Month: February 2022

Russia Ramping Up Disinformation Regarding Ukraine, Say Western Officials

Posted on by SeeEU

The Kremlin is ramping up a disinformation offensive aimed at demoralizing Ukraine and Western powers, using Russian state-owned broadcasters and trolls on social media platforms to portray the West as the aggressor and the government in Kyiv as a puppet of NATO, say Western officials and information war experts. 

Scare stories in recent days have included claims that Ukrainian commandos are planning to launch so-called “false flag” attacks in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine to justify NATO military action and that the United States is planning to attack Russia during this week’s Winter Olympics in China. 

The core message is that NATO and Kyiv present a major threat to Russia, they say.

Moscow has waged a sophisticated and multi-faceted information warfare campaign against Ukraine since 2014, when a popular uprising toppled Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, an ally of Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Shortly after Yanukovych’s ouster in a color revolution that Moscow blamed on the West, Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula and seized part of the Donbas, initially using armed proxies. 

Western leaders fear Putin is prepared to invade Ukraine if he fails to secure concessions he wants from the United States and NATO that in effect would carve out for Russia a Soviet era-like sphere of influence across eastern Europe. Among Putin’s key demands is a guarantee that NATO will never expand eastward. Russian officials deny they have any intentions to invade their neighbor, despite an unprecedented massive military build-up along the borders of Ukraine. They accuse Western powers of causing alarm.

“The drumbeat of Kremlin propaganda is also becoming noticeably louder,” according to Yevhen Fedchenko, co-founder of fact-checking website StopFake.org, which monitors Russian disinformation.

“Over the past eight years, Moscow has been able to deploy an impressive and expanding arsenal of information weapons against Ukraine,” Fedchenko wrote in an expert commentary for the Atlantic Council, a U.S.-based research institution. 

“These have ranged from small armies of online trolls to lavishly funded mainstream media outlets that combine world-class production values with an often near-complete absence of journalistic ethics. Each individual element operates under direct or indirect Kremlin control. Together, they repeat and amplify variations of the same carefully curated messages designed to justify or otherwise support Russia’s undeclared war in Ukraine,” he maintains.

Shaping the message

 

Other analysts also say the Kremlin is making strenuous efforts to try to control the narrative in Ukraine and tailoring messages to Russians and key audiences outside Russia.

Tom Southern is director of special projects at the Center for Information Resilience (CIR), a UK-based NGO which exposes disinformation activities. Southern told British reporters there are two sides to the Kremlin’s information war — “what is being pushed in Ukraine, and what’s being pushed about Ukraine.” He said Kremlin propagandists work across a broad spectrum that uses official Russian government statements broadcast by its well-funded domestic and international media outlets but amplify key messages using social media sites and messaging apps like Telegram.

“This includes the messaging that Ukraine is a failed state and historical revisionism of Ukraine and NATO, as provoking Russia or targeting Russian speakers in Ukraine,” he says. A key message both to domestic Russian audiences and to international ones is that NATO is the aggressor and has broken promises it made as the Soviet Union collapsed about not expanding the Western alliance eastward.

The Russian leader has made the claim frequently about NATO skullduggery, accusing Western powers of taking advantage of a weakened, disoriented Russia as the Soviet Union fell apart. And the West’s supposed trickery and violation of a solemn pledge not to expand has figured prominently as an important component in a Putin foreign policy narrative which presents Russia as a victim and aggrieved party. This key message is being played across all Russian-controlled media outlets and broadcast on social media platforms, say disinformation experts. 

Authoritative historians say no such formal undertaking was ever given. And in 2014 Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev said in an interview, “The topic of ‘NATO expansion’ was not discussed at all” during his talks with U.S. leaders.

Kremlin propaganda output has been increasing compared to this time last year, according to Taras Shevchenko, Ukraine’s deputy minister of culture and information policy. Russia’s official websites are the main drivers, but technology is used by the Kremlin to “circulate harmful, hostile content” and to spread disinformation, he says. He says Russia’s prevailing narrative comprises three key messages — Ukraine is a failed state, Russia is peaceful and that the West wants war. 

Western broadcasters have been complaining in recent weeks that Russian state-controlled media have been misusing their reports and footage by dubbing over their dispatches with changed commentary designed to assist in shaping the message that the West is on a war footing and is preparing to attack. 

This is a variation on what disinformation experts dub ‘information laundering’ — using Western sources to undermine Western arguments, often by interviewing “experts” who are aligned with Moscow but have obscure backgrounds.

The Ukrainian Crisis Media Center, an NGO that receives funding from the European Union among others, has warned that the Kremlin is seeking to fan tensions with constant accusations that Ukraine is “preparing provocations.” One example it says was a recent claim that Ukraine and NATO were planning to launch a clandestine operation code named “Crushing Sword” which would use fake footage of Russian aggression and use that as a pretext to attack Russia. 
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Uganda, Tanzania Finalize Terms for Oil Drilling and Pipeline Project

Posted on by SeeAF

Uganda and Tanzania signed a deal with Chinese and French oil companies this week finalizing terms of a $10 billion drilling and pipeline project. The project’s backers say it will usher in economic development across the region. But Ugandan activists say complaints from communities affected by the project are not being heard.

Civil society organizations have raised red flags again, one day after Ugandan and Tanzanian officials put ink to paper for what they call the Final Investment Decision.

The move opens the way for construction and development of the East African Crude Oil Pipeline connecting future oilfields in Uganda to the Tanzanian port city of Tanga.

However, Ugandan civil society organizations, under their umbrella Stop EACOP, say the $3.5 billion project violates the rights of communities around Lake Albert where oil drilling will take place.

In 2021, the NGO Africa Institute for Energy Governance, which is providing legal support to the affected communities, was raided twice for allegedly operating without a license.

The NGO’s executive director, Dickens Kamugisha, says the attacks were meant to silence them for demanding to see key documents and raising issues such as people’s property rights.

Kamugisha tells VOA that locals may get compensated for the loss of their property but were not given much chance to negotiate.

“They are being forced to open bank accounts. But even those who have opened, they don’t receive the money,” said Kamugisha. “Many people haven’t agreed on the compensation rates, but they are being told you have to receive whatever is available. So, the communities are still aggrieved. There are no grievance handling mechanisms. The courts are not functioning, so the people are helpless. People have been made to even become poorer, and more miserable and desperate.”

This week’s agreement was signed between Uganda, Tanzania, the French company Total Energies and the China National Offshore Oil Corporation.

Total Energies faces a lawsuit in France for its failure to prevent human rights violations and environmental damage linked to the project.

The drilling and pipeline have been delayed for years, and Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni noted that one reason for the delay was the pressure put on Total Energies by civil society groups.

Museveni has been dismissive of the groups, describing members as jobless people moving aimlessly.

‘They go and campaign. They say, Ugandans are not allowing NGO’s to inspect the petroleum operations in Lake Albert,” said Museveni. “They are hiding something. So, I appeal to the Ugandans and to the local governments in Buliisa, Kikube, in Nwoya, let the NGO’s go and sleep in the bush if they want.”

When completed, the pipeline is expected to carry about 60,000 barrels of oil to Tanzania per day.

Tanzania’s Vice President Phillip Mpango expressed hope all parties will adhere to labor and environmental laws.

“I’m therefore looking forward to hear that they are committed to implement this project, in an exemplary manner,” said Mpango. “Taking into consideration the ecology as well as local community rights.”

Uganda’s oil deposits were first discovered in 2006 and are estimated at 6.5 billion barrels. Assuming the drilling and pipeline go ahead, exports are expected to begin in 2025.
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UN Kicks Off Relief Assistance to Malawi Flood Victims

Posted on by SeeAF

U.N. agencies in Malawi have started providing aid to victims from Tropical Storm Ana, which killed scores of people across southeastern Africa and left tens of thousands homeless. The U.N. children’s agency, UNICEF, has provided personal hygiene and water treatment kits to approximately 15,000 people. But Malawi’s President Lazarus Chakwera says more assistance is needed.

