Greece has lashed out at Turkey, warning it will push for sanctions against its neighbor if it continues with what it calls “hostile” and “provocative threats.” The warning from Athens comes as the leaders of the two NATO allies, age-old foes, prepare to meet in an effort to accelerate talks aimed at easing growing tension in the past year over energy rights in the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean Seas. Chances of a breakthrough look bleak.It was this remark by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan that raised critical eyebrows in Athens.He said Turkey was ready to defend territories once held by the Ottomans …and that a recent string of military exercises in the Aegean Sea had Greece… an “enemy” state as he put it …both scared and worried of Turkey’s capabilities to do so.Echoing that threat, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar later called on Greece to uphold international agreements and scrap missiles and military apparatus deployed on a string of Greek islands in the Aegean, situated just miles off Turkey’s Western Coast.Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias rebuffed the demand with a stiff warning.He said Greece has long supported Turkey’s bid to join the European Union. But if Ankara failed to tone down what he called its “hostile” actions and “provocative” rhetoric, then Athens was ready to renew its call for EU sanctions against its neighbor state and NATO ally.Greece, Turkey Resume Talks on Maritime Disputes in Mediterranean Under Pressure from EU and NATO Talks between Athens and Ankara broke down in 2016 after 12 years of insignificant progress Greece and Turkey have been at loggerheads for decades, challenging each other’s sea and air rights to the Aegean. But as massive oil and gas reserves have been discovered in the eastern Mediterranean in recent years, the two foes have clashed over their rights to explore and tap those energy reserves.The standoff has been so intense that both sides came to the brink of war last year when a pair of Greek and Turkish frigates nearly collided in a dangerous chase over drilling rights in disputed parts of the Aegean and Mediterranean Seas that divide the two countries.As tensions flared dangerously at the time, the U.S. State Department intervened to push the two sides to the negotiating table to ease the energy standoff. Washington remains involved in the process, but the talks so far have yielded little result.Still, in a recent visit here by Turkey’s foreign minister, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis agreed to meet with Erdogan to try and jump start the peace talks. The high-level meeting is scheduled for June 14, on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Brussels.”What we are seeing in the last weeks in a sort of kinetic energy from both sides to talk to each other. So, they are prepared to talk to each other at the highest political level. But this does not mean that the talks will yield results. This is a completely different story because the differences are existing, they are diachronic and the demands from both sides are contradictory. So, while I am optimistic that both sides are prepared to defuse tensions, I don’t believe they are chances of solving the problems themselves.”Even so, other experts concede, keeping both sides engaged in the peace process may be enough to buy precious time, keeping tempers down and pushing back the chances of an accident that could spark a potential war and serious rift within the NATO military alliance.
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Month: June 2021
Malawi Rolls Out Second Jab Amid Vaccine Hesitancy
Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera led a rollout Friday of a push for a second dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, with a strong call to Malawians to go for vaccination to prevent a third wave of the coronavirus pandemic. The call came a day after health authorities in Malawi announced the presence of a more contagious Indian variant in the country, which has infected 14 people. Despite this, authorities bemoan the continued low vaccination rate.During a televised event at the state residence in Lilongwe, Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera said he and Vice President Saulos Chilima decided to lead the campaign for a second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine to prove its importance and safety.He said this also was to dispel misconceptions and fears some Malawians have about the COVID-19 vaccination.”The AstraZeneca vaccine we are using is a good vaccine whose aim is to protect us from COVID-19. That’s why my vice president and I were the first to have vaccinated in March, and now we want to become the first to have the second jab in public. Our aim is that you should be protected, there is no need to fear.”The call came a day after health authorities in Malawi announced the presence of a more contagious Indian variant in the country that infected 14 people.Despite the announcement of the Indian variant, the administration of the second jab has started in a low-key manner compared to the first dose.For example, local media reported Friday that some vaccination centers were vaccinating just three people daily.Health experts say this is largely because of lack of information on the importance of the second dose.George Jobe is executive director for Health Equity Network.”Our recommendation is that we need to package special jingles and messages tailored toward the second dosage,” said Jobe. “Those [messages] should fly in our media, encouraging those who got their first jab to get their second jab to complete. And we should also show the benefits of completing the dosage.”Jobe also said there is a need to use community structures, like religious leaders and village chiefs, to encourage their subjects to get the second jab.”What we noted recently, just a few weeks ago as we are getting close to a second jab, the negative information also resurfaced, threatening that people who got the vaccine may die,” said Jobe. “So, that probably has had an impact, that’s why we need more awareness raising and responding to such negative information.”Malawi got a total 512,000 doses of AstraZeneca vaccines in March. The COVAX facility gave Malawi 360,000 doses, the African Union donated 102,000 doses and about 20,000 of those were destroyed last month after they expired. The Indian government donated 50,000 doses.As of Thursday, only 355,000 doses had been used.Another health rights campaigner, Maziko Matemba of the Health and Rights Education Program, says the problem is that Malawi has not created a lot of demand for these vaccines, especially for people in rural areas.This, he says, has resulted in low uptake of the vaccine.”We have only managed to vaccinate about one percent of the population because we have to vaccinate about 60 percent,” said Matemba. “So, for us, I think, the government and members of parliament could have made provisional budget to support the demand creation for the vaccine.”Government authorities say they are now finalizing new awareness messages about the vaccine to help complement its ongoing campaign to encourage people to get the COVID-19 vaccine.
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Cameroon Women Appeal to the UN Security Council to Discuss Escalating Crises
Female Cameroonian activists and opposition members have appealed to the United Nations Security Council, meeting Monday, to discuss possible solutions to escalating Boko Haram terrorism and the separatist crisis in the central African state. They are also asking the U.N. to force Cameroon to respect human rights, release political prisoners and negotiate a cease-fire with armed groups. The government has refused to respond to their appeal.Twenty female leaders say in a letter to the U.N. Security Council that Cameroon, once the bastion of stability in Central Africa, is today conflict-ridden and on the brink of catastrophe.They say that more than 10,000 Cameroonians have died in the Boko Haram conflict on Cameroon’s northern border with Nigeria and the separatist crisis in the central African state’s English-speaking western regions. They accuse Cameroon’s government and rebels of gross human rights violations.Edith Kah Walla is the president of the Cameroon People’s Party and founding member of Stand Up for Cameroon, which advocates for a peaceful transition to rebuild Cameroon.She says the women want the Security Council to include Cameroon on their agenda. “We want the U.N. to give us help now,” said Walla. “We do not want them to wait till the situation is so bad, and then to start telling us that they are bringing U.N. soldiers [peace keeping troops] here. We want them to act now. Our population is dying. Over a million children are out of schools. We cannot sit by as our country falls apart. There is no peace without respect for human rights, without justice.”Walla said the women want the U.N. to require Cameroon to respect human rights and release all nonviolent political prisoners linked to Boko Haram, separatists and the political crisis in the central African state.The women say that for the sake of peace, U.N. member states should ask Cameroon to allow free public discussions on political transition. Cameroon’s 88-year-old President, Paul Biya, has been in power for close to 40 years and is accused of wanting to hang on to power until he dies. Ejani Leonard Kulu is a Cameroonian political analyst at the U.N. University for Peace in Addis Ababa. He says it is very unlikely that the United Nations will take up the female leaders’ proposals. He says the U.N. has already helped Cameroon, Chad, Nigeria, Niger and Benin contribute troops to a joint task force to fight Boko Haram.”The U.N. is a partner in managing the crises in Cameroon,” said Kulu. “If we should take Boko Haram, remember the Multinational Joint Task Force. It is financed and supported by the U.N. The crisis in the North West and South West, the U.N. has pronounced itself on several occasions that it is an internal problem which Cameroon can solve.”Kulu said Cameroon female leaders should have carried out advocacy with the five permanent members of the Security Council – China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States to ensure discussion of Cameroon at the Security Council. In another letter, the female leaders ask International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva to stop disbursing funds until the Cameroon government shows proof of transparent management.Tomaino Ndam Njoya is mayor of the western town of Foumban, an official of the Cameroon Democratic Union and a former lawmaker in Cameroon’s National Assembly.Njoya says the female leaders are not indifferent to the high wave of corruption and theft of public funds in Cameroon. She says many government ministers have been asked to explain what happened to a $335 million IMF loan intended to stop the spread of COVID-19. She says it would be unfair to continue to give loans to Cameroon when the government has not accounted for amounts already received.Cameroon government spokesperson Rene Emmanuel Sadi did not respond when contacted by VOA about Njoya’s comments. In a release read on state radio, Cameroon promised to investigate corruption and punish those found guilty.Cameroon, a majority French-speaking country, is facing several problems, including the separatist crisis in its English-speaking western regions and Boko Haram terrorism on its northern border with Nigeria.Cameroon also suffers the spillover of the crisis in the Central African Republic, with attacks by rebels on its eastern border and political tensions from Biya’s long stay in power.
