‘Power, Politics’ Behind Move to Convert Hagia Sophia Into Mosque: Leading Muslim Cleric, Imam of Milan
New Age Islam News Bureau
25
Jul 2020
• Turkey's President Erdogan Joins Thousands to Pray
for First Time at Hagia Sophia The Mosque
•
Muslim Man Does Last Rites of a Brahmin in Karnataka, When Family Members
Refused to Even See the Body of the 62-Year-Old
• Indonesian Muslim Party Warns Erdogan Could Spark
Global ‘Clash Of Civilizations’
• European Muslims Hail Opening of Hagia Sophia Mosque
• PTA Asks
Operators to Ensure ‘Immoral’ Content Is Inaccessible To Users
• In Afghan Attacks, Facts Are Murky. But It’s Clear
Deaths Are Piling Up.
• ISIS Exploiting Coronavirus Security Gaps to
Relaunch Insurgency, UN Report Warns
• Sudan Finds Mass Grave Believed to Have Bodies of
Officers Executed by Omar Al-Bashir
• Our Children
Were Killed By Islamic State Members. They Must Face Trial.
Mideast
• ‘Power,
Politics’ Behind Move to Convert Hagia Sophia Into Mosque: Leading Muslim
Cleric, Imam of Milan
• Turkey's President Erdogan Joins Thousands to Pray
for First Time at Hagia Sophia The Mosque
• Hagia Sophia ‘Day of Mourning’ Unites Christians
Against Erdogan Decision
• Opposition group presents a secular alternative to
Iran’s clerical regime
• Iranian news agencies welcome Hagia Sophia Mosque
• Minister: US’ Threatening of Iran’s Civil Plane Act
of Terror
• Protesters attacked, arrested as thousands rally
outside Netanyahu residence
• Israel frees Hamas leader in West Bank after 16
months in administrative detention
• Israel orders demolition of more Palestinian
facilities in West Bank
--------
India
•
Muslim Man Does Last Rites of a Brahmin in Karnataka, When Family Members
Refused to Even See the Body of the 62-Year-Old
• Muslim BJP Leader Fasts for Quick Recovery Of J&K
Party Chief Ravinder Raina
• Delhi HC
Adjourns Hearing to Transfer Tablighi Jamaat Chief's Case to Probe Agency NIA
• SixMyanmarTablighi
Jamaat Members, Two Others Sentenced To One Month Imprisonment
• 2 terrorists killed in ongoing encounter on
outskirts of Srinagar
--------
Southeast Asia
• Indonesian Muslim Party Warns Erdogan Could Spark
Global ‘Clash Of Civilizations’
• Malaysia’s Political Centre Has Shifted but National
Leaders Are Still Searching for It
--------
Europe
• European Muslims Hail Opening of Hagia Sophia Mosque
• 'France Should Change Course and Stop Lecturing
Turkey'
• Former Nazi Guard Is Convicted in One of Germany’s
Last Holocaust Trials
• Macron Seeks EU Sanctions Over Turkish ‘Violations’
in Greek, Cypriot Waters
• Greek extremists burn Turkish flags over Hagia
Sophia
--------
Pakistan
• PTA Asks
Operators to Ensure ‘Immoral’ Content Is Inaccessible To Users
• IHC Rejects Ministry’s Report on Cynthia Case
• Posting of Maulana Fazl’s brother as DC Karachi
Central raises PTI, MQM’s hackles
• Development projects to end Balochistan’s sense of
deprivation, PM Imran says
• Jadhav not given any concession: Pakistan govt
• Why Can’t Pakistan’s Opposition Parties Remove the
Khan Government?
• PML-Q leaders laundered money, built assets: NAB
• 10 Chinese nationals hospitalised with Covid-19 in
Bahawalpur
--------
South Asia
• In Afghan Attacks, Facts Are Murky. But It’s Clear
Deaths Are Piling Up.
• Taliban militants suffer heavy casualties in Khost;
at least 29 killed, wounded
• 5 Taliban militants killed, wounded in Afghan forces’
counter-attack
• 5 civilians suffer casualties in Taliban roadside
bomb in Baghlan province
• Eight civilians killed in Afghan strike on freed
Taliban fighter
--------
Arab World
• ISIS Exploiting Coronavirus Security Gaps to
Relaunch Insurgency, UN Report Warns
• US-led forces withdraw from Iraqi military base near
Baghdad
• Iraqi MP urges expulsion of all US forces, says
'slow drawdown' not acceptable
• Hezbollah capable of targeting Israeli offshore gas
rigs in Mediterranean: Israeli commander
• Coronavirus: Lebanese official finds he has COVID-19
at lunch with France's Le Drian
• Iraq forces free German woman kidnapped in Baghdad:
Officials
• White Helmets collude with terrorists in Syria under
humanitarian guise: Russia
--------
Africa
• Sudan Finds Mass Grave Believed to Have Bodies of
Officers Executed by Omar Al-Bashir
• Sudan armed group attacks Darfur village, killing at
least 7
• US says Russia sent more equipment to Libyan front
lines
• UN 'horrified' by killing of five aid workers in
Nigeria
--------
North America
• Our Children
Were Killed By Islamic State Members. They Must Face Trial.
• Trump and Putin talk about Iran's nuclear arms
program: Kremlin
• US: Azerbaijanis blast death threats by Armenian
groups
Compiled by New Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/power-politics-behind-move-convert/d/122469
--------
‘Power, Politics’ Behind Move to Convert Hagia Sophia
Into Mosque: Leading Muslim Cleric, Imam of Milan
July 24, 2020
Imam of Milan Yahya Pallavicini said the
1,500-year-old UNESCO World Heritage Site should have been left as it was
originally built, as a church. (File/AFP)
-----
ROME: The Turkish government’s decision to convert
Istanbul’s historic Hagia Sophia museum into a mosque was based on “power and
politics,” a leading Italian Muslim cleric has claimed.
Imam of Milan Yahya Pallavicini said the
1,500-year-old UNESCO World Heritage Site should have been left as it was
originally built, as a church.
The world-famous site became a museum in 1934 but a
Turkish court annulled its status and President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced
it would be ready for Friday prayers from July 24.
“It should be neither museum nor mosque; Hagia Sophia
was just to remain a church,” said Pallavicini, who is also president of Coreis
(the Islamic religious community of Italy).
“For centuries political and cultural choices that I
have not agreed with have been made. I know my position may not sound
diplomatic enough, but it is supported by historical facts and Qur’anic
references,” he told Italian news agency Adnkronos.
“In the history of Islam, when Muslim scholars visited
a place of worship, such as a synagogue, a monastery, or a burial place of
other confessions, they always respected those places and their identity.
“When he (Caliph Omar) entered Jerusalem, he was
offered the opportunity to pray in a church. But he refused in a sign of
respect for the Christian faithful. A similar approach should be maintained
nowadays too.
“Places of worship should be left to the use they were
originally built for. In Istanbul there are already so many beautiful mosques
where Muslims can pray, so there was no need to have another one. In my opinion
the decision on Hagia Sophia is just a result of logics of power and politics,”
Pallavicini added.
The imam said he agreed with the sentiments of Pope
Francis who had spoken of being “very saddened” by the conversion of Hagia
Sophia into a mosque.
“The pope is right to defend the opportunity to
protect the spaces of worship of different religions. In different ways, we can
all agree on that. On the other hand, whoever truly supports inter-religious
dialogue, as clearly Pope Francis does, needs also to respect the specific
identities of the different faiths.”
Referring to demonstrations organized by the Northern
League anti-immigrant party outside the Turkish Consulate in Milan, Pallavicini
said: “Some Italian politicians should not take advantage of this particular
episode for political reasons.
“Whoever speculates on triumphalism and sovereignty
exploiting religious and cultural symbols, is never for inter-religious
dialogue.”
Several representatives of the Italian Catholic church
have also criticized Erdogan’s decision.
Monsignor Ettore Malnati, the episcopal vicar for the
laypeople and culture of the Trieste diocese, described the move as “worrying.”
He told Arab News: “We all must reflect on this, as
well on all the incarcerations of journalists and free people who have exposed
themselves in Turkey for a democratic, secular, and respectful society for the
right of religious freedom.
“Hagia Sophia was a Christian church for over 1,000
years. It was built for Christian worship by the Christian emperor Justinian.
President Erdogan’s choice sounds like a message of ideological fundamentalism
that certainly does not go in the direction of a tolerant society and of an
international community respecting plural culture and spiritualities.
“Erdogan sends that message to the Christians and to
the Islamic countries too,” Malnati added.
However, Monsignor Paolo Bizzeti, the apostolic vicar
of Anatolia, said: “Polls say that about 70 percent of the Turkish population
approved Erdogan’s decision, and this must be taken into account.”
Speaking to the Italian news agency, ANSA, he added:
“I hope that now the possibility of praying will be granted to Christian
refugees in Turkey by Erdogan, who proclaims himself as a man of faith.
“I hope that he will allow the opening of more
Christian chapels in Turkish territory so that people who are in transit in
this country may be given the chance to find a place where they can pray
together as a community while in this country.”
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1709311/middle-east
--------
Turkey's President Erdogan joins thousands to pray for
first time at Hagia Sophia the mosque
July 24, 2020
During his 17-year rule, Erdogan (holding microphone)
has championed Islam and religious observance and backed efforts to restore
Hagia Sophia’s mosque status. (Photo: Reuters)
-----
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan joined huge crowds
on Friday for the first prayers at Hagia Sophia in nine decades, sealing his
ambition to restore Muslim worship at an ancient site long revered in both
Christianity and Islam.
After the call to prayer rang out from four minarets
surrounding the mosque, whose rose-pink walls and huge grey dome have dominated
Istanbul since Christian Byzantine times, hundreds knelt in prayer inside the
building.
Outside, tens of thousands more prayed in a public
square and on sidewalks, squeezing into spaces between cars or in cafes,
joining a ceremony which many saw as righting a historic mistake when the
mosque was converted to a museum in 1934 by modern Turkey’s secularist founder Mustafa
Kemal Ataturk.
Hagia Sophia was the largest cathedral in the world
for 900 years until its capture by Ottoman Sultan Mehmet the Conqueror in 1453,
after which it was one of Islam’s most exalted mosques for nearly another 500
years.
“This is the opening of a place of worship that was
conquered by the right of the sword by the holy conqueror,” said worshipper
Latif Ozer, 42. “This is a source of great pride for us, great excitement.”
That excitement has not been universally shared.
Church leaders and some Western countries have sharply criticised Turkey’s
move, saying the shift to exclusive Muslim worship at Hagia Sophia risks
deepening religious divisions.
Pope Francis said he was deeply pained by the
decision, which came after a top Turkish court annulled Hagia Sophia’s status
as a museum two weeks ago. Erdogan immediately issued a decree converting it
once again to a mosque.
In Greece, church bells tolled in mourning on Friday.
A vast majority of Greeks consider the monument central to their Orthodox Christian
religion. Greek criticism of the conversion has been scathing, underscoring the
countries’ tense relations.
Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis called Turkey
a “troublemaker”, and the Hagia Sophia conversion an “affront to civilization
of the 21st century”.
“HEARTBREAK” IS ENDING
Several hundred invitees joined Erdogan for the
ceremony inside the sixth-century building. Some, including his son-in-law and
Finance Minister Berat Albayrak, could be seen recording images of the historic
occasion on their mobiles phones.
The president, his head covered by a white prayer cap,
read a Koranic recitation before the head of Turkey’s religious directorate Ali
Erbas addressed worshippers.
“The longing of our nation, which has turned into a
heartbreak, is coming to an end today,” Erbas said from the pulpit, holding a
sword in his hand.
Newly installed white curtains covered an image of
Mary and Jesus which would have faced the worshippers, but pictures of angels
were still visible on arches supporting the mosque’s cavernous dome.
Officials say that glittering mosaics and other art in
the main hall will be concealed during prayer time but will remain uncovered in
other parts of the building.
Earlier, crowds formed at checkpoints around the
historic heart of Istanbul where massed police maintained security. Once
through the checks, worshippers sat apart on prayer mats in secured areas
outside the building in Sultanahmet Square.
A large screen and speakers set up in the square
broadcast proceedings to a crowd which Erdogan said was 350,000-strong.
As crowds grew, leaving little space for social
distancing, Istanbul Governor Ali Yerlikaya said authorities had stopped people
entering the area due to concerns about the spread of the coronavirus. On
Twitter, he called for patience and said the mosque would be open for prayer
until Saturday morning.
CHRISTIAN ICONS CONCEALED
“God is greatest,” chanted people in the square. Some
held Turkish and Ottoman flags.
During his 17-year rule, Erdogan has championed Islam
and religious observance and backed efforts to restore Hagia Sophia’s mosque
status. He said Muslims should be able to pray there again and raised the issue
- popular with many pious AKP-voting Turks - during local elections last year.
Erdogan has reshaped Turkey’s modern republic,
established nearly a century ago by the staunchly secularist Mustafa Kemal
Ataturk, lifting a ban on Muslim headscarves in state institutions, promoting
religious education and taming Turkey’s powerful military, once a bastion of Ataturk’s
secular values.
After leaving Hagia Sophia, Erdogan went straight to
the nearby Fatih (Conqueror) mosque, named after Sultan Mehmet who seized
Istanbul for the Ottomans.
“Hagia Sophia will continue to serve all believers as
a mosque and will remain a place of cultural heritage for all humanity,”
Erdogan said at Mehmet’s tomb. “We said ‘let’s visit the tomb of Sultan Mehmet
the Conqueror, the real owner”.
https://www.indiatoday.in/world/story/turkey-s-president-erdogan-joins-thousands-to-pray-for-first-time-at-hagia-sophia-the-mosque-1704130-2020-07-24
--------
Muslim Man Does Last Rites of a Brahmin in Karnataka,
When Family Members Refused to Even See the Body of the 62-Year-Old
Jul 25, 2020
Muslim ambulance driver cremates Hindu senior citizen
with no family (India Today Image)
------
MANGALURU: When family members refused to even see the
body of a 62-year-old Brahmin who died due to age-related illness, a Muslim
social worker came forward to perform the last rites here on Thursday, reports
Vinobha KT. Mohammed Asif cremated the body according to Hindu rituals and
immersed the ashes in the sea near Vadabhandeshwara Temple at Uddinahithlu,
Malpe, as per the wishes of the kin, who stayed away over Covid fears.
‘Siblings refused to perform 62-year-old man’s last
rites’
The deceased was not married and had four siblings.
All of them refused to perform the last rites and didn’t turn up at the
crematorium. Fear of contracting coronavirus could be a reason for family
members to not receive the body. When I spoke to his sister in Bengaluru, she asked
me to perform the rites. I sought permission of the Mulky police permission
before taking the body to Hindu Rudrabhumi in the town,” he added.
Asif spotted the abandoned man in 2018 and brought him
to his orphanage in Mulky. “He was unwell in the past few days. We shifted him
to Mulky Government Hospital on Thursday morning. He died hours later. He was
diabetic and a hypertension patient. Since he died due to age-related ailments,
doctors ruled out a Covid-19 test on him,” Asif, who also drives a private
ambulance, told TOI.
“I did this as a human being respecting another. I
have been running Maimoona Foundation, a charitable organisation for orphans to
help people in the coastal region,” Asif said.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mangaluru/karnataka-muslim-man-does-last-rites-of-brahmin/articleshow/77161690.cms
--------
Indonesian Muslim party warns Erdogan could spark
global ‘clash of civilizations’
Jul 25, 2020
Hagia Sophia, Istanbul, Turkey. Credit:
K_Boonnitrod/Shutterstock
------
CNA Staff, Jul 24, 2020 / 01:00 pm MT (CNA).- An
Islamic political party in Indonesia said Tuesday that Turkey's President Recep
Tayyip Erdogan could spark a civilizational clash because of his calls for an
Islamic “reawakening” amid the establishment of the Hagia Sophia as a mosque.
A recent tweet from Erdogan “summoned Muslims ‘in every
corner of the earth’ to follow Turkey’s lead in reawakening the Islamic nation,
or ummah, which was largely united under the political and military leadership
of a caliph from the 7th century CE until the dissolution of the Ottoman
Caliphate in 1924,” Indonesia’s National Awakening Party said in a July 21
statement.
Recent statements from the Turkish president “are
attacking the rules-based international order; inflaming emotions ‘wherever
Muslims dwell throughout the earth;’ and threaten to
rekindle a clash of civilizations that afflicted
humanity for nearly 1300 years, along a fault line stretching ‘from Bukhara (in
Central Asia) to al-Andalus (Spain),’” the statement added.
While “President Erdogan has defended the conversion
of Hagia Sofia into a mosque by citing Turkey’s right, as a sovereign nation
state, to do as it pleases with the former Orthodox Christian cathedral,” the
effects of the president’s call for an Islamic reawakening “extend far beyond
Turkey’s borders and threaten both Muslim- majority and non-Muslim nations
worldwide,” the National Awakening Party said.
