On September 11, 2001, sculptor Michael Richards was working in his studio in the World Trade Center when the plane hit the floor he was on and killed him. After one of his works was tracked down, many started to believe Richards foreshadowed his own death, because it was a sculpture of himself, his body pierced by dozens of airplanes. Elena Wolf has the story, narrated by Anna Rice.
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Month: September 2021
Beijing Blasts ‘Uyghur Tribunal’ Investigating Human Rights in Xinjiang
China is criticizing a process called the “Uyghur Tribunal,” a quasi-judicial effort by opponents of the Chinese government’s treatment of Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic minorities designed to publicize evidence of alleged human rights abuses. At a September 9 news conference in Beijing, China’s FILE – Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian takes a question at the daily media briefing in Beijing on April 8, 2020.“It has nothing to do with law, justice or truth, and is just another farce staged to smear and attack Xinjiang,” Zhao told the press, calling the tribunal members clowns. The “tribunal” heard from 38 witnesses in its first round of hearings in June in Church House, London. That event focused on alleged rights abuses in China’s northwest region of Xinjiang. The second set of hearings is scheduled from September 10 to 13, according to the organizers. Led by Sir Geoffrey Nice, a prominent lawyer and expert in international criminal law, the nine “jurors” include academics, medical and business practitioners, diplomats and lawyers, according to Nick Vetch, vice chair of the tribunal. A six-member team of lawyers is helping to collect and present evidence. They are British, French, German, Iranian and Maltese nationals. By year’s end, the jurors plan to issue a “verdict” regarding China’s actions in Xinjiang. “[It’s] not possible for the allegations made against the PRC [People’s Republic of China] to be considered in a formal court such as the International Court of Justice, and it has not been dealt with by states, and therefore it is left to the citizens to seek and answer these questions of such gravity,” Vetch told VOA. Some countries such as the U.S. as well as rights organizations like Amnesty International accuse China of genocide and crimes against humanity targeting Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities. FILE – Chair of the panel Geoffrey Nice gives the opening address on the first day of hearings at the “Uyghur Tribunal”, a panel of UK-based lawyers and rights experts investigating alleged abuses against Uyghurs in China’s Xinjiang region, in London, June 4, 2021.Among other things, they point to arbitrary detentions of an estimated 1 million people and to reports of forced labor and involuntary sterilization. China denies abusing Uyghurs, saying they are being given vocational training and language skills. Beijing says people in Xinjiang are free to choose their work. In December 2020, the FILE – Police officers stand at the outer entrance of the Urumqi No. 3 Detention Center in Dabancheng in western China’s Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, April 23, 2021.According to Hamid Sabi, the head of the six-member team of lawyers, the body was set up at the request of Dolkun Isa, WUC president. China was invited on numerous occasions to take part in the process but organizers received no response. “We do not present a case for or against China,” Sabi told VOA. “The tribunal members and the counsel team are the same as the June hearing.” Foreign Ministry’s Zhao called WUC a separatist organization and Isa a terrorist listed by the Chinese government. “These so-called ‘chair’, ‘experts’ and ‘witnesses’ have deplorable track records and are habitual liars,” Zhao charged, “who have become a laughingstock in the international community long time ago.” Isa, a witness during the first round, confirmed to VOA Mandarin that the tribunal had been established following his request but maintained that it is independent. “The tribunal acts wholly independently, although the WUC closely supports the hearings by arranging Uyghur witnesses and translation, among other things,” Isa said. Teng Biao, a Chinese human right lawyer in the U.S. and an expert witness at the tribunal’s second hearings, said the Chinese Communist Party always tries to discredit the witnesses and survivors to cover up truth. The Uyghur Tribunal, he said, “plays a very significant role to at least disclose the truth and the nature of the crime.”
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Malawi Businessman Convicted for 2019 Attempt to Bribe Judges
Malawi’s high court has found a businessman guilty of attempting to bribe Constitutional Court judges who were ruling on the disputed 2019 presidential election. Thomson Mpinganjira, who owns a commercial bank in Malawi, was arrested in January 2020 by the Anti-Corruption Bureau, or ACB, after the High Court’s chief justice, Andrew Nyirenda, reported he had attempted to bribe the judges. Mpinganjira was accused of offering judges an unspecified amount of money so that a court case over the disputed 2019 presidential election would end in favor of then-president Peter Mutharika. Mpinganjira had pleaded not guilty to six bribery-related charges. But High Court Judge Dorothy DeGabriele, in her judgment Friday, said the court proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Mpinganjira wanted to bribe the five judges. “The court found the accused person under count 1 and 2 for offering an advantage to Justice [Healey] Potani and Justice [Michael] Tembo who were public officers and for the benefit of that advantage to be shared amongst the judges, to induce the judges to make a decision in favor of the respondent. The accused person is hereby convicted accordingly,” DeGabriele said. Mpinganjira’s lawyer, Tamando Chokotho, asked the court to consider giving his client noncustodial punishment, saying his client is a first offender and a responsible man. Reyneck Matemba, Malawi’s solicitor general, dismissed calls for the noncustodial sentence, saying the convict needs a maximum prison term to serve as a lesson to potential offenders. “What the convict wanted to do, the offense which he has committed, is a very serious offense,” Matemba said. “He wanted to defeat the course of justice in one of the most high-profile cases in this country, ever.” Following the conviction, DeGabriele revoked Mpinganjira’s bail and remanded him to Chichiri Prison in Blantyre, where he will await his sentencing.
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Ukrainian President Says War With Russia Is Worst-case Possibility
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Friday that all-out war with neighboring Russia was a possibility, and that he wanted to have a substantive meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Asked at the Yalta European Strategy (YES) summit if there could really be all out-war with Russia, which seized the Crimean Peninsula from Ukraine in 2014 and backs pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine’s east, Zelenskiy said: “I think there can be.” “It’s the worst thing that could happen, but unfortunately there is that possibility,” he added, speaking in Ukrainian. Kyiv says the conflict in eastern Ukraine has killed 14,000 people since 2014. Zelenskiy said relations with the United States had improved, but he bemoaned the fact that Ukraine had not received a clear answer to its request to join the NATO military alliance — a move that would be certain to infuriate Moscow. “We have not received … a direct position on Ukraine’s accession to NATO,” he said. “Ukraine has been ready for a long time.” He said a refusal to admit Ukraine would weaken NATO while playing into Russia’s hands. FILE – A Ukrainian soldier is seen at fighting positions on the line of separation from pro-Russian rebels near Donetsk, Ukraine, April 19, 2021.Tensions between Kyiv and Moscow increased earlier this year when fighting in eastern Ukraine intensified and Russia massed more troops near the border. Moscow accused Ukraine of losing interest in peace talks, while Zelenskiy pushed in vain for a meeting with Putin in the conflict zone. “Honestly, I don’t have time to think about him,” Zelenskiy said on Friday. “I’m more interested in whether we can really meet substantively, not declaratively as he does with some states,” he added. “It seems to me that today … they do not see the sense in resolving issues. End the war and resolve conflict issues quickly — they don’t want this.”
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Myanmar Junta Troops Clash With ‘Self Defense’ Forces
Myanmar troops killed several members of a local “defense force” in a day of clashes, the junta said Friday, with local residents and media reporting at least 10 dead.The country has been in turmoil since a February coup and a military crackdown on dissent that has killed more than 1,000 people, according to a local monitoring group.In some areas, locals — often using hunting rifles or homemade weapons — have formed “defense forces” to fight back.Junta troops were attacked with “small arms and homemade guns” as they entered Myin Thar village in the western Magway region on Thursday, army spokesman Zaw Min Tun told state-backed People Media.The soldiers, who were searching for members of a local “Peoples’ Defense Force” had killed a number of fighters, he said, without giving an exact figure, adding they had seized 23 guns. “More than 10 people from my village were shot and killed,” one Myin Thar resident said on condition of anonymity.Soldiers set fire to several houses after the clash, they said. A resident of neighboring Thar Lin village said locals fled at the sounds of the fighting and were now sheltering in a local monastery or in the jungle.Local media reported between 10 and 15 locals had been killed.Clashes involving civilian militias and the military have largely been restricted to rural areas but in June at least six people died in a gun battle in the country’s second city of Mandalay.On Tuesday around a dozen military-owned communications towers were destroyed, the same day a shadow government working to reverse the coup called for a “people’s defensive war against the junta.”The “National Unity Government” which claims to be the country’s legitimate government, is made up of dissident lawmakers in hiding or exile, many of them from ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s party.The junta has defended its power grab by alleging massive fraud during elections in late 2020 which Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy won by a landslide.
