Activists warn a deal between Tunisia and Libya to share responsibility for hundreds of sub-Saharan African migrants once stranded on their shared border risks migrants’ rights and doesn’t solve the core problem. It also raises fresh concerns about Tunisia, where Black migrants have faced a surge of racist attacks. For VOA, Lisa Bryant reports from Tunis, Tunisia.
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Month: August 2023
Maui Confronts Challenge of Finding Hundreds of Missing People
Two weeks after the deadliest U.S. wildfire in more than a century swept through the Maui community of Lahaina, authorities say anywhere between 500 and 1,000 people remain unaccounted for — a staggering number for officials facing huge challenges to determine how many of those perished and how many may have made it to safety but haven’t checked in.
Something similar happened after a wildfire in 2018 that killed 85 people and destroyed the town of Paradise, California. Authorities in Butte County, home to Paradise, ultimately published a list of the missing in the local newspaper, a decision that helped identify scores of people who had made it out alive but were listed as missing. Within a month, the list dropped from 1,300 names to only a dozen.
Hawaii officials have expressed concern that by releasing a list of the missing, they would also be identifying some people who have died. In an email Tuesday, the State Joint Information Center called it “a standard held by all law enforcement and first responders here in Hawaii, out of compassion and courtesy for the families, to withhold the names until the families can be contacted.”
As of Monday, there were 115 people confirmed dead, according to Maui police. All single-story, residential properties in the disaster area had been searched, and teams were beginning to search multistory residential and commercial properties, Maui County officials said in an update late Monday.
There are widely varying accounts of the tally of the missing. Hawaii Governor Josh Green said Sunday that more than 1,000 remained unaccounted for. Maui Mayor Richard Bissen said in a recorded video on Instagram that the number was 850. And during President Joe Biden’s tour of the devastation on Monday, White House homeland security adviser Liz Sherwood-Randall put it between 500 and 800.
An unofficial, crowd-sourced spreadsheet of missing people posted online listed nearly 700 names as of Tuesday.
State Senator Gilbert Keith-Agaran, representing central Maui, said he’s not aware of any rules that prevent officials from making the list public. But as someone with several members of his extended family still unaccounted for, he understands why some may not want the list released.
“I’m not going to second-guess the approach by the mayor and his people right now,” he said.
Questions are also emerging about how quickly the names of the dead are being publicly released, even after family members have been notified. Maui residents are growing increasingly frustrated as the search for their loved ones drags on.
The Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported Tuesday that the Maui Police Department has instructed the medical examiner in Honolulu — where some burn patients were taken for treatment — not to release the names of anyone who dies from injuries sustained in Lahaina fire. The request came after one severely burned patient died and the man’s name appeared in media reports after notification of his next of kin.
“I don’t know why they aren’t releasing the names,” Honolulu Department of the Medical Examiner Supervising Investigator Theresa Reynolds told the newspaper.
Clifford Abihai said he feels like he’s getting the run-around from authorities. He came to Maui from California to try to find answers about his grandmother, Louise Abihai, 98. He has been just as frustrated on the ground in Maui.
“I just want confirmation,” he said last week. “Not knowing what happened, not knowing if she escaped, not knowing if she’s not there. That’s the hard thing.”
As of Tuesday, he said he had learned nothing further.
His grandmother lived at Hale Mahaolu Eono, a senior living facility where another member of his extended family, Virginia Dofa, lived. Authorities have identified Dofa as among the dead. Abihai described Dofa and Louise Abihai as best friends.
He said his grandmother was mobile and could walk a mile a day, but it was often hard to reach her because she’d frequently turn off her cellphone to save battery power.
Confirming whether those who are unaccounted for are deceased can be difficult. Fire experts say it’s possible some bodies were cremated in the Lahaina fire, potentially leaving no bones to identify through DNA tests.
The situation on Maui is evolving, but those who lived through similar tragedies and never learned of their loved ones’ fate are also following the news and hurt for the victims and their families.
Nearly 22 years later, almost 1,100 victims of the 9/11 terror attacks, which killed nearly 3,000, have no identified remains.
Joseph Giaccone’s family initially was desperate for any physical trace of the 43-year-old finance executive, who worked in the World Trade Center’s North Tower, brother James Giaccone recalled. But over time, he started focusing instead on memories of the flourishing man his brother was.
“So I am OK with the way it is right now,” he said.
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Aviation Professionals Convene in Kenya to Improve African Airlines’ Security, Safety
Aviation experts are meeting in Kenya this week to examine methods to improve security and safety for Africa’s airlines and airports.
Beyond those topics, the eighth meeting of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) will also involve discussions on air transport facilitation and sustainability in Africa.
The principal secretary for Kenya’s department of transport, Mohamed Daghar, told the conference that Kenyan airports now have technology for security measures that make travel for passengers both safe and smooth.
“We now have in place the prerequisite infrastructure and capabilities to fully participate in ICAO’s public key directory, the advanced passenger information and the passenger name record,” Daghar said. “This will see Kenya join the global community in making the passenger journey seamless.”
ICAO President Salvatore Sciacchitano said Africa must prepare for increased air traffic in the coming months, hence the need to improve the safety of airports and passengers.
“It’s important to acknowledge that states are more prosperous when they are better connected and that nothing can connect Africa as efficiently and as reliably as air transport,” Sciacchitano said.
He added that the industry is still recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic but that global traffic is expected to reach 2019 levels by the end of the year.
“The prospect for Africa in this respect is remarkable,” Sciacchitano said.
Africa’s air transport sector was hit hard by the global pandemic, which led to lockdowns and countries issuing strict health measures to combat the infection. Aviation experts say the measures taken to subdue COVID-19 have made it difficult for the airlines and people to move freely, leading to a loss of income.
Even as air traffic picks up, experts say security risks have evolved, and now airlines face threats from insiders, terrorism, human trafficking, inadequately documented passengers and contraband smuggling.
The Transportation Security Administration, a U.S. government agency, invested in Kenya’s international airport to improve security and train staff, increasing the effectiveness of passenger screenings.
The agency’s administrator, David Pekoske, told the aviation conference to work together to deal with security threats.
“Over the next few days, I encourage all of us to not only listen to the best practices and effectiveness that can be sustained but ultimately to collaborate on enhancing the effectiveness of the global civil aviation system,” Pekoske said. “Success’s mission is directly dependent on the cooperation between a myriad of partners. I believe it’s people, partnership and technology that make a difference.”
More than 300 delegates from international and African civil aviation agencies are attending the conference in Nairobi, which ends Friday.
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US Enforces Visa Restrictions on Chinese Officials Over Tibet Policies
The United States is announcing new visa restrictions on current and former Chinese officials for their involvement in what U.S. and U.N. officials say is the forcible assimilation of more than one million Tibetan children in government-run boarding schools.
In a statement on Tuesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said these “coercive policies” seek to “eliminate Tibet’s distinct linguistic, cultural, and religious traditions among younger generations of Tibetans.”
“We urge PRC (People’s Republic of China) authorities to end the coercion of Tibetan children into government-run boarding schools and to cease repressive assimilation policies, both in Tibet and throughout other parts of the PRC,” said Blinken.
Visa restrictions under the authority of Section 212(a)(3)(C) of the Immigration and Nationality Act means foreign nationals may not be granted a visa to enter the U.S. due to potentially significant adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.
A State Department spokesperson declined to provide names of officials from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) who are subject to the visa ban, citing “individual visa records are confidential.”
The spokesperson told VOA today’s announcement on visa restrictions covers current or former PRC and CCP officials believed to be responsible for, or complicit in, policies or actions aimed at repressing religious and spiritual practitioners, members of ethnic groups, dissidents, human rights defenders, journalists, labor organizers, civil society organizers, and peaceful protestors in the PRC.
China has maintained control over Tibet since 1951, following the takeover through troop deployment in what it said a “peaceful liberation.”
Chinese officials have said their policies in Tibet reflect their desire to create “religious harmony, social harmony, and ethnic harmony.”
Tibetans who live outside of China say the government has been systematically persecuting, imprisoning and killing Tibetans for decades.
“China’s unconscionable separation of Tibetan children from their families cannot be left unchecked. It shows the depths of Beijing’s plan to eliminate the Tibetan way of life and turn Tibetans into loyal followers of the CCP,” said Tencho Gyatso who is President of International Campaign for Tibet.
VOA has requested the Chinese Embassy in Washington for comment but has not received a response.
In February, United Nations human rights experts said they were “very disturbed” that in recent years the residential school system for Tibetan children appears to act as “a mandatory large-scale program intended to assimilate Tibetans into majority Han culture,” contrary to international human rights standards.