Hagia Sophia, the church of “Holy Wisdom,” was built
in the year 537 and served as the cathedral of the Patriarch of Constantinople.
It stood as the largest known building in the world and the largest Christian
church, for a period of time.
In the year 1453, Turkish armies sacked Constantinople
and the church was turned into a mosque. In 1934, the cabinet of then-Turkish
leader Mustafa Kemal Ataturk—head of a secularist government—converted the
mosque into a museum and opened it to visitors from around the world.
On July 2, a Turkish court ruled that the 1934
conversion of Hagia Sophia from a mosque to a museum was unlawful. The decision
was announced July 10, and Erdogan subsequently announced that Hagia Sophia
would be converted back into a mosque.
Erdogan made his announcement in a lengthy July speech
that was littered with historical, geographical, and religious references to
the old Islamic world, connecting Hagia Sophia’s reconversion to a much-broader
“Islamic renaissance.”
In his speech, the Turkish leader predicted that Hagia
Sophia’s reconversion would herald the liberation of al-Aqsa mosque on the
Temple Mount in the old city of Jerusalem, the third-holiest site in Islam.
Dr. Elizabeth Prodromou, a former vice chair on the
U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, told CNA July 17 that the
president’s speech aimed to “justify what he [Erdogan] sees as a kind of
religious destiny, and also a geopolitical model for Turkey’s revisionism and
expansionism.”
Erdogan specifically chose these “historical figures”
to promote the depth of Turkey’s history and to “encompass Turkic tribes from
Central Asia into the Ottoman Empire,” she said.
It was a speech “heralding the liberation of the full
Muslim world,” Prodromou said.
Christian and political leaders around the world
condemned the decision to reconvert Hagia Sophia. Orthodox and Catholic leaders
have declared July 24 a day of mourning for the decision.
For its part, the National Awakening Party said that
“Erdogan’s statements were swiftly endorsed by the Muslim Brotherhood, Iran and
a wide range of Islamic supremacists worldwide, including Indonesian Muslims
who seek to transform the multi-religious and pluralistic Republic of Indonesia
into an Islamic State or caliphate.”
“The Islamic world is in the midst of a rapidly
metastasizing crisis, with no apparent sign of remission. Among the most
obvious manifestations of this crisis are the brutal conflicts now raging
across a huge swath of territory inhabited by Muslims, from Africa and the
Middle East to the borders of India; rampant social turbulence throughout the
Islamic world; the unchecked spread of religious extremism and terror; and a rising
tide of Islamophobia among non-Muslim populations, in direct response to these
developments,” the party said.
That crisis, the statement added, has led to
humanitarian problems in many parts of the world, and increased Islamic
militant radicalization.
“In the midst of these circumstances, it is the height
of irresponsibility for Recep Erdogan to further inflame Muslim emotions in
pursuit of his domestic political agenda and to serve as a cover for his
violation of international norms—by drilling for natural gas within the
territorial waters of Cyprus and Greece; supporting al-Nusra (an affiliate of
al-Qaeda) in Syria; and intervening in the Libyan conflict on behalf of the
Islamist-dominated interim government—in an effort to enhance Turkish regional power
and assert maritime rights in the eastern Mediterranean,” the party said.
The National Awakening Party was founded in Indonesia
in 1999, and holds 47 of 560 seats in the country’s lower legislative house. It
is generally identified as a centrist party, and is aligned with centrist
Christian Democrat parties in Europe.
Las week, Indonesian Sheikh Yahya CholilStaquf, leader
of the largest independent Muslim organization in the world, said that
“campaigns of mass killing, displacement, and terror that threaten to break the
already badly frayed bonds of trust that make a shared communal life between
Muslims and non-Muslims possible.”
Staquf is the general secretary of Indonesia’s
Nahdlatul Ulama, the world’s largest Muslim organization with more than 90 million
followers. He has also co-founded a global movement promoting a “humanitarian
Islam” that shuns the ideas of a caliphate, Sharia law, and “kafir,” or
infidels.
In a July 7 essay in Public Discourse, he called for
“a global strategy to develop a new Islamic orthodoxy that reflects the actual
circumstances of the modern world in which Muslims must live and practice their
faith.”
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/indonesian-muslim-party-warns-erdogan-could-spark-global-clash-of-civilizations-15152
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European Muslims hail opening of Hagia Sophia Mosque
Büşra Nur BilgiçÇakmak
24.07.2020
Muslims around Europe hailed the opening of Turkey's
Hagia Sophia Mosque to worship after 86 years with Friday prayer.
VehbijaSecerovic, muezzin of the historic Gazi
Husrev-Beg Mosque in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo, thanked Turkish President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan for the decision.
Speaking to Anadolu Agency in Brussels, Suleyman
Murtaza said that opening Hagia Sophia for worship is a very important
development for the Muslim world.
"I saw Erdogan praying there. I also watched it
live. It was magnificent,” he said.
Belgian Muslim Dema Habib also praised the move.
"I haven't seen the mosque, but I would love to
see it," Habib added.
Speaking to Anadolu Agency in Stockholm, Iraqi-origin
Karwan Mohammed Abubakir said: “I am very happy that Hagia Sophia opened as a
mosque again. Praise to Allah, it has opened with the Friday prayer, we are
very happy.''
“We are grateful to those who contributed to turning
Hagia Sophia into a mosque,” said Ahmed Eltantavi, another Swedish Muslim
Muslim heritage
On July 10, a Turkish court annulled a 1934 Cabinet
decree that turned Hagia Sophia into a museum, paving the way for its use as a
mosque.
Friday’s historic prayers marked the first acts of
worship there in 86 years.
Some 350,000 people took part in the traditional
Friday prayers at the historic mosque in Istanbul.
Before the prayers, Turkish President Recep Tayyip
Erdogan recited from the Quran inside the reopened mosque, choosing verses from
both the Surah Al-Fatihah and the Surah Al-Baqarah.
Besides being a working mosque, Hagia Sophia is also
among Turkey’s top tourism destinations for domestic and foreign visitors
alike.
In 1985, Hagia Sophia was added to the UNESCO World
Heritage List.
It served as a church for 916 years until the conquest
of Istanbul by the Ottoman Empire, and a mosque from 1453 to 1934 – nearly 500
years.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/european-muslims-hail-opening-of-hagia-sophia-mosque-/1921458
--------
PTA Asks Operators to Ensure ‘Immoral’ Content Is
Inaccessible To Users
Ramsha Jahangir
25 Jul, 2020
KARACHI: While the Supreme Court has taken notice of
“objectionable content” being shared on YouTube and other social media
platforms, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) has directed internet
operators to ensure that no “immoral or illegal” content is made accessible to
users.
In a letter dated July 21, a copy of which is
available with Dawn, the PTA said it had discovered that a high volume of
immoral content was being served through Content Delivery Networks (CDNs). “You
are requested to ensure that no pornographic/immoral/illegal content is being
served to the users through CDNs. Compliance report in this regard is required
to be submitted within 10 days of this letter,” it stated.
Necessary regulatory action shall be taken in case of
continued non-compliance, the authority warned.
A CDN improves a website’s loading speed by serving
the content from a location near the user. For instance, if a user is in
Pakistan and tries to access a website hosted in the UK, normally the transfer
must cross the geographic distance every time, which makes it very slow and
costly. To bypass the slow process, a CDN stores a ‘cached’ (copied) version of
the website content on a local server in Pakistan.
A majority of web traffic is served through CDNs,
including traffic from major sites like Facebook, Netflix, YouTube and Amazon.
TikTok hints at removing videos, banning accounts
This also means that while the network must bring
around one-third of its content from the original website, a major part of the
connection is not between the user and the platform — but between the user and
the CDN, which is serving two-thirds of the content.
The PTA, however, said filtering mechanisms applied by
the authority to block access to illegal content were bypassed due to
involvement of CDNs. “Since CDNs are either hosted in operators’ network or CDN
connectivity is established by the operators, therefore it is the
responsibility of the operator to ensure that no objectionable content is being
served to its users,” the PTA said.
The authority pointed out it was empowered under
Section 37 of the Pakistan Electronic Crimes Act (Peca) 2016 to block/remove
unlawful online content. It said the content deemed unlawful included, but was
not limited to, “defence of Pakistan, glory of Islam, indecent and immoral,
impersonation/defamation, child pornography, modesty of natural person, dignity
of natural person, contempt of court, public order, hate speech, (and)
glorification of an offence”.
Banning platforms
A day earlier, the Supreme Court took notice of
“objectionable content” being shared on YouTube and other social media
platforms, and issued notices to the Foreign Office and the attorney general in
this regard.
During the hearing, a judge remarked that the
judiciary had no objection to the right to freedom of speech but people were
inciting others on social media against the Pakistan Army, judiciary and government.
Hinting at a ban on YouTube, the bench observed that
many countries controlled social media through local laws.
Asked if a ban on YouTube was under consideration, the
PTA did not confirm or deny such a possibility.
According to Google’s latest transparency report for
July-Dec 2019, 16 per cent of the total requests sent to the company for
content removal pertained to defamation and 11pc items to national security. As
many as 93 items were reported to Google platforms for “religious offences”.
Besides concerns of a ban on YouTube, social media
users felt disappointed when the PTA announced the blocking of Bigo and issued
a final warning to TikTok.
“TikTok and Bigo are engaged with PTA on the matter.
Concerns with regard to immoral material have been conveyed to the platforms
and they are working on a suitable mechanism to address the concerns,” the PTA
told Dawn.
The authority did not specify whether the decision to
block Bigo would be reversed and if TikTok would face similar action in the
future, while PUBG is “still banned” in Pakistan despite the court orders.
In an email statement to Dawn, TikTok said maintaining
a safe and positive in-app environment was its top priority.
“We deploy a combination of technologies, and
moderation strategies to detect and review problematic content that violates
our terms of use and comprehensive community guidelines, and implement
appropriate penalties including removing videos and banning accounts,” it said.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1570913/pta-asks-operators-to-ensure-immoral-content-is-inaccessible-to-users
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In Afghan Attacks, Facts Are Murky. But It’s Clear
Deaths Are Piling Up.
Asadullah Timory and Mujib Mashal
July 23, 2020
HERAT, Afghanistan — For a full day after airstrikes
on a remote village in western Afghanistan on Wednesday, the only certainty was
that people had perished.
The most basic facts — who had carried out the
strikes, and how many Taliban and civilians were killed — were impossible to
pin down amid the denials, conflicting statements and exaggerations.
With the start of peace talks between the Taliban and
the government delayed by months, the Afghan war has spiraled into a deadlier
phase, even as the United States continues to withdraw its forces. Car bombs,
roadside bombs and airstrikes wreak carnage across the country, killing dozens
of Afghans everyday.
But as the war has spread, the exact nature of the
attacks and their toll, particularly on civilians, has increasingly grown
opaque.
The Taliban often flatly deny incidents that kill
civilians, even when the bodies are there to be buried. Protest and pressure
turns the government’s denials of civilian casualties in its operations into
investigations that rarely result in follow-through or answers.
The U.S. military, after a deal with the Taliban in
February that was supposed to produce something resembling a cease-fire between
them, has quietly returned to striking Taliban units that it sees as preparing
attacks on its Afghan allies, but it no longer officially acknowledges those strikes.
Making the battlefield still more murky has been the
presence of other militant groups in addition to the Taliban, including
factions with long ties to Al Qaeda as well as a branch of the Islamic State.
The airstrikes on Wednesday in the Guzara district of
Herat Province struck a group of 100 to 150 people who had gathered to welcome
a Taliban member who had been held by the government, according to survivors,
local officials and community leaders. He was released as part of a prisoner
swap that is supposed to open the way for direct negotiations between the
insurgents and the government.
As part of the U.S. deal with the insurgents, the
Afghan government was expected to release 5,000 Taliban prisoners in return for
1,000 Afghan troops. But the government opposed the trade at first, and then
only agreed to a phased release of captives after pressure from the Trump
administration.
Afghan officials say about 4,000 Taliban prisoners
have been released so far — and some of them, they claim, have returned to the
battlefield.
The Taliban have released about 800 of the Afghan
troops.
As the prisoner swap dragged on for months, the
Taliban cranked up its attacks across the country. Feeling pressure, the Afghan
government announced it was going on the offensive, although its troops have
been forced to largely defend against Taliban assaults.
American aircraft, mostly drones and A-10 jets, have
carried out at least 40 strikes on Taliban targets since the Feb. 29 agreement,
a U.S. military official familiar with the operations said. But the Pentagon
has not openly acknowledged most of its attacks, in an attempt to keep the
already shaky peace process on track.
In recent days, a bloody wave of violence has
intensified. A Taliban roadside bomb killed seven members of the security
forces, including senior local officials, in southern Uruzgan Province.
In northern Baghlan Province, the Afghan air force
struck two houses, an attack based on intelligence that Taliban fighters were
staying there. Officials later found out that the insurgents had left and the
strikes had killed five civilians, according to the district governor.
In Kandahar Province, a Taliban infiltrator killed
about a dozen police officers.
In Khogyani district in the east, the Afghan
government said 31 Taliban were killed in one battle, which involved heavy air
power.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. special envoy for Afghan
peace, condemned the Guzara airstrikes, saying that civilians were among the
casualties. He also condemned the spate of recent Taliban attacks.
“The last 24 hours have been very violent in
Afghanistan with many losing their lives,” Mr. Khalilzad wrote on Twitter. “The
Afghan people want an immediate start of peace negotiations and a settlement
that is in their best interest. More graves will not bring negotiations
forward.”
But exactly what happened in Guzara, and how many
people were killed, remained uncertain. Increasingly, it appeared the
casualties were a mix of Taliban and civilians, as is often the case.
ArbabSarbeland, a local leader from the
neighboringAdraskan district who was there for the ceremony, said helicopter
gunships started hitting the area around 9 a.m. After the helicopters left,
survivors loaded three dead and four wounded people into cars, but that turned
out to be just the first of several attacks that day.
It is not clear how many times the helicopters circled
back to strike again, or if other aircraft were also involved.
Noor Ahmad Khan, who was at the district center during
the attack, said a relative he had dispatched to the village for information
had told him the civilian toll stood at 12 dead and 22 wounded, but he would
not comment on the number of Taliban casualties.
Late on Wednesday, Abdul Salam Azimi, the police chief
of Guzara district, said “about 50 Taliban are killed or wounded.” The Taliban,
in a statement that said nothing about casualties to its fighters, said 8
civilians were killed in the strikes and 12 wounded.
By the end of the day on Wednesday, it still wasn’t
clear who had carried out the attack. American officials said it wasn’t the
U.S. military.
A spokesman for Afghanistan’s Defense Ministry said it
had “not carried out any airstrike in Herat,” and denied claims that one of the
strikes had hit a vehicle carrying women and children. What damaged the
vehicle, he said, was “actually a roadside bomb.”
But around midnight, the Afghan defense ministry
changed its position, admitting it had been behind the airstrikes and promising
to investigate claims of civilian casualties.
On Thursday, Asadullah Khalid, Afghanistan’s acting
defense minister, said that he would show evidence that Afghan forces had
struck Taliban fighters and that he was “hopeful there are no civilian
casualties.”
The Defense Ministry on Thursday afternoon released a
30-second video clip as evidence it had struck the Taliban. The clip, which
lacked any time or date stamp, showed about a dozen armed men around vehicles
and motorcycles. There was nothing in the video to show that they were, in
fact, the same men who were killed and wounded on Wednesday.
AssadullahTimory reported from Herat, and Mujib Mashal
from Kabul. Thomas Gibbons-Neff contributed reporting from Washington and Fahim
Abed from Kabul.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/world/asia/afghan-taliban-violence-airstrikes.html?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1385975_
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ISIS exploiting coronavirus security gaps to relaunch
insurgency, UN report warns
July 23, 2020
(CNN)There has been a significant rise in ISIS attacks
in Iraq and Syria, with the group exploiting security gaps in Iraq caused by
the coronavirus pandemic to relaunch and invigorate its rural insurgency in the
country, according to a report submitted to the UN Security Council that was
made public on Thursday.
The wide-ranging report, put together by the UN
monitoring team that tracks the global jihadi terror threat, states that the
group is consolidating in Iraq and Syria and "showing confidence in its
ability to increasingly operate in a brazen manner in its former core
area."
It states that the number of ISIS attacks in Iraq and
Syria "increased significantly in early 2020 as compared with the same
period in 2019."
Referring to the situation in Iraq, the UN monitoring
team stated that ISIS has "exploited security gaps caused by the pandemic
and by political turbulence in Iraq to relaunch a sustained rural insurgency,
as well as sporadic operations in Baghdad and other large cities."
In recent weeks in particular, Iraq has seen a huge
surge in Covid-19 cases, with the number of cumulative cases surpassing 100,000
on Thursday compared with fewer than 7,000 confirmed on June 1.