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Denmark Criticized for Asylum Seeker Law
The U.N. refugee agency is sharply critical of a new Danish law, which aims to rid itself of asylum seekers fleeing violence and persecution by transferring responsibilities for their care to third countries.Amendments to the Danish Aliens Act were approved June 3 by parliament. They go into effect if Denmark reaches an agreement with a third country to take the asylum seekers off its hands, while their cases are being processed.The U.N. refugee agency expresses alarm at that prospect and says it has repeatedly raised its concerns and objections to the Danish government. UNHCR spokesman Babar Balloch says the forcible transfer of asylum seekers and the abdication of Denmark’s responsibility for the asylum process risks weakening international protections for vulnerable refugees.“UNHCR strongly opposes efforts that seek to externalize or outsource asylum and international protection obligations to other countries. Such efforts to evade responsibility run counter to the letter and spirit of the 1951 Refugee Convention,” Balloch said.The Danish government says it has not yet found any third countries willing to accept asylum seekers, but it is in negotiation with several candidate countries.Over the past five decades, the UNHCR has helped some 50 million refugees start a new life. Currently, the agency cares for 26 million refugees in all regions of the world. Nearly 90 percent of the world’s refugees live in developing or in the least-developed countries.Balloch says the UNHCR is extremely concerned that a wealthy country, such as Denmark, appears to be unwilling to share those responsibilities.“Plans to externalize asylum processing and protection of refugees to a third country … seriously risk setting in motion a process of gradual erosion of the international protection system, which has withstood the test of time over the past 70 years, and for which we have to have a collective responsibility to safeguard,” Balloch said. UNHCR officials say they will continue to discuss the issue with Danish authorities and seek to find practical ways forward. They urge the Danish government to uphold its international commitments today as it has done in the past.
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Man Who Would be German Chancellor Faces Stiff Electoral Test
Armin Laschet, who hopes to succeed Angela Merkel as Germany’s chancellor, has been compared to a traditional child’s toy – a wooden figure on a round base that, when touched, wobbles but stays upright. Allies and foes alike are watching to see how close Laschet comes to the tipping over when voters turn out Sunday for a regional election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. The election is a significant test for the 60-year-old the ruling Christian Democratic Union has chosen as its candidate for chancellor in national elections scheduled for September. Saxony-Anhalt’s capital, Magdeburg, is the burial place of the Holy Roman Emperor Otto I, and there are already commentators suggesting it may come to be seen as the site where Laschet’s ambitions to become Germany’s next chancellor were first buried. National elections are not “won in the East; they can, however, be lost in the East,” a CDU regional leader, Mario Voigt, said recently.A poor showing for the CDU in Sunday’s election would add to the doubts of many party stalwarts who question whether Laschet, chief minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s most populous state, was the right choice as their national candidate. Many, especially on the right of the party, thought the more charismatic Markus Söder, the 54-year-old leader of the CDU’s Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union, would have been a better electoral champion, offering a greater chance of a victory in September than Laschet, a cautious centrist politician, who is seen as a Merkel retread. The CDU recorded its biggest opinion poll slump after Laschet was picked in April as the party’s nominee for chancellor.FILE – Armin Laschet, chairman of the German Christian Democratic Union, CDU, addresses the media during a news conference at the party’s headquarters in Berlin, Germany, May 17, 2021.In sparsely populated and de-industrialized Saxony-Anhalt, Germany’s poorest state, the nationalist conservative Alternative für Deutschland party is chasing the CDU hard in opinion polls. The pandemic has not been kind to the AfD, which entered the German parliament for the first time in 2017, and its support has gotten stuck at around 11% of the vote nationally. However, the party has remained competitive in the poor states of the former communist East Germany, including Saxony-Anhalt, considered an AfD stronghold. One pollster, INSA, has put the AfD a percentage point OK? ahead of the CDU. In the runup to voting, Laschet has focused on keeping traditional conservative CDU voters in line and appealing to centrists. Some on the CDU’s right wing in the state want Laschet to permit them to form a power-sharing governing arrangement with the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt after Sunday’s election to avoid having to enter a coalition government with the Greens and the Social Democrats.However, Laschet has been reaffirming a sharp demarcation between the CDU and Germany’s far-right party.“One thing is clear to me, any rapprochement with the AfD cannot be made with the CDU. Anyone who does that can leave the CDU,” Laschet told reporters with the Funke media group and the French newspaper Ouest-France.The fear in the CDU is that a poor showing Sunday will add to the headwind Laschet is facing as he heads toward the federal poll in four months.“German politicians have learned OK? to be jumpy about winds of change, especially when they blow from the five Länder [states] that once made up communist East Germany,” said Constanze Stelzenmüller of the Brookings Institution, a U.S.-based think tank. “So the fact that the small state of Saxony-Anhalt holds a bellwether election on Sunday — the last state poll before the national vote on September 26 — is causing some headaches in Berlin,” she added.Since German reunification, Saxony-Anhalt has seen its population shrink by a quarter. As the population shrank the far right has become stronger in the state. A right-wing extremist attacked a synagogue city of Halle, last year, killing two. After the attack, Germany’s security agencies placed the AfD’s regional branch under surveillance for “anti-democratic” tendencies.If center-right voters defect to the AfD in large numbers — or just fail to turn out — it will amplify the voices of Laschet’s critics, who want the party to move further right to undercut the AfD nationally. For Laschet the challenge as September approaches is to find a solution to a big electoral dilemma — how to beat the Greens in the west of the country while also vanquishing the AfD in states like Saxony-Anhalt.“We cannot want a radical right-wing party to be the strongest party in a German state legislature, so what happens in Saxony-Anhalt on Sunday is something that should concern all democrats,” Laschet told Deutschlandfunk radio midweek.Later during a campaign stop in Dessau, he said, “There’s a lot at stake in this election. Everybody should go vote. Otherwise, there will be a rude awakening on Monday.”Pollsters say the signs are that Germans are ready for major political change and the problem is Laschet is seen as a figure from the past.Many voters have reservations about Laschet, according to Manfred Güllner, the head of Geran polling company FORSA. “He still looks a bit old-fashioned, and the voters still don’t see a clear course,” he told local reporters.Laschet has experienced plenty of setbacks in his political career — defeats run through his rise to the top of German politics. After serving just four years in the Bundestag, he lost a reelection bid in 1998, and he was defeated in 2010 for the CDU chairmanship in North Rhine-Westphalia. Like the toy, though, he has gyrated, but always managed to stay upright.
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US Sends Pakistan Health Supplies to Combat COVID-19
The United States mobilized an airlift of critical health supplies that arrived in Pakistan Saturday to help the country combat the coronavirus outbreak.
The donation includes tens of thousands of “critically needed and requested” personal protective items for healthcare professionals, hundreds of oximeters and other supplies, the U.S. Embassy said.
“Today, the United States continues our proud partnership with the government of Pakistan in our fight against the COVID-19 pandemic,” said U.S. Embassy Chargé d’affaires Lesslie Viguerie.
“Pakistan is not alone in its fight against the coronavirus,” Viguerie said.
Washington has allocated more than $40 million to Islamabad for COVID-19 response assistance, including a donation of 200 ventilators, to care for those suffering from the disease.
The support, U.S. officials said, has benefited more than 2.5 million Pakistanis across the country, providing life-saving treatment, strengthening case-finding and surveillance, and mobilizing innovative financing to bolster emergency preparedness.
Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokesman Zahid Hafeez Chaudhri said his government “greatly appreciates” the U.S. assistance.
“This timely gesture is part of the continued assistance that the U.S. has provided to Pakistan to support our COVID relief and prevention efforts,” Chaudhri said.
Pakistan has reported more than 21,000 deaths among at least 930,000 cases of coronavirus infections since the pandemic hit the country of about 220 million early last year.
Islamabad recently received 1.2 million doses of Oxford-AstraZeneca vaccine and 100,000 Pfizer doses under the United Nations-backed COVAX program launched to support the purchase and delivery of COVID-19 vaccine to 92 low- and middle-income countries.
The United States has contributed $2 billion to the COVAX initiative, with another $2 billion commitment planned by 2022.
While initially close ally China provided massive COVID-19 medical supplies to Pakistan and donated a large quantity of vaccine, the Pakistani government says it has purchased or is in the process of procuring more than 90% of the vaccine to inoculate 70% of its eligible population by the end of 2021.
Beijing has also trained Pakistani staff and established a facility at Islamabad’s National Institute of Health, which is locally filling and finishing the Chinese CanSino vaccine from the concentrate China is providing. The facility has the capacity to roll out 3 million doses a month.
Pakistan has inoculated close to 9 million people as of Saturday, but officials say the pace will pick up in coming weeks to about 600,000 a day to achieve the stated target.
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Armed Attackers Kill 100 Civilians in Burkina Faso Village Raid
Armed assailants killed about 100 civilians in an overnight attack on a village in northern Burkina Faso, the government said Saturday.
