As a second vaccine against the novel coronavirus is being rolled out across the United States ahead of the Christmas holiday, Britain is shutting down out of concern that a new mutation of the virus is highly contagious. VOA’s Michelle Quinn has more.
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Month: December 2020
In Bosnia’s Mostar, Ethnic Parties Win First Local Vote in 12 Years
MOSTAR, BOSNIA — Preliminary results from the first local election in 12 years in the Bosnian town of Mostar on Sunday showed most votes going to the Croat and Bosniak parties whose rivalry had left the ethnically divided town without a city council.
The coalition of multiethnic moderate parties BH Bloc won enough votes to act as a kingmaker in the future 35-member city council, according to unofficial preliminary results from the parties and election authorities.
It is not clear if the two main parties will form a coalition again or enter coalitions with other smaller parties.
“I expect the city to start functioning because so far nothing has been functioning,” Hedija Hadzic, a woman in her 50s, told Reuters TV. “At least we’ll get the city council.”
The southern town, renowned for its Ottoman-era Old Bridge, is the most multiethnic town in Bosnia, but the Croat and Bosniak communities have been largely separated by the Neretva river since the end of the country’s civil war in the mid-1990s.
Fifty-five percent of about 100,000 registered voters had cast their ballots by 1800 GMT, when polling stations closed, election authorities said. Most followed social distancing measures against the coronavirus pandemic, they added.
Observers said the election proceeded without any major incidents and irregularities.
Mostar has not held an election since 2008 because the Croat and Bosniak nationalist HDZ and SDA parties were unable to agree on electoral rules.
The dispute was settled thanks to a 2019 court ruling won by Irma Baralija, a philosophy teacher who filed a suit against Bosnia at the European human rights court for failing to hold elections in Mostar.
The voters chose 35 city councilors from six ethnically based electoral units and a central city zone.
The election commission presented results only for the central zone, but the trend is unlikely to change as results come in from other electoral units.
HDZ and SDA have held a firm grip over Mostar for more than a decade, each governing its own part of the town and its separate utilities, postal companies, universities and hospitals.
“The most important is that election took place and finally introduced Mostar into a democratic world,” Faruk Kajtaz, a journalist and analyst from Mostar told N1 television.
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US Lawmakers to Allocate Nearly $2B to Replace Chinese Telecom Equipment, Source Says
U.S. lawmakers are expected to endorse $1.9 billion to fund a program to remove telecom network equipment that the U.S. government says poses national security risks as part of a year-end spending bill and COVID-19 bill, a source briefed on the matter said on Sunday.Lawmakers are also expected to back $3.2 billion for an emergency broadband benefit for low-income Americans.The Federal Communications Commission said in June it had formally designated China’s Huawei Technologies Co and ZTE Corp as threats, a declaration that bars U.S. firms from tapping an $8.3 billion government fund to purchase equipment from the companies.Earlier this month, the FCC finalized rules that require carriers with ZTE or Huawei equipment to “rip and replace” that equipment but is awaiting funding from Congress.Huawei said earlier this month it was disappointed in the FCC’s decision “to force removal of our products from telecommunications networks. This overreach puts U.S. citizens at risk in the largely underserved rural areas – during a pandemic – when reliable communication is essential.”The $7 billion COVID Relief Broadband Package “establishes a temporary, emergency broadband benefit program at the FCC to help low-income Americans, including those economically challenged by the COVID-19 pandemic, get connected or remain connected to broadband,” the source said.The source also said the program will supply a $50 monthly subsidy to qualifying households “to help them afford broadband service and an internet-connected device.”The bill also expands eligibility for the rip-and-replace reimbursement program to communications providers with 10 million subscribers or less but prioritizes reimbursement for providers with 2 million subscribers or less, the source said, citing a draft fact sheet.The bill is expected to include $285 million for connecting minority communities and will establish an Office of Minority Broadband Initiatives at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).
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Trump Wants Supreme Court to Overturn Pennsylvania Election Results
Undeterred by dismissals and admonitions from judges, President Donald Trump’s campaign continued with its unprecedented efforts to overturn the results of the November 3 election Sunday, saying it had filed a new petition with the Supreme Court.The petition seeks to reverse a trio of Pennsylvania Supreme Court cases having to do with mail-in ballots and asks the court to reject voters’ will and allow the Pennsylvania General Assembly to pick its own slate of electors.While the prospect of the highest court in the land throwing out the results of a democratic election based on unfounded charges of voter fraud is extraordinarily unlikely, it wouldn’t change the outcome. President-elect Joe Biden would still be the winner even without Pennsylvania because of his wide margin of victory in the Electoral College.”The petition seeks all appropriate remedies, including vacating the appointment of electors committed to Joseph Biden and allowing the Pennsylvania General Assembly to select their replacements,” Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani said in a statement.He is asking the court to move swiftly so it can rule before Congress meets January 6 to tally the vote of the Electoral College, which decisively confirmed Biden’s win with 306 electoral votes to Trump’s 232. But the justices are not scheduled to meet again, even privately, until January 8, two days after Congress counts votes.Pennsylvania last month certified Biden as the winner of the state’s 20 Electoral College votes after three weeks of vote counting and a string of failed legal challenges.Trump’s campaign and his allies have now filed roughly 50 lawsuits alleging widespread voting fraud. Almost all have been dismissed or dropped because there is no evidence to support their allegations.Trump has lost before judges of both political parties, including some he appointed. And some of his strongest rebukes have come from conservative Republicans. The Supreme Court has also refused to take up two cases — decisions that Trump has scorned.The new case is at least the fourth involving Pennsylvania that Trump’s campaign or Republican allies have taken to the Supreme Court in a bid to overturn Biden’s victory in the state or at least reverse court decisions involving mail-in balloting. Many more cases were filed in state and federal courts. Roughly 10,000 mail-in ballots that arrived after polls closed but before a state court-ordered deadline remain in limbo, awaiting the highest court’s decision on whether they should be counted.
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In US, People Over 75 and Essential Workers Next in Line for Vaccine
An expert committee put people 75 and older and essential workers like firefighters, teachers and grocery store workers next in line for COVID-19 shots as a second vaccine began rolling out Sunday to hospitals, a desperately needed boost as the nation works to bring the coronavirus pandemic under control.The developments occurred as the nation seeks to ramp up a vaccination program that only began in the last week and so far has given initial shots to about 556,000 Americans, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.The vaccines from Pfizer Inc. and Germany’s BioNTech, as well as the one from Moderna Inc., which was approved by regulators last week go first to health care workers and residents of long-term care homes, based on the advice of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.The committee voted 13-1 on Sunday to put people 75 and older as well as certain front-line workers next in line for the vaccines.Those essential workers include firefighters and police officers; teachers and school staff; food and agriculture workers; manufacturing workers; corrections workers; U.S. Postal Service workers; public transit and grocery store workers.The committee also voted that behind those groups should be other essential workers; people ages 65 to 74; and those aged 16 to 64 who have certain medical conditions — like obesity and cancer — that put them at higher risk for severe disease if they get infected with COVID-19.The expert panel’s recommendation next goes to the CDC director and to states as guidance to put together vaccination programs. CDC directors have almost always signed off on committee recommendations. No matter what the CDC says, there will be differences from state to state, because various health departments have different ideas about who should be closer to the front of the line.Pfizer’s shots were first shipped out a week ago and started being used the next day, kicking off the nation’s biggest vaccination drive.Earlier Sunday, trucks left the Olive Branch, Mississippi, factory, near Memphis, Tennessee, with the vaccine developed by Moderna and the National Institutes of Health. The much-needed shots are expected to be given starting Monday, just three days after the Food and Drug Administration authorized their emergency rollout.In Louisville, Kentucky, UPS driver Todd Elble said his vaccine shipment was the “most important load that I’ve hauled” in a 37-year career. His parents contracted COVID-19 in November, and his 78-year-old father died. He said the family speculates that his father got infected while traveling on a hunting trip with four other relatives to Wyoming, and some are still sick.“I’m going to take the vaccine myself. I’m going to be first in line for my father — I’ll tell you that much — and any others that should follow,” he said. “I feel in my heart that everybody should, to help get this stopped.”He added: “To bring this back, I feel Dad was in the truck with me today.”Dr. Moncef Slaoui, the chief science adviser to the federal government’s vaccine distribution effort, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” that nearly 8 million doses will be distributed Monday, about 5.9 million of the Moderna vaccine and 2 million of the vaccine from Pfizer Inc. He said the first Moderna shots should be given Monday morning.Public health experts say the shots — and others in the pipeline — are the only way to stop a virus that has been spreading wildly. Nationwide, more than 219,000 people per day on average test positive for the virus, which has killed over 316,000 in the U.S. and nearly 1.7 million worldwide.Slaoui also predicted the U.S. will experience “a continuing surge,” with larger numbers of coronavirus cases possible from gatherings for Christmas.“I think, unfortunately, it will get worse,” he said.There won’t be enough shots for the general population until spring, so doses will be rationed at least for the next several months. President-elect Joe Biden pledged earlier this month to have 100 million doses distributed in his first 100 days in office, and his surgeon general nominee said Sunday that it’s still a realistic goal.But Vivek Murthy, speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” said it’s more realistic to think it may be midsummer or early fall before coronavirus vaccines are available to the general population, rather than late spring. Murthy said Biden’s team is working toward having the shots available to lower-risk individuals by late spring but doing so requires “everything to go exactly on schedule.”