Syria has far fewer confirmed cases, but leaders of
the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces say ISIS has exploited the fact that the
pandemic has limited the SDF's mobility in the region.
Gen. Mazloum Abdi, the top commander of the SDF, told
CTC Sentinel, the monthly publication of the Combating Terrorism Center at West
Point, in June that a major Covid-19 outbreak would limit his forces' ability
to counter the Islamic State "because we will be busy managing the
situation in detention facilities" where the group currently houses
thousands of former ISIS members.
The newly released UN report, which is based on
information from member states, estimates that there are currently more than
10,000 ISIS fighters in Iraq and Syria.
One reason for ISIS's resilience in those countries is
money. According to the new UN report, member states assess ISIS still has
approximately $100 million in reserves. It states the group's assets are
"believed to take the form of cash, buried or stored in caches across the
conflict zone or kept with financial facilitators in neighbouring countries.
Some of the funds have been invested in legitimate businesses in Iraq, the
Syrian Arab Republic and neighbouring countries."
Report challenges Trump's narrative
The new United Nations findings challenge the
narrative of President Donald Trump, who earlier this year claimed to have
destroyed "100% of ISIS and its territorial caliphate."
The UN monitors also presented a more pessimistic
assessment than that recently presented by the Trump administration. In June,
Ambassador James Jeffrey, the special envoy to the global coalition to defeat
ISIS, stated that although ISIS remained "a resilient and significant
threat" in Iraq and Syria, there had been a small reduction in the overall
number of ISIS attacks and a lessening in their complexity, "so we think
the situation is not getting worse, it's getting better."
The UN report does not paint a uniformly negative
picture of the evolving ISIS threat in Iraq and Syria. It noted that several
significant ISIS leaders had been removed since Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was killed
last October and that "as some financial facilitators are captured or
killed in counter-terrorism operations, knowledge of the whereabouts of hidden
funds may also be lost."
The new UN report also notes that ISIS's new leader
Amir Muhammad Sa'idAbdal-Rahman al-Mawla "has not visibly asserted himself
in communications, which may prove to be a limiting factor in his influence and
appeal, and perhaps that of the group."
In June the US government doubled the reward for
information about al-Mawla to $10 million.
When it came to the big picture the new UN report
noted that although ISIS "maintains the ambition to control territory and
populations ... for the moment, [it] represents an entrenched rural insurgency
without the reach to threaten urban areas on a sustained basis."
Covid-19 and the global terror threat
The UN report finds that outside of Syria, Iraq and
other conflict zones, the short-term terror threat has fallen as a result of
the Covid-19 pandemic, noting that "restrictions on international travel
significantly constrain terrorist mobility, networking and finance-related
activity" and that targets have become more elusive because of the
discouragement of public gatherings
However, it warns that ISIS has "had a captive
audience during the lockdown and, if it has successfully used this for planning
and recruitment purposes, it is possible that the easing of restrictions in
non-conflict zones will see a spike in attacks once targets become available
again. Another motivation is fear of irrelevance: COVID-19 largely eclipsed
terrorism from the news."
The report warns that should the pandemic lead to a
severe global recession that could create conditions where terrorist and
extremist narratives gain increased currency.
The report also noted that there have been no
indications that ISIS "is systematically attempting to weaponize the
virus."
Concern over al Qaeda
The report warns that the security situation in West
Africa and the Sahel is a particular cause for concern, stating that ISIS and
al Qaeda franchises there "continued to enjoy operational success in early
2020," which led to heightened concerns about stability in the region.
It also states that al Qaeda remains active in
Afghanistan nearly 19 years after 9/11 and notes that its leadership continues
to maintain a close relationship with the Haqqani network, a powerful subgroup
within the Afghan Taliban.
A Pentagon report published earlier this month reached
a similar conclusion.
The persisting close relations between al Qaeda and
the Taliban are widely seen as one of the main stumbling blocks to future progress
in the peace process in Afghanistan in the wake of the agreement signed between
the US and the Taliban earlier this year.
Though there has been speculation that al Qaeda leader
Ayman al-Zawahiri may, like Osama bin Laden, have hidden in Pakistan, the UN
report states that according to member states, al-Zawahiri is currently based
in Afghanistan. The report finds that should al-Zawahiri's "poor health
... force a leadership succession, it will be challenging for Al-Qaida in the
context of a peace process" in Afghanistan.
The report also found that al Qaeda has
"ingrained itself in local communities and conflicts" around the
world, with its recent "favored" affiliate in Syria, Hurras al-Din,
"committed to preparing for external attacks despite its current focus on
targeting Syrian forces" and its Yemeni affiliate, al Qaeda in the Arabian
Peninsula, still "determined to mount external operations."
According to the US government, AQAP had
"significant ties" to Saudi air force officer Mohammed Alshamrani, who
carried out a terrorist attack that killed three at Naval Air Station Pensacola
in Florida in December 2019.
The report states that "during his time at
Pensacola and up to the day of the attack, Alshamrani was in direct contact
with Abdullah al-Maliki, an AQAP media and Internet recruitment operative who
was killed in Yemen on May 13. The Pensacola attack is believed to have been
planned prior to Alshamrani's arrival in the United States." In a May news
conference, Attorney General William Barr and FBI Director Christopher Wray
revealed that al-Maliki had been targeted in a counterterrorism operation but
did not spell out whether he had been killed.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/07/23/politics/isis-coronavirus-un-terrorism-report/index.html?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1385975_
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Sudan finds mass grave believed to have bodies of
officers executed by Omar al-Bashir
24 July 2020
Sudan has found a mass grave that most likely contains
remains of 28 army officers executed in 1990 for plotting an attempted coup
against the former President Omar al-Bashir, the public prosecutor office said
late on Thursday.
The officers were executed in mysterious circumstances
after a quick military trial one year after Bashir himself took the power in a
military coup in 1989. There burial site was not disclosed for decades.
For all the latest headlines follow our Google News
channel online or via the app.
"The public prosecution managed to find a mass
grave that data indicates that it is most likely the graveyard where the bodies
of the officers who were killed and buried in a brutal manner," the public
prosecutor said in a statement.
A team of 23 experts reached this result after an
effort that lasted for three weeks, and more forensic and investigative
measures will be taken in the site, the statement added.
The public prosecutor assured the families of the
executed officers that "such crimes will not pass without a just
trial".
Bashir appeared in court on Tuesday at the opening of
his trial for leading the military coup that brought him to power in 1989. He
could be sentenced to death if convicted.
Bashir's attorneys could not immediately be reached
for comment.
Bashir was ousted by the army in April 2019, after
months of mass protests.
Local media reports said earlier this month that
prosecutors questioned Bashir over the 1990 executions. The prosecution has not
publicly commented on the matter.
Last month, Sudan's public prosecutor announced the
discovery of a mass grave east of Khartoum suspected to contain the remains of
students killed in 1998 as they tried escaping military service at a training
camp.
Bashir already was handed down a two-year sentence by
a court in December on corruption charges. Bashir also faces trials and
investigations over the killing of protesters.
He is also wanted by the International Criminal Court
(ICC), which issued arrest warrants against him in 2009 and 2010 on charges of
genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity in Sudan’s restive Darfur
region.
A civilian transition government took over from Bashir
under a three-year power-sharing deal with the military who helped remove
Bashir, but the country's economy is still in crisis.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2020/07/24/Sudan-finds-mass-grave-believed-to-have-bodies-of-officers-executed-by-Omar-al-Bashir.html
--------
Our Children Were Killed By Islamic State Members.
They Must Face Trial.
July 23, 2020
Diane and John Foley, Paula and Ed Kassig, Marsha and
Carl Mueller, and Shirley and Art Sotloff are parents whose children were
abducted and killed by members of the Islamic State.
We are the parents of James Foley, Peter Kassig, Kayla
Mueller and Steven Sotloff. As Syria’s civil war unfolded, our children saw the
Syrian people’s suffering and wanted to help, whether by providing humanitarian
aid or by telling the world about this disaster.
While carrying out this work, they were abducted by
members of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS. They were starved, tortured
and beaten. According to witnesses, Kayla was repeatedly raped by the
then-leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Jim, Peter and Steven were publicly
murdered in the most brutal way imaginable. Nearly six years later, their
bodies haven’t been found. No one has faced justice for their murders.
Some of the men who allegedly committed these
atrocities are now in U.S. military custody in the Middle East. We implore
President Trump, Attorney General William P. Barr and the Justice Department to
have the detainees brought to the United States to face trial.
Like any grieving relatives, we want to know the full
truth about what happened to our loved ones, and we want to see our children’s
murderers held accountable. These things can happen only if the suspects are
put on trial before a jury in an American court of law.
Some of the ISIS members implicated in these crimes,
including Mohammed Emwazi, also known as “Jihadi John,” and al-Baghdadi, are
dead and beyond the reach of earthly justice. But others are being held, right
now, on U.S. bases in the Middle East. The detainees include AlexandaKotey and
El Shafee Elsheikh, two of the surviving ISIS members referred to by their
captives as “the Beatles.” They are British citizens who reportedly
participated in the detention, torture and execution of American hostages.
With the U.S. military reducing its presence in the
Middle East, we worry that the detainees will never face trial, just as
hundreds of terrorists who were detained on U.S. bases during the Iraq War were
let go as the United States withdrew its forces. Having escaped justice, many —
including al-Baghdadi before his death — went on to form the Islamic State
leadership.
Risking a repeat of this regrettable history is
alarming enough. But detaining suspects indefinitely without trial is also bad
policy. Terrorists use it as a recruiting tool and as an excuse for
hostage-taking, accusing the United States of doing the same. Islamic State
propaganda makes heroes of its members in U.S. custody, portraying them as
living martyrs — a message that is repellent to the loved ones of their
victims.
The U.S. government should send a more powerful
message: It doesn’t matter who you are or where you are. If you harm American
citizens, you will not escape. You will be hunted down. And when you are
caught, you will face the full power of American law.
There is no nation on Earth better at bringing
terrorists to justice than the United States. American laws are rigorous and
comprehensive. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are masters of their
craft. And U.S. prosecutors have a long track record of success. More than 400
convicted terrorists are now securely behind bars in federal prisons, their
crimes having been laid bare in open court.
We implore the Trump administration: Please, for the
sake of truth, for the sake of justice, order these Islamic State suspects
transferred to the United States to face trial.
In one of her final letters home, Kayla signed off,
“With all my everything.” That is what Kayla, Jim, Peter and Steven are to us:
our everything. Obtaining justice for them would mean the world.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/07/23/our-children-were-killed-by-islamic-state-members-they-must-face-trial/?utm
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Mideast
Hagia Sophia ‘Day of Mourning’ unites Christians
against Erdogan decision
23 July 2020
Christians around the world will unite on Friday in
observing a ‘Day of Mourning’ for the Hagia Sophia following Turkish President
Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s decision to convert the ancient building from a museum
into a mosque.
Head of the Greek Orthodox Church in the US Archbishop
Elpidophoros, who is spearheading the event, said it is “deeply gratifying” to
see the response from Catholics and other Christian sects, as well as different
religious groups.
“Many ecumenical and indeed interfaith partners will
join us tomorrow, and in a grass roots way, because they see that [Erdogan’s]
decision is heading in the wrong direction for humanity. We will pray, not
condemn. We will join together, not divide,” said Archbishop Elpidophoros in an
interview with Al Arabiya English on Thursday.
“We will bear witness to a better way to live as the
human family, where memories of conquest and empire are relegated to where they
belong: the past,” he added.
Elpidophoros and Roman Catholic Cardinal Timothy Dolan
of New York issued a joint statement on June 15 calling for the Hagia Sophia to
remain a symbol that glorifies “the One God who has made us all be sisters and
brothers of one human family.”
Elpidophoros, a Turkish citizen who grew up in Istanbul,
said there is a “longstanding trend by President Erdogan” to emphasize Turkey’s
Ottoman past and that the conversion of the Hagia Sophia is the latest example.
Hagia Sophia controversy
The Hagia Sophia, located in the Turkish city of
Istanbul, was originally built as a Christian cathedral in the sixth century.
It was converted into a mosque nearly 1,000 years later during the Ottoman
conquest of the city in 1453.
The building had operated as a museum since 1935
following the founding of the secular Turkish Republic - until this month when
Erdogan announced the iconic building would be converted back to a mosque.
Erdogan’s move violates “all standards of religious
harmony and mutual respect,” according to a press release by the Greek Orthodox
Archdiocese of America, who urged its churches to toll their bells “in
lamentation” on Friday.
The US Conference of Catholic Bishops said it would
join the ‘Day of Mourning’ and would offer prayers for “the restoration of
Hagia Sophia as a place of prayer and reflection for all peoples.”
Hagia Sophia significance
Hagia Sophia, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is
“symbolically quite significant to all Orthodox Christians,” according to
Robert Nelson, a professor at Yale University.
The monument houses Christian mosaics and frescoes
from its days as a cathedral - artwork that will now be covered during
religious services.
According to Nelson, Christian Byzantine heritage is
“systematically repressed” in Turkey.
Three other famous Christian churches in Turkey have
also been converted into mosques in recent years: the Hagia Sophia cathedral in
Iznik, the Hagia Sophia Church in Trabzon, and the Church of Chora in Istanbul.
Erdgon motivated by politics
According to experts, President Erdogan’s decision to
change the Hagia Sophia’s museum status is solely for political purposes.
“The Turkish president hopes that Hagia Sophia’s
conversion will create a rally-round-the-flag effect and provide him with some
legitimacy,” said AykanErdemir, who is senior director of the Turkey Program at
the US thinktank Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, in an interview
with Al Arabiya English.
Erdemir said Erdogan’s policies have led to the worst
economic crisis in Turkish history, which is causing even die-hard supporters
to question their loyalties to the president.
Although Erdogan is not up for re-election until 2023,
his political opponents have recently threatened his hold on power. Last month
former Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said he was ready to cooperate
with opposition parties to stand against Erdogan’s ruling Justice and
Development Party (AKP).
Since then, Erdogan ordered the shutdown of Sehir
University in Istanbul, whose founders included Davutoglu.
Erdogan is now feeling threatened by increasing
opposition to him, according to Henri Barkey, a fellow for Middle East studies
at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Yale University Professor Robert Nelson told Al
Arabiya English the conversion of the Hagia Sophia and other historical
churches in the country into mosques is part of the Turkish president’s
playbook to win public support.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/features/2020/07/23/Hagia-Sophia-Day-of-Mourning-unites-Christians-against-Erdogan-decision.html
--------
Opposition group presents a secular alternative to
Iran’s clerical regime
July 24, 2020
LONDON: “A force capable of overthrowing the regime is
lurking in the heart of Iranian cities. From all indications, the ruling
theocracy is at the point of being overthrown,” the leader of the global
Iranian resistance declared to an audience of thousands tuning in to the online
Free Iran Global Summit on July 17.
Five years ago, this declaration might have sounded
like empty rhetoric from a fringe group. Now, two years after Tehran’s failed
attempt at bombing the National Council of Resistance of Iran’s (NCRI) annual
rally in Paris, the words of Maryam Rajavi, a former militant commander and now
the NCRI’s president-elect, look much less like an empty threat and much more
like a promise.
The NCRI is an umbrella group encompassing a broad
spectrum of groups opposed to the Iranian regime, and is often described as the
country’s government in waiting.
With its charismatic leader at the helm and thousands
of Iranian, Western and Arab supporters behind its cause, the NCRI is
increasingly being recognized as the legitimate and progressive alternative to
the supreme leader and the cohort currently in power.
The NCRI, also known as the Mojahedin-e Khalq (MEK) in
Persian, has three aims for Iran: The demise of the clerical regime, universal
suffrage and people’s sovereignty, and social freedom and justice.
Its swelling legitimacy, and the credible alternative
it presents for Iran’s future, have not gone unnoticed among political and
security establishments in the West.
One long-time supporter of the NCRI, and a speaker at
the 2020 Free Iran Global Summit, is Tom Ridge, who was the first ever US
secretary of homeland security after the 9/11 attacks.
He is a former governor of Pennsylvania and an
outspoken advocate for an Iran “free from tyranny.”
Ridge spoke with Arab News during the summit, and
explained his long-running support for the NCRI — despite its designation by
the US as a terrorist organization until 2012.
While secretary of homeland security, he had never
seen any credible reports that justified the group’s terrorist designation,
Ridge said.
“I began every day, for several years, in the Oval
Office alongside President George Bush being presented with a threat report. I
never ever saw a reference to the MEK in any plot that threatened Americans or
American interests,” he added.
Having been removed from the US list of terrorist
organizations in 2012, the NCRI is increasingly being recognized as the most
important player in the landscape of resistance to Tehran’s clerical regime —
both at home and abroad.
“Within American political circles, these days there’s
growing bipartisan recognition of the NCRI’s legitimacy,” Ridge said.
He argues that this consensus and recognition of the
NCRI’s legitimacy are in the best interests of not just the Iranian people, but
also of regional states and the US.