The attackers struck during the night on Friday, killing residents of the village of Solhan in Yagha province bordering Niger. They also burned homes and the market, the government said in a statement.
The government described the attackers as terrorists but no group claimed responsibility.
Attacks by jihadists linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State in West Africa’s Sahel region have risen sharply since the start of the year, particularly in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, with civilians bearing the brunt.
The government declared a 72-hour period of national mourning. It said the provisional toll put the number of people killed at about 100.
The violence in Burkina Faso has displaced more than 1.14 million people in just over two years, while the impoverished arid country is also hosting some 20,000 refugees from neighboring Mali who are seeking safety from jihadist attacks.
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Pilgrims Return to Spain’s ‘El Camino’ Paths after Pandemic
Committing to the pilgrim’s path has for centuries been a source of renewal for those willing to put their lives on hold and spend days, weeks or even months crossing Spain along the Camino de Santiago, a journey that takes hikers to the reported burial place of the apostle St. James.But after a year of being kept off the Way of St. James due to pandemic-related travel restrictions, soul-searchers hoping to heal wounds left by the coronavirus are once again strapping on backpacks and following trails marked with a seashell emblem to the shrine in the city of Santiago de Compostela.Some travelers taking to the Camino are like Laura Ferrón, whose marriage ended during Spain’s lockdown and who fears she might lose her job because the bank she works for plans massive layoffs. She and two lifelong friends flew from their homes in Spain’s North Africa enclave of Ceuta to spend a week walking the final 100 kilometers (62 miles) of the pilgrimage route.“This helps you let it all go. This pandemic has taught us to give more importance to what we have and to take a good long look at yourself,” Ferrón, 33, said while resting on a climb near Arzúa. The village in the green hills of northwest Spain is about two days away from the medieval cathedral in Santiago that is the traditional ending point.The Camino de Santiago is actually a series of paths that fan out beyond the Iberian Peninsula and spread across Europe. Whichever route one takes, they all end at the Santiago’s baroque cathedral, where believers can visit what is said to be the tomb of James, the apostle who, according to Catholic tradition, brought Christianity to Spain and Portugal.The pilgrimage has its roots in the alleged discovery of the tomb in the 9th century. Pilgrims have come to Santiago for a millennium, but the number of both believers and non-believers making the trip boomed in recent decades after regional authorities revived the route. It is now supported by a wide network of religious and civic organizations and served by public and private hostels at prices for all pocketbooks.Over 340,000 people from all over the world walked “El Camino” in 2019. Only 50,000 walked it last year, when Spain blocked both foreign and domestic travel except for during the summer months.Before a state of emergency that limited travel between Spain’s regions ended on May 9, only a handful of Spanish pilgrims were arriving in Santiago each day and registering with the Pilgrim’s Reception Office to receive their official credential for having completed the pilgrimage. Now that travel is again permitted, more people from Spain and elsewhere in Europe are walking the ancient path, although many of the hostels that cater to pilgrims them are still closed. A few hundred arrive in Santiago each day, compared to the several thousand exhausted pilgrims swinging their walking sticks along the city’s cobblestone streets during a typical summer.Spain’s Health Ministry has reported the deaths of over 79,000 people from COVID-19. As it did around the world, the disease took its biggest toll on the country’s oldest residents.“For old people, one year of pandemic has felt like five,” Naty Arias, 81, said while walking the Camino with her 84-year-old husband and two of their daughters. “And like my husband says, we don’t have that much time left anyway, so we have to make the most of it.”The numbers of pilgrims arriving in Santiago over the next year-and-a-half will be boosted after Pope Francis extended the 2021 holy year dedicated to St. James through 2022. For Roman Catholics who take part in the pilgrimage, walking it during a Jubilee Year gives them the chance to receive the plenary indulgence, which grants them the full remission of the temporal punishment for their sins. The last Jubilee Year for the trail was in 2010.Santiago Archbishop Julián Barrio said he is cautiously optimistic that some 300,000 pilgrims could turn out this year, if the pace of Spain’s vaccination program and the health situation worldwide continues to improve. He expects many to come seeking solace from the pain of the pandemic.“The Way of St. James, in this sense, can help us. It is a space that helps us recover our inner peace, our stability, our spirit, which without doubt we all need, given the difficulties that we have in facing the pain and the ravages of the pandemic that sometimes leave us speechless,” Barrio told The Associated Press.Daniel Sarto, 67, joined three friends on the trail, looking to relax after months of stress from seeing his Barcelona-based trade show company bring in zero revenue.“It has been a very, very, very hard year. Psychologically, it is very sad constantly thinking that this is going nowhere, about what will happen to our employees,” Sarto said. “This is a relief being here, without a doubt. My wife told me that I had to get out of the house. I had to come.”Mental health experts agree that the pilgrimage can lead to emotional healing for both faithful Roman Catholics and the large number of non-Catholics who are drawn to make one. Dr. Albert Feliu, a health psychologist and lecturer at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, said preliminary results from a survey of 100 pilgrims point to a reduction of stress and depression that surpass those seen after regular vacations.The survey was part of a multi-year study of the benefits of walking the Camino de Santiago being done by clinical researchers from universities in Spain and Brazil. Manu Mariño, the director of Quietud Mindfulness Center in Santiago, is also involved in the research. He has gone on the pilgrimage 24 times.“The Way of St. James is a very good place to help us realize that suffering forms part of life, and that our suffering depends on how we relate to what we are experiencing,” Mariño said. “You learn to live with just what is necessary, which means exactly what you can carry in a backpack.”Vladimir Vala, a 25-year-old university graduate in business, came to Spain to walk for three weeks before returning to the Czech Republic to get married. For Vala, the pandemic has one positive facet among all the misery, that he feels dovetails with the experience of walking, mostly by himself, day after day through the countryside. “People were alone, and they had to face themselves (during the pandemic),” Vala said after visiting the cathedral. “And I think the Camino is (about) facing yourself in its meaning. So, it comes together really close. It’s beautiful and hard.”The newly divorced Ferrón had a similar assessment.“The trail is good for your mental health because all this can drive anyone crazy, being locked up, the fear, the psychosis,” she said. “Some climbs are really hard, but at the end of the day you reach your goal and then you have the reward of a cold beer, which is divine.”
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Chinese Scientists Developing Inhalable COVID Vaccine
Chinese state media report that scientists are developing an inhalable, fine-mist COVID-19 vaccine. The Chinese Food and Drug Administration has approved the vaccine for expanded clinical trials and is applying for emergency use of the vaccine.Also in China, Sinovac Biotech’s COVID-19 vaccine has been approved for emergency use for young people between the ages of 3 and 17, the company’s chairman, Yin Weidong, said on state television Friday. China’s current vaccination program is restricted to those 18 and older.As Afghanistan attempts to beat back a surge in COVID cases, it has received the news that the 3 million doses of vaccines it was expecting from the World Health Organization in April will not arrive until August, according to the Associated Press.Afghan health ministry spokesperson Ghulam Dastigir Nazari told AP that he has approached several embassies for help but has not received any vaccines. “We are in the middle of a crisis,” he said.On Saturday, India’s health ministry reported 120,529 new COVID-19 cases in the previous 24-hours period, the lowest daily count of new infections in 58 days. More than 3,000 deaths were also recorded.Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency Friday approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for 12- to 15-year-olds.The decision follows similar approvals by U.S. and European Union regulators.British Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the news Friday and said he will wait for clinical advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization regarding how the vaccine should be administered. He said Britain should have enough supply of the vaccine to inoculate the nation’s adolescents.Meanwhile, U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Rochelle Walensky on Friday urged parents of adolescents in the United States to get their children vaccinated as soon as possible, following the release of a CDC report showing a spike in hospitalizations among 12- to 17-year-olds between January and April.The study indicated one-third of those hospitalizations were intensive care patients and 5% of those patients had to be put on ventilators. Walensky said the figures saddened her and show that even young patients can get seriously ill from the virus that causes COVID-19.Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported early Saturday more than 172 million global COVID infections. The U.S. has the most cases with 33.3 million, followed by India with 28.7 million and Brazil with nearly 17 million.
