Tag: HRGT

Hong Kong police issue arrest warrants for eight overseas activists

HONG KONG, July 3 (Reuters) – Hong Kong police on Monday accused eight overseas-based activists of serious national security offences including foreign collusion and incitement to secession and offered rewards for information leading to their arrest.

The accused are activists Nathan Law, Anna Kwok and Finn Lau, former lawmakers Dennis Kwok and Ted Hui, lawyer and legal scholar Kevin Yam, unionist Mung Siu-tat, and online commentator Yuan Gong-yi, police told a press conference.

“They have encouraged sanctions … to destroy Hong Kong and to intimidate officials,” Steve Li, an officer with the police’s national security department, told reporters.

Issuing wanted notices and offering rewards of HK$1 million ($127,656) each, police said the assets of the accused would be frozen where possible and warned the public not to support them financially.

The notices accused the activists of asking foreign powers to impose sanctions on Hong Kong and China.

The activists are based in several countries, including the United States, Britain and Australia. Yam is an Australian citizen. They are wanted under a national security law that Beijing imposed on the former British colony in 2020, after the financial hub was rocked by protracted anti-China protests the previous year.

The United States on Monday condemned the move through a U.S. State Department spokesman, who said it set “a dangerous precedent that threatens the human rights and fundamental freedoms of people all over the world.”

British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly criticised the decision to issue the arrest warrants and said his government “will not tolerate any attempts by China to intimidate and silence individuals in the UK and overseas”.

Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong said her government was “deeply disappointed.” Australia, she said, has consistently expressed concern about the broad application of the national security law.

Some countries, including the United States, say the law has been used to suppress the city’s pro-democracy movement and has undermined rights and freedoms guaranteed under a “one country, two systems” formula, agreed when Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997.

Chinese and Hong Kong authorities say the law has restored the stability necessary for preserving Hong Kong’s economic success.

ACTIVISTS DEFIANT

Several of the accused activists said they would not cease their Hong Kong advocacy work.

“It’s my duty … to continue to speak out against the crackdown that is going on right now, against the tyranny that is now reigning over the city that was once one of the freest in Asia,” Yam, a senior fellow with Georgetown University’s Center for Asian Law, told Reuters by telephone from Australia.

“I miss Hong Kong but as things stand, no rational person would be going back,” added Yam, who police accused of meeting foreign officials to instigate sanctions against Hong Kong officials, judges and prosecutors.

Former Democratic party lawmaker Ted Hui told Reuters the “bounty” adds to the arrest warrants already issued for him under the national security law, but “free countries will not extradite us”.

“The bounty … makes it clearer to the western democracies that China is going towards more extreme authoritarianism,” he said in Australia, where he has lived since 2021 on a bridging visa.

Anna Kwok, executive director of the Hong Kong Democracy Council, told Reuters from Washington she would not back down.

“One key thing I urge President Biden to do immediately is to say a strong and firm NO to (Hong Kong chief executive) John Lee’s possible entry into the United States for November’s APEC meeting in San Francisco,” Kwok wrote.

“He’s the man who has orchestrated the far-reaching transnational repression,” she said. “Bar John Lee.”

Finn Lau, an activist based in London told Reuters the reward was motivated by the fact that many democratic countries had suspended extradition treaties with Hong Kong.

Nathan Law, who obtained refugee status in the UK two years ago, said that people in Hong Kong should not cooperate. “We should not limit ourselves, self-censor, be intimidated, or live in fear,” he said on Twitter.

Police told the press conference 260 people had been arrested under the national security law, with 79 of them convicted of offences including subversion and terrorism, but admitted that the chances of prosecution were slim if the defendants remained abroad.

“We are definitely not putting on a political show nor disseminating fear,” Li, the police official, said.

“If they don’t return, we won’t be able to arrest them, that’s a fact,” he said. “But we won’t stop wanting them.

Reporting by James Pomfret and Jessie Pang; additional reporting by Kirsty Needham in Sydney and Dan Whitcomb in Los Angeles; Editing by Robert Birsel, Alison Williams and Conor Humphries

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Jessie Pang

Thomson Reuters

Jessie Pang joined Reuters in 2019 after an internship. She covers Hong Kong with a focus on politics and general news.

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July 3, 2023
As companies bring more jobs to Mexico, US wants labor rights safeguards

MEXICO CITY, July 3 (Reuters) – The U.S. wants Mexico’s government to build strong institutions to protect worker rights as companies aiming to avoid supply chain disruptions in far-off production spots bring more jobs to the country, a top U.S. labor official told Reuters.

Mexico has begun to benefit from “nearshoring” in which companies seek to move production closer to the U.S. market while maintaining competitive costs.

The trend is further testing a trade deal known as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), in effect since July 2020.

The pact has tougher labor rules than its 1994 predecessor and underpins new Mexican laws that empower workers to push for better wages and conditions after years of stagnant salaries and pro-business union contracts.

Three years into the deal, experts say, some workers have begun to benefit but broad impacts are still far off.

“Hopefully that will ensure that Mexico doesn’t become a dumping ground for companies looking for cheap labor and lax regulations,” said Thea Lee, U.S. Deputy Undersecretary for International Labor Affairs who polices USMCA compliance.

She said in an interview that Mexico was working to fulfill its commitments, backed by leadership keen on helping workers.

Mexico’s new regulations favor companies taking on higher ethical standards, she said.

“Maybe 20 years ago it was okay for a multinational corporation to throw up their hands and say, ‘we have no idea what’s in our supply chain, what the labor conditions are,’” she added.

“That doesn’t seem to be acceptable anymore.”

Mexico has made progress improving labor courts, resolving worker complaints faster and easing union organization, but needs to do more, Lee said.

“Our hope is that Mexico will be well-poised to take advantage of nearshoring … if they continue on the path towards really building labor institutions that work, where workers can have confidence.”

Since 2020, several U.S. labor complaints in Mexico have paved the way for independent unions to land pay raises and even expand. Lee said such examples inspire workers who in the past may have feared threats or dismissals for trying to organize.

Four more cases are under review: At a garment factory, an auto parts plant, a Goodyear tire plant, and a mine owned by conglomerate Grupo Mexico.

Yet one employer that faced two USMCA complaints, U.S.-based VU Manufacturing that makes interior car parts in the northern city of Piedras Negras, recently dismissed dozens of employees just months after a new union, La Liga, pressed for better wages. VU did not respond to a request for comment.

Lee said the company risks penalties if it does not uphold an agreement around worker rights. But La Liga members have already been laid off, and fear the company aims to discourage organizing, said union leader Cristina Ramirez, who lost her job.

“It’s very disappointing and frustrating,” Ramirez said. “We wanted to fight for things to improve.”

Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon; Editing by David Gregorio

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July 3, 2023
Pope Francis condemns burning of Koran – UAE newspaper

DUBAI, July 3 (Reuters) – Pope Francis said the burning of the Muslim holy book, the Koran, has made him angry and disgusted and that he condemned and rejected permitting the act as a form of freedom of speech.

“Any book considered holy should be respected to respect those who believe in it,” the pope said in an interview in the United Arab Emirates newspaper Al Ittihad, published on Monday. “I feel angry and disgusted at these actions.

“Freedom of speech should never be used as a means to despise others and allowing that is rejected and condemned.”

A man tore up and burned a Koran in Sweden’s capital Stockholm last week, resulting in strong condemnation from several states, including Turkey whose backing Sweden needs to gain entry to the NATO military alliance.

