Veteran news photographer recounts facing Dallas gunman

Abstract: DALLAS - Waiting outside a federal courthouse, photographer Tom Fox took in Dallas’ 8 a.m. bustle. People dressed for work got out of cars. A homeless man danced on a street pole. But when what initially sounded like a truck backfiring clarified into gunshots, the routine assignment for a veteran journalist morphed in a moment. As shots echoed off the tall buildings, an armed officer dashed past The Dallas Morning News photographer. A man came around the corner half a block away and Fox pulled out his long lens — focusing in on green military-style garb, a mask and a belt full of ammunition. The gun barrel swung around. Fox squeezed off a last frame. And he ran for cover behind a column in the building’s facade. “I was just praying in that corner that he wasn’t going to pass me,” Fox, 51, told The Associated Press. “I was just afraid he was going to be running with a gun. He was going to pass me, see me, identify me with the camera and shoot me.” Fox’s photos offer a rare in-the-moment glimpse of the type of shootings most Americans only see after the fact. In capturing the gunman approaching the doors of the federal building, Fox said he acted on instinct reinforced by his colleagues’ experiences blocks away a few years earlier. Brian Isaack Clyde’s assault on the Earle Cabell Federal Building marks downtown Dallas’ second high-profile shooting by a U.S. Army veteran in less than three years. In July 2016, Micah Johnson shot and killed five law enforcement officers and wounded nine others before police killed him. But Clyde was the only fatality Monday. “I don’t think, if it wasn’t for the July 7th shootings, that I would have known how to react,” said Fox. “It was just instinctual.” Officials have praised the training and courage of the Federal Protective Service officers who confronted Clyde, saying their actions likely prevented many more deaths. But little information has emerged on what motivated the attack. On what appeared to be his Facebook page, Clyde posted frequently about weapons. A post on Sunday with a photo of a short sword has the caption: “A modern gladius to defend the modern Republic.” A Saturday post features a photo of gun magazines. He captioned a video posted June 9 — the day a severe storm hit Dallas: “This storm is about to pay for kicking me off my porch.” In that video Clyde talks to the camera in a candle-lit room. He says, “I don’t know how much longer I have, but the … storm is coming. However, I’m not without defense.” He then lifts a long gun, saying he’s “ready” and “Let’s do it.” Federal authorities have not confirmed the authenticity of the Facebook page, which was taken down Monday after the shooting. Fox said the man pictured in it is the same person he saw at the courthouse. After graduating from high school in Austin in 2015, Clyde went into the U.S. Army. He served as an infantryman from August 2015 to February 2017 and achieved the rank of private first class, according to the Army. Clyde graduated last month from Del Mar College, a community college in Corpus Christi. He was recognized as an outstanding student at a ceremony in April, according to a statement from Del Mar College. Gabriel Wadsworth, who was stationed with Clyde at Fort Campbell in Kentucky, expressed shock at the news. “Nobody knew that he would have done something like this,” Wadsworth told The Dallas Morning News. Crouched in his corner, Fox listened to the sounds of gunfire and shattering glass. A video shows bullets strike the wall above him. Fox began to record video, but said the shots were louder in person than they ever are on the screen. “It was very intense, and it seemed like it wasn’t going to stop,” he said. “I just waited and waited and waited for almost an eternity.” When an officer eventually appeared across the street, Fox said he was determined to find the gunman and “crept along” with police through a nearby parking lot. Fox said he didn’t see Clyde get shot. “The last I saw him was in my camera lens down the street, and I’m thankful that I never saw him until I saw him lying face down in the parking lot,” he said. As officers in blue surgical gloves cared for Clyde, Fox told his editor that there’d been a shooting and texted in a smartphone photo. Fox said police told him to stay on the scene. But before he went in for an FBI interview, the 29-year-Dallas Morning News veteran said he met a colleague on a corner and handed off his cameras’ memory cards. “My photos were already being worked up before I got back to the paper,” he said.

dallas
guns
tom fox
brian isaack clyde
u.s .
u.s. army
mass shootings


Spain busts gang that helped 'finance al-Qaida militia' in Syria

Abstract: MADRID - Spanish police on Tuesday detained 10 nationals of Syrian origin accused of financing “al-Qaida terrorist militia” in Syria, the interior ministry and a source close to the probe said. With Europol’s collaboration, more than 350 agents took part in an operation in Madrid, farther south in Toledo and the eastern province of Valencia. Fourteen homes and other premises were searched by officers. The source, who refused to be named, said the detainees were Spanish of Syrian origin. “The organization was led by a family clan that for years allegedly used a legal business structure to hide illicit operations with which they evaded tax authorities and laundered large amounts of money,” the ministry said in a statement. “The detainees allegedly took away money from each legal operation, substituting the real amount of the operation in the receipt with another lower value amount,” it said. A large part of the stash of cash amassed went to the opposition-held province of Idlib in Syria to “give support and financial backing to terrorist militia there.” Relatives of the suspects are allegedly al-Qaida members. The money was sent via various methods including human couriers and the “hawala” system, an informal method of payment based on trust that is far more difficult to trace than bank transfers. One of those detained had already been arrested in Syria in 2008 and sentenced for his participation in an attack and for belonging to jihadi group Fatah al-Islam. The operation comes just weeks after a Syrian man was detained on suspicion of funneling money to European jihadis linked to the Islamic State group so that they could return to Europe.


Juan Guaido linked to crimes and leads 'mafia of corruption,' says Venezuela prosecutor

Abstract: CARACAS - Venezuela’s chief prosecutor is accusing opposition leader Juan Guaido of being the author of an alleged public corruption scheme. Attorney General Tarek William Saab said Tuesday that his office is investigating two diplomatic representatives of Guaido accused of misappropriating public funds. The two were helping Venezuelan security forces desert into Colombia under Guaido’s leadership when they allegedly stole money and falsified hotel bills. Guaido, who is seeking to oust President Nicolas Maduro, has also ordered a probe into the allegations with assistance from authorities in Colombia, where the alleged crimes took place. The chief prosecutor is a Maduro ally. He says the case is proof that Guaido is leading a “mafia of corruption” and can’t be trusted to exercise real power.

juan guaido
corruption
venezuela
tarek william saab
colombia
nicolas maduro


Street value tops $1 billion: Over 16 tons of cocaine intercepted at Philadelphia port

Abstract: PHILADELPHIA - U.S. authorities seized more than $1 billion worth of cocaine Tuesday from a ship at a Philadelphia port, calling it one of the largest drug busts in American history. The U.S. attorney’s office in Philadelphia announced the massive bust on Twitter on Tuesday afternoon, saying law enforcement agents seized about 16.5 tons (15 metric tons) of cocaine from a large ship at the Packer Marine Terminal. Members of the crew were arrested and face federal charges. The drug seizure is the latest in a series of large cocaine busts along the East Coast. In a March bust in Philadelphia, drug dogs sniffed out 1,185 pounds (538 kg) of cocaine worth about $38 million — at that time the city’s largest seizure of the drug in more than two decades. In February, customs agents seized 3,200 pounds (1,451 kg) at the Port of New York and New Jersey with a street value estimated at $77 million. That was the largest cocaine bust at the ports since 1994. Television footage of the seized ship in Philadelphia showed its name as MSC Gayane. Online ship trackers said it sails under the flag of Liberia and arrived in Philadelphia after 5 a.m. Monday.

cocaine
philadelphia
drugs
msc gayane
u.s .


Paul Manafort looks to remain in federal custody, not go to Rikers Island

Abstract: WASHINGTON - Former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort has been transferred to a correctional facility in New York but will remain in federal custody while he faces state fraud charges, a Justice Department official said Tuesday. Manafort, who is serving a federal prison sentence, is waiting to be arraigned after prosecutors in Manhattan unsealed a 16-count indictment that accuses him of giving false information on mortgage loan applications. He was expected to be held at New York City’s notorious jail complex, Rikers Island, until the state case is resolved. New York prosecutors had sought to take custody of Manafort under a law that provides for the transfer of prisoners indicted in another jurisdiction. But Manafort’s lawyers reached out to the federal Bureau of Prisons and raised concerns that his health and safety could be threatened if he was transferred to Rikers Island, the Justice Department official said. They instead proposed that Manafort continue to be held in federal custody and made available to state officials when needed, the official said. The Justice Department contacted Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. about the proposal from Manafort’s lawyers. The state prosecutors didn’t object to the proposal and the Justice Department “determined to err on the side of caution” by keeping Manafort in federal custody while the state case plays out, the official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the official wasn’t authorized to speak publicly. Manafort’s lawyer, Todd Blanche, wrote a letter to the warden of the federal prison in Pennsylvania where he had been held before the transfer to New York, and said it “would not serve anyone’s interest” for Manafort to be kept at Rikers Island while awaiting his state trial, according to a copy of the letter obtained by AP. Manafort had been in solitary confinement because of his high-profile status in a Virginia jail while his federal case continued. Moving him to New York would mean he would be farther from his family members, Blanche wrote. The attorney did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Rikers Island has been plagued by complaints of violence for years and city officials have come under scrutiny for the use of solitary confinement and the mistreatment of mentally ill inmates. Manafort likely would’ve been held in a facility on the island that houses inmates with high-profile cases who require protective custody. Vance said in a letter to Rosen that his office never suggested Manafort be housed at Rikers Island and took no position about which correctional facility Manafort should be held in while awaiting trial in New York. Manafort was sentenced in March to serve more than seven years in prison on federal charges in cases brought in special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation. The charges related to Manafort’s years of Ukrainian political consulting work, including allegations he concealed his foreign government work from the United States and failed to pay taxes on it. The state charges in New York were announced just minutes after Manafort’s sentencing in Washington. Bureau of Prisons records show Manafort was being held Tuesday at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, a federal lockup in Manhattan.