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Advocates Hope Spain’s World Cup Win Might Help Fight Sexism
In a gloomy, indoor football camp on an industrial estate on the edge of Barcelona, Marta dives into tackles with the boys without fear.
The 11-year-old has been playing with teenagers who are older — and stronger — than herself for months, but so far has held her own.
Her newfound passion for football meant she watched as Spain beat England 1-0 Sunday and carry away the FIFA Women’s World Cup in Sydney, Australia.
The victory for the Spanish women’s team will have knock-on effects for the next generation of Martas who may dream of sharing the glory, said Sara Otero, Marta’s mother.
“I think it will raise visibility of football in Spain for women. I don’t think Spain is an especially sexist country but for girls and women, football has never been a very accessible sport. Maybe they thought there was too much contact or it was dangerous,” Otero, 52, a businesswoman, told VOA. “But now there has been much more effort to make football accessible to everyone, which I think is good.”
Events after the final whistle at the World Cup final perhaps proved there is still much work to be done off the pitch.
Controversial kiss
After the celebrations, attention in Spain turned to a row over alleged sexism after Luis Rubiales, the president of the Spanish Football Federation kissed female player Jenni Hermoso on the lips during the cup presentation.
Hermoso was later recorded in the dressing room saying she “did not like it,” Reuters reported, but she later played down the incident in a statement to EFE news agency.
At first, Rubiales said he was just celebrating the victory and derided critics as “idiots” for making so much of it. He later apologized, Reuters reported.
The football chief came under fire from Spain’s acting equality minister Irene Montero, who tweeted, “A non-consensual kiss is a kind of sex violence we suffer all women daily, which was until now invisible, and which we cannot normalize. Consent should be at the center.”
El Pais, a left-wing Madrid newspaper, said Monday in an editorial, “Jenni did not like the kiss, and we didn’t either,” and described it as an “intrusion, an invasion of privacy, an aggression.”
League still young
Women’s football in Spain, as in many other countries, is still in its infancy.
The professional league was only set up last season and there are 90,000 registered players which include women and girls, said Maria Rodrigo, a spokeswoman for La Liga Feminine in Spain told VOA.
Professionals in La Liga are paid on average about $65,000 per year while the elite players can expect around $98,000. It is far cry from the astronomic salaries commanded by the likes of Lionel Messi, the Argentina and Inter Miami striker.
Maria Tikas, a journalist who covers football for Sport, one of Spain’s biggest daily sport newspapers, said Rubiales’ kiss for Hermoso showed Spain still had a problem of sexism to address.
“This is a society which has a problem of inherent machoism which is only going to go away through education, cultural changes, politics and legal means. In football this is worse because it has been the territory of men for so, so, long,” she told VOA.
Hope for change
But she believes that the victory of La Roja — the name given to the Spain team — may help change things.
For one thing, there are now role models.
“Many of the players in the (Spanish) team today did not have references (to famous female players). Now when a girl sees Alexia (Putellas, of Spain and Barcelona) win the World Cup they see that could be Alexia too. They see how it could be possible for them.”
Dolors Ribalta Alcalde, an expert on female football at the University Ramon Llull in Barcelona who played for FC Espanyol, a team in the second Spanish league, said Spain’s triumph did not happen by “magic.”
“This has happened firstly because of social changes. With parents seeing it as a positive thing for their daughters to play football instead of discouraging them. Girls have started to see football as something positive,” she said.
Back at the football camp where Marta plays, there are plenty of photographs of star male players like Messi.
But even though girls’ teams play there every week, there are no pictures – yet – of the Spanish women’s team.
Many female players and their fans hope that will change soon.
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Malian Junta Cracks Down on Critics
The recent arrest and conviction of a Malian TikTok influencer and other critics of Mali’s military government have raised concerns among human rights activists about what they say is a crackdown on the government’s political opponents and the suppression of press freedoms since the junta took power. A VOA reporter talked to human rights workers in Mali’s capital, Bamako, who say the trend is worrying and likely to continue under military rule across the Sahel.
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First Defendants Surrender in Georgia 2020 Election Interference Case
The first of the 18 co-defendants of former U.S. President Donald Trump facing 2020 election interference and racketeering charges in the southern state of Georgia are starting to turn themselves in to be arrested and booked.
John Eastman, a former Trump lawyer who pushed a plan to have then-Vice President Mike Pence attempt to block congressional certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory over Trump, surrendered Tuesday to Fulton County authorities in the Georgia state capital city, Atlanta. Another defendant, Scott Hall, a bail bondsman who was a Republican poll watcher in Georgia, also turned himself in.
Eastman faces nine charges that could, if he is convicted, land him in prison for years. On Monday, he reached a $100,000 bond agreement to be released pending trial.
Eastman was adamant in his intention to fight the allegations brought by Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis.
“I am here today to surrender to an indictment that should never have been brought,” Eastman said in a statement. “It represents a crossing of the Rubicon for our country, implicating the fundamental First Amendment right to petition the government for redress of grievances.”
In a separate election interference case filed against Trump alone in Washington by Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith, Eastman has been identified as one of Trump’s six unnamed co-conspirators in trying to upend the 2020 election outcome so Trump could stay in power.
But Eastman lawyer Harvey Silverglate has said his client has no intention of plea bargaining with either federal or state prosecutors to lessen the threat to his freedom.
“With respect to questions as to whether Dr. Eastman is involved in plea bargaining, the answer is no,” Silverglate said in a statement earlier this month. “But if he were invited to plea bargain with either state or federal prosecutors, he would decline. The fact is, if Dr. Eastman is indicted, he will go to trial. If convicted, he will appeal. The Eastman legal team is confident of its legal position in this matter.”
Trump, facing 13 charges in the Georgia case, says he is set to fly from his golf resort in New Jersey to Atlanta on Thursday to be arrested and booked, the fourth criminal indictment filed against him in the last five months. In all, he is accused of committing 91 offenses before, during and after his single-term presidency.
“Can you believe it? I’ll be going to Atlanta, Georgia on Thursday to be ARRESTED,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social account.
The former president’s lawyers reached an agreement on Monday with Georgia authorities on a $200,000 bond so he could be released pending trial, with Trump also agreeing to not threaten or intimidate witnesses, including on social media platforms.
Even as he faces weeks-long trials in the first half of 2024, Trump holds a commanding lead among Republican voters for the party’s presidential nomination in next year’s national election. To this day, he contends that vote-counting fraud in the 2020 election cheated him out of another term in the White House. Trump has denied all wrongdoing in the four indictments against him.
In last week’s 41-count indictment encompassing 19 defendants, Willis, the Fulton County prosecutor, filed seven charges against Hall.
He is alleged to be involved in an effort to illegally breach election equipment in Coffee County, Georgia, more than 300 kilometers from Atlanta, to try to prove a conspiracy theory that the voting machines had been rigged in Biden’s favor.
At the heart of the case against Trump in Georgia is his taped phone call in early 2021 to state election officials asking them to “find” him 11,780 votes, one more than Biden’s margin of victory.
Willis has asked that the sprawling Georgia racketeering and conspiracy case be started March 4, but Trump’s lawyers have yet to propose a trial date. Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee will eventually set the date.
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Urban-Rural Divide Key Factor in Zimbabwe Election
The run-up to Zimbabwe’s election Wednesday has seen political campaigns use music concerts, celebrities and sporting heroes to attract and energize young voters. But some analysts say Zimbabwe’s rural-urban divide could be the deciding factor in the election.
Eleven candidates are vying for the presidency, but the main contest will be between the incumbent president, 80-year-old Emmerson Mnangagwa, and Nelson Chamisa, 45, leader of the Citizens Coalition for Change, or CCC.
The election marks Chamisa’s second bid to unseat Mnangagwa and break the ruling ZANU-PF’s 43-year grip on power.
Chamisa, a lawyer and former preacher, is largely popular among Zimbabwe’s urban and youth voters, as some have only known a nation mired in economic challenges, troubled by chronic high unemployment and rising prices.
Young voters tend to show greater support for the CCC — and one-sixth of Zimbabwe’s 6.6 million registered voters are casting ballots for the first time this year.
Professor Ricky Mukonza from Tshwane University of Technology in South Africa says the elections are not just about the voters’ ages, but where they live.
According to the World Bank, 67.4% of Zimbabweans were living in rural areas in 2022. ZANU-PF has long enjoyed strong support in these areas, where state funds and powerful patronage networks have helped the ruling party secure support.
The main opposition has traditionally had its support concentrated in the southern African nation’s urban centers.
Mukonza says urban youth voters tend to be “noisier” on social media and at opposition rallies, “giving the impression there are more of them than there really are.”