The latest report from Malawi’s Department of Disaster Management says the floods killed 33 people, displaced more than 100,000 and affected nearly 200,000 households in the country.

The storm also damaged at least 19 health facilities, destroying medicines and cold chain equipment.

Mohamed Fall is UNICEF’s regional director for Eastern and Southern Africa. He is in Malawi visiting flood hit areas.

“For the moment, our focus is on life-saving commodities namely those which help for water, for sanitation, nonfood items, probably also some tents, latrines, cleaning stuff. Also, because I am sure that with water levels dropping, resettlement will be a challenge,” he said.

Fall notes that the destruction of water and sanitation facilities puts children and their families at risk of waterborne diseases such as cholera.

Meanwhile, the World Food Program announced Wednesday that it has set aside an initial amount of $500,000 for relief assistance to the flood victims.

Paul Turnbull is the WFP country director in Malawi.

“As part of our immediate response, WFP is providing corn-soya bran to some 21,000 households, around 95,000 people in four most affected districts of Chikwawa, Mulanje, Nsanje and Phalombe. Distribution started yesterday, first of February,” he said.

Turnbull added the WFP is currently prioritizing displaced people living in temporary shelters as it looks for additional resources to scale up its response.

The head of the Department of Disaster Management, Charles Kalemba, told a press conference Tuesday that the relief efforts are hampered by lack of funding despite several government appeals for financial assistance.

During his tour to affected areas Tuesday, President Lazarus Chakwera called for more assistance to help thousands of Malawians affected by floods in over half of the country’s 28 districts.

Chakwera said, “As we continue asking for more assistance from our partners, we should also make sure that in our national budget this year, we should allocate some to help rebuild public infrastructures destroyed by the storm.”

Tropical Storm Ana also killed at least 20 people in Mozambique and 48 people in Madagascar.

The Malawian president said he will soon meet with African Union heads of state to ask for support in aiding areas affected by the storm.
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Belarus Activists Flee to US, Say Europe Not Safe

Posted on by SeeEU

Speaking to VOA from his New York apartment, Dmitry Savchenko, 34, recalls the prosperous life he recently left behind.

“In Belarus, we had everything. My wife had several cafes. I had two businesses myself, some real estate, an apartment, a car,” he said.

Savchenko and his family had never intended to leave their home. But in the last few months, for him and many other Belarussian citizens, what was once unthinkable became a dire necessity.

“We were faced with a dilemma: either go to prison or run and hide in another country,” he said.

Long described as “Europe’s last dictatorship,” Belarus has been run for 27 years by Alexander Lukashenko. But in the run-up to the 2020 presidential elections, there was a sense among his opponents that he was politically vulnerable.

Savchenko says he has been apolitical his entire life, but in those months he, like many others, was “smelling change in the air,” inspired by the caliber and diversity of presidential candidates eager to challenge Lukashenko’s authoritarian rule.

Two months before election day, August 9, the hopeful Belarusian entrepreneur registered as an independent observer for the polls.

But Savchenko was setting himself up for a major disappointment.

On the day of the vote, Savchenko chronicled numerous irregularities in his precinct, which reached their climax with the members of the elections committee — which normally consist of regime loyalists — not letting the independent observers monitor the process in person. The elections committee members then fled the building with the ballots through the backdoor, escorted by the local police, Savchenko says. 

Hearing hundreds of stories like Savchenko’s from friends and family — as well as from independent media — ordinary Belarusians took to the streets. The country saw a rise of civic awareness unprecedented in its history. In Minsk alone, about 200,000 people came out for a peaceful protest on one of the post-election weekends.

And then the violence began.

Trying to drown people’s enthusiasm, Lukashenko, who baselessly claimed victory with more than 80% of the vote, unleashed a wave of repression and violence against the protesters. Video and photo evidence of police brutality, as well as of demonstrators’ mutilated bodies, made headlines around the world.

“Some of my friends participated in those protests,” Savchenko said. “It was heart-wrenching to even look at them (after their release from jail).”

Those who appeared to have suffered the most were those sent to the infamous Okrestina detention center in the country’s capital where, according to numerous detainee accounts, they were beaten and tortured for hours and not given food or water for days.

“Photos of the people who were released from the Okrestina detention center looked like the photos of people who came from war,” Savchenko added. “And I denounce that. Because people came out (to protest) unarmed.”

Savchenko says he is determined to punish those who so flagrantly abused the law. 

“I am gathering proof of falsifications of the election results, abuse of police authority. And I decided that I will bring them to justice no matter where I am,” he said.

He sent the incriminating evidence he had gathered to BYPOL, an independent union of Belarusian ex-security officers whose mission is to keep a registry of crimes committed by the Lukashenko regime.

The state’s crackdown drew international condemnation, but Savchenko says that did not stop the authorities from methodically targeting their critics after the elections.

“At first, the authorities cracked down on most vocal protesters, then on independent media. After that they started laying off state officials who — how should I put it — didn’t vote for ‘the right candidate.’ Slowly but surely, they got to the people who were election observers,” he said. 

For days, he was harassed and intimidated, then detained and beaten by the police. The authorities threatened to send his 5-year-old son to an orphanage.

So he and his family ran. First to Moscow, then all the way to Mexico City, then to Tijuana, then to the United States, where they are seeking political asylum.

Washington-based immigration lawyer Elizabeth Krukova specializes in providing legal help to asylum-seekers from the countries of the former Soviet Union. She says there are many others like the Savchenko family.

“We’ve seen a number of these cases and a big increase in the number of cases coming from Belarus specifically,” she said.

VOA spoke with several Belarusian asylum-seekers who arrived in the United States from the southern border following the post-election crackdown. They all spoke of intimidation, detainment and beatings by police back home.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection data shows a steady increase in the number of encounters of Belarusian migrants by the southwest border CBP officers — from three in October 2020 to 123 in September 2021.

Savchenko says the main reason his family chose to travel to the U.S. instead of Europe is safety. 

“There is a network of Russian and Belarusian agents that are active in the countries neighboring Belarus, as well as in some EU states,” he said. 

Belarusian officials demonstrated their relentless pursuit of critics when they forced a civilian Ryanair flight to land in Minsk last year and arrested an opposition blogger, Roman Protasevich. Another exiled Belarusian activist, Vitaly Shishov, was found hanged in a park near his home in Kyiv, an unsolved case widely seen as the work of Minsk’s clandestine services.

John Sipher, the former CIA deputy chief of station in Europe, still views Europe as relatively safe but says the fears of dissidents are not groundless.

He says horror stories of kidnappings and murders spread among dissidents “like wildfires.” 

“If there are a few cases where Belarusians are hunted down or arrested, or brought back to Minsk, then it becomes a story that makes its way around that community,” Sipher said.

With Russian troops now massing in Belarus and more on the border of Ukraine, experts see the region’s authoritarian leaders becoming more collaborative, putting their critics at greater risk.

“Since Lukashenko’s crackdown in the last year or so, he is going to be looking for more opportunities to assist (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and Putin is going to be looking for means to work with Belarusians on these issues,” Sipher said.

Experts say whether an activist is in danger depends on how high their name is on the Belarusian KGB’s priorities list. But it’s a guessing game no one on the list wants to play. 

VOA’s Aline Barros contributed to this report. 

 
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Belarus Activists Flee to the US, Say Europe Not Safe

Posted on by SeeEU

The continuing crackdown on pro-democracy activists following the 2020 presidential elections in Belarus has spurred a wave of political asylum seekers. VOA’s Igor Tsikhanenka spoke with some who undertook a long and uncertain journey to Mexico and on to the United States in recent months. Some of them say they had no other choice because they no longer feel safe even in the European Union. Camera: Aaron Fedor
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Why Homicide Rates Spiked 30% During the Pandemic

Posted on by SeeUS

The number of homicides in the United States spiked almost 30% during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, a phenomenon seen in both cities and rural areas, and in Republican and Democratic-leaning states.

