The head of Germany’s infectious disease institute said Thursday that while the COVID-19 threat in the country remains high, and some hospitals are reaching capacity, he is cautiously optimistic. Speaking to reporters in Berlin, Lothar Wieler, president of Germany’s Robert Koch Institute for Infectious Diseases, said the nation as of early Thursday had recorded 21,866 new cases of coronavirus infections in the previous 24 hours. According to Johns Hopkins University, Germany has reported nearly 750,000 cases since the pandemic began and more than 12,000 deaths. Although infections continue to rise, he said, “what makes me cautiously optimistic is the fact that the number of cases has been increasing at a slightly slower rate for some days now. So, the curve is going up a little less steeply — it is flattening out.” FILE – A nurse treats a patient with COVID-19 in the intensive care unit of Bethel Hospital in Berlin, Germany, Nov. 11, 2020.Wieler said he did not know if that was a stable development that can continue. But he insisted it shows “we are not helplessly at the mercy of the virus,” and measures the government has taken do make a difference. On November 2, Germany implemented a four-week partial shutdown to bring the rate of new infections under control. Restaurants, bars, sports and leisure facilities have closed, but schools and nonessential shops remain open. Wieler noted that the number of COVID-19 patients in intensive care has doubled in the past two weeks. He added that the situation is likely to worsen before it improves. “It is possible that patients may no longer be able to receive optimal care everywhere,” he said. “We must therefore prevent the situation from worsening further. That is my expectation, and we are doing everything we can to achieve this goal.” Wieler said that nearly half of hospitals responding to his institute are reporting limited availability of ventilator treatment, mostly because of staffing issues caused by infections or quarantine. Although Germany has enough beds and ventilators available nationwide, many German hospitals are currently “working at the limits of their capacity,” said Uwe Janssens, president of Germany’s Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine. Janssens described a shortage of medical personnel trained to provide anesthesia- and ventilation-based treatments as a “key problem.” “Where it is medically justified, procedures must be halted and postponed,” Janssens said, encouraging medical facilities’ need to conserve resources.
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Month: November 2020
Harvard Cleared of Racial Bias in Admissions
Harvard does not discriminate against Asian American applicants, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday in a decision that offers relief to other colleges that consider race in admissions but also sets the stage for a potential review by an increasingly conservative U.S. Supreme Court.The decision came from two judges on the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Boston who rejected claims from an anti-affirmative action group that accused the Ivy League university of imposing a “racial penalty” on Asian Americans. The judges upheld a previous ruling clearing Harvard of discrimination when choosing students.It delivers a blow to the suit’s plaintiff, Students for Fair Admissions, a nonprofit that aims to eliminate the use of race in college admissions. In a statement, the group’s president, Edward Blum, said he was disappointed but that “our hope is not lost.””This lawsuit is now on track to go up to the U.S. Supreme Court, where we will ask the justices to end these unfair and unconstitutional race-based admissions policies at Harvard and all colleges and universities,” Blum said.Both sides have been preparing for a possible review by the Supreme Court, and some legal scholars say the issue is ripe to be revisited.Race’s role in admissionsFiled in 2014, the lawsuit has revived a national debate about race’s role in college admissions. In multiple decisions spanning decades, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that colleges can consider race as a limited factor in order to promote campus diversity. But the practice faces mounting challenges in the courts, including three suits from Students for Fair Admissions.Many elite colleges consider applicants’ race and give an edge to some underrepresented students to promote diversity on campus. The Trump administration has opposed the practice and backed the lawsuit against Harvard. In October, the Justice Department filed a similar suit accusing Yale University of discriminating against Asian American and white applicants.In Thursday’s decision, however, the judges ruled that Harvard’s admissions process passes legal muster and aligns with requirements that the Supreme Court laid out in previous cases.”The issue before us is whether Harvard’s limited use of race in its admissions process in order to achieve diversity in the period in question is consistent with the requirements of Supreme Court precedent. There was no error,” the judges wrote.Blum, a legal strategist, has spent years working to rid racial considerations from college admissions. Before the Harvard case, he orchestrated an unsuccessful fight challenging the use of race at the University of Texas. In that case, a white student said she was rejected by the university because she was white.Several Asian American groups filed legal briefs supporting Harvard, while some others filed briefs backing the suit and alleging discrimination in Ivy League admissions.The suit alleges that Harvard’s admissions officers use a subjective “personal rating” to discriminate against Asian Americans who apply to the school. Using six years of admissions data, the group found that Asian American applicants were given the highest scores in an academic category but received the lowest scores on the personal rating.The group’s analysis found that Harvard accepted Asian Americans at lower rates than any other racial group, while giving preference to Black and Hispanic students with lower grades. The lawsuit also alleged that Harvard works to keep a consistent racial breakdown among new students, which the organization says amounts to illegal “racial balancing.”Statistically insignificant effect Harvard denies any discrimination and says it considers applicants’ race only in the narrow way approved by the U.S. Supreme Court. In close calls between students, some underrepresented students may get a “tip” in their favor, school officials have said, but students’ race is never counted against them.After a three-week trial that cast new light on Harvard’s secretive selection process, a federal judge ruled that other factors could explain why Asian Americans are admitted at lower rates than other students. In her 2019 ruling, District Judge Allison D. Burroughs said Harvard’s admissions process is “not perfect” but concluded that there was “no evidence of any racial animus whatsoever.”A three-judge panel of the appeals court heard arguments in September, but one of the judges, Juan Torruella, died in October before the case was decided. The ruling notes that Torruella heard oral arguments but did not participate in issuing the decision.The judges agreed with a district court finding that Harvard’s personal rating is not influenced by race. Although the rating may be correlated with race, the judges wrote, the link is more likely to be caused by outside factors including students’ personal essays or letters of recommendation.Ultimately, the judges wrote, Asian American identity has a statistically insignificant effect on admissions probability, and they concluded that Harvard does not place outsized emphasis on race.”Harvard has demonstrated that it values all types of diversity, not just racial diversity,” the judges wrote. “Harvard’s use of race in admissions is contextual and it does not consider race exclusively.”The decision received praise from the American Council on Education, an association of university presidents, which called it a “clear win” for Harvard and other universities.Some legal scholars, however, believe that the current makeup of the Supreme Court may be more likely to place tighter limits around the use of race in admissions or to forbid the practice entirely.The three Supreme Court justices appointed to the court by President Donald Trump have pushed the nation’s highest court more conservative than when it last ruled in favor of the consideration of race in college admissions in 2016.