“Recognizing the existence of both an internal and
external opposition group that rejects terrorism and embraces principles like
gender equality and, most importantly, a non-nuclear Iran seems to be in
everyone’s best interest in the globe, not to mention regional states such as
Saudi Arabia,” he said.
Ridge spoke at the summit to highlight and denounce
Iranian support for terrorism, and many other speakers did the same.
The issue of Iranian terrorism is central to the
NCRI’s campaigning, and it is an issue the group is tragically familiar with.
In 2013, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)
forces and their Iraqi militia proxies attacked and killed over 50 NCRI
members, and kidnapped more, from their base in Ashraf, Iraq.
This brazen attack was mortifying for the NCRI, but
looking further back, the persecution that members of the Iranian opposition
have experienced at the hands of the regime becomes even more egregious.
Up to 30,000 of the NCRI’s supporters and members were
murdered by the regime in 1988, following a religious edict by hardline
revolutionary Ruhollah Khomeini.
Amnesty International has referred to these murders as
“ongoing crimes against humanity.” It continues to call for justice over the
killings, and has implored the UN to set up an independent inquiry into the
mass murders.
The most recent assault on the Iranian resistance — a
bomb plot targeting its 2018 annual summit — was organized in part by an
official Iranian diplomat, who just days ago began his trial in France for his
role.
After 30 years of bombings, violence and targeted
attacks, it is perhaps no surprise that the NCRI is so vehemently opposed to
the regime’s use of terrorism as a tool of foreign policy.
These attacks, Ridge argues, are more than illegal and
unjust. He believes that Tehran’s relentless assaults on the NCRI betray its
fear of the movement’s popular appeal.
“If an oppressive regime highlights an internal and
external group as the enemy of the state, then there’s a pretty good
justification to conclude that they’re fearful that their appeal is large,” he
said.
NCRI members believe that Tehran is taking
increasingly drastic measures against them because it knows that their appeal
is increasing every year, and the West is starting to take notice of the
credible, progressive alternative they present for Iran’s future.
Ali Safavi, a member of the NCRI’s foreign affairs
committee, told Arab News that from the 2020 Free Iran Global Summit onward,
its activities are only going to expand and intensify.
He said the group “aims to pave the way for more uprisings,
like those witnessed in November 2019,” when huge anti-regime protests swept
across virtually every Iranian city and town.
Safavi added that the NCRI will “step up its campaign
to hold the regime leaders accountable for their atrocities, first and foremost
the 1988 massacre of 30,000 political prisoners,” and that it will continue to
work on “breaking the climate of fear and repression” that Tehran has
manufactured at home and pursues abroad through terrorism.
Rajavi, Safavi and their cohort in the NCRI were on
the frontlines of the 1979 revolution, and it is looking increasingly likely
that they will take leading roles in the next Iranian revolution.
This time, though, they say they will not allow their
vision for Iran’s future to be distorted, as it was by Khomeini and his
extremist ilk in 1979.
The next Iranian revolution will truly be of the
people, and if the NCRI’s predictions are correct, it could be sooner than
anyone expects.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1709521/middle-east
--------
Iranian news agencies welcome Hagia Sophia Mosque
Ahmet Dursun
24.07.2020
Iranian media outlets on Friday widely covered the
reopening of the Hagia Sophia Mosque to Muslim worship after more than eight
decades.
Iranian state television reported the landmark's
reconversion to a mosque from its 86-year status as a museum as "one of
the most important events of the century."
The official IRNA news agency used the headline
"Friday prayer in Hagia Sophia after 86 years" above its report on
the Hagia Sophia's reopening.
In a separate report the semi-official Fars News
Agency said: "The historical Hagia Sophia, which was converted from a
museum to a mosque with a court decision and with the signature of Turkish
President, is witnessing the first Friday prayers after 86 years with the
participation of Recep Tayyip Erdogan."
House of worship and tourist destination
Besides being a working mosque, Hagia Sophia is also
among Turkey’s top tourism destinations for domestic and foreign visitors
alike.
In 1985, during its time as a museum, Hagia Sophia was
added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.
It served as a church for 916 years until the conquest
of Istanbul, and a mosque from 1453 to 1934 -- nearly 500 years -- and most
recently as a museum for 86 years.
Erdogan and other Turkish leaders had long advocated
it returning to a working mosque, open for worship.
On July 19 a Turkish court annulled a 1934 Cabinet
decree that turned Hagia Sophia into a museum, paving the way for its use as a
mosque.
In the new era for Hagia Sophia, Turkey’s Religious
Affairs Directorate oversees religious services at the mosque, while the
Culture and Tourism Ministry supervises restoration and conservation work.
The architectural treasure is also open to domestic
and foreign tourists free of charge.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/middle-east/iranian-news-agencies-welcome-hagia-sophia-mosque/1921609
--------
Minister: US’ Threatening of Iran’s Civil Plane Act of
Terror
Jul 24, 2020
Speaking to FNA on Friday about the hostile move of
the US fighter jets against the Iranian Mahan Airbus late on Thursday, Eslami
said, “This is a terrorist act which has been carried out by the US lawless and
oppressive government. This is considered an international aggression typical
of the lawless American government.”
“Our passenger plane has been flying in the
international commercial trajectory and corridor and the threat of the US
fighters was illegal and inhumane,” he added.
Iran’s Civil Aviation Organization has presented its
protest against this conduct to the ICAO and we will pursue the issue legally
till convicting the United States.
The minister stressed that the ICAO is expected to
issue a statement on this inhumane behavior of the US government.
Two US fighter jets approached a Mahan Air Tehran-Beirut
flight over the Syrian sky in a highly risky move and the captain of the
Iranian passenger plane was forced to make a sudden change of direction and
altitude, causing several injuries.
The captain of Mahan Air Flight No. 1152 later said
the pilots of the two hostile planes have identified themselves as US army
pilots during a radio contact.
A video posted by a reporter of Iran's state-run TV
who was aboard the plane showed an F-15 fighter jet from the window of the
plane and comments from a passenger who had blood on his face.
In a later interview from Beirut, the reporter said
three passengers have been wounded during "the US planes' intentional
move".
Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Seyed Abbas Mousavi
said Iran's Ambassador to the UN Majid Takht-Ravanchi has informed the UN
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres of the incident, and warned that "in
case of any incident for this plane on the way back home, the Islamic Republic
of Iran will take the United States reponsible".
"A similar message has been sent to the Swiss
ambassador to Tehran," the spokesman added. The Swiss embassy hosts the US
interests section in Iran in absence of formal diplomatic ties between the two
countries.
Mahan Air told FNA later that several passengers have
been wounded during the incident and have been taken to a hospital in Beirut
and others have evacuated the plane sound and safe.
It said the passenger jetliner refueled to fly back to
Iran.
The jetliner flew back home early Friday morning.
https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990503000322
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Protesters attacked, arrested as thousands rally
outside Netanyahu residence
24 July 2020
Israeli forces have used water cannons to disperse
thousands of demonstrators rallying near the residence of prime minister Benjamin
Netanyahu in Jerusalem al-Quds and made many arrests.
Scuffles broke out in the early hours of Friday when
security forces pushed demonstrators back.
Wearing protective masks, protesters held up signs and
chanted for the five-term premier to step down, angered over Netanyahu's
handling of a worsening coronavirus crisis and corruption.
Public anger has been fueled by corruption charges
against Netanyahu, who went on trial in May for bribery, fraud and breach of
trust.
Protesters carried signs that read “Stopping the
plague of dictatorship” in reference to Netanyahu during the Thursday night
rally, while others described him as “a fatal plague”.
Some of the protesters yelled "Justice for
Iyad," in reference to the 32-year-old autistic Palestinian man Iyad
Hallaq who was shot dead by two Israeli forces in the Old City of Jerusalem
al-Quds in May.
Tamar Shneck, one of the protesters at the rally on
Thursday night, accused Netanyahu of “taking advantage of the coronavirus for
power,” and said he was trying to increase his authority by leveraging the
health crisis.
“You can see that he's continuing to do so. You can
see that he's always stripped Israel of its democratic powers,” she said.
The organizers said in a statement, “Thousands of
young people that are coming out to protest are not victims of the coronavirus
— they’re victims of the corruption of Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Amir Haskel, a former Israeli air force general who
has turned into a prominent figure in the anti-Netanyahu protests, said,
“Tonight’s protest is a protest of young people. We expect very many of them
and hope that the protest ends without violence.”
By the end of the protests, 55 people were arrested by
the police, media reports said.
Netanyahu dismissed as “absurd” reports that he intends
to trigger new elections in November, but warned the polls would indeed be
unavoidable if his coalition administration failed to pass a national budget
next month.
“I’m not aiming for [early] elections. That’s absurd,”
he said. “We are in the midst of the coronavirus crisis. We have to deal with
it. We also have to pass a budget. It can pass in a minute… or a very short
time.”
Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz reported on Wednesday
that Netanyahu has decided to seek another round of elections after the district
court in Jerusalem al-Quds ruled last week that witnesses would begin
testifying in his corruption trial in January, with hearings to take place
three times a week.
The Israeli prime minister reportedly fears that
petitions to the so-called high court of justice will force him into
resignation, and that attorney general AvichaiMandelblit will back such a
stance.
Netanyahu’s remarks came soon after two new TV surveys
were released, showing his right-wing Likud party would have to concede to
defeat if elections were held today – to far-right Yamina opposition political
alliance headed by Naftali Bennett.
Channel 12 and Channel 13 surveys showed that whilst
the popularity of Netanyahu’s Likud is slipping, Bennett’s Yamina is rising
fast amid widespread public dissatisfaction with the coalition’s handling of
the coronavirus crisis.
Unemployment in the occupied territories stands at
some 21 percent — or 850,000 people — and is rising. Coronavirus restrictions
have further battered the economy.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/24/630322/Thousands-gather-outside-Netanyahu%E2%80%99s-residence-in-al-Quds-to-protest-COVID-19-fallout-demand-his-resignation
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Israel frees Hamas leader in West Bank after 16 months
in administrative detention
23 July 2020
Israel has released a senior leader of the Palestinian
resistance movement Hamas in the occupied West Bank after holding him in prison
without trial for 16 months, his son says.
Hassan Yousef, 65, was arrested on April 2 last year
after Israeli security forces raided his home in Beitunia town, west of
Ramallah. Shortly afterward, an Israeli military court ordered his detention
for six months.
Administrative detention is a sort of imprisonment
without trial or charge that allows Israel to incarcerate Palestinians for up
to six months. The detention order can be renewed for indefinite periods of
time. Critics of the Israeli regime and rights groups say the system is abused.
Yousef is a co-founder of the Gaza-based Hamas and
once a legislator in the now-defunct Palestinian parliament. His detention was
renewed for yet another six-month period before he was given a four-month
detention order.
On Thursday, Yousef’s son, Owais, announced that his
father “is now at home and is in good health.”
Israeli security forces, he said, freed his father at
a military checkpoint in the vicinity of Ramallah instead of letting his
relatives and friends receive him outside the Ofer prison as everyone expected.
The senior Hamas official had been imprisoned multiple
times before. So far, he has spent some 23 years in different Israeli prisons,
the Palestinian Information Center said.
Yousef was released from a previous 10-month prison
term in October 2018.
More than 350 detainees are under administrative
detention, including women and minors.
Such detentions take place on orders from a military
commander and on the basis of what the Israeli regime describes as
"secret" evidence.
Some prisoners have been held in administrative
detention for up to 11 years without any charge.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/23/630281/Palestine-Israel-Hamas-Hassan-administrative-detention-West-Bank
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Israel orders demolition of more Palestinian
facilities in West Bank
23 July 2020
Israel has ordered the demolition of several more
Palestinian facilities, including a number of homes, in the occupied West Bank,
the Palestinian media says.
The Palestinian Information Center reported on
Thursday that Israeli forces delivered demolition notices and ultimatums in
al-Walaja village, which is located west of Bethlehem city.
The threatened structures include three homes, a
number of cattle shelters, one water well and a farmland.
Palestinian residents possessed documents proving
their ownership of the lands located near an Israeli settlement in the area,
the report said.
Israeli authorities usually demolish Palestinian homes
in the occupied West Bank, claiming that the structures have been built without
permits. They also sometimes order the Palestinian owners to demolish their own
homes or pay the demolition costs to the municipality if they do not.
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has announced
that he would start plans for annexing more areas in the occupied West Bank, in
accordance with US President Donald Trump’s "deal of the century"
scheme, further infuriating Palestinians.
Trump officially unveiled his scheme in January at the
White House with Netanyahu on his side, while Palestinian representatives were
not invited.
The proposal gives in to Israel’s demands while
creating a Palestinian state with limited control over its own security and
borders, enshrining the occupied Jerusalem al-Quds as “Israel’s undivided
capital” and allowing the Tel Aviv regime to annex settlements in the West Bank
and the Jordan Valley.
Trump's highly provocative scheme, which further
denies the right of return to Palestinian refugees, is also in complete
disregard of UN Security Council resolutions and rejected by the vast majority
of the international community.
Israel’s unlawful annexation push has drawn widespread
criticism from the entire international community, including the regime’s
closest allies.
Israeli settlers raid Palestinian quarry in West Bank
Hardline Israeli settlers on Thursday attacked a
quarry in Jamma'in village, which is located southwest of the Palestinian city
of Nablus in the occupied West Bank.
The settlers stormed the quarry, spray-painted remarks
on its walls and tried to set fire to a bulldozer and an excavator on the site.
In December last year, the Palestinian Ministry of
Foreign Affairs and Expatriates called on the international community to place
Israeli settlers involved in attacks and acts of terror against the Palestinian
civilian population in the occupied territories on their terror lists, and put
travel bans on them.
For years, Israel has clearly allowed its settlers to
assault Palestinians and inflict damage on their property as one of its
policies. This has included provision of military protection for the attackers,
and in some cases troops' active participation in the assault, B’Tselem
concluded.
Palestinians want the West Bank as part of a future
independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem al-Quds as its capital.
More than 600,000 Israelis live in over 230
settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the Palestinian
territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem al-Quds.
According to human rights groups, incidents of
sabotage and violence by extremist settlers against Palestinians and their
property are a daily occurrence throughout the West Bank.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/23/630278/Israel-Palestine-West-Bank-Benjamin-Netanyahu
--------
India
Muslim BJP leader fasts for quick recovery of J&K
party chief Ravinder Raina
Khalid Hussain
Jul 25, 2020
A Muslim BJP leader in Jammu and Kashmir is praying
for quick recovery of the party's state unit chief Ravinder Raina by fasting.
Raina had tested positive of COVID-19 infection
earlier this month and is undergoing treatment. His latest COVID-19 report has
also come back positive.
Javaid Qureshi, a senior BJP leader from Kupwara in
the Union Territory, is fasting for early recovery of Raina.
"Today I kept fast as our party president
Ravinder Raina who visited Bandipora for the condolence meet of Wasim Bari.
Today again I heard that he is still positive. I pray to God for his speedy
recovery, as people need such leaders," Quraishi said.
Raina was tested positive when he came back from
Srinagar to Jammu after attending the condolence meet at Bandipora where BJP
leader Wasim Bari was killed by terrorists.
He was accompanied by Union Minister Jitendra Singh
and BJP National General Secretary Ram Madhav.
https://www.dnaindia.com/india/report-muslim-bjp-leader-fasts-for-quick-recovery-of-jk-party-chief-ravinder-raina-2833913
--------
Delhi HC Adjourns Hearing to Transfer Tablighi Jamaat
Chief's Case to Probe Agency NIA
July 24, 2020
New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Friday adjourned to
October 9 hearing on a petition seeking transfer of the case against Tablighi
Jamaat chief Maulana Saad in connection with the Nizamuddin congregation to the
National Investigation Agency (NIA).
A division bench of Justice Siddharth Mridul and
Justice Talwant Singh adjourned the matter to October 9 in view of a similar
matter pending before the Supreme Court.
The petitioner Ghanshyam Upadhyay sought the
invocation of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and entrusting to the
NIA, investigation in the case pertaining to allegedly organising a
congregation at Tablighi Jamaat with delegates from foreign countries in
violation of the orders against large gatherings to contain the spread of
coronavirus.
Earlier, Delhi Police had opposed the petition stating
that investigation is going on in a fine manner and added that there is no need
to transfer the case to another agency.
The case is currently being probed by the Crime Branch
of Delhi Police, which had recently filed several charge-sheets in connection
with the Jamaat matter involving hundreds of foreign nationals in a trial
court.
The charge sheets have been filed under relevant
sections of the Foreigners Act, 1946, Epidemic Diseases Act, 1897, Disaster
Management Act, 2005, and Indian Penal Code (IPC). The foreign nationals are
being charge-sheeted for violation of visa norms.