“That pre-election energy rarely translates to high youth turnout at the ballot box,” he told VOA.
In the 2018 election, which saw Mnangagwa win 50.8% of the vote, turnout was at 75%, according to Zimbabwean election officials. It is not clear how many voters turned out in rural areas versus urban.
Mukonza predicts a strong showing in Wednesday’s poll among the rural electorate, whom he refers to as “Zimbabwe’s silent majority.”
“If we go by past voting patterns, ZANU-PF will win with high margins in the rural areas and will lose with high margins in the urban areas,” Mukonza said.
Chamisa seeks rural support
The CCC seems to recognize the power of the rural vote. The party promised to prioritize voters living outside the cities but told supporters to brace for a “rough election campaign.”
“We’ve seen Chamisa campaigning very strongly in rural areas,” said Chipo Dendere, an assistant professor of Africana Studies at U.S.-based Wellesley College.
“The question isn’t whether the message is right to rural voters. It’s whether or not rural voters will feel comfortable on election day to put their ‘X’ on Nelson Chamisa,” Dendere told VOA’s “Straight Talk Africa.”
Drumming up opposition support in ZANU-PF territory has proven to be a mammoth task for Chamisa. Police have blocked several CCC rallies across the country in the run-up to the elections.
Alleged attacks on CCC supporters have stoked fears Zimbabwe’s violent election history is already repeating itself.
In an interview with The Associated Press, Chamisa alleged that people in rural areas, far from the international spotlight, are making their political choices under the threat of violence. Chamisa said, for some, it was a choice of “death or ZANU-PF.”
Voter intimidation, unfair electoral processes
A report released by Human Rights Watch documented first-hand accounts of abductions, arbitrary arrests of political opposition figures and government critics, and other human rights abuses ahead of Wednesday’s election.
Zimbabwe-based voter watchdog Electoral Resource Center says there have been reports of voter intimidation, especially in rural areas of the country.
“General public sentiment, as noted in several surveys, reveals that people have very little confidence in the electoral process as well as the election management body in the country,” the ERC said in a statement released this week.
The president, ZANU-PF officials and its supporters have denied any foul play.
At a news conference on Thursday, ZANU-PF spokesperson Chris Mutsvangwa denied allegations of voter intimidation and unfair electoral processes.
He accused the opposition of being “obsessed with criticizing the electoral process so that they have something to say after losing.”
For Mukonza, this kind of violent backdrop makes it hard to distinguish whether some people vote out of loyalty or fear. “Even if those in the rural areas have a change of heart or start to warm up to the main opposition party,” he said, “ultimately they will still vote for the ruling party.”
Dendere said rural voters “understand political violence in a way that urban voters might not.” Because of that, she said, some may vote for the ruling party as a form of self-protection.
“And that’s the biggest challenge for the opposition. Can they convince rural voters that their vote will be protected, and that they, too, will be protected if they vote their choice?” Dendere said.
Zimbabwe’s foreign affairs ministry says it has invited 46 countries and 17 international organizations, including the African Union and the European Union, to observe the elections.
Addressing a 150,000-strong crowd at a ZANU-PF rally in Harare earlier this month, Mnangagwa told supporters they would be “lost” if they did not vote for ZANU-PF and re-elect him, adding, “No one will stop us from ruling this country.”
This story originated in VOA’s English to Africa service. Some information in this report came from Reuters.
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Europe’s Sweeping Rules for Tech Giants Are About to Kick In
Google, Facebook, TikTok and other Big Tech companies operating in Europe are facing one of the most far-reaching efforts to clean up what people encounter online.
The first phase of the European Union’s groundbreaking new digital rules will take effect this week. The Digital Services Act is part of a suite of tech-focused regulations crafted by the 27-nation bloc — long a global leader in cracking down on tech giants.
The DSA, which the biggest platforms must start following Friday, is designed to keep users safe online and stop the spread of harmful content that’s either illegal or violates a platform’s terms of service, such as promotion of genocide or anorexia. It also looks to protect Europeans’ fundamental rights like privacy and free speech.
Some online platforms, which could face billions in fines if they don’t comply, have already started making changes.
Here’s a look at what’s happening this week:
Which platforms are affected?
So far, 19. They include eight social media platforms: Facebook, TikTok, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, Pinterest and Snapchat.
There are five online marketplaces: Amazon, Booking.com, China’s Alibaba AliExpress and Germany’s Zalando.
Mobile app stores Google Play and Apple’s App Store are subject, as are Google’s Search and Microsoft’s Bing search engine.
Google Maps and Wikipedia round out the list.
What about other online companies?
The EU’s list is based on numbers submitted by the platforms. Those with 45 million or more users — or 10% of the EU’s population — will face the DSA’s highest level of regulation.
Brussels insiders, however, have pointed to some notable omissions from the EU’s list, like eBay, Airbnb, Netflix and even PornHub. The list isn’t definitive, and it’s possible other platforms may be added later on.
Any business providing digital services to Europeans will eventually have to comply with the DSA. They will face fewer obligations than the biggest platforms, however, and have another six months before they must fall in line.
Citing uncertainty over the new rules, Meta Platforms has held off launching its Twitter rival, Threads, in the EU.
What’s changing?
Platforms have started rolling out new ways for European users to flag illegal online content and dodgy products, which companies will be obligated to take down quickly and objectively.
Amazon opened a new channel for reporting suspected illegal products and is providing more information about third-party merchants.
TikTok gave users an “additional reporting option” for content, including advertising, that they believe is illegal. Categories such as hate speech and harassment, suicide and self-harm, misinformation or frauds and scams, will help them pinpoint the problem.
Then, a “new dedicated team of moderators and legal specialists” will determine whether flagged content either violates its policies or is unlawful and should be taken down, according to the app from Chinese parent company ByteDance.
TikTok says the reason for a takedown will be explained to the person who posted the material and the one who flagged it, and decisions can be appealed.
TikTok users can turn off systems that recommend videos based on what a user has previously viewed. Such systems have been blamed for leading social media users to increasingly extreme posts. If personalized recommendations are turned off, TikTok’s feeds will instead suggest videos to European users based on what’s popular in their area and around the world.
The DSA prohibits targeting vulnerable categories of people, including children, with ads.
Snapchat said advertisers won’t be able to use personalization and optimization tools for teens in the EU and U.K. Snapchat users who are 18 and older also would get more transparency and control over ads they see, including “details and insight” on why they’re shown specific ads.
TikTok made similar changes, stopping users 13 to 17 from getting personalized ads “based on their activities on or off TikTok.”
Is there pushback?
Zalando, a German online fashion retailer, has filed a legal challenge over its inclusion on the DSA’s list of the largest online platforms, arguing that it’s being treated unfairly.
Nevertheless, Zalando is launching content flagging systems for its website even though there’s little risk of illegal material showing up among its highly curated collection of clothes, bags and shoes.
The company has supported the DSA, said Aurelie Caulier, Zalando’s head of public affairs for the EU.
“It will bring loads of positive changes” for consumers, she said. But “generally, Zalando doesn’t have systemic risk [that other platforms pose]. So that’s why we don’t think we fit in that category.”
Amazon has filed a similar case with a top EU court.
What happens if companies don’t follow the rules?
Officials have warned tech companies that violations could bring fines worth up to 6% of their global revenue — which could amount to billions — or even a ban from the EU. But don’t expect penalties to come right away for individual breaches, such as failing to take down a specific video promoting hate speech.
Instead, the DSA is more about whether tech companies have the right processes in place to reduce the harm that their algorithm-based recommendation systems can inflict on users. Essentially, they’ll have to let the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm and top digital enforcer, look under the hood to see how their algorithms work.
EU officials “are concerned with user behavior on the one hand, like bullying and spreading illegal content, but they’re also concerned about the way that platforms work and how they contribute to the negative effects,” said Sally Broughton Micova, an associate professor at the University of East Anglia.
That includes looking at how the platforms work with digital advertising systems, which could be used to profile users for harmful material like disinformation, or how their livestreaming systems function, which could be used to instantly spread terrorist content, said Broughton Micova, who’s also academic co-director at the Centre on Regulation in Europe, a Brussels-based think tank.
Under the rules, the biggest platforms will have to identify and assess potential systemic risks and whether they’re doing enough to reduce them. These risk assessments are due by the end of August and then they will be independently audited.
The audits are expected to be the main tool to verify compliance — though the EU’s plan has faced criticism for lacking details that leave it unclear how the process will work.
What about the rest of the world?
Europe’s changes could have global impact. Wikipedia is tweaking some policies and modifying its terms of service to provide more information on “problematic users and content.” Those alterations won’t be limited to Europe, said the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation, which hosts the community-powered encyclopedia.