“I think it’s more realistic to assume that it may be closer to mid-summer or early fall when this vaccine makes its way to the general population,” Murthy said. “So, we want to be optimistic, but we want to be cautious as well.”Meanwhile, Trump’s surgeon general, Jerome Adams, defended the administration’s handling of the Pfizer vaccine Sunday, a day after the Army general charge of getting COVID-19 vaccines across the U.S. apologized Saturday for “miscommunication” with states over the number of doses to be delivered in the early stages of distribution. At least a dozen states reported they would receive a smaller second shipment of the Pfizer vaccine than they had been told previously.Gen. Gustave Perna told reporters in a telephone briefing that he made mistakes by citing numbers of doses that he believed would be ready. Slaoui said the mistake was assuming vaccines that had been produced were ready for shipment when there was a two-day delay.“And unless it’s perfectly right, we will not release vaccine doses for usage,” he said. “And, sometimes, there could be small hiccups. There have been none, actually, in manufacturing now. The hiccup was more into the planning.”But Adams, speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” said that “the numbers are going to go up and down.”“It absolutely was not poor planning,” he said. “There’s what we plan. There’s what we actually allocate. There’s what’s delivered, and then there’s what’s actually put in people’s arms.”Adams, who is Black, said he understands that mistrust of the medical community and the vaccine among Blacks “comes from a real place,” the mistreatment of communities of color. He cited the decades-long Tuskegee experiment in Alabama, where Black men with syphilis were not treated so the disease could be studied.He also said immigrants in the U.S. illegally should not be denied the vaccine because of their legal status because “it’s not ethically right to deny those individuals.”“I want to reassure people that your information when collected to get your second shot, if you get the Pfizer or Moderna vaccine, will not be used in any way, shape or form to harm you legally,” Adams said. “That is something that I have been assured of.”Both the Moderna vaccine and the Pfizer-BioNTech shot require two doses several weeks apart. The second dose must be from the same company as the first. Both vaccines appeared safe and strongly protective in large, still unfinished studies.
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Germany Repatriates Three IS Women, 12 Children From Syria
The German government has brought home three women and 12 children from refugee camps that hold families of Islamic State (IS) fighters in northeastern Syria.Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said in a press release Sunday that he was “relieved” that the German nationals were repatriated in an operation carried out Saturday in cooperation with Finland.“The repatriation was based on humanitarian grounds and involved (amongst others) orphans and sick children – cases in which a repatriation was deemed particularly necessary and urgent,” Maas said.“Shortly before Christmas, this is good news and an encouraging sign that we will be able to make repatriations happen in other cases, too,” he added.Maas did not identify the women, but prosecutors said one of them was arrested upon arrival at the airport in Frankfurt.German news media reported that all three women face terror charges for their connection with IS.Contacted by VOA, a Kurdish official confirmed the repatriation of the women and children but declined to give further details.Local media outlets in northeast Syria reported that a German delegation over the weekend met with officials from the local administration to discuss among other things the situation of German nationals held in Kurdish-run refugee camps in the region.About 70 adult Germans and 150 children of German parents remain in the custody of Kurdish forces in Syria, according to the German newspaper Bild.The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) says it currently holds about 70,000 people, mostly families of IS fighters or sympathizers of the terror group, in several detention camps. Most of them were captured following the 2019 U.S.-led campaign that destroyed IS’s so-called caliphate in Syria.In addition to women and children, the SDF also has more than 10,000 IS fighters in their custody, including about 2,000 foreign nationals.SDF officials have called on countries to take back their detained citizens, cautioning that they do not have enough resources to keep IS prisoners and their families indefinitely, especially during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.Several Western countries such as the United States, France, Germany, Britain and Finland have repatriated some of their citizens.
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WFP: Unrest in Northern Mozambique Creating Acute Food Shortages
The World Food Program is warning that hundreds of thousands of people in conflict-ridden northern Mozambique are facing life-threatening shortages of food. Escalating violence and increased insecurity in Mozambique’s three northernmost provinces, Cabo Delgado, Niassa and Nampula, are disrupting agricultural activities and causing food prices to skyrocket. The World Food Program says this is spurring dangerous levels of hunger and malnutrition. The WFP says over 900,000 people in the region are reaching emergency levels of food insecurity. WFP spokesman Tomson Phiri says a recent mission to these areas found malnourished children on the brink of starvation. “Cabo Delgado, it has to be noted, it has the highest rates of chronic malnutrition in Mozambique — with more than half the children malnourished,” she said. “Without urgent and sustained access and assistance, the situation may turn into another major humanitarian disaster.” Phiri says other vulnerable groups, including pregnant and nursing women, also need urgent nutritional support. In light of this emergency, WFP says it plans to scale up its humanitarian operation in Mozambique’s volatile northern provinces, aiming to deliver needed food to 750,000 people. The agency is appealing for $117 million for its humanitarian operation during the next 12 months. Without the required financial support it says it will have to cut food rations to this population.
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Agreement Likely Sunday on Nearly $1 Trillion US COVID Aid Bill
Top Washington negotiators, propelled by a late-night agreement on the last major obstacle to a COVID-19 economic relief package, said a Sunday agreement is all but inevitable to deliver long-overdue pandemic aid of almost $1 trillion. “I am very hopeful that we get this done today,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told Fox News Channel’s “Sunday Morning Futures.” The breakthrough involved a fight over Federal Reserve emergency powers that was resolved by the Senate’s top Democrat and a senior conservative Republican. Aides to lawmakers in both parties said the compromise sparked a final round of negotiations on a handful of remaining issues. An aide to a key GOP lawmaker said it would likely require all of Sunday to finalize and draft the final agreement, which is already guaranteed to be the largest spending measure yet, combining COVID-19 relief with a $1.4 trillion omnibus spending bill and reams of other unrelated legislation on taxes, health, infrastructure and education. The measure is finally nearing passage amid a frightening spike in coronavirus cases and deaths and accumulating evidence that the economy is struggling. Lawmakers and aides say it would establish a temporary $300 per week supplemental jobless benefits and $600 direct stimulus payments to most Americans. It would provide a fresh round of subsidies for hard-hit businesses and money for schools, health care providers and renters facing eviction. President Donald Trump is supportive, particularly of the push for providing more direct payments. “GET IT DONE,” he said in a late-night tweet. It would be the first significant legislative response to the pandemic since the $1.8 trillion CARES Act passed virtually unanimously in March. The COVID-19 legislation was held up by months of dysfunction, posturing and bad faith. But talks turned serious last week as lawmakers on both sides finally faced the deadline of acting before leaving Washington for Christmas. The measure is being added to a $1.4 trillion spending bill and combined with lots of other unfinished work, including previously stalled legislation to extend tax breaks, authorize water projects, and address the problem of surprise sky-high medical bills for out-of-network procedures. It would be virtually impossible for lawmakers to read and fully understand the sprawling legislation before a House vote expected on Monday. Senate action would follow. In the meantime, with a government shutdown deadline looming at midnight Sunday, lawmakers faced the reality of needing to enact another temporary spending bill — the second in as many days — to avert a shutdown of non-essential activities by federal agencies on Monday. Lawmakers had hoped to avoid that step, but progress slowed Saturday as GOP Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania pressed for the inclusion of a provision to close down Fed lending facilities. Democrats and the White House said it was too broadly worded and would have tied the hands of the incoming Biden administration, but Republicans rallied to Toomey’s position. The Fed’s emergency programs provided loans to small and mid-size businesses and bought state and local government bonds. Those bond purchases made it easier for those governments to borrow, at a time when their finances were under pressure from job losses and health costs stemming from the pandemic. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said last month that those programs, along with two that purchased corporate bonds, would close at the end of the year, prompting an initial objection by the Fed. Under the Dodd-Frank financial overhaul law passed after the Great Recession, the Fed can only set up emergency programs with the support of the treasury secretary. Toomey defended his provision in a Senate speech, saying the emergency powers were designed to stabilize capital markets at the height of the pandemic this spring and were expiring at the end of the month anyway. Democrats said that Toomey was trying to limit the Fed’s ability to boost the economy, just as President-elect Joe Biden prepared to take office. “This is about existing authorities that the Fed has had for a very long time, to be able to use in an emergency,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. “It’s about a lending authority for helping small businesses, state government, local government in the middle of a crisis.” Toomey disputed that, saying his proposal “is emphatically not a broad overhaul of the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending authority.” His office issued a statement early Sunday calling the compromise with Schumer “an unqualified victory for taxpayers” that met Toomey’s aim of shutting down the emergency facility. The emerging agreement on virus aid would deliver more than $300 billion in aid to businesses as well as the extra $300-per-week for the jobless and renewal of state benefits that would otherwise expire right after Christmas. It included $600 direct payments to individuals; vaccine distribution funds; and money for renters, schools, the Postal Service and people needing food aid. The governmentwide appropriations bill would fund agencies through next September. That measure was likely to provide a last $1.4 billion installment for Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall as a condition of winning his signature.