While Swedish police have rejected several recent applications for anti-Koran demonstrations, courts have over-ruled those decisions, saying they infringed freedom of speech.

On Sunday, an Islamic grouping of 57 states said collective measures are needed to prevent acts of desecration to the Koran and international law should be used to stop religious hatred.

Reporting by Maha Eldahan; Editing by Edmund Klamann and Raju Gopalakrishnan

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July 3, 2023
Harvard ‘legacy’ policy challenged on heels of affirmative action ruling

July 3 (Reuters) – Three civil rights groups filed a complaint against Harvard on Monday, claiming its preferential policy for undergraduate applicants with family ties to the elite school overwhelmingly benefits white students, days after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down its race-conscious admissions policies.

The groups filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Education claiming that Harvard’s preferences for “legacy” applicants violates a federal law banning race discrimination for programs that receive federal funds, as virtually all U.S. colleges and universities do.

Last week, the Supreme Court said race-conscious policies adopted by Harvard University and the University of North Carolina to ensure that more non-white students are admitted are unconstitutional. The decision was a major blow to efforts to attract diverse student bodies and is expected to prompt new challenges to admission policies.

Harvard College is the undergraduate school of Harvard University.

The groups in Monday’s complaint said the Supreme Court ruling had made it even more imperative to eliminate policies that disadvantage non-white applicants.

Harvard did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The groups are represented by Lawyers for Civil Rights, a Boston-based nonprofit that describes itself on its website as working with “communities of color and immigrants to fight discrimination.”

Ivan Espinoza-Madrigal, the group’s executive director, said the Supreme Court last week made clear that any policies that disadvantage racial groups are unlawful by noting that “eliminating racial discrimination means eliminating all of it.”

“Your family’s last name and the size of your bank account are not a measure of merit, and should have no bearing on the college admissions process,” he said in a statement.

Students and pedestrians walk through the Yard at Harvard University, after the school asked its students not to return to campus after Spring Break and said it would move to virtual instruction for graduate and undergraduate classes, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S., March 10, 2020. REUTERS/Brian Snyder/File Photo

Legacy policies, which are common at U.S. colleges and universities, have become increasingly controversial

President Joe Biden, a Democrat, in remarks following las week’s Supreme Court ruling, said schools should consider eliminating legacy policies because they “expand privilege instead of opportunity.”

Several prominent lawmakers from both parties made similar comments. Representative Barbara Lee, a Democrat from California, called legacy policies “affirmative action for white people” in a tweet.

According to Monday’s complaint, nearly 70% of Harvard applicants with family ties to donors or alumni are white and are about six times more likely to be admitted than other applicants.

About 28% of Harvard’s class of 2019 were legacies, the groups said in the complaint. That means fewer admissions slots were available for non-white applicants who are far less likely to have family ties to the school, they said.

The groups are asking the Department of Education to investigate Harvard’s admission practices and order the school to abandon legacy preferences if it wants to continue receiving federal funding. Michael Kippins, one of the lawyers who filed the complaint, said in an email that Lawyers for Civil Rights has not ruled out filing a lawsuit against Harvard in the future.

When the Supreme Court heard the Harvard and UNC cases last October, a lawyer for the group that had sued the schools argued that eliminating legacy preferences “would make Harvard far less white, wealthy, and privileged.”

Conservative Justices Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas appeared to agree, pressing Harvard’s lawyer on why the school could not get rid of the legacy policy instead of granting separate preferences to non-white students.

The lawyer, Seth Waxman, told the court that there was no evidence that ending legacy preferences would lead to a more diverse student body.

Reporting by Daniel Wiessner in Albany, New York; Editing by Alexia Garamfalvi and Leslie Adler

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Daniel Wiessner

Thomson Reuters

Dan Wiessner (@danwiessner) reports on labor and employment and immigration law, including litigation and policy making. He can be reached at daniel.wiessner@thomsonreuters.com.

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July 3, 2023
Indian PM Modi wraps up Washington trip with appeal to tech CEOs

WASHINGTON, June 23 (Reuters) – Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met with U.S. and Indian technology executives in Washington on Friday, the final day of a state visit where he agreed new defense and technology cooperation and addressed challenges posed by China.

U.S. President Joe Biden rolled out the red carpet for Modi on Thursday, declaring after about 2-1/2 hours of talks that their countries’ economic relationship was “booming.” Trade has more than doubled over the past decade.

Biden and Modi gathered with CEOs including Apple’s (AAPL.O) Tim Cook, Google’s (GOOGL.O) Sundar Pichai and Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) Satya Nadella.

Also present were Sam Altman of OpenAI, NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, and Indian tech leaders including Anand Mahindra, chairman of Mahindra Group, and Mukesh Ambani, chairman of Reliance Industries, the White House said.

“Our partnership between India and the United States will go a long way, in my view, to define what the 21st century looks like,” Biden told the group, adding that technological cooperation would be a big part of that partnership.

Observing that there were a variety of tech companies represented at the meeting from startups to well established firms, Modi said: “Both of them are working together to create a new world.”

Modi, who has appealed to global companies to “Make in India,” will also address business leaders at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts.

The CEOs of top American companies, including FedEx (FDX.N), MasterCard (MA.N) and Adobe (ADBE.O), are expected to be among the 1,200 participants.

NOT ‘ABOUT CHINA’

The backdrop to Modi’s visit is the Biden administration’s attempts to draw India, the world’s most populous country at 1.4 billion and its fifth-largest economy, closer amid its growing geopolitical rivalry with Beijing.

Modi did not address China directly during the visit, and Biden only mentioned China in response to a reporter’s question, but a joint statement included a pointed reference to the East and South China Seas, where China has territorial disputes with its neighbors.

Farwa Aamer, director for South Asia at the Asia Society Policy Institute, in an analysis note described that as “a clear signal of unity and determination to preserve stability and peace in the region.”

Alongside agreements to sell weapons to India and share with it sensitive military technology, announcements this week included several investments from U.S.-firms aimed at spurring semiconductor manufacturing in India and lowering its dependence on China for electronics.

White House national security spokesperson John Kirby said the challenges presented by China to both Washington and New Delhi were on the agenda, but insisted the visit “wasn’t about China.”

“This wasn’t about leveraging India to be some sort of counterweight. India is a sovereign, independent state,” Kirby said at a news briefing, adding that Washington welcomes India becoming “an increasing exporter of security” in the Indo-Pacific.

“There’s a lot we can do in the security front together. And that’s really what we’re focused on,” Kirby said.

Some political analysts question India’s willingness to stand up to Beijing over Taiwan and other issues, however. Washington has also been frustrated by India’s close ties with Russia while Moscow wages war in Ukraine.

DIASPORA TIES

Modi attended a lunch on Friday at the State Department with Vice President Kamala Harris, the first Asian American to hold the No. 2 position in the White House, and Secretary of State Antony Blinken.

In a toast, Harris spoke of her Indian-born late mother, Shyamala Gopalan, who came to the United States at age 19 and became a leading breast cancer researcher.

“I think about it in the context of the millions of Indian students who have come to the United States since, to collaborate with American researchers to solve the challenges of our time and to reach new frontiers,” Harris said.

Modi praised Gopalan for keeping India “close to her heart” despite the distance to her new home, and called Harris “really inspiring.”

On Friday evening, Modi will address members of the Indian diaspora, many of whom have turned out at events during the visit to enthusiastically fete him, at times chanting “Modi! Modi! Modi!” despite protests from others.