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With NATO Forces Gone, Russia Looks South to Afghanistan, Warily
Russia has been treading carefully in its dealings with the Taliban, engaging with them but so far withholding formal recognition of Afghanistan’s new rulers.Russian President Vladimir Putin and his aides have been quick to cheer the U.S.-led NATO withdrawal from Afghanistan, presenting it as a strategic setback for Washington. But they fear Afghanistan falling apart and being plunged into a protracted civil war, which could allow the country to become a sanctuary once again for jihadists to hatch plots against Russia and its Central Asian allies, according to Western diplomats and analysts.Commenting last week, Putin said NATO’s 20-year intervention had accomplished nothing. “The result is zero, if not to say that it is negative,” he said. Like his Western counterparts, though, the Russian leader appears also to have been surprised by the speed of the collapse of the government of President Ashraf Ghani and the Taliban’s sweep of the country. When the Taliban seized Kandahar on August 13, Putin’s envoy to Afghanistan, Zamir Kabulov, said he doubted the Taliban would take control of Kabul any time soon. They seized it within two days.FILE – Russian envoy to Afghanistan Zamir Kabulov, left, speaks with Taliban representatives prior to their talks in Moscow, May 28, 2019.With Afghanistan right on its doorstep, there are more downsides and risks for Russia from NATO’s departure arguably than there are for the Western powers, and the Kremlin is casting a wary glance south, according to Paul Stronski, who was director for Russia and Central Asia at the U.S. National Security Council from 2012 to 2014. “Russia has been eying the departure of U.S. troops from Afghanistan with schadenfreude. But the Kremlin does not relish the prospect of an unstable Afghanistan,” Stronski wrote in a commentary for the Carnegie Endowment, a think tank in Washington.“Even though Moscow has publicly cheered the removal of U.S. and NATO troops from the region, Russian officials are sober-minded enough to appreciate the downsides of their departure,” he says. “The key question now is whether Moscow is equipped to deal with a combustible situation along its southern flank that is unfolding far more quickly than anyone might have expected,” he added.Midweek, top Russian and Indian security officials met in Delhi to discuss the implications of the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan. In the subsequent readouts of their talks for the press, Nikolay Patrushev, the secretary of Russia’s Security Council and a key Putin adviser, and Indian counterpart Ajit Doval highlighted the security dangers, with their officials saying global militant groups operating from Afghanistan pose a threat to Central Asia and to India. They agreed to deepen counterterrorism cooperation.FILE – Taliban fighters atop Humvee vehicles parade along a road to celebrate the withdrawal of foreign troops from Afghanistan, in Kandahar, Sept. 1, 2021, following the Taliban’s military takeover of the country.“U.S. withdrawal and Taliban triumph generate an acute security challenge for Russia,” according to Pavel Baev of the Brookings Institution. A former researcher in the Soviet Union’s Ministry of Defense, he says the problem for the Kremlin is the NATO withdrawal “yields no rewards” and presents Moscow with a security “black hole” on its southern flank. Like their Western counterparts, Russian security chiefs are trying to judge whether the Taliban will abide by the promises its leaders made in political talks in Doha, Qatar, to stop Afghanistan once again from turning into a sanctuary for al-Qaida and other global jihadist groups.The Kremlin also is alarmed by the prospects of an increase in opiate drug trafficking, which alone may earn the Taliban $416 million a year, according to a U.N. assessment.Taliban leaders have said they won’t permit any opium poppy cultivation. But with a financial crunch looming for the country — and for the militant group — there are widespread doubts that they will — or can — keep to that promise. Afghanistan is estimated to be responsible for about 80 percent of global opium and heroin supplies.In July, following a string of bilateral talks with the Taliban, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said the Taliban leadership was “rational.” He added: “They are sane people. They clearly stated that they have no plans to create problems for Afghanistan’s Central Asian neighbors.”FILE – Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, second left, speaks as he attends a conference on Afghanistan with representatives of the Taliban, in Moscow, Russia, Nov. 9, 2018.Baev believes that statement was “an exercise in wishful thinking.” “The best Russian diplomats can hope for is to dissuade the shrewd leadership of the Taliban from launching cross-border attacks northwards,” he says. The Taliban remains proscribed in Russia as a terrorist organization. Its ties with Central Asian jihadists, including Chechen separatists who the Taliban allowed to train in Afghanistan, prompted President Putin in September 2001 to acquiesce regarding the U.S. building military bases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan to facilitate the U.S.-led NATO invasion of Afghanistan. Putin also allowed the U.S.-led coalition to use Russian airspace for the invasion.The Kremlin appears to be readying for the worst, and it has been for some time. In 2012, it signed an agreement with Tajikistan to extend its lease on a military base in Dushanbe until 2042, and in 2016 it started modernizing the base and rearming it, including with armed Orlan-10 drones.Last month, the Russian, Tajik and Uzbek militaries held joint exercises on the Afghan border. Recently, Russia’s defense minister Sergei Shoigu pledged to strengthen military cooperation with the former Soviet republics of Central Asia.
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African Union Suspends Guinea After Coup
The African Union said on Friday it was suspending Guinea after a coup in the West African country that saw its president Alpha Conde arrested.The pan-African body said on Twitter that it “decides to suspend the Republic of Guinea from all AU activities and decision-making bodies”.The move came after Guinean special forces seized power on Sunday and arrested Conde, who had come under increasing fire for perceived authoritarianism.The AU had on Sunday condemned the military takeover and called for the release of Conde, who became the country’s first democratically elected president in 2010.Its move came a day after the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) also suspended Guinea and said it was sending a mission to the country to evaluate the situation there. The AU’s Political Affairs, Peace and Security Council said it called on AU Commission chief Moussa Faki to “engage with stakeholders in the region” on the crisis.
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Raducanu, Fernandez Set Up Battle of Teens in U.S. Open Final
It will be the Big Apple battle of teenagers in Saturday’s U.S. Open final after Britain’s Emma Raducanu became the first qualifier to reach the title clash at a major, joining Canadian Leylah Fernandez as the duo continued their giant-killing spree.The final under the lights at the colossal Arthur Ashe Stadium between Fernandez and Raducanu will be the first major final in the Open Era across both the men’s and women’s game to feature two unseeded players.It will also mark the first Grand Slam final to be contested by two teenagers since the 1999 U.S. Open between Serena Williams and Martina Hingis.Both Raducanu, 18, and Fernandez, who turned 19 this week, were yet to be born then.”We first encountered each other because I was born in Toronto and she was Canadian, so we kind of, like, made a little relationship back then,” said Raducanu, whose parents moved to England when she was two-years-old.”But, yeah, then I played her at junior Wimbledon. Obviously since then we’ve both come very far in our games and as people. Yeah, I’m sure it’s going to be extremely different to when we last encountered each other.”But we’re both playing good tennis so it will be a good match.”Fernandez was the first to book her spot with yet another upset on Thursday as she took down second seed Aryna Sabalenka 7-6(3) 4-6 6-4 in the first semi-final on Thursday night.Raducanu did not take much longer, wrapping up her contest against Greek Maria Sakkari 6-1 6-4 in 84 minutes to become the first British woman to reach a major final since Virginia Wade won Wimbledon in 1977.Playing in just her fourth tour-level tournament, Raducanu has not dropped a set in New York – the first woman to make the U.S. Open final without dropping a set since German Angelique Kerber in 2016.”Honestly I just can’t believe it. A shock. Crazy,” she said, beaming from her ubiquitous smile. “To be in a Grand Slam final at this stage of my career, yeah, I have no words.”Their fearless tennis has endeared both to the fans and the crowd will have a tough choice in deciding who they would want to back on Saturday.”They are both young. They play fearless. They have nothing to lose playing against us,” said Sakkari. “I have to give credit to both of them, both of the young girls, that they take their chances. They’re out there fighting for that title.”A win in the final would see Raducanu jump to 24th in the rankings, a massive climb after starting the hardcourt major ranked 150th in the world.Left-handed Fernandez, who can make her top-20 debut by climbing to number 19 with the U.S. Open title, has been no less impressive.The Canadian had shown en route to the semi-final that she can beat anyone, with victories over four-time major winner and defending champion Naomi Osaka, three-time Grand Slam winner Kerber in the fourth round and fifth-seeded Elina Svitolina in the quarter-finals.She looked at sea against the power of big-hitting Sabalenka at the start of the match, but soon found her groove as her Belarusian opponent squandered her chances.It was her third win in four matches against top-five players in the world.”Impossible is nothing,” she said. “Like my dad would tell me all the time there’s no limit to my potential to what I can do. Every day we just got to keep working hard, we got to keep going for it.”I think I’ve been doing some things incredible. I don’t know. It’s like I think one word that really stuck to me is ‘magical’ because not only is my run really good but also the way I’m playing right now.”