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World Leaders, NGOs Press for Vaccine Cash at Paris Forum
European and world leaders Thursday insisted that when COVID-19 vaccines are ready they should be made available to everyone, under an international project that still needs $28 billion. “We aren’t going to beat the virus if we abandon part of humanity,” French President Emmanuel Macron told the Paris Peace Forum, which seeks concrete solutions to global issues. The third edition of the forum is dedicated to finding ways to ease the pain caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The three-day international conference aims to raise more than $500 million toward ensuring fair access to coronavirus tests, treatment and vaccines for all, including poor countries. European and world leaders attend The Paris Peace Forum at The Elysee Palace in Paris, Nov. 12, 2020.It takes place as the number of cases is increasing rapidly across Europe and beyond but with hopes rising for the rollout of a coronavirus vaccine, perhaps even before the end of the year, Top U.S. government scientist Anthony Fauci said Thursday the coronavirus vaccine “cavalry” was on its way, bringing fresh hope as the world registered more than 10,000 deaths in just 24 hours, a record. The world-leading expert on infectious diseases said that after this week’s much-trumpeted news that a vaccine developed by U.S. drug giant Pfizer and Germany’s BioNTech was 90% effective, another is “literally on the threshold of being announced.” ‘Financing gap’ During the online Paris forum, several countries are expected to announce funding for the so-called ACT-Accelerator, a mechanism led by the World Health Organization that aims to ensure access to tests, treatments and vaccines for all. In September, the United Nations estimated that the ACT-Accelerator had received only about $3 billion of the $38 billion needed to meet the goal of producing and delivering 2 billion vaccine doses, 245 million treatments and 500 million diagnostic tests over the next year. On Thursday, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that a “financing gap” of $28.5 billion remains and that $4.5 billion is urgently required “to maintain momentum.” “The international community must ensure that fair and equitable access to a vaccine is ensured for everyone,” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said. Chinese President Xi Jinping exhorted world leaders to “put human life above everything … and provide a targeted and concerted response” to the health crisis. Senegal’s President Macky Sall attends The Paris Peace Forum at The Elysee Palace in Paris, Nov. 12, 2020.Senegalese President Macky Sall asked for assurances that enough doses of a virus vaccine would be produced and would reach the poorest countries “which have the most need.” Senegal, a poor nation with a population of about 16 million people, has so far been spared a large coronavirus outbreak. Biggest public health effort in history Day one of the meeting saw France offer 100 million euros, with another 50 million euros pledged by Spain and 100 million euros from the European Commission. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation pledged $70 million, bringing its total donations to $226 million for the vaccine project. “We are talking about the largest public health effort in the history of the world and it won’t be unexpensive,” Melinda Gates said. The British government is also set to declare a contribution of one British pound for each $4 announced. Paris Forum members also promised the creation of a high-level expert panel that would curate all available science concerning the interactions between humans, animals and changes in the environment. “The pandemic showed us how much correlation there is between the health of humans, that of animals, and that of the planet,” German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas told the forum. At the finance part of the forum, a group of development banks pledged to refocus their investments to take into account climate and development targets set by the U.N. and the Paris accord of 2015. Public development banks invest $2.3 trillion every year, 10% of the world’s total investments. The banks also promised to promote projects that reduce inequalities, protect the environment and pursue “sustainable development” goals, without offering examples.
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After Trump, Southeast Asia Craves Reliable Ally in Biden
A Joe Biden presidency is likely to involve a deeper U.S. engagement with Southeast Asia, some analysts say, offering trade for their pandemic-hit economies and security leverage against regional heavyweight China—but also bringing uncomfortable questions on rights and democracy.Southeast Asia knows Biden from his time as vice president in the administration of President Barack Obama, whose “Asia pivot” lavished diplomatic capital and resources on a strategic trade and defense vision for the region aimed at expanding economies that are home to 650 million people and checking China’s march.President Donald Trump’s approach to the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations has seen defense sales, bilateral trade deals and promises of support in the face of an increasingly assertive Beijing, which has ramped up its bases in the contested South China Sea.Trump also brought threats to the same countries, however, over trade deficits. The sudden withdrawal from the Obama-era Trans-Pacific Partnership after years of talks on the world’s largest low-tariff trade zone left allies wondering whether the U.S. could still be counted on as a long-term partner.Now, ASEAN leaders are expected this weekend to sign a rival trade deal, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, anchored by China.Some analysts predict that under Biden, America will be a more visible ally.“Biden will reconstruct US foreign policy in Southeast Asia,” said Ade M Wirasenjaya, who lectures on International Relations at the Universitas Muhammadiyah Yogyakarta, Indonesia.“Biden has political insignia with Democrat and predecessor Obama. He will be more calm and build relationships in a multilateralist way than Trump.”Biden—and his top officials—also will show up, said Emeritus Professor Carl Thayer of the University of New South Wales, in Australia.“President-elect Biden has already proclaimed ‘we’re back!’ meaning that top U.S. officials will turn up for high-level meetings with their ASEAN counterparts,” he said.Trump skipped several key ASEAN summits, while China routinely sends top leaders.Trump’s trade war with China also left blisters across the region’s export-reliant economies—some countries benefiting from a shift of supply chains, others losing investment from battered Chinese firms as protectionist measures toxified the trade environment.FILE – President Donald Trump and Chinese Vice Premier Liu He have lunch after signing the ‘Phase 1’ U.S.-China trade agreement, in the State Dining Room of the White House, Jan. 15, 2020, in Washington.The projected change in the White House has been welcomed by ASEAN leaders, many stunned by America’s sudden retreat from leadership on major global issues like trade and climate change.Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, whose country is Southeast Asia’s second biggest economy and Washington’s oldest Asian ally, said he “looks forward to working closely” with the incoming president, while Halimah Yacob, Singapore’s president took to Facebook to praise the president-elect and his running mate, Vice President-elect Kamala Harris.“This is the historic moment for women minorities in the U.S., and around the world,” Yacob said on Facebook.Elephant in the room?There may be awkward conversations, however, once Biden takes office in January.Biden will “pay attention to issues related to human rights and democratic development, which has been overlooked by the Trump administration,” said Kavi Chongkittavorn, a Bangkok-based veteran diplomatic commentator.Trump paid less public attention than his predecessors to pro-democracy movements and questions of human rights, dismaying activists from Thailand to Cambodia. Analysts say that served to embolden regional strongmen such as Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, as well as the ex-generals who stack Thailand’s government, and even Vietnam’s communist leadership.Kavis said Biden will be more attentive and “zero-in on Thailand and its future strategic role,” said Kavi.Trade and securityWhile the TPP deal is unlikely to re-emerge as it was, Southeast Asian leaders who are meeting this week in Vietnam will be hoping for swift reassurances from a Biden administration on free trade.Equally, they will be keen to have a reboot of the climate change agenda, which they see as integral to the future of a region hit by historic droughts and storms.Their main concern, though, is the rapid advance of China. It is now the biggest trading partner with ASEAN and a military power with its eyes firmly set on dominating the South China Sea, as well as completing a lattice of debt-funded infrastructure projects to realize its Belt and Road Initiative ambitions.Trump had promised to turn up the economic and military heat on China in a second term, offering Southeast Asian states—an area his administration defined as the Indo-Pacific—valuable leverage in their negotiations with their neighborhood superpower.Biden will have to address the same concerns, experts say.“No matter who runs the White House, there’s still an increasing convergence of strategic interests in the South China Sea and bilateral economic ties are still flourishing,” said Le Hong Hiep, an academic at the Contemporary Southeast Asia ISEAS – Singapore based Yusof Ishak Institute.First, though, he will have to seize the chance to remake old friendships and show that America remains a long-term ally that will not divide and rule a Southeast Asian bloc already being fractured by China’s wealth and influence.“Biden will become a strategic partner with ASEAN,” Wirasenjaya said, “particularly to reduce China’s aggression in the South China Sea.”