Activists said Biden had failed to strongly call out what they describe as India’s deteriorating human rights record under Modi, citing allegations of abuse of Indian dissidents and minorities, especially Muslims. Modi leads the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and has held power since 2014.

Biden said he had a “straightforward” discussion with Modi about issues including human rights, but U.S. officials emphasize that it is vital for Washington’s national security and economic prosperity to engage with a rising India.

Asked on Thursday what he would do to improve the rights of minorities including Muslims, Modi insisted “there is no space for any discrimination” in his government.

“There is no end to data that shows Modi is lying about minority abuse in India, and much of it can be found in the State Department’s own India country reports, which are scathing on human rights,” said Sunita Viswanath, co-founder Hindus for Human Rights, an advocacy group.

Reporting by Steve Holland, Simon Lewis and Jeff Mason; additional reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt, Doina Chiacu, David Brunnstrom and Kanishka Singh; Editing by Don Durfee and Grant McCool

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Jeff Mason

Thomson Reuters

Jeff Mason is a White House Correspondent for Reuters. He has covered the presidencies of Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden and the presidential campaigns of Biden, Trump, Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain. He served as president of the White House Correspondents’ Association in 2016-2017, leading the press corps in advocating for press freedom in the early days of the Trump administration. His and the WHCA’s work was recognized with Deutsche Welle’s “Freedom of Speech Award.” Jeff has asked pointed questions of domestic and foreign leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un. He is a winner of the WHCA’s “Excellence in Presidential News Coverage Under Deadline Pressure” award and co-winner of the Association for Business Journalists’ “Breaking News” award. Jeff began his career in Frankfurt, Germany as a business reporter before being posted to Brussels, Belgium, where he covered the European Union. Jeff appears regularly on television and radio and teaches political journalism at Georgetown University. He is a graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and a former Fulbright scholar.

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June 23, 2023
Brazil takes fight against racism abroad

LISBON, April 23 (Reuters) – Government officials from Brazil are using their president’s first visit to Europe since being elected to raise awareness and fight against the racial discrimination faced by the Brazilian community in Portugal and elsewhere.

Brazil’s minister of racial equality, Anielle Franco, was one of the officials who travelled with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Her mission was to bring discussions about racism to the table.

“We’re not going to be able to solve 523 years of problems in just one visit but I hope we can move forward because that’s why we’re here,” Franco told reporters on Sunday, referring to centuries of oppression faced by Black people.

Franco is the sister of Marielle Franco, a Black councilwoman in Rio de Janeiro who fought for racial justice and was shot dead in 2018.

When elected, Lula said he aimed to attack racism and Brazil’s legacy of slavery. Portuguese vessels carried nearly 6 million enslaved Africans into slavery. Most went to Brazil.

Europe’s top human rights group previously said Portugal had to confront its colonial past and role in the transatlantic slave trade to help fight racism and discrimination in the country today.

“Let’s build a future without forgetting the debts of the past,” Franco wrote on Instagram. “Let’s build a future where cooperation is mutual between countries to seek justice and reparation.”

In a letter addressed to Lula on Sunday, Lisbon-based migrant association Casa do Brasil said cases of discrimination against Brazilians in Portugal were on the rise.

A study by Casa do Brasil showed 91% of Brazilians in Portugal, a community of around 300,000, have faced some sort of discrimination in access to public services.

Franco met Portuguese parliament affairs minister Ana Catarina Mendes on Saturday to discuss policies to tackle racial injustice.

Both governments agreed on a national strategy to combat racism.

“We need to make it happen,” said Franco.

Reporting by Catarina Demony; Editing by Christina Fincher

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Catarina Demony

Thomson Reuters

Portugal-based multimedia correspondent reporting on politics, economics, the environment and daily news. Previous experience in local journalism in the UK., co-founded a project telling the stories of Portuguese-speakers living in London, and edited a youth-led news site.

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April 24, 2023
Number of bodies exhumed from suspected Kenyan cult graves jumps to 47

NAIROBI, April 23 (Reuters) – Kenyan police have now exhumed the bodies of 47 people thought to be followers of a Christian cult who believed they would go to heaven if they starved themselves to death.

Police near the coastal town of Malindi started exhuming bodies on Friday from the Shakahola forest.

“In total, 47 people have died at the Shakahola forest,” detective Charles Kamau told Reuters on Sunday.

The exhumations were still ongoing, Kamau said.

[1/4] Kenya police officers stand guard as Forensic experts and homicide detectives exhume bodies of suspected members of a Christian cult named as Good News International Church, who believed they would go to heaven if they starved themselves to death, in Shakahola forest of Kilifi county, Kenya April 22, 2023. REUTERS/Stringer

Earlier this month, police rescued 15 members of the group — worshippers at the Good News International Church — who they said had been told to starve themselves to death. Four of them died before they reached hospital, police said.

The leader of the church, Paul Mackenzie, was arrested following a tip-off that suggested the existence of shallow graves belonging to at least 31 of Mackenzie’s followers.

Local media, citing police sources, reported that Mackenzie has refused to eat or drink while in police custody.

Interior Minister Kithure Kindiki said the entire 800 acre forest had been sealed off and declared a scene of crime.

“This horrendous blight on our conscience must lead not only to the most severe punishment of the perpetrator(s) of the atrocity on so many innocent souls, but tighter regulation (including self-regulation) of every church, mosque, temple or synagogue going forward,” he said.

Reporting by Humphrey Malalo and Ayenat Mersie
Editing by Christina Fincher

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April 24, 2023
Russian charged with war crimes may brief U.N. Security Council

UNITED NATIONS, April 3 (Reuters) – Russia’s commissioner for children’s rights, who is wanted by the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges, is likely to brief an informal meeting of the U.N. Security Council this week, according to a note seen by Reuters on Monday.

Russia, which holds the monthly rotating presidency of the 15-member body for April, told council members in a note that it plans to hold an informal meeting on Wednesday on Ukraine, focused on “evacuating children from conflict zone.”

“Participants will hear ‘first hand’ information from the Presidential Commissioner for Children’s Rights of the Russian Federation, as well as from children evacuated from the conflict area,” read the note.

The commissioner is Maria Lvova-Belova. The International Criminal Court (ICC) last month issued an arrest warrant against Russian President Vladimir Putin and Lvova-Belova, accusing them of illegally deporting hundreds of children from Ukraine, as well as the unlawful transfer of people to Russia from Ukraine since Moscow invaded on Feb. 24, 2022.

“They cannot invite a credible briefer because they do not have any credibility on this issue,” Britain’s Deputy U.N. Ambassador James Kariuki told Reuters in a statement. “Russian leaders have been charged by the ICC with unlawfully deporting children from Ukraine to Russia. That is a war crime.”

Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said on Monday that the meeting briefers would be announced shortly. Such meetings are held at U.N. headquarters, but not in the Security Council chamber, and briefings can be done virtually.

‘APRIL FOOL’S JOKE’

Moscow has not concealed a program under which it has brought thousands of Ukrainian children to Russia but presents it as a humanitarian campaign to protect orphans and children abandoned in the conflict zone.

Nebenzia told reporters last month that the informal meeting of Security Council members to be held on Wednesday had been planned long before the ICC announcement and it was not intended to be a rebuttal of the charges against Putin and Lvova-Belova.

While a feature of Russia’s presidency, members do not need to be the rotating monthly president to hold such meetings.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov is due to travel to New York to chair formal Security Council meetings later in the month on the Middle East and on “effective multilateralism through the defense of the principles of the U.N. Charter.”