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Denmark Lifts All COVID Curbs
With no masks in sight, buzzing offices and concerts drawing tens of thousands, Denmark on Friday ditches vaccine passports in nightclubs, ending its last COVID-19 curb.The vaccine passports were introduced in March 2021 when Copenhagen slowly started easing restrictions.They were abolished at all venues on Sept. 1, except in nightclubs, where they will be no longer necessary from Friday.”We are definitely at the forefront in Denmark as we have no restrictions, and we are now on the other side of the pandemic thanks to the vaccination rollout,” Ulrik Orum-Petersen, a promoter at event organizer Live Nation, told AFP.On Saturday, a sold-out concert in Copenhagen will welcome 50,000 people, a first in Europe.Already on Sept. 4, Live Nation organized a first open-air festival, aptly named “Back to Live,” which gathered 15,000 people in Copenhagen.”Being in the crowd, singing like before, it almost made me forget COVID and everything we’ve been through these past months,” said Emilie Bendix, 26, a concertgoer.Denmark’s vaccination campaign has gone swiftly, with 73% of the 5.8 million population fully vaccinated, and 96% of those 65 and older.’Aiming for free movement'”We’re aiming for free movement… What will happen now is that the virus will circulate, and it will find the ones who are not vaccinated,” epidemiologist Lone Simonsen told AFP.”Now the virus is no longer a societal threat, thanks to the vaccine,” said Simonsen, who works at the University of Roskilde.According to the World Health Organization, the Scandinavian country has benefitted from public compliance with government guidelines and the COVID-19 strategy adopted.”Like many countries, Denmark has, throughout the pandemic, implemented public health and social measures to reduce transmission. But at the same time it has greatly relied on individuals and communities to comply voluntarily,” said Catherine Smallwood, WHO Europe’s emergency officer.With around 500 daily COVID-19 cases and a reproduction rate of 0.7, Danish authorities say they have the virus under control.Health Minister Magnus Heunicke has however vowed that the government would not hesitate to swiftly reimpose restrictions if necessary.Authorities insist that the return to normal life must be coupled with strict hygiene measures and the isolation of sick people.The WHO still considers the global situation critical and has urged caution.”Every country needs to remain vigilant as and when the epidemiological situation changes,” Smallwood said.Denmark has said it will keep a close eye on the number of hospitalizations — just under 130 at the moment — and conduct meticulous sequencing to follow the virus.A third dose has also been available to risk groups since Thursday.Simonsen said the vaccines have so far provided immunity from variants “but if escape variants (resistant to the vaccine) were to appear, we will have to rethink our strategy.”Christian Nedergaard, who owns several restaurants and wine bars in Copenhagen, said that while everyone is happy about the return to normal life, “the situation is still complicated.””The memory of coronavirus will fade very quickly from some people’s minds but not for everyone, and for restaurants this period has for sure been a game-changer,” he said.”The industry needs to think about how to become more resilient.”Travelers entering Denmark must still present either a vaccine passport or a negative PCR test, and masks are mandatory in airports.
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Afghan Withdrawal Raises Questions, But Saving Lives Comes First, Says Albanian Prime Minister
In an interview Thursday, Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said there are questions about how the U.S. troop withdrawal from Afghanistan was handled, “but we need to first save the lives [of Afghans].”Rama, whose country is temporarily hosting 4,000 Afghan refugees, said that as a NATO member country, Albania has to take its “share of responsibility” to protect those who worked with the organization in Afghanistan.Rama told Mirwais Rahmani of VOA’s Afghan Service that Afghan refugees can stay in Albania for as long as they wish.This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.VOA: Mr. Prime Minister, thank you so much for your time. Albania was one of the first countries that offered to host Afghan refugees. Tell us why.Prime Minister Edi Rama: Because of who we are. We have a very proud history of having built our life in this country for generations based in our first common law, which says that the house of the Albanians belongs to God and the guest. The accurate translation would be the traveler. And then there is a whole explanation of the duty behind the knock at the door of whomever is behind the door and in whatever situation he, she or they are, you have to open the door and you have to offer shelter to the traveler that is lost or needs refuge or needs to be fed or whatever. So, that is first. Second is our history. Our grandparents did something fascinating and thanks to them, Albania became the first and the last European country that had more Jews after the war than before and independent from their religion.And many Jews were saved by being hidden from Muslim armies. Because we have Muslims and Christians here but independent from their religion, Albania was protecting Jews. And then we were like the Afghans 30 years ago. So, it was at that time us demanding help and knocking on others’ doors for shelter.Now it’s the time to give what we got. And finally, I would say that we owe it to our children. Our children need to inherit this attitude, and every generation should cultivate it when the chance is being presented because, God forbid, we become a cynical rich country.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 2 MB480p | 3 MB540p | 3 MB1080p | 9 MBOriginal | 16 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioEdi Rama: Thirty years ago, “it was at that time us demanding help and knocking on others’ doors for shelter. Now it’s the time to give what we got.”VOA: I’m sure you saw the chaos and tragedy in Kabul airport during the last two weeks of August. Many believe it was a result of hasty withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces from Afghanistan. What’s your take on this?Rama: As I said and I want to repeat, for sure what happened in the last weeks and what the world saw live from Kabul, from the airport, from the scenes of desperate people losing gravity and falling from the sky will absolutely raise many questions – many questions about our civilization, about our democratic world, about NATO, about the future of NATO and how we should see and shape it. But it’s not the time to enter in this (conversation) until the last person that is in need is saved from whatever the danger might be for him or her in Afghanistan. We should take care of human lives, and then of course, the discussion will follow. But on the other hand, I have to say that, you know, it’s quite hypocritical to put the blame on the United States and on the administration and just wash their hands like Pontius Pilate. After all we have been in this together. Yes, there are questions, of course, and the withdrawal had its problems, and it’s obvious but we need to first save the lives. And the blame on the withdrawal, the whatever mismanagement of the withdrawal, the dramatic episodes of the withdrawal, should not be alibis or should not be instruments to forget the real thing – the lives of people.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 3 MB480p | 4 MB540p | 4 MB1080p | 13 MBOriginal | 22 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioEdi Rama: “The withdrawal had its problems and it’s obvious, but we need to first save the lives.”VOA: I talked to some Afghan evacuees in Albania. Their main concern is the uncertainty surrounding the process of their application. An Afghan evacuee, while thanking your government for the warm hospitality, had a question for you: in case their application or resettlement process takes months or years, will the Albanian government provide them with health services and education opportunities for their children?Rama: Thank you for the question. It’s a very good question. First of all, they should forget months. It will not be months. It will be more than months because the mass of applications and the massive bureaucratic work that has to be done back in the [United] States for so many people that have been parked, as they said, in different places in Europe or elsewhere, is huge. So, it will be more than months. Secondly, we have already decided that we will offer them free health care.The concern of the kids and the young students is a common concern. So, we are working to come up with a plan, we are working to be able to create a network of teachers because we can put them right away in our schools. But it’s in Albanian, and we need to somehow give them some continuity to have their language and English, so we are working on that. And we will not let them, you know, drag in the places they are for more than months without sending those kids to school, without being able to see a future. At the same time, I would invite all of them to think about integrating while waiting – they are great people.VOA: The U.S. might not take in those Afghans who fail security background checks, or their cases are rejected. How will Albania deal with such a scenario? Are you ready to take in those Afghans who will have no other place to go, or is there any alternative solution?Rama: They are at home here. They should feel at home here, and if they want to stay, they are welcome. We will never tell them to leave the country because they don’t fulfill criteria. We’ll never tell them they have to apply for a visa clearance in Albania. We suffered a lot from visa regimes, and we are not going to be now a visa regime country for them, so they are more than welcome to stay.VOA: What’s Albania’s reaction to the Taliban’s government in Afghanistan? Will Albania, as a country that hosts hundreds, if not thousands, of Afghans, recognize a government led by the Taliban?Rama: Albania had its Taliban. They were not Islamic Taliban. They were Marxist and Leninist Taliban. And we saw religion being bombed. We saw God being declared illegal. We saw our own culture of the 20th century being bombed. We saw the jailing of artists, of writers, of play writers. We saw a total lack of freedom of expression. We saw full nationalization, and private property being dumped and being bombed and so many other things that, you know, you have seen in that country. Every comparison has its weakness. So, I’m not going further. But no, we will not be part of any club that will recognize this regime.Let me add this. While I said this, I say also the other thing, that it’s important to build communication, it’s important to talk with that regime. Because for the sake of all that need to be helped, demands it. So, one of the strengths of our Taliban regime was that not only didn’t they want to talk to others, but the others didn’t want to talk to them. So, this is something to be remembered.