paul manafort
rikers island
new york
bureau of prisons
robert mueller
donald trump
russia probe


Assassination of German pro-migrant politician raises 'alarm bell' over neo-Nazi threat

Abstract: BERLIN - Germans have voiced shock at the suspected far-right murder of a pro-migrant official, fueling debate on Tuesday on whether the country has failed to take seriously a rising threat from neo-Nazis. Prosecutors on Monday said they suspected an extremist motive in the assassination-style shooting of Kassel city administration chief Walter Luebcke, 65, on June 2. A suspect identified as Stephan E., 45, is in custody, with prosecutors saying he has multiple links to the far-right scene. Although prosecutors saw no evidence so far that the man belonged to a “terrorist network,” the arresting judge pointed to clues for possible “accomplices or confidants” after a witness reported hearing two cars on the night of the shooting, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung daily reported. If a far-right extremist political motive is confirmed, the murder would be post-war Germany’s first killing of a politician by a far-right perpetrator. Interior Minister Horst Seehofer, who called the killing an “alarm bell” for Germany, acknowledged on Tuesday that “right-wing extremism is a significant and serious danger for our society. For the left-leaning Taz daily, the case “must be a turning point. “We must speak about far-right terror, and in a very different way than before,” it warned, stressing that words must be backed up by action to counter the threat. “We need a rigorous procedure against right-wing militants and their structures — and also against the digital mob and the verbal lashing from (Islamophobic movement) Pegida to (the far-right party) AfD.” Markus Nierth — who quit his voluntary village mayor post after receiving threats from the far right over his pro-migrant stance — said the killing revived memories of the weeks and months both he and his wife spent in fear. “‘We’ll get you at some point’ — that’s the message of this case,” he told the daily Berliner Zeitung. Nierth warned that politicians who call for “more understanding for the right-wing” fringes need to wake up. “In Walter Luebcke, a key inhibition threshold has been crossed. Suspected far-right terrorists have now done what they have dreamt about for years in their perverse fantasies of violence.” Investigators into Luebcke’s murder had initially said there was no evidence of an extremist motive, before arresting Stephan E., a former member of the neo-Nazi NPD, more than two weeks later. Observers said the initial failure to draw a link to the far right was chillingly reminiscent of investigations into the killings of nine Turkish and Greek-born immigrants by the far-right militant group National Socialist Underground (NSU). Investigators who worked on the 2000-2007 NSU murders looked in the wrong direction, long suspecting that migrant criminal gangs were to blame. In the Luebcke case too, “some investigators did not want to admit the obvious — that a politician was liquidated here because he stood up for Germany’s constitution,” said Sueddeutsche Zeitung. Urging action, the daily noted that like-minded militants were openly applauding the killing on social media. “Hate is seeping from the fringes into the middle of society.” More than 12,000 far-right extremists across the country are rated dangerous, according to official statistics. Painting a dark picture of the reaches of far-right extremism, the Sueddeutsche daily also cited several cases in which law enforcers themselves were tainted. Some 38 investigations were underway against police officers in Hesse state over right-wing extremism issues. Experts are pointing the finger at the anti-migrant AfD for contributing to an atmosphere of hate. Extremist expert Gideon Botsch estimated that the “next 12 to 18 months could be extremely dangerous. “The enemy has been clearly chosen — the AfD contributed to this, Pegida too,” he said. “All these forces that have officially distanced themselves from violence have contributed a lot to incitement.” Germany’s domestic intelligence agency had said that the AfD’s “The Wing” (Der Fluegel) grouping, as well as the party’s youth organisation JA, were suspected of having ties with the extremist Identitarian Movement. CDU lawmaker Michael Brand also accused the AfD of fanning the flames. “It is true that only the hate and incitement of the last years could have made this possible,” he said. “Anyone who doesn’t see that is blind.”

neo-nazis
murder
walter luebcke
germany
afd
immigration
refugees


In move seen energizing supporters, Trump says U.S. will begin deporting millions

Abstract: WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump is threatening to deport millions of people living in the United States illegally, heralding a plan that could help energize his supporters just ahead of formally announcing his re-election bid . The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement next week will “begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States,” Trump said in a pair of tweets Monday night. “They will be removed as fast as they come in,” he wrote. An administration official said the effort would focus on the more than 1 million people who have been issued final deportation orders by federal judges but remain at large in the U.S. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to explain the president’s tweets. Other U.S. officials with knowledge of the preparations have said the operation was not imminent, and that ICE officials were not aware the president would make public sensitive law enforcement plans on Twitter. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. It is unusual for law enforcement agencies to announce raids before they take place. Some in Trump’s administration believe that decisive shows of force — like mass arrests — can serve as effective deterrents, sending a message to those considering making the journey to the U.S. that it’s not worth coming. The acting head of ICE, Mark Morgan, said in an interview with journalists earlier this month that there would be enforcement action coming that would include deporting families, and that it would be done humanely. Trump has threatened a series of increasingly drastic actions as he has tried to stem the flow of Central American migrants crossing the southern border, which has risen dramatically on his watch. He recently dropped a threat to slap tariffs on Mexico after the country agreed to dispatch its national guard and step-up coordination and enforcement efforts. A senior Mexican official said Monday that, three weeks ago, about 4,200 migrants were arriving at the U.S. border daily. Now that number has dropped to about 2,600. Immigration was a central theme of Trump’s 2016 campaign and he is expected to hammer it as he tries to fire up his base heading into the 2020 campaign. Trump will formally launch his re-election bid Tuesday night at a rally in Orlando, Florida — a state that is crucial to his path back to the White House.

donald trump
immigrants
u.s .
refugees
2020 u.s. presidential election


Apollo astronauts celebrate 50 years since first moon landing

Abstract: PARIS - Three astronauts instrumental in the groundbreaking U.S. space program of the 1960s and 70s gathered at the Paris Air Show on Tuesday to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11, the mission that first put a man on the moon. Walter Cunningham, 87, who was part of the Apollo 7 mission, Al Worden, 87, who flew with Apollo 15, and Charlie Duke, 83, who walked on the moon with Apollo 16, recounted their extra-terrestrial experiences before a captive airshow audience. Worden, who orbited the moon alone for days in 1971, holds the feat of having been the world’s most isolated human, while Cunningham is notable for being part of a team that talked back to Mission Control in 1968, getting them blacklisted from future flights. Despite that setback, which came after the astronauts asked Mission Control if they could re-enter the atmosphere without helmets on and were told no, Cunningham remembers his experiences fondly. “Five hundred years from now there is only going to be one thing they remember about Apollo, and that is that man landed on the moon,” he told the audience. “That’ll be it. And people will have no idea how hard it was, for example, to get the first Apollo mission off. Apollo 7 was the fifth mission that Wally Schirra, Donn Eisele and I were on, and finally we flew.” NASA pioneered space flight in the 1960s, amid competition from Soviet cosmonauts, but not without serious risks. The Apollo 1 mission burned up on the launchpad during a test in 1967, killing the crew and prompting NASA to halt all attempts at manned flights. Only two years later, once the Command Module and spacesuits had been redesigned, was Apollo 7 cleared for launch. Charlie Duke was a part of the Apollo 16 mission in 1972, and became the youngest person to walk on the moon, at 36. “It’s like ‘well I’m home, I know where to go, I know what’s over here,’ ” he said of the experience, which only 12 people have ever had. “It was a feeling of belonging, but it was also wonder, awe, excitement, adventure. “The best way I could describe it, if you could imagine a five-year-old kid on Christmas and birthday and everything else rolled into one. That was the most exciting moment in my life.” Apollo 11, the mission that ultimately delivered Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin to the moon, touched down on July 20th, 1969. NASA has organized a series of events to commemorate the 50th anniversary.

apollo
moon
space
paris air show
walter cunningham
al worden
charlie duke
nasa
neil armstrong
u.s .


