New Age Islam News Bureau
04 December 2021
Pakistan Prime Minister
Imran Khan/ Photo: Times of India
-----
• Hindu Groups Target Gurgaon’s Muslim Prayer Sites;
Litter-Strewn Patch Of Concrete Has Become A Religious Battlefield
• Hundreds Of Social Media Users Worldwide Took A
Stand Against Islamophobia In America
• Cementing Ties With France, UAE Places $19 bln Order
For 80 Rafale, Helicopters
Pakistan
• Anti-Terrorism Court Of Gujranwala Hands Down
16-Year Jail Term To 19 Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan Men
• TNFJ rejects amendments to Muslim family laws
• Pakistan’s Serbia embassy Twitter handle ‘hacked’,
post targets Imran
• Pakistan re-elected to executive council of chemical
weapons watchdog
--------
India
• Notice To Imam For Organizing Friday Prayers In In
Noida’s Phase 2 Park
• Kerala Police Books BJP-RSS Workers For Raising
'Anti-Muslim' Slogans
• Pakistan to allow Afghan trucks to ferry Indian
wheat to Afghanistan
• J&K: Mysterious blinking lights seen close to
border in Jammu region
--------
North America
• US: Democrats denounce lawmaker's anti-Muslim
attacks
• US special envoy discusses Afghanistan with Qatari
authorities
• US hits out at Iran for not coming to Vienna with
constructive proposals
• US State Department phones hacked with Israeli
company spyware: Sources
--------
Arab World
• Islamic State Attack Leaves Over Dozen Kurds Dead
• More than 90 Houthis killed in last 24 hours in
Yemen’s Marib: Arab Coalition
• US ‘deeply concerned’ by rising Daesh/ISIS attacks
in Iraq: Secretary of state
• Turkish defence chief denounces Assad regime’s
‘meaningless’ statement
• Lebanon’s information minister resigns after Saudi
Arabia comments
--------
Africa
• Saif al-Islam Is Not Looking To Resurrect His
Father’s Rule; Wants To Lay That Era To Rest
• Include Miyetti Allah, FUNAM on list of terrorists –
Ortom to Buhari govt
• Sudan Sovereign Council head Burhan says he will not
run for presidency
• UN worker killed in attack on peacekeeping convoy in
Mali
--------
South Asia
• Karzai Calls For Inclusive Government In Afghanistan
To Gain International Acceptance, Recognition
• Millions of Afghans starving as winter approaches:
UN
• Afghan judges in Brazil still fear the Taliban
--------
Southeast Asia
• Kit Siang Asks If PM’s Special Envoy To Middle East
Banned From Saudi Arabia
• Philippine military says Muslim rebel leader killed
in clash
• Confusing laws over marriage wreckers
• 2 telling cases of cognitive dissonance
--------
Mideast
• Iran Urges Lifting of All US Unlawful Sanctions in
Draft Documents
• President Rayeesi Calls for Broadening of Iran-Laos
Cooperation
• Putin criticizes Ukraine’s use of Turkish drones in
Erdogan call
• Israeli army arrests 24 Palestinians in West Bank
• Dozens of Palestinians injured by Israeli forces in
West Bank
--------
Europe
• Family Loses Defamation Claim In UK After
Questioning Donations To Mosque From ‘Extremist’
• In Khashoggi's shadow, Macron set for Saudi talks
with crown prince
• Macron thanks Qatar for Afghan evacuations
• Rights groups urge Macron to refuse protection to
Syrian war criminal
• EU announces $367M in extra funds to support
refugees in Turkey
• France’s Macron says hoping for progress on Lebanon
‘within next hours’
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/pakistan-imran-lanka-lynch-blasphemy/d/125899
--------
Sri Lankan Lynched To Death, Burnt For 'Blasphemy' in
Pakistan's Punjab Province, PM Imran Khan Calls It 'Day Of Shame,' Army Chief Too
Condemns
Pakistan Prime Minister
Imran Khan/ Photo: Times of India
-----
Dec 3, 2021
NEW DELHI: A Sri Lankan national was beaten to death
and his body burnt over allegations of blasphemy in Pakistan's Punjab province
on Friday.
The man was a manager at a factory in Sialkot in the
Punjab province.
Prime Minister Imran Khan tweeted, terming the
incident "a day of shame for Pakistan," and said all those
responsible will be punished.
The horrific vigilante attack on factory in Sialkot
& the burning alive of Sri Lankan manager is a day of shame for…
https://t.co/fIfArcc5mv
— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) 1638540329000
Chief minister of Punjab Usman Buzdar said he was
"extremely shocked at the horrific Sialkot incident", and has ordered
an inquiry.
Around 50 people have been arrested so far, according
to Pakistan media reports.
Priyantha Kumara, a Sri Lankan national who was in his
40s, worked as the general manager of a factory in Sialkot district, some 100
kms from Lahore.
"Mr Kumara allegedly tore a poster of the
hardline Tehreek-e-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) in which Quranic verses were
inscribed and threw it in the dustbin. The poster of the Islamist party was
pasted on the wall adjoining the office of Kumara. A couple of factory workers
saw him removing the poster and spread the word in the factory," a police
official said.
Hundreds of men, enraged over the “blasphemy”
incident, started gathering outside the factory from adjoining areas. Most of
them were activists and supporters of the TLP.
He was badly beaten and succumbed to his injuries. The
mob also burnt his body before police could reach the spot.
Several videos were circulated on social media showing
hundreds of men gathered at the site surrounding the body and chanting slogans
of the TLP.
"CCTV footage is being obtained so that those who
were responsible can be identified. The IG has directed law enforcement
personnel to produce results in 48 hours after which the probe will be
extended," a Punjab government spokesperson said.
Pakistan has extremely strict laws against defaming
Islam, including the death penalty, and rights campaigners say they are often
used to settle personal disputes in the Muslim-majority country.
Mere allegations of blasphemy have triggered violence
against minorities like Christians.
A Punjab governor in Islamabad was also shot and
killed by his own guard in 2011, after he defended a Christian woman who was
accused of blasphemy.
Pakistan has been under pressure for the past several
decades to change the country's blasphemy laws. However, Islamists in the
country have strongly resisted the efforts, and have prevailed upon successive
governments.
Source: Times of India
Please click the following URL to read the text of the
original story:
--------
Hindu Groups Target Gurgaon’s Muslim Prayer Sites;
Litter-Strewn Patch Of Concrete Has Become A Religious Battlefield
Police standing guard in
Gurgaon, India, to secure the site of Friday prayers amid protests by Hindu
groups in October. Photograph: Manoj Kumar/AFP/Getty
----
Hannah Ellis-Petersen in Gurgaon
Sat 4 Dec 2021
Until a few weeks ago, no one had given much thought
to the car park outside sector 37 police station in Gurgaon, a satellite city
to India’s capital, Delhi. But for the last few Fridays the dusty,
litter-strewn patch of concrete has become a religious battlefield.
This week as a Hindu nationalist mob assembled in
their usual saffron, roars of their signature slogans “Jai Shri Ram” (Hail Lord
Ram) and “hail the motherland” filled the air. Then a cry rang out: “The
Muslims are here.” And the mob began to charge.
For more than a decade, this car park has been one of
hundreds of sites that the Muslims of Gurgaon have been using as a makeshift
prayer ground on Fridays, their designated day of congregational prayer, for
jumma namaz. Usually such prayers are held in mosques but Gurgaon, a city that
rose in the 1990s from the brushland on the outskirts of Delhi to serve India’s
new middle class, has a severe shortage, with around 13 to cater for a city of
more than 1.5 million people. Attempts to build more mosques in the area, even
on Muslim-owned land, have been met with resistance and hostility.
Instead, the thousands of Muslim labourers who have
flocked to this expanding metropolis for construction work on Gurgaon’s
corporate skyscrapers and luxury high-rise apartments found another option.
Unable to travel for miles to a mosque to offer namaz, they began praying on
empty patches of land. They even sought permission from the administration and
by 2018 the Muslim community had been granted permission for outdoor prayers in
108 places across the district.
“People are forced to pray out in the open because we
have no other choice,” said Altaf Ahmad, a co-founder of the Gurgaon Muslim
council.
But in 2018, rumblings of discontent began, as Hindu
vigilante groups realised that Muslims were praying on public land. They began
to hold protests, sometimes with more than 100 people, disrupting dozens of
Friday prayers and fracturing the modern metropolis along an age-old schism.
In response, the Gurgaon administration reduced the number
of namaz sites from 108 to 37, to the dismay of the Muslim leaders who felt the
administration was bowing to the demands of fanatics. “They told us it was
temporary and just to cool the situation down,” said Ahmad. But this year,
after a lull due to Covid, the objections came back with a vengeance.
Every Friday for months, members of Hindu vigilante
groups alongside local residents have been gathering, occasionally armed with
axes and wooden rods, at the sites of namaz to try to stop them happening. Slogans
including “shoot the traitors” have been shouted and Hindu prayers and songs
read out to try to drown out Qur’an readings. Cow dung has been placed at the
sites and police have regularly had to hold back the mob so namaz could
continue.
Last month an umbrella organistion of Hindu groups
called the Sanyukt Hindu Sangharsh Samiti told police that they were ready to
use weapons and go to jail if the namaz was not stopped.
At the forefront of the fight is Dinesh Thakur, who
goes by the name Dinesh Bharti, a nod to his devotion to Bharat, meaning mother
India. Thakur, who has set up his own one-man Hindu nationalist army called
Bharat Mata Vahini, has been detained more than 10 times and arrested and
charged three times for his communal actions.
On Friday Thakur sprinted towards Shehzad Khan, the
Muslim leader who was there to lead the prayer, and began confronting him,
getting within inches of his face shouting “no namaz here”, until he was
dragged away by five police officers. As the Muslims filed silently into the
area for namaz, heads down and clutching their prayer mats, a line of armed
police held back the Hindu nationalist mob. Seven were detained by police.
“Conducting namaz in the open is land jihad,” Thakur
said before being arrested. “It’s an international conspiracy. They do namaz
outside, then they build a shrine, then they build a mosque and then inside the
mosque they are harbouring terrorists and weapons and they are a threat to the
nation. I will not stop my fight until this becomes illegal.”
Residents have joined the protests, including Ravinder
Kumar, 45, a software engineer and joint secretary of Gurgaon’s sector 47
residents’ welfare association. “So many unknown people were coming here for
namaz, and it created an environment of fear,” said Kumar. “Afterwards they
wander into our park, and we are worried they could be here for theft. A few
days ago an AK47 rifle was seized from a Muslim in Gurgaon by police. We don’t
want such things in our area.”