Earlier, an FIR was registered against Tablighi Jamaat
chief and others in connection with the congregation held at Markaz Tablighi
Jamaat in the Nizamuddin area of the national capital, which had reportedly
become an epicentre for the spread of coronavirus.
https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/tablighi-jamaat-hearing-to-transfer-case-against-islamic-sect-chief-maulana-saad-to-probe-agency-nia-adjourned-2268340
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Six Myanmar Tablighi Jamaat Members, Two Others
Sentenced To One Month Imprisonment
Jul 25, 2020
As many as six foreign jamaat members and two from
India who accompanied them were sentenced to a month-long imprisonment and are
required to pay a fine by a trial court in Sehore, the neighbouring district of
Bhopal, on Friday, as per the district prosecution unit in Sehore.
As per an official release from the district
prosecution officer Nirmala Singh Chaudhary, the convicts KhinMaungZaw, ThninTharyiKhinMaung,
Zawoo, Ye Lin Phyo, Thein Lni and Myoo OO are residents of Myeik, Myanmar.
Mashur Rehman hails from Jharkhand and Ahmad Hussain is from Bihar.
The official release said, “The convicts having
visited Nizamuddin Markaz in Delhi reached Bhopal and stayed in different
mosques over there on February 21, 2020. The foreigners had a tourist visa.
During the inquiry (by police) it came to be known that they reached Sehore on
February 26 and stayed at Pukhta masjid for the propagation of their religion
in violation of the tourist visa. They were advised by the Sehore district
hospital’s civil surgeon to quarantine for 14 days but they continued to meet
people while ignoring the advice.”
The official release stated, “These eight were
sentenced to one month’s imprisonment and a total fine of Rs 16,800 on all of
them under section 51-B of National Disaster Act and section 14 of the
Foreigners Act.”
Additional district prosecution officer (ADPO) Kedar
Singh Kaurav said, “The convicts were arrested by police on May 22 and produced
before the court on May 23 and later sent to jail. They got bail as per an
order of the high court on July 14. Since they have already been in jail for
more than a month, they will not have to go to jail.” Kaurav said all the proceedings
on Friday were completed through video conferencing.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/6-foreign-jamaat-members-two-others-sentenced-to-one-month-imprisonment/story-JVLtRe0L7SOb6vhyVOIDMJ.html
--------
2 terrorists killed in ongoing encounter on outskirts
of Srinagar
Jul 25, 2020
Two terrorists were killed and a soldier injured in an
encounter that broke out on the outskirts of Srinagar on Saturday, police said.
Security forces launched a cordon-and-search operation
in the Ranbirgarh area on the outskirts of the city this morning following
information about the presence of terrorists there, a police official said.
As the forces were conducting the search, terrorists
fired upon them, he said, adding that the forces retaliated, ensuing an encounter.
The area falls in Panzinara on the outskirts of
Srinagar city bordering North Kashmir’s Baramulla district.
Exchange of firing is going on and further details are
awaited.
https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/encounter-breaks-out-between-security-forces-terrorists-on-outskirts-of-srinagar/story-tJUZfJ6B0mmhQMtmMA7I7J.html
--------
Southeast Asia
Malaysia’s political centre has shifted but national
leaders are still searching for it
24 Jul 2020
SEMENYIH, Selangor: The temperature of Malaysian
politics is rising again as the COVID-19 threat subsides.
When Malaysia’s parliament resumed sitting in
mid-July, the Perikatan Nasional (PN) government confirmed a razor-thin majority
of just 113 of 222 seats.
Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin narrowly survived his
first crucial test in removing the speaker of the lower house with a marginal
two-vote majority.
With the ruling coalition’s legitimacy built on a
house of cards, every Bill to be introduced in parliament can turn into a
battle of wills between the government and the opposition.
Without a clear political consensus, it is unclear how
the country will move forward. Even if a snap election is called, the
possibility remains that it could result in a hung parliament.
THE END OF LONGSTANDING COALITIONS
After a long spell under the hegemonic rule of the
previous Barisan Nasional (BN) regime, Malaysians have grown accustomed to the
idea of political stability — but they may need to accept weak governments as
the “new normal”.
Before a two-coalition system emerged in 2008, BN was
a durable regime built on the back of a highly-cohesive grand coalition of 13
political parties that maintained a supermajority for decades.
A factor that contributed to the BN regime’s stability
was its position between the two extremes in Malaysia’s ethnic politics.
The opposition was divided with the Pan-Malaysian
Islamic Party (PAS) on its right and the predominantly Chinese but multiracial
Democratic Action Party (DAP) on its left. Located on opposing sides of the
racial divide, they had limited appeal beyond their respective Malay-Muslim and
Chinese constituencies.
But the sacking of Anwar Ibrahim as Deputy Prime
Minister and the establishment of his Reformasi movement in 1998 changed the
political equation. Together with Anwar’s People’s Justice Party (PKR), PAS and
DAP gradually moved away from their ethnic flanks and became political allies
twice — from 1999 to 2001 and again from 2008 to 2015.
When PAS ended its relationship with DAP in June 2015,
the progressive faction in the former broke away and eventually spawned a new
political entity called National Trust Party (PAN) to continue working with the
latter under Pakatan Harapan (PH) coalition.
Having a strong opposition coalition was such an
effective strategy that it eventually ushered in a peaceful democratic
transition for Malaysia in the 2018 general election.
Both BN and PH are primarily electoral pacts that
allow member parties to conduct pre-election seat negotiations with each other
to prevent vote-splitting. Under Malaysia’s first-past-the-post electoral
system, there can only be one winner based on plurality in all of its 222
single-member parliamentary districts.
FORGING A NEW POLITICAL CENTRE
While electioneering issues are comparatively easy to
settle, ideological differences are more complicated. Even though a regime
change has occurred, the ethnic factors that divide Malaysians remain the same.
When Mahathir Mohamad was at the helm, PH was supposed
to forge a new political middle ground — but the problem was no party was
located further left. Until a more radical liberal party emerges in Malaysia,
PH will always occupy this half of the equation in a two-coalition system.
The “centre” envisioned by some PH leaders is also
being torn apart by controversies relating to the International Convention on
the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (ICERD), Islamic preacher
Zakir Naik, and the introduction of Jawi (Arabic scripts) lessons in vernacular
schools.
As United Malays National Organisation (UMNO) and PAS
have moved further right, PH leaders are naturally perceived as liberals due to
their multiracialism even if they may not qualify from a purely Western
ideological perspective.
Still, coalitional politics is more complicated than
party rhetoric. Despite PN being trumpeted as a Malay-Muslim government, UMNO
also has its share of Western-educated liberals who may not see eye-to-eye with
PAS.
While forming a new alliance with PAS, UMNO has not
given up its previous political arrangement with the Malaysian Chinese
Association and the Malaysian Indian Congress under BN.
THE ROLE OF EAST MALAYSIAN POLITICS
Besides a liberal-conservative dichotomy, the
centre-periphery cleavage is becoming more prominent — and the Bornean states’
regional parties may play a counterbalancing role in PN.
While the Sarawak Parties Coalition (GPS) and United
Alliance Sabah (GBS) support PN now, their loyalty is contingent on many
factors. Sabahan and Sarawakian politicians have always claimed that their
states are marginalised. Now, they can push for more federal funds and
political autonomy.
Under the current political configurations, PAS will
also face a hard time getting its religious Bills passed in parliament if the
Bornean lawmakers in PN — many of whom are Christians — decide to oppose them.
All three GBS lawmakers in the ruling coalition are
Christians, and one is the son of a former cabinet minister who spoke out
forcefully against the implementation of syariah laws in Malaysia.
Despite news reports that GPS is more comfortable
working with PAS than DAP, nearly half of GPS’s 18 MPs are non-Muslims who will
likely check the Islamist agenda.
In a nutshell, there are two broad scenarios for
Malaysia moving forward. The first is rebuilding a grand coalition buttressed
by repression against opponents. But backsliding will betray the previous
struggles for institutional reforms.
The second option is normalising weak governments that
are unable to implement long-term policies and to properly mediate ethnic,
religious and regional contentions.
The biggest challenge is finding a way to reconcile
democracy with regime stability.
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/commentary/malaysia-political-centre-muhyiddin-yassin-perikatan-nasional-12955628
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Europe
'France should change course and stop lecturing
Turkey'
BuketGuven
23.07.2020
France’s president would do better to put his own
country back on track before trying to give lessons to Turkey, said Turkey's
ruling party spokesman on Thursday.
Emmanuel Macron “should correct France's route before
lecturing Turkey,” Justice and Development (AK) Party spokesman Omer Celik
wrote on Twitter.
Underlining that Macron is again in the wrong by
supporting the Greek Cypriot administration's unfair and unlawful activities in
the Mediterranean – trying to halt Turkey’s legal energy exploration – Celik
said: “He is making the same mistake in the Eastern Mediterranean he made in
Libya. He recently claimed that a Turkish warship harassed a French ship, and
his claim was disproved.”
A NATO probe of the June 10 alleged harassment episode
did not back France’s claims, according to Turkey’s Ambassador to France Ismail
Hakki Musa.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan repeatedly told
French President Macron the truth about Syria, Libya, Cyprus, and the Eastern
Mediterranean, said Celik.
“Each time it was proven that what our president said
was true and what Macron said was wrong. Macron, who calls for sanctions on
Turkey, is the biggest supporter of the culprits responsible for the mass
graves in Libya,” said Celik, referring to mass human remains found in areas
recently occupied by warlord Khalifa Haftar.
Libya has been torn by civil war since the ouster of
late ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The country's new government was founded in
2015 under a UN-led agreement, but efforts for a long-term political settlement
failed due to a military offensive by Haftar's forces.
The UN recognizes the Libyan government headed by
Fayez al-Sarraj as the country's legitimate authority, as Tripoli has battled
Haftar's militias since April 2019, a conflict that has taken over 1,000 lives.
After the discovery of mass graves in areas left
behind by retreating Haftar militias, the UN and international jurists have
expressed concern over possible war crimes.
While Turkey continues to support Libya’s
internationally recognized government, Haftar has been supported by Russia,
France, Egypt, and the UAE.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/france-should-change-course-and-stop-lecturing-turkey/1920374
--------
Former Nazi Guard Is Convicted in One of Germany’s
Last Holocaust Trials
By Melissa Eddy
July 23, 2020
BERLIN — A German court convicted a 93-year-old man on
Thursday for helping the Nazis murder thousands of people while he served as a
concentration camp guard more than 75 years ago, in what might be one of the
last verdicts to be handed down to a living participant in the Holocaust.
The Hamburg state court found Bruno Dey guilty of
5,230 counts of accessory to murder — one for each person believed to have been
killed in the Stutthof concentration camp, east of Gdansk in Poland, during the
time he served as a guard there, from August 1944 to April 1945.
Mr. Dey, who was tried in juvenile court because he
was only 17 years old at the time, was given a two-year suspended sentence,
reflecting the prosecutors’ acknowledgment of his contrition and willingness to
cooperate with authorities.
But survivors and those representing them criticized
the sentence as too lenient.
“It is unsatisfactory and much too late,” said
Christoph Heubner of the International Auschwitz Committee, who followed the
trial. “What is so upsetting for survivors is that this defendant failed to use
the many postwar years of his life to reflect on what he saw and heard.”
The trial against Mr. Dey was the latest in a push by
prosecutors in the special office for handling Nazi-era crimes to bring aging
suspects to justice before it is too late. And it came at a moment when the
country is struggling to deal with a resurgence in right-wing extremism.
Mr. Dey appeared at the Hamburg state court, seated in
a wheelchair and wearing a blue surgical mask because of the coronavirus
outbreak. He cast his eyes downward as the judge read his sentence, according
to German public media.
“You still see yourself as a mere observer, when in
fact you were an accomplice to this man-made hell,” presiding judge Anne
Meier-Goering told the defendant while reading the verdict. “You did not follow
an order to carry out a crime and should not have inferred this.”
In a closing statement, Mr. Dey said he felt it was
important to express his thoughts and feelings about what he had learned during
the trial, but also argued that he had been forced to serve as a concentration
camp SS guard and was ordered into the position.
“The witness testimony and the expert assessments made
me realize the full scope of the horrors and suffering,” he told the court.
“Today I would like to apologize for those who went through the hell of this
insanity. Something like this must never happen again.”
The German authorities have intensified their efforts
in recent years to hold to account men and women, most of them now over 90, who
played smaller roles in helping the Nazis round up and murder Europe’s Jews in
their network of concentration and death camps.
Throughout the Cold War, these people were overlooked
by a justice system that demanded evidence of direct involvement of a Nazi-era
crime in order to bring charges against a perpetrator.
As the survivors grew older a reunited Germany began
emphasizing the importance of remembrance and atonement, giving a prominent
place to a Holocaust memorial in the heart of its new capital and establishing
funds worth millions to compensate long overlooked victims of Nazi crimes.
Over the past decades, the courts, too, have shifted
their perspective, following landmark rulings in 2011 and 2015 that established
that individuals who played supporting roles in Nazi crimes could be convicted
on the argument of association.
Last week, another former guard from Stutthof, age 95,
was charged with similar crimes.
Because Mr. Dey was only 17 when he began his guard
duties, he was tried as a juvenile. Prosecutors had sought a three-year prison
sentence for his role at the camp, where he was tasked with making sure that
none of the inmates, mostly Polish Jews and political prisoners, escaped.
More than 60,000 people — roughly half of whom were
Jews — are believed to have died or been killed at the camp, which was the
first to be established by the Nazi regime outside of Germany’s borders.
Located in the small Polish town of Sztutowo, it served as a prison camp after
the invasion of Poland in 1939. Gas chambers were put into use in 1944, and the
camp was one of the last to be liberated.
More than three dozen survivors testified in the
trial, which began in October. They told the court of seeing relatives die in
the electric fences that surrounded the Stutthof camp, collecting the bones of
other victims and being chased from their barracks, naked in subzero
temperatures.
Mr. Dey acknowledged hearing screams from the camp’s
gas chambers and watching as corpses were taken to be burned. But he said he
never fired his weapon and that the “images of misery and horror have haunted
me my entire life.”
For Mr. Heubner, of the International Auschwitz
Committee, who volunteered at Stutthof during the 1970s and attended several
sessions of Mr. Dey’s trial as an observer, the statement rang hollow.
“The image of him sitting above the camp in his tower
is reflective of the view he had of himself as above those who were suffering,”
he said. “And although he had decades to confront the horrors of what he
witnessed, he remained silent.”
Stefan Waterkamp, Mr. Dey’s attorney, argued for his
client to be acquitted. He said Mr. Dey did not become a guard by choice and
that trying to flee or resist duty would have put him in danger.
“How could an 18-year-old step out of line in a
situation like this?” Mr. Waterkamp said as part of his closing argument.
Judge Meier-Goering said the lesson of the trial must
be to “honor human dignity at all costs — even when the price is your own
safety.”
Germany continues to struggle with this maxim, as
far-right activity has surged in the country in the past year. Earlier this
week, a different German court opened a trial against a 28-year-old German
suspected of plotting to blast his way into a synagogue filled with Jews
observing Yom Kippur an attack that failed but left two people dead and injured
several others.
The attack was the most severe of thousands of crimes
committed against Jews in Germany in 2019 — the worst year since the country
started tracking them in 2001.
Prosecutors said the defendant in that trial, Stephan
Balliet, had been motivated by a belief that “the root of all these problems is
the Jew.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/23/world/europe/holocaust-trial-nazi-guard-germany.html?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1385975_
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Macron seeks EU sanctions over Turkish ‘violations’ in
Greek, Cypriot waters
23 July 2020
French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday demanded
EU sanctions against Turkey for “violations” of Greek and Cypriot waters and
said the European Union should act over the crisis in Libya.
Turkey and Greece are at loggerheads over overlapping
claims for natural gas reserves, brought into sharp focus by attempts of EU
member Cyprus to explore for gas in the Eastern Mediterranean amid strong
Turkish objections.
Macron’s comments came after Turkey’s navy on Tuesday
issued an advisory for seismic surveys in an area of sea between Cyprus and
Crete, a move Greece said was an attempt by Ankara to encroach on its
continental shelf.
It also comes as relations between Paris and Ankara,
two NATO allies, fray, with Paris repeatedly pointing the finger at Ankara over
its role in Libya.
“I stand fully behind Cyprus and Greece in the face of
theTurkish violations of their sovereignty. It is unacceptable thatthe maritime
space of (EU) member states be violated and threatened,” Macron told reporters
alongside his Cypriot counterpart, NicosAnastasiades.
“Those who are doing that must be sanctioned.”
He said it would be a “serious mistake” for the EU to
not respond.
Ibrahim Kalın, chief adviser to Turkish President
Tayyip Erdogan, told a think-tank event in Brussels on Thursday: “Using the
language of threats of sanctions will never fly here and will have no impact on
Turkey’s sovereignty or determination in pursuing the national interest.”
On July 13, EU foreign ministers agreed to prepare
additional listings within the existing sanctions framework on Turkey’s
drilling in the Eastern Mediterranean, as requested by Cyprus.