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Trump Administration Bans US Investments in Firms Linked to Chinese Military
The Trump administration Thursday announced an executive order prohibiting U.S. investment in Chinese firms that Washington says are owned or controlled by the Chinese military, ramping up pressure on Beijing after the U.S. election. The order could impact some of China’s biggest companies, including telecom firms China Telecom Corp. Ltd., China Mobile Ltd. and surveillance equipment-maker Hikvision. The move is designed to deter U.S. investment firms, pension funds and others from buying and selling shares of 31 Chinese companies that were designated by the Defense Department as backed by the Chinese military earlier this year. Starting January 11, the order will prohibit any transaction by U.S. investors in the securities of those companies. It also bans Americans from buying and selling securities in a Chinese company beginning 60 days after it is designated as a Chinese military company. FILE – Paramilitary police officers march in formation near a poster of Chinese President Xi Jinping at the gate to the Forbidden City, in Beijing, China, May 22, 2020.”China is increasingly exploiting United States capital to resource and to enable the development and modernization of its military, intelligence and other security apparatuses,” said the order released by the White House. The move is the first major policy initiative by President Donald Trump since losing the November 3 election to the projected winner, Democratic rival Joe Biden, and indicates that he is seeking to take advantage of the waning months of his administration to crack down on China, even as he has appeared focused on challenging the election result. Biden’s strategyBiden has won enough of the battleground states to surpass the 270 electoral votes needed in the state-by-state Electoral College that determines the next president, but Trump has refused to concede, citing unsubstantiated claims of voting fraud. Thursday’s action is likely to further weigh on already fraught ties between the world’s top two economies, which are at loggerheads over China’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic and its move to impose security legislation on Hong Kong. Biden has not laid out a detailed China strategy, but all indications are that he will continue a tough approach to Beijing, with whom Trump has become increasingly confrontational. Blocking accessThe executive order takes a page from a bill, filed by Republican Senator Marco Rubio last month, to block access to U.S. capital markets for Chinese companies that have been blacklisted by Washington. It is part of a growing effort by Congress and the administration to thwart Chinese companies that enjoy the backing of U.S. investors but do not comply with U.S. rules. In August, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission and Treasury officials urged Trump to delist Chinese companies that trade on U.S. exchanges and fail to meet auditing requirements by January 2022.
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Amnesty International: Scores Killed in Tigray
A new report Thursday from Amnesty International said scores of civilians were killed in the Tigray region of Ethiopia earlier this week.“We have confirmed the massacre of a very large number of civilians who appear to have been day laborers, in no way involved in the ongoing military offensive,” Deprose Muchena, Amnesty International director for east and southern Africa, said in a press release.“This is a horrific tragedy whose true extent only time will tell as communication in Tigray remains shut down,” the organization said.The report said the bodies were found Monday in Mai-Kadra in the southwestern part of the region. Amnesty International said it had not confirmed who was responsible for the killings.Tensions have been building in the region since September 9 when Tigray, the northernmost of Ethiopia’s nine regional states, defiantly held a regional election after Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed postponed the polls, citing the COVID-19 pandemic. Early reports say hundreds have died in the fighting. The internet has been shut down since the beginning of the unrest, a factor that analysts say is leading to a lack of information to assess humanitarian needs.According to U.N. figures, over 7,000 Ethiopians have fled the Tigray region into neighboring Sudan.
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Widespread Drop Reported in US Public Schools’ Kindergarten Enrollment
For parents and teachers, navigating schooling during a global pandemic has proved to be a challenge. While many students returned to school online amid the COVID-19 pandemic, school districts across the country have reported double-digit declines among their preschool and kindergarten enrollment. Public school enrollment across the Midwestern state of Missouri is down by more than 28,000 students. In Gaston County, North Carolina, the kindergarten population is down 16% from last year. Los Angeles Unified, the nation’s second-largest school system, lost nearly 11,000 pupils. While there has been no comprehensive national data on the trend, research by NPR, in addition to independent news stations across the United States, points toward the coronavirus pandemic as the cause for the decrease in the number of the country’s youngest students in public schools. FILE – Claire Reagan plays with her kids Evan, 5, and Abbie, 3, outside her home in Olathe, Kansas, Sept. 21, 2020. Reagan is keeping her son from starting kindergarten and her daughter from preschool due to concerns about the coronavirus pandemic.Portland Public Schools, the largest school district in the Western state of Oregon, reported a decrease in enrollment of 3% overall, with a 17% drop in the number of kindergartners. Superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero told The Oregonian that the drop is not surprising, given that distance learning is better suited to older students. For many parents, in-person classes during the pandemic raised concerns about safety. But distance learning provides its own challenges, and some families have opted to transition to alternative education methods, such as private schools and home schooling. Other families, in states like Missouri and North Carolina, have declined to enroll their kindergarten-age children this school year, as parents are not legally required to enroll their children in school until first grade. The trend apparently extends beyond income lines. A survey by the Education Week Research Center found that among some 400 school districts, more than half reported a decline in kindergarten enrollment. The findings were similar between low-income communities and more affluent neighborhoods. The drop in enrollment may cause additional challenges for school districts themselves, as most public schools are funded by states on a per-pupil basis. This, on top of additional expenditures like masks, hand sanitizer and boosted technology services, could leave U.S. schools scrambling for financial support.