Boris Johnson builds lead in race to be next U.K. prime minister

Abstract: LONDON - Boris Johnson increased his lead Tuesday in the race to become Britain’s next prime minister as one of his rivals was eliminated in a party vote, while upstart candidate Rory Stewart defied expectations to stay in the contest. Johnson, a flamboyant former foreign secretary, won 126 of the 313 votes cast Tuesday in a second-round ballot of Conservative Party lawmakers that left five contenders standing. The total all but guarantees that Johnson will be one of the candidates in a runoff that will be decided by party members. Dominic Raab, who tried to vie with Johnson for the votes of committed Brexit supporters, got only 30 votes Tuesday, three short of the threshold needed to go through to the next round. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt, Environment Secretary Michael Gove, Home Secretary Sajid Javid and Stewart all remain contenders in what is now effectively a race for second place and a runoff spot. All five candidates were taking part in a live television debate on Tuesday evening, two days after Johnson skipped another televised debate despite being the front-runner. Tory lawmakers will vote again Wednesday and Thursday, eliminating at least one candidate each time. The final two contenders will go to a postal ballot of all 160,000 Conservative Party members nationwide. The winner, due to be announced in late July, will replace Theresa May as both party leader and British prime minister. May stepped down as party leader earlier this month after failing to secure Parliament’s approval for her Brexit deal. Johnson was already the front-runner after last week’s first round of voting in a race that started out with 10 competitors. He has since been backed by several lawmakers who have dropped out. He is admired by many Conservatives for his ability to connect with voters, but others mistrust him for his long record of misleading and false statements, verbal blunders and erratic performance in high office. Johnson added a dozen votes to his tally from last week, securing more than the combined total for the next three challengers: Hunt with 46 votes, Gove with 41 and Stewart with 37. Javid scraped into the next round with 33 votes. Stewart has the most momentum, almost doubling his first-round tally, while Hunt and Gove barely increased their totals. Stewart, Britain’s minister for international development, calls himself the “anti-Boris,” the pragmatist rival to populist Johnson. He has energized the contest with a combination of plain-speaking and quirkiness. He calls for compromises on Brexit, and accuses his rivals of peddling Brexit “fairy tales” about the amazing deals they will secure from the EU. A former diplomat who once walked across Afghanistan and was a deputy provincial governor in Iraq after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, Stewart is also the only contender regularly asked whether he has been a British spy. He denies it — but notes that former spies are barred by law from disclosing their covert pasts. Hunt and Gove are both considered experienced and competent ministers, but unexciting. Gove seems to have shrugged off the revelation that he used cocaine two decades ago. Javid, the son of Pakistani immigrants, says he offers a common-man alternative to private school-educated rivals like Johnson and Stewart, although he was a highly paid investment banker before entering politics. All the contenders vow they will succeed where May failed and lead Britain out of the European Union, though they differ about how to break the country’s Brexit deadlock. Johnson says the U.K. must leave the bloc on the scheduled date of Oct. 31, with or without a divorce deal to smooth the way. The EU says it won’t reopen the Brexit agreement it struck with May’s government, which has been rejected three times by Britain’s Parliament. Many economists and businesses say a no-deal exit would cause economic turmoil by ripping up the rules that govern trade between Britain and the EU. Johnson’s rivals are divided over how willing they are to contemplate a no-deal Brexit. Javid says a no-deal would be preferable to further delays, while Hunt warns it would cause “potentially severe economic disruption.” Gove says he would be willing to postpone Brexit further in order to secure a deal. Stewart has ruled out a no-deal Brexit and aims to get Parliament to back something very much like May’s rejected Brexit agreement. As he arrived for Tuesday’s BBC debate, Stewart thanked supporters for keeping him in the race but said “there’s a long way to go.” “I’m still very much the underdog in this race,” he said.

boris johnson
rory stewart
conservatives
brexit
jeremy hunt
michael gove
u.k .
u.k. parliament


EU fights to keep nuclear deal alive amid U.S. and Iran pressure

Abstract: BRUSSELS - A year after the United States pulled out of the Iran nuclear agreement, the pact is at severe risk of collapse and the European Union is caught in the middle, struggling to keep supply lines open to the Islamic Republic’s wilting economy under the threat of U.S. sanctions. With few real options left, their trust in the Trump administration running low, and fears rising that conflict could break out, major powers Germany, France and Britain have been reduced to repeating calls for restraint as pressure builds and Iran threatens to walk away from the painstakingly drafted 2015 deal. In an effort to keep Iran’s economy afloat and save an agreement they believe has stopped Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, the Europeans are turning to diplomacy to try to encourage other countries to buy more Iranian oil. They also have set up a barter-type system to evade possible U.S. sanctions. “We have to do everything to solve the conflict situation with Iran in a peaceful manner,” German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday. “We will do everything to impress on all sides, but especially to make clear to Iran, that this serious situation mustn’t be aggravated.” The pact, which ensures that Tehran’s nuclear program be restricted to civilian uses in exchange for economic assistance, was signed by Iran, the U.S., Russia, China, France Germany and Britain. U.S. President Donald Trump pulled Washington out of the deal in May 2018. “We are relying on Iran continuing to abide by it,” Merkel said. “If that isn’t the case, that will of course have consequences.” But her tougher tone does little to hide the fact that there’s not a lot that Europe can do. Under pressure from U.S. sanctions once held in check by the deal, the value of Iran’s currency has plummeted by about 60 percent in the last year. Inflation is up 37 percent and the cost of food and medicine has soared 40 percent to 60 percent, according to EU figures. The Europeans believe the growing economic pressure on President Hassan Rouhani may well have prompted Iran’s announcement that it will exceed the uranium stockpile limit set by deal in the next 10 days — a time frame that seems unlikely but which cannot be excluded. To get around possible U.S. sanctions, the Europeans have come up with a complicated barter-type system to skirt direct financial transactions with Iran. The workaround, dubbed INSTEX, would help ensure trade between Iran and Europe by allowing buyers and sellers to exchange money without relying on the usual cross-border financial transactions. It is not yet operational, although the EU promises that it will be “soon.” The EU has also introduced a “blocking statute” to protect European companies from the effects of U.S. sanctions, but many international corporations do more business in the United States than in Iran and have already severed ties with Tehran rather than risk running afoul of Washington. The real problem, though, is oil. Iran’s economy is not diversified and oil makes up about 80 percent of its exports. The country was selling 1 million to 1.5 million barrels a day a year ago, and is only selling 600,000-700,000 now, according to EU estimates. But EU member states use little Iranian oil. China, another signatory to the nuclear deal, India and perhaps Turkey could buy more, so the Europeans are using diplomatic channels to encourage them to do so. It’s difficult to see what more can be done. The EU provides funds to Iran’s agricultural sector and for environmental protection. The country benefits from the European research budget and students have access to EU programs. Beyond that, the 28 nations have donated substantial earthquake relief. Even as the rhetoric from Iran has risen, no specific new request has been made of the Europeans, apart from a general demand to help keep the economy afloat. Nor has there been any help from across the Atlantic. In withdrawing the U.S. from the deal, Trump said it does nothing to stop Iran from developing missiles or creating problems in the Gulf region and Middle East. Last month, the U.S. ended waivers that allowed some countries to continue buying Iranian oil and deployed the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier battle group to the Gulf. It also sent four nuclear-capable B-52 bombers to Qatar and deployed more Patriot air defense systems. After two oil tankers were damaged last week in the Strait of Hormuz in what the U.S. said was an attack it blamed on Iran, concern rose that a conflict could break out. Under pressure from Washington and Tehran, European confidence in both sides appears to be low. “We base our assessments and our judgments on facts, on the verification mechanisms that are in place and that we trust,” EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said Monday, referring to monitoring of the accord by the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency. The IAEA has found Iran to be complying with the deal, as recently as May. The question remains: What more can be done to keep Iran onboard as it sets new deadlines and Washington shows little sign of backing down? “It is not an easy exercise,” said Mogherini, who was due to hold talks in Washington on Tuesday with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. “During the last year, it has become increasingly difficult for all to keep the nuclear deal fully implemented.”

eu
iran
nuclear weapons
donald trump
u.s .
u.n .
nuclear energy
iran nuclear deal


Trump officially launches re-election bid: Democrats 'want to destroy our country'

Abstract: ORLANDO, FLORIDA - Jabbing at the press and poking the eye of the political establishment he ran against in 2016, U.S. President Donald Trump officially kicked off his re-election campaign Tuesday with a grievance-filled Florida rally that focused more on settling scores than laying out his agenda for a second term. Addressing a crowd of thousands at Orlando’s Amway Center, Trump complained he had been “under assault from the very first day” of his presidency by the “fake news media” and an “illegal witch hunt” that had tried to keep him and his supporters down. He painted a disturbing picture of what life would look like if he loses in 2020, accusing his critics of “un-American conduct” and telling the crowd that Democrats “want to destroy you and they want to destroy our country as we know it.” “A vote for any Democrat in 2020 is a vote for the rise of radical socialism and the destruction of the American dream,” he said, ripping “radical” and “unhinged” Democrats even as he made only passing mention of any of the men and women running to replace him. The apocalyptic language and finger-pointing made clear that Trump’s 2020 campaign will probably look a lot like his improbably successful run three years ago. While Trump’s campaign has tried to professionalize, with shiny office space and a large and growing staff, and despite 2½ years occupying the Oval Office as America’s commander-in-chief, Trump nonetheless remained focused on energizing his base and offering himself as a political outsider running against Washington. He appeared eager for a rerun of 2016, spending considerably more time focused on former Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, whose name elicited “Lock her up!” chants, than on his current challengers. Trump aides scheduled the kickoff near the four-year anniversary of the day when the bombastic reality television star and New York tabloid fixture launched his long-shot campaign for president with a famous escalator ride in front of a crowd that included paid actors. Trump spoke fondly of his 2016 run, calling it “a defining moment in American history.” He said that, in the years since, he had fundamentally upended Washington, staring down “a corrupt and broken political establishment” and restoring a government “of, for and by the people.” Of course, Trump never really stopped running. He officially filed for re-election on Jan. 20, 2017, the day of his inauguration, and held his first 2020 rally in February 2017 in Melbourne, Florida. He has continued holding his signature “Make America Great Again” rallies in the months since. Still, he told the Orlando crowd he was standing “before you to officially launch my campaign for a second time.” Trump is hoping to replicate the dynamics that allowed him to capture the Republican Party and then the presidency in 2016 as an insurgent intent on disrupting the status quo. Back then, he successfully appealed to disaffected voters who felt left behind by economic dislocation and demographic shifts. And he has no intention of abandoning that mantle, even if he is the face of the institutions he looks to disrupt. He underscored that on the eve of the rally in the must-win swing state of Florida, returning to the hard-line immigration themes of his first campaign by tweeting that, next week, Immigration and Customs Enforcement “will begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States.” That promise, which came with no details and sparked Democratic condemnation, seemed to offer a peek into a campaign that will largely be fought along the same lines as his first bid, with very few new policy proposals for a second term. Early Democratic front-runner Joe Biden said Tuesday that Trump’s politics are “all about dividing us” in ways that are “dangerous — truly, truly dangerous.” Another leading Democratic contender, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, said Trump had delivered “an hour-and-a-half speech of lies, distortions and total, absolute nonsense.” But those involved in the president’s re-election effort believe that his brash version of populism, combined with his mantra to “drain the swamp,” still resonates, despite his administration’s cozy ties with lobbyists and corporations and the Trump family’s apparent efforts to profit off the presidency. Advisers believe that, in an age of extreme polarization, many Trump backers view their support for the president as part of their identity, one not easily shaken. They point to his seemingly unmovable support from his base supporters as evidence that he is still viewed the same way he was as a candidate: the bomb-throwing political rebel. Trump tried to make the case that he had made good on his 2016 promises, including cracking down on illegal immigration and boosting jobs. Near the end of the rally, Trump ran through a list of promises for a second term, pledging a new immigration system, new trade deals, a health care overhaul and a cure for cancer and “many diseases,” including the eradication of AIDS in America. Florida is considered a near-must-win state for Trump to hold onto the White House, and both parties have been mobilizing for a fierce and expensive battle in the state, which Trump has visited as president more often than any other. Although Trump bested Clinton there in 2016, a Quinnipiac University poll released Tuesday found Biden leading Trump by 50 percent to 41 percent, and Sanders besting him by 48 percent to 42 percent.