The proliferation of guns, pandemic stress and diminished public trust in the police all contributed to the increase in homicides nationwide, according to Justin Nix, an associate professor of criminology and criminal justice at the University of Nebraska Omaha. 

“We have evidence that gun carrying in public spaces was up. … We know that the pandemic, with all of its strains and the uncertainties that it produced, the economic anxiety produced, likely played a role,” says Nix. “And then, lastly, the murder of George Floyd and the protests that happened after that sparked a police legitimacy crisis.”

On May 25, 2020, George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man, was murdered by a white police officer in Minnesota, igniting nationwide protests against police brutality.

Previous research shows that officers reduce their efforts and crime increases in the aftermath of police killings that draw significant public attention.

“Police do slow down partly out of fear of being the next officer to get dragged on social media or in the news,” Nix says. “It’s a fear among officers that, ‘Even if I use force lawfully, even if I stopped this person, and it escalates into a use-of-force incident, even if my behaviors were perfectly legally reasonable, I still might find myself being the next star of a viral video.’” 

Additionally, members of the public might be less likely to call police to report a crime, fearing their actions could do more harm than good. 

“[They think] ‘If I call the police and they show up and they end up abusing this person or using excessive force on this person, I don’t want to contribute to what I see as a problem, so it’s safer for me to just not call 911,’” Nix says. “If people don’t report being victimized or report seeing other people victimized by criminal activity, then a lot of that will go unnoticed by the police.” 

Clinical psychologist Dr. Maria Espinola, who has worked in jails and juvenile centers and is familiar with people who have violent tendencies, says certain people can grow more aggressive when they’re under stress. 

“People who witnessed violence at home or in their communities when they were growing up, and maybe have a genetic tendency to aggression, can develop violent behaviors as a way to cope with stressful situations,” says Espinola, who is also an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. “And then, when faced with a pandemic, you can see how many of them, in times of desperation, have turned to being aggressive towards others.” 

FBI background checks suggest that gun sales are way up since the pandemic began in early 2020.

The bureau conducted the most ever firearm background checks — 1,218,002 — during a single week in March 2021, the highest number since the federal government began tracking gun sales in 1998. In fact, the nine highest weeks ever for gun background checks all occurred in 2020 and 2021, during the pandemic.

Solutions to gun violence aren’t easy to come by in a nation polarized by the debate over whether to limit firearm sales. However, 19 states have passed Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPO), which allow police or family members to petition a court to temporarily remove firearms from a person in crisis who poses a risk of harm to themselves or others. As long as the ERPO is in place, the person is also banned from buying firearms. 

“I don’t think anyone would argue that one of the most polarizing topics in this country is gun violence prevention policies,” says Shannon Frattaroli, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Research and Policy. “We have seen almost half of states adopt this new kind of policy that allows for temporary prohibitions on purchasing and possession of guns, which is quite extraordinary, and demonstrates, in my mind, that there is a place where we can come together and agree on reasonable policies for gun violence prevention.” 

While there have been calls from some quarters to abolish or defund the police, the vast majority of Americans oppose getting rid of police departments. However, about half do support reducing police department budgets and shifting those funds to social programs.

“Policing is necessary in a country awash with guns, where violence is common,” says Nix. “Policing is necessary and needs to be invested in. We need well-trained officers to have the tools and resources they need. We don’t want fatigued, stretched-thin officers who are sleep-deprived out exercising the authority that they have. We need to invest in police officers, but we also need to invest in community organizations that respond to violence as well.” 
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Hunger Crisis Looms in Nigeria’s ‘Food Basket’ Amid Conflict

Posted on by SeeAF

It’s 2 p.m. and Hannah Mgbede asks her husband if she can take her first break of the day from threshing rice so she can breastfeed their 18-month-old baby girl fastened to her back during the grueling work.

Her husband Ibrahim Mohammed, 45, used to harvest as many as 10 bags of rice a year from his farm. But that dropped to just three bags after attackers burned his home to the ground a few years ago, as violence between farmers and herders escalated across the northwest and central parts of Nigeria.

With that decreased yield, Mohammed hasn’t made enough money to buy seedlings to grow yams, soybeans and guinea corn (sorghum).

“Sometimes we manage to eat once (a day),” says Mohammed, who has three children, aged five and younger. “Since the crisis, it is only by the grace of God we are feeding to remain alive.”

Here in Benue state, harvests of rice, yams and soybeans were once so bountiful that it was called the “food basket of Nigeria.” But waves of violence over the last several years have reduced crops in the northcentral state of Africa’s most populous nation.

More than 1 million farmers in the state have been displaced because of the intercommunal violence between herders and farmers competing for water and land, say officials.

“We are heading to a food crisis,” Benue state Gov. Samuel Ortom told The Associated Press.

Across northern Nigeria, at least 13 million are now facing hunger amid a lean season, according to the U.N. World Food Program. The violence has also disrupted the sales of food as roads are too unsafe for farmers to transport crops and marketplaces have been razed by attackers.

Rice production has dropped so much that its price has jumped more than 60% in Benue state as well as some other parts of the country.

“There is a very real risk of famine because both conflict and COVID-19 has made it harder to reach those most in need,” a spokesperson of the U.N. agency told AP.

Thousands of Nigerians have been killed in the decades-long clashes between agrarian communities and nomadic cattle herders who are fighting over limited access to water and grazing land. The farmers often accuse the herders of encroaching in their fields while the herders, mostly from the Fulani ethnic group, claim the croplands are their traditional grazing routes.

The government has now launched an initiative under the National Livestock Transformation Plan in the hope of resolving the conflict which has been worsened by the proliferation of arms and the government’s failure to prosecute past perpetrators from both groups.

About 3,000 people who have fled the violence in Benue state are now living at a camp in Guma local government area.

Mtonga Iliamgee, 43, says every day is a struggle to feed her family of 10. She was seen preparing their only meal of the day at 1 p.m.

“We live for the day, and we don’t know what tomorrow could bring,” she says.

Felix Agune, the deputy head of the camp school, says some children come to class crying that they’ve had no breakfast. Non-government organizations are trying to fill the gap, but it is “nothing compared to the massive hunger spread across Benue state,” said Rex Elanu, a program director for the One to One Healthcare Initiative.

Government officials insist they are working to make farmlands safe enough for people to return and work the land. They’re also trying to encourage nomadic herders to take up ranching, so they are less at odds with farmers.

Seeds and fertilizers have also been supplied to farmers in the past to enhance food production, cushion the effect of the pandemic and encourage more youths to go into agriculture, according to a spokesman of the agriculture ministry.

Despite the violence, Nigerian farmers have been able to produce enough crops to keep the country self-sufficient in staples such as rice, cassava and yams.

“Nigeria survived with the produce generated by the smallholder farmers,” Theodore Ogaziechi of the agriculture ministry said. “The farmers are doing their utmost best to feed the nation.”

Farmers are resilient but also afraid because some who have attempted to go back to their farms have been killed, warned Ortom, the governor of Benue state.

“If there is security for these farmers, we’ll continue to retain our position as the food basket of the nation,” he said. “But if nothing is done, as it is now, it is a big challenge.”
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US Deploying Navy Destroyer, Fighter Jets to Aid UAE

Posted on by SeeUS

The U.S. military is sending a guided missile destroyer to the United Arab Emirates and deploying fighter jets to help the UAE as it contends with missile attacks from Houthi rebels in Yemen. 

The Pentagon said Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin discussed the moves in a phone call Tuesday with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Zayed Al Nahyan. 

A Pentagon statement said the USS Cole will “partner with the UAE Navy before making a port call in Abu Dhabi.” 

“The Secretary also informed the Crown Prince of his decision to deploy 5th Generation Fighter aircraft to assist the UAE against the current threat and as a clear signal that the United States stands with the UAE as a long-standing strategic partner,” the statement said. 