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EU Commission Launches Strategy for LGBT Protection
The European Union’s executive branch announced a strategy Thursday to provide protection for lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, nonbinary, intersex, and queer people as discrimination against those groups increases in Europe. At a news conference in Brussels, European Commission Vice President for Values and Transparency Vera Jourova said it is becoming increasingly apparent the protections are needed. “Too many people cannot be themselves without fears of discrimination, exclusion or violence,” she said. Jourova cited attacks on pride marches and the adoption of anti-gay legislation in countries such as Hungary and Poland, where there has been an effort to create “LGBTIQ ideology-free zones.” European Commissioner for Equality Helena Dalli said the strategy to fight such discrimination is based on four pillars: reducing discrimination against LGBT people, ensuring their safety, building inclusive societies and calling for equality around the world. The commission proposed tackling discrimination against LGBT people, in particular when it comes to employment and ensuring their safety, also protecting them from online hate speech by including homophobic hate crime and hate speech in a list of “Eurocrimes.” Jourova added that COVID-19 lockdowns made the situation for LGBT people worse. European Commission President Ursula Von der Leyen called out Poland’s LGBT ideology-free zones in her state of the EU speech in September, saying “Being yourself is not your ideology, it’s your identity.” She said such zones have no place in the European Union. The commission cited a report from the EU Agency for Fundamental Rights, which found 43% of LGBT people last year declared that they felt discriminated against compared with 37% in 2012, even though EU acceptance of LGBT people is improving.
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Baby Dies After Rescue From Sinking Migrant Boat in Mediterranean
A 6-month-old baby is one of six migrants who died after the boat they were traveling in deflated and sank in the Mediterranean Sea, the Spanish rescue charity Proactiva Open Arms said Thursday.The baby, named Joseph, was from Guinea and was making the dangerous journey to Europe from Libya with his mother, the nongovernmental organization said.An Italian coast guard member holds a child who was evacuated from the Spanish ship Open Arms after being rescued from the Mediterranean Sea, Nov. 12, 2020, in Malta.Joseph was one of 111 migrants rescued by an Open Arms ship on Wednesday. He died hours later before he could be taken to Malta for medical attention, according to the rescue group. The organization did not disclose the cause of death.Five bodies were recovered during the rescue operation. Open Arms said a 3-month-old baby girl, her mother and a 25-year-old man with serious heart trouble were flown to Malta for urgent medical attention.The International Organization for Migration (IOM) says at least 796 people have died this year trying to cross the Mediterranean to reach Europe.On Tuesday and Wednesday, 257 refugees were rescued in separate operations, according to Open Arms. Thirteen other migrants died, including another child whose age is not known.
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What Will Happen to US-Russia Relations Under Biden?
US-Russian relations have been at a low ebb over the past four years — lasting damage from charges of Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential elections. But with Joe Biden’s projected victory in the 2020 race, debate in Russia now centers on what, if anything, will change. From Moscow, Charles Maynes reports.Producer: Jason Godman. Camera: Ricardo Marquina
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Grief, Anger, Disbelief: Trump Voters Face Biden’s Victory
When Joan Martin heard that Joe Biden had been declared the winner of the presidential election, the retired nurse and avowed supporter of President Donald Trump was deeply unsettled. To steel herself, she thought about how her household weathered Hurricane Katrina when it battered her hometown of Picayune, Mississippi, in 2005.
As the storm blew toward the town, Martin rushed out into her yard to carry her 85 show chickens to safety. Outside, howling winds lashed her family’s barn, lifting the edges of the roof off its moorings.
“The next day they (the chickens) were very concerned about the changes in the yard — we had trees down,” said Martin, 79. “They were very eyes-wide. But within two days, they said, ‘Oh, yeah, we can deal with this,’ and they did. So I have to follow their lead.”
Across the country, many of the 71.9 million people who voted for Trump — especially his loyal, passionate base — are working through turbulent emotions in the wake of his loss. Grief, anger and shock are among the feelings expressed by supporters who assumed he would score a rock-solid victory — by a slim margin, maybe easily, perhaps even by a landslide.
There is also denial. Many are skeptical of the results, saying they don’t trust the media’s race call for Biden, the way election officials counted the ballots, the entire voting system in America. Their views echo the unsupported claims Trump has made since Election Day.
This despite the fact that state officials and election experts say the 2020 election unfolded smoothly across the country and without widespread irregularities. Trump and Republicans have pointed to isolated problems, but many are explained by human error. Many of the Trump campaign’s legal challenges have been dismissed in court. And with Biden leading Trump by solid margins in key battleground states, none of those issues would have any impact on the outcome of the election.Daniel Echebarria, a 39-year-old supporter of President Donald Trump, poses for a picture in Carson City, Nev., where he works as a teacher.Still, any fragment of possibility is enough for some Trump supporters. Their comments lay out the political challenge ahead for the president-elect: The longer Trump casts doubt on the legitimacy of Biden’s win, the harder it will be for the new president to unite a riven country, as he has said he wants to do.”I’m really not in a live and let live mood,” said Daniel Echebarria, a 39-year-old school teacher who lives in Sparks, Nevada.
Echebarria said he was surprised by the election results, questioned some of the numbers and would like to see the president continue with his legal challenges. But he also said he doesn’t consider the result “a big rig job” and doesn’t want to see Trump deny the results into January. Still, he’s not feeling particularly united, either.
Echebarria said he believes Democrats never gave Trump a chance to govern and cites the Russia investigation and the impeachment trial as examples.
“I think that the president was prohibited from getting a lot of his agenda done because so much time and effort had to be put against defending against these,” he said.
Several Trump supporters interviewed by The Associated Press in recent days were rankled by widespread celebrations of Biden’s win in liberal cities. They saw hypocrisy in the public, outdoor gatherings after Democrats condemned Trump supporters for attending big rallies — some were held indoors — amid the coronavirus pandemic.
“Sad” is how Lori Piotrowski sums up her mood. The president of the Boulder City Republican Women club in Nevada at first sounds much like any other deflated supporter.
“You always want your candidate to win. You’re a little let down. You worked hard,” she said.
But Piotrowski also described herself as “extremely” surprised by the result of the election. She’s struggling to reconcile her version of the campaign with the results. She says she saw so many images of large Trump rallies in the final days. On a recent drive from Las Vegas to Reno — through rural, GOP-leaning Nevada — she saw only Trump signs and banners, she said.
“The votes didn’t reflect that amount of enthusiasm. I just find that very surprising,” she said. “It makes me wonder.”
Biden won Nevada by racking up votes in the state’s urban areas.
Piotrowski, like many Trump supporters, wants to see Trump’s legal challenges continue. A massive surge in mail voting and the slower tally of those votes has made the vote count look unfamiliar and strange. Piotrowski said it concerns her that races were called with so many ballots outstanding, although that is often the case.