Kumar conceded that so far no incidents of crime had
been committed by anyone coming for Friday prayer.
For the Muslim community, praying in the few public
sites they have left has become a statement about their rights in society. The
number of public places where Muslims are allowed to pray in Gurgaon has
recently been reduced again, to 20, and owing to the continuing protests it is
likely to shrink further. Mufti Mohammad Saleem Qasmi, the president of the
Muslim organisation Jamiat Ulama-i-Hind, said they would continue to hold
Friday prayer in these spaces as it was a matter of justice.
On Friday as the cries of “Jai Shri Ram” rang out and
the police held back the protesters with batons, about 50 Muslims sat side by
side in the direction of Mecca and bowed their heads to the ground. Khan then led
a prayer for Hindu-Muslim harmony. “Muslims are as much citizens of India as
Hindus. Our forefathers have also sacrificed for this country,” he said. “Guide
us, Hindu and Muslim brothers, to remain united in a bond of brotherhood.”
Washi Ahmer, 25, was among those who came to pray. “We
are not scared but it’s not right what is happening,” he said. “We have been
praying here for 10 to 12 years but all this protest is new. They want to
divide the nation. They have a problem with our existence.”
The developments in Gurgaon reflect divisions between
Hindus and Muslims that have opened up across India since the Hindu nationalist
Bharatiya Janata party won power in 2014. The BJP has been accused of fanning
the flames of communal tensions and enabling a persecution of Muslims – a
charge it denies.
“When this first happened in 2018, it hurt me very
badly,” said Ahmad. “But there’s been so much pressure on Muslims since then
that now I have become numb. I don’t feel that pain any more.”
To improve communal harmony, last Friday the Sikh
community stepped in and offered its five gurdwaras in Gurgaon as spaces for
namaz. But this inflamed the problem even more. Several people picketed a
gurdwara with placards and handed out booklets questioning how Sikhs could let
Muslims inside their place of worship when their ninth Sikh guru was killed by
the Mughals.
In the end, in the name of safety, no Muslims prayed
in the gurdwara. Daya Singh, 72, a member of the Gurudwara Shri Guru Singh
Sabha committee, said: “We know this is not really about namaz, it’s all part
of the plan to alienate Muslims.”
The Gurgaon administration says it has resolved the
issue. “We are committed to preserving communal harmony and law and order in
the area,” said Gurgaon’s deputy commissioner Dr Yash Garg. “Namaz is now being
offered peacefully. This issue is caused only by the fringe elements from both
sides. This is a free country for all religions, the Muslim community can build
another mosque if they want.”
Source: The Guardian
Please click the following URL to read the text of the
original story:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/04/hindu-groups-target-muslim-sites-india-gurgaon
--------
Hundreds Of Social Media Users Worldwide Took A Stand
Against Islamophobia In America
Hundreds of social media users worldwide took a stand
against Islamophobia in a viral social experiment started by an American Muslim
activist on Tuesday.
----
December 4, 2021
Hundreds of social media users worldwide took a stand
against Islamophobia in a viral social experiment started by an American Muslim
activist on Tuesday.
Saqib Hussain Javed, 27, of Detroit, Michigan, asked
Twitter users to say where they're from and that they're against anti-Muslim
hate.
Ex-National Basketball Association professional player
Rex Chapman wrote: "I am from Kentucky and I stand against
Islamophobia."
He was following the format suggested by Javed, which
invites users to fill in the blank in an example post with their location.
I am from
Kentucky and I stand against Islamophobia.
— Rex
Chapman (RexChapman) November 30, 2021
States across the US were represented with similar
messages – from Washington State to Colorado to Texas. People from cities and
countries around the world joined in too: from Toronto, Canada to Kerala in
India, and from Uganda to the UK.
Even the New York State Green Party got involved,
saying: "We are from New York and we stand against Islamophobia."
Others expanded on the prompt.
"You will not find shelter here: only my never
ending [sic] rage over your choice to exclude," one user from Colorado
told Islamophobes. "You aren't welcome here."
Beasy Jennison from Ohio said: "Thank you for
tweeting this experiment.
"Still so much to do to end the cancerous hate
that plagues our [E]arth, but it fills one with hope to see so many from all
different parts of the world uniting together."
I am from
Ohio, USA and I will forever stand against islamophobia.
Thank you
for tweeting this experiment.
Still so
much to do to end the cancerous hate that plagues our earth, but it fills one
with hope to see so many from all different parts of the world uniting
together.
— Beasy
Jennison (BestBea13) November 30, 2021
Javed, the experiment's creator, described
Islamophobia as being "like a plague in western society".
"The reason specifically for this 'social experiment'
was because of the recent attack on Muslim Congress woman [sic] Ilhan Omar, by
another [C]ongress woman [sic] who happens to be white," he told The New
Arab.
"She was spewing the same s**t a lot of Muslims
have to hear growing up in schools as a form of bully[ing] from other students
associating us with terrorism."
Javed said this was a particular issue for Muslims
who, like him, grew up after the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001.
He was discussing a video of Republican Congresswoman
Lauren Boebert which has prompted outrage online after being posted on Twitter
by self-professed right-wing extremism monitor PatriotTakes last Thursday.
Boebert suggested her Democratic colleague Ilhan Omar
belongs to a "Jihad Squad", seemingly hitting out at the progressive
"Squad" of US lawmakers Omar is a member of.
The Colorado Republican also implied a police officer
had believed Omar was a terrorist during an episode in a Capitol Hill lift the
Democrat said never happened.
Javed said: "I got PTSD watching that video from the
racial abuse I went through in grade school."
The New Arab contacted Boebert's press team for
comment but did not receive a reply by the time of publication.
The day after the video was shared by PatriotTakes,
last Friday, Boebert said: "I apologize to anyone in the Muslim community
I offended with my comment about Rep. Omar.
"I have reached out to her office to speak with
her directly."
When they talked on the telephone on Monday, Omar
terminated the call.
According to Omar, this was over Boebert
"refus[ing] to publicly acknowledge her hurtful and dangerous
comments". Boebert said it happened after she explained she would not make
a "public apology".
Islamophobia
is on the rise under this government.
Today I
shared my own experiences in Parliament during a debate for Islamophobia
Awareness Month. pic.twitter.com/ekyOGnWV5T
— Apsana
Begum MP (ApsanaBegumMP) November 24, 2021
Another inspiration for Javed's anti-Islamophobia
experiment was British MP Apsana Begum speaking out about the prejudice she
faces last Wednesday in the UK Parliament.
This came as part of an Islamophobia Awareness Month
debate.
Reflecting on the global support his experiment
received, Javed said: "It didn't necessarily make me feel better, but it
gave me a sense [of] hope.
"And where there is hope there's a chance for a
better world."
Source: ABNA24
Please click the following URL to read the text of the
original story:
--------
Cementing Ties With France, UAE Places $19 bln Order
For 80 Rafale, Helicopters
CEO of Dassault Aviation
Éric Trappier (L) poses with an Emirati official after the signing of the deal.
----
03 December ,2021
The United Arab Emirates ordered 80 Rafale fighter
jets and 12 military helicopters on Friday, deepening economic and political
ties with France through an arms contract worth 17 billion euros ($19.20
billion).
The largest ever overseas sale of the French warplane
was sealed as French President Emmanuel Macron began a two-day trip to the
Gulf, during which he will also visit Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
“This contract is historic,” French Armed Forces
Minister Florence Parly said in a statement.
The French presidency said deal, signed at a ceremony
between Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan (MBZ) and
Macron on the side-lines of the Dubai Expo 2020, is worth $19 billion.
“This contract cements a strategic partnership that is
stronger than ever and directly contributes to regional stability, the French
presidency said in a statement.
Macron’s visit comes at a time when Gulf Arab states
have voiced uncertainty about the United States’ focus on the region even as
they seek more weapons from their key security ally.
The French leader has forged a good relationship with
MBZ with investments flowing between the two countries. Paris has a permanent
military base in the Emirati capital.
Shares in Dassault Aviation SA , the Rafale’s maker,
rose more than 9 percent.
It is the biggest bulk purchase of the Dassault-made
Rafale, other than by the French army, and comes after deals in Greece, Egypt
and Croatia this year.
Abu Dhabi also ordered 12 Caracal helicopters. It is
the French code name for the H225M, the multirole military version of the Super
Puma.
The on-off negotiations for the Rafale fighter jets
took more than a decade with Abu Dhabi publicly rebuffing France’s offer to
supply 60 Rafale jets in 2011 as “uncompetitive and Unworkable.” Abu Dhabi
already has French-built Mirage 2000 warplanes.
Defence sources said the Rafale would replace the
Mirage 2000 fleet but is unlikely to displace the American-built F-35 as the
UAE continues to hedge its security with two major suppliers, France and the
United States.
The deal could nonetheless be seen as a signal of
impatience as the US Congress hesitates on approving an F-35 deal amid concerns
about the UAE’s relationship with China, including the prevalence of Huawei 5G
technology in the country.
UAE order of 80 Rafale will support 7,000 jobs in
France
The 80 Rafale fighter jets order by the United Arab
Emirates will directly support 7,000 jobs in France and guarantee the supply
chain of the Dassault Aviation made aircraft until the end of 2031, a French
official told journalists.
He also said the UAE deal, the largest order ever for
the warplane, would lead to an increase of the monthly Rafale warplane
production.
Source: Al Arabiya
Please click the following URL to read the text of the
original story:
--------
Pakistan
Anti-Terrorism
Court Of Gujranwala Hands Down 16-Year Jail Term To 19 Tehreek-i-Labbaik
Pakistan Men
Waseem
Ashraf Butt
December
4, 2021
GUJRAT:
An anti-terrorism court of Gujranwala has convicted 19 activists of the
Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) and awarded them 16-year imprisonment under
four different sections in a case of attacking police during the riots in
Hafizabad.
ATC
judge Natasha Naseem Sipra also imposed a fine of Rs30,000 to each of the
convicted person. She, however, acquitted 15 others in the case.
The
Pindi Bhattian police had booked 34 TLP workers on the charges of killing a
policeman, injuring several others, blocking the roads, snatching the anti-riot
jackets and other such offences.
The
case had been lodged under various sections including 302, 324, 148, 109 of
Pakistan Penal Code as well as sections 6/7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act on April
13 this year.
The
judge awarded 15 years’ imprisonment and a fine of Rs30,000 each in three
different offences of section 6 of ATA and one-year imprisonment in section 148
of PPC. The convicts have already been arrested and kept in the Hafizabad
district jail.