The 193-member U.N. General Assembly has criticized Russia for violating the founding U.N. Charter by invading its neighbor and called for a “comprehensive, just and lasting peace” in line with the principles of the U.N. Charter.

Given Russia’s Security Council presidency started on April 1, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, told reporters on Monday: “It’s like an April Fool’s joke … We expect that they will behave professionally.”

“But we also expect that they will use their seat to spread disinformation and to promote their own agenda as it relates to Ukraine, and we will stand ready to call them out at every single moment that they attempt to do that,” she said.

Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Don Durfee and Bill Berkrot

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April 4, 2023
Attacks on Iran-linked bases in Syria will draw swift response, spokesperson says

BEIRUT, March 25 (Reuters) – Strikes on Iranian-linked bases in Syria would draw a quick response, an Iranian security spokesperson said on Saturday, after the reported death of 19 people in one of the deadliest exchanges between the U.S. and Iranian-aligned forces in years. read more

“Any pretext to attack bases created at the request of the Syrian government to deal with terrorism and Islamic State elements in this country will be met with an immediate counter-response,” Keyvan Khosravi, spokesperson for Iran’s top security body, was quoted as saying by Iranian state media.

Iran says its forces and allied fighters are in Syria at the request of Damascus, and sees U.S. forces there as occupiers.

The death toll in U.S. air strikes on pro-Iran installations in eastern Syria has risen to 19 fighters, a Syrian war monitoring group said on Saturday.

The U.S. carried out strikes in eastern Syria in response to a drone attack on Thursday that left one American contractor dead and another wounded along with five U.S. troops. Washington said the attack was of Iranian origin.

The U.K.-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said air raids killed three Syrian troops, 11 Syrian fighters in pro-government militias and five non-Syrian fighters who were aligned with the government.

The monitoring group’s head Rami Abdel Rahman could not specify the nationalities of the foreigners. Reuters was unable to independently confirm the toll.

The initial exchange prompted a string of tit-for-tat strikes. Another U.S. service member was wounded, according to officials, and local sources said suspected U.S. rocket fire hit more locations in eastern Syria.

President Joe Biden on Friday warned Iran that the United States would “act forcefully” to protect Americans.

Iran has been a major backer of President Bashar al-Assad during Syria’s 12-year conflict.

Iran’s proxy militias, including the Lebanese group Hezbollah and pro-Tehran Iraqi groups, hold sway in swathes of eastern, southern and northern Syria and in suburbs around the capital.

Iran’s foreign ministry condemned the latest U.S. strikes, accusing U.S. forces of targeting “civilian sites”.

“Iran’s military advisers have been in Syria at the request of the Syrian government to help this country fight terrorism, and shall remain by Syria’s side to help establish peace, stability and lasting security,” ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani told state media.

Tehran’s growing entrenchment in Syria has drawn regular Israeli air strikes but American aerial raids are more rare. The U.S. has been raising the alarm about Iran’s drone program.

Reporting by Maya Gebeily; additional reporting by Dubai newsroom; editing by Frances Kerry, Bernadette Baum, Michael Georgy and Giles Elgood

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March 25, 2023
Exclusive: Ukraine accuses Russian snipers of abusing child, gang raping mother
Soldiers assaulted family soon after invasion, prosecutors say

Ukraine accuses Russian army of widespread sexual assaults

President Vladimir Putin’s government denies atrocities
KYIV, March 14 (Reuters) – Ukraine has accused two Russian soldiers of sexually assaulting a four-year-old girl and gang raping her mother at gunpoint in front of her father, as part of widespread allegations of abuse during the more than one-year-long invasion.

According to Ukrainian prosecution files seen by Reuters, the incidents were among a spree of sex crimes Russian soldiers of the 15th Separate Motorized Rifle Brigade committed in four homes of Brovary district near the capital Kyiv in March 2022.

Russia’s Defence Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. Phone numbers listed for the brigade were out of order. Two officials at the Samara Garrison, of which the brigade is a part, said they were unable to give contacts for the unit when contacted by Reuters, with one saying they were classified.

During Moscow’s failed push to capture Kyiv after its Feb. 24 invasion, soldiers entered Brovary a few days later, looting and using sexual violence as a deliberate tactic to terrorise the population, the Ukrainian prosecutors said.

“They singled out the women beforehand, coordinated their actions and their roles,” said the prosecutors, whose 2022 documents were based on interviews with witnesses and survivors.

Most of the alleged atrocities took place on March 13, when soldiers “in a state of alcoholic intoxication, broke into the yard of the house where a young family lived,” the prosecutors alleged.

The father was beaten with a metal pot then forced to kneel while his wife was gang raped. One of the soldiers told the four-year-old girl he “will make her a woman” before she was abused, the documents said.

The family survived, though prosecutors said they are investigating additional crimes in the area including murders during the same period.

President Vladimir Putin’s government, which says it is fighting Western-backed “neo-Nazis” in Ukraine, has repeatedly denied allegations of atrocities. It has also denied that its military commanders are aware of sexual violence by soldiers.

The soldiers were both snipers, aged 32 and 28, the files said, adding that the former had died while the younger, named as Yevgeniy Chernoknizhniy, returned to Russia.

When Reuters asked for the identities of both soldiers, prosecutors provided only the name of the younger man. When Reuters called a number in online databases for him, a person saying he was Chernoknizhniy’s brother said he was deceased.

“He died. There’s no way you can get hold of him,” said the man, crying. “That’s all that I can say.”

Reuters was unable to independently confirm his assertion.

GROWING ACCUSATIONS

The two snipers were among six suspects accused in the Brovary assaults, which prosecutors say is one of the most extensive investigations of sexual abuse since the invasion.

After the alleged attack on the girl and her parents, the two soldiers entered the house of an elderly couple next door, where they beat them, prosecutors said, also raping a 41-year-old pregnant woman and a 17-year-old girl.

At another location where several families lived, the soldiers forced everyone into the kitchen and gang raped a 15-year-old girl and her mother, they said.

All the victims survived, prosecutors said, and were receiving psychological and medical assistance.

A pre-trial investigation is ongoing into the possible role of superior officials in the Brovary attacks, prosecutors said, in a case adding to growing allegations of systematic sexual abuse by Russian soldiers.

Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s office says it is investigating more than 71,000 reports of war crimes received since Russia sent tens of thousands of troops over the border.

Ukrainian investigators know the probability of finding and punishing suspects is low and potential trials would be mainly in absentia, but there are also international efforts to prosecute war crimes including by the International Criminal Court.

While suspects are unlikely to be surrendered by Moscow, anyone convicted in absentia may be placed on international watchlists, which would make it difficult to travel.

Russia has also accused Ukrainian forces of war crimes, including the execution of 10 prisoners of war.

A U.N. human rights monitoring mission in Ukraine has said that most of the dozens of sexual violence accusations pointed at the Russian military.

So far, Ukrainian prosecutors have convicted 26 Russians of war crimes – some prisoners of war, some in absentia – of which one was for rape.

Reporting by Anthony Deutsch in Amsterdam and Stefaniia Bern in Kyiv;
Additional reporting by Anton Zverev and Maria Tsvetkova;
Editing by Alison Williams and Andrew Cawthorne

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March 15, 2023
South Korea, Japan near landmark deal on wartime labour dispute – media

SEOUL/TOKYO March 5 (Reuters) – South Korea and Japan may be near resolving a dispute over colonial-era forced labour that has overshadowed political and trade relations between the two neighbours, with media reports saying Seoul could announce plans on Monday.