“It just seems to me that there’s a lot of things that can be improved in the system so that people felt more confident,” she said.
She said she hasn’t listened to any of Biden’s speeches since Election Day.
Za Awng, of Aurora, Colorado, is also suspicious of the vote count.
Awng, who came to the U.S. as a refugee from Myanmar, has embraced Trump as a politician who echoes his conviction that China’s influence in the world must be sharply curtailed, and as one who shares his Christian values.
This spring, Awng lost his job as a chef for two months when the pandemic forced the closure of the restaurant where he works. Back at work now, he credits Trump with working hard over the last four years to improve the economy. It was hard for him to grasp how the president could lose.
“I believe there is something wrong,” he said, pointing to what appear to be Democratic shifts in the tally but were a result of mail-in votes being counted later. Democrats were more likely than Republicans to cast mail ballots after Trump baselessly declared mail voting fraudulent.
“I hope there will be counting again and maybe it will change,” he said.
Even in less tense times, Jim Czebiniak seeks solace in hours of evening prayer. So when Czebiniak, an avid Trump supporter who lives in the upstate community of Knox, New York, heard that Biden had been declared the winner, he turned once again to worship in a search for answers.
“First of all, I went to the Lord and I asked him why, why is it going like this? The Lord said, ‘Because I’m working on stuff. Just relax and let things work themselves out,'” said Czebiniak, 72, who is semi-retired from a career writing custom software.
“To quote what’s-his-name from the Rolling Stones, Mick Jagger: ‘You can’t always get what you want,'” Czebiniak said.
Still, Czebiniak said he is far from ready to accept a Biden presidency. He cited several unsupported claims made by the Trump campaign.
“The election isn’t really called yet,” Czebiniak said, days after all the major U.S. television networks and the AP examined vote counts in key states to declare Biden the overall winner. “I don’t trust anything that’s going on there with all this vote counting.”
Unlike many Trump supporters, Michelle Sassouni wasn’t shocked by the outcome of the election or the aftermath.
The 29-year-old in Tampa, Florida, is an active member of her region’s Young Republicans Club and a co-host of a video show, “Moderately Outraged.” She floated the idea of Biden’s nomination, and potential to win, months ago.
“Everyone laughed at me on the show,” she said. With many liberal friends, she had seen the strong opposition to Trump. She even understands it somewhat. “I don’t love everything he does, but I voted for him because I’m a Republican.”
But Sassouni doesn’t see danger in Trump’s vow to fight the results in court. People need to be reassured of the results, and a court fight might give them confidence, she said.
“If you voted for Joe Biden, wouldn’t you want to know that he won fair and square so that there’s not this cloud over his head?” she asked. “If half the country believes there was some sort of election tampering, then that creates distrust in the system, that creates distrust in Western democracy as a whole.”
Martin, the retiree in Mississippi, says she’s planning to resume her daily life, tending to her animals and avoiding talking about the country’s change in leadership as a way to deal with the stress and trepidation she feels.
“I’ll go out in the yard to check and talk to my chickens and say my old-fashioned hymns and get by,” she said.
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US Jobless Claims Decline
U.S. unemployment benefit claims declined again last week, the Labor Department reported Thursday, but the country’s recent surge in coronavirus cases poses a new threat to the world’s biggest economy. Seasonally adjusted, a total of 709,000 jobless workers filed new applications for unemployment compensation, down 48,000 from the revised figure of the week before. It was fourth straight week the number fell below 800,000 but remained above the highest pre-pandemic figure in records that date back to the 1960s. A total of 6.8 million workers remain unemployed, a 4.6% jobless rate for the last week of October, the Labor Department said. The figure is a marked improvement from the pandemic low point — a 14.7% jobless rate in April.Now, however, more than 140,000 new coronavirus cases are being recorded in the U.S. on some recent days. The soaring number of new cases, as winter approaches in the U.S. and people spend less time outdoors, is forcing some state governors and municipal officials to reimpose restrictions on business operations that they had previously lifted, which could lead to more layoffs of workers in coming weeks.About a third of unemployed workers have been without a job for 27 weeks or more, compared with 4.1% in April before the brunt of the coronavirus pandemic weighed in on the U.S. economy.Two weeks ago, the country’s Commerce Department reported that the U.S. economy surged 7.4% from July to September. But U.S. economic growth is expected to slow in the last three months of the year, especially if business restrictions are markedly increased, such as renewed limitations on indoor seating at restaurants.Government officials have been reluctant to curtail business activity as occurred in the March-to-June period during an earlier period of rising infections. But some consumers have shunned in-store shopping or eating in restaurants, and many entertainment events have been canceled for months, leading to continued layoffs.Congress has reconvened after the November 3 national presidential and congressional elections. But there has been no evidence this week on movement toward a new estimated $2 trillion coronavirus relief aid package, including federal boosts to less generous state unemployment compensation.It is not clear whether Congress and President Donald Trump, who is contesting election results showing him losing to Democrat Joe Biden, will reach agreement before he is set to leave office on January 20.It is also uncertain what role, if any, Biden might take in shaping a relief package before he takes office.Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who won reelection, said he hopes Congress will approve more aid by the end of 2020.
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Improvised Landmines and Explosive Remnants of War Killing, Maiming More Civilians, Monitoring Group Finds
This year’s edition of the Landmine Monitor finds civilian casualties are rising because of the new use of improvised landmines by rebel groups in conflict areas and from explosive remnants of war.Despite several setbacks, authors of the Landmine Monitor proclaim the 1999 landmine treaty an ongoing success. They note 164 countries, or 80 percent of the world’s nations, have signed on to the treaty, which bans the use, production, stockpiling and trade in this lethal weapon. And, they note, most of the 33 countries outside the treaty are in ad hoc compliance.The Monitor reports only one state, Myanmar, which is not party to the treaty, used antipersonnel landmines from mid-2019 through October 2020. During the same period, however, it reports the use of improvised landmines by rebel groups increased in a number of countries. FILE – Britain’s Prince Harry walks through a minefield in Dirico, Angola, during a visit to see the work of landmine clearance charity the Halo Trust, on day five of the royal tour of Africa, Sept. 27, 2019.The report says improvised landmines account for over half of the more than 5,550 civilian casualties recorded last year in countries of conflict including Afghanistan, Colombia, Iraq, Mali, Niger, Ukraine and Yemen. It says children represent nearly half of all civilian casualties.Of the estimated 5,500 casualties, Landmine Monitor research team leader Loren Persi tells VOA around 2,200 were killed and 3,357 injured.“This ratio of people killed to injured indicates very clearly to us that there were many, many more casualties and that people who were injured by landmines and explosive remnants of war are not being recorded adequately in many countries where there are conflicts,” said Persi.Since the treaty came into force, the Monitor reports parties have destroyed 55 million stockpiles of antipersonnel landmines, including 269,000 in the past year. It says progress is being made in clearing contaminated areas of landmines.The monitor lists 12 countries as producers of landmines but reports only a handful are actively producing them. The director of Human Rights Watch’s Arms Division, Stephen Goose, says a decision by the Trump administration to reverse the Obama administration’s policy on ending production of landmines was a major setback to achieving the goal of a mine-free world.“The U.S. as it stands now is declaring itself eligible to produce the weapon again as it pleases, to trade the weapon as it pleases, to use it anywhere in the world,” said Goose.