“The rules and processes that govern Wikimedia projects worldwide, including any changes in response to the DSA, are as universal as possible. This means that changes to our Terms of Use and Office Actions Policy will be implemented globally,” it said in a statement.
It’s going to be hard for tech companies to limit DSA-related changes, said Broughton Micova, adding that digital ad networks aren’t isolated to Europe and that social media influencers can have global reach.
The regulations are “dealing with multichannel networks that operate globally. So there is going to be a ripple effect once you have kind of mitigations that get taken into place,” she said.
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China’s Xi Receives Warm Welcome on South Africa State Visit
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa hosted Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping for an official state visit, full of pomp and ceremony, on the side of the BRICS summit on Tuesday. Xi was greeted in Pretoria with a 21-gun salute as the two countries marked 25 years of diplomatic relations.
Ramaphosa welcomed Xi warmly, recalling how Beijing supported South Africa’s struggle against apartheid and calling the relationship between the two a “very special” one.
He noted that China is South Africa’s biggest global trade partner, with some $32 billion in bilateral trade last year, but stressed a trade imbalance in China’s favor needs addressing.
“As South Africa, we would like to see the significant trade deficit narrowed and this visit is an opportunity for us to look at ways to do so,” Ramaphosa said.
South Africa is currently in the throes of a major energy crisis, with its economy being hit hard by almost-daily blackouts. Ramaphosa thanked China for donating emergency power equipment and for a grant of approximately $26 million as development assistance.
“Energy cooperation with China is a recent development that we look to deepen, particularly in line with our respective commitments to low-carbon, climate resilient development,” he said.
Ramaphosa confirmed South Africa’s commitment to the One-China policy, and noted that Pretoria and Beijing shared a similar position in supporting the peaceful resolution of the conflict in Ukraine.
For his part, Xi noted the two nations share a strong bond, “as comrades and brothers.”
Paul Nantulya, a China expert at the Africa Center for Strategic Studies, said while China is the world’s second largest economy, it has always projected itself as a fellow developing country.
“It would like Global South countries to see it as a developing country and that becomes particularly important in terms of providing a counter-weight to what it sees as a western and a U.S. dominated international order and international system,” Nantulya said.
Several memorandums of understanding were signed during the state visit, including agreements on direct investment, the digital economy, the export of avocados, and the development of industrial parks and special economic zones.
The two nations also agreed to step up cooperation on tourism and education.
Later Tuesday, the BRICS Summit of emerging economies – Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa – gets into full swing. All the BRICS country leaders are in attendance save for Russian President Vladimir Putin, who will be taking part remotely.
Expansion of the bloc is expected to dominate the agenda of the summit, which ends on Thursday.
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Meta Rolls Out Web Version of Threads
Meta Platforms on Tuesday launched the web version of its new text-first social media platform Threads, in a bid to retain professional users and gain an edge over rival X, formerly Twitter.
Threads’ users will now be able to access the microblogging platform by logging-in to its website from their computers, the Facebook and Instagram owner said.
The widely anticipated roll out could help Threads gain broader acceptance among power users like brands, company accounts, advertisers and journalists, who can now take advantage of the platform by using it on a bigger screen.
Threads, which crossed 100 million sign-ups for the app within five days of its launch on July 5, saw a decline in its popularity as users returned to the more familiar platform X after the initial rush.
In just over a month, daily active users on Android version of Threads app dropped to 10.3 million from the peak of 49.3 million, according to a report, dated August 10, by analytics platform Similarweb.
The company will be adding more functionality to the web experience in the coming weeks, Meta said.
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Reporter’s Notebook: Kupiansk Families Prepare for Feared Attack
A public kitchen closes early so workers can get home on a day of heavy bombing. Police officers stuff the windows of their station with white sandbags. Every few minutes we hear the boom or thud of weapons being fired into and out of the city.
Each hit could mean a death. The Russian military is drawing closer.
In a golden-domed church on Sunday morning, Valentina, a 70-year-old singer, looks sad when she tells us she will stay in her eighth-floor apartment, despite fears that Russia once again has her city in its sights.
“This year I will plant potatoes in my garden,” she says. “I will harvest tomatoes.”
About two hours later, rockets hit a residential area a block away, burning out cars and sending 10 people to the hospital. Later that day, a nearby bridge is blown up.
In the suburbs, volunteers drive a small green bus from neighborhood to neighborhood, picking up families who want to evacuate. Many people weep as they hug loved ones or neighbors and board the bus.
“Maybe it’s silly,” says a woman in a white dress with teary, red eyes. “But I just can’t go.”
Inside the bus, passengers are eager to get moving.
“We need to get out of here as soon as possible,” says Lydia, 65, as she and her husband wait for the bus to depart.
Another woman, Tatiana, 63, is traveling alone. “We’ve been here since the war began,” she says. “During the winter we had no heat and no windows. During the occupation we had no internet and no grocery store.”
Russia occupied Kupiansk for seven months in 2022, before they were pushed out by Ukrainian forces.
“But now combat is coming closer,” says Tatiana.
Snail mail
Across town, closer to where Russian soldiers are firing off bombs from about 5 to 10 kilometers (3 to 6 miles) away, a post office is tucked behind an open-air market where vendors sell clothes, housewares and dried fish.
Every few minutes a customer comes into the post office, despite the ongoing shelling. Many come with packages to ship.
“I’m sending out my most important things, like electronics,” says Nina, 64, standing at the counter. “I’m planning to leave the city, and I’m afraid my property will be destroyed.”
Within a few days, she says, she will flee to western Ukraine, where she hopes to find her valuables waiting for her.
Other customers come in to pick up their pensions — the only income for most retirees in Kupiansk. Officials tell us they are paying out pensions three months in advance nowadays, in case they lose access to the city.
Carriers used to deliver the mail, but the last time it went out was weeks ago, and then only to the region’s most infirm people, those who couldn’t make it to the post office.
The windows are mostly filled in with plywood, but one rectangle of glass lets in light. “That’s all that’s left of our peacetime windows,” jokes one worker.
Svitlana Oleynikova, 45, the post office manager, says incoming bombs frequently hit a nearby school, but some seem to miss their mark and land outside their office.
When Russia controlled the city, the post office was closed, and it seems inevitable that workers will be forced to abandon their post again, she says.
“I am evacuating my mother this week,” she explains. “But I will keep working until the post office is closed.”
Soldiers standing by
Near a clearing in the bush alongside the Oskil River, about a dozen Ukrainian soldiers relax by the shore in various states of undress — speedos, camouflage pants, underwear. We are about 5 kilometers (3 miles) from Russian forces.
“Isn’t this a great place for a holiday?” one man asks us. The rest of the group laughs.
Two beers in cut-off water bottles are stowed under a car bumper, out of the sun. One man swims about 5 meters out to the center of the river. There is a faint smell of cigarettes. The band Måneskin’s version of the 1967 Four Seasons song “Beggin’” blares from somebody’s phone.
“Don’t be afraid of shrapnel,” says one soldier, wearing shorts and dog tags, without a shirt. “This one hit our car” he adds, grinning. He points out a hole in the roof and the side-back window, shattered and covered with lime green tape. “And we were in it.”
Inside the city, at a territorial defense post hidden on the side of the hill, Maxim, a 25-year-old soldier with a hand badly mangled from a mortar attack in the early days of war, mans a grenade launcher. He scans the horizon over the river for approaching Russians, as smoke from recent bombings rises from the forest.
So far, neither side has launched a full-scale attack, says Maxim, but they are preparing for battle.
“They’re not going to be able to take this city like they did in the early days of the war,” he says. “The city was taken without a single shot being fired. But we have a lot of forces here now.”
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Major Wildfire in Northeastern Greece Has Forced Evacuation of Villages, City Hospital
A massive wall of flames raced through forests toward a port city in northeastern Greece overnight, prompting authorities to evacuate another eight villages and a city hospital as firefighters battled dozens more wildfires across the country on Tuesday.
Gale-force winds and high summer temperatures have hampered the efforts of hundreds of firefighters backed by dozens of water-dropping aircraft as they tackle wildfires breaking out across Greece.
The fire risk level for several regions, including the wider Athens area, was listed as “extreme” for the second day Tuesday. Authorities have banned public access to mountains and forests in those regions until at least Wednesday morning and ordered military patrols.
On Monday, the blazes left two people dead and two firefighters injured in northern and central Greece.
About 65 of the more than 100 patients in the Alexandroupolis hospital in northeastern Greece were transported to a ferry boat docked in the city’s port as the country’s largest wildfire currently burning out of control entered its fourth day. Others were taken to other hospitals in northern Greece.