The South Korean government plans to announce on Monday morning its solution to the historical and legal dispute over compensating people forced to work under Japan’s 1910-1945 occupation of Korea, Japan’s Kyodo news reported, citing unnamed diplomatic sources.

The labour dispute and one over women forced into Japanese military brothels have bedevilled ties between the two pivotal U.S. allies for years.

South Korea’s foreign ministry, asked about the reported agreement, said negotiations were ongoing.

“The government is continuing to consult in various ways between diplomatic authorities at all levels in order to come up with a reasonable solution that meets the common interests of Korea and Japan as soon as possible,” it said in a statement.

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Japan’s Cabinet Office and Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to phone and email requests for comment.

Relations plunged to their lowest point in decades after South Korea’s Supreme Court in 2018 ordered Japanese firms to pay reparations to former forced labourers. Fifteen South Koreans have won such cases, but none has been compensated.

The row spilled over into a trade dispute. Japan has maintained the compensation issue was settled under earlier treaties.

‘VOLUNTARY’ FUND, SUMMIT

Seoul unveiled a plan in January to compensate former forced labourers through a South Korean public foundation. The proposal sparked backlash from victims and their families because it did not include contributions from Japanese companies, including those ordered by South Korean courts to pay reparations.

Japan could allow its companies to “voluntarily” contribute to the foundation, and the two governments are aiming for South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol to visit Japan this month, Kyodo reported.

South Korea’s Yonhap news agency, citing unnamed government sources, said Seoul and Tokyo had tentatively agreed to create a “future youth fund” to sponsor scholarships for students as part of the deal.

The fund would be jointly formed by the Federation of Korean Industries, South Korea’s big business lobby, and its Japanese counterpart, Keidanren, the report said.

Japan’s Nikkei reported that a Korean foundation would pay compensation on behalf of Japan, and the Japanese side would acknowledge expressions of apology and reflection made by previous administrations.

Prime Minster Fumio Kishida plans to say he is extending past statements on wartime forced labour, which include an apology for Japan’s colonialism, Japan’s Yomiuri reported on Saturday.

The newspaper said Tokyo could lift restrictions on exports of key electronics components to South Korea, as part of a deal for Seoul to withdraw its complaint to the World Trade Organization over the trade dispute.

The conservative Yoon, who took office in May, has vowed to improve ties with Japan. In September, he met Kishida in the two countries’ first summit since 2019.

On the dispute over Korean women forced into wartime brothels, euphemistically called “comfort women”, a 2015 agreement that was supposed to “irreversibly” resolve the claims fell apart after backlash from many of the victims.

Reporting by Josh Smith in Seoul and Rocky Swift in Tokyo; Editing by William Mallard

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March 5, 2023
Protests break out in Iran over schoolgirl illnesses

DUBAI, March 4 (Reuters) – Worried parents protested in Iran’s capital Tehran and other cities on Saturday over a wave of suspected poison attacks that have affected schoolgirls in dozens of schools, according to Iranian news agencies and social media videos.

The so-far unexplained illnesses have affected hundreds of schoolgirls in recent months. Iranian officials believe the girls may have been poisoned and have blamed Tehran’s enemies.

The country’s health minister has said the girls have suffered “mild poison” attacks and some politicians have suggested the girls could have been targeted by hardline Islamist groups opposed to girls’ education.

Iran’s interior minister said on Saturday investigators had found “suspicious samples” that were being studied.

“In field studies, suspicious samples have been found, which are being investigated… to identify the causes of the students’ illness, and the results will be published as soon as possible,” the minister, Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli, said in a statement carried by the official news agency IRNA.

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Sickness affected more than 30 schools in at least 10 of Iran’s 31 provinces on Saturday. Videos posted on social media showed parents gathered at schools to take their children home and some students being taken to hospitals by ambulance or buses.

A gathering of parents outside an Education Ministry building in western Tehran on Saturday to protest over the illnesses turned into an anti-government demonstration, according to a video verified by Reuters.

“Basij, Guards, you are our Daesh,” protesters chanted, likening the Revolutionary Guards and other security forces to the Islamic State group.

Similar protests were held in two other areas in Tehran and other cities including Isfahan and Rasht, according to unverified videos.

The outbreak of schoolgirl sickness comes at a critical time for Iran’s clerical rulers, who have faced months of anti-government protests sparked by the death of a young Iranian woman in the custody of the morality police who enforce strict dress codes.

Social media posts in recent days have shown photos and videos of girls who have fallen ill, feeling nauseaous or suffering heart palpitations. Others complained of headaches. Reuters could not verify the posts.

The United Nations human rights office in Geneva called on Friday for a transparent investigation into the suspected attacks and countries including Germany and the United States have voiced concern.

Iran rejected what it views as foreign meddling and “hasty reactions” and said on Friday it was investigating the causes of the incidents.

“It is one of the immediate priorities of Iran’s government to pursue this issue as quickly as possible and provide documented information to resolve the families’ concerns and to hold accountable the perpetrators and the causes,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani told state media.

Schoolgirls were active in the anti-government protests that began in September. They have removed their mandatory headscarves in classrooms, torn up pictures of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and called for his death.

Reporting by Dubai newsroom
Editing by Frances Kerry

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March 5, 2023
Deadlier and more media savvy, separatist rebels evolve in Indonesia’s Papua

JAKARTA, Feb 23 (Reuters) – Egianus Kogoya, the dreadlocked rebel behind the kidnapping of a New Zealand pilot this month in the highlands of Indonesia’s Papua region, is at the vanguard of an increasingly dangerous and media-savvy insurgency for independence.

Separatist rebels kidnapped New Zealand pilot Philip Mehrtens, 37, after he landed his small plane in the remote Papuan highlands on Feb 7.

Sitting in the cockpit of the plane, Kogoya, wearing a denim jacket, bone necklace and mirror shades, with a hand draped over a rifle, appeared to relish posing as his men documented their most high-profile kidnapping to date.

In a series of videos, Kogoya demanded the resource-rich region’s independence in return for Mehrtens’ release.

Fighters in the Indonesian, western half of New Guinea island have for decades waged a low-level battle for independence, but Kogoya and his gang have emerged as especially dangerous and unpredictable.

“What we are seeing is younger, new leadership among local rebel groups that is more aggressive and not necessarily strategic in the long term,” said Deka Anwar, from the Jakarta-based think tank, the Institute for Policy Analysis of Conflict (IPAC).

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The security ministry did not respond to requests for comment on the separatists but military spokesperson Kisdiyanto said attacks against Indonesian sovereignty by “a few” separatists were being handled.

The military has said it is preparing for a “law enforcement operation” but only as a last resort if negotiations to free Mehrtens fail.

Separatists say their fight is legitimate because former colonial power the Netherlands promised the region it could become independent before it was annexed by Indonesia in 1963.

Indonesia says Papua is its territory after a 1969 vote supervised by the United Nations, in which 1,025 handpicked people unanimously backed its integration.

More than a half a century later, rebels are still fighting the Indonesian republic.

An estimated 500 fighters identify as members of the West Papua National Liberation Army (TPNPB), the armed wing of the Free Papua Movement (OPM).

Loosely organised and geographically fractured, the TPNPB lacks cohesion and a central leadership and command.

Instead, units in different areas operate under individual commanders, like Kogoya, who hails from a family with rebel connections – some relatives were behind the kidnapping of several foreign researchers in 1996.

For years, the separatists mounted small attacks with minimal casualties but Kogoya and his group opened a bloody new chapter in 2018 when they attacked a road-construction project killing 21 workers.