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China Opens Rail Line, Trade Route to Indian Ocean Through Myanmar
China last month inaugurated a new trade route via ship, road and rail running through Myanmar in keeping with Beijing’s dogged building spree across the Southeast Asian country to reach the Indian Ocean and points west.Analysts say it is one more strand in the ever-expanding web of transportation channels pulling China and Southeast Asia closer under the banner of Beijing’s sprawling Belt and Road Initiative while boosting China’s sway across the region.Whether the new route actually pays off, they add, may hinge on whether and when new rail lines are laid across Myanmar, a challenge made tougher by the violent turmoil the country has tipped into since its Feb. 1 coup.Ties that bindThe Chinese Embassy in Myanmar announced the opening of the route after a successful test run with a post to its Facebook page.The trip started out by ship from Singapore to Yangon, Myanmar’s commercial hub, where it continued by road to the country’s border with China at Chinshwehaw, on the border with China’s Yunnan province. The cargo then finished the last leg of the journey over a new rail line from the border to Chengdu, the capital of China’s central Sichuan province.The embassy called it a new route for Beijing to the Indian Ocean and “an important breakthrough in strengthening China-Myanmar trade relations.”Bryan Tse, Myanmar analyst for the Economist Intelligence Unit, told VOA the project, “as with many of similar nature in Southeast Asia, will help strengthen trade ties between China and the region, and thus increase Chinese influence there.”Li Mingjiang, a China policy expert at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said the new train tracks in China upgrade a trade route that has existed for years and will complement the China-Myanmar Economic Corridor, a cornerstone of Beijing’s BRI.The corridor already features twin oil and gas pipelines bisecting Myanmar from the Bay of Bengal in the west to its border with China in the east, passing through Mandalay along the way. A deep-water port where the pipelines hit the coast is under construction. China’s plans also envision a high-speed rail line and expressway tracing the same path as the pipes, with an offshoot running south from Mandalay to Yangon, on the Andaman Sea.Critically for Beijing, the Bay of Bengal and Andaman Sea both open onto the Indian Ocean. That gives China’s oil and gas imports from the Middle East an alternative to passing through the chokepoint of the Malacca Strait near Singapore, a potential liability in the event of a conflict.Off the railsWith the rail line from the China-Myanmar border to Chengdu now up and running, China says the new trade route through Myanmar via Yangon will shave weeks off the time it takes to move goods between the Indian Ocean and Sichuan.Li, though, said the overland stretch through Myanmar by road makes for a tight bottleneck and will probably prove impractical for anything but specialty, high-value goods.“It’s too slow, and also in terms of volume it’s quite limited, and that’s going to be a major constraint,” he said.According to the analyst, the only real fix is for China to convince Myanmar to start laying new rail lines across Myanmar itself.“That’s the only way, but for a long time Myanmar has been not very supportive of such ideas. Even if Myanmar eventually agrees to this proposal, it will take time to build,” Li said, a few years at least.Until then, he added, the volume of goods China can move over the new trade route through Yangon will also do little to address Beijing’s “Malacca dilemma.”Facing loud opposition from locals along the proposed path of the tracks who fear losing their land for little or no compensation, Myanmar has only reluctantly agreed to China’s requests for feasibility studies.Tse said concerns over feasibility and cost have added to the delays.“Many joint projects have thus far suffered the same fate, and there are not many reasons to expect this to change for the better given the significantly poorer geopolitical and macroeconomic policy environment the [Myanmar] junta now finds itself in,” he said.Already hobbled by the pandemic, Myanmar’s economy has taken another big hit since the military toppled the country’s democratically elected government in February. Fitch Solutions, an international ratings agency, expects Myanmar’s economy to contract at least 20% this year.Tse said the new trade route as it stands could give the economy a boost, but not enough to “move the needle.”Trading favorsKhin Khin Kyaw Kyee, who follows China-Myanmar relations at Myanmar’s Institute for Strategy and Policy, a local think tank, expects even less from the new route.A handful of officials and well-connected companies may well cash in on logistics fees, she said, “but in terms of the ordinary … people and Myanmar as a country, I’m not sure whether we will be getting a lot of benefits.”What ordinary people need at least as much as infrastructure upgrades, she said, were better bilateral trade policies to help even the playing field with China and to formalize the large volume of informal cross-border trade now exposed to the whims of local officials.Khin Khin Kyaw Kyee added that the new trade route also has to contend with the uptick in fighting the coup has sparked between the military and armed rebel groups vying for territory on Myanmar’s fringes, some of them near the very stretch of the China-Myanmar border the route crosses.Since the coup, rights groups say Myanmar’s security forces have killed more than 1,000 civilians and arrested thousands more in their bid to put down all forms of resistance to the junta, from protests to neighborhood militias and a civil disobedience movement. The U.S. and other Western countries have responded with a series of sanctions targeting senior military officials and their vast business interests.China and Russia, though, both major arms suppliers to Myanmar, have helped shield the junta from more coordinated international pressure at the United Nations.By embracing the new trade route, Khin Khin Kyaw Kyee said, the junta sees one more opportunity to keep China on its side.“At this point what they are all thinking is to woo China, to please China, so that they will get more diplomatic protection in the international community,” she said.
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Councilors Swear New Hong Kong Loyalty Oath After Hundreds Quit
Dozens of local community politicians in Hong Kong swore a newly required loyalty oath to China on Friday after hundreds of their colleagues quit in protest as authorities try to purge the city of “unpatriotic” elements.District councils are the only political office in Hong Kong where all seats are directly elected by residents.They deal with bread-and-butter local issues like bus routes, trash collection and playgrounds. But they have also become a symbol of residents’ urge for a greater say in how their city is run.In late 2019, towards the end of months of huge democracy protests, opposition candidates critical of China’s rule won a landslide, hammering pro-government candidates.China has since responded with a crackdown on dissent as well as an overhaul of the city’s political system that reduces the number of directly elected officials and vets politicians for their perceived patriotism.On Friday, the first 24 councilors took the oath in a closed-door ceremony, according to the government.Similar ceremonies have been held for other sectors, including civil servants, government officials and lawmakers.However, those who swear allegiance can still be disqualified.Under the new rules imposed by Beijing earlier this year, a national security committee can disqualify anyone deemed an “anti-China” element or disloyal.Subversion charges”If we have doubts on certain councilors’ oath-taking and could not completely trust whether they have pledged loyalty and allegiance, we will give them the opportunity to explain… If their oaths are invalid in the end, they will be disqualified,” Chief Executive Carrie Lam said earlier this week.Some 180 district councilors are expected to take oaths in the coming weeks and those who refuse to attend will lose their seats.However, a majority of the elected district councilors have simply quit rather than adhere to the vetting process.So far a total of 260 — more than half of the 452 elected members — have resigned.”It (oath-taking) has become the regime’s tool to keep you on a leash,” former district councilor Debbie Chan, who resigned in July, told AFP.”They want to eliminate the pro-democracy camp in Hong Kong.”Since the 2019 protests, China has imposed a national security law that has criminalized much dissent and began remolding Hong Kong in its own authoritarian image.Several district councilors are among the more than 60 people who have been charged with national security crimes, the vast majority for their political views.In the latest prosecution, three leading members of the group behind Hong Kong’s annual Tiananmen vigils appeared in court on Friday.A day earlier, police raided a museum they ran dedicated to the victims of Beijing’s deadly 1989 crackdown.The three leaders were hit with a subversion charge after they refused to cooperate with a national security investigation.Writing on Facebook before her court appearance, barrister Chow Hang-tung, one of those charged, struck a defiant tone. She was denied bail in Friday’s court appearance.”If they have written the script to eliminate our freedom, then obedience and cooperation will only help them reach their goal quicker and easier,” she wrote.In court, she told the judge the charges were “absurd.”National security crimes carry up to life in prison and the majority are denied bail until trial.