Source:
Dawn
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.dawn.com/news/1661832/atc-hands-down-16-year-jail-term-to-19-tlp-men
--------
TNFJ
rejects amendments to Muslim family laws
December
04, 2021
ISLAMABAD:
Quaid-e-Millat-e-Jaffaria Agha Hamid Ali Shah Moosavi Friday rejected the
amendment to Muslim family laws, urging the CJP to take notice of the
legislation based against the principles and faith of Shia school of thought.
He said that despite being rejected twice by the concerned Senate Standing
Committee, the passing of disputed bill is a clear violation of democratic
norms and the Constitution. He said this while addressing the TNFJ core
committee meeting in Rawalpindi. “Intervention continues in worship, rituals,
and beliefs of Maktab-e-Tashayyo. We are peace-loving people, however, we shall
never compromise on the fundamental rights.” He said introduction of disputed
curriculum, curbs on processions, amendments in books of Shia school of
thought, banning of Majalis and discriminatory legislation are all reviving the
bitter memories of Zia’s martial law.
Source:
The News Pakistan
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/913954-tnfj-rejects-amendments-to-muslim-family-laws
--------
Pakistan’s
Serbia embassy Twitter handle ‘hacked’, post targets Imran
Dec
4, 2021
ISLAMABAD:
A series of tweets from the official Twitter handle of Pakistan’s embassy in
Serbia targeted Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday, alleging non-payment of
salaries to the mission’s staff for three months, prompting the Foreign Office
to clarify that social media accounts of its embassy in Belgrade had been
hacked.
Later,
the embassy in Serbia also claimed that its account was hacked and a “baseless”
tweet posted on it from a device in Karachi. The tweets were subsequently
deleted and an investigation was launched.
The
tweet from the embassy’s verified account stated: “With inflation breaking all
previous records, how long do you expect @ImranKhanPTI that we (government)
official will remain silent & keep working for you without been paid for
past 3 months & our children been forced out of school due to non-payment
of fees. Is this #NayaPakistan?”
The
tweet accompanied a video parodying Khan’s “Ghabrana nahin hai” (don’t worry)
slogan. In a subsequent tweet, it said: “I am sorry (PM Imran Khan), am not
left with another option.”
The
tweets provoked a storm on social media until the Foreign Office issued a
statement. “The Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts of Pakistan’s embassy
in Serbia have been hacked. Messages being posted on these accounts are not
from the Embassy of Pakistan in Serbia.”
The
Foreign Office said someone in Karachi hacked into the account through a
“desktop” and a “baseless” and factually incorrect “post was made regarding
non-payment of salaries”. The embassy in Belgrade also made a similar
statement, saying it was not responsible for the posts.
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Pakistan
re-elected to executive council of chemical weapons watchdog
Naveed
Siddiqui
December
4, 2021
Pakistan
has been re-elected to the executive council of the Organisation for the
Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), the Foreign Office said in a statement
on Saturday.
Pakistan
will now be a member of the executive council for a further two years from 2022
to 2024.
Elections
for the council were held during the recently concluded 26th session of the
Conference of States Parties in the Netherlands from November 29 to December 2.
The
Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) — the world's first multilateral disarmament
agreement with 193 states as parties — is the most successful disarmament
treaty eliminating an entire class of weapons of mass destruction, according to
the FO statement.
The
executive council is the principal policy-making organ of the OPCW, which is
responsible for supervising the effective implementation of and compliance with
the CWC. It also supports the scientific and economic development of its member
states in the peaceful uses of chemistry, it added.
Pakistan
has been a member of the executive council since 1997.
"Pakistan
has been contributing constructively towards the fulfillment of the objectives
of the CWC and regularly hosts OPCW routine inspections at its relevant
facilities," the Foreign Office said.
Source:
Dawn
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
India
Notice
To Imam For Organizing Friday Prayers In In Noida’s Phase 2 Park
Dec
04, 2021
Noida:
Police on Friday issued a notice to an imam--a Muslim priest who leads a
prayer--for organising a Friday prayer in a park in Noida’s Phase 2. The move
came after a person tweeted a photo of the gathering in the park and tagged
Noida police.
Atul
Pandey tweeted a photo on Friday afternoon with the caption, “Shall we take
this as open entitlement to practice religion in public parks? This was at
Block B in Hosiery Complex, Noida.”
Sujeet
Upadhyaya, station house officer (SHO) of Phase 2 police station, said a police
team soon reached the spot on getting information about the incident. “Primary
investigation indicates that workers of a factory had gathered at a local
mosque to offer Friday prayers. However, since the mosque was full, a group of
men visited the park in the neighbourhood to offer prayers,” he said.
Upadhyaya
said people have been advised not to offer prayers in the park from next week.
“We have also served a notice to the Imam/Maulvi Siraj Ahmad,” he said.
Talking
to HT, Ahmad said he works at a factory in Phase 2. “The factory workers have
been offering prayers in the park for five years but due to lockdown, this
practice was discontinued two years ago. The workers again gathered on Friday
to offer prayers. We were not aware that offering prayers at the park is
banned. We will not organise such congregation in the park from next week,” he
said.
Source:
Hindustan Times
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Kerala
police books BJP-RSS workers for raising 'anti-Muslim' slogans
Dec
3, 2021
THIRUVANANTHAPURAM:
The Kerala police has booked RSS-BJP workers who raised highly provocative
slogans against Muslims and even threatened to vandalise their places of worship.
The
incident took place on Wednesday when
BJP took out a march in Thalassery town in Kannur district to commemorate the Martyrdom day of Yuva Morcha leader K T
Jayakrishnan. He was hacked to death
allegedly by a gang of CPM workers on December 1, 1999.
According
to Kannur police, the case was registered "suo motu" for raising
slogans that created communal disharmony.
The
cases were registered under section 153 of IPC and 143 IPC which pertains to
creating enmity between different
religious groups and unlawful assembly.
Though
the Muslim organisations had no
role in the murder, it is alleged
that the BJP workers purposefully raised slogans against the community to create enmity and trigger religious
polarisation.
The
ruling CPM lashed out at the RSS
for vitiating the peaceful atmosphere in
the state and making attempts to disturb communal harmony. There was no provocation for raising
such hateful slogans, said Thalassery MLA A N Shamsheer.
Source:
Deccan Chronicle
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Pakistan
to allow Afghan trucks to ferry Indian wheat to Afghanistan
Sachin
Parashar
Dec
3, 2021
NEW
DELHI: India and Pakistan seemed close to breaking the deadlock over delivery
of 50,000 MT of Indian wheat to Afghanistan with Islamabad announcing on Friday
it had conveyed to India its consent to the proposed use of Afghan trucks for
transporting the grain.
While
India wanted Indian or Afghan trucks to carry the humanitarian assistance to
Afghanistan, Islamabad had been insisting that India use Pakistani trucks
operating under the UN banner to move aid from the Attari-Wagah border to
Pakistan’s Torkham border crossing with Afghanistan.
The
proposal to deliver 50,000 MT to drought-stricken Afghanistan and the NSA-level
conference chaired by Ajit Doval last month are the 2 most important
initiatives taken by India in its efforts to remain on a solid footing after
the return of the Taliban to Kabul on August 15 this year. The government has
been helped by the fact that the Taliban have done nothing so far to compound
India’s insecurities and have, in fact, taken up with Pakistan the need to
expedite aid from India.
The
supply through Attari-Wagah, apart from offering a template for regional
cooperation in South Asia, can also perhaps help the two countries lay the
ghost of 2002 when Pakistan rejected the same proposal by India for delivering
aid to Afghanistan.
Pakistan
said in a statement on Friday that with a view to facilitate its decision to
allow transportation of Indian wheat and life-saving medicines to Afghanistan
via Wagah on an "exceptional basis" for humanitarian purposes, it had
decided to allow the use of Afghan trucks for transportation from Wagah to Torkham.
The same was conveyed to the Indian high commission in Islamabad on Friday. The
exercise will apparently require thousands of trucks to ferry aid over a period
of 30 days.
"This
demonstrates the commitment and seriousness of the Government of Pakistan to
facilitate the proposed humanitarian assistance. The Indian government was also
urged to proceed quickly to take necessary steps to expeditiously undertake the
delivery of the humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan," said the Pakistan
foreign ministry.
The
government said in Parliament this week that India’s special relationship with
the Afghan people and UNSC Resolution 2593 (passed under India’s presidency)
would continue to guide India’s approach to Afghanistan. "In this
endeavour, India has committed to provide 50,000 MT of wheat and life-saving
drugs to the Afghan people as humanitarian assistance," it said, in
response to a written question in Rajya Sabha.
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
J&K:
Mysterious blinking lights seen close to border in Jammu region
Dec
3, 2021
JAMMU:
A mysterious trail of blinking lights was witnessed in the night sky in some
villages close to the LoC and International Border in the Jammu region on
Friday evening, triggering curiosity panic among the locals.
The
lights were visible in Rajouri, Poonch and Samba districts, as well as Akhnoor
of Jammu.
The
locals who were eyewitnesses to the mysterious lights informed the police following
which team of police and the Border Security Force went on alert. Police
sources said "The blinking light was seen moving from Ghagwal belt towards
Ramgarh and many locals have captured the same on their cell phones.”
“Alert
has been sounded and the matter is being verified,” they said.
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
North America
US:
Democrats denounce lawmaker's anti-Muslim attacks
3
December 2021
More
than 40 House Democrats, including the chairs of five congressional caucuses,
are calling for Congresswoman Lauren Boebert to be stripped of her committee
assignments, after her repeated "anti-Muslim" attacks against fellow
lawmaker Ilhan Omar.
Thirty
six members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus signed a letter that called
for Boebert to lose her committee assignments.
The
letter, led by Congresswomen Cori Bush and Pramila Jayapal, Congressmen Jamaal
Bowman and Andre Carson, said Boebert's actions made their work environment
dangerous.
"We
refuse to stand by as Islamophobia, anti-Blackness, anti-immigrant sentiment,
and xenophobia are trafficked into the halls of Congress by members of the
Republican party," the lawmakers wrote, as reported by the Washington
Post.
"Today,
we are calling for Rep. Boebert to be removed from her committee assignments.
Our response to behavior that creates a dangerous work environment and furthers
a climate of toxicity and intolerance cannot be silence."
In
a separate letter, Jayapal and the chairs of four other congressional caucuses
said "there must be consequences when Members of Congress demonize an
entire religion and promote hate from their positions of public trust",
referring to the threats Omar has received since the verbal attacks from
Boebert.