Indonesia launched a security crackdown in response, vowing to wipe out the rebels with hundreds of extra troops.

The violence forced thousands of villagers to flee, triggering a humanitarian crisis in which more than 160 people died of sickness and starvation. But in the rugged Papuan highlands, the security forces failed to track down Kogoya and his men.

SOCIAL MEDIA TOOL

Rebels who once brandished bows and arrows are now increasingly carrying guns, including automatic rifles seized in raids on the security forces or bought on the black market, and conducting more frequent and more lethal attacks, the IPAC said in a July report. Fifty-two members of the security forces and 34 fighters were killed between 2018 and 2021, it said.

The rebels are also taking advantage of modern communications.

Cahyo Pamungkas, a researcher from the National Research and Innovation Agency, said the separatists are using social media to get their message out.

“Social media is a tool of resistance to deliver the stories from Papua because national media is mainly dominated by perspectives from Jakarta,” he said.

“They are really media savvy,” said IPAC’s Anwar, “They want to show they are not a rag tag rebel group but have some structure, at least at the local level.”

TPNPB spokesperson Sebby Sambom said the New Zealand pilot was being well looked after and treated as “family”.

“This was his idea but we are responsible for controlling the situation,” Sambom said by telephone, referring to Kogoya’s seizure of the pilot.

Sambom vowed more violence unless the separatists’ demands were met, saying the TPNPB planned a “total revolution” by 2025 with widespread destruction and bloodshed.

The government did not respond to requests for comment on the rebel threat of escalation.

Some rights activists criticise the government’s response to the insurgency.

A project to get satellite coverage over the area that would help the security forces pinpoint Kogoya’s location has become embroiled in graft, a lawmaker with knowledge of the matter told Reuters on the condition of anonymity.

There are also questions about overall responsibility for policy with the government flagging a “softer approach” while the military has tended to deploy more troops in response to attacks.

“It’s not quite under the control of the civilian government there,” said Marzuki Darusman, a former attorney general turned human rights campaigner.

“It’s become military turf and that doesn’t help.”

(This story has been corrected to fix the name to Sebby Sambom, not Sebby Sambon, in paragraphs 24-26)

Additional reporting by Ananda Teresia; Editing by Robert Birsel

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February 23, 2023
Turkey summons nine Western ambassadors over security alerts

ANKARA, Feb 2 (Reuters) – Turkey summoned ambassadors of nine Western countries including the United States and Sweden on Thursday to criticise their decisions to temporarily shut diplomatic missions and issue security alerts following Koran-burning incidents in Europe.

The envoys of Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Britain were also summoned, according to foreign ministry sources in Ankara.

Over the last two weeks, far-right activists burned copies of the Muslim holy book, the Koran, in Sweden, Denmark and the Netherlands, acts that prompted Turkey to halt negotiations meant to lift its objections to Sweden and Finland joining NATO.

The European countries have denounced the incidents but some say they cannot prevent them because of free speech rules.

Over the last week, France, Germany, Italy and the United States were among those issuing warnings to their citizens of an increased risk of attacks in Turkey, particularly against diplomatic missions and non-Muslim places of worship.

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Germany, France and the Netherlands were among countries that temporarily closed diplomatic missions in Turkey for security reasons this week. Some cited central Istanbul areas of high concern but did not provide the source of the information.

“Such simultaneous activities do not constitute a proportional and commonsense approach and…only serve the covert agenda of terrorist organizations,” said a foreign ministry source who asked not to be further identified.

The source added that the security of all diplomatic missions is ensured in accordance with international conventions and “allies should cooperate with” Turkish authorities.

The interior minister, Suleyman Soylu, said on Twitter the embassies were waging “a new psychological war” against Turkey.

All 30 NATO members must approve newcomers. Sweden and Finland applied for membership last year in the face of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but ran into surprise resistance from Turkey.

Since then they have sought to win its backing including agreeing to take a harder line domestically against those Turkey says are members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, the PKK, designated a terrorist group by Ankara and the European Union.

On Thursday, police in NATO member Norway banned a planned anti-Islam protest including the burning of the Koran for security reasons, hours after the Turkish foreign ministry summoned Oslo’s ambassador to complain.

Diplomatic tensions rose last weekend when Turkey responded to the initial U.S. security alert by warning its citizens against “possible Islamophobic, xenophobic and racist attacks” in the United States and Europe.

The U.S. embassy confirmed its Ambassador Jeffry Flake attended a meeting at Turkey’s foreign ministry on Thursday. Two European diplomatic sources said envoys from Germany, France and the Netherlands were also summoned.

Writing by Jonathan Spicer; Editing by Alison Williams, Peter Graff and Mark Heinrich

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February 3, 2023
Iran executes British-Iranian national, UK condemns ‘barbaric’ act
Alireza Akbari was a former Iranian deputy defence minister

Arrested in 2019, he was accused of spying for Britain

UK’s Sunak calls it ‘a callous and cowardly act’

Britain had said Iran must not follow through with sentence
DUBAI/LONDON, Jan 14 (Reuters) – Iran has executed a British-Iranian national who once served as its deputy defence minister, its judiciary reported on Saturday, defying calls from London for his release after he was handed the death sentence on charges of spying for Britain.

Britain, which had declared the case against Alireza Akbari as politically motivated, condemned the execution and said it would not stand unchallenged.

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak called it “a callous and cowardly act carried out by a barbaric regime with no respect for the human rights of their own people”.

The Iranian judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported the execution early on Saturday, without saying when it had taken place. Late on Friday, British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly had said Iran must not follow through with the sentence – a call echoed by Washington.

“Alireza Akbari, who was sentenced to death on charges of corruption on earth and extensive action against the country’s internal and external security through espionage for the British government’s intelligence service … was executed,” Mizan said.

The report accused Akbari, arrested in 2019, of receiving payments of 1,805,000 euros, 265,000 pounds, and $50,000 for spying.

In an audio recording purportedly from Akbari and broadcast by BBC Persian on Wednesday, he said he had confessed to crimes he had not committed after extensive torture.

Sunak said on Twitter he was “appalled by the execution”. Cleverly said in a statement it would “not stand unchallenged”. “We will be summoning the Iranian Charge d’Affaires to make clear our disgust at Iran’s actions.”

British statements on the case have not addressed the Iranian charge that Akbari spied for Britain.

Iranian state media broadcast a video on Thursday that they said showed that Akbari played a role in the 2020 assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, killed in a 2020 attack outside Tehran which authorities blamed at the time on Israel.

In the video, Akbari did not confess to involvement in the assassination but said a British agent had asked for information about Fakhrizadeh.

Iran’s state media often airs purported confessions by suspects in politically charged cases.

Reuters could not establish the authenticity of the state media video and audio, or when or where they were recorded.

Akbari was a close ally of Ali Shamkhani, now the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, who was defence minister from 1997 to 2005, when Akbari was his deputy.

‘3,500 HOURS OF TORTURE’

Reflecting Iran’s worsening ties with the West, London-Tehran relations have deteriorated in recent months as efforts have stalled to revive Iran’s 2015 nuclear pact, to which Britain is a party.

Britain has also been critical of the Islamic Republic’s crackdown on anti-government protests, sparked by the death in custody of a young Iranian-Kurdish woman in September.

A British foreign office minister said on Thursday that Britain was actively considering proscribing Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organisation but has not reached a final decision.

Iran has issued dozens of death sentences as part of the crackdown on the unrest, executing at least four people.