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Facing Stalemate in Ties, Biden and China’s Xi Discuss Avoiding Conflict in Call
U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese leader Xi Jinping spoke for 90 minutes in their first talks in seven months on Thursday, discussing the need to avoid letting competition between the world’s two largest economies veer into conflict.The U.S. side said the “proof will be in the pudding” as to whether the stalemate can be broken with relations between the superpowers languishing at their lowest point in decades.A White House statement said Biden and Xi had “a broad, strategic discussion,” including areas where interests and values converge and diverge. The conversation focused on economic issues, climate change and COIVD-19, a senior U.S. official told reporters.”President Biden underscored the United States’ enduring interest in peace, stability, and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific and the world and the two leaders discussed the responsibility of both nations to ensure competition does not veer into conflict,” the statement said.Occasional high-level meetings since Xi and Biden’s first call in February have yielded scant progress on a slew of issues, from human rights to transparency over the origins of COVID-19.During the ensuing months, the two sides have lashed out at each other almost constantly, often resorting to vitriolic public attacks, slapping sanctions on each other’s officials and criticizing the other for not upholding their international obligations.Chinese state media said Xi had told Biden that U.S. policy on China imposes “serious difficulties” on relations, but added that both sides agreed to maintain frequent contact and to ask working-level teams to increase communications.”China and the United States should … show strategic courage and insight, and political boldness, and push Sino-U.S. relations back to the right track of stable development as soon as possible,” the state media report said, citing Xi.Asian currencies and share markets strengthened on Friday, as investors speculated that the call could lead to some thaw in relations between the two most important trading partners for economies in the region.’Proof will be in the pudding’The Biden administration, preoccupied by a chaotic U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, has signaled that ending America’s longest war will give U.S. political and military leaders the space to focus on more pressing threats stemming from China’s rapid rise.But Beijing has been quick to seize on the U.S. failure in Afghanistan to try to portray the United States as a fickle partner and China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi said last month that Washington should not expect China’s cooperation on that or other issues if it was also trying to “contain and suppress” China.The senior U.S. administration official told reporters before the call that Washington had been disappointed that Chinese officials appeared only willing to read talking points during recent high-level talks, and that the U.S. side saw the leaders’ call as a test of whether direct engagement with Xi could end what has become a stalemate in ties.”This is about seeing if there is an ability to engage more substantively than we’ve been able to … the proof will be in the pudding,” the official said following the call, describing the tone as candid but respectful.But the official also acknowledged that the United States’ ability to change China’s behavior may be limited, and that Washington must largely focus on shoring up the U.S. competitiveness and rallying partners and allies.Successive U.S. administrations have complained that Beijing has sought to use endless dialogue as a delaying tactic and frustration with this tactic ultimately led to Washington ending an annualized U.S.-China dialogue mechanism.Even so, the official said Biden had not planned to raise the prospect of U.S. retaliatory action or “costs” if China refused to cooperate on a range of issues, including on COVID-19 origin investigations. Beijing denies the U.S. accusation that it hasn’t cooperated with investigations into the source of the pandemic.The U.S. official said it would “take time” and a “training period” for the Biden administration to convince Chinese leaders – who are themselves preparing domestically for an important Communist Party congress next year – that Beijing’s stance would not pay dividends.”We also think that essentially Beijing’s actions are quieter than their words,” the official said. “Their responses to our actions have actually been largely symbolic and frankly their hard-line rhetoric isn’t really working.”
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Biden Announces Sweeping Vaccine Mandates, More Steps to Fight COVID
As the United States continues to deal with the spread of the highly transmissible delta variant, President Joe Biden announced new sweeping vaccine mandates as part of a multipronged push to end the pandemic. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
Producer: Mary Cieslak
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UN Chief Says He Fears Afghanistan-like Situation in Sahel
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told AFP on Thursday that he feared the return to power of the Taliban in Afghanistan would encourage influential jihadist armed groups in the Sahel, as he called for a strengthening of “security mechanisms” in that region.”I fear the psychological and real impact of what happened in Afghanistan” in the Sahel, Guterres said in an interview. “There is a real danger. These terrorist groups may feel enthusiastic about what happened and have ambitions beyond what they thought a few months ago.”Guterres said it is “essential to reinforce security mechanisms in the Sahel,” because it “is the most important weak point, which must be treated.””It is not only Mali, Burkina or Niger. Now we have infiltrations in Ivory Coast, in Ghana,” he added.He noted that France will reduce its presence in the region and cited news reports that Chad wants to withdraw some troops from border areas around Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali.”This is the reason why I am fighting for there to be an African counterterrorism force with a mandate under Chapter 7 [which provides for the use of force] of the Security Council and with dedicated funds, which can guarantee a response to the threat level,” he added.Insufficient capacity to respond”I fear today that the response capacity of the international community and the countries of the region are not sufficient in the face of the threat,” he said.The U.N. chief has been trying for several years to give the G5 Sahel force – Chad, Mauritania, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso – a U.N. mandate accompanied by collective funding from the world body.France supports Guterres, but the U.N.’s leading financial contributor, the United States, has rejected the move.”This blocking must be ended. It is absolutely essential,” said the secretary-general.He said he was worried about fanatical groups where death “is desirable,” with armies “disintegrating in front of” these types of fighters.”We saw this in Mosul in Iraq, in Mali during the first push towards Bamako, we saw it in Mozambique,” he said. “This danger is real, and we must seriously think about its implications for the terrorist threat and the way in which the international community must organize itself in the face of this threat.”
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WHO: Africa to Receive 25% Fewer COVID Vaccines Than Expected
Africa is slated to receive 25% fewer COVID-19 vaccines by the end of the year than it was expecting, the director of the World Health Organization’s regional office for Africa said Thursday.The African continent, already struggling with a thin supply of vaccines while many wealthy nations initiate booster shot programs, has fully vaccinated just more than 3% of its residents.The global vaccine sharing initiative COVAX announced Wednesday that it expects to receive about 1.4 billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines by the end of the year, as opposed to the projection of 1.9 billion doses it received in June.”Yesterday, #COVAX shipment forecasts for the rest of the year were revised downwards by 25%, in part because of the prioritization of bilateral deals over international solidarity.” – Dr @MoetiTshidi— WHO African Region (@WHOAFRO) September 9, 2021Matshidiso Moeti, WHO’s Africa director, said during a press conference Thursday that the United States has thrown away three times as many vaccine doses as COVAX has delivered to African countries since March.COVAX delivered more than 5 million doses to Africa in the past week, but the U.S. Centers for Disease and Prevention said that as of September 1, U.S. pharmacies have thrown away more than 15 million doses since March.The United States and other wealthy nations have been under increasing pressure to donate their surplus of COVID-19 vaccines to poorer countries as the pandemic wreaks havoc across the globe with the emergence of new and more contagious variants of the coronavirus, which causes COVID-19.Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director-general of the World Health Organization, on Wednesday implored wealthy nations to forgo COVID-19 vaccine booster shots for the rest of the year to ensure that poorer countries have more access to the vaccine. Tedros had previously asked rich countries not to provide boosters until September.Also on Thursday, Turkey’s health minister said the country is soon likely to approve a locally made vaccine, which began late-stage trials in June, for emergency use. Ankara expects it will start mass producing “Turkovac” this October.Italy sent teams to the island of Lampedusa to inoculate newly arrived immigrants. Lampedusa is one of the main arrival points for African migrants from Libya and Tunisia. Roughly 40,000 migrants from North Africa have arrived in Italy so far this year, twice as many as in 2020.In Los AngelesMeanwhile, the Los Angeles Board of Education approved a measure Thursday that would mandate vaccinations against COVID-19 for all students 12 years and older. Students would be required to receive their first dose by November 21 followed by a second dose by December 19 in order to be fully vaccinated by the next semester.The measure also requires students participating in in-person extracurricular activities to receive both shots by the end of October. The district will allow medical or religious exemptions.Los Angeles is the largest school district in the U.S. to impose a mandatory vaccination policy. The district is the nation’s second-largest, with just more than 600,000 students.In JapanSeparately, Japan announced Thursday that it would extend its current coronavirus state of emergency for Tokyo and 18 other areas until Sept. 30. Two prefectures will be shifted from full emergency status to more targeted restrictions.The state of emergency was first imposed for the city and a handful of other prefectures just weeks before the start of the Tokyo Olympics as Japan struggled under the surge of new infections sparked by the delta variant and a sluggish vaccination campaign.Japan currently has more than 1.6 million confirmed infections, including 16,600 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, with nearly 50% of its population fully vaccinated.Some information for this report came from the Associated Press and Reuters.