The flames turned the sky over the city and across the region red, hiding the sun as choking smoke and swirling flecks of ash filled the air.
A school, several homes and a cemetery were damaged in two villages near Alexandroupolis, where more than 200 firefighters were battling the flames, supported by four airplanes and three helicopters. Dozens more houses were damaged by another wildfire in the Kavala region, local authorities said, while a separate fire in the Evros border region was burning through forest in a protected national park.
The coast guard evacuated 14 people by sea overnight from a nearby coastal area to the port of Alexandroupolis.
A new fire broke out in the Aspropyrgos area on the western fringes of the Greek capital Tuesday morning, prompting authorities to issue evacuation orders for two villages in the area.
Romania sent 56 firefighters and Cyprus send two water-dropping aircraft to help fight the wildfire in Alexandroupolis, while French firefighters helped tackle a separate fire on the island of Evia.
Greece suffers destructive wildfires every summer. Its deadliest wildfire killed 104 people in 2018, at a seaside resort near Athens that residents had not been warned to evacuate. Authorities have since erred on the side of caution, issuing swift mass evacuation orders whenever inhabited areas are under threat.
Last month, a wildfire on the resort island of Rhodes forced the evacuation of some 20,000 tourists. Days later, two air force pilots were killed when their water-dropping plane crashed while diving low to tackle a blaze on Evia. Another three wildfire-related deaths have been recorded this summer.
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Trump Likely to Upstage Opponents Even if Absent from Debate
The first big event of the 2024 U.S. presidential election campaign will be held Wednesday when candidates of the Republican Party meet on a debate stage in the Midwestern city of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
Nine candidates have qualified under the Republican Party’s rules to be on the stage inside the Fiserv Forum, the overwhelming front-runner — former President Donald Trump — says he will be skipping the event.
Few of the participants have been outspoken in criticizing Trump. Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is an exception. Others, such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who is running a distant second to Trump, and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, have taken a more measured approach, hoping to convince a party base that remains loyal to Trump that they can implement the former president’s right-wing “Make America Great Again” agenda without the legal encumbrances and other controversies.
Then there is Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence, who defends his ceremonial certification of the 2020 election results against Trump’s wishes. He is still in the low single digits in most polls of potential 2024 Republican voters.
In addition to Pence, Christie, DeSantis and Haley, others who have qualified for the event hosted by Fox News are Ohio businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson.
Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social on Sunday that due to his vast lead in the polls and his known accomplishments during his one term as president, “I WILL THEREFORE NOT BE DOING THE DEBATES.”
Trump reportedly was referring to the first two debates of the primary airing on Fox News, including next month’s face-off in California, leaving open the possibility he is willing to face Republican rivals on stage later in the campaign season.
The former president has recently turned critical of Fox News, which championed his candidacy in the last two presidential elections. But the media empire of magnate Rupert Murdoch, which owns Fox News, has taken a more measured approach to Trump amid the current crowded field of Republican contenders.
Trump has also stated he will not sign the RNC’s “loyalty pledge,” which asks all the primary losers to eventually support the nominee, one of the requirements for participating in the Milwaukee debate.
“Surprise, surprise… the guy who is out on bail from four jurisdictions and can’t defend his reprehensible conduct, is running scared and hiding from the debate stage,” Christie posted Friday on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, foreshadowing the rhetoric he is expected to unleash against the absent front-runner on Wednesday. Christie added that Trump is a “certified loser, verified coward.”
Even without Trump exchanging insults with Christie and others, the conversation at the event is anticipated to be largely about him, including the more than 90 felony charges the former president faces for alleged crimes committed before, during and after his presidency
“It creates a very, very difficult environment for the other Republicans, because they have their own ideas for what they want to do with respect to key issues like the economy or Ukraine or immigration. But that doesn’t mean they’ll have much of a chance to talk about it. They’ll be asked about Donald Trump,” predicts Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington.
The debate will not be very consequential for Trump — he will still be the front-runner regardless of what happens. But for the others, there could be a viral moment, good or bad, that significantly changes their polling numbers.
“We’ve seen from debates in past election seasons that candidates sometimes have a moment in a debate that ends up disqualifying them because they look bad. We’ve also seen moments in past debates where candidates have said something that got a lot of attention for them in a positive way and gave them a huge boost,” notes Provost Associate Professor Jordan Tama of American University’s School of International Service.
DeSantis is the candidate who perhaps has the most at stake. Once touted as the party’s Trump slayer, the second-term governor has dropped in the polls. In a few surveys, the relatively unknown Ramaswamy has pulled even with or surpassed DeSantis for distant second place.
“This is his moment,” says Farnsworth of DeSantis. “Remember, in 49 other states, these people do not know the governor of Florida. They maybe have seen a little bit on the news here and there. But most of the coverage is focused on the former president. As a result, Ron DeSantis will be introducing himself to the country. And one of the things he needs to do is make a good first impression. If he doesn’t, he won’t be able to really change the dynamics of the race in a significant way.”
The Fox News moderators are also certain to attempt to draw the candidates out on why they would be a better leader than President Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic Party nominee, who would be 82 if he is inaugurated in January 2025.
The first Republican Party debate also puts the spotlight on Wisconsin, one of the few states expected to provide a true contest between the two major parties in next year’s presidential election. Milwaukee will host the Republican Party’s nominating convention next July.
Four of the last six presidential elections have been decided by less than a percentage point in Wisconsin. Trump won narrowly in the state in 2016 before losing by a similar margin to Biden four years later.
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Regional Bloc Says Niger Junta’s 3-year Transition Plan Unacceptable
The Economic Community of West African States has rejected a plan by Niger’s coup leaders to relinquish power within three years.
The three-year transition plan proposed by Niger’s military junta was unacceptable, ECOWAS commissioner for political affairs, peace and security, Abdel-Fatau Musah, told a Nigerian television channel Monday.
He said the regional bloc ECOWAS insists on the return of constitutional order as quickly as possible, and that the junta proposed the transition plan as a distraction to remain in power for longer.
“In some other countries under military regime in West Africa, they had about three years and already they’re negotiating with their population to have another 18 months,” Musah said. “What legitimacy do they have to already begin with three years? And we know it is not going to end there.”
In a televised address Saturday, Niger’s junta leader Abdourahamane Tchiani said the country would return to civilian rule within three years. He spoke soon after meeting with an ECOWAS delegation led by Nigeria’s former head of state, Abdulsalam Abubakar.
Tchiani urged political parties to submit their vision for the transition within 30 days.
“Our ambition is not to confiscate power,” he said. “Transition period will not exceed three years.”
It was the first time the junta had met with ECOWAS representatives since the July 26 coup, raising hopes of continued dialogue.
But Musah said it is the pressure from ECOWAS sanctions and threat of military intervention that is making the junta more compliant.
“We’re no longer going to get into drawn out haggling with people who have used their power against their own constitution.”
Idayat Hassan, the director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, an Abuja-based pro-democracy think tank, said ECOWAS must not give in to the transition plan by Niger’s coup leaders.
“If ECOWAS allows for this three-year transition, it is going to be following in the footsteps of Mali, and in Burkina Faso and in Guinea,” she said.
Soldiers of the presidential guard who deposed President Mohammed Bazoum last month continue to hold him and his family hostage.
ECOWAS recently activated a standby force to intervene in Niger if negotiations fail. Defense chiefs who met in Accra last week said they are ready to take action as soon as an order is given.
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Inside KCON LA 2023, an Extravagant Microcosm of K-pop’s Macro Influence
Hours before doors would open, thousands of K-pop fans lined up in downtown Los Angeles, stretching long city blocks in the warm August sun. In pleated skirts and platform shoes, toting the clear bags that have become arena staples, they danced and traded homemade stickers, banners, bracelets and photocards. Inside was their paradise: an IRL (in-real-life) space to commune over their URL passions.
If anything, the 2023 LA KCON was a microcosm of K-pop’s macro influence on the music industry as a whole.
Held from Friday to Sunday at the Los Angeles Convention Center and adjacent Crypto.com Arena, an estimated 140,000 fans from all over the world celebrated their favorite K-pop idols across three days of panels, premium meet-and-greets, interviews, dance breaks, concerts, and more.
Inside the convention center, fans carried light sticks of their favorite groups, showed off DIY shirts with simple, direct slogans like “I HEART MINGI,” collected sticker books and K-beauty products, and lined up for tteokbokki.
KCON started 11 years ago in Irvine, California, drawing 10,000 people to its inaugural celebration of Korean culture, says Steve Chung, chief global officer of organizers CJ ENM. Now it’s a global event, taking place in multiple countries: So far in 2023, KCON has hit Thailand, Japan and the U.S.