A January 17 rebel attack killed three foreign workers at an Abu Dhabi oil facility. 

One week later, UAE and U.S. forces at Abu Dhabi’s Al Dhafra airbase launched interceptor missiles to destroy two Houthi missiles.  

A third attack came Monday, with UAE missiles intercepting a Houthi rocket during a visit from Israeli President Isaac Herzog. 

The UAE is part of a Saudi-led coalition, which since 2015 has battled the Houthi rebels in defense of Yemen’s internationally recognized government. 

Some information for this report came from Agence France-Presse and Reuters.  
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US Trade Official Says China Failed to Meet Phase 1 Commitments 

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China has failed to meet its commitments under a two-year Phase 1 trade deal that expired at the end of 2021, and discussions are continuing with Beijing on the matter, Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Sarah Bianchi said on Tuesday. 

“You know, it is really clear that the Chinese haven’t met their commitment in Phase 1. That’s something we’re trying to address,” Bianchi told a virtual forum hosted by the Washington International Trade Association. 

In the deal signed by former President Donald Trump in January 2020, China pledged to increase purchases of U.S. farm and manufactured goods, energy and services by $200 billion above 2017 levels during 2020 and 2021. 

Through November, China had met only about 60% of that goal, according to trade data compiled by Peterson Institute for International Economics senior fellow Chad Bown. 

The deal prevented the escalation of a nearly three-year trade war between the world’s two largest economies but left in place tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars of imports on both sides of the Pacific. 

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in late January told lawmakers that China’s purchases of U.S. farm goods fell short of the Phase 1 goal by about $13 billion. 

The U.S. Census bureau is expected to release final 2021 trade data for goods and services on February 8, which will provide specifics on the shortfall. 

Chinese customs data showed the country’s 2021 trade surplus with the United States surged 25% to $396.6 billion after declining for two straight years, with exports to the United States up 27% and imports of American goods rising 33%. 

A spokesperson for China’s Embassy in Washington said Beijing has worked to implement the Phase 1 agreement “despite the impact of COVID-19, global recession and supply chain disruptions.” 

“We hope the U.S. can create a sound atmosphere and conditions for expanded trade with China. The two trade teams are in normal communication,” the spokesperson said in an emailed statement. 

Bianchi, whose portfolio includes China and Asian trade matters, did not identify steps the Biden administration is taking to hold China to its Phase 1 commitments, which also include some increased Chinese market access for U.S. agriculture, biotechnology and financial services. 

“It’s not our goal to escalate here. But certainly, we’re looking at all the tools we have in our toolbox to make sure they’re held accountable,” Bianchi said, without providing details. 

Bianchi, who served as an economic adviser in the Obama administration and took office in October, said the United States was trying to foster a “stable relationship” with China, but the two countries are at a “difficult stage in the relationship.” 

“To be super-candid, the conversations are not easy. They’re very difficult. But you know, from my perspective, what’s important is that we’re having conversations and they will be unflinchingly honest,” Bianchi said. 

She said USTR was emphasizing that China’s state aid to companies and non-market economic policies and practices are a “serious threat to American economic interests.” 

Bianchi said USTR was consulting closely with Congress on the Biden administration’s planned Indo-Pacific Economic Framework to re-engage economically with the rest of Asia, and more details would be released in coming weeks. 

The framework will not include improved market access for countries that sign up, Bianchi said, but said the United States will be seeking high standard “binding commitments” from trading partners in negotiations on digital trade policies, labor rules, environmental standards and supply chain resilience.
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Pharmacy Giants to Pay $590 Million to US Native Americans Over Opioids

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A group of pharmaceutical companies and distributors agreed to pay $590 million to settle lawsuits connected to opioid addiction among Native American tribes, according to a U.S. court filing released Tuesday. 

The agreement is the latest amid a deluge of litigation spawned by the U.S. opioid crisis, which has claimed more than 500,000 lives over the past 20 years and ensnared some of the largest firms in American medicine. 

The companies involved in the latest agreement include Johnson & Johnson (J&J) and McKesson, according to a filing in an Ohio federal court by a committee of plaintiffs in the case. 

Native Americans have “suffered some of the worst consequences of the opioid epidemic of any population in the United States,” including the highest per-capita rate of opioid overdoses compared with other racial groups, according to the filing from the tribal leadership committee. 

“The burden of paying these increased costs has diverted scarce funds from other needs and has imposed severe financial burdens on the tribal plaintiffs.” 

J&J, McKesson and the other two companies in the accord – AmerisourceBergen and Cardinal Health – previously agreed to a $26 billion global settlement on opioid cases. 

J&J said Tuesday the $150 million it agreed to pay in the Native American case has been deducted from what it owes in the global settlement. 

“This settlement is not an admission of any liability or wrongdoing and the company will continue to defend against any litigation that the final agreement does not resolve,” the company said.

It was unclear if the other companies would take their portion under the latest agreement from the global settlement. 

‘Measure of justice’ 

Robins Kaplan, a law firm negotiating on the behalf of the plaintiffs, said the agreement still must be approved by the Native American tribes. 

“This initial settlement for tribes in the national opioid litigation is a crucial first step in delivering some measure of justice to the tribes and reservation communities across the United States that have been ground zero for the opioid epidemic,” Tara Sutton, an attorney at the firm, said in a statement. 

Douglas Yankton, chairman of the North Dakota-based Spirit Lake Nation, said the money from the settlement would “help fund crucial, on-reservation, culturally appropriate opioid treatment services.” 

Steven Skikos, an attorney representing the tribes, told AFP they are pursuing claims against other drugmakers. 

“This is hopefully the first two of many other settlements,” he said. 

All tribes recognized by the U.S. government, 574 in all, will be able to participate in the agreement, even if they have not filed lawsuits. 

The settlement is separate from a prior agreement that resulted in $75 million in payments to the Cherokee Nation from three distribution companies, including McKesson. 

Many of the lawsuits regarding the opioid crisis have centered on Purdue Pharma, the manufacturer of OxyContin, a highly addictive prescription painkiller blamed for causing a spike in addiction. 

A judge in December overturned the company’s bankruptcy plan because it provided some immunity for the owners of the company in exchange for a $4.5 billion payout to victims of the opioid crisis. 

The litigation wave also has swamped pharmacies owned by Walmart, Walgreens and CVS, which a jury found in November bear responsibility for the opioid crisis in two counties in Ohio. 

 
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Out of Office, Trump Still the Center of Attention, Investigations

Posted on by SeeUS

Former U.S. President Donald Trump left office more than a year ago, but his conduct in the waning weeks of his presidency as he tirelessly sought to remain in power and his reported role in the riot at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, remain a focal point of the American political scene and multiple investigations. 

Trump, with a wide base of Republican voter support, is teasing another run for the presidency in 2024 after losing in 2020 to Democrat Joe Biden, now the 46th U.S. president. Both men are in their 70s, but an electoral rematch in two years is possible. 

Trump is already assailing Biden’s performance during his first year in office, while Biden and his aides attack Trump, zeroing in on his baseless claims that he was cheated out of a second term by electoral fraud. 

But for the moment, the focus is not on 2024 or the nationwide congressional elections coming up in nine months. The current focus is on how the Trump presidency ended. 

Special grand jury 

A prosecutor in the southern city of Atlanta, Georgia, has convened a special grand jury to investigate Trump’s phone call to the top Georgia election official, Brad Raffensperger, in early 2021 asking him to “find” enough votes to overturn his loss in the state.

“So, look. All I want to do is this,” Trump said in a recording of the call to Raffensperger. “I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state.”

Meanwhile, several U.S. news outlets reported Tuesday that aides to Trump drafted orders, which apparently were never issued, calling on the Defense and Homeland Security departments to seize voting machines in key political battleground states in hopes of proving electoral fraud.

Trump lost one court challenge after another in states that Biden won. William Barr, Trump’s former attorney general, declared that federal investigators had not found evidence of fraud that would have changed the election outcome.