democrats
donald trump
republicans
elections
2020 u.s. presidential election


Ecuador denies Galapagos Islands will host U.S. military base

Abstract: QUITO - Ecuador President Lenin Moreno insisted Tuesday the United States would not be installing a military base on the Galapagos Islands, a day after the government revealed that American aircraft would be able to use an airstrip there. “There are not, nor will there be, foreign military bases in the country,” Moreno wrote on Twitter, expressing his commitment to preserving the Galapagos Islands. Defense Minister Oswaldo Jarrin caused a stir on Monday when he revealed that an air surveillance agreement signed with Washington would allow U.S. planes to refuel or temporarily be stationed at the San Cristobal airport. Jarrin said those planes would be taking part in surveillance to combat drug trafficking and illegal fishing, but would only use the airstrip “once a month, for no more than three days.” Moreno stressed that “aerial surveillance is a joint activity between several countries to protect this world heritage” site that lies around 1,000 km (600 miles) off Ecuador’s Pacific coast. “Peace, sovereignty and national security are our legacy,” added the president. Jarrin had been called before Congress’ international relations commission to explain the U.S. agreement, while several lawmakers voiced concerns over Ecuador’s sovereignty and the impact on the environment. The Galapagos Islands are best known for their unique flora and fauna, which inspired naturalist Charles Darwin to write his landmark 1859 study on evolution, “On the Origin of Species.” They are home to species of tortoises, iguanas, birds and fish found nowhere else. Ecuador’s constitution, adopted in 2008, prohibits the installation of foreign military bases in the country. Moreno’s predecessor, Rafael Correa, decided in 2007 not to extend beyond 2009 the lease of a U.S. base in the Manta fishing port, which was used to carry out anti-drug trafficking flights. However, since last September, U.S. planes started taking off from the southwestern coastal town of Guayaquil on missions to combat drug trafficking and illegal fishing following a new pact signed between Quito and Washington. Relations between the two countries were tense during socialist Correa’s decade in power from 2007-17 but have improved since Moreno took over. Correa has lived in Belgium since 2017 and sources close to the former president claim he has requested political asylum there. He is wanted in his homeland on suspicion of kidnapping, a charge he has dismissed as “political persecution.”

ecuador
galapagos islands
military
lenin moreno
u.s .


Candidate Joe Biden balances middle-class appeal with ritzy fundraisers

Abstract: HIGHLAND PARK, TEXAS - During the early weeks of his presidential campaign, Joe Biden stopped by this exclusive Dallas-area enclave to headline a fundraiser at the home of Russel Budd, a lawyer known for overseeing billions of dollars in settlements with corporations sued for asbestos exposure. The former vice president urged the lawyers in the room to go after pharmaceutical companies and told them their work mattered. Trial lawyers, he said, “are the only ones who shout out and scream for people who don’t have the ability to do it for themselves.” His visit to Highland Park, a neighborhood with Spanish Colonial mansions and residents including Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, is becoming routine. During the first six weeks of his campaign, roughly half of the more than a dozen fundraisers Biden headlined were in the opulent homes of prominent trial lawyers in cities including Atlanta, Boston and Chicago. On Tuesday, he was slated to attend two New York fundraisers held by attorneys, including one hosted at a personal injury law firm. Biden’s ties to trial lawyers could help pad his campaign coffers for what’s expected to be a long, bruising primary fight against nearly two dozen Democratic rivals. But they could also leave him vulnerable to criticism that he’s cozying up to wealthy donors who may want something in return if he becomes president, an argument that could undermine his efforts to portray his campaign as a battle to protect the middle class. A politician courting wealthy benefactors who are tied to specific industries or interest groups is nothing new. But the legal profession is already vastly overrepresented in American politics, with lawyers more than 100 times as likely to get elected to Congress as the average voter, according to Adam Bonica, a Stanford University political science professor who studies the political influence of the legal profession. An administration that favors their interests would lend them even more sway. “That is pretty much the most extreme form of interest group self-protection,” Bonica said. Biden’s campaign declined comment for this story. The former vice president has walked a fine line during some of his fancier events. At a Monday fundraiser at the New York home of billionaire investment manager Jim Chanos, Biden said 360,000 people had contributed an average of $55 to his campaign this quarter, far less than the thousands of dollars it takes for a donor to attend a fundraiser. During another event in a high-rise on Chicago’s Gold Coast hosted by lawyer William Singer, Biden credited his wealthy audience as the product of the middle class he’s pledging to strengthen. “You all have done very well, and you deserve what you’ve done because you’ve worked hard for it,” Biden said. “But this country was built by ordinary people in the neighborhoods you come from.” The amount of money Biden has raised from trial lawyers will become clear when his second quarter fundraising report becomes public next month. During his brief 2008 presidential bid, about 20 percent of the $8.5 million Biden raised from donors came from lawyers or people in the legal profession, according to an analysis of Federal Election Commission data. His ties to the profession go back decades. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee from 1987 to 1995, Biden left a record of siding with trial lawyers by blocking Republican efforts to limit punitive damages in federal cases. He supports suing drug manufacturers, attributing the nation’s opioid crisis in part to them. As president, Biden could be counted on to appoint friendlier plaintiff’s lawyer judges to the federal bench, said Ken Jacobsen, a lawyer who attended Biden’s first fundraiser as a 2020 candidate in April. “Trial courts have taken a very pro-business, anti-consumer approach,” said Jacobsen, a Philadelphia lawyer who also teaches at Temple University law school. “I believe Joe’s approach to justices is going to be that, now, we’ve got to make up for the years past.” Biden is hardly the first or only Democratic politician to lean on trial lawyers for money. During the 2016 election, they were a major source of campaign cash for Hillary Clinton, who collected at least $41.5 million from them, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. In 2012, they gave about $27 million to Barack Obama, the data show. Lawyers were the top industry donors listed in the first quarter fundraising report for Biden’s 2020 rival Kamala Harris, who was previously California’s attorney general. Harris, elected to the Senate in 2016, is among a handful of lawyers who rose to prominence in their states as a doorway into politics. Harris was San Francisco’s top prosecutor before she was elected attorney general in 2010. Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar was the top prosecutor in her state’s most populous county before being elected to the Senate in 2006 and has historically received much of her campaign cash from the legal profession. And attorneys were also a top donor to a political action committee for Montana Gov. Steve Bullock, who was his state’s attorney general before he was elected governor in 2012. But some of Biden’s lawyer supporters say he has an edge over his rivals. Like any successful courtroom lawyer, Biden has the ability to connect personally with his audience and the perception of what it takes to sway the convincible, they say. “The art of trying cases is all about being able to persuade,” said Tom Nolan, a Los Angeles lawyer planning a July fundraiser for Biden. “What I like about Biden — and other trial lawyers do — is that people will listen to him, and he can persuade them.” Fellow Los Angeles lawyer Tom Girardi, who attended a Hollywood fundraiser for Biden in May, put it more simply: Biden, he says, can win. “It’s a jury trial, baby. And you’ve got to get nine of those 12 jurors, or you lose the case,” he said.

joe biden
democrats
kamala harris
u.s .
donald trump
2020 u.s. presidential election


Trump sows doubt over use of U.S. force to protect Gulf oil after 'very minor' ship attack impact