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Sudan Rally Shows Lingering Anger Over 2019 Massacre
Thousands of protesters in Sudan’s capital demanded justice from the government this week over a 2019 massacre in Khartoum in which more than 100 people died.The protesters Thursday called for the government to hold the Rapid Support Forces, a security unit, accountable for violently suppressing sit-in protests two years ago.On Wednesday night, Sudan’s military began restricting access to the area surrounding the military headquarters where the killings took place.In a press release addressing the anniversary, the prime minister of Sudan, Abdalla Hamdok, described what he called a complicated relationship with the country’s various security agencies, which the constitution says are under the authority of his military counterpart.Hamdok said this relationship had delayed the investigation and the government was holding talks to fix this relationship.Political analyst Shawgi Abdulazeem said the absence of justice in the sit-in dispersal was increasing tension.Activists have shared videos from the June 2019 attack that show heavily armed security convoys near the protester encampments.Qatar-based political analyst Abbas Mohamed said he thought the accusations might threaten the country’s fragile transition to democracy.Mohamed said demands of the massacre victims’ relatives remained linked with political agendas. He noted that their protests were aimed at the Rapid Support Forces alone, not other uniformed forces such as the military and other security forces that should also be under investigation.Surfaced under BashirThe controversial Rapid Support Forces surfaced during the Darfur war in 2003 under former dictator Omar al-Bashir. The forces grew larger over the years, participating in the Yemen war on behalf of Saudi Arabia, and they were allegedly involved in Libya’s war.After Bashir was ousted from Sudan in 2019, the top leaders of Rapid Support Forces reached a power-sharing agreement with military and civilian lawmakers.In March 2021, Human Rights Watch alleged that the Rapid Support Forces had committed many abuses, and it urged the transitional government to address the unit’s growing power.The United States also called on Sudan to bring all the militias and armed entities into one army controlled by a civilian-led government.Meanwhile, the Sudanese public prosecutor resigned in May without explanation.Sudan’s prime minister has asked the official tasked with investigating the 2019 killings to set a deadline for releasing the findings. Protesters say they will escalate their rallies if the government further delays the results of the investigation.
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JPMorgan Freezes Donations to Republicans who Contested 2020 Election
JPMorgan Chase & Co will resume making political donations to U.S. lawmakers but will not give to Republican members of Congress who voted to overturn President Joe Biden’s election victory, according to an internal memo Friday seen by Reuters.The country’s largest lender was among many corporations that paused political giving following the deadly Jan. 6 Capitol riot when supporters of former president Donald Trump tried to stop Congress from certifying the election.Just hours later, 147 Republicans, the vast majority of them in the House of Representatives, voted to overturn the Electoral College results which Trump falsely claimed were tainted by fraud.Following a review, JPMorgan will this month resume giving through its Political Action Committee (PAC) but will continue its freeze on donations to a “handful” of the 147 lawmakers whom it had previously supported, the bank said.The pause will last through the 2021-22 election cycle, which includes November’s midterm elections, after which JPMorgan will review whether to resume contributions to the lawmakers concerned on an individual basis, it said.”This was a unique and historic moment when we believe the country needed our elected officials to put aside strongly held differences and demonstrate unity,” the bank wrote of the Jan. 6 vote to certify Biden’s win.Also on Friday, Citigroup said it was resuming PAC contributions but did not specify how it would treat the lawmakers who tried to block Biden taking office.Citigroup said it would evaluate whether to give to all lawmakers case-by-case based on a new set of criteria which includes “character and integrity” and “a commitment to bipartisanship and democratic institutions.”JPMorgan noted that its PAC is an important tool for engaging in the political process in the United States. PACs are political committees organized for the purpose of raising cash to support or in some cases oppose election candidates.”Democracy, by its nature, requires active participation, compromise, and engaging with people with opposing views. That is why government and business must work together,” JPMorgan wrote.As part of its revamped spending strategy, the bank will also expand donations beyond lawmakers who oversee financial matters to those active on issues the bank considers “moral and economic imperatives for our country,” such as addressing the racial wealth gap, education and criminal justice reform.Spending slowly resumesSince the initial January backlash, corporations have been grappling with how to resume PAC spending, seen by lobbyists as important for gaining access to policymakers, without alienating other stakeholders, including their employees who fund the PACs.Other big financial companies that paused donations have slowly resumed spending.Morgan Stanley’s PAC resumed donations to some lawmakers in February, while the American Bankers Association PAC, one of the biggest in the country, started giving again in March, federal records show.While JPMorgan did not name lawmakers in its memo, the bank’s new policy risks alienating Republicans with sway over banking policy, some of whom are already angered by its active stance on issues like climate change and racial equity.Of the 147 lawmakers, JPMorgan gave $10,000 each to House finance committee members Blaine Luetkemeyer and Lee Zeldin, and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy, among others, during the 2019-20 election cycle, according to the Center for Responsive Politics (CRP). Representatives for the lawmakers did not respond to requests for comment.All told, JPMorgan’s PAC gave nearly $1 million to federal candidates and committees backing candidates during the 2019-20 election cycle, according to CRP.Of the $600,300 it gave to federal candidates, nearly 60% went to Republicans and the rest to Democrats, according to the CRP data, a mix that is likely to swing further to the left as the bank supports a broader range of social and economic issues.Commercial banks overall have ramped up political spending in recent years, dishing out $14.6 million to federal candidates in the 2020 cycle, the second highest amount since 1990, the data shows.Following the 2008 financial crisis, that mix favored Republicans but in recent years banks have increased spending on Democrats as they look to rebuild bipartisan support in Congress.
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Nigeria Suspends Twitter Over President’s Deleted Tweet
Nigeria’s government said Friday it was suspending Twitter indefinitely in Africa’s most populous nation, a day after the company deleted a controversial tweet President Muhammadu Buhari made about a secessionist movement.It was not immediately clear when the suspension would go into effect as users could still access Twitter late Friday, and many said they would simply use VPNs to maintain access to the platform.Others mocked the government for using the platform to announce the action.”You’re using Twitter to suspend Twitter? Are you not mad?” one user tweeted in response.Information Minister Lai Mohammed said Friday that government officials took the step because the platform was being used “for activities that are capable of undermining Nigeria’s corporate existence.”Mohammed criticized Twitter for deleting the post. “The mission of Twitter in Nigeria is very suspicious,” he said, adding that Twitter had in the past ignored “inciting” tweets against the Nigerian government.Twitter deleted Buhari’s post on Wednesday, calling it abusive, after the president threatened suspected separatist militants in the southeast.More than 1 million people died during the 1967-70 civil war that erupted when secessionists sought to create an independent Biafra for the ethnic Igbo people. Buhari, an ethnic Fulani, was on the opposing side in the war against the Igbos.In recent months, pro-Biafra separatists have been accused of attacking police and government buildings, and Buhari vowed to retaliate and “treat them in the language they understand.”
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NKorean Leader Calls for Meeting to Review Battered Economy
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has presided over a meeting of his ruling party in his first public appearance in about a month and called for a larger political conference to discuss efforts to salvage a decaying economy.The North’s official Korean Central News Agency said Saturday that Kim expressed appreciation that a lot of works were being sped up thanks to the “ideological enthusiasm and fighting spirit of self-reliance” demonstrated by the party and his people.But he also said there was a need to correct “deflective matters” and called for a plenary meeting of the Workers’ Party’s Central Committee to review overall state affairs for the first half of 2021. The party announced that the plenary meeting was set for early June.Kim’s appearance at Friday’s Politburo meeting was the first time he showed himself in public since May 6, when he held a photo session with families of North Korean soldiers.North Korea’s battered economy has deteriorated further amid pandemic border closures, which significantly reduced trade with China, its major ally and economic lifeline.The Workers’ Party last held a plenary meeting of Central Committee members in February, when Kim ripped into state economic agencies for their “passive and self-protecting tendencies” in setting their annual goals.While Kim said Friday that North Korea was continuing to face challenges brought by “unfavorable subjective and objective conditions and environment,” the KCNA report did not mention any comments he made toward the United States or South Korea.North Korea has so far ignored the allies’ calls to resume nuclear negotiations that have stalled since the collapse of the second summit between Kim and former President Donald Trump in February 2019. The Americans then rejected North Koreans’ demands for lifting sanctions in exchange for a piecemeal deal toward partially surrendering their nuclear capabilities.Following a meeting last month in Washington, President Joe Biden and South Korean President Moon Jae-in said in a joint statement that Washington would take a “calibrated and practical approach that is open to and will explore diplomacy” with Pyongyang.But North Korea has questioned the sincerity of the proposals and claimed that Biden’s agreement to end Washington’s decades-long range restrictions that capped South Korea’s missile development, which was announced after his meeting with Moon, demonstrated continuing U.S. hostility toward the North.U.S. officials have suggested Biden would adopt a middle ground policy between his predecessors — Trump’s direct dealings with Kim and Barack Obama’s “strategic patience.” But some experts say Washington won’t likely provide the North with meaningful sanctions relief unless it takes concrete denuclearization steps first. Kim has vowed to strengthen his nuclear weapons program in recent political speeches, while saying that the fate of bilateral relations depends on whether Washington discards what he perceives as hostile policies.During a rare ruling party congress in January, Kim urged his people to be resilient in the struggle for economic self-reliance. He called for reasserting greater state control over the economy, boosting agricultural production and prioritizing the development of chemicals and metal industries.Experts say such sectors are crucial to North Korean hopes to revitalize industrial production that has been decimated by sanctions and halted imports of factory materials amid the pandemic.