Undaunted, Trump turned his attention to the congressional certification of the Electoral College vote on January 6, 2021, imploring then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject the Biden electors from several key battleground states that the Democrat had won.

Shortly before Congress convened that day, Trump staged a rally near the White House in front of several thousand of his supporters, urging them to “fight like hell” to block certification of Biden’s win.

Hundreds of Trump supporters stormed into the U.S. Capitol, smashing windows and doors, ransacking offices and scuffling with police, injuring 140 of them. Five people died that day or in the immediate aftermath, with one Trump protester shot dead by a police officer. 

To this point, 768 people have been charged with criminal offenses during the chaotic melee at the Capitol, many with minor trespassing charges but some with assaulting police. A total of 178 have pleaded guilty, with many receiving a sentence of a few weeks in jail, although some facing assault charges have been sentenced to more than four years. The rest of the cases remain unresolved as investigators pore through vast video footage of the mayhem to identify the rioters. 

Congressional investigation 

A select committee in the House of Representatives — seven Democrats and two vocal anti-Trump Republicans — has been investigating the events leading up to the January 6 riot, interviewing more than 300 witnesses, including Marc Short, Pence’s chief of staff. 

Other key witnesses, including Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows, have refused to testify, but the committee expects to reach conclusions by midyear about how the riot unfolded, Trump’s role in fomenting it and why for three hours he declined to call off his supporters from the ensuing riot. 

Trump has belittled the investigation, issuing a statement saying, “The January 6th Unselect Committee composed of Radical Left Democrats and a few horrible RINO Republicans is looking to hold people in criminal contempt for things relative to the Protest, when in fact they should hold themselves in criminal contempt for cheating in the Election.”

Trump’s RINO reference — Republicans in Name Only — derisively referenced the two Republicans on the committee: Congresswoman Liz Cheney and Congressman Adam Kinzinger. 

This past weekend at a political rally in Texas, Trump spoke up for the rioters arrested at the Capitol, saying, “So many people have been asking me about it. If I run and if I win, we will treat those people from January 6 fairly. And if it requires pardons, we will give them pardons because they are being treated so unfairly.” 

But Trump faced immediate blowback for his pardon suggestion, drawing a rebuke from Cheney and other Republicans. 

“Trump uses language he knows caused the Jan 6 violence; suggests he’d pardon the Jan 6 defendants, some of whom have been charged with seditious conspiracy; threatens prosecutors; and admits he was attempting to overturn the election,” Cheney said on Twitter. “He’d do it all again if given the chance.” 

 

A close political ally of Trump’s, Republican Senator Lindsay Graham, rejected pardons as “inappropriate.” Graham told CBS News’ “Face the Nation” show, “I don’t want to send any signal that it was OK to defile the Capitol. There are other groups with causes that may want to go down the violent path if these people get pardoned.” 

White House press secretary Jen Psaki also assailed Trump, saying, “You know, his remarks this weekend, he defended the actions of his supporters who stormed the Capitol and brutally attacked the law enforcement officers protecting it. 

“I think it’s important to shout that out and call that out. He even attacked his own vice president for not, in his words, having ‘overturned the election.’ And it’s just a reminder of how unfit he is for office,” Psaki said. 

 
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US Lightning Bolt Leaps Into Record Books at 768 Kilometers Long

Posted on by SeeUS

A single lightning bolt that leapt across three U.S. states has been identified as the longest ever, the U.N. weather agency said Tuesday. Dubbed a megaflash, the rare low-rate horizontal discharge covered 768 kilometers (477 miles) between clouds in Texas and Mississippi in April 2020.

It was detected by scientists using satellite technology and its distance – beating the previous record by 60 kilometer – confirmed by a World Meteorological Organization committee.

“That trip by air[plane] would take a couple of hours and in this case the distance was covered in a matter of seconds,” WMO spokesperson Clare Nullis said.

Another megaflash that occurred above Uruguay and Argentina in June 2020 also set a record, as the longest-lasting at 17.1 seconds, the WMO said.

While these two newly cataloged megaflashes never touched the ground, they serve as a reminder of the dangers of a weather phenomenon that kill hundreds of people a year.

“We reiterate our message: when thunder roars, when you see lightning — go indoors. Don’t seek shelter in a beach hut, don’t stand under a tree,” Nullis said. 
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West Africa’s ECOWAS Condemns ‘Attempted Coup’ in Guinea-Bissau

Posted on by SeeAF

Regional bloc ECOWAS has condemned what it calls an “attempted coup” in the West African state of Guinea-Bissau, where heavy gunfire was heard near the seat of government Tuesday.

President Umaro Cissoko Embalo, a former army general, was reportedly holding a cabinet meeting in the government palace when the shooting broke out. 

Sources in the capital, Bissau, say heavily-armed men had surrounded the building. 

Reuters reports an “unknown number” of people were injured and that two were killed. 

If confirmed, this would be the second coup in West Africa in just over a week. Burkina Faso’s president, Roch Kabore, was overthrown by the military on January 23.Army officers also seized power in Guinea and Mali last year. 

Embalo was declared the winner of the 2020 elections, but the results have been contested by his opponent, Domingos Simoes Pereira.

Embalo started to form a new government with the support of the military even while a supreme court challenge to the election was ongoing. 

At the United Nations, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the world body does not know details of the events in Guinea-Bissau but added that “coups are totally unacceptable.” 

He said, “We are seeing a terrible multiplication of coups, and our strong appeal is for soldiers to go back to the barracks and for the constitutional order to be fully in place in the democratic context of today’s Guinea-Bissau.” 

The country of 1.5 million gained independence from Portugal in 1974 and has experienced four coups and more than 12 coup attempts since. 

Some information in this report comes from Reuters and The Associated Press. 

 
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Nigerian Authorities Respond To Killings North of the Country

Posted on by SeeAF

Nigerian authorities have sent security reinforcements to areas in three states where armed groups killed scores of people over the weekend. Nigerian police say the gangs targeted civilians and security personnel in Nigeria’s northwest and central states of Niger, Katsina and Kaduna. Security analysts say the attacks underscore authorities’ failure to stem violence in the regions.

The attacks last weekend were some of the deadliest seen in northern Nigeria over the past year.

Authorities said the gangs, referred to locally as bandits, killed 12 people in Katsina, 11 in Niger, and 11 in Kaduna states. Some of the victims were burned alive as the attackers rained terror on communities, razing down houses.

Niger state authorities say fatalities included security personnel who were killed when gunmen overran a security base in the Shiroro local government area.

Commissioner of police Monday Bala-Kuryas says authorities are responding to the attacks.  

“We have beefed up security in that place. And what we’re doing also…areas that are closer (to the affected area) where we suspect bandits are there, we have also mobilized officers to those places and we’re monitoring,” said the Niger state police commissioner.

Authorities have also deployed heavily armed security reinforcements to the affected areas in Kaduna and Katsina states.

Authorities have not announced any arrests in connection with the attacks.

On Tuesday, Katsina State police spokesperson, Gambo Isah, said an undetermined number of people were also kidnapped in a separate attack in the state.

Security analyst Kabiru Adamu says security threats will persist unless government’s forces dislodge forest hideouts known where the gangs usually take cover.

“They need to dominate it and by dominating it I mean, to take over those forests so that these bandits don’t have space to operate in any longer. Any effort that is done and those forests are [still] left unoccupied, it means these bandits will still come through them especially in this instance where these gunmen are able to move across borders,” Adamu expressed.

But the lingering security problems have been stretching Nigeria’s internal security architecture.

Late last year Nigeria designated the groups as terrorist organizations. Experts say in theory, the designation gives security forces more fighting power and makes punishment against offenders more defined.

But security analyst Ebenezer Oyetakin says corruption is preventing authorities from making much progress. 

“Our security forces, our security intelligence should get their acts together. We have compromised elements in our security system, in the financial system and in the society,” he noted.