"It
should not be a partisan issue to condemn the explicit harassment and dangerous
abuse of a colleague based on their religion," the caucus leaders wrote in
their letter.
House
Republican leaders have been facing numerous calls to condemn Islamophobic
remarks by members of their party, including comments by Boebert and
Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene.
Greene
previously said Muslims did not belong in government and referred to the
elections of Omar and Rashida Tlaib, another Muslim woman member of Congress,
as "an Islamic invasion of our government".
It
is not clear if Boebert will be removed from her comittee assignments, but she
would not be the first. Greene was removed from her committee duties after she
supported comments encouraging violence against Democrats and peddling
antisemitic tropes.
'Jihad
squad'
During
an event in her Colorado district last month, Boebert shared a story of an
encounter with Omar, who she went on to refer as a member of the "jihad
squad".
She
also shared another encounter with Omar where she said she remarked to a
Capitol Police officer: "Well, she doesn't have a backpack. We should be
fine."
Omar
condemned the remarks, saying the story was "made up", and called for
her to be disciplined by House leaders.
Last
week, Boebert tweeted an apology "to anyone in the Muslim community I
offended with my comment about Rep. Omar".
However,
in a phone call with Omar on Monday, she refused to publicly apologise and
instead accused the Minnesota Democrat of "anti-American and
antisemitic" rhetoric.
This
is not the first time Boebert has used this verbal attack line on Omar. Earlier
in November, Boebert said on the House floor that Omar was a "jihad squad
member from Minnesota with a brother-husband".
Source:
Middle East Eye
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/us-democrats-denounce-boebert-anti-muslim-attacks-ilhan-omar
--------
US
special envoy discusses Afghanistan with Qatari authorities
03
Dec 2021
US
special representative to Afghanistan Thomas West met with Qatar’s Deputy Prime
Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Muhammad Bin Abdul Rahman Al-Thani and
the country’s National Security Advisor Mohammad Al-Misand.
The
special representative in a Twitter post said that he discussed Afghanistan’s
situation with the Qatari partners.
Thomas
West said that the US was grateful to Qatar for their robust support and value
their engagement.
The
meeting comes days after Thomas West had two-day talks with the Taliban’s
acting foreign minister Amir Khan Motaqi in the Qatari capital Doha.
Amir
Khan Motaqi had dubbed the negotiations as promising and fruitful.
Not
only is the best and vital aide of the US during the Kabul evacuation, but
Qatar has also been the greatest partner of the country since peace talks
between the US and Taliban started.
Source:
Khaama Press
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.khaama.com/us-special-envoy-discusses-afghanistan-with-qatari-authorities-457457/
--------
US
hits out at Iran for not coming to Vienna with constructive proposals
03
December ,2021
The
US criticized Iran on Friday after the seventh round of indirect talks over the
now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal, saying Tehran did not come to Vienna with
constructive proposals.
“The
first six rounds of negotiations made progress, finding creative compromise
solutions to many of the hardest issues that were difficult for all sides.
Iran’s approach this week was not, unfortunately, to try to resolve the
remaining issues,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement.
For
the latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
“The
new Iranian administration did not come to Vienna with constructive proposals,”
the official added.
Later
Friday, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken slammed Iran for not being serious
during this week’s talks.
“What
we’ve seen in the last couple of days is that Iran, right now, does not seem to
be serious about doing what’s necessary to return to compliance, which is why
we ended this round of talks in Vienna,” he said during the Reuters Next
conference.
Iran’s
top diplomat was quoted as saying the Europeans and Americans were not serious
in their efforts to reach an agreement on a return to the deal, also known as
the JCPOA.
But
senior European diplomats said Friday they were concerned over Iran’s new
proposals, which were seen as a reneging on previous agreements reached in
earlier rounds of talks.
Asked
about this week’s talks in Vienna, led by the US Special Envoy for Iran Rob
Malley, the State Department official said Washington’s delegation was
returning to the DC.
Citing
Iran’s “new round of nuclear provocations,” the State Department official said
Tehran had still failed to reach an understanding with the UN atomic watchdog
to restore transparency “they have degraded in recent months.”
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
US
State Department phones hacked with Israeli company spyware: Sources
03
December ,2021
Apple
iPhones of at least nine US State Department employees were hacked by an
unknown assailant using sophisticated spyware developed by the Israel-based NSO
Group, according to four people familiar with the matter.
The
hacks, which took place in the last several months, hit US officials either
based in Uganda or focused on matters concerning the East African country, two
of the sources said.
For
the latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
The
intrusions, first reported here, represent the widest known hacks of US
officials through NSO technology.
Previously,
a list of numbers with potential targets including some American officials
surfaced in reporting on, but it was not clear whether intrusions were always
tried or succeeded.
Reuters
could not determine who launched the latest cyberattacks.
NSO
Group said in a statement on Thursday that it did not have any indication their
tools were used but canceled the relevant accounts and would investigate based
on the Reuters inquiry.
“If
our investigation shall show these actions indeed happened with NSO’s tools,
such customer will be terminated permanently and legal actions will take
place,” said an NSO spokesperson, who added that NSO will also “cooperate with
any relevant government authority and present the full information we will
have.”
NSO
has long said it only sells its products to government law enforcement and
intelligence clients, helping them to monitor security threats, and is not
directly involved in surveillance operations.
Officials
at the Uganda embassy in Washington did not comment. A spokesperson for Apple
declined to comment.
A
State Department spokesperson declined to comment on the intrusions, instead
pointing to the Commerce Department’s recent decision to place the Israeli
company on an entity list, making it harder for US companies to do business
with them.
NSO
Group and another spyware firm were “added to the Entity List based on a
determination that they developed and supplied spyware to foreign governments
that used this tool to maliciously target government officials, journalists,
businesspeople, activists, academics, and embassy workers,” the Commerce
Department said in an announcement last month.
Easily
identifiable
NSO
software is capable of not only capturing encrypted messages, photos and other
sensitive information from infected phones, but also turning them into
recording devices to monitor surroundings, based on product manuals reviewed by
Reuters.
Apple’s
alert to affected users did not name the creator of the spyware used in this
hack.
The
victims notified by Apple included American citizens and were easily
identifiable as US government employees because they associated email addresses
ending in state.gov with their Apple IDs, two of the people said.
They
and other targets notified by Apple in multiple countries were infected through
the same graphics processing vulnerability that Apple did not fix until
September, the sources said.
Since
at least February, this software flaw allowed some NSO customers to take
control of iPhones simply by sending invisible yet tainted iMessage requests to
the device, researchers who investigated the espionage campaign said.
The
victims would not see or need to interact with a prompt for the hack to be
successful. Versions of NSO surveillance software, commonly known as Pegasus,
could then be installed.
Apple’s
announcement that it would notify victims came on the same day it sued NSO
Group last week, accusing it of helping numerous customers break into Apple’s
mobile software, iOS.
In
a public response, NSO has said its technology helps stop terrorism and that
they’ve installed controls to curb spying against innocent targets.
For
example, NSO says its intrusion system cannot work on phones with US numbers
beginning with the country code +1.
But
in the Uganda case, the targeted State Department employees were using iPhones
registered with foreign telephone numbers, said two of the sources, without the
US country code.
A
senior Biden administration official, speaking on condition he not be
identified, said the threat to US personnel abroad was one of the reasons the
administration was cracking down on companies such as NSO and pursuing new
global discussion about spying limits.
The
official added that they have seen “systemic abuse” in multiple countries
involving NSO’s Pegasus spyware.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Arab World
Islamic
State Attack Leaves Over Dozen Kurds Dead
December
03, 2021
KHIDIRJIJA,
IRAQ —
Bayan
Mala Osman, accompanied by her three sons, was at home in the small, secluded
Kurdish village in northern Iraq when she heard dogs barking. Her sons grabbed
their weapons and walked outside to find the source of the commotion.
Then
she heard gunshots as her sons attempted to protect the village from members of
the Islamic State (IS). Outmanned and outgunned, Osman's three sons were
killed.
"We
didn't harm anyone," said a tearful Osman. "My sons didn't infringe
on anybody's space. ISIS encroached on our land. My sons were defending
themselves. The fought down to the last bullet." ISIS is an acronym for
Islamic State.
At
least 13 people were killed in an IS attack on two villages on Thursday
evening, including 10 members of the Kurdish Peshmerga forces who had gone to
reinforce the villages' defenses.
Despite
losing its territorial caliphate in Iraq and Syria, it was the radical Sunni
group's worst attack in months, underscoring its rising lethality.
Both
settlements are in Makhmur, a town some 50 kilometers north of the Iraqi
Kurdish capital Irbil, in the so-called disputed territories — tracts of land
claimed by both the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) and Baghdad.
The
tracts were under Kurdish rule until 2017, when Iraqi forces retook them
following a controversial non-binding independence referendum staged by Kurds.
Since then, regional experts have warned of a security gap in the disputed
territory, which has allowed IS to build a foothold and begin attacks against
villagers along the Hamrin Mountain Ridge.
Calls
for cooperation
The
president of Iraqi Kurdistan, Nechirvan Barzani, made a statement on Friday
urging greater cooperation between his government and Baghdad.
"On
the political front," said Barzani, "all Iraqi sides must recognize
that until the political process is corrected and peace and political stability
in the country are established, the terrorist groups will continue to exploit
the situation.
"Therefore,
it is imperative to reassess the military conditions and capabilities, to take
immediate actions to optimize coordination between the Iraqi army and the
Peshmerga forces, with the participation and support from the international
coalition," he said.
Iraqi
Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi condemned the attack, adding that IS remained
a significant threat to the oil-rich country.
"The
Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces stressed the need to close ranks and not
to underestimate the pockets of ISIS terrorist gangs," said a statement
published Friday by al-Kadhimi's military spokesman Yehia Rasool.
Source:
VOA News
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.voanews.com/a/islamic-state-attack-leaves-over-dozen-kurds-dead-/6339163.html
--------
More
than 90 Houthis killed in last 24 hours in Yemen’s Marib: Arab Coalition
03
December ,2021
The
Arab Coalition on Friday said its forces launched 13 military operations
against the Iran-backed Houthi militia in Yemen’s Marib, killing more than 90
members of the militia.
The
coalition added that the operations destroyed eight military equipment.
On
Thursday, the coalition revealed that an airstrike launched by its forces
against a military target for the Houthis in Sanaa hit a site of qualitative
weapons that were transported from Sanaa International Airport.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
US
‘deeply concerned’ by rising Daesh/ISIS attacks in Iraq: Secretary of state
Zehra
Nur Duz
04.12.2021
The
US is “deeply concerned” by the continued escalation of Daesh/ISIS attacks in
Iraq, including Thursday’s attack in the country's north, US Secretary of State
Antony Blinken said Friday.