In the audio recording broadcast by BBC Persian, Akbari said he had made false confessions as a result of torture.

“With more than 3,500 hours of torture, psychedelic drugs, and physiological and psychological pressure methods, they took away my will. They drove me to the brink of madness… and forced me to make false confessions by force of arms and death threats,” he said.

Reporting by Dubai newsroom and Michael Holden in London; Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by William Mallard and Angus MacSwan

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January 13, 2023
U.S. FDA allows abortion pills to be sold at retail pharmacies

WASHINGTON, Jan 3 (Reuters) – The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) will allow retail pharmacies to offer abortion pills in the United States for the first time, the agency said on Tuesday, even as more states seek to ban medication abortion.

The regulatory change will potentially expand abortion access as President Joe Biden’s administration wrestles with how best to protect abortion rights after they were sharply curtailed by the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the landmark Roe v Wade ruling and the state bans that followed.

Pharmacies can start applying for certification to distribute abortion pill mifepristone with one of the two companies that make it, and if successful they will be able to dispense it directly to patients upon receiving a prescription from a certified prescriber.

The FDA had first said it would be making those changes in December 2021 when it announced it would relax some risk evaluation and mitigation strategies, or REMS, on the pill, that had been in place since the agency approved it in 2000 and were lifted temporarily in 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The changes included permanently removing restrictions on mail order shipping of the pills and their prescription through telehealth.

The agency finalized the changes on Tuesday after reviewing supplemental applications from Danco Laboratories and GenBioPro, the two companies that make the drug in the United States.

“Under the Mifepristone REMS Program, as modified, Mifeprex and its approved generic can be dispensed by certified pharmacies or by or under the supervision of a certified prescriber,” the agency said on its website on Tuesday.

Mifeprex is the brand name version of mifepristone which, in combination with a second drug called misoprostol that has various uses including miscarriage management, induces an abortion up to 10 weeks into a pregnancy in a process known as medication abortion.

Abortion rights activists say the pill has a long track record of being safe and effective, with no risk of overdose or addiction. In several countries, including India and Mexico, women can buy them without a prescription to induce abortion.

“Today’s news is a step in the right direction for health equity,” Planned Parenthood President Alexis McGill Johnson said in a statement.

“Being able to access your prescribed medication abortion through the mail or to pick it up in person from a pharmacy like any other prescription is a game changer for people trying to access basic health care,” Johnson added.

NO EQUAL ACCESS

The regulatory change will, however, not provide equal access to all people, GenBioPro, which makes the generic version of mifepristone, said in a statement.

Abortion bans, some targeting mifepristone, have gone into effect in more than a dozen states since the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to terminating pregnancies when it scrapped the 1973 Roe v. Wade ruling last year.

Women in those states could potentially travel to other states to obtain medication abortion.

The president of anti-abortion group SBA Pro-Life America, Marjorie Dannenfelser, said the latest FDA move endangers women’s safety and the lives of unborn children.

“State lawmakers and Congress must stand as a bulwark against the Biden administration’s pro-abortion extremism,” she said in a statement.

FDA records show a small mortality case number associated with mifepristone. As of June 2021, there were reports of 26 deaths linked with the pill out of 4.9 million people estimated to have taken it since it was approved in September 2000.

Retail pharmacies will have to weigh whether or not to offer the pill given the political controversy surrounding abortion, and determine where they can do so.

A spokesperson for CVS Health (CVS.N) said the drugstore chain owner was reviewing the updated REMS “drug safety program certification requirements for mifepristone to determine the requirements to dispense in states that do not restrict the dispensing of medications prescribed for elective termination of pregnancy.”

A spokesperson for Walgreens (WBA.O), one of the largest U.S. pharmacies, said the company was also reviewing the FDA’s regulatory change. “We will continue to enable our pharmacists to dispense medications consistent with federal and state law.”

Reporting by Ahmed Aboulenein; Additional reporting by Eric Beech in Washington, Shivani Tanna, Rahat Sandhu, and Kanjyik Ghosh in Bengaluru; Editing by Himani Sarkar

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Ahmed Aboulenein

Thomson Reuters

Washington-based correspondent covering U.S. healthcare and pharmaceutical policy with a focus on the Department of Health and Human Services and the agencies it oversees such as the Food and Drug Administration, previously based in Iraq and Egypt.

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January 3, 2023
Migrants face freezing Christmas at U.S.-Mexico border

MATAMOROS, Mexico, Dec 24 (Reuters) – Hundreds of migrants prepared to camp in the cold at Mexico’s northern border over Christmas, hoping for a swift reversal in U.S. migration restrictions as they endure the bite of a winter storm ravaging the United States.

After the U.S. Supreme Court this week ruled that restrictions known as Title 42 could stay in place temporarily, many migrants are facing a Christmas weekend of what Mexico’s weather service called a “mass of arctic air.”

“I’m staying here, where else can I go?” said Walmix Juin, a 32-year-old Haitian migrant preparing for the weekend in a flimsy tent in the city of Reynosa, across the border from McAllen, Texas. “I never thought I would spend a Christmas like this.”

Temperatures in the border cities of Matamoros and Reynosa, where several thousand people are camping outside or in bare-bones shelters, are expected to hover around freezing on Saturday and only slightly improve on Sunday.

Further west in Ciudad Juarez, where hundreds of migrants have been lining up to seek asylum at the border with El Paso, Texas, temperatures are forecast to drop to minus six degrees Celsius (21 degrees Fahrenheit). Many have been sleeping in the streets.

Officials have provided more space in shelters in recent days, but some migrants are wary.

[1/4] Migrants, mostly from Venezuela, take refuge from the cold on a public transport bus during a night of low temperatures, while another migrant with his son watches them from outside, in downtown El Paso, Texas, U.S., December 23, 2022. REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez

Wearing a baseball hat and jacket zipped to the chin, 29-year-old Venezuelan Antony Rodriguez has tried to stay warm in Matamoros by huddling under blankets in a tent with five relatives, he showed in a video shared with Reuters.

After an arduous trek across Central America and Mexico, Rodriguez said he turned down the offer of a shelter because he feared authorities would bus them south.

“We feel they’ll send us back,” he said.

Another Venezuelan in Matamoros, Giovanny Castellanos, said he was camping out in a tent on the border, wrapped up in blankets, to keep abreast of developments.

“If you go to shelter you’re further from here where the real information is,” the 32-year-old said.

Title 42 allows the United States to return migrants to Mexico or certain countries without a chance to request asylum. It had been due to end on Dec. 21 before the court ruling. Without clarity on when it will finish, some officials worry their cities could be overwhelmed if more migrants turn up.

“U.S. migration policy has a big impact here on the border,” Reynosa Mayor Carlos Pena Ortiz said on Friday.

Reporting by Daina Beth Solomon and Daniel Becerril; Additional reporting by Jackie Botts, Jose Luis Gonzalez and Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Leslie Adler
Editing by Dave Graham

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December 24, 2022
Ukraine says Russia strike kills at least 10; Moscow blames pro-Kyiv forces

KYIV, Dec 24 (Reuters) – A Russian strike on Ukraine’s recently recaptured city of Kherson killed at least 10 people, wounded 58 and left bloodied corpses on the road, authorities said, in what Kyiv condemned as wanton killing for pleasure.

A pro-Moscow official responded by saying Ukrainian forces had launched the attack in a bid to blame the Russian military.

Fresh from a trip to the United States seeking weapons to resist the 10-month-old Russian invasion, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy published photos showing streets strewn with burning cars, smashed windows and bodies.