Last month, some 200 people were killed and about 10,000 displaced after armed gangs launched a reprisal in northwestern Nigerian state of Zamfara following military air raids on their hideouts. 
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US Inspector Questions Top Ghani Aide on Corruption, Collapse of Afghan Government

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A former senior Afghan official says he has answered questions in a U.S. inquiry into allegations that former Afghan President Ashraf Ghani took $150 million in cash with him when he abruptly left Kabul last year as the Taliban took control.

Hamdullah Mohib, who served as Ghani’s national security adviser, says he voluntarily met with John Sopko, Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR), in December at his office in Arlington, Virginia, to answer questions about corruption in the U.S.-backed Afghan government.  

“I also gave [SIGAR] my bank accounts and details of all my assets,” said Mohib, who left Afghanistan in the same plane with Ghani and stayed with him in Abu Dhabi for a while. He told VOA that he would continue to cooperate with SIGAR investigations.  

The U.S. was the largest donor to the Afghan government until it collapsed, and SIGAR has been tasked by Congress to investigate allegations that Ghani took millions in cash as he fled Afghanistan last August.  

“The fact that we’re looking at those allegations doesn’t mean that they’re true or not,” Sopko said at an Atlantic Council event last week.  

In addition to the cash flight allegations, which were first reported by the Russian Embassy in Kabul, Sopko said his investigators were looking into several related issues. “Why did the government of Afghanistan fall so quickly? Why did the military collapse so quickly? What happened? All the weapons? What happened to all the money that we were sending right up to the end — money, fuel, things like that.”  

SIGAR is expected to find answers to these questions and present a classified report to Congress in March or April this year. There will also be a public report which will be released later, Sopko said.

Ghani not interviewed  

Fazel Fazly, another close aide to Ghani who fled with him in the same convoy and now lives in Sweden, told VOA the former Afghan president has not yet been interviewed by SIGAR. “I’ve been in touch with the president,” said Fazly, adding that he also had not yet received inquiries from SIGAR.

In a video message released three days after he left Afghanistan, Ghani strongly rejected the reports that he took cash with him, and later called on the United Nations to launch an independent investigation into the matter.

Like Mohib, Fazly said he is willing to cooperate with SIGAR to prove he was not involved in any corruption, while at the same time admitting corruption infested all layers of the former Afghan government.  

“It’s insane to say there was no corruption,” Fazly said. “We expect SIGAR to do objective, comprehensive and meaningful investigations to uncover the truth about corruption in Afghanistan.”

Mohib and Fazley, widely reported to be closer to Ghani than any other Afghan officials, both said allegations that Ghani fled with sacks of dollars were aimed at maligning the former Afghan president as a corrupt U.S. ally. 

“Moscow’s relations with President Ghani were terrible and even some Central Asian leaders called him a Western imperialist,” Fazley said.  

The Cash 

Fazly and Mohib both said they were unaware ofthe existence of large volumes of cash in the Afghan Presidential Palace.  

While Ghani’s predecessor, Hamid Karzai, confirmed that his office received bags of cash from the CIA and from the Iran government, Ghani said on multiple occasions that his office never received cash from the CIA or any other intelligence agency. 

Ghani claims he had transferred his executive authority over state funds to a government committee and had no power over U.S. and NATO contracting processes for Afghan military funding, according to Mohib.  

Others say the president did not need to personally receive the assistance funds in order to make use of them. 

“There was money in the Afghanistan Bank,” said Sayed Ikram Afzali, director of a local corruption watchdog Integrity Watch Afghanistan.  

The Afghanistan Bank building — headquarters of the state-run central bank — is adjacent to the Presidential Palace compound in central Kabul where all funds, liquidities and highly valuable items were stored. 

“Moving cash from the central bank to the palace was not a hard thing to do, especially when the governor of the bank was a Ghani henchman,” said Afzali, adding that Ghani had kept Ajmal Ahmady, a U.S. citizen, as governor of the central bank even after his nomination to the post was repeatedly rejected by parliament.

Ahmady, now a senior fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School who leads a study group entitled “Afghanistan—What Happened & How to Engage the Taliban,” did not respond to an email inquiry.

“Corruption in Afghanistan did not take place only for one day, and we must not be solely fixated on what happened on August 15. Large amounts of money were taken out of Afghanistan for so many years and those involved in high-level corruption were not waiting until the last day of the republic to move physical currency out of the country,” Afzali said. 

Accountability  

From 2001 to the end of 2021, the U.S. spent more than $2 trillion on the Afghan war, including some $140 billion spent on development projects, according to the Costs of War project at Brown University’s Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs.

At least $15.5 billion of the U.S. development funds went to “waste, fraud and abuse,” SIGAR’s investigations have found.

“Systemic corruption perpetuated an implosion of the system in Afghanistan,” conceded Hamdullah Mohib.  

Like others, Mohib said he was concerned that “truly corrupt” individuals who enriched themselves through the U.S.-bankrolled funding and contracting systems in Afghanistan now roam free in different parts of the world.   

Since the fall of the Afghan government, tens of thousands of Afghans, among them former government officials and contractors, have sought refuge outside Afghanistan. 

There are now growing calls, even by officials of the former Afghan government, for some sort of accountability by their own former colleagues.  

“[Former government officials] must be held accountable and tried,” Naseer Ahmad Faiq, chargé d’affaires of Afghanistan’s mission at the United Nations, told a Security Council meeting last week. “It is not fair that 38 million people [in Afghanistan] are starving and mothers sell their children to survive but these corrupt former government officials live in luxurious houses and villas in different countries in Europe and the U.S.”

SIGAR’s investigations have led to criminal charges and trials of some individuals and companies, both U.S. and Afghan, in U.S. federal courts. It’s unclear whether SIGAR would press criminal charges against former Afghan officials, who were previously commended as U.S. partners, if found guilty of fraud and corruption.  

“We’re looking at more people than President Ghani about taking money out of the country at the end,” John Sopko said in response to a VOA question.
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Ten Killed as Rival Clans Clash in Central Somalia

Posted on by SeeAF

At least 10 people were killed and 15 were wounded when rival clan militias clashed in central Somalia, residents and community elders said Tuesday.

The battle broke out in the neighborhoods of the Balanbal district in the Galgaduud region. Both sides used rocket-propelled grenades, anti-aircraft guns and assault rifles, witnesses and officials said.

What sparked the battle between the Ayr and Marehan clans remains unclear, but the two rival groups have had a history of repeated disputes about pasture rights, water wells and other clan disagreements.

“We call for the cessation of hostility. It is unfortunate that two brotherly clans fight over trivial matters, while their families are suffering from a severe drought,” said Mo’alim Sugaal Guuled, a respected religious scholar in the region.

The clashes come at a time when escalating drought in Somalia is creating a massive displacement crisis.

Somali authorities and international aid agencies say 245,000 people have already fled their homes, with numbers projected to reach up to 1.4 million if the drought continues. 

Meanwhile, a military court in the central Somali town of Galkayo handed down death sentences Tuesday for five al-Shabab militants accused of killing several people.

Two other defendants were sentenced to life in prison. 

The defendants, all between the ages of 18 and 21, appeared in the military court in prisoners’ uniforms. Some of them looked shocked and confused, according to witnesses at the court hearing.

At the court, before the sentence were announced, one of the defendants shouted, “We are innocent, and we were framed up!”

“After court proceedings, including hearings and the presentation of evidence, the court sentences these men to death and jail terms,” said the court verdict. “The defendants were responsible for the killing of 10 people, among them two members of parliament and three senior military officers.” 

The defendants have 30 days to appeal the verdicts.

Al-Shabab’s insurgency aims to drive out African Union peacekeepers, topple Somalia’s Western-backed government, and impose its strict version of Islam on the Horn of Africa state.

Abdiwahid Mo’alim Isaq contributed to this report.