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FBI Subpoenas Info on Readers of News Story on Slain Agents
The FBI issued a subpoena demanding U.S. newspaper giant Gannett provide agents with information to track down readers of a USA Today story about a suspect in a child pornography case who fatally shot two FBI agents in February.The subpoena, served on the company in April, came to light this week after the media company filed documents in federal court asking a judge to quash the subpoena. The Justice Department’s actions were immediately condemned by press freedom advocates.The news comes as the Justice Department has disclosed in recent weeks that it seized the email and phone records of reporters in at least three separate instances during the Trump administration. It raises questions about what liberties federal authorities are taking in using news organizations, journalists and their work as investigative tools.The subpoena asks for information about anyone who clicked on the article for a period of about 35 minutes on the day after the shooting. It seeks the IP addresses — which can sometimes be used to identify the location of a computer, the company or organization it belongs to, and where it was registered — along with mobile phone identification information of the readers.While the subpoena doesn’t ask specifically for the names of those who read the story, such identification information could easily lead federal agents to the readers.It is unclear why the FBI was seeking information about the USA Today story, even though numerous others news organizations, including The Associated Press, had reported extensively on the Florida shooting, one of the bloodiest days in the FBI’s history.2 dead, 3 woundedThe suspect opened fire on the agents when they arrived to serve a federal search warrant in a child exploitation case. The two agents, Daniel Alfin and Laura Schwartzenberger, were killed and three others were wounded.Maribel Perez Wadsworth, the publisher of USA Today and president of the USA Today Network, said the government wants the news organization to hand over “private information” about its readers and said it was fighting the subpoena to protect the relationship between its readers and journalists. The company also contacted the FBI before asking a judge to quash the subpoena but did not receive “any substantive reply nor any meaningful explanation of the asserted basis for the subpoena,” she said.“We intend to fight the subpoena’s demand for identifying information about individuals who viewed the USA Today news report,” Wadsworth said in a statement. “Being forced to tell the government who reads what on our websites is a clear violation of the First Amendment.”The FBI agent who signed the subpoena to Gannett has worked for years on child exploitation cases and has testified in several criminal cases related to child pornography offenses, newspaper accounts and other public records show.The subpoena — first reported by Politico — says the information is needed as part of an ongoing criminal investigation. Federal officials would not provide additional details about the investigation.“This is an extraordinary demand that goes to the very heart of the First Amendment. For good reason, the courts have generally refused to give the government access to this kind of sensitive information except in the most unusual circumstances,” said Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.The Justice Department in recent weeks disclosed that investigators secretly obtained call records of journalists at The Washington Post, The New York Times and CNN in an effort to identify sources who provided national security information that was published in the early months of the Trump administration. President Joe Biden has said the Justice Department would not seize reporters’ phone records, though it remains unclear if that promise can be kept.“This subpoena, especially when viewed alongside the subpoenas that the Justice Department served under the Trump administration in an effort to obtain journalists’ records, strongly suggests we need more robust protection for records that implicate the freedoms of speech and the press,” Jaffer said.2007 ruseThe Justice Department — in both Republican and Democratic administrations — has struggled to balance the media’s constitutionally protected rights against the government’s interests in safeguarding classified information and collecting information for criminal cases.During a 2007 investigation, an FBI agent impersonated an Associated Press journalist while investigating bomb threats at a high school in Washington state. The agent portrayed himself as an AP journalist when he communicated with the suspect online and then sent a link to a fabricated AP news article that, when clicked, allowed the FBI to pinpoint the suspect’s location.The ruse was made public in 2014 and two years later the FBI imposed restrictions on the ability of agents to masquerade as reporters — but it stopped short of ruling out the practice.In 2013, federal investigators secretly seized two months of phone records for Associated Press reporters and editors that included 20 telephone lines of both AP offices and the journalists, including their home phones and cellphones.After that, the Justice Department, under then-Attorney General Eric Holder, announced revised guidelines for leak investigations, which require additional levels of review before a journalist could be subpoenaed.
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Myanmar Poets Square Off Against Junta’s War on Words
Editor’s note: This story contains graphic descriptions of violence.Before he was killed, Khet Thi’s poems railed eloquently against Myanmar’s sudden coup, joining a deluge of protest verse celebrating democracy demonstrators and defying the military’s brutal war on words.As soldiers unleashed a violent crackdown on resistance to the army takeover, he implored the public to stand firm against what he saw as an existential threat to the country’s future.”We have to fight to win this battle,” he wrote. “If we lose: North Korea. If we win: South Korea.”Last month, scores of police and soldiers surrounded the home he shared with his wife and family in the central city of Shwebo.They accused the poet — who baked cakes and made ice cream to support his family — of planning a series of bomb blasts, and demanded he give himself up.The next day his wife Chaw Su was summoned to a hospital in Monywa around 80 kilometers away.”I thought I would able to (bring) him some clothes,” she told AFP.But there was no need, according to a police officer, who told Chaw Su her husband was dead.”I got only the dead body back,” she told AFP.Myanmar has been in uproar since the February coup ended a 10-year experiment with democracy that had loosened the fetters of censorship and allowed for greater self-expression.As some protesters picked up hunting rifles and slingshots, poets like Khet Thi joined a fight against the coup staged by a population unwilling to surrender hard-won democratic freedoms.Along with violence in the streets, the junta has tried to stifle dissent with internet blackouts and by rounding up celebrities and civil servants who have called for rebellion.A video uploaded to Facebook soon in the weeks after the putsch showed a collage of defiant protesters reciting poems against the military.”With what conscience can you go to work while everyone goes out and protests?” asked one man, referring to a mass strike campaign launched to pressure the junta.’Overwhelmed with rage’Poetry played a prominent role in Burma’s struggle for independence against colonial power Britain and the decades of military rule that followed, when scores of writers were locked up as political prisoners.U.K.-based poet Ko Ko Thett believes the medium has struck a chord with ordinary people “overwhelmed with rage, disbelief and grief” at the junta’s takeover.He put his own writing on the back burner in order to concentrate on translating works by fellow poets writing from post-coup Myanmar — some of whom, like Khet Thi, have since been killed.Among them were Myint Myint Zin and K Za Win, both teachers, who died during a ferocious military assault on protesters in Monywa.Footage of security forces dragging away the body of K Za Win later went viral on social media.’A clear conscience’The transition to democracy “liberated” Burmese poetry, said Ko Ko Thett, making it “more diverse in form and content, also more openly political.”Many have mobilized online in their battle against the junta, including an underground collective of 30 bards from across the country spreading their verse on Facebook.”There is so much crime against humanity (in Myanmar). Poets in such situations live with tears in every single breath,” one poet, who asked to remain anonymous for security concerns, told AFP.”Our poems are hordes of screaming children.”Ko Ko Thett said he was “numb with grief” over the deaths of his fellow poets.All of them “should have been noted for their poetry (but) got noted in the international media only after they got killed,” he said.Khet Thi, the poet abducted in Shwebo, composed a verse two weeks after the coup to declare that he didn’t want to be a martyr or hero.”I do not want to be a supporter of (the junta’s) violence,” he wrote.”If there is only one minute left to survive I want to have a clear conscience even for that minute.”
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Ex-Counsel Tells Congress of Trump Efforts to Undercut Russia Probe, Democrats Say
A former White House counsel “shed new light” on the investigation into Russia’s role in the 2016 U.S. elections and the pressure he was under to stymie the federal probe, congressional Democrats said Friday. Don McGahn, who served as Donald Trump’s presidential lawyer for nearly two years before resigning in October 2018, testified in a daylong, closed-door session before the House Judiciary Committee.McGahn appeared under a subpoena issued about two years ago to testify as the committee was looking into allegations of wrongdoing by Trump. Late in 2019, the House voted to impeach Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. The Senate, then under Republican control, acquitted him.A transcript of McGahn’s testimony is due to be made public in coming days. Under an agreement with the Department of Justice, Judiciary Committee members declined to provide specifics of what he said before then.”Mr. McGahn was clearly distressed by President Trump’s refusal to follow his legal advice, again and again, and he shed new light on several troubling events today,” committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said in a statement.Republican Representative Matt Gaetz told reporters that McGahn’s testimony provided no new information, however.”The expectation was that Don McGahn would be some sort of essential witness bringing new information worthy of years of litigation and countless taxpayer dollars spent,” Gaetz said of Democrats.Democratic Representative Madeleine Dean, a senior Judiciary Committee member, told reporters McGahn “brought to life the pressure he was under, the pressure that other aides were under by the president to direct Rod Rosenstein to oust special counsel [Robert] Mueller.”At the time, Rosenstein was serving as deputy attorney general, and Mueller was probing Trump and his 2016 presidential campaign.After a lengthy investigation, Mueller found “numerous links” between the campaign and the Russians and concluded the campaign “expected it would benefit” from Moscow’s effort to tilt the vote in Trump’s favor. But Mueller said such interactions either did not amount to criminal behavior or would be difficult to prove in court.