When it announced the move in January, the Trump administration said the restrictions could place American forces “at a severe disadvantage during a conflict against our adversaries,” and that “the President is unwilling to accept this risk to our troops.”Goose says he is pleased to report that back in February, then-presidential candidate Joe Biden declared that he would reverse the Trump policy if elected. Goose says activists are looking forward to the U.S. once again joining those countries that are in favor of banning this weapon.
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Ethiopia’s Tigray Region Conflict Raises Fears of Civil War
Ethiopia’s military conflict with its independence-minded Tigray region has raised fears of civil war in Africa’s second most populous nation. It also raises concerns about regional instability spreading if the conflict continues. The conflict between the Ethiopian government and fighters loyal to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front is entering its second week. Some 8,000 Ethiopians have crossed into Sudan for safety and aid agencies expect more in the coming days.The conflict started when Tigray fighters attacked a federal government position last week in what the government called an attempt to loot weapons and equipment. Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed ordered military action to end the armed uprising.Comfort Ero is the International Crisis Group Africa Program director.“Right now what we see is more fighting, more entrenched positions by both sides. Even if the Tigray forces are squeezed and overpowered you may see a strong resistance attack, a guerilla type attack resistance and that’s possible. We don’t see the Tigrayans being governed anytime soon from Addis, and we could be looking at a long, protracted situation,” said Ero.Tensions have been building since September, when Tigray region, one of Ethiopia’s nine regional states, defiantly held a local election after Abiy postponed the polls due to the COVID-19 pandemic.A woman casts her ballot at a polling station during Tigray’s regional elections, in the town of Tikul, 15 kms east from Mekele, Ethiopia, Sept. 9, 2020.There has been less information coming from the conflict area and difficulty assessing humanitarian needs since the government shut down the internet Wednesday.Thomas Murphy is a sub-Saharan Africa Intelligence analyst for the Risk Advisory group. He said government failure to defeat the Tigray Fighters may cause more trouble for the country.“The likelihood of a coup would almost certainly increase if the military fails to defeat the TPLF. That would probably come from factions linked to the TPLF who have previously been highly influential in the government. In terms of wider implications, Ethiopia is in a very fragile state at the moment, and I think the likelihood, the potential for tensions to escalate or deteriorate into pockets of conflict involving other ethnic actors across the country is probably very high.” he said.On Sunday, the prime minister appointed a new army chief and intelligence head to lead the war against the Tigray region.FILE – People walk in front of the head office of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front, the ruling party in the region, in the city of Mekele, northern Ethiopia, Sept. 6, 2020.Political expert Awol Allo said solving the country’s problems through guns could divide the country even further.“This is a highly divided country along ethnic lines. The current constitution provides people the right to self-determination in the sense of the ability to determine their political and cultural status, but also the right to be an independent state. So, the decision of the prime minister to settle a political dispute through an armed confrontation would likely lead to the disintegration of the Ethiopian state into multiple small republics, and that, of course, would have a considerable ramification not just for Ethiopia but also for the horn of Africa,” said Allo.In 2019, Abiy won the Nobel Peace Prize for his effort to end Ethiopia’s hostilities with Eritrea, bringing political reform to the country and mediating disputes in Sudan, South Sudan, Kenya, and Somalia. Abiy has ruled out talks with the Tigray regional leaders, but Ero of ICG said comprehensive national dialogue could save Ethiopia and the region.“The continental body in the form of African Union, one of the most important allies for the African Union, but also for Ethiopia, for EU, are all on the same page in terms of what needs to be done to prevent this conflict from spreading out of control and from sucking in the region where we already have a very fragile transition in Sudan, a country like Somalia about to turn an important page in its own, the crisis in South Sudan in its own slow transition and new unity government. So this is not a good time for the Horn of Africa region with one of its most important, pivotal countries now going into a war footing,” said Ero.The government in Addis Ababa insists the military operation will end when the north of the country is liberated and new leadership is restored in the region.