“We’ve welcomed something like half a million people in those (11) years all throughout the world,” he says.
In Los Angeles, panels were held on K-pop songwriting and cup sleeve creations (K-pop fan events are held at cafes on an idol’s birthday, anniversary, or some other special date). Up-and-coming groups like NMIXX led dance classes on one stage, while another stage allowed rookie groups to introduce themselves to a wider audience.
Over the course of the weekend, The Associated Press spoke to an incredible diversity of fans who, among them, drove 12 hours straight from Utah, flew in from the U.K. and South America and represented a range of ages, genders, races, and socioeconomic backgrounds.
“The culture of inclusiveness is huge,” said 40-year-old Annya Holston from Florida who got into K-pop through her daughter. “We’ve made so many friends, being here.”
At $500 a day, premium tickets allowed attendees to access a “Red Carpet” area, where acts posed for portraits and answered two or three questions in a 30-minute window — along with entry to the convention and concert. For an additional $100, fans could pay for “Hi-Touch” — a quick meet-and-greet where fans and performers high-five — with one group of their choice. With renewed concerns about the spread of COVID-19, “Hi-Touch” became “Hi-Wave” (exactly what it sounds like, to the chagrin of a few fans hoping for that physical connection; others were happy with the sheer proximity).
Those experiences served as a welcome reminder of a facet of the music industry that K-pop knows remarkably well, and far better than most: fandom is this business’ most lucrative and enduring resource.
As Peyton Tran, a 17-year-old L.A. native and dancer told AP at KCON, “It’s just cool to see how much people can support these businesses out here.”
In 2023, the music industry faces unique challenges, including what Mark Mulligan, a MIDiA Research music industry analyst, has referred to as the “fragmentation of fandom.” New artists suffer a kind of competition unheard of before the streaming age, a direct effect of algorithmic listening. Think of it this way: It is rare for a new act to reach the level of monolithic pop star — the ranks of Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, Harry Styles, all who started performing pre-streaming — because listenership is hyper-specific.
In K-pop, where companies are typically fully integrated institutions — a record label and a talent agency all in one — and hyper-consumerism is welcomed, business focuses on building a community of superfans and inspiring those loyal listeners to advocate for their group, fueling a sense of participation beyond their purchasing power. It doesn’t hurt that K-pop audiences have a tendency to coordinate global fan actions on their own and create rituals and events, communicating on bespoke fandom platforms like WeVerse and Vlive.
Niche doesn’t mean small; it means specialized. KCON is proof.
At the concerts, held all three nights for the first time, fans witnessed K-pop groups and soloists from across “generations”: Taemin from the second-generation boy band SHINee,Rain — the first K-pop idol to take off internationally, and now a manager himself — fourth-generation boy bands ATEEZ and Stray Kids, and rookie groups like XG and ZEROBASEONE.
XG performed songs like the Kesha -channeling “TGIF,” with production pulling heavily from the current liquid drum-and-bass/U.K. garage trend in global pop music, a welcomed retro-futuristic sound from a group and convention with eyes set on the future.
Notably, these concerts placed a lot of emphasis on K-pop girl groups, reflecting a recent trend in listenership. Historically, boy bands were thought to be more lucrative — but girl groups like IVE, ITZY, NMIXX, Kep1er, (G)I-DLE, and EVERGLOW proved that’s vintage thinking in their explosive KCON sets.
A particularly unique and effective moment during the concert was called the “Dream Stage,” where a few dozen fans who auditioned to perform a dance with a K-pop group earlier in the day were brought out to do exactly that.
On the second day of the convention, iHeartRadio’s KIIS-FM set up a new, open-to-the-public “K-pop Village,” where the K-pop-curious could experience free performances from newer acts — like LEO, who made his U.S. debut on the outdoor stage.
“2023 is like a crossover event. The last 10 years has been about sort of serving the endemic fanbase of people who already know K-pop and who love K-pop,” Chung says. “As evidenced by the iHeartMedia partnership, it’s really like a crossover moment where K-pop goes mainstream.”
On the last day of the convention, not even Tropical Storm Hilary could stop the most devoted fans from lining up in the rain to see their favorite acts. On the train the night before, the AP asked a K-pop fan from Massachusetts, who publishes fan cam videos on YouTube under the name Toadcola, if he was worried about the weather. Not so much.
But, if the weather canceled his flight home, he thought that wouldn’t be so bad: maybe, just maybe, the idols would be stuck at the airport with him.
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Somali Government Announces Amnesty for Al-Shabab
The Somali government has offered amnesty to al-Shabab militants amid an ongoing military offensive in central parts of the country. The move is seen by some analysts as a way to remove al-Shabab fighters from the battlefield, thereby weakening the insurgent group.
The amnesty offer is part of a widening approach by the Somali government in its fight against the al-Shabab militant group. The government has deployed the military, targeted financial networks and waged an ideological battle against the group.
The announcement by the National Counter Terrorism Center to open doors for defections follows President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud’s remarks that al-Shabab leadership was not willing to negotiate with the government.
Abdiaziz Hussein Issack, a security analyst with Hamad Bin Khalifa Civilization Center, said the amnesty offer to al-Shabab is a strategic tactic by the Somali government to further weaken the group.
Already, he said, there have been reports of discontent among the foot soldiers that they are not getting support from the top leadership as the government forces pile pressure on them.
The federal government launched a large-scale offensive against al-Shabab in the Mudug and Galgaduud regions in central parts of the country.
Clan militias also provided support to the forces, which, the government said are on course to finish the first phase of the operation. Issack says amnesty might also provide government forces with intelligence about the group.
If well-coordinated, the amnesty could be a plus for the government, he said. If the fighters desert their positions, the government forces will not only face little resistance but will also benefit from intelligence from the defectors.
Despite the expected positive outcomes, some analysts think an amnesty offer may not tilt the scales of the war. Abdirashid Farah Ali, a security and political analyst at Linking Governance, a policy and strategy consultancy in Mogadishu, warned not to expect too much from the amnesty offer.
He said there is no guarantee the amnesty will net a major gain for the government. There might be just a few defectors out of the thousands of soldiers, and while it has a psychological effect on the war against al-Shabab, it may not change the course of the war.
Several senior figureheads in al-Shabab have defected in the past. The current minister for religious affairs was the founder and the second most senior leader before he defected to the government in 2017 and he’s currently leading the ideological warfare against the group.
Ali says if the amnesty does work and several militants defect, it might force al-Shabab to the negotiating table.
He says major defections are unlikely. But if there are some defections, al-Shabab might be forced to consider negotiation rather than face humiliation. So, there might be a good opportunity for the government to pursue amnesty.
Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has been leading the war campaign in Galmudug state in central Somalia for the last two weeks. The two-time leader has staked his presidency on the annihilation of al-Shabab.
As he prepares to launch the second phase of operations in the south, he faces two tasks: an ongoing al-Shabab build-up and tough terrain. But should he succeed in getting defectors, the war might work in his favor.
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Maryland Man Charged With ISIS-inspired Plot Pleads Guilty to Planning Separate Airport Attack
A Maryland man charged in 2019 with planning an Islamic State-inspired attack at a Washington, D.C., area shopping and entertainment complex pleaded guilty on Monday to engaging in a separate plot to drive a stolen van into a crowd of people at a nearby airport.
Rondell Henry’s plea agreement with Justice Department prosecutors could lead to his release from federal custody as soon as October, when a judge is scheduled to sentence him in the airport plot, which Henry abandoned. Henry, who has remained in custody for over four years, didn’t harm anybody before police arrested him.
Henry, 32, of Germantown, Maryland, pleaded guilty to attempting to perform an act of violence at an international airport, court records show.
Henry admits that he stole a U-Haul van from a parking garage in Alexandria, Virginia, drove it to Dulles International Airport in Virginia and entered a terminal building on March 27, 2019.
“Henry unsuccessfully attempted to follow another individual into a restricted area of the airport, but the other individual prevented Henry from entering the restricted area,” according to a court filing accompanying his plea agreement.
Henry later told investigators that he went to the airport because he “was trying to hurt people there” and “was going to try to drive through a crowd of people,” but ultimately left because “there wasn’t a big enough crowd” at the airport, according to the filing.
Henry pleaded guilty to a felony that carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years. But prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed that an appropriate sentence for Henry would be the jail time he already has served and lifetime supervised release with mandatory participation in a mental health treatment program, according to his plea agreement.
U.S. District Judge Paula Xinis, who isn’t bound by that recommendation, is scheduled to sentence Henry on Oct. 23. He will remain jailed until his sentencing hearing.