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Vegas Restaurants Cope with Extended Virus Restrictions
Las Vegas restaurants and bars are turning to individual dining tents, food trucks and contactless takeout to survive extended coronavirus restrictions limiting indoor dining. The hospitality industry has been especially hurt by the pandemic, first seeing total shutdowns and then shifting restrictions on capacity and other operations. Amid a surge of reported coronavirus cases hospitalizations and deaths in Nevada, Gov. Steve Sisolak in late November tightened restrictions on casinos and restaurants, which had been operating generally at 50% capacity since summer. Sisolak ordered them to reduce capacity to 25% or 50 people, whichever is less, and extended the limits until at least Jan. 15. To cope with the new rules as chilly weather has made its way to southern Nevada, one Las Vegas restaurant, Esther’s Kitchen, has expanded into its parking lot in the city’s Arts District with eight cabana-style structures. The Las Vegas Review-Journal reports each individual dining tent has floor coverings, lighting, a sound system and a heater. The tents are arranged around a fire pit sitting on artificial turf. James Trees, chef and owner of Esther’s Kitchen, said he’ll have to stay creative because even if restrictions are eased back to 50% capacity, it won’t pay the bills. “We still need more ideas, which causes us to just push ourselves in a way that will make us more innovative over the next few months,” he said. He’s also created takeout versions of two of the restaurant’s pasta dishes and is working to get takeout packaging that keeps orders fresh as they travel. Hash House A Go Go, which has five locations in the Las Vegas metropolitan area, had been considering launching a food truck before the pandemic, co-owner Jim Rees said. “When this hit, it was all the more reason to get it going as quickly as we could,” Rees said. The chain debuted the food truck this past week outside their location in west Las Vegas on Sahara Avenue. The truck offers buy-one-get-one-free on all menu items and $1.50 domestic beers. Most of Hash House A Go Go’s restaurants, which have limited hours, have reduced the menu from eight pages to a two-sided sheet for food and one for drinks. Rees said it was an attempt to convert the menu into single-use, disposable sheets and concentrate on the signature offerings that a smaller staff can prepare. Rees said guests have provided very little negative feedback to the slimmer menu. Other establishments have offered new takeout options, such as La Strega in Summerlin which started selling piadina flatbread sandwiches and more from a walk-up sidewalk stand next to the restaurant. “We have a clientele here that’s a little bit more cautious, with corona and everything,” said chef and partner Gina Marinelli. “So for them to come up and get contact-free piadina, salads, spritzes and things to take home, or go the park, or do whatever — we’ve created something really special and safe for them.”
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UN Condemns Growing Repression in Thailand
The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights is expressing alarm at the growing repression and clampdown on freedom of expression and assembly in Thailand.In recent weeks, Thai authorities have charged at least 35 protesters, including a 16-year-old student, with defaming the country’s royal family. A spokeswoman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ravina Shamdasani, said the juvenile’s arrest is particularly alarming.She said the young boy was arrested on so-called lese majeste charges after participating in a fashion show mocking the royal family’s fashion style. Lese majeste is a provision of Thailand’s criminal code, that carries sentences of between three and 15 years’ imprisonment for defaming, insulting or threatening the country’s royal family.Shamdasani said the fashion show was part of a student rally organized as part of mass protests that have been going on for the past four months. Protesters are calling for an overhaul of the government and military as well as reform of the monarchy.Shamdasani said the students and young boy were just exercising their right of free expression.“So, to use law, which carries a maximum sentence of 15 years’ imprisonment for this quote-unquote offense does not fit in with Thailand’s obligations under the International Covenant on Political and Civil Rights with regards to the right of freedom of expression,” she said.FILE – Police detain pro-democracy protester Jatupat “Pai Dao Din” Boonpattararaksa during a mass rally to call for the ouster of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha’s government and reforms in the monarchy, in Bangkok, Thailand, Oct. 13, 2020.Spokeswoman Shamdasani said Thailand continues to ignore repeated calls from U.N. watchdog groups, including the U.N. Human Rights Committee, to bring its criminal law in line with the country’s international treaty obligations.“It is extremely disappointing that after a period of two years without any cases, we are suddenly witnessing a large number of cases, and, shockingly, now also against a minor. We also remain concerned that other serious criminal charges are being filed against protesters engaged in peaceful protests in recent months, including charges of sedition and offenses under the Computer Crime Act, she said.Human Rights Watch has said the Act gives the government broad powers. The measure has been used to silence opposition to the government and monarchy.The U.N.’s human rights office is calling on the government to stop filing criminal charges against people exercising their right to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. It says detaining people for exercising these rights constitutes arbitrary arrest or detention, which is prohibited under international human rights law.
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Dozens of Anti-Lukashenko Demonstrators Detained in Belarus
A Belarusian human rights group says security forces have detained dozens of people during protests calling on strongman Alexander Lukashenko to step down.
The Vyasna rights group said on December 20 that at least 42 people had been detained in the capital, Minsk, and the cities of Barysau, Homel, Hrodna, and Salihorsk.
Marches and rallies were reported in several districts of Minsk, accordng to RFE/RL’s Belarus Service, with many carrying the opposition’s red-and-white flag or banners.
Smaller protests were also held in other towns and cities across Belarus. Belarus has been roiled by nearly daily protests since early August when Lukashenko was declared victor of a presidential election that opposition leaders said was flawed. FILE – Law enforcement officers detain two men as opposition supporters rally to protest against police violence and the Belarus presidential election results in Minsk, Nov. 29, 2020.Police have violently cracked down on the postelection protests, with more than 27,000 detentions, according to the United Nations. There have also been credible reports of torture and ill-treatment, and several people have died. Many of Belarus’s opposition leaders have been arrested or forced to leave the country, while Lukashenko, who has ruled the country with an iron fist for almost three decades, has refused to negotiate with the opposition.
The United States, the European Union, and several other countries have refused to acknowledge Lukashenko as the winner of the vote, and imposed sanctions on Lukashenko and his allies, citing election rigging and the police crackdown.
Crowd numbers at protests in Minsk and elsewhere have dropped amid fatigue, repression, and the cold weather. Protests organizers have also switched tactics, calling for smaller gatherings to evade arrest and stretch the riot police.
Small marches and rallies were also reported on December 19 in Minsk and elsewhere, including the western city of Hrodna.