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Greek-Turkish Rivalry Persists, Even in Celebration of Possible Coronavirus Vaccine
Greece and Turkey have long been at loggerheads over a host of issues – from a scattering of uninhabited islands in the Aegean Sea that divide them, to the origins of souvlaki.Now, they are trading jabs anew, this time trying to trump each other’s claims to Pfizer’s creation of what may be the world’s first demonstrably effective coronavirus vaccine.Since the company’s announcement earlier this week, media and medical experts from around the globe have hailed the drug’s pioneers, Dr. Ozlem Tureci and Dr. Ugur Sahin, as heroes.While both scientists are children of Turkish migrants who moved to Germany as part of the first guest worker generation in the late 1960s, the pair founded BioNTech in 2008 to develop new types of targeted cancer treatments.Two men wearing masks to help protect against the spread of coronavirus, watch their dogs playing in a public garden, in Ankara, Turkey, Nov. 12, 2020.As the coronavirus pandemic spread earlier this year, BioNTech, which employs 1,300 people, quickly moved to reallocate its resources, teaming up with the U.S. pharmacy industry giant Pfizer to develop 20 candidates for a vaccine.As the world this week breathed a sigh of relief at news that one of the experimental vaccines had shown results, Turkey, like perhaps no other state, went into a frenzy.Since the revelation, Turkish news media have splashed pictures and praise of the “Turkish dream team” on the fronts of newspapers, magazines and websites. Politicians have praised them for contributing to humanity. Even teachers across the nation are said to be aggressively lecturing students about what is being described as the great Turkish feat.On the other side of the Aegean divide, though, Greeks are giving scant coverage and little praise to the scientific duo, largely referring to them as Germans, rather than Turkish nationals.Pundits, press and politicians have instead taken to rejoicing their own national success: Albert Bourla, the Greek veterinarian at the helm of Pfizer and his strategy of striking a deal with BioNTech to produce and globally distribute the landmark drug.“A Greek yields hope of a breakthrough,” shouted the Athens-based Skai television network, featuring reports and special segments about Bourla and his rise from the humble origins in Thessaloniki, northern Greece.“The Greek who steers Pfizer,” blared the Capital.gr news site, as politicians across the divide posted pictures and praises for the leading Greek executive, fanning web chatter that the small and poor country, in the throes of a tragic COVID-19 comeback, would be the first to receive samples of the vaccine.5 Things to Know About Pfizer’s Coronavirus Vaccine Early results look great, but questions remain Having joined Pzifer’s animal-health division in 1993, Bourla became the company’s chief executive last year, striking a string of successful deals. In the first nine months of his tenure, he refocused the company toward patent-protected drugs and vaccines with the potential for significant sales growth.The drug maker’s announcement this week triggered a surge in BioNTech’s stock, pushing the company’s shares up by 23.4%, and rallying markets globally.BioNTech and Pfizer had been working together on a flu vaccine since 2018, but they agreed to collaborate on a coronavirus vaccine in March.Both sides left politics and age-old rivalries aside, bonding more over their shared backgrounds as scientists and immigrants.“We realized that he is from Greece, and I’m from Turkey,” Sahin said in a recent interview, avoiding mention of their native countries’ long-running antagonism. “It was very personal from the beginning.”While both NATO allies, Greece and Turkey have been at odds over air, sea and land rights for decades. They came to the brink of war in September before Washington waded into a standoff in the eastern Mediterranean, urging Ankara to recall a vessel exploring for energy off the coast of a Greek island. EU and U.S. diplomats have long tried to bridge the Greek-Turkish divide and build trust between the two sides through business. A major thawing of relations in 1999 saw trade between the two countries soar while cultural barriers eroded dramatically.Whether the Pfizer and BioNTech cooperation on good science can serve as a catalyst for improved Greek-Turkish relations remains unclear, pundits and politicians quip on both sides. For now, though, the rivalries seem to have no impact on Pfizer’s collaboration with BioNtech.“He’s a scientist and a man of principles,” Bourla said of Sahin, in a recent interview. “I trust him 100%.”
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Ukrainian President Hospitalized Due to COVID-19
Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and the head of his office have been hospitalized after contracting the coronavirus earlier this week.
Zelenskiy and the head of the presidential office, Andriy Yermak, are being treated at Kyiv’s Feofaniya Clinical Hospital, Yermak’s adviser, Mykhailo Podolyak, said in a November 12 interview with the online newspaper Ukrayinska Pravda.
“A special office has been equipped there to enable the president to hold conferences. He has held a large number of conference calls today,” Podolyak said.
He said Yermak has a separate, isolated ward.
Zelenskiy “first went home but decided to move to Feofania [hospital] to accurately isolate and not expose anyone,” Reuters quoted a presidential spokeswoman as saying.
“There are better conditions for patients. Nothing serious,” she said, referring to the president’s condition.
On November 9, Zelenskiy’s office said he had tested positive for coronavirus, adding that the president “is feeling well and will continue to perform his duties remotely in self-isolation.”
Minutes later, Yermak also announced that he had tested positive for the coronavirus and that he was feeling “fine.”
Other top Ukrainian officials, including the finance and defense ministers, were also reported to be infected.
Health authorities said on November 12 that the country registered a record 11,057 new coronavirus cases over the previous 24 hours, with 198 new deaths.
The new infections took the total confirmed cases to 500,865, with 9,145 deaths.
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Tropical Storm Eta Makes Second Florida Landfall
Tropical Storm Eta made landfall early Thursday along the west coast of the U.S. state of Florida.
The National Hurricane Center said the storm had maximum sustained winds of 85 kilometers per hour as the center hit near Cedar Key.
Forecasters expect Eta to bring up to eight centimeters of rain to parts of Florida during the day Thursday as it crosses the state before emerging into the Atlantic Ocean.
There were no immediate reports of major damage.
Authorities closed some bridges due to high winds and Tampa International Airport suspended its operations ahead of the storm with a plan to reopen no later than midday Thursday.
State and federal emergency orders are in place to help officials respond to the storm.
Eta first made landfall as a major hurricane in Nicaragua and killed at least 120 people in Central America. It later moved across Cuba and the Florida Keys before turning and affecting Florida again.
The storm was a record-tying 28th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. Another storm, Theta, became the 29th this week, breaking the record set in 2005.
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Biden Names Klain Chief of Staff
U.S. President-elect Joe Biden has announced his choice of longtime adviser Ron Klain to be his White House chief of staff.Klain previously served as Biden’s vice-presidential chief of staff during the administration of President Barack Obama, and was the official Obama put in charge of the U.S. response to the Ebola outbreak in 2014.“His deep, varied experience and capacity to work with people all across the political spectrum is precisely what I need in a White House chief of staff as we confront this moment of crisis and bring our country together again,” Biden said in a statement Wednesday.Klain called the new appointment “the honor of a lifetime.”Biden is continuing to meet with his transition advisers, who include experts familiar with issues he will face early in his administration, as he plans for taking control of the American government when he is inaugurated on January 20.
The projected winner of the November 3 election, Biden has named an array of advisers to look at the operations of agencies throughout the government. He said Tuesday he could announce some key appointments before the annual Thanksgiving holiday on November 26. U.S. President Donald Trump departs after placing a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Solider as he attends a Veterans Day observance in the rain at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, Nov. 11, 2020.Trump seeks to overturn election results
President Donald Trump has not conceded his apparent loss to Biden in last week’s national election and has filed numerous lawsuits contesting the outcome in key battleground states. With scant evidence so far, Trump has claimed that voting and vote-counting irregularities cost him the election. He is seeking to overturn Biden’s victory and claim a second four-year term in the White House. So far, however, judges have dismissed all the Trump lawsuits, with more yet to be considered. Election analysts interviewed by VOA and other news organizations say they do not think Biden’s claim to victory will be reversed. According to unofficial vote counts, Biden has won more than the 270-vote majority in the Electoral College that determines the outcome of U.S. presidential contests. He is ahead in the vote count in two more states, Georgia and Arizona, that could ultimately give him a 306-232 advantage in the Electoral College, where the most populous states have the most votes. Biden’s possible final Electoral College tally is the same total as in 2016, when Trump came out on top, unexpectedly defeating Democrat Hillary Clinton. Congratulations from leaders worldwide
Leaders of U.S. allies in Europe, including British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, have called Biden to congratulate him, ignoring Trump’s contention that he will yet win. Biden spoke late Wednesday with the leaders of Australia, Japan and South Korea. Biden visited the Korean War Memorial in Philadelphia on Wednesday in observance of Veterans Day. Trump traveled to Arlington National Cemetery near Washington. It was Trump’s first public event since last Thursday, when he leveled a string of unfounded allegations about widespread election fraud. Trump has continued his barrage of complaints about the election outcome on Twitter, posting the comments of Republicans supporting his claims that he was cheated out of winning. U.S. President-elect Joe Biden smiles as he speaks at the theater serving as his transition headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, Nov. 10, 2020.Most Americans view Biden as election winner
However, a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Tuesday indicated that nearly 80% of Americans, including half of Republicans, say Biden is the rightful winner. Meanwhile, Biden told reporters at a Tuesday news conference that Republican leaders, most of whom have not acknowledged his victory, are “mildly intimidated by the sitting president.” Biden said Trump’s refusal to concede is “an embarrassment, quite frankly. How can I say this tactfully? I think it will not help the president’s legacy.” Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 2 MB480p | 3 MB540p | 3 MB1080p | 15 MBOriginal | 26 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioEven though the Electoral College vote is determinative in U.S. presidential elections, Biden is leading Trump by 3.2 percentage points and more than 5 million votes in the national popular vote count as final votes are tabulated.