Abstract: GENEVA/DUBAI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES - U.S. President Donald Trump said he was prepared to take military action to stop Tehran from getting a nuclear bomb but left open whether he would back the use of force to protect Gulf oil supplies that Washington fears may be under threat by Iran. Worries about a confrontation between Iran and the United States have mounted since attacks last week on two oil tankers near the strategic Strait of Hormuz shipping lane at the entrance to the Gulf. Washington blamed long-time foe Iran for the incidents. Tehran denies responsibility but the attacks, and similar ones in May, have further soured relations that have plummeted since Trump pulled the United States out of a landmark international nuclear deal with Iran in May 2018. Trump has restored and extended U.S. economic sanctions on Iran. That has forced countries around the world to boycott Iranian oil or face sanctions of their own. But in an interview with Time magazine, Trump, striking a different tone from some Republican lawmakers who have urged a military approach to Iran, said last week’s tanker attacks in the Gulf of Oman had only a “very minor” impact so far. Asked if he would consider military action to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons or to ensure the free flow of oil through the Gulf, Trump said: “I would certainly go over nuclear weapons and I would keep the other a question mark.” The nuclear deal with Iran, which was reached in 2015 during Barack Obama’s presidency, aimed to head off any pathway to an Iranian nuclear bomb. Trump says the agreement failed to address Iran’s missile program or punish it for waging proxy wars in Middle East countries. Tehran has decried the toughening of U.S. sanctions and urged other signatories to take action to save the nuclear pact or see Iran turn its back on the deal. The United States will maintain its pressure campaign on Iran and continue to deter aggression in the region but does not want the conflict with Tehran to escalate, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Tuesday. “We have been engaged in many messages, even this moment right here, communicating to Iran that we are there to deter aggression,” Pompeo told reporters. “President Trump does not want war and we will continue to communicate that message while doing the things that are necessary to protect American interests in the region.” As tension with Iran rises, uncertainty about leadership of the Pentagon grew on Tuesday with the news that acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan had withdrawn from consideration to head the U.S. military. USA Today has reported the FBI had been examining a nine-year-old domestic dispute involving Shanahan and his then-wife. Shanahan on Monday had announced the deployment of about 1,000 more troops to the Middle East for what he said were defensive purposes, citing concerns about a threat from Iran. The deployment is in addition to a 1,500-troop increase announced last month in response to tanker attacks in May. Russia told the United States it should drop what it called provocative plans to deploy more troops to the Middle East and cease actions that looked like a conscious attempt to provoke war with Iran, and urged restraint on all sides. “What we see are unending and sustained U.S. attempts to crank up political, psychological, economic and yes military pressure on Iran in quite a provocative way,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov was cited as saying by Russian media. “They (these actions) cannot be assessed as anything but a conscious course to provoke war,” he said. China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, warned the world should not open a “Pandora’s box” in the Middle East, as he denounced U.S. pressure on Iran and urged Tehran to heed the deal. Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany, another signatory, was doing all it could to ease tensions with Iran but said Iran must abide by the 2015 deal. Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said in a speech that Iran did not seek war and dismissed U.S. efforts to isolate Iran. “Iran will not wage war against any nation,” he said. “Despite all of the Americans’ efforts in the region and their desire to cut off our ties with all of the world and their desire to keep Iran secluded, they have been unsuccessful.” But the commander of Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards Corps said on Tuesday that Iran’s ballistic missiles were capable of hitting “carriers in the sea” with great precision. “These missiles are domestically produced and are difficult to intercept and hit with other missiles,” Brig. Gen. Hossein Salami said in a televised speech. He said Iran’s ballistic missile technology had changed the balance of power in the Middle East. Heightened Iran-U.S. tensions have stoked fears of increased violence in countries where Iran and its Gulf Arab regional rivals are locked in a sometimes bloody struggle for influence. Saudi air defenses intercepted two drones fired by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi group, Saudi media said on Tuesday. The group’s Al Masirah TV said the Houthis had sent drones to strike the airport of the Saudi city of Abha. Three rockets landed on a military base hosting U.S. forces north of Baghdad late on Monday, an Iraqi military statement said, without providing further details. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack. U.S. officials said last month there was an increased threat from Iran-backed militias against U.S. interests in Iraq, and the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad evacuated hundreds of staff.

oil
shipping
donald trump
iran
mike pompeo
patrick shanahan
u.s .
gas
iran nuclear deal
hormuz tanker attack


At least 14 reported slain in attack on ethnic Dogon villages in Mali

Abstract: BAMAKO - At least 14 people were killed in an attack on two ethnic Dogon villages in central Mali, local officials said Tuesday. No group immediately claimed responsibility for Monday’s attack but Mali has seen a spate of violence this year between ethnic Dogon and Fulani communities. The attacks on Ganfafani and Yoro villages near the border with Burkina Faso left “14 people dead according to a provisional toll,” said local judicial official Boubacar Sidiki Samake. A Mali military source said as many as 40 people may have been killed. Goundjou Poudiougou, a local community official, said a dozen bodies had been counted in both villages. Earlier this year 130 people were killed in an attack on a village by suspected militiamen from a rival ethnic group. Jihadist raids remain a persistent threat in Mali, but in the center of the country, an ethnic mosaic, attacks have had a bloody impact on groups that have a history of rivalry.


U.N. expert eyes probe of Saudi prince's role in murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, citing 'credible evidence'

Abstract: GENEVA - An independent U.N. human rights expert investigating the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi on Wednesday recommended an investigation into the possible role of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, citing “credible evidence.” The 101-page report released by Agnes Callamard into the October killing of Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul calls on U.N. bodies or Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to “demand” a follow-up criminal investigation. Callamard noted the “extreme sensitivity” of considering the criminal responsibility of the crown prince, as well as Saud Alqahtani, a senior adviser to the Saudi royal court who has not been charged. “No conclusion is made as to guilt,” she wrote of the two men. “The only conclusion made is that there is credible evidence meriting further investigation, by a proper authority, as to whether the threshold of criminal responsibility has been met.” She wrote that there was “no reason why sanctions should not be applied against the Crown Prince and his personal assets” — noting that sanctions regimes have been put in place in the past even before guilt was determined. But she played down the focus on a single person, writing: “The search for justice and accountability is not singularly dependent on finding a ‘smoking gun’ or the person holding it.” She wrote that her focus was mainly on identifying those who may have failed in or abused their positions of authority. Eleven people are on trial in Saudi Arabia in largely secret proceedings, and five could face the death penalty. Callamard wrote that she obtained access to a recording of the killing on Oct. 2. She said she had received information about a “financial package” offered to Khashoggi’s children, “but it is questionable whether such package amounts to compensation under international human rights law.” Callamard noted limitations on her inquiry, which began in January. She received no response to her request to travel to Saudi Arabia. She wrote that she had received only a total of 45 minutes of tapes recorded within the consulate around the time of the killing, while Turkish intelligence had referenced some seven hours of recordings. The report offers gruesome, nearly minute-by-minute accounting of the events surrounding the killing, and cites sounds of a buzzing saw that could have been used to dismember Khashoggi’s body. She also identified by name 15 suspects in the case. The U.S. State Department has publicly designated 16 people for their roles in the killing of Khashoggi. Many U.S. lawmakers have criticized President Donald Trump for not condemning Saudi Arabia for the journalist’s killing.

murder
jamal khashoggi
rights
mohammed bin salman
saudi arabia
media
u.n .
turkey


Mike Pompeo snubs his experts and blocks inclusion of Saudis on U.S. child soldiers list, say sources

Abstract: WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has blocked the inclusion of Saudi Arabia on a U.S. list of countries that recruit child soldiers, dismissing his experts’ findings that a Saudi-led coalition has been using under-age fighters in Yemen’s civil war, according to four people familiar with the matter. The decision, which came after a fierce internal debate, could prompt new accusations by human rights advocates and some lawmakers that U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration is prioritizing security and economic interests in relations with oil-rich Saudi Arabia, a major U.S. ally and arms customer. Pompeo’s move comes amid heightened tensions between the United States and Iran, the Saudis’ bitter regional rival. State Department experts recommended adding Saudi Arabia to the soon-to-be released list based in part on news reports and human rights groups’ assessments that the desert kingdom has hired child fighters from Sudan to fight for the U.S.-backed coalition in Yemen, the four sources said. The Saudi government, Saudi Embassy in Washington and Saudi-led coalition did not respond to requests for comment. The coalition has previously said it was upholding international human rights standards and denied the use of child soldiers. The experts’ recommendation faced resistance from some other State Department officials who, according to three of the sources, argued that it was not clear whether the Sudanese forces were under the control of Sudanese officers or directed by the Saudi-led coalition. A New York Times report in December cited Sudanese fighters saying their Saudi and United Arab Emirates commanders directed them at a safe distance from the fighting against the coalition’s foes, Iran-aligned Houthi militias. Pompeo rejected the recommendation from the experts, who are from the State Department’s anti-human trafficking office, said the four sources who spoke on condition of anonymity. The office has a key role in investigating the use of child soldiers worldwide. “The United States condemns the unlawful recruitment and use of child soldiers. We place great importance on ending the practice wherever it occurs,” a State Department official said in response to Reuters’ questions. The official, however, did not specifically address the Saudi decision or whether any consideration was given to Riyadh’s security ties to Washington. Instead of adding Saudi Arabia to the list, Sudan will be reinstated after being removed last year, three of the sources said. A spokesman for Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, which has contributed fighters to the Yemen war, said the force is affiliated with Sudan’s military. “Based on Sudanese laws, it does not recruit minors,” he said. He did not directly respond to a question on who controlled Sudanese forces in Yemen. The UAE government did not respond to a request for comment. The child soldiers list will be part of the State Department’s annual global Trafficking in Persons report, which the sources said is expected to be released as early as Thursday. The Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2008 requires the State Department to report annually on countries using child fighters, defined as “any person under 18 years of age who takes a direct part in hostilities as a member of governmental armed forces.” Foreign militaries on the list cannot receive U.S. aid, training and weapons unless the president issues full or partial waivers of those sanctions based on “national interest.” Trump and his predecessors have done this in the past for countries with close security ties to the United States. While internal debates over issues like child soldier violations often take place ahead of the release of the annual State Department list, this one was especially heated, several of the sources said. Since the end of 2016, the Saudi-led coalition has deployed as many as 14,000 Sudanese at any given time, including children as young as 14, to fight in Yemen, offering payments of up to $10,000 per recruit, according to the New York Times. The article cited Sudanese fighters who had returned home and Sudanese lawmakers. In Washington, the Yemen conflict is a contentious issue well beyond the State Department. Republican and Democratic lawmakers, citing evidence of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s role in the 2018 killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi and angered by the civilian toll from the Saudi-led air campaign in Yemen, have ramped up efforts to block Trump’s multibillion-dollar arms sales to Saudi Arabia. Congressmen Tom Malinowski and Ted Lieu organized a letter to Pompeo from more than a dozen lawmakers in March that said they were “gravely concerned by credible reports” of the Saudi-led coalition deploying Sudanese child fighters in Yemen. They called for a U.S. investigation, including into whether they had been armed with U.S.-made weapons, and also asked for an inquiry into “credible evidence of Houthi forces forcibly conscripting minors into combat.” Sudan sent thousands of troops to Yemen with the Saudi-led coalition that intervened in the civil war in 2015 against the Houthis, who had captured most of the main populated areas of the country and forced President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi into exile. Almost from the start, accusations of the use of child soldiers have dogged the parties to the bloody conflict. A report by an independent group of experts to the U.N. Human Rights Council in August 2018 found that all sides in Yemen “conscripted or enlisted children into armed forces or groups and used them to participate actively in hostilities.” The Trump administration has faced controversy in the past over its handling of the child soldier issue. Reuters reported in 2017 that then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson opted to remove Iraq and Myanmar from the child soldiers list and rejected a recommendation to add Afghanistan to it, despite the department publicly acknowledging that children were still being conscripted in those countries. The State Department said at the time that while the use of child soldiers was “abhorrent,” it was still in “technical compliance with the law.” Pompeo, who succeeded Tillerson, reinstated Iraq and Myanmar on the list last year.