The
statement came after 13 people – 10 Peshmerga soldiers of the Kurdish Regional
Government (KRG) and three civilians – were killed in a Daesh/ISIS terror
attack in the village of Khadirjija at the foot of Mount Qarachokh, in
Makhmour, Nineveh, some 50 kilometers (31 miles) south of the KRG capital
Erbil.
“The
US reaffirms our commitment to supporting the Iraqi Security Forces, including
the Peshmerga, as they continue the fight against ISIS to ensure its enduring
defeat,” Blinken said in a written statement.
Blinken
also extended condolences to the families of those killed and injured in the
attacks.
Attacks
blamed on Daesh/ISIS fighters have escalated in Iraq in recent months,
especially in the provinces of Salahuddin, Diyala, and Kirkuk.
In
2017, Iraq declared victory over Daesh/ISIS by reclaiming all of its territories
– about a third of the country's area – invaded by the terror group in 2014.
Source:
Anadolu Agency
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Turkish
defence chief denounces Assad regime’s ‘meaningless’ statement
Sarp
Ozer
03.12.2021
Turkey’s
defense minister on Friday reacted to the statement of the so-called People's
Assembly of the Bashar al-Assad regime in Syria which targeted the territorial
integrity of Turkey.
“We
hear some reckless and meaningless statements about our province of Hatay,”
Hulusi Akar said, adding these statements have no value or worth.
Akar’s
remarks came during military inspections together with top commanders of navy,
ground and air forces in the southern Hatay province.
"We
do not have our eyes on anybody's land," he said, adding that one could
learn from history what happened to those who had eyes on Turkey’s territory.
On
Thursday, the Foreign Ministry said had said: “We strongly reject the
impertinent and unlawful statement targeting the territorial integrity of our
country, which has been made by the regime’s so-called People's Assembly which
is devoid of democratic legitimacy and under no circumstances represents the
Syrian people.”
Source:
Anadolu Agency
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Lebanon’s
information minister resigns after Saudi Arabia comments
03
December ,2021
Lebanon’s
Information Minister George Kordahi announced on Friday his resignation to pave
the way for a possible resolution of a diplomatic spat between Lebanon and
Saudi Arabia sparked by comments he made.
For
the latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
He
also explained that he understood from Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati,
whom he met three days ago, that the French want him to resign before Macron’s
visit to Saudi Arabia this weekend in order to help open a dialogue with Saudi
officials about Lebanon.
Kordahi,
a Christian whose Marada party is backed by Hezbollah, had refused to resign in
the weeks after his comments even as PM Mikati asked him to put “national
interest” first.
“I
understood from Mikati ... that the French want my resignation to take place
ahead of his (Macron’s) visit,” Kordahi told the news conference, saying he
believed Mikati had assurances that Macron would discuss Lebanon’s ties with
Riyadh.
Critical
comments by Kordahi on the war in Yemen in late October led to expel Lebanon’s
envoy to the kingdom, recall its ambassador and ban all imports from Lebanon,
dealing a new blow to the country’s ailing economy.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Africa
Saif
al-Islam Is Not Looking To Resurrect His Father’s Rule; Wants To Lay That Era
To Rest
03/12/2021
Faisal
Al Yafai
The
sudden appearance of Seif al-Islam Gadhafi in a southern Libyan town submitting
his candidacy papers for December’s presidential election has caused street
protests in the country and a flurry of analysis abroad over whether Libyans
could really vote for a return to the Gadhafi era.
Certainly,
his reappearance was astonishing. Most Libyans had not heard Seif’s
once-ubiquitous voice for a decade before last week’s brief comments. But it
was also just one more step in the return to public life of the Gadhafi clan.
Imagining that Saif truly intends to become president of Libya next month is to
misunderstand modern Libya and Seif’s gradual grasp for power. Far from
resurrecting his father’s rule, Seif wants to lay that era to rest and lay the
path for his own ascendancy.
Seif
is not the only candidate to thrust himself into the spotlight. Monday’s
deadline for presidential applications led to an unedifying scramble among
Libya’s current political elite to put themselves forward.
Some
were expected, Khalifa Haftar, the commander of the Libyan National Army, is
the highest-profile military figure to stand, while some, such as the current
and supposedly interim, prime minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah, who announced his
candidature at the last minute, were unexpected.
Dbeibah
is meant to hold the reins of power until a new president is elected, meaning
he could be in the farcical situation of announcing his own victory and happily
handing power to himself. By Tuesday morning, election officials said nearly
100 candidates had put themselves forward.
But
the most surprising and the one who will be most closely watched, is Seif
al-Islam Gadhafi.
His
reappearance has complicated the calculations of the other candidates. For a
figure such as Haftar, who announced his candidacy not in his trademark
military fatigues but in a sober suit, Seif’s involvement makes it harder to
claim to be a unifying figure: why, after all, vote for a unity candidate who
has waged war, when you can vote for a figure who has said nothing for ten
years? Seif’s silence is his greatest weapon, always talked about but rarely
heard from.
The
two perspectives on Seif’s registration as a presidential candidate are that he
is either seeking to appeal to those who are nostalgic for the previous regime,
including young Libyans who may remember little beyond the past ten years of
war and instability, or that he is seeking to be a consensus candidate, in the
midst of faceless politicians and warring factions. As the sole person on the
ballot who can command widespread name recognition, he certainly has a chance
in a crowded field.
But
given that the powers of the presidential office have not yet even been decided
and the constant rumours that the election may not even go ahead on December
24, it is unlikely Seif truly intends, or even desires to win.
Much
more likely is that his true aim in running for the office is simply to
reintroduce himself to the Libyan public, the strategy of “coming back slowly,
slowly, like a striptease” to which he confessed in an infamous New York Times
profile earlier this year. The big reveal may have lacked some drama, but it
certainly got people talking.
In
fact, Seif’s best route back to power is to lose this election. Not so badly
that the spectre of the Gadhafi name is excised as a political possibility, but
well enough, say perhaps third or fourth in a crowded field, that he becomes a
kingmaker. Someone who has proven his popular support and is able to exert
influence but remains above the brutal, chaotic fray. His supporters would
claim he was newly humbled, a prince-in-waiting chastened by reality.
This,
after all, is a terrible time to wield power in Libya. The government is not in
full control of the country and rival militias and foreign powers still jockey
for influence. The demise of his father’s rule has had widespread repercussions
in neighbouring countries, which will take years to resolve. There are regular
power outages and a lack of basic governance. No president could solve these
issues in one term and Seif’s attraction as a candidate is not based on his
credibility as an administrator, but on what he represents. Far better to
remain on the sidelines than be blamed in office.
Source:
The Arab Weekly
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://thearabweekly.com/seif-al-islam-not-looking-resurrect-his-fathers-rule
--------
Include
Miyetti Allah, FUNAM on list of terrorists – Ortom to Buhari govt
December
3, 2021
By
Ochogwu Sunday
Benue
State Governor, Samuel Ortom has reiterated his call on the Federal Government
to include Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association
of Nigeria, MACBAN and Fulani Nationality Movement, FUNAM on the list of
terrorist groups in Nigeria.
Recall
that the Federal Government through the office of the Attorney General of the
Federation had approached a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja to designate
bandits as terrorist organisations which the court obliged.
But
Governor Ortom while speaking on Friday, in Makurdi at the wedding between
Barristers Agatha Msurshima Tyokyaa and Uhamber Bamber, said the bandits being
mentioned are mostly from Miyetti Allah Kautal Hore, MACBAN and FUNAM and so
they should be designated as terrorist groups as well.
While
commending the Federal Government for considering the option of designating
bandits as terrorists, he suggested that “this should also include Miyetti
Allah and FUNAM groups on the list.”
He
said, “I want to commend the Federal Government for being bold to designate
bandits as terrorists. But I call on the government to also include Miyetti
Allah Kautal Hore, Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association, MACBAN and Fulani
Nationality Movement, FUNAM in the category of terrorists because those bandits
are their members,” the Governor stated.
Source:
Daily Post
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Sudan
Sovereign Council head Burhan says he will not run for presidency
04
December ,2021
Sudan’s
Sovereign Council head Abdel Fattah al-Burhan said he will not run for the
presidency even if he was asked to do so, Al Arabiya TV quoted him as saying on
Friday.
Burhan,
who is also army chief, added his mission will end with the termination of the
transitional period, saying there are efforts to form a high electoral
commission in Sudan.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
UN
worker killed in attack on peacekeeping convoy in Mali
03
December ,2021
Unidentified
armed men attacked a convoy belonging to the United Nations peacekeeping
mission in Mali on Friday, killing one civilian worker and wounding another,
the mission said.
The
convoy was travelling from the northern city of Kidal to Gao and came under
fire about 100 km (62 miles) northeast of the town of Bourem, the mission said
in a statement on Twitter.
Armed
attacks by extremist militants and other groups are common across vast swathes
of Mali, despite a heavy presence of international troops. The UN mission
MINUSMA has deployed about 13,000 troops to try to contain the violence.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
South Asia
Karzai
calls for inclusive government in Afghanistan to gain international acceptance,
recognition
Dec
4, 2021
KABUL:
Former Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai emphasized the significance of
inclusive government in Afghanistan calling Loya Jirga (Great Assembly) as a
good option to chart its path towards legitimacy.
Karzai
necessitated the importance of an inclusive government that advocates different
aspects of society in Afghanistan, to gain international acceptance and
recognition, reported TOLOnews, citing his interview with BBC.
Karzai
believes the Great Assembly would pose as a good option towards forming a
legitimate government in Afghanistan, reported TOLOnews.
Opposing
the US mission of over-the-horizon counterterrorism, the former Afghanistan
President insisted the US government to work with the prevailing Afghan
government.
"I
have had conversations with them on a lot of issues--the return of women to
back to work. The schools, the flag of the country, the national flag of the
country. And the need for a political process, for a government that belongs to
all Afghans, that all Afghans see as theirs--that is inclusive," quoted
TOLOnews as saying, Karzai.
Karzai
seeking support from the international communities to aid Afghanistan in the
time of crisis, said, "They have better come and help the Afghan people.
They and their allies and the international community must help Afghanistan
rebuild itself, must heal the wounds that have been caused on all sides. Must
work with the Taliban- they are the government today. Work towards improvements
towards a better Afghanistan."