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Special Prosecutor to Probe Allegations of Australian War Crimes in Afghanistan
Australia will appoint a special investigator with the power to prosecute allegations of war crimes by its troops in Afghanistan. The move follows a four-year investigation by the government-appointed inspector general of the Australian Defense Force into the conduct of Australian special forces between 2005 and 2016.The war crimes inquiry focused on allegations of brutality and the unlawful killing of civilians by elite Australian troops in Afghanistan. It examined 55 incidents of alleged breaches of the laws of armed conflict over more than a decade. It did not look at decisions made in the heat of battle, but rather the treatment of individuals who were clearly either noncombatants or no longer part of the conflict.Criminal prosecutions and military sanctions could follow.Prime Minster Scott Morrison says the inquiry has been a long and painstaking process.“These are incredibly complex events involving actions and conduct in another country in a war,” he said. “That is not a simple process in terms of the evidence-gathering, there are language difficulties, there are international law issues. This is not a simple matter.”The special investigator will be appointed in the coming months to examine the report’s evidence.It was compiled in secret over a four-year period and is scheduled to be released in a week. It is likely to be heavily censored on national security grounds. Morrison said Australia had to confront “brutal” truths about the actions of some of its soldiers.The prime minister also said a new panel will be set up to bring about attitudinal change within Australia’s Special Air Service Regiment and its 2nd Commando Regiment. Media reports have previously alleged a so-called warrior culture within the elite units.Thirty-nine thousand Australian servicemembers have served in Afghanistan since Canberra joined an international coalition following the terror attacks in the United States in September 2001. Forty-one Australian military personnel have died, including several special forces soldiers.
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Typhoon Vamco Leaves Parts of Philippine Capital Underwater
Parts of the Philippines near the capital, Manila, are besieged by rising floods caused by Typhoon Vamco, which made landfall early Thursday.Emergency crews have been deployed across the main island of Luzon to rescue thousands of residents trapped in their homes, many of them forced to take refuge on the roofs of their submerged homes. At least three people are reportedly missing in one coastal province.Forecasters say Vamco was carrying maximum sustained winds of 130 kph as it passed over Luzon on a path toward the South China Sea.The arrival of the typhoon comes just days after the Pacific archipelago was devastated by super Typhoon Goni, which destroyed tens of thousands of homes and displaced some 370,000 people after striking Luzon with maximum sustained winds of 225 kph, making it the strongest typhoon to hit the Philippines this year.The Philippines is also struggling with a rampant outbreak of COVID-19, with more than 400,000 total infections and 7,710 deaths.
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Libyans Reach Deal on Elections, UN Says
Libyan delegates have agreed on a plan to hold elections for parliament and president within 18 months as part of a process to end a decade of violence and instability in the country.Acting U.N. Libya envoy Stephanie Williams called the development a “breakthrough.”The world body brought together 75 Libyans for talks in Tunisia this week.”There’s real momentum and that’s what we need to focus on and encourage,” Williams told reporters Wednesday.The delegates are also working to develop plans for a temporary government to prepare for elections and provide services.Libya has been in a state of instability since the 2011 overthrow of longtime leader Moammar Gadhafi.Two rival governments have battled for power with the internationally recognized Government of National Accord in the capital, Tripoli, and the Libyan National Army allied with eastern military leader Khalifa Haftar.While the political talks are taking place in Tunisia, there are separate negotiations in the Libyan city of Sirte on the details of a cease-fire deal the two sides agreed to in October.
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Ivory Coast President, Opposition Leader Say They’ll Work Toward Peace
Ivory Coast President Alassane Ouattara and rival Henri Konan Bedie Wednesday said they would continue discussions aimed at restoring peace following the Oct. 31 election that triggered clashes and left dozens dead.Ouattara described Wednesday’s initial meeting with former president and opposition candidate Henri Konan Bedie as an ice breaker, a first step toward establishing trust.Bedie said the two would continue to call each other in the coming days and weeks and meet so that the country returns to what it was.Following the meeting in the commercial capital, Abidjan, the two rivals did not say if any agreement was struck to continue working together.Bedie’s party and others in the political opposition are reportedly conditioning any movement on resolving the political conflict with the ruling party on authorities dropping criminal charges against opposition leaders for forming a rival government.Opposition groups have been at odds with Ouattara’s controversial decision to seek a third term, which they say violates a constitutional two-term limit.Quattara says the new constitution adopted in 2016 reset the term limit, allowing him to seek another term.
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Big City Telewokers Migrate to Bali to Prop Up Tourism
Up until recently, the Indonesian tourist destination of Bali has seen empty beaches and hotel rooms. But that’s changing in a most unusual way. Rendy Wicaksana reports.
Camera: Rendy Wicaksana
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Rwandan Genocide Suspect Pleads Not Guilty at First Court Appearance
A Rwandan war crimes suspect charged with helping to orchestrate the country’s 1994 genocide and arming militias, was granted not guilty pleas during his first court appearance at the Hague Wednesday. Félicien Kabuga, who arrived at court in a wheelchair, did not respond to the charges before the U.N.’s International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, but the presiding judge deemed his silence as not guilty pleas. The 85-year-old faces multiple charges, including complicity in genocide and persecution. Kabuga is accused of using a radio station he ran to urge ethnic Hutus to kill Tutsis. He also allegedly funded militias targeting Tutsis across Rwanda. Kabuga was transferred to the Netherlands in May following his arrest near Paris after more than two decades on the run. He faces a possible sentence of life in prison if convicted.
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