mike pompeo
child soldiers
saudi arabia
yemen
rights
sudan
houthis
children
u.s .
rsf


Xi writes rare op-ed in North Korea's ruling party newspaper, touts 'grand plan' for East Asia stability

Abstract: Chinese President Xi Jinping has penned a front page op-ed in the Wednesday edition of North Korea’s ruling party newspaper, a day ahead of his landmark visit to the nuclear-armed country, writing that Beijing is willing to work with Pyongyang to prepare a “grand plan” for achieving “permanent stability” in East Asia. In the commentary in the Rodong Sinmun — the official mouthpiece of the North’s ruling Worker’s Party of Korea — Xi said Beijing vowed to play a greater role in pushing for progress on stalled nuclear negotiations between the U.S. and North Korea, calling Pyongyang’s demands “reasonable.” “We will actively contribute to regional peace, stability, development and prosperity by strengthening communication and coordination with North Korea and other relevant parties to make progress in talks and negotiations on the issues on the Korean Peninsula,” Xi said in the piece. Nuclear talks between Washington and Pyongyang have been deadlocked since a February summit in Hanoi between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump collapsed without a deal due to major differences over the scope of the North’s denuclearization and potential sanctions relief by the United States. Beijing, the North’s top ally and economic lifeline, has advocated for a step-by-step, dual-track process — an approach similar to the “phased and synchronous” one pushed by Pyongyang — but Washington has said that the North must first relinquish its nukes before the U.S. agrees to ease crippling sanctions. Experts say Kim is unlikely to give up his nuclear arsenal, which he views as essential to the survival of his regime. A report by Voice of America on Monday, citing what it said was a leaked internal North Korean policy document, appeared to back up this claim, making clear that Kim saw the meeting in Hanoi as a way of striking “a final deal” and a path toward acceptance as a “global nuclear strategic state.” The Japan Times could not independently confirm the veracity of the document. Nevertheless, China appears to be ramping up its backing for a step-by-step approach in the U.S.-North Korea nuclear talks by leaning on both Kim and Trump. Xi’s front-page commentary, a rarity for a foreign head of state, was seen as an attempt by the Chinese leader to highlight Sino-North Korean ties ahead of his two-day “state visit” to the country at the invitation of Kim. The trip, his first since assuming office in 2013, will also mark the first time in 14 years that a Chinese leader has visited the North and comes on the heels of four visits to China by Kim since last year. Experts said that the trip’s timing — one week before the Group of 20 summit in the city of Osaka — was intended as a signal to the U.S. and Japan that his influence and backing for Kim has not waned. “While the relationship between China and North Korea is no longer as close as ‘lips and teeth,’ as it used to be portrayed, Xi Jinping will want to demonstrate that he is still the key global player when it comes to dealing with North Korea, and that China cannot be sidelined in any future negotiations on the country’s nuclear program,” Katie Stallard-Blanchette, a fellow with the Wilson Center think tank in Washington, wrote in a blog post Tuesday. The visit also comes amid a protracted trade war with the U.S. that has seen Sino-American ties deteriorate. And observers have said that the meeting with Kim — with the sway China holds over nuclear and other issues in the region — could serve as a reminder to Trump that cooperation with Beijing is a necessity if Washington hopes to achieve its strategic goals in the Asia-Pacific. Trump said Tuesday that he had spoken to Xi over the telephone and that the two leaders’ teams would restart trade talks after a long lull in order to prepare for a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit.

north korea
xi jinping
kim jong un
donald trump
china
diplomacy
north korea nuclear crisis


South Korea to send 50,000 tons of rice to North in first food aid since 2010

Abstract: SEOUL - South Korea said Wednesday it will send 50,000 tons of rice to North Korea via the World Food Program to help the country cope with a severe food shortage. The isolated, impoverished North — which is under several sets of sanctions over its nuclear weapon and ballistic missile programs — has long struggled to feed itself and suffers chronic food shortages. “The government cannot ignore the plight among North Korean people,” said Seoul’s unification ministry, which handles inter-Korean relations. It will be the first time the South has provided food aid to the North since 2010, when it sent 5,000 tons of rice across the border. It comes after a joint report last month by the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization and WFP that said about 10.1 million North Koreans — 40 percent of the population — were suffering from severe food shortages and that conditions could be exacerbated in the absence of aid. The North’s state media also reported in May that the country was experiencing the worst drought since 1917. After “close consultation” with the WFP, Seoul decided to send domestic rice “without delay,” Seoul’s unification ministry said. “The time and scale for additional food aid to the North will be decided at a later date, after reviewing the results of this round of support.” The WFP and the North will consult on the distribution of the aid, which will be monitored by the U.N. agency, said unification minister Kim Yeon-chul. Pyongyang has been frequently condemned by the international community for decades of prioritizing the military and its nuclear weapons program over adequately providing for its people — an imbalance some critics say the U.N.’s aid program encourages.


As Hong Kong protests quiet down, who can outlast who?

Abstract: HONG KONG - All but a handful of protesters in Hong Kong have gone home, but the crisis that brought hundreds of thousands into the streets to oppose an extradition bill is far from over. The way forward for both Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam and her opponents is uncertain because of the limits built into the city’s “one country, two systems” arrangement with Beijing after Britain ceded control of the former colony in 1997. The public is wary of seeing Communist Party-ruled Beijing wield still greater influence that would imperil civil liberties such as independent courts and the freedom to speak out against the local government, privileges not enjoyed in the mainland. Officials in Beijing back the unpopular extradition legislation. Lam is stuck in the middle. A look at some possibilities for the key players in this drama. The chief executive Many analysts expect Lam will eventually step down to take responsibility for the mess resulting from her effort to fast-track the extradition bill, which would allow some suspects in Hong Kong to be tried in mainland Chinese courts. On Tuesday, she apologized and said she needed to do better but also insisted she wants to finish her five-year term. Too abrupt a departure by the Beijing-appointed career bureaucrat would be a loss of face for China’s leadership. If her opponents keep up the pressure and she does leave, she might opt to spend more time with her husband and children, who are British citizens and live elsewhere. The protesters The various pro-democracy groups that helped drive and organize the protests are pushing for Lam’s resignation and the permanent scrapping of what they call the “evil” extradition bill. Differences over strategy have emerged, but the groups dismissed Lam’s latest apology, saying she failed to respond to their demands. Some vowed to stage acts of resistance, perhaps using measures such as delaying subway trains, if their demands are not met by Thursday evening. But the protests have dwindled from the masses that turned out on Sunday to a handful of die-hard demonstrators. They could resume, especially on the July 1 anniversary of Hong Kong’s handover to China. The police At a late-night news conference on Monday, Hong Kong Police Commissioner Stephen Lo Wai-chung sought to soothe anger over the use of forceful measures during clashes with protesters on June 12. He said only five of 32 people arrested in or around the protests were accused of rioting, a serious charge that can result in a prison term of up to 10 years. Local lawmakers planned to question the city’s secretary for security on Wednesday, and some are calling for an independent inquiry into complaints that police tactics were too aggressive. The extradition bill The proposed changes to Hong Kong law would expand the scope of transfers of criminal suspects to include mainland China, Taiwan and Macau. Lam said the legislation is needed to prevent Hong Kong from becoming a haven for fugitives and improve the ability to fight crimes including money laundering. China has been excluded from Hong Kong’s extradition agreements because of concerns over the independence of its courts and its human rights record. Since Lam has bowed to public pressure in shelving the bill indefinitely, it is unlikely to become law soon. The leaders in Beijing China promised when it took control of Hong Kong from Britain to allow it to keep its civil liberties and independent legal system for 50 years. That special status has been compromised in a number of cases. Prosecutions of activists, detentions without trial of five Hong Kong book publishers and the illegal seizure in Hong Kong by mainland agents of at least one mainland businessman are among moves in recent years that have unnerved many in the city of 7 million. Beijing backed the extradition bill and said it fully supported Lam. It appears to have now bowed to public pressure. But analysts say both Lam and China are playing a game of “attrition,” betting that protesters will eventually grow weary of their struggle for greater democracy in a former colony that has never fully determined its own future.