Henry’s attorneys didn’t immediately respond Monday to an email seeking comment on his guilty plea and plea deal.
Henry was charged in 2019 with attempting to provide material support to a foreign terrorist organization, the Islamic State group. But the charge to which he pleaded guilty is unrelated to what authorities had said was a ISIS-inspired plot to carry out an attack at National Harbor, a popular waterfront destination in Maryland just outside the nation’s capital.
Monday’s filing doesn’t mention the Islamic State or specify any ideological motivation for an attack at the airport.
Henry left the airport and drove the stolen U-Haul to National Harbor, where he parked it. Police arrested him the next morning after they found the van and saw Henry jump over a security fence.
Henry told investigators he planned to carry out an attack like one in which a driver ran over and killed dozens of people in Nice, France, in 2016, authorities said. A prosecutor has said Henry intended to kill as many “disbelievers” as possible.
Monday’s court filings don’t explain why Henry didn’t plead guilty to any charges related to the alleged National Harbor plot.
The case against Henry remained on hold for years amid questions about his mental competency. Last year, Rondell Henry’s attorneys notified the court that he intended to pursue an insanity defense.
Xinis had ruled in February 2020 that Henry was not competent to stand trial. She repeatedly extended his court-ordered hospitalization.
But the judge ruled in May 2022 that Henry had become mentally competent to stand trial, could understand the charges against him and was capable of assisting in his defense. Xinis said a March 2022 report on Henry’s medical condition found experts had restored his mental competence.
Prosecutors have said Henry watched Islamic State group propaganda videos of foreign terrorists beheading civilians and fighting overseas. Investigators said they recovered a phone Henry had discarded on a highway in an apparent attempt to conceal evidence, including images of the Islamic State flag, armed Islamic State fighters and the man who carried out the 2016 Pulse nightclub massacre in Orlando, Florida.
Henry is a naturalized U.S. citizen who moved to the country from Trinidad and Tobago more than a decade ago.
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Biden, in Hawaii Visit, Pledges to Support Wildfire Recovery
U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday promised survivors of Hawaii’s wildfires to help rebuild, nearly two weeks after the fires killed at least 114 people and destroyed thousands of homes and wiped out much of the historic town of Lahaina.
Biden and first lady Jill Biden visited the Hawaiian island Maui where they met with officials, including Gov. Josh Green, and thanked first responders for their work following the deadly fires.
“From stories of grief, we’ve seen so many stories of hope and heroism, of the aloha spirit. Every emergency responder put their lives on the line to save others,” Biden said. “Everyday heroes, neighbors helping neighbors, Native Hawaiian leaders offering solace and strength.”
Biden said the country grieves with the victims, and that his administration will do everything possible to help recovery efforts and to respect local cultural traditions as rebuilding takes place.
“For as long as it takes, we’re going to be with you,” Biden said, standing near a 150-year-old banyan tree in Lahaina that was burned, but was still standing. He said the “tree survived for a reason.”
“I believe it’s a very powerful symbol of what we can and will do to get through this crisis,” he said.
Biden was accused by some Republicans of not doing enough in the immediate aftermath of the fires.
Former President Donald Trump said it was “disgraceful” Biden did not respond more quickly. White House officials said the visit was delayed to avoid interfering with emergency response efforts, and that the president was in touch with Hawaii officials as the crisis unfolded.
There were signs some Hawaii residents are also unhappy with the president’s response. As Biden’s motorcade drove through an area scorched by the fires, most onlookers cheered, waved, and made a hand gesture for “aloha” – a Hawaii greeting. But news reports also said a few bystanders showed their displeasure with less friendly hand signals.
Bob Fenton, a regional leader at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, was named Monday as the lead coordinator for the federal response to the Maui wildfires, the White House announced.
Some information for this story came from The Associated Press and Reuters.
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Key Question in Two Trump Cases: Did He Know He Lost?
As former President Donald Trump braces for two separate trials over his alleged efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election, his lawyers are scrambling to come up with legal defenses that could test the limits of the law and the Constitution.
They’ve signaled that they will argue that Trump was merely exercising his First Amendment rights when he spread baseless claims that the election had been stolen and then pressed state officials to change the results in his favor.
They will contend that the former president was simply following the counsel of his lawyers who advised him he had the right to “petition” the officials to investigate fraud.
And they may even invoke the idea that as president he should be immune from prosecution, arguing that the actions he took after the election were related to his presidential duties.
But legal experts say when the case goes to trial the key question the jury will have to answer is: Did Trump know he had lost the election?
“A jury is not going to focus on whether he had a First Amendment right to petition for redress of grievances and [is] not going to focus on whether he had any executive privilege to meet with his vice president and urge him to not count the votes from the swing states that were contested,” said John Malcolm, a former federal prosecutor who is a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation. “They’re going to focus on the president and his belief.”
Election indictments
Trump faces two separate indictments in connection with the 2020 election scheme that culminated in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
On Aug. 1, a federal grand jury in Washington issued a four-count indictment, accusing Trump of conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy against the rights of citizens, obstructing an official proceeding and conspiring to obstruct an official proceeding.
Then last week, a grand jury in Georgia indicted Trump and 18 others for racketeering and a raft of other crimes in connection with efforts to overturn the election outcome in that state.
While the state and federal cases are different in scope, they both alleged election fraud and require that prosecutors prove “mens rea” or criminal intent on the part of Trump, according to legal experts.
“In both jurisdictions, general principles of criminal law in the U.S. probably are quite relevant,” said Morgan Cloud, a professor of law at Emory University in Atlanta. “Not all, but most crimes, including felonies like the ones charged in these current federal and state indictments… require proof of… mens rea.”
Trump has long claimed that he lost the 2020 election fraudulently, despite no evidence of that assertion, and his lawyers are now challenging prosecutors to disprove his sincerity.
“I would like them to try to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Donald Trump believed that these allegations were false,” John Lauro, who represents Trump in the special counsel case, told Fox News after special counsel Jack Smith announced the federal charges against Trump.
Circumstantial evidence
Proving criminal intent can be challenging but it’s not impossible, according to legal experts.
To prove criminal intent, prosecutors can use two types of evidence: direct and circumstantial.
Direct evidence shows a defendant’s state of mind or actions, while circumstantial evidence can imply a guilty mind.
In Trump’s case, direct evidence could include testimony about his private admission that he had lost the election. At least two former White House aides have come forward with claims to that effect. One of them, Cassidy Hutchinson, testified before Congress last year that she was told by her boss, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, that “a lot of times (Trump will) tell me that he lost, but he wants to keep fighting it.”
Prosecutors can also marshal circumstantial evidence to prove Trump knew he had lost. Among other things, they can cite testimony by senior Justice Department officials, White House aides, and Trump’s own campaign staff who told Trump that they had found no evidence of widespread fraud.
Though circumstantial, this kind of testimony can persuade a jury that Trump knew he had lost the election.
A “myth I think people have is that you have to have the smoking gun, the guy on the audiotape saying, ‘I did it,” but you don’t,” said Kimberly Wehle, a former federal prosecutor now a professor of law at the University of Baltimore. “You can prove crimes beyond a reasonable doubt with circumstantial evidence.”
Yet Trump, notorious for rejecting expert advice, could claim he was swayed by other advisers who insisted the election was stolen.
“I don’t think there’s any question that there were people around former President Trump at the time who were telling him that he was not wrong, and that the election really had been stolen,” Malcolm said.
Without proving Trump’s criminal intent, Malcolm said, “the case collapses.”
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FDA Approves RSV Vaccine for Moms-To-Be to Guard Their Newborns
U.S. regulators on Monday approved the first RSV vaccine for pregnant women so their babies will be born with protection against the respiratory infection.
RSV is notorious for filling hospitals with wheezing babies every fall and winter. The Food and Drug Administration cleared Pfizer’s maternal vaccination to guard against a severe case of RSV when babies are most vulnerable — from birth through 6 months of age.
The next step: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention must issue recommendations for using the vaccine, named Abrysvo, during pregnancy. (Vaccinations for older adults, also at high risk, are getting underway this fall using the same Pfizer shot plus another from competitor GSK.)
“Maternal vaccination is an incredible way to protect the infants,” said Dr. Elizabeth Schlaudecker of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, a researcher in Pfizer’s international study of the vaccine. If shots begin soon, “I do think we could see an impact for this RSV season.”
RSV is a cold-like nuisance for most healthy people but it can be life-threatening for the very young. It inflames babies’ tiny airways so it’s hard to breathe or causes pneumonia. In the U.S. alone, between 58,000 and 80,000 children younger than 5 are hospitalized each year, and several hundred die, from the respiratory syncytial virus.