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EU-UK Trade Talks Floundering over Fish as Cutoff Day Nears
Deep into a crucial weekend of negotiations, a breakthrough on fishing rights remained elusive for the European Union and Britain, leaving both without a trade agreement that would dull the edge of a chaotic, costly economic break on New Year’s Day. With hundreds of thousands of jobs at stake throughout the economy, the tiny sector of fisheries continued to drive a wedge between the 27-nation bloc and the U.K., highlighting the animosity that drove them to a Brexit divorce over the past four years. Britain left the bloc in January but a 11-month economic transition period ends on Dec. 31. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s office said Sunday that the EU is “continuing to make demands that are incompatible with our independence. We cannot accept a deal that doesn’t leave us in control of our own laws or waters.”The almost mythical sense of Britain’s rights to rule its waves was an essential part of what drove Brexiteers to victory in the 2016 referendum. Johnson is seeking to make sure that as much as possible of the shared British waters are now returned to U.K. vessels only. The EU has always maintained that those waters have been shared for decades, if not centuries, and insists if too many fishing rights are taken away, it will punish Britain by imposing hefty import fees to the mainland market, which is essential to the U.K. seafood industry. The stalemate has left the overall talks inconclusive with businesses on both sides clamoring for a deal that would save tens of billions in costs. Johnson, though, could not be budged. “We need to get any deal right and based on terms which respect what the British people voted for,” his office said. The EU parliament needs to approve any deal before the end of the year and had set a Sunday night deadline so it could have a cursory vetting of the deal and approve it before New Year’s Day. Negotiators, however, seemed little impressed by yet another deadline when so many had already been missed during the four-year departure process. One official from an EU coastal nation said the EU was refusing to yield more than a quarter of the fishing quotas the bloc stands to lose now that Britain is regaining full control of its waters due to Brexit. Britain is also steadfast that a 3-year transition period would be long enough for EU fishermen to adapt to the new rules, while the EU wants at least six years. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were still ongoing.A failure to reach a post-Brexit deal would lead to more chaos on Britain’s borders with the EU at the start of 2021, when new tariffs would add to other impediments to trade enacted by both sides. The talks have bogged down on two main issues over the past days — the EU’s access to U.K. fishing waters and assurances of fair competition between businesses. A trade deal would ensure there are no tariffs and quotas on trade in goods between the two sides, but there would still be technical costs, partly associated with customs checks and non-tariff barriers on services. While both sides would suffer economically from a failure to secure a trade deal, most economists think the British economy would take a greater hit, at least in the near-term, as it is relatively more reliant on trade with the EU than vice versa.
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British Prime Minister: ‘We Can’t Continue with Christmas as Planned’
Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center said early Sunday there are 76.3 million global COVID-19 cases.The U.S. continues to lead the world in case numbers at 17.6 million, followed by India with 10 million and Brazil with 7.2 million.U.S. lawmakers are expected to vote Sunday on a nearly $1 trillion COVID-19 economic relief package. The package includes, among other things, $300 supplemental unemployment benefits and $600 direct stimulus payments to many Americans.“We can’t continue with Christmas as planned,” British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Saturday as he announced new restrictions for London and southern England, where a mutant strain of the coronavirus is spreading and where there is now a virtual lockdown, with people urged to stay home.All nonessential stores in the region are set to close, and people should not enter or leave the British capital or large parts of southeastern England.South Korea recorded 1,097 new infections Sunday, the fifth consecutive day it recorded more than 1,000 new cases.A South Korean Justice Ministry official said an outbreak at a prison in Seoul has infected 184 prisoners and one worker.Starting Monday, the Australian states of Victoria and Queensland are banning people arriving from Sydney, where a 70-person coronavirus cluster has emerged in its northern beach suburbs which have now been placed under a strict lockdown until Christmas Eve.Thailand said Sunday it will test more than 10,000 people in the southwestern province of Samu Sakhon after a daily surge of more than 500.
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One Year on, Wuhan Residents Share Lockdown Memories, Hopes for 2021
In China’s Wuhan, the original epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak, the city’s residents are returning to normal life, even as they continue to grapple with memories of the early outbreak, which struck fear in the city.It’s been almost seven months since the city recorded a locally transmitted case of the disease due to a strict city-wide lockdown and a mass testing event of almost all the city’s 11 million residents.Today, restaurants, shopping streets and bars are crowded, but locals are still experiencing the lasting impact of the lockdown on mental health and work.Reuters asked people throughout Wuhan to share images and videos they took during their outbreak, as well as their hopes for 2021, as the city approaches the one-year anniversary of the outbreak. City health officials released the first public notice of the then-unknown virus on Dec. 31, 2019.Like the city itself, most people are enduringly optimistic, even as they reflect on the city’s toughest year in recent memory.An Junming, Wuhan volunteerAn worked as a volunteer during the city’s strict 76-day lockdown, delivering food to people trapped in their homes.“At that time, I could only eat one meal a day, because there was indeed a lot of work to do, but there were very few people doing this, so I was very anxious.“I hope that the entire city will prosper in 2021.“It can be said that in 2020 there were no people on the streets of the whole Wuhan – only animals were active outside.”An Junming poses for a picture on a street, almost a year after the global outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Wuhan, Hubei province, China, Dec. 15, 2020.Zhang Xinghao, lead singer Of Wuhan band Mad Rat“At that time, I couldn’t do anything at home. It was very boring, so I thought I needed to write some music and sing some songs to find some fun in my life.“It made me reflect on a lot of things, and it is the first time in my life that I have experienced such a disaster.“The epidemic must not be ignored. I see that the news about foreign countries has a lot of infections, so this must not be ignored. We should not think that we are very powerful. In fact, I think we humans are quite fragile.”Duan Ling, 36, businesswomanDuan’s husband, Fang Yushun, caught COVID-19 in February while working as a surgeon.“I had my birthday on the day he was hospitalized during the epidemic, and he spent a day editing and sent a video to me. So I felt very moved.“We have experienced a lot of things in the year 2020, and I want to say goodbye to the 2020. But in the new year, I wish we could have a baby.”Lai Yun, 38, Japanese restaurant owner“At this time, every one of us in Wuhan feels like time flies very fast. Like closing the city only feels like yesterday.”Lai said he cherished memories of his children putting on performances in the family living room.“I think the inspiration that COVID-19 gives us is that a healthy body is more important than anything else.”Student Wu Mengjing, 22, right, poses with her friend on a street, almost a year after the global outbreak of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Wuhan, Hubei province, China, Dec. 16, 2020.Wu Mengjing, 22, design student“I think the Wuhan epidemic has affected too many people. Many companies went bankrupt and residents were unemployed. This has a great impact on the entire development of Wuhan.“I am very worried that there will be a second wave in Wuhan, because there were some recurrences of the epidemic in various parts of the country, and the number of college students in Wuhan is particularly large.”Jiang Honghua, 34, street food vendor“During the epidemic, our whole family is together, and this time like this is very rare, and I felt very happy,” said Jiang, sharing photos of her son and daughter playing.“I thought my year in 2020 was actually OK – I felt lucky that I could maintain the livelihood of the whole family. I hope in year 2021 I can have good business.”Liu Runlian, 58, street dancer“2021 is coming, and I don’t expect much from myself. But I want to live a peaceful life, and then I hope everyone is safe.”
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Thailand Holds Provincial Elections in Test of Democracy
Thais voted nationwide on Sunday in provincial elections that mark the first test of democracy since a general election last year that drew accusations of manipulation and helped spawn months of youth protests.The elections in Thailand’s 76 provinces outside the capital Bangkok are the first since Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, who kept power after last year’s ballot, overthrew an elected government in a military coup.“It’s my duty to vote,” said 27-year-old bank worker Korkiet Akaraparn, voting in his first provincial election in Nonthaburi, on the outskirts of Bangkok. “I hope that there will be new people from this election who bring change.”Polling officials reported a steady turnout despite Thailand’s biggest daily surge in coronavirus cases on Saturday in a province outside Bangkok. Polls close at 5 p.m., with results expected from the evening.Among the parties putting up candidates is the Progressive Movement, which has its roots in the now banned Future Forward Party of Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit.Thanathorn had emerged as the most vocal challenger to Prayuth. When he and his party were banned from politics, it prompted protests demanding the removal of Prayuth, a new constitution and reforms to the powerful monarchy.Prayuth rejects accusations that he engineered the general election to keep power.Although the party backing him in parliament is not formally putting up candidates in the provincial elections, contestants in races across the country are making clear their loyalty to his camp.The elections are also a test for the Pheu Thai Party linked to populist former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. In opposition it remains the largest party in Thailand’s parliament.Thaksin, who rarely comments in public from self-exile since being overthrown in 2006, has posted on Twitter to encourage people to support the party ahead of provincial elections, in which powerful families traditionally hold local sway.“I voted for candidates who are relatives of the former chief,” said Charoen Buaperm, 60.Provincial administrations are responsible for the provision of local services and development plans and run their own budgets. The Progressive Movement seeks to devolve more power to provinces from Bangkok, which is not yet holding its own local election.