hong kong
protests
china
rights
hong kong extradition protests


Belgium seeks Uighur family in Xinjiang after police took them from its Beijing embassy

Abstract: BEIJING - A Belgian diplomat was expected to travel to China’s restive Xinjiang region on Tuesday to confirm the whereabouts of a Uighur family that was escorted from Belgium’s embassy in Beijing by police last month. The disappearance of the woman and her four children has alarmed her husband, as an estimated 1 million ethnic Uighurs and other mostly Muslim minorities are believed to be held in internment camps in Xinjiang. Abdulhamid Tursun, a political refugee in Belgium, said he has not heard from his family since May 31, a few days after they left the embassy under murky circumstances. “I am worried about their safety,” he told AFP. “I hope they can safely come be at my side as soon as possible, and our family can reunite.” Belgium’s decision to dispatch a diplomat to Xinjiang comes as the embassy faces criticism for allegedly enabling Chinese police to take the family back to Xinjiang — where they could face detention. “The case exposes the additional risk Uighurs in China face even if they want to seek help from foreign governments,” said Patrick Poon, China researcher at Amnesty International. “The Belgian Embassy set an extremely bad example of how governments put economic interests above human rights,” he told AFP. China’s foreign ministry and the Xinjiang government did not immediately respond to AFP requests for comment. The mother, Horiyat Abula, and her four children traveled to Beijing at the end of May to complete missing paperwork for their family reunification visas. According to Tursun, his wife and children panicked upon learning it would take “at least three months” for their visas to be approved and refused to leave the embassy. They were afraid to return to their hotel because police had visited them multiple times since they arrived in Beijing, he explained. “The police came in the middle of the night, asking why they came to Beijing, when they would return,” he said. “They were very scared, they didn’t sleep all night.” The embassy offered to accompany Abula and her four children back to their hotel, but they “refused to leave the embassy in a kind of sit-in,” a Belgian ministry spokesman told AFP. In an interview published Tuesday, Belgian Foreign Minister Didier Reynders told Le Soir newspaper that the diplomatic police “asked the family to leave the premises” and the situation was explained to the father the next day. An embassy is not intended to “lodge people” applying for visas, he said. In the end, Chinese police “escorted them away,” the Belgian ministry spokesman told AFP. A few days later, Abula and her children were taken away by Xinjiang police, her husband said, and he has not heard from her since. Reynders told the Belga news agency on Monday that the diplomat would go to the address given by the father to check if “everything is going well” with them. “My only concern here is that we can reunite the family,” he told Belga. On Monday the foreign ministry did not have confirmation that they were at home. The case highlights the barriers Uighurs face in attempting to leave China. According to human rights groups, authorities in Xinjiang have confiscated passports of Uighurs, making it difficult for them to join their relatives overseas. Abula and her children too have struggled to obtain passports — an issue that Belgium’s ambassador will take up with China’s director of consular affairs, Reynders told Belga. Abula applied for a passport in 2017, but never received one, according to receipts seen by AFP. Tursun believes that the family “took a risk” by traveling outside Xinjiang in the first place. “If my family then returns to (Xinjiang’s capital) Urumqi, it’s very likely that they will be sent to a concentration camp,” he wrote in March in an email to a nonprofit helping the family with their visa application.

belgium
uighurs
xinjiang
beijing
china
abdulhamid tursun
islam


Osaka plays down need for new safety measures for G20 summit after recent quake

Abstract: Following Tuesday night’s magnitude 6.7 earthquake in northwest Japan, Osaka Prefecture, the host of the Group of 20 summit scheduled next week, isn’t planning additional changes to its emergency safety plans, officials said Wednesday. Kazuo Fudo, an assistant chief of the Osaka Prefecture’s fire prevention and safety affairs division, said the city of Osaka already has a regional disaster prevention plan, which the city will follow in case of an earthquake. The G20 summit will convene on June 28 and 29 at Intex Osaka in the city’s waterfront area. “Intex Osaka is located on high ground, so we don’t think there would be damage due to a possible tsunami,” Fudo said. “Besides, even though it is standing on an artificial island, it is connected to land via tunnels, bridges and expressways that are all capable of withstanding earthquakes. We don’t believe people will be stranded there.” The central government, the official added, handles safety and security issues for world leaders and key government officials. If an earthquake strikes, Fudo said, they would likely take shelter there or leave the country. After Tuesday night’s earthquake in Niigata and Yamagata prefectures, Osaka Prefecture established a tentative task force to collect information, said Daigo Yakabe, an official in the prefecture’s disaster control division, adding that such a precaution would be taken regardless of the G20 summit. The earthquake that rattled residents in four northern prefectures Tuesday night coincided with the one-year anniversary of a major earthquake in the Kansai area, which killed six people and injured more than 450 people. Yakabe said the authorities will further tighten disaster prevention and security measures next week as it gets closer to the G20 summit. The authorities have already warned residents about the heightened security measures being implemented and coming traffic restrictions that will be enforced. Osaka, along with surrounding areas, is considered to be vulnerable to an earthquake along the Nankai Trough. The probability of a magnitude 8 or 9 earthquake in the Nankai Trough happening within 30 years is between 70 and 80 percent, according to one study released last year.


Japan requests South Korea take next step in arbitration process over wartime labor row

Abstract: Japan on Wednesday took the next step in pushing South Korea to begin an arbitration process for a dispute over wartime labor that has seen ties between the neighboring countries sink to their lowest point in years. A day after South Korea failed to meet a deadline to name a member to an arbitration panel along with Japan and a third country, Tokyo asked Seoul under the terms of a 1965 bilateral accord to establish a panel selected entirely by other countries. Rather than comply, however, South Korea made its own offer — to open diplomatic talks regarding the issue on the condition that Japanese companies help compensate victims of forced labor during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula. Tokyo quickly said it rejects the offer. Should South Korea ignore the latest request, Japan will consider taking the dispute to the International Court of Justice. Underscoring the frosty relations, Japanese officials say Prime Minister Shinzo Abe plans to forgo holding talks with South Korean President Moon Jae-in on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit next week in Osaka. The dispute stems from South Korean court decisions ordering Japanese companies to compensate forced wartime laborers during Japan’s colonial rule of the Korean Peninsula from 1910 through the end of World War II in 1945. While Japan argues that the issue of compensation was settled by the 1965 accord, under which it provided South Korea with $500 million in financial aid, lawyers have pushed ahead with plans to seize and liquidate the companies’ assets. In January, Japan asked to settle the issue through diplomatic channels. But South Korea did not oblige, maintaining that the issue should be left to its judicial system. In a bid to break the impasse, Japan proposed on May 20 that the countries set up an arbitration panel consisting of one member each selected by the two countries and a third nation. Under the dispute settlement process outlined in the 1965 accord, South Korea had 30 days to comply. South Korean officials had said they would “carefully review” the proposal but did not present a panel member by the deadline on midnight Tuesday. On Wednesday, Japan pressed South Korea to move to the next step, in which each side has a further 30 days to each ask another country to choose a panel member. Those two countries would also select a third country to produce the final panel member. Failing that, Foreign Minister Taro Kono has expressed willingness to take the dispute to the ICJ. Kenji Kanasugi, director general of the Foreign Ministry’s Asian and Oceanian Affairs Bureau, made the request to a senior official at the South Korean Embassy in Tokyo, expressing regret over Seoul’s failure to meet the deadline. The official said he would relay the request to the country. Kono and his South Korean counterpart, Kang Kyung-wha, are planning to meet on the fringes of the June 28-29 G20 summit to discuss the issue, Japanese government officials said. Often marred by differing views of wartime history and a territorial row, bilateral relations have become especially fraught in recent months due to the wartime labor issue, as well as an incident where a South Korean destroyer allegedly locked its fire-control radar onto a Japanese patrol plane in Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

south korea
arbitration
wartime labor
group of 20
south korea-japan relations


Japan sees record number of foreign visitors for May

Abstract: The estimated number of foreign visitors to Japan in May rose 3.7 percent from a year earlier to 2,773,100, an all-time high for the month, as there were more tourists from the United States, Europe and many other Asian countries, government data showed Wednesday. But the number of visitors from Indonesia, South Korea, Singapore and Taiwan declined, partly because air ticket prices soared as many Japanese traveled to foreign countries during this year’s special 10-day Golden Week holiday from late April to early May, the Japan Tourism Agency said. The Golden Week holiday was extended to mark Japan’s imperial succession. By country and region, visitors from China topped the list at 756,400, up 13.1 percent from a year before, followed by South Korea at 603,400, down 5.8 percent, according to the agency’s data. Taiwan was third at 426,500, down 3.1 percent, while the number of visitors from Vietnam jumped 41.6 percent to 39,900 and Russia saw its numbers grow 30.2 percent to 9,700. In the first five months of this year, the number totaled 13,753,600, up 4.2 percent from a year earlier, the data showed. “The environment of competition is tough,” said Hiroshi Tabata, commissioner of the agency, pointing out that other destinations such as Vietnam are increasingly becoming popular for South Korean tourists. To meet the goal of attracting 40 million foreign visitors in 2020 when the Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics will be held, the agency said it would step up marketing and promotion efforts, targeting tourists from China, and for this year’s Rugby World Cup in Japan.

japan tourism agency
tourism
foreign tourists


World Refugee Day: How well is Japan fulfilling its obligations in 2019?