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Aid Programs Reduced Hunger in US in 2020, but Racial Disparities Worsened
A huge increase in federal food aid kept the number of U.S. households considered “food insecure” from rising during 2020, despite the economic devastation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. But a report from the U.S. Department of Agriculture found that more than one in 10 U.S. households was short of food at some point last year, and that racial and regional disparities in hunger increased despite the surge in federal aid.Now, however, with the pandemic surging back throughout the country, the assistance programs that prevented an untold number of American families from facing food shortages last year are beginning to expire, raising the possibility that more Americans could soon find themselves going hungry.The FILE – Dylan Pfeifer uses a lift to move a box filled with donated canned and boxed foods to his home in Chandler, Ariz., April 3, 2021, to safely store the items until they are given to St. Mary’s Food Bank.On top of direct food assistance, the federal government authorized the extension of unemployment insurance benefits as well as a $300 weekly supplement to those benefits.The USDA study did not specifically tie increased benefits to the fact that hunger rates remained stable during the pandemic, but anti-hunger groups said the connection was clear.“The fact that the numbers around overall hunger in America did not drastically increase shows that the route and the steps that the federal government and that the Congress and administration took throughout the year were the right approach, and that our nutrition programs work,” said Eric Mitchell, executive director of the Alliance to End Hunger.Racial disparities found While the overall numbers paint a picture of an effective pandemic response, the details demonstrate that there are significant holes in the social safety net lawmakers tried to augment last year.FILE – Elizabeth Ruiz, 7, spells out “God Bless U” as she and her mother, Daylin Lemus, of Adelphi, Md., wait to receive a Catholic Charities distribution of food at Northwestern High School, in Hyattsville, Md., May 5, 2020.The rate of food insecurity among white, non-Hispanic households actually decreased during the pandemic year, from 7.9% to 7.1%. However, among Black households, food insecurity affected 21.7% in 2020, an increase from 19.1% the previous year. The rate of food insecurity also rose in Hispanic households, but the change was not statistically significant.Overall, a Black household was more than three times as likely to suffer food insecurity in 2020 as a white household. Hispanic households were 2.4 times as likely to be short on food as white households.(The USDA report codes the race of a household by determining the race of a single “reference person,” typically the owner of the residence or the person whose name appears on a rental agreement, and does not break out multiracial households.)Regional and household differencesThe survey also found that rates of hunger in the Northeast, Midwest and West all fell year-over-year, though the drop was statistically significant only in the Midwest. In the South, however, hunger rose by a statistically significant amount, from 11.2% in 2019 to 12.3% in 2020.Households with children were significantly more likely to face food insecurity than the average, at 14.8%, and that percentage rose to 15.3% if any of those children were under 6 years old.FILE – City worker Randy Greice, foreground, unloads a pallet of food at a distribution event in Opa-locka, Fla., Oct. 6, 2020.“The disparities were there prior to COVID,” said Mitchell, “If anything, [the pandemic] exacerbated those disparities … and made them even more alarming.”Aid programs set to expireThis month, many of the programs that allowed Americans to keep food on the table through the first 20 months of the pandemic are beginning to expire. The enhanced unemployment benefit payment ended as of this week, and Congress failed to extend a moratorium on evictions that had been preventing people behind on their rent from losing their homes.The expanded SNAP benefit will expire at the end of this month, as will the program providing some low-income families access to fresh foods.”Congress and administration need to come together to find solutions to be able to extend the changes that were implemented or, better yet, make them permanent,” said Mitchell. “There’s potential for this to happen in Washington, but we’re going to have to create the political will to make it reality.”While combating hunger is a bipartisan issue in Congress, there is significant disagreement on how to do it. Many Republicans in Washington object, for example, to a large spending bill being pushed by Democrats, which would make some of the new social safety net spending permanent.Representative Kevin Brady of Texas, the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee, released a statement Thursday saying, “President Biden, Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats are ramming through trillions of wasteful spending and crippling tax hikes that will drive prices up even higher, kill millions of American jobs and drive them overseas, and usher in a new era of government dependency with the greatest expansion of the welfare state in our lifetimes.”Many Democrats support further safety net expenditures, including robust federal efforts to guarantee food security. Representative Joaquin Castro, a Texas Democrat, recently tweeted, “We have the ability to prevent hunger in America — it’s a policy choice.”
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Return Home ‘Complicated’ for Last Soldiers Deployed in Afghan War
Soldiers from 10th Mountain Division at Fort Drum, New York, were among the first to deploy to Afghanistan in 2001, and the unit is now among the last to return after the withdrawal. Our Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb was there for the troops’ long-awaited return.Camera: Saqib Ul Islam
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Britain Threatens to Send Migrant Boats Back to France
Britain has approved plans to turn away boats illegally carrying migrants to its shores, deepening a rift with France over how to deal with a surge of people risking their lives by trying to cross the Channel in small dinghies.
Hundreds of small boats have attempted the journey from France to England this year, across one of the world’s busiest shipping lanes. The summer surge happens every year, but it now is larger than normal as alternative routes have been shut down.
Border officials will be trained to force boats away from British waters but will deploy the new tactic only when they deem it safe, a British government official who asked not to be named said on Thursday.
Michael Ellis, Britain’s acting attorney-general, will draw up a legal basis for border officials to deploy the new strategy, the official said.
Home Secretary Priti Patel told French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin that stopping people making their way from France on small boats was her “number one priority.”
Patel had already irritated the French government earlier this week when she indicated Britain could withhold about $75 million (54 million pounds) in funding it had pledged to help stem the flow of migrants.
Darmanin said Britain must honor both maritime law and commitments made to France, which include financial payments to help fund French maritime border patrols.
“France will not accept any practice that goes against maritime law, nor financial blackmail,” the French minister tweeted.
In a letter leaked to British media, Darmanin said forcing boats back toward the French coast would be dangerous and that “safeguarding human lives at sea takes priority over considerations of nationality, status and migratory policy.”
Britain’s Home Office, or interior ministry, said: “We do not routinely comment on maritime operational activity.”
Politically charged
Charities said the plans could be illegal and some British politicians described the idea as unworkable.
Channel Rescue, a citizen patrol group that looks for migrants arriving along the English coast, said international maritime law stipulated that ships have a clear duty to assist those in distress.
Clare Mosely, founder of the Care4Calais charity, which helps migrants, said the plan would put the lives of migrants at risk. “They’re not going to want to be sent back. They absolutely could try and jump overboard,” she said.
Tim Loughton, a member of parliament for the ruling Conservatives, said the tactics would never be used because people would “inevitably” drown.
“Any boat coming up alongside at speed would capsize most of these boats anyway and then we’re looking at people getting into trouble in the water and drowning,” he said.
A spokesman for Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the government was exploring a range of safe and legal options to stop the boats.
The number of migrants crossing the Channel in small dinghies has risen this year after the British and French governments clamped down on other forms of illegal entry such as hiding in the back of trucks crossing from ports in France.
The numbers trying to reach Britain in small boats – about 13,000 so far in 2021 – are tiny compared with migrant flows into countries such as Lebanon and Turkey, which host millions of refugees.
But the issue has become a rallying cry for politicians from Johnson’s Conservative Party. Immigration was a central issue in the referendum decision in 2016 to leave the European Union.
France and Britain agreed in July to deploy more police and invest in detection technology to stop Channel crossings. French police have confiscated more dinghies, but they say they cannot completely prevent departures.
British junior Health Minister Helen Whately said the government’s focus was still on discouraging migrants from attempting the journey, rather than turning them back.