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Millions
of Afghans starving as winter approaches: UN
04
Dec 2021
United
Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) has said that war and insecurity
in Afghanistan have displaced 3.5 million people in the country who are on the
brink of poverty as the winter season is approaching.
UNHCR’s
spokesperson in Refugees affairs Babur Baloch said that displaced families are
lacking shelter, warm clothes, and firewoods to heat their houses and added
that they also need food, medicines, and other supplies to survive.
“Humanitarian
crisis is deepening in Afghanistan and starvation is now at its unprecedented
level in the country. 23 million Afghans that form 55% population of the
country are facing the highest level of poverty and nine million of them are
facing starvation.” Said Baloch.
The
UN spokesperson who visited Afghanistan said, the number of malnourished
children is growing, hospitals are nearly overwhelmed with malnourished
children and the 3 million of these children are at a critical point.
Baloch
added that one million malnourished Afghan children are close to death.
He
also said that the UN needs up to $375 million to carry out humanitarian
operations during this and next year’s winter season.
Source:
Khaama Press
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.khaama.com/millions-of-afghans-starving-as-winter-approaches-un-457457/
--------
Afghan
judges in Brazil still fear the Taliban
04
December ,2021
A
female judge, Muska, was hiding with her family from newly empowered Taliban
militants in Afghanistan when an apparent reading mistake 7,000 miles away
helped to drastically change her life.
Brazilian
President Jair Bolsonaro opened his nation’s doors to potential refugees from
the Asian nation during remarks at the United Nations General Assembly on Sept.
21.
“We
will grant humanitarian visas for Afghan Christians, women, children and
judges,” he read on the teleprompter — apparently mispronouncing the final
word, which was “jovens” — youngsters — in his printed speech as “juizes,” or
judges.
Error
or not, his government fulfilled that offer.
Muska
and her family were taken by bus to the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and
were then flown to Greece with six female colleagues.
By
the end of October, they found themselves in Brazil — a country with very
little in common with Afghanistan beyond their shared love of soccer.
Speaking
to international media for the first time, Muska told The Associated Press this
week that she and the other judges still fear retribution from the Taliban —
some of whose members had been sentenced for various crimes in their courts.
She
asked that her true name not be used, nor her precise location — at a Brazilian
military installation — be published. Her colleagues declined to speak to the
news media.
Muska
had been a judge for almost ten years before the Taliban captured power in
August and she said her home in the capital, Kabul, had recently been searched.
Afghanistan
had about 300 female judges, Muska said, and many are now in hiding, their bank
accounts frozen.
“We
knew they (the Taliban) wouldn’t let the women judges work. We would have
serious threats to our lives,” she said. “They released all the criminals from
the prison. These were the criminals that we sentenced.”
The
judges who remain “are very scared, in hiding. They have serious financial
problems, no salary, lost their jobs, had their bank accounts blocked. They are
still in danger,” the judge said. “It is not good in Kabul.”
The
Taliban won widespread support in Afghanistan in part because the toppled
US-backed government was widely seen as corrupt.
“But
women judges were the bravest, strongest and most honest officials in the
previous administration,” said Muska, who said the decision by US President Joe
Biden to end American presence in the country meant she quickly had to leave.
“Everything
happened suddenly,” she said.
Judge
Renata Gil, the head of the Brazilian Association of Magistrates that is
sponsoring the refugees, said the Afghans arrived “in a lot of fear, still
feeling threatened.”
“They
are being chased because they convicted Taliban fighters,” she said noting that
she herself had received death threats “because I sentenced drug dealers. For
women this is much harder.”
Speaking
at the association’s headquarters in the capital, Brasilia, she said, “I hope
they are able to live their lives independently. But as long as they need, we
will be here to help.”
The
judges and their 19 family members — apparently the only Afghan refugees who
have come to Brazil since the Taliban returned to power — now have Brazilian
bank accounts and health care. Those who can are taking lessons in Portuguese.
It’s
not clear yet what the future holds for them in Brazil, where at least they are
protected. But Muska said they’d like to return home one day.
“I
hope I can join my family members in Kabul. I have this dream I am in my house.
I miss everything,” the judge said.
Muska
hasn’t seen much of Brazil due to security reasons, difficulties with the
language and her own fears. But she has found people with empathy for her
situation.
“They
cry with us, we know they can sense our feelings,” the judge said with tears in
her eyes.
Muska’s
three children, including a toddler, are also having a tough time adapting. The
judge used to have her parents and nannies to help, but in Brazil she’s largely
on her own, while worrying about her future, and theirs.
The
children look happy and energetic as they run and jump at a public playground,
speaking Dari among themselves. But the judge said her eldest daughter has
questions she cannot answer.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://english.alarabiya.net/News/world/2021/12/04/Afghan-judges-in-Brazil-still-fear-the-Taliban
--------
Southeast Asia
Kit
Siang asks if PM’s special envoy to Middle East banned from Saudi Arabia
02
Dec 2021
BY
JUSTIN ONG
KUALA
LUMPUR, Dec 2 — The prime minister should clarify if Saudi Arabia has barred
his special envoy to the Middle East from visiting, DAP’s Lim Kit Siang said
today when urging the government to address claims of leakages amounting to
billions of ringgit annually.
After
proposing a parliamentary select committee on corruption, abuses and wastage of
public funds, the federal lawmaker said the growing number of political appointments
in the Prime Minister’s Department deserved scrutiny.
“For
instance, is it true that the prime minister’s special envoy to the Middle East
has been banned from Saudi Arabia and had never visited Saudi Arabia for the
whole term of his appointment?
“If
so, what kind of a special envoy to the Middle East is this?” Lim said in a
statement today.
Earlier,
Lim cited a report from the Rasuah Busters movement that estimated Malaysia to
be losing as much as RM60 billion each year to corruption and illicit outflows.
While
Lim did not name the person, PAS president Datuk Seri Abdul Hadi Awang is
Malaysia’s special envoy to the Middle East.
Hadi
was appointed to the position last year when Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin had been
the prime minister and was reappointed after Datuk Seri Ismail Sabri Yaakob
took over this year.
Questions
about Hadi’s status in Saudi Arabia already emerged earlier this year when he
was absent from Muhyiddin’s entourage during the then-PM’s official visit to
the kingdom and the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
Source:
Malay Mail
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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Philippine
military says Muslim rebel leader killed in clash
Dec
3, 2021
COTABATO:
Philippines, Philippine troops killed an Islamic rebel leader and four of his
men in fighting in the volatile south in the latest setback for insurgent
forces aligned with the Islamic State group, military officials said Friday.
Army
troops gunned down Asim Karinda and four others in a gunbattle in a rural
village near Mamasapano town on Thursday, just over a month after he took over
Daulah Islamiya, an armed Islamic group whose previous leader was killed in an
army offensive, regional military commander Maj. Gen. Juvymax Uy said.
The
military did not report any army casualties in the hourlong firefight in
Maguindanao province.
Small
bands of Muslim rebels, who have pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group,
remain in the country's south despite a 2014 peace pact between the government
and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the largest guerilla group, which
dropped its secessionist bid and embraced Muslim autonomy in the southern third
of the largely Roman Catholic nation.
The
military said troops retrieved the body of Karinda, an alleged bomb maker. Also
known as Abu Azim, he took over Daulah Islamiya after its leader, Salahudin
Hasan, died in an army offensive Oct. 29 in Maguindanao's Talayan town.
Another
fighter of the Daulah Islamiya, which has been blamed for deadly bombings and
assaults on government forces, was killed by troops in a clash on Tuesday in
Shariff Saydona Mustapha town, also in Maguindano, the military said.
"Our
series of successes in countering these terrorist elements is an indication
that they are on the brink of defeat," said Col. Pedro Balisi, who leads
an army mechanized brigade.
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Confusing
laws over marriage wreckers
Mariam
Mokhtar
December
4, 2021
Having
two sets of laws operating in parallel will, at some point, cause a conflict of
interest. If left unchecked, people will take advantage of loopholes and make a
mockery of justice.
We
cannot compartmentalise people into Muslims and non-Muslims and then expect
justice when things go wrong. In the recent case of a Muslim breaking up the
marriage of a non-Muslim couple, one can argue that justice was not served.
On
Dec 1, Chief Justice Tengku Maimun Tuan Mat and Federal Court judge Mohd Zawari
Salleh agreed that a Muslim could not be included in a legal marital dispute
involving a non-Muslim couple.
Tengku
Maimun dismissed an appeal by the woman, named only as AJS, who had sought to
include the Muslim woman, known as JBMH, in her judicial separation petition.
JBMH
had an affair with AJS’s husband, whom we only know as RIS, and this
relationship ultimately caused the breakdown of AJS’s marriage to RIS.
One
thing is clear from the CJ’s judgment. A precedent has been set and many people
feel that justice was not served.
The
Federal Court decided that according to the Law Reform Act (LRA), the Muslim
cannot be a party to this legal dispute.
The
ordinary Malaysian will be under the impression that Muslims can escape justice
if they were to be involved in a non-Muslim marriage dispute. How is that fair?
Many may feel that they can cause marital break-ups and not face repercussions.
The
dissenting judge in the appeal was P Nallini. She said that Section 3(3) of the
LRA did not preclude a Muslim from being named as a party in a non-Muslim
couple’s marital legal dispute.
She
also ruled that courts were empowered by Section 17(a) of the Interpretation
Act to look at the intent and purpose of a legislation when interpreting a
provision, such as the one in LRA.
We
are told that non-Muslims cannot be tried under shariah law. So, does the law
cherry pick who it decides to prosecute under shariah?
In
March 2017, a Muslim husband contacted the religious authorities in Terengganu
(JHEAT) to report that his wife, a Muslim, was having an affair with a
non-Muslim man.
Officers
from JHEAT raided a hotel in Kuala Nerus and caught the Muslim woman and her
non-Muslim lover. The khalwat raid conducted in the early morning happened
after the husband had seen the couple entering the hotel.
The
couple was investigated under Section 29 of the Terengganu Syariah Criminal
Offences Enactment (Takzir) 2001.
Why
was the non-Muslim man investigated under shariah law in the Terengganu case?
Did he have to convert, as has happened to many non-Muslim single men caught
having affairs with Muslim women? Weren’t we told that only Muslims could be
investigated under shariah?
In
the petition involving the Federal Court, the Muslim lover, JBMH, could not be
included in the marital dispute and subsequent appeal lodged by AJS.
Source:
Free Malaysia Today
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
2
telling cases of cognitive dissonance
December
4, 2021
This
past week we have seen a couple of instances of cognitive dissonance which
occur when people say diametrically opposed things about the same matter.