Abstract: Ahead of World Refugee Day on Thursday, attention has been turning to just how well Japan — the world’s third-biggest economy — has been fulfilling its responsibilities as a signatory of the United Nations 1951 Refugee Convention this year. Justice Ministry data shows Japan, a country known for its strict refugee screening process, has granted refugee status to 42 asylum-seekers so far in 2019 — a figure that is double that of last year. This increase has been welcomed by refugee support groups, but critics have noted that the overall refugee acceptance rate is still very low and the core issues have not been resolved. The government has maintained that the majority of the applicants are “fake refugees” who are attempting to use their application status to get work permits, which the government had previously issued unconditionally six months after a person applied for asylum. The government restricted that system in January last year. After the revision, the number of applications drastically dropped by 47 percent to 10,493 applications this year. In short, only about 1 in 250 applicants, on average, is granted refugee status, according to the ministry data. By comparison, Canada, which has a robust program for accepting refugees, accepted 14,790 of 55,388 applications in 2018 — or about 1 in 4. Critics say the low refugee acceptance rate is partly attributable to Japan’s strict interpretation of “persecution,” which guidelines by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees describes as “threats to life or freedom on account of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or membership in a particular social group — as well as other serious human rights violations.” However, according to the Justice Ministry’s interpretation, “persecution” refers only to threats to life and limb. Aside from the refugee acceptance system, the government has announced the expansion of its resettlement program — accepting refugees who are staying in an asylum country — and is reportedly aiming to double the number of those taken from 30 to 60 annually, possibly starting in 2020. The envisioned review of the program is expected to accelerate refugee resettlement in rural areas, with a Foreign Ministry official saying the government is “actively studying” the possibility of selecting locations other than the Tokyo metropolitan area, news agencies Kyodo and Jiji have reported. “Using this expansion of resettlement as an opportunity, we hope that discussions over the refugee application system will develop and the refugee application system will be revised upwards,” the Japan Association for Refugees said in a statement. According to a study published by the UNHCR on Wednesday, the number of forcibly displaced persons reached 70.8 million in 2018, up 2.3 million from the previous year — the highest recorded in the last 70 years. This figure surpasses the entire population of Thailand. The UNHCR will light up 15 towers and monuments across Japan in blue — from the Tokyo Skytree to the Sapporo TV Tower in Hokkaido — to raise awareness on World Refugee Day.


Liberal Democratic Party and tradition may stymie push for same-sex marriage in Japan

Abstract: As Japanese lawmakers grapple with a landmark same-sex marriage bill, campaigners fear it may die at the first legislative hurdle as lawmakers pander to aging voters and old traditions. While surveys show overwhelming support for gay rights, most people who identify as LGBT say they keep their sexuality a secret in a nod to the reverence for harmony that pervades the country. “Japan is a culture where people don’t want to stick out and cause trouble,” said Alexander Dmitrenko, co-chair of Lawyers for LGBT & Allies Network, an NGO that promotes LGBT rights. “It’s also a very process-oriented society, where things take a longer time to happen,” added Dmitrenko, who worked on Canada’s LGBT laws. He said the bill, while unlikely to lead to a new law, was only a first draft, adding: “As any lawyer will tell you, the first draft of any law is the hardest, so this is significant.” The same-sex marriage bill — a first for Japan — was introduced earlier this month, and LGBT campaigners have already raised fears that right-wingers could stymie its passage, despite growing acceptance of gay, bisexual and transgender people. “To be honest, it’s going to be tough to get this through parliament,” said Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan lawmaker Kanako Otsuji — the only openly gay member of the Diet. “But the legislature is totally out of sync with the will of the people (on same-sex marriage).” Otsuji and two other opposition party members submitted the bill weeks after Taiwan became the first place in Asia to allow same-sex marriage. However, it faces the immediate task of passing through both houses of the Diet, both of which are controlled by a coalition led by the Liberal Democratic Party. In its 2016 manifesto, the conservative LDP said “same-sex marriage is incompatible with the Constitution.” “There are no plans in our party to debate any same-sex law at this point,” an LDP spokesperson said. Written by postwar occupying forces, the Constitution says marriage must rest on the mutual consent of “both sexes.” Yet the immediate hurdle is just to get the issue aired. “Actually, the bill is unlikely to be even discussed in parliament,” said Hiroshi Ikeda, of the Same-sex Partnership Net Japan lobby group, citing a lack of support from opposition parties. LDP and its coalition partner, Komeito, hold the key to which laws get debated and put to a vote. Even if the bill fails to make it into law, LGBT activists believe it could still help trigger a much-needed public debate. “It’s a major first step,” said Kazuhiro Terada, president of Equal Marriage Alliance Japan, an advocacy group. “For a long time, same-sex couples were an invisible presence in society and they themselves had come to believe that same-sex marriage would never happen here,” he said. Yet support for same-sex marriage is high. The most recent 2018 survey by Dentsu Diversity Lab — part of ad giant Dentsu — found about 78 percent were in favor. However, it also showed that those supporters are mainly young, urban and female, not the bedrock of LDP voters needed to persuade the party to change tack. The survey shows the elderly and people living in rural areas, traditionally the most loyal LDP voters, are strongly against same-sex marriage. Otsuji — the gay lawmaker — said there were people within the ruling coalition parties who would support the bill but they were unlikely to break ranks just now. Apart from a spell in the 1870s, gay sex has never been illegal in Japan. Yet in a race to modernize and westernize over the last century, gay culture was swept under the carpet, activists say, relegated to the fringes with the few known LGBT celebrities often becoming the butt of jokes and comedy skits. Despite a lack of religious prohibitions, strong family-centric attitudes mean the LGBT community has a relatively low profile compared to that found in other developed nations. There are also no explicit laws protecting people from discrimination at work, or on issues from housing to public services, on the basis of sexuality or gender identity. Gay rights activists are now pushing for a higher profile. Thirteen couples marked Valentine’s Day by launching legal action against the government, demanding that the Supreme Court support their bid for marriage equality. “The LDP is likely to use its majority to avoid debating same-sex marriage in parliament, but we are hoping the Supreme Court will at least respect the rights of the minority,” said Ikeda of Same-sex Partnership Net Japan. Twenty-one cities, towns and wards have created partnership recognition certificates that, while lacking legal standing, help same-sex couples gain recognition and win benefits in some financial affairs and real estate matters. The LDP, in its 2016 manifesto, says it remains “cautious” of the slew of certificates that have been issued since 2015. Opinion among advocates for reform is also split on the best way to achieve marriage equality. One activist, who wished to remain anonymous for fear of any impact on her business, said the bill might have jeopardized a bipartisan, anti-discrimination measure being considered by lawmakers by putting ruling parties on the defensive. “It is just grandstanding,” she said. “This bill won’t amount to anything and may actually make things worse for us. We are a culture where people are turned off by conflict and place a high value on harmony.” According to Dentsu Diversity Lab, a little more than 65 percent of LGBT respondents said they had not come out to anyone at work or home, with many citing prejudice and a lack of acceptance. But the LDP has also tiptoed toward acceptance. Last year, it announced plans — if not details — to look into a bill dedicated to a “promotion of understanding of LGBT.” The bill has yet to surface but it has already been criticized by LGBT advocates as likely to fall short of one that would cover anti-discrimination or same-sex marriage. “Still, it’s better than nothing,” Terada said. “There will eventually be more and more LDP members supporting us,” he said. “Eventually, I think there will be a chance we will see a conservative-led marriage equality bill.”

same-sex marriage
marriage
lgbt
alexander dmitrenko
kanako otsuji


Japan bans parents from physically punishing children, but offenders face no penalties

Abstract: The Diet enacted Wednesday a revised law banning parents and other guardians from physically punishing children, following several fatal cases of abuse dealt out in the name of discipline. Another law was also amended to strengthen the ability of child welfare centers to intervene in abuse cases by separating staff members in charge of taking children into protective custody from those dealing with their guardians. Though there are no penalties for offenders, the revised abuse prevention law states that parents, foster parents and heads of child welfare centers are banned from physically punishing children while attempting to discipline them. “The state has declared that violence is not allowed for discipline,” said Kazuhiko Abe, professor of child welfare at Seinan Gakuin University. But he pointed to the need to educate parents on how to discipline children without resorting to physical punishment. “The state needs to set aside a budget to implement measures” in order for the revised laws to be effective, Abe said. Most of the contents of the revised laws will go into effect next April. Calls for drastic measures have intensified following a number of deaths of children at their homes, with the responses of child welfare centers being criticized in recent cases. In March last year, 5-year-old Yua Funato died in Tokyo’s Meguro Ward having made desperate pleas for her parents to “forgive” her and stop mistreating her. In January this year, 10-year-old Mia Kurihara died in Chiba Prefecture due to suspected physical abuse by her father, which her mother allegedly failed to stop. Earlier this month, 2-year-old Kotori Ikeda, of Sapporo, was found dead and her mother and her boyfriend were arrested on suspicion of assault. The suspected abuse of the girl occurred despite a child welfare official interviewing her mother last year following a tipoff and a police officer meeting with the mother and the girl in mid-May, according to investigative sources. The revised laws oblige schools, local education boards and officials of child welfare centers to keep case information confidential, after a local board of education in Chiba was criticized for informing the father of Mia about a questionnaire in which the child reported being abused by him. Under the revised laws, local child consultation centers and related entities are urged to swiftly share information so that support can be seamlessly provided even if a child moves to a different area. Coordination with centers dealing with domestic violence is also mandated. Prefectural governments and child welfare centers are also urged to counsel parents with a history of child abuse, using medical and psychological expertise, to prevent abuse from happening again. As for a civil code provision on the parental right to discipline children, the legislation calls for a review within two years after the revised laws enter into force. At a meeting on Thursday, Justice Minister Takashi Yamashita is expected to ask the Legislative Council, an advisory panel at the ministry, to start examining the matter.

children
diet
education
child abuse
parenthood