For all the latest headlines follow our Google News
channel online or via the app
Macron has also criticized Turkey for months over
Ankara’s role in Libya, and on Thursday said the EU should now push for
sanctions. He did not identify nations or people that should be penalized for
their involvement in the North African country’s conflict.
“It (sanctions) is necessary to obtain a ceasefire and
begin a real dynamic towards a political solution to the Libyan conflict,” he
said.
Russia and Turkey are the key players in Libya’s
conflict, where they support opposing sides. Russia back the eastern-based
forces of Khalifa Haftar, while Turkey has helped the Tripoli-based Government
of National Accord (GNA) repel Haftar’s attempt to storm the capital.
Turkey accuses France of supporting Haftar
politically, having previously given him military assistance to fight
militants. Paris denies this.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/07/23/Macron-seeks-EU-sanctions-over-Turkish-violations-in-Greek-Cypriot-waters-.html
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Greek extremists burn Turkish flags over Hagia Sophia
Mehmet Hatipoglu
25.07.2020
A group of far-right Greek extremists burned Turkish
flags late Friday in Thessaloniki to protest the reopening of the Hagia Sophia
Mosque for worship in Istanbul.
The group burned a Turkish flag after gathering
outside the Agia Sofia Church before marching toward the Turkish Consulate
while holding signs that read: "For homeland, nation and orthodoxy."
Protesters were stopped outside the consulate by
security forces but burned another Turkish flag and sang the Greek national
anthem and shouted slogans.
Besides being a functioning mosque, Hagia Sophia is
also among Turkey’s top tourism destinations for domestic and foreign visitors
alike.
In 1985, during its time as a museum, Hagia Sophia was
added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.
It served as a church for 916 years until the conquest
of Istanbul, and a mosque from 1453 to 1934 -- nearly 500 years -- and most
recently as a museum for 86 years.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other
Turkish leaders had long advocated for it to return to a functioning mosque,
open for worship.
A Turkish court annulled a 1934 Cabinet decree July 19
that turned Hagia Sophia into a museum, paving the way for its use as a mosque.
In the new era for Hagia Sophia, Turkey’s Religious
Affairs Directorate will oversee religious services at the mosque, while the
Culture and Tourism Ministry will supervise restoration and conservation work.
The architectural treasure is also open to domestic
and foreign tourists free of charge.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/greek-extremists-burn-turkish-flags-over-hagia-sophia/1921779
--------
Pakistan
IHC rejects ministry’s report on Cynthia case
25 Jul, 2020
ISLAMABAD: The Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Friday
termed the interior ministry’s report on US blogger Cynthia D. Ritchie’s case
as unsatisfactory and directed the interior secretary to review it.
The court was hearing a petition filed by a worker of
the Pakistan Peoples Party, Iftikhar Ahmed, in which he had requested it to
instruct the interior ministry to expel Ms Ritchie over visa and
passport-related issues and her alleged defamatory tweets against PPP leaders.
Last week the interior ministry had submitted a report
to the IHC, which said Ms Ritchie was in Pakistan on an extended visa. The
ministry, however, did not comment on the allegations that she had posted
defamatory tweets against the PPP leadership, saying the matter was sub judice.
In its report, the ministry said that Ms Ritchie was visiting
Pakistan on a business visa and was working on some projects of the
Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government.
The court had referred the matter to the interior
ministry through a verbal order after hearing the stance of the US blogger.
Sardar Latif Khan Khosa, the counsel for the
petitioner, pointed out that Ms Ritchie had not been registered as a voter in
any constituency in the country and yet she had tweeted on local political
matters.
IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah observed that the
allegations against the US citizen were of serious nature. He inquired about
the projects on which she was working in collaboration with the ISPR and the
provincial government and whether any taxpayer funds were disbursed for the projects.
Justice Minallah remarked that it was the
responsibility of the state to conduct transparent investigations into the
allegations levelled against the blogger and that the interior secretary should
keep in mind the reputation of the country while considering the matter.
Additional Attorney General Tariq Mehmood Khokhar
sought some time from the court to seek instructions from the government.
Subsequently, the hearing was adjourned until August 4.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1570937/ihc-rejects-ministrys-report-on-cynthia-case
--------
Posting of Maulana Fazl’s brother as DC Karachi
Central raises PTI, MQM’s hackles
Azfar-ul-Ashfaque
25 Jul, 2020
KARACHI: The appointment of an official of the Khyber
Pakhtunkhwa government, who happens to be a younger brother of Jamiat
Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) chief Maulana Fazlur Rehman, as the deputy
commissioner of a key Karachi district by the Sindh government has invited the
wrath of main opposition parties in the province.
On July 23, the Sindh government through a
notification posted Ziaur Rehman, an officer of KP’s Provincial Management
Service in grade-19, as the deputy commissioner of Karachi’s Central district
by transferring Farhan Ghani, an ex-PCS officer also in grade-19.
It is unclear as to how an official of the KP
government managed to bring himself at the disposal of the Sindh government.
However, the move is being seen as an outcome of a meeting between PPP
co-chairman Asif Ali Zardari, PPP chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and Maulana
Fazl in Karachi on July 10.
The news of Mr Rehman’s appointment became public on
Friday and both the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) and MuttahidaQaumi
Movement-Pakistan (MQM-P) voiced concern over the Sindh government’s move since
the incumbent had no prior administrative experience in Sindh.
Federal Minister for Kashmir Affairs Ali Amin Gandapur
of the PTI said in a statement that Mr Rehman did not pass the PMS examination
and he was inducted without appearing in a test or having merit.
Sindh information minister says ‘it is not a crime’ to
be the maulana’s brother
Talking to reporters outside the Sindh Assembly,
senior MQM-P leader KhwajaIzharul Hasan said that the Sindh government did not
accept an inspector general of police from outside the province; then how could
it post an officer of KP without the notification of the federal government?
However, the Sindh government defended the move as
Information Minister Nasir Shah told media that it was “not a crime to be the
brother of Maulana Fazlur Rehman”.
“Ziaur Rehman had worked on administrative position in
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, he was the Afghan Refugees commissioner as well as DC
Khushab. His posting [in Sindh as DC-Central] is an administrative issue,” he
said.
‘Worst example of nepotism’
Terming it a “worst example of political nepotism”,
the coordination committee of the MQM-P condemned the appointment of “brother
of Maulana Fazlur Rehman” on the post of DC-Central.
“The racist government of Sindh has crossed every
limit. Previously, the PPP was usurping the rights of the urban areas of Sindh
all alone, but now it has made other political parties accomplice in its
political crimes,” the MQM-P said in a hard-hitting statement.
The party warned that the “sense of deprivation”
already existing in the urban parts of the province would turn into sense of
alienation if such actions were not stopped.
It said that it was the deputy commissioners of urban
areas of Sindh, especially of Karachi districts, who were involved in issuance
of fake domiciles and permanent residence certificates to hundreds of thousands
of non-residents who later got government jobs.
Meanwhile, the general secretary of PTI’s Karachi
chapter, Saeed Afridi, said that it seemed that the Sindh government got
completely disappointed with the performance of the deputy commissioners
belonging to Sindh so it posted a KP officer to appease Maulana Fazl.
He said that the people of Karachi knew that the Sindh
government posted Maulana Fazl’s brother as DC-Central only to “please and
favour” him.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1570931/posting-of-maulana-fazls-brother-as-dc-karachi-central-raises-pti-mqms-hackles
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Development projects to end Balochistan’s sense of deprivation,
PM Imran says
Jul 25, 2020
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Imran Khan on Friday
expressed his firm resolve to end the “sense of deprivation” long felt by the
people of Balochistan by launching a series of development projects to undo the
neglect of decades in the province.
“Ensuring complete peace, security and socio-economic
development for the people of Balochistan are the key priorities of my
government,” he said while chairing the second meeting of the National
Development Council (NDC).
The NDC’s first meeting was held in August 2019 after
its formation in June that year.
The prime minister said he was fully cognizant of the
problems people in Balochistan face and expressed his commitment to turn the
situation around by providing them relief and services in the best possible
manner.
“Financial resources allocated for Balochistan in the
past were never diverted towards the development of the province,” he said.
The prime minister said such a state of affairs led to
dismal development in the province and caused “a sense of deprivation”among its
people.
Federal ministers Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Asad Umar,
Mohammad Hammad Azhar, Ali Haider Zaidi, Omer Ayub Khan, Advisers Dr Abdul
Hafeez Shaikh, and Abdul Razak Dawood, Chief Minister Balochistan Jam Kamal
Khan, Chief of Army Staff General Qamar JavedBajwa, Special Assistant Lt Gen
(r) Asim Saleem Bajwa, DG ISI Lt Gen Faiz Hameed and other senior officials
attended the meeting.
The meeting reviewed in detail several projects
related to the national development agenda.
These included the provision of means of
communications in the remote areas of Balochistan, better facilities for
irrigation, agriculture, energy, and setting up barter markets to attain
optimal benefit from the Gwadar Port.
The premier said the development of Gwadar Port would
be a game-changer, not only for the people Balochistan but also for the entire
region.
“There must be a full focus on the development of
infrastructure, provision of employment for the youth, and completion of road
networks to gain benefit from the completion of the Gwadar Port and the CPEC,”
he said.
In this regard, the prime minister constituted a
committee comprising Umar, Shaikh, and Chief Minister Kamal, that would submit
a report to him on the priority areas for development — particularly in
communications, agriculture, energy, and other important sectors.
The meeting also gave approval for the setting up of
the Balochistan Mineral Exploration Company that would work for better
utilisation of the mineral resources of Balochistan and boost exploration
activities.
https://www.pakistantoday.com.pk/2020/07/24/series-of-projects-to-end-balochistans-sense-of-deprivation-pm-imran-says/
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Jadhav not given any concession: Pakistan govt
Jul 24, 2020
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s law minister on Friday ruled out
giving any concession to Khulbhushan Jadhav and said that the government had
brought an ordinance to grant him consular access and allow him to file a
review petition against his conviction and sentence by the military court as
directed by the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
A day after rumpus erupted in the National Assembly
with opposition blaming treasury over the Jadhav issue, law minister Farogh
Naseem told lawmakers that the government has not given any concessions to
Jadhav similar to the National Reconciliation Order (NRO). The NRO refers to a
presidential order signed by former president Pervez Musharraf that paved the
way for slain ex-PM Benazir Bhutto’s return to Pakistan from exile after all
corruption cases against her were dropped.
“In the past few days an ordinance was brought
regarding the Jadhav case. It is my responsibility to inform everyone about the
facts pertaining to the case,” the minister said at the start of his speech in
the lower house of parliament.
The ICJ (Review and Reconsideration) Ordinance 2020
promulgated on May 20 gives foreign citizens convicted in Pakistan to file a
review appeal in courts here. The ordinance was promulgated after ICJ, in its
verdict last year, directed Pakistan to grant consular access to Jadhav and
allow him to file a review appeal.
Jadhav, according to Naseem, was arrested on March 3,
2016 and the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) government at that time had
decided not to grant consular access to him. “The PML-N government had not
given consular access as Jadhav was caught for spying in Pakistan. On May 8,
2017 India had filed a case in the ICJ, asking the court to direct Pakistan to
release him. The ICJ rejected India’s appeal but directed Pakistan to grant
consular access to him,” he told the legislators.
“The ordinance was issued in view of the ICJ verdict.
This ordinance is not an NRO. The NRO was issued by Musharraf,” Naseem said,
adding that if Pakistan had not given consular access to India, then New Delhi
would have raised the issue in front of the world.
“If the ordinance was not brought then India would
have gone to the UN Security Council,” Nassem said. The minister said New Delhi
would have sought sanctions against Islamabad if it didn’t issue the ordinance.
“Where is it written in the ordinance that Jadhav’s
conviction has ended?” he asked. “Not has the sentence been cut nor has Jadhav
been given any concession.”
The minister also told the lawmakers that nowhere was
it written that the government needed to speak to the opposition before
bringing in an ordinance. “The ordinance was not formulated by someone “under a
pillow” and no one should be blamed for it,” he remarked.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/jadhav-not-given-any-concession-pakistan-govt/articleshow/77156581.cms
--------
Why Can’t Pakistan’s Opposition Parties Remove the
Khan Government?
By Umair Jamal
July 24, 2020
On Monday, Pakistan’s main opposition parties
announced an All Parties Conference (APC) after Eid al-Adha to formulate a
joint strategy to remove the current political party from power.
The decision by the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz
(PML-N) and the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) to lead anti-government agitation
comes after years of preparation. However, the real question is whether the
parties can dislodge the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) government, even if
they launch a joint front.
This is not the first time that opposition parties
have decided to launch anti-government protests. In May 2019, the heads of both
parties made a similar declaration, citing growing inflation as a key reason
for their agitation against the government. However, the PML-N and the PPP
didn’t make a move on their announcement and rather decided to bring a motion
to remove the ruling party’s chairman in the upper house of Parliament. The
motion failed to remove the chairman of the Senate even after both parties had
a clear majority. Following the failure of the motion, the PML-N accused the
PPP of colluding with the security establishment to gain political favor.
In October 2019, the PPP and the PML-N, in
coordination with the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F), once again announced
they would mobilize the public against the government. That round of agitation
was framed around a sit-in the capital, supposed to last until Prime Minister
Imran Khan tendered his resignation. Once the agitation got underway, the PPP
and the PML-N’s reluctance to take further action became obvious; JUI-F’s
leadership and workers were left alone in the capital. Khan didn’t resign.
In February 2020, the PPP and the PML-N yet again
announced a phase of anti-government protests. Fast forward to July 2020 and
another movement is being planned by the opposition parties to topple the
government.
Clearly, the opposition’s efforts to form a joint
front against the government remain marred by trust issues and other
conflicting personal and party interests. In Pakistan’s politics, agitation
against elected governments generally happens due to either the interference of
undemocratic forces or an opposition party’s inability to ward off
institutional pressures and gain favors from institutions that matter in the
country.
In the current case, the PML-N and PPP’s leaders are
facing serious allegations of corruption. For more than a year, both parties
have sought relief from the government and its supporters in the security
establishment regarding growing pressure from the National Accountability
Bureau (NAB), the institution leading investigations against the two parties.
This is one of the reasons that the PML-N and the PPP have not moved against
the ruling party beyond threats of leading an agitation.
However, the PPP and the PML-N have not received any
relief and if anything, the government has pushed for a stern approach to bring
both parties to “justice.” By now, it has become clear to the PML-N and the PPP
that as long as the current government remains in office, their chances of
gaining political relief are nil.
In the backdrop of this understanding comes another
announcement to agitate after Eid al-Adha. However, the latest announcement is
unlikely to produce anything significant when the parties do not share
ideological interests and are divided internally over the issue. The alliance
between the two parties is merely glued together by virtue of individual
electoral interests and an intent to survive the current accountability campaign
against them both.
The new alliance has already fractured, with PPP
leaders accusing the PML-N leadership of undermining the pact. The current
president of the PML-N and the opposition leader in the National Assembly,
Shahbaz Sharif, has refused to join the all parties huddle after Eid. It is
well known that Sharif has good ties with Pakistan’s security establishment.
Understandably, his political faction within the PML-N doesn’t want to anger
the military leadership by becoming a part of an anti-government agitation
campaign.
This is not the first time that Sharif has refused to
support PML-N factions that want an aggressive approach against the
military-supported government of the PTI. Sharif’s halfhearted support for his
brother and the founder of the PML-N, Nawaz Sharif, was visible when he arrived
back in Pakistan in 2018. Sharif is also known to have undermined the PPP and
PML-N alliance with the JUI-F to unseat Khan in November 2019.
Sharif has again decided against lending support to
any agitation movement to remove the current government.
After CoD [Charter of Democracy signed between Nawaz
Sharif and late Benazir Bhutto in 2006] setback, it is clear that the PPP
cannot and should not trust the PML-N,” said a senior PPP leader after finding
out Shahbaz Sharif’s position on the issue.
However, the PPP is also not new to such maneuvers:
Last year, the PPP’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, undercut his commitment with
the PML-N to remove the chairman of the Senate. Zardari used the deal’s threat
to make an agreement with actors that support the current civilian setup and
brought some political respite in Sindh province. The approach, however,
strengthened the view that opposition parties in Pakistan are not interested in
the question of good governance as long as they continue to get political
relief.
In the current milieu, this means that the ruling
party still enjoys the support of the national security establishment. And
leading an action against the government could mean leading a movement against
the military’s selection in the civilian domain. Adopting this approach could
have serious implications for any party or leader’s political life in Pakistan.
As of now, it remains unclear if any political party,
including the PPP and the PML-N, are ready to take that route. Making
statements for the removal of the government is one thing; it may not anger
people in powerful places. Leading a nationwide agitation is an altogether
different story.
Arguably, both political parties are making another
effort at using the threat of a potential alliance to strike a deal with the
national security establishment. But any such respite is unlikely to come: With
the question of the 18th amendment fate’s hanging in the balance, the costs of
making a compromise with the government and its support base in the military
have only gone up. The PPP and the PML-N will have to make some hard choices in
the coming weeks and months.