“Social networks will most likely mark these photos as ‘sensitive content’. But this is not sensitive content – it is the real life of Ukraine and Ukrainians,” he wrote.

“These are not military facilities. … It is terror, it is killing for the sake of intimidation and pleasure.”

Russia controls most but not all of Kherson region. Local Governor Yaroslav Yanushevych, appointed by Kyiv, told national television the death toll had risen to 10, Interfax Ukraine news agency said.

Vladimir Saldo, the region’s Russian-installed governor, said Kyiv had ordered troops to shell the city.

“This is a disgusting provocation with the obvious aim of blaming the Russian armed forces,” he wrote on Telegram.

Yuriy Sobolevskyi, deputy chair of the regional council, said a missile landed next to a supermarket by the city’s Freedom Square.

Cars burn on a street after a Russian military strike, amid Russia’s attack of Ukraine, in Kherson, Ukraine December 24, 2022. Ukrainian Presidential Press Service/Handout via REUTERS

“There were civilians there, each of whom lived their own life, went about their own business,” he said, noting a girl selling phone Sim cards, others unloading items from a truck, and passersby.

Reuters was unable to independently verify the reports from Kherson.

Ukraine retook the city, the only regional capital Russia had since its Feb. 24 invasion, in November. Since then, Kyiv says Russian forces have heavily shelled the city from across the vast Dnipro river.

‘KILL WITH IMPUNITY’

Ukrainian presidential aide Kyrylo Tymoshenko said the attack came from a Grad multiple rocket launcher.

Another aide, Mykhailo Podolyak, criticized those calling for Kyiv to seek peace talks with Russia, referencing Moscow’s relentless pounding of Ukraine’s power grid since October that has left millions without heat or water.

“I’ll remind those who propose to take into account (Russian) ‘peace’ initiatives: Right now Russia is ‘negotiating,’ killing Kherson residents, wiping out Bakhmut, destroying Kyiv/Odesa grids, torturing civilians in Melitopol,” Podolyak wrote.

“Russia wants to kill with impunity. Shall we allow it?”

Yanushevych had earlier shared a message from the city’s blood bank calling for urgent donations.

Kyiv was still recovering from Monday’s wave of missile strikes, which knocked out half the city’s power supply into the next day, according to Ukraine’s prime minister.

Reporting by Max Hunder;
Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, David Ljunggren, Josie Kao and Leslie Adler

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December 24, 2022
Taliban bans female NGO staff, jeopardizing aid efforts
Taliban orders NGOs to stop female staff from working

Comes after suspension of female students from universities

U.N. says order would seriously impact humanitarian operations

U.N. plans to meet with Taliban to seek clarity
KABUL, Dec 24 (Reuters) – Afghanistan’s Taliban-run administration on Saturday ordered all local and foreign NGOs to stop female employees from working, in a move the United Nations said would hit humanitarian operations just as winter grips a country already in economic crisis.

A letter from the economy ministry, confirmed by spokesperson Abdulrahman Habib, said female employees of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) were not allowed to work until further notice because some had not adhered to the administration’s interpretation of Islamic dresscode for women.

It comes days after the administration ordered universities to close to women, prompting global condemnation and sparking some protests and heavy criticism inside Afghanistan.

Both decisions are the latest restrictions on women that are likely to undermine the Taliban-run administration’s efforts to gain international recognition and clear sanctions that are severely hampering the economy.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Twitter he was “deeply concerned” the move “will disrupt vital and life-saving assistance to millions,” adding: “Women are central to humanitarian operations around the world. This decision could be devastating for the Afghan people.”

Ramiz Alakbarov, the U.N. deputy special representative for Afghanistan and humanitarian coordinator, told Reuters that although the U.N. had not received the order, contracted NGOs carried out most of its activities and would be heavily impacted.

“Many of our programmes will be affected,” he said, because they need female staff to assess humanitarian need and identify beneficiaries, otherwise they will not be able to implement aid programs.

International aid agency AfghanAid said it was immediately suspending operations while it consulted with other organisations, and that other NGOs were taking similar actions.

The potential endangerment of aid programmes that millions of Afghans access comes when more than half the population relies on humanitarian aid, according to aid agencies, and during the mountainous nation’s coldest season.

“There’s never a right time for anything like this … but this particular time is very unfortunate because during winter time people are most in need and Afghan winters are very harsh,” said Alakbarov.

He said his office would consult with NGOs and U.N. agencies on Sunday and seek to meet with Taliban authorities for an explanation.

Aid workers say female workers are essential in a country where rules and cultural customs largely prevent male workers from delivering aid to female beneficiaries.

“An important principle of delivery of humanitarian aid is the ability of women to participate independently and in an unimpeded way in its distribution so if we can’t do it in a principled way then no donors will be funding any programs like that,” Alakbarov said.

When asked whether the rules directly included U.N. agencies, Habib said the letter applied to organisations under Afghanistan’s coordinating body for humanitarian organisations, known as ACBAR. That body does not include the U.N., but includes over 180 local and international NGOs.

Their licences would be suspended if they did not comply, the letter said.

Afghanistan’s struggling economy has tipped into crisis since the Taliban took over in 2021, with the country facing sanctions, cuts in development aid and a freeze in central bank assets.

A record 28 million Afghans are estimated to need humanitarian aid next year, according to AfghanAid.

Reporting by Kabul newsroom; additional reporting by Susan Heavey in Washington
Editing by Mark Potter and Josie Kao

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December 24, 2022
Protests in Malta as parliament debates abortion amendment

VALLETTA, Dec 4 (Reuters) – A large picture of an unborn baby was placed outside the office of Malta’s prime minister on Sunday as demonstrators called on the government to halt plans to amend the country’s strict anti-abortion laws.

The protest, the biggest in years, attracted several thousand people including Malta’s top Catholic bishop and the leader of the conservative opposition, but was led by a former centre-left president, Marie Louise Coleiro Preca.

“We are here to be the voice of the unborn child,” said 19-year-old university student Maria Formosa, one of the speakers at the rally. “Through abortion, life is always lost.”

Some of those present carried placards reading slogans such as “Keep abortion out of Malta” and “Protect our children”. They also chanted “No to abortion, yes to life”.

Traditionally Catholic Malta is the only member of the European Union which bans abortion in all circumstances, even when a woman’s life or health is endangered by her pregnancy.

Last week, Health Minister Chris Fearne presented an amendment in parliament that would make doctors no longer risk up to four years’ imprisonment if their intervention to help women with severe health issues causes the end of a pregnancy.

To date, no doctor has been prosecuted on such charges.

The centre-right opposition, the powerful Catholic Church and some NGOs have described the amendment as not needed and as paving the way for a full liberalisation of abortion, a claim rejected by the ruling centre-left Labour party.

Prime Minister Robert Abela’s government holds a comfortable majority and no dissent has appeared within its ranks, but opinion polls show a big majority against abortion, particularly among older people.

No one from the government made any comment in response to the protest on Sunday.

The move to change abortion rules comes after a U.S. tourist, Andrea Prudente, was refused a request in June to terminate a non-viable pregnancy after she began to bleed profusely.

Her doctors said her life was at risk and she was eventually transferred to Spain where she had an abortion. She later sued the Malta government, calling on the courts to declare that banning abortion in all circumstances breaches human rights.

The case has not yet come to trial.

Reporting by Christopher Scicluna; Editing by Alvise Armellini and David Holmes

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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December 4, 2022