarks directed at Washington, China’s President Xi Jinping denounced efforts to politicize or stigmatize the virus.
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Bipartisan Backlash Confronts Trump’s Hedge on Committing to Peaceful Transfer of Power
White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany sought Thursday to quell a bipartisan backlash after President Donald Trump hedged on committing to a peaceful transfer of power after the November 3 election. “The president will accept the results of a free and fair election,” she told reporters when asked about the president’s comment the previous evening in the same briefing room. “He will accept the will of the American people.” McEnany then stated that Democrats should be asked the same question and she reiterated Trump “wants to get rid of mass mail-out voting.” White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany speaks during a news conference at the White House, Sept. 24, 2020.”We’re going to have to see what happens,” said the president in response to a reporter’s question during a White House news conference late Wednesday. ”I’ve been complaining very strongly about the ballots and the ballots are a disaster.” Trump, without evidence, has repeatedly predicted massive fraud with tens of millions of mail-in ballots, which Democrats have encouraged amid the coronavirus pandemic. “We want to have — get rid of the ballots,” continued the president, explaining if that happens “there won’t be a transfer, frankly; there’ll be a continuation.” Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., speaks during a news conference on Capitol Hill, Sept. 24, 2020.Senator Bernie Sanders, in a speech, said Trump “is prepared to undermine American democracy in order to stay in power.” Sanders, a Democratic presidential candidate in 2016 and 2020, said, “the American people, no matter what their political persuasion, must make it clear that American democracy will not be destroyed.” Biden also responded to Trump’s remarks late Wednesday. “What country are we in? I’m being facetious,” said the former vice president. “I said what country are we in? Look, he says the most irrational things. I don’t know what to say.” FILE – Democratic presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden departs after voting early in Delaware’s state primary election at the New Castle County Board of Elections office, in Wilmington, Delaware, Sept. 14, 2020.One of the country’s oldest constitutional rights groups also weighed in. “The peaceful transfer of power is essential to a functioning democracy. This statement from the president of the United States should trouble every American,” said David Cole, the national legal director of the American Civil Liberties Union. Supreme CourtEarlier Wednesday, Trump said he thinks the November election “will end up in the Supreme Court and I think it’s very important that we have nine justices.” The president plans to announce on Saturday his Supreme Court nominee to fill the seat of liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg who died this past Friday. If the Senate confirms the president’s nominee before the election, that would give the conservative wing a 6-3 majority on the court. “This scam that the Democrats are pulling, it’s a scam, the scam will be before the United States Supreme Court, and I think having a 4-4 situation is not a good situation,” Trump said. Mail-in ballotsThe president has repeatedly expressed concern about plans by a number of states, including California, Colorado, Hawaii, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, Utah, Vermont and Washington, to automatically dispatch mail-in ballots to all state residents for the election. Benjamin Ginsberg, a top election lawyer who has represented four Republican presidential candidates, has been quoted this month saying Trump’s prediction of fraud with such ballots lacks evidence. “The president’s words make his and the Republican Party’s rhetoric look less like sincere concern — and more like transactional hypocrisy designed to provide an electoral advantage,” Ginsberg wrote in a Washington Post opinion article. “And they come as Republicans trying to make their cases in courts must deal with the basic truth that four decades of dedicated investigation have produced only isolated incidents of election fraud.” VOA’s Patsy Widakuswara contributed to this report from Wilmington, Delaware.
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Zimbabwe’s Rescued Wildlife Joins Jerusalema Dance Challenge
As the Jerusalema dance challenge sweeps across Africa, in Zimbabwe the wildlife are joining in. Staff at a Zimbabwe sanctuary for rescued wildlife have seen their online dance video with elephants, giraffes and other animals go viral. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Harare.Camera: Blessing Chigwenhembe Produced by: Jon Spier
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