These
days the most obvious example of this affliction is when people purport to look
at the evidence and say they don’t believe there has been climate change, a
stance that can drive climate alarmists berserk.
Well,
at least this much can be said about climatological evidence: it’s abstruse and
so parsing it can be difficult.
But
what about matters that are much less obscure and upon which firm conclusions
can be drawn?
Why
should cognitive dissonance occur on a matter such as Tengku Razaleigh Hamzah’s
announcement that, at 84 years age and 11 terms as an MP, he will give GE15 the
miss?
You
see, Ku Li, as he is familiarly known, has his strong supporters who can be
counted on to prevail upon him to stay on.
After
all, didn’t Ku Li recently describe himself as an “agent of necessity” in his
struggle to revive the Umno of 1946, which he argues is the true Umno, not the
“Umno Baru” he says Dr Mahathir Mohamad foisted in 1988?
An
“agent of necessity” has to hover around if he hopes to bring to an end a
masquerade that he holds is the cause of the grand old party’s advanced state
of decay, with two of its top leaders indicted for massive forms of corruption.
But
Ku Li did say he will retire as MP for Gua Musang. His interviewer has this
announcement on videotape.
Unless,
of course, Ku Li does a Lingam-like – “It looks like me, it sounds like me, but
it is not me” – repudiation, it can safely be taken that the Kelantanese prince
told the Free Malaysia Today reporter who interviewed him that he wants out of
GE15.
True,
politicians are licensed to juggle with ambiguity. About grave and weighty
matters, that resort is understandable; on lesser ones, being ambiguous suggest
a lack of seriousness.
Following
his quit disclosure to FMT, Ku Li must have been besieged by his supporters who
prevailed upon him to back away from his announcement. Though he didn’t
publicly renounce it, he told friends they could say he was misconstrued.
His
intention to quit is not a grave matter, but trying to revive the Umno of 1946
is one. If you are an “agent of necessity” for its restoration, it hardly needs
stressing you have to be a person of resolution.
Anwar
Ibrahim is a politician of aspiration more than resolution. Earlier this week,
he announced that a formal proposal has been submitted for a merger between the
party he leads, PKR, with Amanah, a component of the Pakatan Harapan coalition
Anwar heads.
Barely
had the proposal wended its way into the public domain than the deputy
president of Amanah, Salahuddin Ayub, piped up to deny it had even been raised
in Pakatan Harapan leadership circles.
Amanah
split off from PAS in 2015, a move initiated by the professionals who joined
PAS in numbers in the wake of Anwar’s brutal decapitation in government and
Umno in late 1998.
They
were a group, tertiary-qualified in the secular disciplines, who wanted to
modernise a conservative party and make it and Islam appealing to non-Muslims.
They
had a sympathetic patron in Nik Aziz Nik Mat, the PAS spiritual leader of high
integrity and broad appeal. When Nik Aziz died in early 2014, this professional
cohort were denounced as fifth columnists by the conservatives and wiped out in
party polls the following year.
They
left to set up Amanah.
Source:
Free Malaysia Today
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Mideast
Iran
Urges Lifting of All US Unlawful Sanctions in Draft Documents
2021-December-3
Iran
has reiterated that the sanction include all those embargoes imposed under
former US President Donald Trump as part of the maximum pressure campaign.
Iran's
lead negotiator Ali Baqeri Kani announced that the Islamic Republic has called
for the verifiable removal of sanctions and guarantees that the US will not
commit further violations.
He
pointed out that the ball is now in the US court.
Following
talks with EU coordinator Enrique Mora on Thursday, Baqeri Kani also met the
Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency Rafael Mariano
Grossi, expressing Iran’s intention to continue its close cooperation with the
IAEA and to remain actively engaged in
the Vienna talks.
Iran’s
lead negotiator said he has warned other participants not to allow outside
players to negatively influence or obstruct the process of talks, saying his
team is serious about reaching an agreement and is ready to continue the
negotiations.
The
European diplomats participating in talks with Iran in Vienna talks were surprised
on Thursday by the Iranian negotiating team’s initiative and pragmatic
proposals on removal of sanctions.
European
diplomats participating in Vienna talks, planned to pursue their own agenda and
push Iran to a corner.
Despite
the fact that the first phase of the seventh round of nuclear negotiations
among the G4+1 group (Britain, France, Russia, China plus Germany), Iran and
the European Union kicked off in a positive atmosphere, some parties try to
follow up political and propaganda campaign under the pressure of the US.
Reports
say that the European negotiating teams, who meant to pursue their own agenda
and push Iran to a corner, did not expect to face a documented initiative by
the new Iranian negotiators on lifting sanctions and practical propositions for
an agreement to resolve disputes over the nuclear and sanctions issues.
Certain
European teams are said to be calling for the finalizing of the negotiations in
the first phase of the seventh round in order to find a strategy against the
Iranian initiative and to affect Iran’s economy and internal affairs.
On
the other hand, the Iranian delegation underlined during experts talks that
they are ready to continue talks as long as needed.
Therefore,
media connected to European delegations have exacerbated propaganda campaign in
a bid to push the Iranian team into the trap of rushing for a consensus.
However,
the negotiating teams in Vienna have officially announced that the negotiations
will continue to pave the way for a conclusion, which should be acceptable in
the eyes of all parties.
Iranian
officials have declared that Tehran is determined to reach a fair agreement,
which guarantees Iran’s nuclear and economic rights.
Envoys
from Iran and the G4+1 group of countries began on Monday the seventh round of
talks in Vienna after a five-month pause caused by Iran’s presidential election
and the formation of a new administration in the country.
The
following day, they participated in expert-level meetings of the working group
formed to separately deal with the removal of US sanctions against Iran.
On
Wednesday, the third day of the talks, working groups continued discussions on
different topics. Bilateral and multilateral meetings were also held at
different levels, according to the Iranian Foreign Ministry.
Former
US president Donald Trump left the JCPOA in May 2018 and re-imposed the
anti-Iran sanctions that the deal had lifted. He also placed additional
sanctions on Iran under other pretexts not related to the nuclear case as part
of his “maximum pressure” campaign.
Source:
Fars News Agency
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click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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President
Rayeesi Calls for Broadening of Iran-Laos Cooperation
2021-December-3
"I
hope that through the joint efforts of the high-ranking officials of the two
countries, the two nations will withness increasing expansion of relations in
all areas of mutual interest," President Rayeesi said in his
congratulatory message to Laotian president.
"I
sincerely congratulate you and the people of your country on the occasion of
the National Day of the Lao People's Democratic Republic," the Iranian
president added.
President
Rayeesi reiterated that the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Democratic
Republic of Laos enjoy good relations and friendly cooperation, saying, "I
wish the Laotian president good health and success and also wish for the
well-being of the people of the Democratic Republic of Laos."
Source:
Fars News Agency
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click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Putin criticizes Ukraine’s use of Turkish drones in Erdogan call
03
December ,2021
Russian
President Vladimir Putin on Friday criticized Kiev for deploying Turkish-made
drones in its conflict with pro-Moscow separatists during a call with Turkey’s
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Putin,
according to a Kremlin transcript of the call, said Kiev was aiming to disrupt
peace agreements in eastern Ukraine, with “provocative” military action,
“including the use of Bayraktar unmanned aerial vehicles,” which are produced
by Turkey.
For
all the latest headlines follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
The
Ukrainian army in October released footage of what it said was its first use of
the Turkish-made TB2 Bayraktar drone against separatists in the east of the
country, where it has been fighting a trench conflict since 2014.
The
move was met with criticism from Russia and also Kiev’s Western allies.
Both
Turkey and Israel have recently been selling drones in the former Soviet Union
and they played a key role Azerbaijan’s victory over Russia’s ally Armenia in
last year’s Nagorno-Karabakh war.
The
Kremlin said that during the call, “the need was emphasized for Kiev to abandon
any attempts to forcefully influence the Donbass.”
Ankara,
for its part, said Putin and Erdorgan only discussed a range of issues
“especially Syria, Libya and Ukraine.”
Russia
and Turkey have historically had complex relations, balancing regional
rivalries with finding common ground on economic and strategic interests.
In
recent years, the two powers have clashed in particular in Syria, where Moscow
and Ankara support opposing camps in the civil war.
Source:
Al Arabiya
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click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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Israeli
army arrests 24 Palestinians in West Bank
Qais
Abu Samra
04.12.2021
RAMALLAH,
Palestine
Israeli
forces rounded up 24 Palestinians in the West Bank city of Hebron on Saturday,
according to a local official.
Israeli
forces raided Hebron’s town of Surif and searched a number of houses there, the
official, who preferred not to be named, told Anadolu Agency.
According
to the official, 24 residents were detained in the raid.
The
Israeli army often carries out detention campaigns against Palestinians in the
occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem, claiming to arrest wanted Palestinians.
Source:
Anadolu Agency
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/israeli-army-arrests-24-palestinians-in-west-bank/2438453
--------
Dozens
of Palestinians injured by Israeli forces in West Bank
Awad
al-Rujoub, Mohammed Ghefari
04.12.2021
RAMALLAH,
Palestine
Dozens
of Palestinian protesters were injured on Friday when Israeli forces fired live
and rubber-coated bullets, and tear gas in the northern occupied West Bank.
Ahmed
Jebril, director of the Palestinian Red Crescent, told Anadolu Agency that
medical teams treated one person with live bullets, 23 with rubber-coated
bullets, in addition to 73 others who suffered teargas inhalation in the
villages of Beit Dajan and Beita, east of Nablus city.
He
added that one of the injured was a boy who was hit in his eye and was shifted
to hospital for treatment in Nablus.
Jebril
noted that the Israeli forces dug the roads leading to Mt. Sbeih in Beita
village which hindered the arrival of ambulances.
Meanwhile,
the Palestinian official Wafa news agency reported four more people were
injured and dozens of others got suffocated by tear gas in an anti-settlement
rally in Kafr Qaddoum village, east of Qalqilya city.
On
weekly basis, Palestinians hold demonstrations against illegal Jewish
settlements in different parts of the West Bank, especially in Beita, Beit
Dajan and Kafr Qaddoum villages.
Source:
Anadolu Agency
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click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Europe
Family
loses defamation claim in UK after questioning donations to mosque from
‘extremist’
Paul
Peachey
Dec
3, 2021
A
family lost a defamation battle with a British mosque over claims that they
were permanently barred after raising questions over £250,000 donations from
Sadiq Al Ghariani, the grand mufti of Libya, because of his alleged Islamist
links.