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Putin Chafes at US, Criticizes Response to Capitol Attack
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday set a tough tone for his upcoming summit with U.S. President Joe Biden, accusing Washington of trying to contain Russia and citing its response to the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol as a manifestation of the West’s double standards.Speaking at an economic forum in St. Petersburg, Putin said that arms control, global conflicts, the coronavirus pandemic and climate change are among the issues he and Biden would discuss at their June 16 summit in Geneva.”We need to find ways of looking for a settlement in our relations, which are at an extremely low level now,” Putin said.”We don’t have any issues with the U.S.,” he continued. “But it has an issue with us. It wants to contain our development and publicly talks about it. Economic restrictions and attempts to influence our country’s domestic politics, relying on forces they consider their allies inside Russia, stem from that.”He voiced hope that the meeting would help ease tensions with Washington. Russia-U.S. ties have sunk to post-Cold War lows over Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, accusations of Russian interference in elections in the U.S. and other Western nations and cyberattacks that U.S. officials allege had Russian origins.Putin reiterated that Russia rejects accusations of interfering in U.S. presidential elections, and he spoke critically of the U.S. response to the Capitol attack, which took place as Congress prepared to certify that Biden had defeated then-President Donald Trump in November.”They weren’t just a crowd of robbers and rioters. Those people had come with political demands,” he said.Putin pointed out that the heavy charges against hundreds of participants in the attack were filed even as the U.S. and its allies strongly criticized Belarus’ crackdown on anti-government protests. And he charged that even as the West has criticized Russian authorities for a harsh response to anti-Kremlin demonstrations, protesters in Europe have faced an even tougher police response, with some shot in the eye by what he mockingly called “democratic rubber bullets.”‘Corresponding interests’At a later videoconference with the heads of major international news agencies, Putin said, “I don’t expect any breakthrough results” from the summit with Biden. The United States and Russia have some corresponding interests, he said, “despite certain disagreements. These disagreements are not the result of Russian actions.”In response to a question from Associated Press President and Chief Executive Gary Pruitt, Putin returned to the theme of blaming the United States for poor relations.”We are not taking steps first — I’m talking about the steps that deteriorated our relations. It was not us who introduced sanctions against us, it was the United States who did that on every occasion and even without grounds, just because our country exists,” he said through a translator.He also criticized the United States as being overconfident and drew a parallel with the Soviet Union.”You know what the problem is? I will tell you as a former citizen of the former Soviet Union. What is the problem of empires — they think that they are so powerful that they can afford small errors and mistakes,” he said. “But the number of problems is growing. There comes a time when they can no longer be dealt with. And the United States, with a confident gait, a firm step, is going straight along the path of the Soviet Union.”‘Sheer nonsense’At the earlier session, Putin praised Biden as a “very experienced statesman who has been involved in politics for his entire life … and a very prudent and careful person. I do hope that our meeting will be positive.”He also took time to deride the allegations that Russian hackers targeted a U.S. pipeline and a meat plant — accusations that have clouded the atmosphere before the summit.”I do hope that people would realize that there hasn’t been any malicious Russian activity whatsoever,” he said. “I heard something about the meat plant. It’s sheer nonsense. We all understand it’s just ridiculous. A pipeline? It’s equally absurd.”Putin said “the U.S. special services should track down those ransom seekers. It’s certainly not Russia that would extort money from some company. We don’t deal with chicken or beef. It’s plain ridiculous.”He alleged the hacking accusations were aired by those who try to “provoke new conflicts before our meeting with Biden,” and added that some in the U.S. doubted Russian involvement in the hacks.”It means that inside the American society, media and political class, there are people who want to find ways to repair U.S.-Russian relations,” he said.Thoughts on permafrost, pandemicOn other issues, Putin praised his country’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic and called for a stronger worldwide response to global warming as he sought to bolster Russia’s international standing.Addressing the forum, Putin lauded the efficiency of Russian-designed vaccines and bemoaned what he described as “politically motivated bans” on their purchase in some countries.Last year, Russia boasted of being the first in the world to authorize a coronavirus vaccine, but it has since moved slowly in giving shots to its population. The slack pace of vaccination has been partly attributed to public skepticism about the vaccines amid controversial signals from authorities.Experts have questioned whether Russia will be able to meet the government target of vaccinating more than 30 million of the country’s 146 million people by mid-June, and nearly 69 million by August.Putin again urged Russians to move quickly to get the shots, and he invited foreigners to Russia to get vaccinated, saying he would instruct the government to facilitate that.He also emphasized the need to strengthen the international response to climate change, noting that melting permafrost has posed a major challenge to Russia’s Arctic regions.”We have entire cities built on permafrost,” he said. “What will happen if it all starts melting?”Putin said pipes have been laid for the first of two lines of the prospective Nord Stream 2 pipeline to Germany, leaving only welding to finalize its construction. He said the second line will follow soon.The U.S. has strongly opposed construction of the Russian pipeline, but the Biden administration opted last month not to punish the German company overseeing the project while announcing new sanctions against Russian companies and ships. The Kremlin has hailed it as a “positive signal” before the Putin-Biden summit.The Russian leader hailed the project as more economically feasible than an existing pipeline via Ukraine, rejecting Ukrainian and Western criticism that it’s designed to rob Kyiv of transit fees.Putin said Russia will continue pumping via Ukraine 40 billion cubic meters of gas a year in line with an existing five-year contract and could continue doing so after it expires if Ukraine shows “goodwill.”Russia and Ukraine have been locked in a tense tug-of-war following Moscow’s 2014 annexation of the Crimean Peninsula and its support for separatist insurgents in eastern Ukraine.Putin deplored what he described as the U.S. use of the dollar as a political weapon, saying that “its use as an instrument of competition and political struggle has hurt its role as the world reserve currency.”Russia said Thursday it will completely remove the U.S. dollar from its National Wealth Fund and turn the dollar-denominated assets into euros, yuan and gold. Russia long has moved to reduce the dollar’s share in its hard currency reserves as it has faced U.S. sanctions amid tensions with Washington and its allies.
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FDA Approves Obesity Drug That Helped People Cut Weight 15%
Regulators on Friday said a new version of a popular diabetes medicine could be sold as a weight-loss drug in the U.S. The Food and Drug Administration approved Wegovy, a higher-dose version of Novo Nordisk’s diabetes drug semaglutide, for long-term weight management. In company-funded studies, participants taking Wegovy had average weight loss of 15%, about 34 pounds (15.3 kilograms). Participants lost weight steadily for 16 months before plateauing. In a comparison group getting dummy shots, the average weight loss was about 2.5%, or just under 6 pounds. “With existing drugs, you’re going to get maybe 5% to 10% weight reduction, sometimes not even that,” said Dr. Harold Bays, medical director of the Louisville Metabolic and Atherosclerosis Research Center. Bays, who is also the Obesity Medicine Association’s chief science officer, helped run studies of the drug. In the U.S., more than 100 million adults — about 1 in 3 — are obese. Dropping even 5% of one’s weight can bring health benefits, such as improved energy, blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels, but that amount often doesn’t satisfy patients who are focused on weight loss, Bays said. Bays said Wegovy appears far safer than earlier obesity drugs that “have gone down in flames” over safety problems. Wegovy’s most common side effects were gastrointestinal problems, including nausea, diarrhea and vomiting. Those usually subsided, but led about 5% of study participants to stop taking it. The drug carries a potential risk for a type of thyroid tumor, so it shouldn’t be taken by people with a personal or family history of certain thyroid and endocrine tumors. Wegovy also has a risk of depression and pancreas inflammation. Wegovy (pronounced wee-GOH’-vee) is a synthesized version of a gut hormone that curbs appetite. Patients inject it weekly under their skin. Like other weight-loss drugs, it’s to be used along with exercise, a healthy diet and other steps like keeping a food diary. The Danish company hasn’t disclosed Wegovy’s price but said it will be similar to the price of Saxenda, an 11-year-old weight loss drug injected daily that now typically costs more than $1,300 per month without insurance. Dr. Archana Sudhu, head of the diabetes program at Houston Methodist Hospital, said Wegovy’s usefulness “all depends on what the price will be.” She noted patients’ health insurance plans sometime don’t cover weight-loss treatments, putting expensive drugs out of reach. Sudhu, who has no connection to Novo Nordisk, plans to switch patients who are obese and have Type 2 diabetes to Wegovy. It makes patients feel full sooner and increases release of insulin from the pancreas to control blood sugar, she said. Patients would then be more likely to get motivated to exercise and eat healthier, she added. Wegovy builds on a trend in which makers of relatively new diabetes drugs test them to treat other conditions common in diabetics. For example, popular diabetes drugs Jardiance and Novo Nordisk’s Victoza now have approvals for reducing risk of heart attack, stroke and death in heart patients. Phylander Pannell, 49, of Largo, Maryland, joined a patient study after cycles of losing and then regaining weight. She said she received Wegovy, worked out several times a week and lost 65 pounds over 16 months. “It helped curb my appetite and it helped me feel full faster,” said Pannell. “It got me on the right path.” Shortly after she finished the study and stopped receiving Wegovy, she regained about half the weight. She’s since lost much of that, started exercise classes and bought home exercise equipment. She’s considering going back on Wegovy after it’s approved. Novo Nordisk also is developing a pill version.