Britain’s opposition Labour Party criticised the new approach as putting lives at risk and it said the priority should be to tackle people-smuggling gangs.
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What to Expect as China Sends Another Survey Ship Into a Disputed Asian Sea
A Chinese scientific research ship that set out Monday to explore parts of the South China Sea will flex Beijing’s muscle in a six-way sovereignty dispute without getting other countries riled up enough to chase the vessel away, experts believe. The Shiyan 6 set off from Guangdong province near Hong Kong toward the northern area of the South China Sea for “multidisciplinary scientific tasks,” the Chinese state-run CGTN news website reported. The Global Times, another Chinese news website, said the ship would “carry out an important scientific mission of multidisciplinary comprehensive observation.” The Shiyan 6 cost $77.37 million and can travel up to about 22,000 kilometers according to the Beijing-based Baidu online encyclopedia. It was launched in July of last year. China Sends Ship as Warning to Vietnam: No Court Case, No Oil Drilling China sent a seismic survey vessel into Vietnam’s exclusive economic zone earlier this month near an oil exploration tract Another Chinese survey ship passed near a Vietnamese energy exploration site in 2019 and again last year to assert Beijing’s claims to those waters. The Shiyan 6 may do the same, analysts say. “It’s some kind of, like, exercise for those survey ships to be familiar with the South China Sea,” said Nguyen Thanh Trung, director of the Saigon Center for International Studies at the University of Social Sciences and Humanities in Ho Chi Minh City. “It’s like a theater for those survey ships to do research and to harass the exploration in the region,” he said. Beijing claims about 90% of the 3.5 million-square-kilometer South China Sea as its own, overlapping waters that five other governments say belongs to them. Chinese officials point to documents dating back more than 1,000 years to dynastic times as support for their claim. Rival claimants Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam cite a U.N. maritime convention. Taiwan claims most of the sea as well. Claimants prize the sea for fisheries, fossil fuel reserves and marine shipping lanes. Jay Batongbacal, international maritime affairs professor at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City, said, “The worst things that they [the Shiyan 6] could do to us is what they did to Vietnam, which is to start surveying and exploring for petroleum.” The Shiyan 6 may again “harass” Vietnam’s oil project near the Vanguard Bank, a South China Sea feature where Vietnamese contractors have sought oil since 2019, Nguyen said. The Chinese survey ship Haiyang Dizhi 8 got into a four-month standoff with Hanoi two years ago when it approached oil-rich Vanguard Bank, where Vietnam maintains oil drilling operations. The standoff ended when the Chinese ship left on its own, its mission apparently complete, but it returned to waters near Vietnam in April 2020 on a separate mission.A Year of Multiple Standoffs, Few Solutions in South China Sea DisputeChina pushed its weight in a disputed sea this year, but Vietnam and the Philippines pushed backAnother Chinese survey ship, operated by the Chinese Academy of Science, crossed into the Philippine exclusive economic zone last month, U.S. Naval War College faculty member Ryan Martinson said in a Twitter post in August. PRC research vessel “Hai Da Hao” currently operating 65nm east of Scarborough Shoal. This ship is operated by China Ocean University. pic.twitter.com/JWJkOaNhQC— Ryan Martinson (@rdmartinson88) August 11, 2021As a nonmilitary vessel, scholars say, the Shiyan 6 will attract relatively little international attention, although foreign governments are likely to track its course. The United States and its allies periodically send naval ships in response to Chinese military movement that they believe threatens international use of the South China Sea. China’s Likely Responses to European and Indian Warships in Sea it Calls its OwnChinese authorities may tail foreign vessels, protest verbally and target other countries one by one, analysts suggest Western powers, which have taken an increasingly active role in the South China Sea dispute this year, are likely to track the Shiyan 6, but without forcing it to leave, said Derek Grossman, senior analyst with the U.S.-based Rand Corporation research organization. Rival maritime claimants would avoid it, too, given China’s relative power. Beijing has the third-largest armed forces in the world. It has taken a lead in the maritime dispute over the past decade by building artificial islets for military use. If challenged, Grossman said, China would say the ship is just conducting scientific research. The survey ship will probably gather information for military and civilian reference, Grossman said. One big project, he suggested, would be mapping the seabed itself. That research would help detect any fossil fuel and prepare for any conflict at sea. “We actually have very little of the ocean mapped, so that type of information is extremely valuable if you are to do undersea operations in a military conflict,” he said.
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BRICS Nations Say Afghan Territory Should Not Be Used by Terror Groups
Leaders of the BRICS nations discussed Afghanistan at a virtual summit Thursday, with participants underscoring the importance of preventing terrorists from using Afghan soil to stage attacks on other countries. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi hosted the five-nation group that comprises Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The talks come weeks after the Taliban takeover in Afghanistan led to a geopolitical shift in Asia. Russian President Vladimir Putin, China’s President Xi Jinping, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro joined Modi for the online summit. Speaking at the opening of the summit, Putin said the withdrawal of the United States and its allies from Afghanistan “has led to a new crisis” and the “entire international community will have to clear up the mess as a result.” He said the situation stemmed from “irresponsible attempts to impose alien values from outside and this intention to build so-called democracy” without taking into account historical features and traditions resulting in “destabilization and chaos.” In wrapping up the summit, the BRICS nations called for “refraining from violence and settling the situation by peaceful means to ensure stability in the country.” Afghanistan is of major concern to three of the five countries in the group – Russia, India and China. Putin said the country should not become a threat to its neighbors or a source of terrorism and drug trafficking. In late August, the U.S. completed a withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan to end a 20-year war. Observers say China and Russia will use the opportunity to step into the void left by the U.S., although Moscow is wary of the Islamist ideology of the Taliban and the threat posed by foreign militant groups to Central Asia.India’s concern New Delhi, meanwhile, finds itself isolated with the takeover by the Taliban, which has long been an anti-India group. New Delhi has emphasized that its main concern is about Afghan territory being used by terror groups that target India such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad. The group adopted what it called a Counter Terrorism Action Plan and said in its declaration, “We stress the need to contribute to fostering an inclusive intra-Afghan dialogue so as to ensure stability, civil peace, law and order in the country.” The statement also emphasized the need to address the humanitarian situation and to uphold human rights, including those of children, women and minorities. The summit, held for a second year in the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic, expressed “regret” at the glaring inequity in access to vaccines, especially for the most vulnerable populations, and highlighted the need for access to affordable shots for the world’s poorest. The declaration also said cooperation on the study of the origins of the coronavirus is an important aspect of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic. The coronavirus causes COVID-19. The BRICS group was formed to enhance cooperation among the world’s major emerging economies, which account for 40% of the global population and 25% of global gross domestic product. Their first summit was held in 2009.