Three
members of the Abdulrazaq family claim they were punished by the trustees of a
mosque in Exeter, south-west England, for questioning five separate payments
from 2014 made by Mr Al Ghariani, who has justified suicide bomb attacks in
Libya.
Mr
Al Ghariani lived in Exeter where he studied for a doctorate before returning
to Libya after the fall of the Libyan dictator Muammar Qaddafi. He is regarded
by the Muslim Brotherhood and others as the country’s grand mufti.
After
an increasingly bitter dispute, in September 2019 the mosque leadership voted
to bar the father and his two sons from the mosque.
It
gave 24 reasons for the decision, including making frivolous complaints at the
courts that were time-consuming and “put a needless strain on the mosque”. They
were also accused of trying to trip over a trustee in the main prayer hall and
bullying a child.
The
family, Tallha, Basim and Abdulaziz Abdulrazaq, said the true reason for being
barred was punishment for “raising perfectly valid questions about the Al
Ghariani monies”, according to High Court documents.
The
trustees said that the donations were legitimate and paid for building work in
the Muslim community. They claimed that the real reason for the dispute was the
failed attempts by a member of the family to join the mosque’s executive
committee.
They
posted a notice at the mosque and on social media with photographs of the three
men and cited the “unacceptable behaviour and malicious actions” of the three
who had “caused non-Muslims to believe that the mosque condoned terrorism”.
The
family sued over the notice, which accused them of shattering the “peace,
harmony and sanctity” of the Exeter Mosque and Cultural Centre.
But
the judge ruled that the trustees were protected under law when responding to
criticisms made by the family.
Mr
Justice Jay said the family had claimed that “the Al Ghariani cash payments lie
at the heart of this dispute, and represent the real reason for all the
decisions made”.
He
said the family had failed to come up with evidence to back up their claim.
“The limited documentary material that has been made available do not support
that interpretation,” he said.
Source:
The National News
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click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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In
Khashoggi's shadow, Macron set for Saudi talks with crown prince
Dec
4, 2021
JEDDAH,
SAUDI ARABIA: French President Emmanuel Macron arrived in Saudi Arabia on
Saturday for face-to-face talks with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, becoming
the first major western leader to step on the kingdom's soil since journalist
Jamal Khashoggi's 2018 murder.
Macron
considers Saudi Arabia vital to help forge a region-wide peace deal with Iran,
as well as an ally in the fight against Islamist terrorists from the Middle
East to West Africa, and a rampart against the Muslim Brotherhood.
France
is one of Saudi Arabia's main arms suppliers, but it has faced increasing
pressure to review its sales because of the Saudi-led coalition fighting the
Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Yemen, now one of the world's worst humanitarian
crises.
While
ties between Paris and Riyadh were warmer under Macron's predecessor Francois
Hollande, France has not reaped the business rewards. The relationship has
cooled in recent years despite Macron, prior to Khashoggi's murder, urging
detractors to give time to the then 33-year-old leader-in-waiting.
A
business delegation of about 100 companies including TotalEnergies, EDF, Thales
and Vivendi is due to attend an investment forum during Macron's trip.
Speaking
to reporters in Dubai, Macron rejected accusations that he was legitimising the
crown prince, adding that the region's multiple crises could not be dealt with
by ignoring the kingdom.
"We
(can) decide after the Khashoggi affair that we have no policy in the region,
which is a choice some can defend, but I think France has an important role to
play in the region. That doesn't mean we are complicit or that we forget,"
Macron said.
Recent
contracts have been few, with most centred on the Al-Ula tourism project that
aims to bring to life the kingdom's Nabatean history, part of Saudi Arabia's
diversification drive to wean its economy off oil revenues.
Macron's
visit comes at a time when Gulf Arab states have voiced uncertainty about the
US focus on the region even as they seek more weapons from Washington.
Saudi
Arabia has been frustrated by the approach of US President Joe Biden's
administration, which has pressed Riyadh over its human rights record and the
Yemen war and released intelligence linking bin Salman to Khashoggi's murder.
The
crown prince has denied any involvement in the killing of the journalist in
Riyadh's Istanbul consulate, an incident that sparked global outrage and
tainted Prince Mohammed's image.
"Whether
it's the objective or not, (this trip) contributes to a policy of
rehabilitating the Saudi prince," said Agnes Callamard, secretary general
of the rights group Amnesty International. "It pains me that France, the country
of human rights, is the instrument of this policy."
Macron
is the first major Western head of state to visit Saudi Arabia since
Khashoggi's killing and the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic last year, which
dashed Riyadh's hopes of hosting G20 leaders during its 2020 presidency.
Source:
Times of India
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
--------
Macron
thanks Qatar for Afghan evacuations
04
December ,2021
French
President Emmanuel Macron, on a visit to the Gulf, expressed appreciation to
Qatar on Saturday for helping to organize the latest evacuation to France of
more than 250 threatened Afghans.
Qatar
has played a significant role both in diplomacy and evacuations at the end of a
20-year war in Afghanistan by Western nations.
“I
thank Qatar for the role it has played since the start of the crisis, and which
permitted the organization of several evacuations,” said Macron, before heading
to Saudi Arabia for the final leg of his two-day Gulf tour.
Macron
met on Friday evening with Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al-Thani.
A
flight chartered by Paris flew out the 258 Afghans who were “particularly
threatened because of their activities, especially journalists, or because of their
links to France, including former locally-recruited civilian personnel for our
armies,” the French foreign ministry said on Friday.
The
same flight carried 11 French nationals and about 60 from The Netherlands,
along with dependents.
The
ministry said that since September 10, 110 French nationals and their
dependents as well as 396 Afghans have been evacuated on 10 flights organized
by Qatar.
“We
are going to continue,” Macron said.
Around
half of the 124,000 Westerners and Western-allied Afghans flown out of
Afghanistan in the waning days of the US-led military involvement in
Afghanistan transited through Qatar.
Several
European countries are considering opening a common site for diplomatic
representation in the country’s capital, Kabul, after the departure of their
ambassadors following the capital’s fall to the extremist Taliban in August,
Macron said.
Qatar
has long hosted a Taliban political office.
After
his stay overnight Friday in Qatar, the world’s biggest exporter of liquefied
natural gas, Macron was heading to the Saudi Red Sea city of Jeddah on
Saturday.
Macron
will become one of the first Western leaders to meet the Kingdom’s Crown Prince
Mohammed bin Salman since 2018.
The
United Arab Emirates signed a record 14-billion-euro ($15.8 billion) contract
for 80 Rafale warplanes at the start of Macron’s visit.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
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https://english.alarabiya.net/News/world/2021/12/04/Macron-thanks-Qatar-for-Afghan-evacuations
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Rights
groups urge Macron to refuse protection to Syrian war criminal
Shweta
Desai
04.12.2021
PARIS
Human
rights groups urged President Emmanuel Macron on Friday to ensure France
exercises the principle of “universal jurisdiction” and refuse protection to
perpetrators of crimes against humanity.
The
request came after a court ruled that it had a lack of jurisdiction to
prosecute a Syrian war criminal.
In
an open letter titled, “France should not be a land where torturers are not
tried in Syria,” 11 organizations, including Amnesty International, Human
Rights League (LDH), European Constitution and Human Rights Center (ECCHR),
appealed to Macron to urgently amend the legal Code of Criminal Procedure to
prosecute individuals living in France who are accused of war crimes in their
country of origin.
It
concerns the Nov. 24 ruling in the case of former Syrian intelligence officer
Abdulhamid C, who has been imprisoned in France since January on torture and
crimes against humanity charges.
Prosecutors
said he was part of a state operation in notorious detention facilities where
hundreds of prisoners were tortured, starved and left to die.
Horrific
images of corpses in the prisons documenting systematic torture by Assad
forces, were made public as the Caesar Files Group after being smuggled out by
a former Syrian military police employee named “Caesar.”
The
criminal chamber of the Court of Cassation said French courts lacked
jurisdiction to prosecute Syrians living in France for committing war crimes in
Syria because that country has not ratified the Rome Statute and its domestic
laws do not sanction crimes against humanity.
The
court ruled on the basis of Article 689-11 in the Code of Criminal Procedure,
which gives jurisdiction to French courts “over a person habitually residing in
France who has committed one of the offenses listed in the Rome Statute,
provided that the offense is punishable in the state in which it was committed
or in the state of the person's citizenship, if the state is a party to the
Rome Statute.”
The
letter said France has sent a “disastrous signal to all the executioners on the
planet” with the ruling.
It
asked Macron to commit to the assurances given by him as a presidential
candidate to enforce the “application of universal jurisdiction.”
The
French judiciary in 2010 adopted a law which in effect rendered that genocide,
crimes against humanity and war crimes committed in countries that are not a
party to the Rome Statute, the Establishment of the International Criminal
Court, cannot be tried in France. Thereby making “the exercise of universal
jurisdiction for the most serious crimes is made legally impossible,” said the
letter.
Source:
Anadolu Agency
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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EU
announces $367M in extra funds to support refugees in Turkey
Agnes
Szucs
03.12.2021
BRUSSELS
The
European Union allocated €325 million ($367 million) in additional funding for
refugees in Turkey, the European Commission announced Thursday.
Extending
the bloc's multi-purpose cash assistance scheme, the Emergency Social Safety
Net, until early 2023, the financial support will provide refugees monthly
transfers to cover the essential needs of rent, bills, food and medicine.
Visiting
Turkey's capital Ankara, EU Commissioner for Crisis Management Janez Lenarcic
said the support would be "a critical lifeline for hundred thousands of
families, many of whom have been especially hard hit by the coronavirus
pandemic."
"This
cash assistance enables them to decide for themselves what they need most
urgently whilst contributing to the Turkish economy," he added, calling
the program a "major achievement" for the EU and Turkey.
Last
week, the European Parliament gave the final green light for providing €149.6
million for the extension of the program through early 2022, financed from the
remaining margin of the 2021 EU budget.
The
newly announced €325 million adds to this support to prolong the scheme for
another year, covered by the €3 billion support package European Commission
President Ursula von der Leyen announced in June for refugees in Turkey.
Source:
Anadolu Agency
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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France’s
Macron says hoping for progress on Lebanon ‘within next hours’
03
December ,2021
French
President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday he hoped there would be progress on
the Lebanon crisis in the next hours.
“We
will do all we can to re-engage the Gulf regions for the benefit of Lebanon...
I hope the coming hours will allow us to make progress.” Macron said during a
visit to the United Arab Emirates.
For
the latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
Source:
Al Arabiya
Please
click the following URL to read the full text of the original story:
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