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Africa Parliament Scuffle Upends Leadership Talks
A well-aimed kick. A strong shove, body checks, shouting and a fight for dominance.This isn’t a rowdy football (soccer) match. This is the latest session of the Pan African Parliament.The continental body brings together African legislators to implement the policy of the African Union. And its latest session, this week, was suspended amid a physical scuffle over leadership that prompted this Portuguese-speaking delegate to call for help as a literal fight happened on the floor:“Please call the police,” he pleaded, through a translator, over the official feed provided by South Africa’s government, as delegates in suits and traditional regalia shoved, kicked and wrestled with each other at the venue in Johannesburg.“Please call the police, put an order here. It is urgent, it is urgent. You should call the police. Please call the police. Please call the police. This is urgent. This is urgent, please call the police, please call the police. Please. Please, call the police.”Pan African Parliament member Maria Traore speaks to another inside the house following its postponement in Midrand, Johannesburg on June 1, 2021.Let’s go to the replayVOA watched the two-hour ordeal. In the style of Africa’s favorite sport, football (soccer), here’s how the action unfolded:We start on May 31 with all 229 MPs, taking to the field at this venue near Johannesburg. The goal: elect a new president.The Southern African bloc, led by feisty, far-left striker Julius Malema of South Africa — the sharp-tongued leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters party — strode out onto the field with strong support of their region’s candidate, Zimbabwe’s Fortune Charumbira.But they were met by a strong defense from their West and East African opponents, who each back a different candidate. The Southern side pushed their offensive, arguing that the leadership should rotate by region — a West African currently holds the top spot.About 28 minutes into the first half, things got loud, with one faction chanting for elections. And then, a few minutes later, it got physical. In the five minutes of chaos that unfolded, members committed most of the classic red-card fouls: kicking, tripping, jumping, charging, striking, holding and pushing — basically, everything but touching the ball, though some members did try to grab the plastic ballot box. MPs also rushed the podium several more times before the speaker called things off.President of the Pan African Parliament Cameroonian Roger Nkodo Dang poses inside the house following its postponement following chaotic and violent scenes that played out during the leadership rotation elections.And the post-match analysisHere’s the Southern African take on it, from South African parliamentary spokesman Moloto Mothapo. The Pan African Parliament is not supposed to be a blood sport, he said.“The two caucuses’ attempts to continue with electing the new president and ignoring advice from the AU that the well-established principle of geographical rotation within the union be observed is a sign that they do not value unity in the continent,” he told VOA.From Nairobi, pan-African activist Daniel Mwambonu was quick to pin the blame on not just West Africa, but on the country that he believes taught them to play rough.“The Francophone region is putting personal interests first,” he told VOA “… So basically, they are trying to reduce the African parliament into a dictatorship of some sort. What we witnessed in countries that are controlled by France, there’s actually coups every time we have a new leader, he or she has removed from power by the military. This situation we are witnessing in Mali is because these countries that were colonized by France and they actually behave like colonizers themselves because of the French assimilation policy.”And from Ghana, Pan-African activist Sarfo Abebrese notes that no Southern African has held the presidency, which bolsters Southern Africa’s case for a change of leadership. But Abebrese, a lawyer, said the Southern team didn’t exactly play by the complex rules of the game.“I do not think that I have much time to go into the nitty-gritty of the rotation argument,” he said.“But suffice it to say that if you have a situation where South Africa thinks that they really, really need to have a candidate at the helm of affairs for the first time, they have to go by the rules, that is all that I can say. Get amendments done and Article 93 and then let’s get back and get the right thing to be done for the sake of Africa and for African unity and pan Africanism that the parliament is supposed to stand for.”Mwambonu, who heads the Global Pan-Africanism Network, says a possible solution is to bring in more referees from civil society. Here’s the call he would have made.“We’d have issued them a red card,” he said. “And if we were there, actually, we would not have allowed that chaos to happen. Because we are really passionate about Africa, and that’s what pan-Africanism is all about: putting the interests of Africa first.”And that is one thing that all of the parties here seem to agree on: Africa, as a continent, was not helped by this. Nor, apparently, was this important legislative body: the parliament called off its presidential election, leaving the organization without a clear leader until they meet on the field again.
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World Bank Pauses Mali Payments After Coup as Leader Warns Against Sanctions
The World Bank said on Friday it had temporarily paused payments to operations in Mali following a military coup, while the man expected to become the new prime minister warned sanctions would only complicate the country’s crisis.The World Bank’s actions added to pressure on Mali’s military leadership after chief security ally France announced on Thursday it was suspending joint operations with Malian troops in order to press for a return to civilian rule.The military’s overthrow of Mali’s transitional president last week, its second coup in nine months, has drawn international condemnation and raised fears the political crisis will weaken regional efforts to fight Islamist militants.’Temporarily paused’The World Bank, whose International Development Association (IDA) is financing projects to the tune of $1.5 billion in Mali, confirmed the suspension of payments in a statement to Reuters.”In accordance with the World Bank policy applicable to similar situations, it has temporarily paused disbursements on its operations in Mali, as it closely monitors and assesses the situation,” it said.Assimi Goita, the colonel who led both coups, was declared president last Friday after having served as vice president under Bah Ndaw, who had been leading the transition since September. Ndaw and his prime minister resigned while in military custody last week.FILE – Mali’s Col. Assimi Goita attends the Economic Community of West African States consultative meeting in Accra, Ghana, Sept. 15, 2020.Goita is widely expected in the coming days to name as prime minister Choguel Maiga, the leader of the M5-RFP opposition coalition that spearheaded protests against former President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita before his overthrow last August.At a rally in the capital, Bamako, on Friday to mark the one-year anniversary of the start of the protests against Keita, Maiga was alternately firm and conciliatory toward foreign partners.”We will respect international engagements that aren’t contrary to the fundamental interests of the Malian people,” he said to thousands of supporters in the city’s Independence Square.”Sanctions and threats will only complicate the situation,” he said.French troopsFrance, the former colonial power, has more than 5,000 troops waging counterinsurgency operations against Islamist militants in Mali and the wider Sahel, an arid region of West Africa just south of the Sahara.It hopes to use its leverage to press Goita to respect the 18-month timetable agreed to at the start of the transition by organizing a presidential election next February.The African Union and a West African regional bloc responded to the coup by suspending Mali’s membership but did not impose further sanctions.
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Facebook Suspends Trump for at Least Two Years
Facebook said Friday it would suspend Donald Trump’s accounts for at least two years, retaining a ban on the former U.S. president that it imposed after determining he incited the deadly January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. “At the end of this period, we will look to experts to assess whether the risk to public safety has receded,” Facebook Vice President Nick Clegg wrote in a blog post Friday. The social media giant’s independent oversight board upheld its block on Trump, which was enacted after the riot because the company said his posts were inciting violence. On January 6, Trump implored thousands of supporters who had come to Washington for a “Save America March” to “fight like hell” to overturn his defeat, just before the riot aimed at preventing the certification of Joe Biden’s presidential victory. Five people died, including a federal police officer. The ban expires on January 7, 2023, two years after Facebook first blocked the former president. The timing of Facebook’s decision will reduce Trump’s ability to influence midterm congressional elections in November 2022, but his account could be restored well before voters go to polls in 2024 should Trump decide to seek the presidency again that year. In response to Facebook’s decision, Trump said in a statement it is “an insult to the record-setting 75M people, plus many others, who voted for us in the 2020 Rigged Presidential Election. They shouldn’t be allowed to get away with this censoring and silencing and ultimately, we will win.” FILE – The founder and CEO of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg speaks during the 56th Munich Security Conference in Munich, Germany, Feb. 15, 2020.In a separate statement he added, “Next time I’m in the White House there will be no more dinners, at his request, with Mark Zuckerberg and his wife. It will be all business!” Zuckerberg is the co-founder and chief executive officer of Facebook. At the White House briefing Friday, press secretary Jen Psaki said the ban was the company’s decision. “Our view continues to be, though, that every platform, whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, any other platform that is disseminating information to millions of Americans, has a responsibility to crack down on disinformation, to crack down on false information whether it’s about the election or even about the vaccine, as we are trying to keep the American public safe.”