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Deal on Fed Removes Obstacle to US COVID Relief
Top congressional lawmakers struck a late-night agreement on the last major obstacle to a COVID-19 economic relief package costing nearly $1 trillion, clearing the way for votes as early as Sunday.A Democratic aide said in an email that an agreement had been reached late Saturday and that compromise language was being finalized to seal a deal to be unveiled on Sunday.The breakthrough involved a fight over Federal Reserve emergency powers that was defused by an odd couple: the Senate’s top Democrat and a senior conservative Republican.“We’re getting very close, very close,” Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said earlier Saturday as he spent much of the day going back and forth with GOP Sen. Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania. Toomey had been pressing a provision to close down Fed lending facilities that Democrats and the White House said was too broadly worded and would have tied the hands of the incoming Biden administration.The COVID-19 legislation has been held up after months of disfunction, posturing and bad faith, but talks turned serious in December as lawmakers on both sides finally faced the deadline of acting before exiting Washington for Christmas.The bill, lawmakers and aides say, would establish a temporary $300 per week supplemental jobless benefits and $600 direct stimulus payments to most Americans, along with a fresh round of subsidies for hard-hit businesses and funding for schools, health care providers, and renters facing eviction.Schumer said he hoped both the House and Senate would vote on the measure Sunday. That would take more cooperation than the Senate can usually muster, but a government shutdown deadline loomed at midnight Sunday and all sides were eager to leave for Christmas.Fed emergency programsToomey defended his controversial provision in a floor speech, saying the emergency powers were designed to stabilize capital markets at the height of the COVID panic this spring and were expiring at the end of the month anyway. The language he had sought would block the Biden administration from restarting them.Toomey has a stubborn streak and Democrats held firm as well, but both sides saw the need for a compromise to clear the way for the $900 billion-plus COVID-19 relief measure, which was being attached to a $1.4 trillion government-wide spending bill and a host of other bills that compiled much of Capitol Hill’s remaining legislative output of the Trump era.At issue were Fed emergency programs, launched amid the pandemic this spring, that provided loans to small and mid-size businesses and bought state and local government bonds. Those bond purchases made it easier for those governments to borrow, at a time when their finances were under pressure from job losses and health costs stemming from the pandemic.Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said last month that those programs, along with two that purchased corporate bonds, would close at the end of the year, prompting an initial objection by the Fed. Under the Dodd-Frank financial reform law passed after the Great Recession, the Fed can only set up emergency programs with the support of the treasury secretary.Democrats in Congress also said that Toomey was trying to limit the Fed’s ability to boost the economy, just as Biden prepared to take office.“This is about existing authorities that the Fed has had for a very long time, to be able to use in an emergency,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass. “It’s about a lending authority for helping small businesses, state government, local government in the middle of a crisis.”Toomey disputed that charge, saying his proposal “is emphatically not a broad overhaul of the Federal Reserve’s emergency lending authority.”Pandemic surgingThe massive package would wrap much of Capitol Hill’s unfinished 2020 business into a take-it-or-leave-it measure that promised to be a foot thick or more. House lawmakers would probably have only a few hours to study it before voting as early as Sunday night.A Senate vote would follow, possibly on Monday. One more short-term funding bill would be needed to avoid the looming deadline — or a partial shutdown of non-essential agencies would start on Monday.The $900 billion package was being finished as the pandemic delivered its most fearsome surge yet, killing more than 3,000 victims per day and straining the health care system. While vaccines were on the way, most people wouldn’t get them for months. Jobless claims were on the rise.The emerging agreement would deliver more than $300 billion in aid to businesses as well as the extra $300-per-week for the jobless and renewal of state benefits that would otherwise expire right after Christmas. It included $600 direct payments to individuals; vaccine distribution funds; and money for renters, schools, the Postal Service and people needing food aid.It would be the first significant legislative response to the pandemic since the landmark CARES Act passed virtually unanimously in March, delivering $1.8 trillion in aid, more generous $600 per week bonus jobless benefits and $1,200 direct payments to individuals.The governmentwide appropriations bill would fund agencies through next September. That measure was likely to provide a last $1.4 billion installment for President Donald Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall as a condition of winning his signature.
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Moderna COVID-19 Vaccine Begins Rollout as US Races to Broaden Injection Campaign
U.S. distribution of Moderna Inc.’s COVID-19 vaccine began Saturday, with more than 3,700 sites scheduled to start receiving and administering shots as soon as Monday, vastly widening the rollout started last week by Pfizer Inc.Amid record coronavirus infections and deaths, Moderna has moved vaccine supplies from its manufacturing plants to warehouses operated by distributor McKesson Corp.Workers on Saturday were packing vaccines into containers and loading them onto trucks, U.S. Army Gen. Gustave Perna said during a news conference. Trucks will set out Sunday and shipments will start reaching health care providers as soon as Monday, he said.Doses of vaccine must travel with security guards, including U.S. Marshals, and will be stored in locked refrigerators. U.S. plans call for at-risk groups, such as elderly people in nursing homes and medical workers, to receive injections first.The Food and Drug Administration on Friday approved an emergency use authorization for Moderna’s vaccine, the second COVID-19 vaccine to receive approval.Moderna said a panel of outside advisers to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention voted Saturday to recommend its vaccine for use in people age 18 and older. The Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices panel voted 11-0 in favor of the vaccine.The shot developed by Pfizer and its German partner BioNTech SE was authorized Dec. 11.Pharmaceutical services provider Catalent Inc.’s facility in Bloomington, Indiana, is filling and packaging vials with Moderna vaccine and handing them to McKesson. The company is shipping them from its facilities, including those in Louisville, Kentucky, and Memphis, Tennessee, which are close to air hubs for United Parcel Service Inc. and FedEx Corp.Pfizer organized its own distribution system. The U.S. government’s vaccine program, dubbed Operation Warp Speed, is in charge of logistics for Moderna’s distribution under Perna.Reduced number of dosesPerna apologized to U.S. governors for confusion on the vaccine’s availability after the U.S. government reduced the number of doses states would receive in the upcoming week.States including Oregon and Washington, which are ramping up to get front-line health care workers vaccinated as quickly as possible, said their allocation had dropped by as much as 40%.Perna said he made an error estimating the number of doses that would actually be cleared by regulators for shipment, which was fewer than the number of doses produced.A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said 7.9 million doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines would be delivered nationally this week.The Moderna delivery system will have some of the same players as Pfizer’s but will differ in ways.Transportation companies UPS and FedEx are giving priority to vaccines on planes and trucks that are moving holiday gifts and other cargo. Their drivers will handle the bulk of the last-mile Moderna vaccine deliveries. They are going directly to vaccination sites, unlike Pfizer’s, which was sent to large hubs and redistributed.“We added a lot of aircraft, a lot of temporary workers. (Vaccines) are a very small fraction of total volumes,” said Wes Wheeler, a UPS executive in charge of vaccine shipments.Moderna’s vaccine is available in quantities as small as 100 doses and can be stored for 30 days in standard-temperature refrigerators, while the inoculations from Pfizer come in boxes of 975 doses, must be shipped and stored at -70 Celsius, and can be held for only five days at standard refrigerator temperatures. Initial doses were given to health professionals.Programs by pharmacies Walgreens and CVS to distribute the Pfizer vaccine to long-term care facilities are expected to start Monday. A CDC advisory panel Sunday will consider which groups should get vaccinated next.Perna said the United States is on track to have enough doses of Pfizer and Moderna vaccines by the end of the year to inoculate 20 million people, as the government projected, but deliveries of those doses may continue into first week of January. Health care experts forecast it will take well into 2021 for a significant portion of Americans to be inoculated.Both vaccines were about 95% effective at preventing illness in clinical trials that found no serious safety issues.