Last year’s RSV season was extremely harsh in the U.S., and it began sickening tots in the summer, far earlier than usual.
Babies are born with an immature immune system, dependent for their first few months on protection from mom. How the RSV vaccination will work: A single injection late in pregnancy gives enough time for the mom-to-be to develop virus-fighting antibodies that pass through the placenta to the fetus — ready to work at birth.
It’s the same way pregnant women pass along protection against other infections. Pregnant women have long been urged to get a flu shot and a whooping cough vaccine — and more recently, COVID-19 vaccination.
Pfizer’s study included nearly 7,400 pregnant women plus their babies. Maternal vaccination didn’t prevent mild RSV infection — but it proved 82% effective at preventing a severe case during babies’ first three months of life. At age 6 months, it still was proving 69% effective against severe illness.
Vaccine reactions were mostly injection-site pain and fatigue. In the study, there was a slight difference in premature birth — a few weeks early — between vaccinated moms and those given a dummy shot, something Pfizer has said was due to chance. The FDA said to avoid the possibility, the vaccine should be given only between 32 weeks and 36 weeks of pregnancy, a few weeks later than during the clinical trial.
Cincinnati’s Schlaudecker, a pediatric infectious disease specialist, said both the new antibody drug and the maternal vaccine are eagerly anticipated, and predicted doctors will try a combination to provide the best protection for babies depending on their age and risk during RSV season.
Another Cincinnati Children’s physician who’s cared for seriously ill RSV patients volunteered to participate in Pfizer’s vaccine study when she became pregnant.
“The last thing a parent wants to see is their kid struggling to breathe,” Dr. Maria Deza Leon said. “I was also at risk of being the person that could get RSV and give it to my son without even realizing.”
Deza Leon received her shot in late January 2022 and her son Joaquin was born the following month. While she hasn’t yet learned if she received the vaccine or a dummy shot, Joaquin now is a healthy toddler who’s never been diagnosed with RSV.
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Trump Maintains Large Lead in Early Iowa Polling
Just days before the first debate of the Republican presidential primary, a new poll shows that former President Donald Trump maintains a commanding lead among GOP voters in the state of Iowa, the first state to vote in the party’s selection of a nominee for the 2024 election.
The poll, sponsored by the Des Moines Register and NBC News, found that Trump is the first choice for the nomination of 42% of Republicans likely to participate in the state’s January Republican caucus. Trump’s nearest challenger, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, has the support of 19% of Iowa Republicans, while none of the other 12 candidates mentioned in the poll were able to break into double digits.
Trump is feeling enough confidence in his position in the primary that he confirmed over the weekend that he will not participate in Wednesday’s debate, scheduled to take place in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
The former president’s strength in Iowa is all the more remarkable given that in the 2016 primary, during his first run for the presidency, he only managed a tie for second place in the state.
Indictment may have helped
In news that may bode even more poorly for Trump’s adversaries, the former president’s support in Iowa remained strong even though his indictment in Georgia on charges of conspiring to subvert the results of the 2020 presidential election was announced August 15, while the poll was in the field.
When the results of the poll were analyzed, they revealed that 38% of respondents polled in advance of the indictment’s release supported Trump. After the indictment, support for the former president rose to 43%.
Because the caucus remains several months away, the poll also set out to measure the firmness of candidates’ support by asking respondents whether they feel that their minds are already made up, or if they could still be persuaded to change their allegiance. The results suggest that Trump’s support is firmer than that of DeSantis, with 66% of the former president’s supporters saying their minds are made up, versus 31% of the Florida governor’s backers.
Remaining field
Of the remaining 12 Republican candidates who have declared their candidacy for the nomination, South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott performed the best, with 9% of the vote. Former Vice President Mike Pence and former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley each earned 6% of the vote, while former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie took 5% and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy received 4%. No other candidate received more than 2% of the vote.
Kyle Kondik, managing editor of Sabato’s Crystal Ball at the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics, told VOA that while the results of the Des Moines Register poll are similar to other results recorded by pollsters in Iowa, it carries more weight because it was conducted by J. Ann Selzer, president of Selzer & Co., who has a reputation for accuracy in the state.
“She’s a very respected pollster, and so that is why this particular survey is getting a lot of attention,” Kondik said.
Kondik pointed out that Trump’s performance in Iowa is actually somewhat weaker than it is in national polling, where he regularly leads DeSantis by margins of more than 40 points. However, he said, the fact that Trump is doing so well in Iowa after losing the 2016 caucus there, speaks to the former president’s overall strength.
“Trump is probably weaker in Iowa than he is nationally, but he’s still really pretty strong,” Kondik said.
Kondik urged some caution when it comes to analyzing the apparent surge the former president enjoyed after the August 15 announcement of his Georgia indictment.
“The indictments have not hurt Trump amongst Republicans, and in fact, arguably, may have helped by prompting people to ‘rally around the flag’ for him,” Kondik said. “Maybe over time, you see that reverse, and maybe people get cold feet about Trump and are concerned about him as a general election candidate. But again, there’s really no evidence from this poll or other polls to suggest that that’s happened.”
Evolution of the GOP
The fact that Trump has moved from an undistinguished second-place finish in Iowa eight years ago to a double-digit lead today highlights the degree to which the former president has remodeled the Republican party in his own image, said William A. Galston, a senior fellow in the Brookings Institution’s Governance Studies program.
“Donald Trump’s presidency, including its very, very troubled ending in January of 2021, succeeded in cementing the intense relationship he has with the base of the Republican Party,” Galston told VOA. “As far as they’re concerned, he can do no wrong. He has been forgiven sins that would sink any other candidate.”
Galston said that the poll results also cast serious doubt on the ability of DeSantis to mount a serious challenge to Trump.
“Ron DeSantis, who was supposed to be his principal challenger, has not succeeded in strengthening his position in recent months,” Galston said. “If anything, he has weakened, very, very significantly, opening the door for someone else to emerge as the leading challenger.”
He added, “the field could consolidate enough around someone not named Ron DeSantis to pose a significant challenge to Donald Trump down the road.”
Why Iowa matters
Iowa has long had an outsized role in the process by which the U.S. selects its president, even though it is both smaller than most states, and has a population that is 83% white, making it one of the least diverse.
Traditionally, the Iowa caucuses have been seen as a vital early test of presidential candidates — one that puts a premium on face-to-face interactions with voters. The caucus format requires voters to assemble at designated sites across the state and to publicly declare their support for a specific candidate, a level of commitment not required in most states, where primary votes are conducted via secret ballots.
Iowa voters do not have a particularly good track record of choosing the ultimate GOP nominee. Trump tied for second place in the 2016 caucus, and the party’s eventual nominee has not won a well-contested Iowa caucus outright since 2000. (Trump won 97% of the vote in 2020, facing only a handful of little-known challengers.)
However, what Iowa has often done is serve as the first cut in culling over-large primary fields. In past years, many candidates that performed poorly in the states have terminated their campaigns within days of the vote.
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Russia’s Prigozhin Posts First Video Since Mutiny, Hints He’s in Africa
Russian mercenary chief Yevgeny Prigozhin posted his first video address since leading a short-lived mutiny in late June, appearing in a clip — possibly shot in Africa — on Telegram channels affiliated with the Wagner group on Monday.
Prigozhin is seen standing in a desert area in camouflage and with a rifle in his hands. In the distance, there are more armed men and a pickup truck.
Reuters was not able to geolocate or verify the date of the video, but Prigozhin’s comments and some posts in the pro-Wagner channels suggested it was filmed in Africa.
“The temperature is +50 — everything as we like. The Wagner PMC makes Russia even greater on all continents, and Africa — more free. Justice and happiness — for the African people, we’re making life a nightmare for ISIS and al-Qaida and other bandits,” Prigozhin says in a video.
He then says Wagner is recruiting people and the group “will fulfill the tasks that were set.” The video is accompanied by a telephone number for those who want to join the group.
The future of Wagner and Prigozhin has been unclear since he led a short mutiny against the Russian defense establishment in late June and the Kremlin said he and some of his fighters — who have fought in some of the fiercest battles of the Ukraine war — would leave for Belarus.
Since the mutiny, some Wagner fighters have moved to Belarus and started training the army there. In comments published in late July, Prigozhin also said Wagner was ready to further increase its presence in Africa.
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Will F-16 Fighter Jets Turn War in Ukraine’s Favor?
Ukraine’s president has described the decision by the Netherlands and Denmark to supply his country with F-16 fighter jets as “historic and inspiring.” The Western allies will supply dozens of the technically advanced jets after Washington’s approval. Henry Ridgwell reports from London.
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