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Advances in Magnets Move Distant Nuclear Fusion Dream Closer
Teams working on two continents have marked similar milestones in their respective efforts to tap an energy source key to the fight against climate change: They’ve each produced very impressive magnets. On Thursday, scientists at the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER) in southern France took delivery of the first part of a massive magnet so strong its American manufacturer claims it can lift an aircraft carrier.Almost 20 meters (about 60 feet) tall and more than 4 meters (14 feet) in diameter when fully assembled, the magnet is a crucial component in the attempt by 35 nations to master nuclear fusion.Massachusetts Institute of Technology scientists and a private company announced separately this week that they, too, have hit a milestone with the successful test of the world’s strongest high-temperature superconducting magnet that may allow the team to leapfrog ITER in the race to build a “sun on earth.”Unlike existing fission reactors that produce radioactive waste and sometimes catastrophic meltdowns, proponents of fusion say it offers a clean and virtually limitless supply of energy. If, that is, scientists and engineers can figure out how to harness it — they have been working on the problem for nearly a century.Rather than splitting atoms, fusion mimics a process that occurs naturally in stars to meld two hydrogen atoms together and produce a helium atom — as well as a whole lot of energy.Achieving fusion requires unimaginable amounts of heat and pressure. One approach to achieving that is to turn the hydrogen into an electrically charged gas, or plasma, which is then controlled in a donut-shaped vacuum chamber.This is done with the help of powerful superconducting magnets such as the “central solenoid” that General Atomics began shipping from San Diego to France this summer.Scientists say ITER is now 75% complete and they aim to fire up the reactor by early 2026.”Each completion of a major first-of-a-kind component — such as the central solenoid’s first module — increases our confidence that we can complete the complex engineering of the full machine,” said ITER’s spokesman Laban Coblentz.The goal is to produce 10 times more energy by 2035 than is required to heat up the plasma, thereby proving that fusion technology is viable.Among those hoping to beat them to the prize is the team in Massachusetts, which said it has managed to create magnetic field twice that of ITER’s with a magnet about 40 times smaller.The scientists from MIT and Commonwealth Fusion Systems said they may have a device ready for everyday use in the early 2030s.”This was designed to be commercial,” said MIT Vice President Maria Zuber, a prominent physicist. “This was not designed to be a science experiment.”While not designed to produce electricity itself, ITER would also serve as the blueprint for similar but more sophisticated reactors if it is successful. Proponents of the project argue that even if it fails, the countries involved will have mastered technical skills that can be used in other fields, from particle physics to designing advanced materials capable of withstanding the heat of the sun.All nations contributing to the project — including the United States, Russia, China, Japan, India, South Korea and much of Europe — share in the $20 billion cost and benefit jointly from the scientific results and intellectual property generated.The central solenoid is just one of 12 large U.S. contributions to ITER, each of which is built by American companies, with funds allocated by Congress going toward U.S. jobs.”Having the first module safely delivered to the ITER facility is such a triumph because every part of the manufacturing process had to be designed from the ground up,” said John Smith, director of engineering and projects at General Atomics.The company spent years developing new technologies and methods to make and move the magnet parts, including coils weighing 250,000 pounds, across their facility and then around the globe.”The engineering know-how that was established during this period is going to be invaluable for future projects of this scale,” Smith said.”The goal of ITER is to prove that fusion can be a viable and economically practical source of energy, but we are already looking ahead at what comes next,” he added. “That’s going to be key to making fusion work commercially, and we now have a good idea of what needs to happen to get there.”Betting on nuclear energy — first fission and then fusion — is still the world’s best chance to drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050, said Frederick Bordry, who oversaw the design and construction of another fiendishly complex scientific machine, the Large Hadron Collider at CERN.”When we speak about the cost of ITER, it’s peanuts in comparison with the impact of climate change,” he said. “We will have to have the money for it.”
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CIA Chief Visits Pakistan, India to Discuss Afghanistan
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director Willam Burns flew to India and Pakistan this week to discuss the situation in Afghanistan and the region as well as the way forward.In Islamabad Wednesday, Burns met with the head of the Pakistani army, General Qamar Javed Bajwa, along with Pakistan’s intelligence chief, Lieutenant General Faiz Hameed.“It was reiterated that Pakistan remains committed to cooperate with its international partners for peace in the region and ensuring a stable and prosperous future for Afghan people,” said a press release issued by the military’s public relations wing. The messy and often chaotic process of evacuating foreigners and at-risk Afghans from Afghanistan after the withdrawal of foreign forces also came under discussion, with Burns expressing appreciation for “Pakistan’s role in [the] Afghan situation including successful evacuation operations,” said the release. Pakistan has worked with multiple countries, including several in Europe, to help hundreds of people, many of them Afghans considered to be at-risk under a Taliban government, to leave Afghanistan through its land borders, accommodating them with either visas on arrival or other transit documents.Taliban Allow Flight With Americans, Other Westerners to Depart KabulBut some Americans and hundreds of Afghan allies remain stranded in Mazar-e-SharifThe Pakistani embassy in Kabul has also issued hundreds of visas to Afghans upon requests from embassies, media organizations and other non-government organizations.Burns’ visit to New Delhi Tuesday followed a trip last month to Kabul. U.S. officials say he met with Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban’s top political leader. Reports said the talks came amid negotiations on evacuating people from Afghanistan. Burns’ India trip also coincided with the visit of Russian intelligence chief Nikolai Patrushev. Last week, British intelligence chief Richard Moore traveled to India. All three spy chiefs met with Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, among others, to discuss security concerns linked to the Taliban takeover of Afghanistan, according to Indian media reports. In his meetings with the Indians, Burns discussed the possibility of developing a joint strategy on Afghanistan, a senior source in the Indian government told VOA on condition of anonymity since he was not authorized to speak to the media.Their discussion, according to the official, included regional response to the Taliban takeover, focusing on China. China has welcomed the announcement of an interim cabinet by the Taliban, calling it a “necessary step to restore order” according to the French news agency.US Assessing Announcement of Taliban’s Caretaker GovernmentLineup includes Sirajuddin Haqqani, head of the Haqqani network, designated by the US as a global terrorist organizationThe country also wants the Taliban to “unite with all ethnic groups and factions, build a broad and inclusive political structure, pursue moderate and prudent domestic and foreign policies,” according to Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian in his weekly press conference Thursday. He said the sentiment was shared by the foreign ministers of Afghanistan’s neighbors in a virtual conference Wednesday led by Pakistan.He also said everyone in the meeting believed that “the United States and its allies are the culprits of the Afghan issue” and are “obligated more than any other country to provide economic, livelihood and humanitarian assistance to the Afghan people.”China has pledged to provide around $30 million of aid to Afghanistan to deal with its humanitarian crisis including its first batch of three million doses of coronavirus vaccine.State Councilor& FM Wang Yi at the 1st Meeting of Foreign Ministers of #Afghanistan’s Neighboring Countries: #China decides to provide ¥200 million worth of food, winter weather supplies, vaccines and medicines for emergency use to the Afghan people. pic.twitter.com/82yztiEy26— Hua Chunying 华春莹 (@SpokespersonCHN) September 8, 2021
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Biden to Order Federal Workers to Get Vaccinated
U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday is planning to order 2.5 million federal workers and contractors to get vaccinated against the coronavirus as part of a new effort to control the infectious disease.
The new order, which eliminates an option he previously gave the workers to get regularly tested for the virus in lieu of being inoculated, is part of a six-point plan Biden is laying out in a White House address to combat the surge in recent weeks of delta variant coronavirus cases and deaths.
Aides said the U.S. leader will spell out new efforts to convince the unvaccinated to get inoculated, protecting those already vaccinated with booster shots in coming weeks, keeping schools open, increasing testing and requiring face masks in some situations, advancing the economic recovery and improving care for those who have contracted COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus.
With the mandate for federal worker vaccinations, the White House is hoping businesses across the U.S. will follow suit. Some major companies are already requiring their workers to get vaccinated or be fired.
It was not immediately clear if Biden’s order covering federal workers and contractors would allow for exceptions for those seeking religious or medical exemptions from vaccination.
The latest surge in U.S. coronavirus cases and deaths is mostly among the unvaccinated, although there have been some breakthrough infections among those who were vaccinated months ago. FILE – In this Aug. 17, 2021, photo, an ICU nurse moves electrical cords for medical machines outside the room of a COVID-19 patient in an intensive care unit at the Willis-Knighton Medical Center in Shreveport, La.
More than 177 million people out of the country’s population of 332 million have been vaccinated, but vaccines have yet to be approved by federal health regulators for children under 12 years old.
More than 62% of the population 12 and older has been vaccinated, but about 150,000 new cases are being recorded each day in recent weeks and about 1,000 people a day are dying.
For a variety of reasons — such as a belief they won’t catch the virus or a contention that no one should be able to demand they get inoculated — millions of Americans remain unvaccinated.
Some state governors, mostly conservative Republicans, have urged their citizens to get vaccinated, but they balked at mandating the inoculations or requiring face masks in schools or at workplaces. That has led to numerous political and legal disputes, with some courts siding with local officials wanting to impose coronavirus rules opposed by governors in their states. Nicole Tschabourian, 8, (L) and Leah Yousefi, 8, arrive with printed barcodes for the first day of school and return to full-time in-person learning after the COVID-19 break in Glendale, Los Angeles, California, Aug. 18, 2021.
The spike in Americans who have not been vaccinated includes an increasing number of young children who are not yet eligible to receive a vaccine.
The American Academy of Pediatrics said cases among children soared to 750,000 between August 5 and September 2.
The latest surge has pushed hospitals and health care workers across the U.S. to a breaking point, with some intensive care units filled to capacity with COVID-19 patients.
The U.S. economy, the world’s largest, has advanced sharply since the worst of the pandemic 18 months ago, but the number of new jobs in the country slowed markedly in August, which Biden blamed on the surge in new coronavirus cases.
Some material in this report came from The Associated Press.
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