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Graffiti Explodes Across Pandemic-era New York
Graffiti, part of New York’s history for more than 50 years, is flourishing during the coronavirus pandemic, a sign of decadence for some, but vitality for others.As dusk becomes nightfall, graffiti artist Saynosleep takes a quick look around and then gets to work on a luxury store closed since it was looted in June during protests over George Floyd’s death.”If you’re not painting right now, I don’t know what you’re doing,” the 40-year-old said, adding an expletive. “There has never been a time like this.”The facades of hundreds of stores that have shut because of the pandemic are “an invitation” to artists, Marie Flageul, curator at New York’s Museum of Street Art (MoSA) said.Walls, bridges, sidewalks and subway cars — 34 of which have been painted since the beginning of the month — are canvases.”It’s a big surge, a renaissance of graffiti,” said Saynosleep, who uses a different pseudonym for his legal artwork.Graffiti was first accepted by the art world in the 1980s when it moved into galleries.Expressive street art then captured the imagination of the general public in the 2000s when it went from illegal to legal spaces.FILE – In this Feb. 22, 2006, photo, the 7 Train passes by the 5 Pointz Building in Long Island City, Queens, New York.But since March, it is the raw, illegal type of graffiti that has spread in a disorderly fashion.”Everybody wants to express themselves,” said Saynosleep, who said he has seen a woman in her 60s drawing graffiti. “People are bored. They need something to do.”The growth of the Black Lives Matter movement following Floyd’s killing in the custody of a Minnesota police officer in May has accelerated the trend, with protesters scribbling racial justice slogans and demands on buildings.In a year when socializing has virtually stopped and streets no longer throng with activity, graffiti is artists’ way of saying: “‘It feels like New York is dead and you don’t see us, but we are still here,'” Flageul said.The creative impulses are not to everyone’s taste, however. New York State Gov. Andrew Cuomo said the graffiti was “another sign of decay,” along with an increase in homicides and shootings in New York City.He indirectly blamed Mayor Bill de Blasio for supposedly taking a lax attitude toward it.Critics were also angry that the city government, because of budgetary constraints, cut its graffiti removal program that had cleaned almost 15,000 sites in 2019.”I think it’s horrible,” said Darcy Weber, who has recently settled in New York. “Some say it’s art, but did they get permission for that? No, so it’s vandalism.”FILE – In this Aug. 1, 2018, photo, artist Lynne Yun’s mural project on a corrugated metal shed is seen near One World Trade Center in Lower Manhattan in New York.For some, graffiti reminds them of the dark days of the 1970s and ’80s when New York was broke and crime was rife.”From the beginning of the shutdown, I’ve been seen by police and I kept going, multiple times,” without being arrested Saynosleep said.A spokesperson for the New York Police Department told Agence France-Presse the force is “fully aware of the importance of addressing graffiti-related crime,” and said such incidents were down 17% from last year.Flageul, who is also a spokesperson for the 5Pointz graffiti collective, says it’s “a bit of a cliche” to say that more graffiti means New York is regressing.Brooklyn President Eric Adams, who wants to become New York’s mayor next year, says tags spray-painted onto public and private property “is quickly destroying our borough’s landscape.””It costs home and business owners hundreds of thousands of dollars and tremendous efforts to erase it,” he added, drawing a distinction between “vandalism” and “amazing street murals.”Ken Lovett, an adviser to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chairman, noted that cleaning graffiti from trains is draining resources when the MTA is facing “the worst financial crisis” in its history.New Jersey resident Emile Fu says he’s not too bothered.”There’s other things to be concerned about,” she told AFP.Bryce Graham, who lives in the Chelsea neighborhood, said the graffiti would shock him in somewhere like Ottawa “where everything is super clean.””But here in New York, it’s a … mix of what is clean and what is dirty,” he said.
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Pentagon Plan on Cyber Split Draws Strong Hill Criticism
The Pentagon is proposing to end an arrangement in which a single military officer leads two of the nation’s main cybersecurity organizations, a move that a leading Democrat said Saturday makes him “profoundly concerned” amid a large-scale hacking campaign on U.S. government computer systems.Representative Adam Smith, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said in a letter to acting Defense Secretary Christopher Miller that he objected to the way the Pentagon was going about splitting off U.S. Cyber Command from the National Security Agency.Both organizations currently are headed by Army General Paul Nakasone, an arrangement known as “dual-hatting.””Any action to sever the dual-hat relationship could have grave impacts on our national security, especially during a time that the country is wrestling with what may be the most damaging cyberattack in our country’s history,” Smith wrote.Major breachSmith was referring to revelations that elite hackers gained access to U.S. government computer systems over a monthslong period before being detected. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday that Russia was “pretty clearly” behind the hack, which is ongoing. On Saturday, President Donald Trump suggested without evidence that China — not Russia — might be behind the hack and tried to minimize its impact.A U.S. official confirmed Saturday that the Pentagon has a plan for separating the National Security Agency and Cyber Command. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss an internal matter not publicly announced.In his letter to Miller, Smith said the Pentagon has not met conditions set by the 2017 defense bill for severing the NSA from Cyber Command. Those conditions include certification by the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that ending the “dual-hat” arrangement will not hurt national security.Smith sent a similar letter to General Mark A. Milley, the Joint Chiefs chairman.A spokesman for Milley, Colonel Dave Butler, said Milley had “not officially reviewed or endorsed the proposal” for splitting the two organizations.The notion of splitting NSA from Cyber Command goes back to the Obama administration, which proposed to elevate the status of Cyber Command by making it a unified military command, taking it from under the purview of U.S. Strategic Command. The move reflected growing concern about cyber security.Trump gave OKThat move was approved by President Donald Trump in 2017, and it was foreseen that at some point Cyber Command would split away from the NSA, although such a move had strong opponents in Congress.It’s not clear whom the Trump administration might install as head of the NSA if it were split from Cyber Command before President-elect Joe Biden takes office January 20.Smith questioned the legality and timing of the Pentagon’s proposal to split the organizations.”I am deeply concerned about measures to terminate the dual-hat structure and request that you immediately consult with the House Armed Services Committee regarding any potential efforts to take such action,” Smith wrote in his letter to Milley, which Smith made public on Saturday.”Further, given that no assessment has been completed and no certification has been issued, I remind you that any action to terminate the dual-hat relationship with NSA and Cyber Command is not only inadvisable, but is contrary to law.”
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EU, UK Each Demand Concessions as Post-Brexit Talks Stall
British and EU negotiators have dug in their heels and each is demanding more concessions from the other as post-Brexit trade talks dragged on into Sunday, deadlocked on fishing rights.Sources from each side said that unless the other backed down on access to U.K. waters, Britain would leave the single market at midnight December 31 without a deal on cross-channel commerce.”We’re continuing to try every possible path to an agreement, but without a substantial shift from the [European] Commission we will be leaving on WTO terms on 31 December,” a British government source said.But an EU diplomat told Agence France-Presse that Brussels had made Britain its last offer on fishing and it was down now to U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson to decide whether he wanted a deal.”If Britain doesn’t accept the latest EU offer, it will be a ‘no deal’ over fish,” he warned. A European official said: “It’s very blocked.”The tough talk came as both sides engaged in intense negotiations to secure a pact before the end of the month. No deal would risk chaos at EU and U.K. borders, where a pre-deadline rush has caused long lines of lorries.Observers, however, noted that the fishing issue was about finding middle ground between offer and counteroffer in an economically small sector, while the much bigger other main issue, on guaranteeing fair trade competition rules, was closer to settlement.”It’s all down to numbers now,” the European diplomat said.British chief negotiator David Frost arrives at the U.K. delegation office for Brexit talks in Brussels, Dec. 19, 2020. EU fishing rights in British waters were proving to be a hurdle to securing a post-Brexit trade deal.The EU’s lead negotiator, Michel Barnier, has proposed that EU fishermen give up nearly a quarter of the value of the fish they currently catch in U.K. waters. Britain is understood to be holding out for getting back much more than half.The U.K. has suggested this compromise last for three years before it is renegotiated, whereas Europe is holding out for double that.Fishermen ‘sold down the river’EU fishermen fear losing any access to the rich U.K. fishing waters will threaten their livelihoods.”We are in the throes of being sold down the river,” the European Fisheries Alliance said in a statement, urging Barnier to stick to protecting them. “The shape of a deal as currently stands would give a huge blow to the European seafood sector, which is made up of more than 18,000 fishermen and 3,500 vessels with an annual turnover of 20.7 billion euros.”Time is very short to reach an accord. The European Parliament has highlighted a deadline of midnight (2300 GMT) on Sunday to receive a deal for review if its members are to ratify it before the end of the year.Their U.K. parliamentary counterparts are in recess but can be recalled within 48 hours to do likewise.But EU capitals are not binding themselves to the European Parliament’s deadline.France’s European affairs minister, Clement Beaune, said talks would not be called to a halt if they dragged out past Sunday night.’Concerns’ Britain not readyThe urgency of reaching a deal is seen in long lines of trucks at the freight rail link through the Channel tunnel as British companies frantically stockpile.A group of U.K. MPs warned Saturday that Britain had not installed the complex IT systems and port infrastructure needed to ensure trade with the EU runs smoothly.Some disruption is inevitable, deal or no deal, with British and European firms needing to fill out import-export, health and tax forms to send and receive goods to each other.A deal would avoid tariffs but there would still be traffic snarls as checks on truck loads and drivers’ papers are carried out.