The leaders of both political parties remain skeptical
of each other in terms of who may end up making a deal first with the country’s
national security establishment. Thus, the perpetual game of hide and seek by
self-seeking politicians will continue to go on in the months to come.
https://thediplomat.com/2020/07/why-cant-pakistans-opposition-parties-remove-the-khan-government/
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PML-Q leaders laundered money, built assets: NAB
25 Jul, 2020
LAHORE: The National Accountability Bureau (NAB) has
accused the PML-Q leaders — Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain and Punjab Assembly
Speaker Chaudhry Pervez Elahi — of committing money laundering and accumulating
illegal assets.
NAB stated this in a reply submitted to the Lahore
High Court in connection with a joint petition of the Chaudhry brothers
challenging three 20-year-old inquiries against them by the anti-corruption
body.
The bureau said an investigation conducted so far
revealed that the wealth of Mr Hussain and his family increased to Rs2.556
billion between 1985 and 2018. Their shareholding also increased to over Rs500
million from around Rs2m in 1985.
Mr Hussain’s family has also acquired properties worth
more than Rs123m and his two sons namely Shafay Hussain and Salik Hussain have
given loan amounting to Rs1.5bn to different companies owned by them.
It said that foreign remittances of over Rs581m had
been received in bank accounts of Mr Hussain since 2004. NAB said that five
people who remitted money had joined the investigation and denied having sent
any remittance. It shows that the petitioner and his family used fake
identities to route unexplained money from foreign countries to Pakistan, it
said.
About Mr Elahi, the report said the wealth of the
petitioner and his family members rose to Rs4.069bn from 1985 to 2018. And
their shareholding increased to Rs3bn from 1985 to 2019 while the family
acquired properties worth over Rs250m.
It alleged that foreign remittances of Rs978m had been
received in the bank accounts operated by the family members of Mr Elahi since
2004. It said that so far three people
who had remitted the money had joined the
investigation and denied having sent any remittance, which established that
fake identities had been used to route unexplained money from foreign countries
to Pakistan.
NAB said the petitioners had repeatedly been asked
through call-up notices to submit their version about the assets in question
but they failed to come up with satisfactory answers.
The reply said Mr Elahi, in another inquiry of misuse
of authority, was accused of making illegal appointments in the local
government board during his stint as chief minister of Punjab.
Rejecting an argument by the Chaudhrys in their
petition, the bureau said the inquiries into illegal assets and misuse of
authority were never approved for closure by the competent authority and the
investigation was being held strictly in accordance with law.
It said another allegation of willful default could
not be established against the two petitioners. Therefore, the inquiry in this
regard was approved for closure by the authority on July 10, 2017.
NAB asked the court to dismiss the petition of the
PML-Q leaders for being devoid of any merits.
In reaction to NAB’s reply, a spokesman for Chaudhry
brothers said that the institution of NAB was being used for political
engineering and old cases against them were being repeatedly opened and closed.
“If rehearing a 20-year-old case is not political
engineering then what it is?” the spokesman wondered. He said the complainants
against the PML-Q leaders in the inquiries had been unknown and reasons for
reopening of matter were also not known.
The spokesman claimed that NAB in its reply had not
been able to disclose any asset owned by the Chaudhry brothers beyond their
income. He said there was no mention in the bureau’s reply about any
corruption, kickbacks, misappropriation or misuse of powers.
The PML-Q leaders in their petition in May last had
also stated that the establishment of the NAB, its credibility, partiality and
use for political engineering had been a matter of heated debate not only by
political parties but also by human rights organisations and intelligentsia
both at national and international level.
They said the conduct of the bureau and the manner in
which its officials used authority had also been taken notice of by superior
courts in a number of cases.
They asked the court to set aside the authorisation of
the inquiries and the order for their bifurcation passed by the NAB chairman
for being unlawful.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1570935/pml-q-leaders-laundered-money-built-assets-nab
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10 Chinese nationals hospitalised with Covid-19 in
Bahawalpur
25 Jul, 2020
BAHAWALPUR: Ten Chinese engineers and workers were
admitted to hospital after they tested positive for coronavirus here on Friday.
Dawn learnt that the Chinese nationals were working on
a power project near Khairpur Tamewali about 45 kilometres from here on
Hasilpur Road where they contracted the virus and were taken to the city. They
were shifted to hospital under strict security measures by personnel of
law-enforcement agencies (LEAs).
Dr Hamid, focal person of the coronavirus treatment at
BVH-2 on Jhangiwali Road, told Dawn that the Chinese nationals were brought
here today and were tested positive. He said their condition was stable and
they were being observed by the hospital staff. He said prior to the arrival of
the Chinese patients, the hospital staff was at ease as the hospital for the
first time since the outbreak of Covid-19 had no confirmed case of coronavirus
after the recovery of all the patients admitted here for the previous three
months.
He said he was sure that with the due supervision and
treatment by the doctors and paramedical staff, the Chinese patients would
recover in due course of time.
MURDER: A man allegedly murdered his wife and a man
she was alleged to have an affair with at Faisal Colony on Friday.
According to police sources, Ahsan Zia, a school
watchman, killed his wife and her lover. Neighbours handed him over to the
police who registered a case.
HAILSTONES: Rain accompanied by hailstones hit the
city and suburbs for the second consecutive day on Friday.
The agriculture experts have advised the farmers not
to allow the accumulation of rainwater in the cotton fields.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1571043/10-chinese-nationals-hospitalised-with-covid-19-in-bahawalpur
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South Asia
Taliban militants suffer heavy casualties in Khost; at
least 29 killed, wounded
25 Jul 2020
The Taliban militants suffered heavy casualties during
a clash with the Afghan forces in South-eastern Khost province with the Afghan
military saying the security forces killed or wounded at least 29 militants.
The 203rd Thunder Corps in a statement said the
Taliban militants were planning to attack the army outposts in Do Mandi and Sur
Kali areas of Musa Khel district.
The statement further added that the security forces
launched operations with the support of the air power, killing at least 18
Taliban militants.
The security forces also wounded at least 11 other
Taliban militants during the operation, the 203rd Thunder Corps said, adding
that the militants were also planning to plant Improvised Explosive Devices to
inflict casualties on security personnel and ordinary civilians.
Furthermore, the security forces discovered a
Vehicle-borne Improvised Explosive Device or a motor bomb during the operation
and successfully defused it.
The Taliban group has not commented regarding the
report so far.
https://www.khaama.com/taliban-militants-suffer-heavy-casualties-in-khost-at-least-29-killed-wounded-08983/
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5 Taliban militants killed, wounded in Afghan forces’ counter-attack
25 Jul 2020
The Afghan forces countered a Taliban attack in
northern Faryab province, killing or wounding at least militants of the group,
the Afghan military said.
The 209th Shaheen Corps in a statement said a group of
Taliban militants were looking to launch an attack in the vicinity of Dawlatbad
district of Faryab on Friday.
The statement further added that the security forces
retaliated and launched counter-attack, killing at least 2 militants of the
group.
The security forces also wounded 3 other Taliban
militants during the same operation, the 209th Shaheen Corps added in its
statement.
The Taliban group has not commented regarding the
incident so far.
https://www.khaama.com/5-taliban-militants-killed-wounded-in-afghan-forces-counter-attack-08982/
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5 civilians suffer casualties in Taliban roadside bomb
in Baghlan province
25 Jul 2020
An Improvised Explosive Device (IED) inflicted
casualties on five civilians in norhtern Kunduz proivnce of Afghanistan, the
Afghan security officials said.
Tariq Arian, a spokesperson for the Ministry of
Interior (MoI), said a roadside bomb planted by Taliban militants went off in
Pul-e Khumri city late on Friday.
The statement further added that the incident took
place in Bagh-e Shamal area of Pul-e Khumri city, the provincial capital of
Baghlan province.
The explosion killed four civilians after their
vehicle struck the bomb and wounded another civilian, Arian added.
The Taliban group has not commented regarding the
incident so far.
https://www.khaama.com/5-civilians-suffer-casualties-in-taliban-roadside-bomb-in-baghlan-province-08981/
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Eight civilians killed in Afghan strike on freed
Taliban fighter
23 July 2020
Eight civilians were killed when an Afghan air strike
hit a group of people gathered to celebrate a Taliban commander's release from
prison, an official said Thursday.
The strike in the western province of Herat on
Wednesday drew condemnation from a top US diplomat and underscores the
worsening violence in Afghanistan's war even as the Taliban and Kabul are
supposed to be preparing for peace talks.
According to Ali Ahmad Faqir Yar, the district
governor in the area where the strike took place, a group had gathered to
welcome the Taliban commander.
"An air strike was carried out during the
ceremony and civilians who participated were among those killed," he told
AFP, putting the toll at eight civilian dead and 16 wounded.
Zalmay Khalilzad, the US special envoy to Afghanistan,
said photographs and witness accounts indicated that many civilians, including
children, had been killed.
"We urge all sides to contain the violence,
protect civilians, and show necessary restraint as the start of intra-Afghan
negotiations is so close," he said on Twitter.
The defence ministry, however, disputed both accounts
and said none of those killed were civilians.
Afghan forces had carried out the strike "based
on intelligence photos and videos", the ministry said.
"The defence ministry's investigation is ongoing,
but initial information shows that no civilians were killed," it said.
It was not immediately clear if the commander had
survived the attack or how many insurgents were killed or wounded.
On their website, the Taliban said the insurgent had
been released from Bagram prison outside Kabul on Tuesday.
He had been freed under a contentious prisoner swap
that is seen as a crucial step toward eventual peace talks.
The exchange, outlined in a deal between the Taliban
and the US in February, will see the Afghan government release 5,000 insurgents
while the Taliban free 1,000 Afghan security force captives.
Kabul has protested that many among the Taliban
inmates being released are dangerous fighters who will return to the
battlefield.
In a separate incident in the eastern province of
Nangarhar on Wednesday, at least 31 Taliban fighters were killed in clashes
with security forces, the defence ministry said.
In a series of tweets, the United Nations Assistance
Mission in Afghanistan warned of a "spiralling cycle of violence",
and mission head Deborah Lyons called for a ceasefire over the upcoming Eid
festival.
In recent months, violence levels have soared in
Afghanistan, with the Taliban carrying out near-daily attacks against security
forces.
strs-mam-jds/wat/fox
In recent months violence has soared in Afghanistan,
with the Taliban carrying out near-daily attacks against security forces
https://au.news.yahoo.com/eight-civilians-killed-afghan-strike-freed-taliban-fighter-133332850--spt.html?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1385975_
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Arab World
US-led forces withdraw from Iraqi military base near
Baghdad
25 July 2020
The US-led military coalition, purportedly formed to
fight the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group, has officially handed over a military
base south of the Iraqi capital Baghdad to the country’s security forces.
“Combined Joint Task Force – Operation Inherent
Resolve (CJTF–OIR) turned over its facilities in Besmaya Range Complex to Iraqi
security forces, thanks to the successes achieved by the troops in the campaign
against ISIS (Daesh),” the official Iraqi News Agency quoted Major General
Gerald Strickland, the Deputy Commander-Strategy of CJTF-OIR, as saying in a
press release on Saturday.
Strickland said he is “working to re-position his
forces inside Iraq,” noting that “these military moves were planned long ago in
coordination with the government of Iraq.”
The statement added that “the international coalition
is handing over the seventh site this year to Iraqi security forces, as part of
an ongoing partnership between the Iraqi forces and the international coalition
against ISIS (Daesh,” praising “the crucial role of Iraqi soldiers in the
liberation [of the strategic northern city of Mosul] three years ago.”
On Friday afternoon, four Katyusha rockets struck
Besmaya base, where Spain had led the training of Iraqi security forces since
2015.
Iraq's Security Media Cell announced said in a
statement published on its official Twitter page that one of the projectiles
landed on a warehouse, while another hit caravans belonging to the protection
regiment of the base. The other two rockets fell in an open area. The rockets
only caused some material damage, and there was no mention of casualties.
No group claimed immediate responsibility for the
rocket attack.
On July 22, a convoy carrying logistical support for
American troops was struck by two roadside bombs on the al-Bathaa road in
Iraq’s southern province of DhiQar.
Turkey's official Anadolu news agency, citing an
unnamed Iraqi security source, reported at the time that the explosive devices
had damaged some of the trucks and their consignments.
A week earlier, the Lebanese Arabic-language
al-Mayadeen television news network, citing Iraqi tribal sources, reported that
an explosion had targeted a US convoy carrying logistic supplies in Iraq’s
north-central province of Salahuddin. It was not immediately known if the
attack had resulted in any casualties.
The resistance group Ashab al-Kahf later claimed
responsibility in a statement, saying, “We confirm the destruction of a large
logistical support convoy with its materials in Salahuddin.”
Anti-US sentiment has been running high in Iraq
following the assassination of top Iranian anti-terror commander Lieutenant
General Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of Iran's Islamic
Revolution Guards Corps and his Iraqi trenchmate Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the
deputy head of the PMU, and their companions in a US assassination drone
airstrike authorized by President Donald Trump near Baghdad International
Airport on January 3.
Iraqi lawmakers approved a bill two days later,
demanding the withdrawal of all foreign military forces led by the United
States from the country.
The US responded to the move by threatening crippling
sanctions against the Arab country.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/25/630373/US-led-coalition-hands-over-base-south-of-Baghdad-to-Iraqi-security-forces
--------
Iraqi MP urges expulsion of all US forces, says 'slow
drawdown' not acceptable
24 July 2020
While the US claims it plans to gradually reduce the
number of its forces in Iraq, a senior Iraqi lawmaker has called the partial
pullout unacceptable and urged the expulsion of all foreign troops.
Major General Kenneth Ekman, deputy commander of
coalition forces, told reporters on Thursday that the US will “slowly"
decrease the number of its troops in Iraq over time.
He said the US is to reduce its “footprint” in Iraq as
a feared resurgence of Daesh has not so far materialized in the Arab country.
“I think over time, what you will see is a slow reduction of US forces,"
he added.
He noted that US forces will hand over the control of
the Besmaya base south of Baghdad to Iraqi forces on Saturday, and Spain’s
training contingent will return home.
However, a senior Iraqi lawmaker said the partial
withdrawal is not acceptable, urging the government of Prime Minister Mustafa
al-Kadhimi to pursue the expulsion of all US-led foreign troops as per the
Iraqi Parliament's decision.
Mukhtar al-Musawi, a member of Fatah Alliance in the
Iraqi Parliament, said Iraqi armed forces are fully prepared to defend the
country against any danger, adding there is no need for US soldiers.
He said the US plan to “slowly" withdraw its
forces from Iraq is mainly aimed at “killing time", adding PM Kadhimi must
discuss the issue with American officials in his coming trip to Washington.
“We will take a different position if a timetable is
not announced for the drawdown of US troops,” he warned.
Anti-US sentiment has been running high in Iraq
following Washington’s January 3 assassination of top Iranian anti-terror
commander Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani and senior Iraqi commander Abu
Mahdi al-Muhandis, in addition to several other comrades, outside the Baghdad
airport.
Two days after the assassinations, the Iraqi
parliament voted for a resolution that called for an end to the presence of all
foreign forces, including the Americans.
Washington, however, has threatened sanctions should
US troops be expelled from Iraq instead of ending the occupation of the Arab
country.
On Monday, the Iraqi TV station Etejah broadcast an
animated video showing rows of coffins covered with American flags in a
helicopter, as it takes off from the desert.
US military vehicles are then shown burning as a
massive fist with flags for Iraq and the resistance forces rises from the ground
beneath them.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/24/630319/Iraq-us-troops-withdrawal-military-base
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Hezbollah capable of targeting Israeli offshore gas
rigs in Mediterranean: Israeli commander
25 July 2020
A senior Israeli military official says the Lebanese
Hezbollah resistance movement now has the capability to attack Israeli offshore
natural gas platforms in the Mediterranean Sea in case of a future
confrontation.
Israeli Hebrew-language Israel Hayom daily newspaper
quoted the commander of the Israeli navy's Haifa base, Brigadier General Gil
Aginsky, as alleging on Friday that Israeli naval forces are ready to face off
any potential threat, noting that the Tel Aviv regime currently “faces two
challenges at two levels: One on the surface of the water and one beneath. We
know how to deal with any complex and thorny scenario. In relation to what is
under the surface of the water, we are getting prepared and acquiring weapons
to confront this stiff challenge,” the London-based and pan-Arab al-Araby
al-Jadeed media outlet reported.
Aginsky noted that Hezbollah is working on an undersea
attack tunnel that crosses into the occupied territories.
“They are active in sea water…. They intend to prevent
us from being here, and if they can, they will do it. Our job is to prevent
such a thing. We maintain and cover the northern border wall,” he said.
Aginsky went on to say that the Israeli army has
learned lessons from the Hezbollah anti-ship missile attack on INS Hanit
corvette on July 14, 2006, during Israel's 33-day war on Lebanon.