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Frustration Greets EU Decision to Keep Travel Restrictions on US, UK
Have European Union restrictions on travelers from the U.S., Britain and some other major nations become politicized? The chief executive of Wizz Air, the Budapest-based low-cost airline, thinks so.“I think the European Union as such has broken down completely,” József Váradi told CNBC this week. “We have failed to come up with unified measures and an orchestrated approach dealing with the situation, and it has become incredibly overpoliticized.”He’s not alone in expressing frustration. Michael O’Leary, the CEO of Ryanair, a rival Dublin-headquartered discount airline, has urged politicians to recognize “it’s time that we got on with our lives.” Ryanair last month posted the biggest annual loss in the company’s 35-year history, because of COVID-19 travel restrictions and lockdowns wiping out air traffic. This turned the company’s previous year’s $1.24 billion profit into a $990 million loss in the 12 months to March 31.The EU decision Thursday to urge member states to maintain a prohibition on tourists and other nonessential travelers from the U.S. and Britain, among other non-EU countries, has left many in Europe’s commercial aviation and hospitality sectors fuming about what they view as the laggardly pace of easing travel restrictions for tourists.European Commission Vice President Margaritis Schinas speaks during a media conference at EU headquarters in Brussels, June 2, 2021. The European Union unveiled Wednesday plans to revamp Europe’s ID-check free travel area.Lack of uniformityThey say the European Commission is being overcautious, and they also are impatient with the lack of uniformity among member states about reopening their countries to tourists this Northern Hemisphere summer. Most national governments have been implementing the EC’s tight travel recommendations, but others in the past few weeks have not, further complicating journeys into the bloc from outside, especially for those unable to take direct flights to their destinations.Some member states have also been imposing curbs on travel from other EU countries, turning the bloc and the once borderless Schengen Area into a complicated puzzle of rules and requirements.Italy, Portugal and Greece, member states of the Schengen Area, and Croatia, an EU member, have all been ignoring Brussels and have been cautiously opening their tourist-dependent countries to travelers, including from the U.S. and Britain, which have vaccinated more of their populations than the EU. Italy started to ease travel restrictions on Americans and Britons in mid-May, although quarantines often still apply. Americans can travel on COVID-19-safe flights to Italy, which require multiple coronavirus tests.American and British travelers are crucial for the European tourist industry. Americans made more than 36 million trips to Europe in 2019. The total number of tourist visits by U.K. residents to the European Union reached 67 million the same year.EC keeps a listThe EC has a “white list” of countries with low infection rates comprising Australia, Israel, New Zealand, Rwanda, Singapore, South Korea and Thailand. Travelers from those countries, regardless of their reasons for journeys, are welcome, as far as the EC is concerned. Japan was added to the list at midweek. China also is on the white list, subject to reciprocity by the Chinese government.The 27 EU member states have been debating for months ways to make travel easier, both within the bloc and from outside, and the EC has recommended all member states starting July 1 lift restrictions on travelers who were fully vaccinated at least 14 days before their arrival in the EU.FILE – German police check arriving passengers for a negative coronavirus test in Frankfurt, March 30, 2021. The European Commission proposed April 29 issuing “Digital Green Certificates” to EU residents to facilitate travel in the bloc by summer.By July 1, the EU’s Digital COVID-19 certificate is meant to be up and running across the bloc, allowing border authorities to verify the coronavirus status of travelers — whether they have been vaccinated, had a recent negative test or have proof of recovery from coronavirus infection. Seven countries, including tourist-dependent Greece and Croatia, already have started rolling out so-called vaccine passports much earlier than planned.“Europeans should enjoy a safe and relaxing summer,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Monday. “As vaccination progresses, we propose to gradually ease travel measures in a coordinated way with our common tool: the EU Digital COVID Certificate.”But some in Europe’s travel industry have doubts that everything will go smoothly next month, even when many restrictions are due to be eased. Olivier Jankovec, director-general of Airports Council International Europe, a trade association, worries there will be a lack of consistency in travel rules across the bloc and says the EC and national governments don’t understand how challenging reopening will be for airports and airlines. Jankovec says the EU and member states are underestimating what will happen when tourism does pick up.Airport ‘chaos’ feared“The level of both uncertainty and complexity in planning for the restart is just mind-blowing for now,” Jankovec said in a statement. “With each passing day, the prospect of travelers enduring widespread chaos at airports this summer is becoming more real. We urgently need governments to step up planning on the full range of issues involved — and work more closely with airports and airlines.”FILE – Travelers, wearing face masks to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, walk along the departure hall of the Zaventem international airport in Brussels, Jan. 22, 2021.His trade association has warned that air passengers risk spending hours at airports in July and August because of multiple and diverse COVID-19 checks.Some British lawmakers have expressed suspicions the EU has not added Britain to the white list because of post-Brexit political grievances. Last month, Brussels eased its COVID-19 cases per 100,000 people criteria from 25 to 75 and Britain meets the EU target. But EU officials say they are concerned about an increase in infections in Britain from a more transmissible coronavirus variant first discovered in India, hence the decision to exclude the U.K.The Biden administration has not yet lifted a ban on travelers wishing to visit the United States from the 27 European Union member states and the United Kingdom, but officials have indicated that could soon change.Meanwhile, Britain also has faced criticism from southern European countries for failing to include them on its meager “green list” of safe-for-travel countries. Portugal’s foreign ministry said it couldn’t “understand the logic” of Britain’s midweek switch of Portugal from green to amber.The move means any Britons who travel to Portugal will have to take two tests upon their return and self-isolate at home for 10 days, which will deter tourists. “Portugal is continuing its easing of its lockdown, prudently and gradually, with clear rules for the safety of those who reside here or visit us,” Portugal’s foreign ministry tweeted Thursday.British officials, like their EU counterparts, say they are guided in their decision by the scientific advice they are receiving. The U.S. has not lifted its restrictions on travel from Europe for non-U.S. citizens or residents, but officials in Washington have told VOA that is under review.
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Belarus Aircraft Banned From Flying Over EU
The European Union announced Friday it is banning all flights from Belarus from flying over EU airspace and denying them access to all EU airports. In a statement, EU officials said all EU member states will be required to deny permission to land in, take off from or overfly their territories to any aircraft operated by Belarusian air carriers, including as a marketing carrier. The ban will take effect at midnight Friday, Central European Time. FILE – In this handout photo released by European Radio for Belarus, Belarus journalist Raman Pratasevich poses for a photo in front of euroradio.fm sign in Minsk, Belarus, Nov. 17, 2019.The move comes in response to the May 23 incident in which Belarus scrambled a fighter jet to order the forced landing of an Irish Ryanair commercial airliner that was traversing Belarusian airspace en route to Lithuainia. Belarus officials took opposition journalist Raman Pratasevich off the plane and have held him ever since. The regional air traffic agency Eurocontrol reports about 400 civilian planes usually take routes over Belarus. Several European airlines including Lufthansa, SAS and Air France have already announced they would stop flying over its airspace. Pratasevich appeared on Belarus state television Thursday, tearfully confessing to his role in anti-government protest in an interview that the opposition said was made under duress. In the interview, Pratasevich admitted to plotting to topple President Alexander Lukashenko by organizing “riots” and recanted earlier criticism of the veteran leader. Lukashenko’s office did not immediately respond to accusations of coercion.
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British Regulator Approves Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 Vaccine for 12-Year-Olds
Britain’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency on Friday approved the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine for 12- to 15-year-olds. The decision follows similar approvals by U.S. and European Union regulators. FILE – Britain’s Health Secretary Matt Hancock delivers a speech on the COVID-19 vaccine program at the Jenner institute in Oxford, Britain, June 2, 2021.British Health Secretary Matt Hancock welcomed the news Friday and said he will wait for clinical advice from the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunization, or JCVI, regarding how the vaccine should be administered. He said Britain should have enough supply of the vaccine to inoculate the nation’s adolescents. Meanwhile, U.S. Centers for Disease Control Director Rochelle Walensky on Friday urged parents of adolescents in the United States to get their children vaccinated as soon as possible, following the release of a CDC report showing a spike in hospitalizations among 12- to 17-year-olds earlier between January and April this year. FILE – Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, testifies during a Senate hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, March 18, 2021.The study indicated one third of those hospitalizations were intensive care patients and five percent of those patients had to be put on ventilators. Walensky said the figures saddened her and show that even young patients can get seriously ill from the virus that causes COVID-19. Separately, the World Health Organization’s Regional Director for Africa, Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, told reporters Thursday the threat of a third wave of COVID-19 in Africa is “real and rising.” She said that while many countries outside Africa have now vaccinated their high-priority groups and, in many areas, are on to children, “African countries are unable to even follow up with second doses for high-risk groups.” She urged “countries that have reached a significant vaccination coverage to release doses and keep the most vulnerable Africans out of critical care.” And in India, the health ministry says it has ordered 300 million doses of an unapproved vaccine at a cost of over $200 million to be produced by Hyderabad-based Biological-E. The vaccine is currently in Phase 3 of the clinical trials. FILE – A man stands next to the body of his wife, who died due to breathing difficulties, inside an emergency ward of a government-run hospital, amidst the coronavirus pandemic, in Bijnor, Uttar Pradesh, India, May 11, 2021.India’s Supreme Court has criticized the country’s vaccine program, which has left much of the country’s massive population unvaccinated. On Friday, India’s health ministry said that it had recorded 132,364 new coronavirus cases in the previous 24-hour period and 2,713 deaths. India has reported 28.5 million COVID-19 cases, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. Only the U.S. has more infections, at more than 33 million.
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