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Trump Downplays Suspected Russia-led Hack
U.S. President Donald Trump is downplaying the severity of a massive cybersecurity breach by suspected Russian operatives that has exposed the networks of government agencies and private sector companies, contradicting the assertions of his secretary of state and lawmakers briefed on the matter.After days of silence, Trump took to Twitter on Saturday for his first comments on the hack, which is thought to have impacted at least 18,000 customers of SolarWinds, a Texas-based software management company. Those affected include the Energy, Treasury and Commerce departments, as well as state and local governments.But unlike intelligence officials and lawmakers, who warned that damage from the breach was ongoing, the president said that “everything is well under control.”“I have been fully briefed,” he wrote. “The Cyber Hack is far greater in the Fake News Media than in actuality.”Trump also cast doubt on comments late Friday by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who said it appeared that Russia was responsible.The Cyber Hack is far greater in the Fake News Media than in actuality. I have been fully briefed and everything is well under control. Russia, Russia, Russia is the priority chant when anything happens because Lamestream is, for mostly financial reasons, petrified of….
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) FILE – This Federal Bureau of Investigation headquarters in Washington.U.S. intelligence and cybersecurity agencies have yet to make a formal attribution for the hack, which they said was under way at least as early as March.The Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the FBI on Saturday declined to comment on Trump’s tweets, standing by a joint statement issued Wednesday, which described the hack only as part of a “significant and ongoing cybersecurity campaign.”Since then, however, in a series of updated alerts, the cybersecurity unit of the U.S. Homeland Security Department — the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) — has warned that the problem was not contained to software from SolarWinds.Other platforms“CISA has evidence of initial access vectors other than the SolarWinds Orion platform,” one alert said, adding that the agency was investigating instances in which other platforms were used to access critical networks.“This threat poses a grave risk to the federal government and state, local, tribal and territorial governments as well as critical infrastructure entities and other private sector organizations,” CISA said. “This is a patient, well-resourced and focused adversary that has sustained long duration activity on victim networks.”In the meantime, CISA’s former director answered some of the president’s Twitter allegations, rejecting the notion that the hack could have in any way changed the results of November’s presidential election.“Do not conflate voting system security and SolarWinds,” said Christopher Krebs, who had played a leading role in the country’s election security efforts until Trump fired him last month, two weeks after American voters cast their ballots.Trump Fires Security Chief Who Said 2020 Vote Was ‘Most Secure’ in US History President late Tuesday fired the director of the Cyber Security and Infrastructure Security Agency, alleging Christopher Krebs made ‘highly inaccurate’ comments about security of the November 3 vote “The proof is in the paper,” Krebs said, referring to the widespread use of paper ballot backups. “You can audit or recount again to confirm the outcome. Like they did in Georgia. And Michigan. And Wisconsin. And Arizona. Can’t hack paper.”Do not conflate voting system security and SolarWinds. The proof is in the paper. You can audit or recount again to confirm the outcome. Like they did in Georgia. And Michigan. And Wisconsin. And Arizona. Can’t hack paper.
— Chris Krebs (@C_C_Krebs) December 19, 2020Top lawmakers briefed on the hack also went on social media Saturday, pushing back against Trump’s insistence without evidence that Russia might not be responsible for the breach.“Increasingly clear that Russian intelligence conducted the gravest cyber intrusion in our history,” the acting chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican Marco Rubio, tweeted.“The process of determining its extent & assessing the damage is underway,” Rubio said, adding, “Our response must be proportional but significant.”Increasingly clear that Russian intelligence conducted the gravest cyber intrusion in our history
The process of determining its extent & assessing the damage is underway
Remediation will take time & significant resources
Our response must be proportional but significant
— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) December 19, 2020The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, Democrat Adam Schiff, meanwhile, castigated Trump for his response to the cyber breach.“Another day, another scandalous betrayal of our national security by this president,” Schiff tweeted. “Another dishonest tweet that sounds like it could have been written in the Kremlin.”Another day, another scandalous betrayal of our national security by this president.
Another dishonest tweet that sounds like it could have been written in the Kremlin.
Another obsequious display towards Putin.
And yet another reason that Trump can’t leave office fast enough. https://t.co/ILNh3KnfbT
— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) December 19, 2020Indications of a cyber intrusion went public earlier this month when the private cybersecurity firm FireEye announced its systems had been penetrated and that sensitive information had been stolen.The hack was later traced to updates for network management software from SolarWinds, though officials said the hackers were also using other software and systems to reach inside government and private sector networks.Research by tech giant Microsoft, made public Thursday, indicated the hackers precisely targeted at least 40 organizations. The vast majority were in the United States, but companies in Canada, Mexico, Britain, Belgium, Israel and the United Arab Emirates were also attacked.Not ‘espionage as usual’“This is not ‘espionage as usual,’ even in the digital age,” Microsoft President Brad Smith wrote on the company’s blog. “This is not just an attack on specific targets, but on the trust and reliability of the world’s critical infrastructure.”Former U.S. government officials also expressed concern about the impact of the hack.“The scope of it is large but exactly how large remains to be seen, and exactly how severe remains to be seen,” Michael Daniel, who served as a special assistant to former U.S. President Barack Obama on cyber issues, told VOA’s Russian Service.“The damage could be very, very significant to U.S. national security and to our economic security,” he said.Tom Bossert, a former homeland security adviser to Trump, said Saturday in a thread on Twitter, “It is clear that a foreign government is holding American networks at risk.”“If it’s Russia, as all indications suggest, the free world — led by the United States — must impose costs on the Kremlin,” Bossert added. “Our long-term goals must be to regain network integrity and control and to establish geopolitical deterrence.”It is clear that a foreign government is holding American networks at risk. @SecPompeo took a necessary step attributing the attack to Russia. That step requires formalization. 1/
— Thomas P. Bossert (@TomBossert) December 19, 2020U.S. President-elect Joe Biden on Thursday called the cybersecurity breach, “a matter of great concern.”“I want to be clear: My administration will make cybersecurity a top priority at every level of government — and we will make dealing with this breach a top priority from the moment we take office,” he said in a statement shortly after the latest CISA alert was issued.“Our adversaries should know that, as president, I will not stand idly by in the face of cyber assaults on our nation,” he added.Biden is set to be inaugurated as the 46th U.S. president on January 20.Wayne Lee and the VOA Russian Service’s Danila Galperovich contributed to this report.
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Experts Warn of Food Insecurity in South Sudan That Could Lead to Famine
Three U.N. organizations are calling for immediate humanitarian access to parts of Pibor County in South Sudan’s Jonglei state, where people have run out of food and are facing catastrophic levels of hunger, according to a report on food insecurity in the country.The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report, released Friday, identified Pibor County as one of the areas experiencing a crisis level of food insecurity because of widespread flooding and insecurity, which have prevented aid agencies from delivering food.The IPC report indicates that in the coming year, an estimated 5.8 million people in South Sudan will likely face IPC Phase 3, which is classified as acute food insecurity.The IPC analysis estimates that by mid-2021, an estimated 7.24 million people, or 60 percent of the South Sudanese population, including about 1.4 million children under age 5, are expected to be acutely malnourished, the highest number in three years, according to the United Nations.Poor crops, pandemic, pestsSeveral factors have contributed to food insecurity in South Sudan, according to Isaiah Chol Aruai, who chairs the country’s National Bureau of Statistics.“The food security situation and nutrition situation has deteriorated,” Aruai told South Sudan in Focus. “This is because of pockets of insecurity that have led to population displacement, low crop production because of climate shocks such as floods and drought, the ongoing microeconomic crisis and the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, pests such as desert locusts, and inadequate multisectoral humanitarian assistance.”FILE – Akon Morro, 2, who is anemic and suffers from edema due to malnutrition, sits on the floor of a feeding center in Al Sabah Children’s Hospital in Juba, South Sudan, Dec. 3, 2020.The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), the U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the World Food Program (WFP) issued a joint press release Friday, saying they and other humanitarian organizations were scaling up their response.”We call on all parties to stop the violence and to ensure safe humanitarian access in order to prevent an already dire situation from turning into a full-blown catastrophe,” said FAO Representative in South Sudan Meshack Malo.The IPC Global Support Unit released a real-time quality review report indicating populations in South Sudan’s Akobo, Aweil South, Tonj East, Tonj North and Tonj South communities all fall into the catastrophic IPC Phase 5, or acute food insecurity.’Immediate scale-up’ of aidAruai called for urgent humanitarian intervention.“In order to save lives and avert total collapse of livelihoods in the affected counties, particularly those with the populations in catastrophe IPC Phase 5 and Emergency IPC Phase 4, there is an urgent need for immediate scale-up of multisectoral humanitarian assistance,” Aruai told VOA.The IPC report identified Jonglei, Unity, Upper Nile, Lakes, Warrap and Northern Bahr El-Ghazal states as the most affected areas, with 50 percent of the population facing acute food insecurity.Makena Walker, the WFP’s deputy country director in South Sudan, said the organization was deeply concerned about the worsening food security situation.“The World Food Program has already begun scaling up its food and nutrition assistance response. We have extended food assistance beyond the lean season and by increasing the number of people we support,” Walker told South Sudan in Focus.FILE – Children wash in muddy floodwaters in Wang Chot, Old Fangak County, Jonglei state, South Sudan, Nov. 26, 2020. A report issued Dec. 18, 2020, identified several areas in South Sudan experiencing crisis levels of food insecurity.Mohamed Ayoya, UNICEF’s country representative in South Sudan, said 3,000 children were on the verge of severe acute malnutrition, which he called “extremely worrying.”“The data that we have today leaves us with no doubt about the sense of urgency for all of us — government, donor community and humanitarian actors here in South Sudan — to join hands and ensure that all these children get the treatment they need, and they do so as soon as possible,” Ayoya told VOA.U.N. agencies said the 2020 humanitarian appeal was underfunded and more resources were needed to support the humanitarian response in the coming months to strengthen people’s capacity to cope with looming famine in South Sudan.