The Israeli naval commander highlighted that the
vessel was struck 16 kilometers (9 miles) off the coast of the Lebanese capital
Beirut, and that four Israeli marines were killed in the incident.
“The threat remains and is serious, but we monitor and
guard gas platforms. If Hezbollah wants to do strategic damage, it will try to
harm these platforms…,” Aginsky pointed out.
Back in February 2018, Hezbollah released a video that
showed what appeared to be drilling platforms floating above Israeli gas fields
with targeting sights superimposed on the images.
The video, aired by Israel’s Hadashot TV news at the
time, also included quotes from Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hassan
Nasrallah’s speech, in which he warned that the group would retaliate against
any Israeli strike on Lebanon by attacking Israel’s offshore platforms.
“If you attack, we will attack. If you bomb, we will
bomb you…. I promise you, within hours [the platform] will cease operating,”
Nasrallah said then.
Earlier that month, Hezbollah had released another
video and issued pamphlets, warning the Israeli regime against operations in
Lebanon’s exclusive economic maritime zones.
“Whoever harms gas and oil sites in Lebanese economic
waters, their own sites will be harmed,” one pamphlet read.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/25/630365/Hezbollah-capable-to-target-Israel%E2%80%99s-offshore-gas-platforms-with-missiles-Israeli-military-official
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Coronavirus: Lebanese official finds he has COVID-19
at lunch with France's Le Drian
24 July 2020
A senior Lebanese official said on Friday he had taken
bad news of testing positive for COVID-19 during a lunch with visiting French
Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian.
“I received a telephone call from the hospital saying
the test was positive, so naturally I left the lunch and informed all those
present,” Hadi Hashem, head of the Lebanese foreign minister's office, told the
local OTV broadcaster.
A spokesman for Le Brian, whose lunch with Lebanese
officials on Thursday came during a trip urging reforms to the crisis-hit
economy, had no immediate comment on the matter.
Speaking by video, Hashem told OTV he had taken a
polymerase chain reaction (PCR) test ahead of a planned trip to Denmark, but
was now self-isolating at home until Monday before another test.
“The result was unexpected but the most important
thing is that the virus level is low and not contagious,” he said.
After Hashem's diagnosis, Lebanese Foreign Minister
Nassif Hitti and his political affairs director also underwent PCR tests, but
their results came back negative, a health ministry source told Reuters.
Lebanon has recorded 3,258 infections and 43 deaths
from the novel coronavirus since February.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/coronavirus/2020/07/24/Coronavirus-Lebanese-official-finds-he-has-COVID-19-at-lunch-with-France-s-Le-Drian.html
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Iraq forces free German woman kidnapped in Baghdad:
Officials
24 July 2020
A German woman kidnapped in Baghdad earlier this week
was freed overnight, Iraqi officials said on Friday, without providing
additional details.
For all the latest headlines follow our Google News
channel online or via the app.
“Security forces have freed activist Hella Mewis,”
Iraq's military spokesman Yahya Rasool said in a statement.
There were no details on the timing of the operation,
the force that carried it out or who had kidnapped Mewis.
A spokesman for Iraq's Supreme Judicial Council,
AbdelsattarBayraqdar, said the operation had been backed by a Baghdad
investigative court.
“We are still investigating this crime,” he said.
Mewis, who ran arts programs at Iraqi collective
Tarkib, was kidnapped late on Monday as she was leaving her office.
“She was riding her bicycle when two cars, one of them
a white pickup truck (of the type) used by some security forces, were seen
kidnapping her,” a security source told AFP.
Police officers at the local station witnessed the
abduction but did not intervene, the source added.
Mewis's phone was still unreachable on Friday and her
friends had not heard from her.
The German embassy in Baghdad had no immediate
comment.
A friend of Mewis told AFP she had been worried
following the killing of Hisham al-Hashemi, an Iraqi scholar who had been
supportive of anti-government protests last year.
“I spoke to her (Mewis) last week and she was really
involved in the protests too, so she was nervous after the assassination,” said
the friend, DhikraSarsam.
Large demonstrations erupted in Baghdad and Iraq's
Shiite-majority south last year, railing against a government seen as corrupt,
inept and beholden to Iran.
Around 550 people died in protest-related violence,
including two dozen activists who were shot dead by unidentified men, usually
on motorcycles.
Dozens more were kidnapped, some of whom were later
released near their homes. The whereabouts of others remain unknown.
Amnesty International has slammed the incidents as “a
growing lethal campaign of harassment, intimidation, abductions and deliberate
killings of activists and protesters.”
This year has seen a worrying spike in abductions of
foreigners, who had not been targeted in several years.
On New Year's Eve, two French freelance journalists
were taken hostage for 36 hours and three French NGO workers were held for two
months.
In both cases, neither the kidnappers nor the
conditions of their releases were revealed.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2020/07/24/Iraq-forces-free-German-woman-kidnapped-in-Baghdad-Officials.html
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White Helmets collude with terrorists in Syria under
humanitarian guise: Russia
24 July 2020
Russia's Foreign Ministry says members of the
so-called civil defense group White Helmets continue to collude with
foreign-sponsored Takfiri terrorists operating in Syria, and are involved in
acts of looting and robbery under the guise of humanitarian activities.
“Western sponsors have not yet abandoned their support
for the White Helmets and its affiliated outfits. We have repeatedly pointed to
the fact that the humanitarian label of the group actually lies in plunder,
extortion, robbery, intentional misinformation, false-flag chemical attacks,
air and artillery strikes, and simply direct collusion with terrorism,” the
Arabic service of Russia's Sputnik news agency quoted spokeswoman for Russia's
Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova as saying during a press briefing in Moscow on
Thursday.
Earlier this year, Director of the Russian Foreign
Intelligence Service, Sergey Naryshkin, said Western intelligence services are
sponsoring White Helmets and offering complete support to them to propagate
fake news in a bid to incriminate Syrian government forces as a pretext for
possible acts of aggression on army troops.
“The White Helmets is an organization financed by
intelligence services overseas… It is fulfilling their objective within the
framework of a propaganda campaign against the Syrian people, and the Syrian
Arab Republic at large,” the high-ranking Russian official said at the time.
He added that the Russian military has proven that the
video footage of an alleged chemical attack in the city of Douma, located about
10 kilometers (6 miles) northeast of the capital Damascus, back in April 2018
was staged and a false-flag operation indeed.
The White Helmets group is known for its coordination
with terror outfits in Syria to carry out staged chemical attacks aimed at falsely
incriminating the Syrian government forces and inventing pretexts for possible
acts of aggression on army troops by a United States-led military coalition
present in Syria since roughly 2014.
The group has been involved in such attacks before.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/07/24/630308/White-Helmets-collude-with-terrorists-in-Syria-under-humanitarian-guise-Russia
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Africa
Sudan armed group attacks Darfur village, killing at
least 7
July 25, 2020
CAIRO: A Sudanese paramilitary group attacked
civilians in the war-scarred region of South Darfur, killing at least seven
people and wounding 20 more, local activists and a rebel group said Friday.
The assault in the troubled province came a week after
government-linked armed groups stormed a protest camp in North Darfur and
killed 13 people.
The latest attack was staged Thursday by armed men who
opened fire on people headed to their farms in the town of Gereida, some 107
kilometers (66 miles) south of South Darfur’s provincial capital, said Mohamed
Abdel-Rahman Al-Nayer, a spokesman for a rebel group known as the Sudan
Liberation Movement.
Seven people were killed, said Adam Regal, a spokesman
for a local organization that helps run displacement camps in Darfur.
Late Friday, Al-Nayer put the death toll at 15, saying
several more people had succumbed to their wounds.
The flashes of violence in Darfur have threatened to
destabilize the country’s fragile political transition. In April of last year,
a sweeping pro-democracy protest movement toppled longtime autocrat Omar
Al-Bashir, ushering in a transitional government jointly composed of civilian
and military leaders.
Al-Bashir is imprisoned in the capital, Khartoum, on
corruption charges, although the International Criminal Court has sought for a
decade to arrest him on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity over
his role in the Darfur conflict.
Sudan’s government has vowed to end the conflicts in
the country’s far-flung provinces in hopes of slashing military spending, which
eats up 80% of the national budget.
Rebel groups from Darfur and southern Sudan have for
months engaged in peace talks. As part of a wider effort to hold former
officials to account, the public prosecutor has pledged to investigate alleged
atrocities in Darfur.
Yet sporadic violence continues, with each new attack
fuelingfears that ruling authorities may not deliver on their promises.
“The militia that committed this crime is supported by
the old regime,” Al-Nayer said, referring to the Rapid Support Forces, a
paramilitary unit drawn from the Janjaweed militias accused of mass killings
and rapes in Darfur in the 2000s.
The group continues to wield power in Khartoum. Gen.
Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, the unit’s commander, is deputy head of Sudan’s ruling
council.
There was no immediate comment from the Rapid Support
Forces about Thursday’s attack.
“We are calling on the government to play its role in
protecting civilians, arresting criminals and disarming the militias,” Al-Nayer
said.
Sit-ins have sprung up across Darfur in recent weeks
as people, mostly those displaced by the waves of fighting in the region, press
demands for unhindered access to their farmlands and the resignation of
provincial security officials, who they say fail to protect them against
frequent paramilitary attacks.
A government delegation earlier this week visited the
protest camp of Fata Borno in North Darfur, the site of the recent deadly
crackdown. There, Gen. Abdelrahim Hamdan Dagalo, deputy commander of the Rapid
Support Forces, pledged to launch an investigation into the dispersal of the
sit-in and deploy forces to better protect farmers during the agricultural
season, according to Sudan’s state-run news agency.
Yet soon after the delegation met, footage surfaced
online from Gereida, showing a woman carried on a stretcher with a bullet
lodged in her head, homes torched in an alleged arson attack — and later —
shrouded bodies lowered into a mass grave.
Meanwhile, a several hours’ drive north, around 32
activists were arrested in a dragnet targeting protesters and displaced people
this week, said Regal, the camp spokesman.
In a statement Friday, the Khartoum-based Darfur Bar
Association confirmed that several advocates had been swept up in North Darfur,
including one of its own attorneys providing legal aid for detainees in Kutum,
where security forces dispersed another protest camp last week.
The arrests of lawyers and advocates sends “a clear
message” that transitional authorities are continuing the same repressive
Bashir-era tactics, the association said.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1709786/middle-east
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US says Russia sent more equipment to Libyan front
lines
July 24, 2020
TUNIS: Russia appears to be sending more military
equipment to its mercenaries in Libya, including the flashpoint city of Sirte,
in breach of an arms embargo, the US military said on Friday.
Its Africa Command said there was mounting evidence
from satellite pictures of Moscow’s military cargo planes, including IL-6s,
bringing supplies to fighters from the Russian Wagner Group.
Both sides have been mobilizing forces around Sirte
where any major new escalation could risk drawing major regional powers further
into Libya’s messy conflict.
The Tripoli-based, internationally recognized
Government of National Accord (GNA) is backed by Turkey. The eastern-based
forces of Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) are backed by Russia, the
United Arab Emirates and Egypt.
“The type and volume of equipment demonstrate an
intent toward sustained offensive combat action capabilities,” the Africa
Command said in a statement posted on its website.
Both Russia and its LNA ally have denied previous US
military statements that Moscow has sent fighter jets to back Wagner forces
there.
The GNA earlier this year pushed the LNA from most
territory it held in northwest Libya, including in Tripoli, destroying several
Russian air defense systems.
However, the LNA stopped retreating at the central
coastal city of Sirte, which it took from the GNA in January, and the front
line has solidified there.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1709376/middle-east
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UN 'horrified' by killing of five aid workers in
Nigeria
23 Jul 2020
The United Nations has said it is "utterly
shocked and horrified" by the killing of five aid workers by unknown armed
groups in northeastern Nigeria.
The statement late on Wednesday by Edward Kallon, UN
humanitarian coordinator in Nigeria, followed the release of a video showing
the murder of the humanitarian workers who were kidnapped last month in Borno
state.
The Nigerian government identified the victims as
employees of the country's State Emergency Management Agency as well as
international aid organisations Action Against Hunger (ACF), International
Rescue Committee and Rich International.
"They were committed humanitarians who devoted
their lives to helping vulnerable people and communities in an area heavily
affected by violence," Kallon said.
The aid workers were abducted while travelling on a
main route connecting the town of Monguno with Borno state capital, Maiduguri.
Kallon said he was troubled by the number of illegal
checkpoints set up by non-state armed groups along the region's main supply
routes.
"These checkpoints disrupt the delivery of
life-saving assistance and heighten the risks for civilians of being abducted,
killed or injured, with aid workers increasingly being singled out."
Northeast Nigeria has been ravaged by a decade-long
armed campaign led by the armed group Boko Haram that has killed tens of
thousands of people and displaced about two million from their homes.
Last year, fighters from a Boko Haram splinter group,
the Islamic State West Africa Province, abducted a group of six humanitarian
workers - including a female ACF employee - in the region.
Five of the hostages were later executed and the ACF
worker remains in captivity.
Aid groups provide a vital lifeline for some 7.9
million people in the region who the UN says are in need of urgent assistance.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/07/horrified-killing-aid-workers-nigeria-200723081635932.html?utm_source=iterable&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=1385975_
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North America
Trump and Putin talk about Iran's nuclear arms
program: Kremlin
23 July 2020
US President Donald Trump told Russian counterpart
Vladimir Putin Thursday he wanted to avoid a costly arms race with Russia and
China and hoped for progress in arms control negotiations, the White House
said.
“President Trump reiterated his hope of avoiding an
expensive three-way arms race between China, Russia and the United States and
looked forward to progress on upcoming arms control negotiations in Vienna,”
White House spokesman Judd Deere said.
The two leaders also discussed Iran’s nuclear arms
program, the Kremlin said in its statement on the call.
“The need for collective efforts to maintain regional
stability and the global nuclear non-proliferation regime has been emphasized
on both sides,” the Kremlin said.
The White House did not mention Iran but said Trump
and Putin discussed ways to defeat the coronavirus pandemic while continuing to
reopen global economies.
The United States says that, as a growing nuclear
weapons power, China should join it and Russia in a new treaty. But China’s
estimated 300 warheads are dwarfed by the arsenals of Russia and the United
States.
China has balked. A top Chinese diplomat said earlier
this month that China would be happy to hold arms control talks with the United
States and Russia, but only if Washington was willing to cut its nuclear
arsenal to China’s level, which is about 20 times smaller.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/07/23/Trump-and-Putin-talk-about-Iran-s-nuclear-arms-program-Kremlin.html
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US: Azerbaijanis blast death threats by Armenian
groups
BeyzaBinnurDönmez
24.07.2020
Amid brazen online threats targeting Azerbaijanis in
the US, police should investigate and locals should stay alert, said
Azerbaijan’s Consulate in Los Angeles, California.
On Facebook late Thursday, the consulate decried these
threats, taking place just after an assault by Armenians on peaceful
Azerbaijani and Turkish demonstrators, and urged the Los Angeles Police
Department and the FBI to take action.
Some of the online threats cited by the consulate,
such as the “armo_bountyhunters” Instagram account with an Armenian flag,
offered Bitcoin payments for information on the whereabouts of local
Azerbaijanis and Turks. One Armenian Facebook user praised Tuesday’s assault on
peaceful Azerbaijani protestors, saying: "Death toll of Aziks will rise
soon in LA. Good job brothers!!!"
Posting a hotline number, the consulate said,
"This might be part of an intimidation campaign by some radical and
aggressive Armenian groups. We call on all of you to be careful and be alert
for any provocation from such groups."
It called on the LA police to "seriously"
investigate these threats and urged Mayor Eric Garcetti and all other city
officials to "strongly" condemn the hate crimes committed by Armenian
National Committee of America-backed Armenian extremists against Azerbaijani
community members on July 21 in Los Angeles.
At least one LAPD officer was also injured during
Armenian aggression, according to local TV channel KTLA 5 News.
"It is high time to send a strong and unambiguous
message to all Armenian radical groups that violence targeting any community in
Los Angeles will not be tolerated," the consulate urged.
Azerbaijan's consulate confirmed reports that a hate
crime investigation has been launched by the police and said it will take
necessary steps to bring the matter into FBI's attention.
On Tuesday a large group of Armenians attacked and
injured a much smaller group of Azerbaijanis and Turks who gathered near the LA
consulate to peacefully protest recent Armenian aggression against Azerbaijan.
On July 12, the Armenian army violated a cease-fire
and attacked Azerbaijani border positions with artillery fire, and later
withdrew after losses when Azerbaijan’s army pushed back.
During its aggression, Armenia martyred 12 Azerbaijani
soldiers, including high-ranking officers, besides wounding four troops.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/americas/us-azerbaijanis-blast-death-threats-by-armenian-groups/1920940
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URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/power-politics-behind-move-convert/d/122469