 
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Several Black Colleges Receive Bomb Threats for Second Day

Posted on by SeeUS

Several historically Black colleges and universities, known as HBCUs, received a second round of bomb threats Tuesday following similar threats on Monday.

Among those receiving threats Tuesday were Howard University and the University of the District of Columbia in Washington; Edward Waters University in Jacksonville, Florida; Kentucky State University in Frankfort, Kentucky; Fort Valley State in Fort Valley, Georgia; Xavier University in New Orleans, Louisiana; Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia; and Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland.

The threats again resulted in canceled classes and shelter-in-place orders.

There have been no explosions and no word of any bombs found.

The FBI took note of Monday’s threats that prompted lockdowns and investigations by law enforcement.

“The FBI is aware of the series of bomb threats around the country, and we are working with our law enforcement partners to address any potential threats. As always, we would like to remind members of the public that if they observe anything suspicious to report it to law enforcement immediately,” the FBI said in a statement.

On Monday, Howard University, Southern University and A&M College (Baton Rouge, Louisiana), Bethune-Cookman University (Daytona Beach, Florida), Bowie State University (Bowie, Maryland), Albany State University (Albany, Georgia) and Delaware State University (Dover, Delaware) confirmed the threats.

“Classes have been canceled, and students are to remain in their dorm rooms until an all-clear is issued. University operations will be suspended until further notice and campus entry will be limited at this time,” Southern University and A&M College said in an initial message on its website. The school later announced that it had received an all-clear and would resume classes and normal operations on Tuesday.

News reports say that at Howard, the scene “was cleared without any hazardous material found.” Bethune-Cookman, Bowie State, and Delaware State were also cleared.

A message on Albany State’s website said, “At this time, all campuses, classes, and university operations are canceled until further notice.” The announcement also said, “Once the investigation is complete, you will receive an all-clear message.”

This is the second spate of bomb threats in recent weeks against HBCUs. Several schools received threats in early January and were cleared.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press. 
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South Africa Luxury Housing Market Sees Boom in Demand

Posted on by SeeAF

South Africa’s luxury housing dealers say the market is booming despite the economic damage from the coronavirus pandemic. Real estate agents say the need to work from home and have better security are some of the drivers, while affordable housing for the poor remains a challenge. Linda Givetash reports from Johannesburg.
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Fear and Uncertainty in Ukraine Prompt Civilians to Prepare Arms

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For the last eight years, Ukraine has lived under a permanent state of alert, with the constant threat of Russian intervention in its territory. The fear and tension have led many civilians to seek military training to be prepared in the event of a conflict.  Jonathan Spier narrates this report for VOA from Ricardo Marquina in Kyiv.
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Ukrainian Civilians Train to Defend Their Country

Posted on by SeeEU

Since 2014, when Russia illegally annexed Crimea and fomented a separatist conflict in eastern Ukraine, Ukrainians have lived in a permanent state of alert, facing a constant threat of further Russian incursions. With a possibility of a full-scale invasion now looming, many civilians have volunteered to undergo military training to be prepared in the event of a conflict. They use equipment and weapons they buy with their own money and train in their spare time. For VOA, reporter Ricardo Marquina spent a day with them at a training site outside of Kyiv and brings us these images.
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US Senate Contemplates ‘Mother of All Sanctions’ if Russia Invades Ukraine

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A bipartisan effort in the U.S. Senate has come together to produce what the chairman of the body’s Foreign Relations Committee has dubbed “the mother of all sanctions” to be levied against Russia in the event of a new invasion of Ukraine. 

According to committee chairman Robert Menendez, senators are on the cusp of agreeing to a package of measures meant to make the financial cost of aggression in Ukraine extremely high for high-ranking government officials and ordinary Russians. 

The bill being considered, Menendez said in an interview Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” show, involves “massive sanctions against the most significant Russian banks, crippling to their economy, meaningful in terms of consequences to the average Russian in their accounts and pensions.” 

In addition, Menendez said he expects the Senate to approve additional “lethal assistance to Ukraine” in the form of weapons, as well as economic sanctions on key sectors of the Russian economy, and a bar on Russia’s ability to sell its sovereign debt in international markets. 

The Senate is considering taking action against Russia, because Moscow currently has well over 100,000 troops positioned along Ukraine’s northern, eastern and southern borders. In 2014, Russia invaded Crimea, a region of Ukraine, and took control of it. At the same time, it began providing support to a pro-Russian insurgency in Ukraine’s Donbass region, which has perpetuated a long, low-intensity conflict in that region for the past several years.

Bipartisan resolve 

Menendez was joined by Senator James Risch, the top-ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, in a show of bipartisan resolve. Risch said he is not convinced that Russia has decided it actually will invade Ukraine, and said that is why telegraphing the economic price Moscow will pay in advance is important. 

“Well, I don’t think that decision has been made yet,” Risch said. “There’s a lot of us that believe that if (Russian President Vladimir) Putin sees weakness, if he sees bumbling, ineptitude, if he sees indecision, he will take advantage of that. I don’t think he’s made a decision to do that yet.

“What (Senator Menendez) and I and our coalition of bipartisan senators are attempting to do is to project the resolve that we have as Americans to see that he doesn’t do that. To provide the strength, project the strength and convince him that this would be a very, very bad idea and it’s going to be extremely painful.” 

Russia well-positioned to resist 

Not all experts agree that the sanctions the U.S. is contemplating will be as punishing to Russia and to the Putin regime as lawmakers think. 

Kristine Berzina, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund of the United States, told VOA that Russia has been living with some degree of sanctions, as well as the threat of more sanctions, for most of the past decade and has taken steps to create an economic buffer. 

“Russia has tremendous currency reserves set up so that it can make good on its sovereign debt, and it can suffer through some economic hardships,” she said. 

To the extent that new sanctions cause short-term pain while Moscow figures out how best to work around them, she said that it’s during that early period under sanctions when Putin would benefit most from calls for patriotic sacrifice from the Russian people. 

“The short term really is also the moment in which Putin will have the most support from his people, because then the likelihood is that an attack would be portrayed as some kind of defensive measure against the ‘encirclement’ by NATO and the refusal to meet what they would consider reasonable demands to turn back history,” Berzina told VOA. 

Battle at U.N.

The preparation of sanctions took place as representatives from the U.S. and Russia clashed harshly in a meeting of the United Nations Security Council on Monday morning. The meeting was convened at the request of the U.S. in order to discuss what the U.S. and its NATO allies have described as threatening behavior by Russia toward Ukraine. 

Russian Ambassador Vasily Nebenzya, in remarks to the Security Council, accused the United States of “whipping up hysteria” about Russia’s intentions toward Ukraine. In the same remarks, he suggested that the U.S., with its increasingly strident warnings about Russia’s intentions, is actually “provoking escalation.” 

Russia was not alone in suggesting that the U.S. has overstated the danger of a Russian invasion. Even senior officials in Ukraine have asked representatives of the U.S. to tone down their warnings.

Over the weekend, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky urged Western governments to avoid causing panic within Ukraine, saying that the potential “destabilization of the situation” inside Ukraine is currently the greatest threat facing his country. 

In a statement released after the Security Council meeting ended, U.S. President Joe Biden said, “If Russia is sincere about addressing our respective security concerns through dialogue, the United States and our Allies and partners will continue to engage in good faith. If instead Russia chooses to walk away from diplomacy and attack Ukraine, Russia will bear the responsibility, and it will face swift and severe consequences.” 

 
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Pfizer Expected to Seek FDA Emergency Approval of its COVID-19 Vaccine for Young Children

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U.S.-based drugmaker Pfizer and its German-based partner BioNTech is expected to ask the Food and Drug Administration Tuesday to grant authorization of its COVID-19 vaccine for children under five years old.

The two companies will ask the FDA to grant emergency use authorization to administer a low dose of its two-shot vaccine to children starting at six months old, even though they announced back in December that the vaccine did not produce an immune response in children between the ages of 2 to 4 years old similar to that of teenagers and adults. The two companies had decided to add a third shot to their clinical trials, a move that could have set back efforts to make the vaccine available for younger Americans.