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Congressional Negotiators Down to a Few Issues on $900B US Aid Plan
Negotiators were down to a handful of issues as they sought to finalize an almost $1 trillion COVID-19 economic relief package Saturday, still optimistic the overdue talks would soon produce an agreement. The Senate convened a Saturday session, while House members stood by for a vote that will come no earlier than Sunday.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said a provision by Senator Pat Toomey, R-Pa., that would curb emergency Federal Reserve powers was the biggest hurdle to sealing a deal.”That has to be resolved. And then everything will fall into place,” she said. “It’s a very significant difference.”Democrats said Toomey’s stand on the Fed would deprive President-elect Joe Biden of crucial tools to manage the economy.Sunday deadlineA new deadline of midnight Sunday for a government shutdown served as a backstop for the tortuous negotiations, which were being conducted in secret largely among the top four leaders in Congress.”We need to conclude our talks, draft legislation and land this plane,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky.A spokesman for Pelosi said she told Democratic colleagues on a Saturday conference call that “we’re right within reach.”FILE – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California speaks during her weekly briefing, Dec. 4, 2020, on Capitol Hill in Washington.Final pushThe massive package would wrap much of Capitol Hill’s unfinished 2020 business into a take-it-or-leave-it measure that promised to be a foot thick or more. House lawmakers will probably have only a few hours to study it before voting as early as Sunday afternoon. A Senate vote would follow, probably on Monday. One more short-term funding bill probably would be needed to avoid the looming deadline.An agreement in principle Saturday would be a precursor to more hours of translating compromises into detailed legislation. Lawmakers are eager to exit Washington and close out a tumultuous year.House lawmakers were told they wouldn’t have to report to work Saturday but that a Sunday session was likely. The Senate scheduled votes on nominations Saturday.The $900 billion package comes as the pandemic is delivering its most fearsome surge yet, killing more than 3,000 people a day and straining the health care system. While vaccines are on the way, most people won’t get them for months. Jobless claims are rising.The emerging agreement would deliver more than $300 billion in aid to businesses and provide the jobless a $300-per-week bonus federal unemployment benefit and renewal of state benefits that would otherwise expire right after Christmas. It includes $600 direct payments to individuals, vaccine distribution funds and money for renters, schools, the Postal Service and people needing food aid.FILE – Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., is pictured at the Capitol in Washington, Feb. 3, 2020.Effort to bar Fed lendingToomey’s provision, a feature of GOP bills that failed to advance this fall, would close down more than $400 billion in potential Fed lending powers established under legislation in March. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is shutting down the programs at the end of December, but Toomey’s language goes further, by barring the Fed from restarting the lending next year.”As we navigate through an unprecedented economic crisis, it is in the interests of the American people to maintain the Fed’s ability to respond quickly and forcefully,” said Brian Deese, an economic adviser to Biden. “Undermining that authority could mean less lending to Main Street businesses, higher unemployment and greater economic pain across the nation.”The Fed programs provided loans to small and midsized businesses and bought state and local government bonds, making it easier for those governments to borrow, at a time when their finances are under pressure from the pandemic.The Fed would need the support of the Treasury Department to restart the programs, which Biden’s Treasury secretary nominee, Janet Yellen, a former Fed chair, probably would provide. The Treasury could also provide funds to backstop those programs without congressional approval and could ease the lending requirements. That could encourage more lending under the programs, which have seen only limited use so far.CARES ActThe developing package is the first significant legislative response to the pandemic since the landmark CARES Act passed virtually unanimously in March, delivering $1.8 trillion in aid, more generous $600-per-week bonus jobless benefits and $1,200 direct payments to individuals.The new relief aid would be added to a $1.4 trillion governmentwide appropriations bill that would fund agencies through next September. That measure is likely to provide a last $1.4 billion installment for Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall as a condition of winning his signature.
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Britain Imposes Tougher Coronavirus Lockdown Measures
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson imposed new coronavirus lockdown measures in England Saturday, reversing initial plans to ease restrictions during the holiday season after a new strain of the coronavirus was detected in the country. “I know how much emotion people invest in this time of year …I know how disappointing this will be,” Johnson said at a news conference. “There is no alternative open to me.”Britain’s PM Boris Johnson attends a news conference, together with Chris Whitty, the Chief Medical Officer and Patrick Vallance, UK Gov. Chief Scientific Adviser, in response to the ongoing situation with the coronavirus, London , Dec. 19, 2020.Whitty said Britain has alerted the World Health Organization about the strain, which British Health Secretary Matt Hancock said on Monday was detected in the south of England.As a result of the new measures that become effective at midnight Saturday night, people in London and southeast England are now under a new higher tier of restrictions, affecting about one-third of the country’s population. They will be required to remain at home except for essential reasons, such as work. Non-essential retail stores will close, along with leisure and entertainment venues.In the U.S., American drug maker Moderna, Inc. and partners have started distributing its COVID-19 vaccine, the second approved for emergency use in the country. Trucks will begin shipping the vaccine to more than 3,700 U.S. locations on Sunday, U.S. Army General Gustave Perna said Saturday during a virtual news conference.FDA Approves Emergency Use of Second Coronavirus VaccineVice President Mike Pence and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi receive shots Friday Perna said the Moderna vaccine will reach health care workers as early as Monday, but that the delivery of some of the first 20 million doses of vaccines from Moderna and Pfizer, Inc. could be delayed until the first week of January.Nearly 76 million people around the world contracted the coronavirus as of midday Saturday, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. More Than 75 Million Global Coronavirus CasesUS has more COVID cases than any other countryThe U.S. tops the list as the country with the most cases, with 17.5 million; India is second, with more than 10 million, followed by Brazil, with 7.1 million. Medical residents staged a protest Friday at Stanford Medical Center in Palo Alto, California, because they and other frontline medical professionals, including nurses and respiratory therapists, were not included among the staff members scheduled to receive the coronavirus vaccine. Stanford apologized and has promised to remedy the situation “immediately.”Turkish state-run media said eight people were killed in a fire that broke out in an intensive care unit where COVID-19 patients were being treated. The Anadolu news agency said the fire erupted Saturday when an oxygen cylinder exploded at Sanko University Hospital in Gaziantep in southern Turkey. A hospital statement said 14 other patients have been transferred to other hospitals. Zeng Yixin, vice minister of China’s National Health Commission, said Saturday the country would focus on vaccinating high-risk groups over the next several months before beginning to vaccinate the general public. “During the winter and spring seasons, carrying out novel coronavirus vaccination work among some key population groups is of great significance to epidemic prevention,” Zeng, who also is director of State Council’s vaccine R&D working group, said. The World Health Organization said it has gained access to 2 billion doses of several coronavirus vaccines. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said access to the vaccines ensures that some 190 countries will be able to inoculate their populations “during the first half of next year.” South Korea has recorded four straight days of more than 1,000 coronavirus cases. The government is offering free testing because of the surge, but has not yet decided what, if any, new measures will be imposed to curb the uptick.Slovak Prime Minister Igor Matovic is the latest European leader to test positive for the coronavirus. French President Emmanuel Macron has also announced that he has contracted COVID-19. Both men attended an EU summit last week in Brussels. In Australia, portions of Sydney are set to adhere to new lockdown measures, following an outbreak of 38 cases on the city’s beaches. The lockdown begins late Saturday and goes until midnight Wednesday. “We’re hoping that will give us sufficient time to get on top of the virus so that we can then ease up for Christmas and the New Year,” said Gladys Berejiklian, the state premier of New South Wales.
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