But health experts urged Pfizer and BioNTech to go ahead and make the request to the FDA for the two-shot regimen while they wait for results of tests involving the third shot. The vaccine could be available for use as soon as late February if both the FDA and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grant final emergency approval.

Meanwhile, another U.S.-based pharmaceutical company, Novavax, announced Monday that it had submitted a request to the FDA for approval of its long-delayed COVID-19 vaccine for emergency use.

The two-shot vaccine was developed by a conventional method that uses proteins to teach the body’s immune system how to recognize and block the coronavirus. Clinical trials revealed the vaccine was about 90 percent effective at providing enough immunity to protect against the initial version of the disease and its variants. Experts say that technology could appeal to people who are hesitant to be inoculated with vaccines developed by Pfizer or Moderna that use the more advanced messenger RNA technology.

Novavax received $1.6 billion from the U.S. government through Operation Warp Speed, the program created under the administration of former U.S. president Donald Trump to quickly develop new coronavirus vaccines, but faced numerous delays due to a lack of manufacturing capacity. The vaccine has already been authorized by Indonesia, South Korea, India and the European Medicines Agency, the drug regulator for the 27-nation European Union. It is expected to play an important role in boosting vaccine supplies for low and middle-income nations because it does not have to be stored at ultracold temperatures, unlike the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines.

A report released Tuesday by the World Health Organization reveals the coronavirus pandemic has created tens of thousands of tons of extra medical waste, such as used needles, syringes and vials. The report found that most of the 87,000 tons of personal protective equipment (PPE), such as masks and rubber gloves, that were procured through a United Nations emergency initiative between March 2020 and November 2021 has ended up as waste.

The WHO report says the discarded material puts health care workers at risk of work-related injuries such as needle sticks, burns and disease-causing germs. Communities near poorly managed landfills are also at risk of contaminated air and water from burning waste and disease-carrying pests. 

Some information for this report came from the Associated Press (Reuters, Agence France-Presse). 
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Blinken, Lavrov Set for Talks After US-Russia Showdown at UN

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The top diplomats from the United States and Russia are expected to speak by phone Tuesday, a day after United Nations representatives from the two countries faced off at the U.N. Security Council over Russian-denied allegations that it is planning a large-scale invasion of neighboring Ukraine. 

Tuesday’s diplomatic efforts to address the crisis also include a trip by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to Kyiv for talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy. 

“We urge Russia to step back and engage in dialogue to find a diplomatic resolution and avoid further bloodshed,” Johnson said in a statement. 

Britain, like the United States and other Western allies, has provided weapons to Ukraine, and Johnson is considering doubling British troops in the Baltic countries. 

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held face-to-face talks January 21 in Geneva, and since then the two sides have exchanged written responses in order to try to make their positions clear. 

Russia said a U.S. document failed to address its core security concerns, which include its opposition to further eastward expansion of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, especially to Ukraine. The United States, NATO and Ukraine have all deemed such a demand an unacceptable restriction on their ability to decide their own affairs. 

The United States received a Russian response letter Monday, but State Department officials declined to discuss its contents, citing a desire to keep the negotiation process private. 

The United States has threatened to impose sharp economic sanctions if Russia invades Ukraine. In 2014, Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, and it says it has no plans to invade Ukraine again.  

“The situation we’re facing in Europe is urgent and dangerous, and the stakes for Ukraine — and for every U.N. member state — could not be higher,” U.S. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield told Security Council members Monday. 

She said the more than 100,000 troops Russia has amassed along Ukraine’s border include combat forces and special forces prepared to conduct offensive actions into the former Soviet republic.     

“This is the largest — this is the largest — hear me clearly — mobilization of troops in Europe in decades,” Thomas-Greenfield said. “And as we speak, Russia is sending even more forces and arms to join them.”

She said that included the nearly 5,000 Russian troops “with short-range ballistic missiles, special forces and anti-aircraft batteries” that Moscow had moved into its close ally and neighbor Belarus. There is evidence Moscow plans to increase their number to 30,000 troops by early February, she added.     

The U.S. ambassador said Russia’s aggression threatens Ukraine, Europe and the international order.     

“An order that, if it stands for anything, stands for the principle that one country cannot simply redraw another country’s borders by force or make another country’s people live under a government they did not choose,” she said.     

As Thomas-Greenfield spoke, President Joe Biden issued a statement from the White House.  

“If Russia is sincere about addressing our respective security concerns through dialogue, the United States and our allies and partners will continue to engage in good faith,” Biden said. “If instead, Russia chooses to walk away from diplomacy and attack Ukraine, Russia will bear the responsibility, and it will face swift and severe consequences.”      

He later told reporters in the Oval Office while meeting with Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, that the United States is ready for any scenario in Russia, but, he added, “We continue to urge diplomacy as the best way forward.”        

Russian response    

At the Security Council, Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia tried to use a procedural vote to block Monday’s public meeting but narrowly failed to get the requisite support.     

He said Russia is not “scared” of discussing the issue, but it just did not understand why a discussion was necessary.  

“The deployment of Russian troops within our own territory has frequently occurred on varying scales before and has not caused any hysterics whatsoever,” Nebenzia said.

He said that the United States and Western colleagues were acting as though an invasion had already taken place, and that they presented no evidence that one was planned.     

“Our Western colleagues are talking about the need for de-escalation, but first and foremost, they are whipping up tensions, rhetoric and provoking escalation,” he said, calling the discussions about a threat of war “provocative.”   

All Russian officials have “categorically rejected” plans for an invasion, he said, and anyone who claims the opposite is “misleading you.”      

Sovereign rights   

Based on its past experiences with Moscow, Ukraine simply cannot accept Russia’s declaration, and Moscow should withdraw its troops from near its borders, Ukrainian envoy Sergiy Kyslytsya told the council.  

“Ukraine strongly rejects any attempt to use the threat of force as an instrument of pressure to make Ukraine and our partners accept illegitimate demands. There is no room for compromise on principle issues,” Kyslytsya said. “The most principled position for Ukraine is that we have (an) inherent sovereign right to choose our own security arrangements, including treaties of alliance which cannot be questioned by Russia.”   

He emphasized that Kyiv is prepared to defend itself but supports keeping diplomatic channels with Moscow open. He noted that Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said he is willing to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.  

“If Russia has any questions to Ukraine, it is better to meet and talk, not to bring troops to Ukraine’s borders and intimidate Ukrainian people,” the envoy said.     

After the meeting, in response to reporters’ questions, Kyslytsya said he believes a Russian invasion is “imminent.” Asked what he meant by “imminent,” he referenced an English-Russian dictionary of diplomacy, reading in Russian.     

“Imminent, the first meaning, published in Moscow: approaching, hanging over and only then unavoidable,” he said, translating for reporters. “So, we have to work very hard so that the first two stay as it is — the threat is hanging over. It’s our duty.”   

Intensifying crisis    

U.S. Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told reporters Monday that “we continue to see, even over the course of the weekend … additional Russian ground forces move in Belarus and around the border with Ukraine,” as well as “increasing naval activity in the Mediterranean and Atlantic by Russian fleet vessels.” He called the Russian movements “concerning.”  

NATO has increased its military presence in member countries bordering Russia, but NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Sunday that NATO has no intention of sending troops to Ukraine if Russia invades the former Soviet republic.       

VOA Pentagon Correspondent Carla Babb and VOA’s Chris Hannas contributed to this report. Some information for this report came from Reuters. 
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US Talks Tough as Russian Troops Mass Near Ukraine

Posted on by SeeUS

Will Russia invade Ukraine? While the world waits, the war of words is picking up steam, with top diplomats from the U.S. and Russia going head-to-head at the United Nations and President Joe Biden vowing that the U.S. is ready “no matter what happens.” VOA White House correspondent Anita Powell reports from Washington.
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