UN Investigator Says Saudi Prosecutor Allowed High-Level Officials Behind Khashoggi Killing to Walk Free
New Age Islam
News Bureau
08 September
2020
UN human rights investigator
Agnes Callamard on Monday called the Saudi prosecutor's verdict on the 2018
murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul a "parody of
justice"
-----
• Saudi Scraps
Death Sentences Over Khashoggi Murder, Jails 8
• Taliban Talks
Will Be One of Hardest Peace Deals in History: Afghan VP Amrullah Saleh
• 'Say Jai Shri
Ram', Killers of Aftab Alam in NCR Said, Police Deny Murder Was Hate Crime
• ‘Big Shame’:
Turkey’s Erdogan, European Court of Human Rights Meeting Under Fire
• Nearly 300
Rohingya Found on Indonesian Beach After Months at Sea
• Islamabad High
Court Wants Imran Khan Briefed on Enforced Disappearances
• Indigenous
Genocide Finding Hangs Over Canada's Myanmar Court Intervention
Europe
• UN
Investigator Says Saudi Prosecutor Allowed High-Level Officials Behind
Khashoggi Killing To Walk Free
• Turkey tops
agenda of France’s Macron, Greek PM talks at ‘MED7’ summit in Corsica
• UK backs
German efforts to resolve east Mediterranean dispute between Greece, Turkey
• UK Supreme
Court to hear extremist bride’s citizenship case in November
• 'Turkey to
continue supporting Gagauzia, Moldova'
--------
Arab World
• Saudi Scraps
Death Sentences Over Khashoggi Murder, Jails 8
• Khashoggi
Family Describes Final Verdicts in Murder Case As ‘Fair Ruling’
• Iraqis in
Karbala Hold Anti-US Rallies with Images of General Soleimani, Abu Muhandis
• Put Lebanon
ahead of Iran and stop Arab interference, Geagea tells Hezbollah
• Arab Coalition
destroys explosive-laden Houthi drone targeting Saudi Arabia
• Two SDF
militants killed in northeastern Syria: SANA
• Another US
logistic convoy hit by explosion north of Baghdad: Reports
• Saudi Arabia’s
Abha International Airport targeted again in Yemeni drone attacks
--------
South Asia
• Taliban Talks
Will Be One of Hardest Peace Deals in History: Afghan VP Amrullah Saleh
• Taliban Office
Says its Prisoners Not Fully Released
• Security Pact
Reinforces “Militarization”: Rahmani
• Narayanganj
mosque blast: Titas suspends 8 officials, employees
• Kabul Hails
EU, Canada Stance on Afghan Peace Process
• Kabul to push
for ceasefire in talks with Taliban: Afghan official
--------
India
• 'Say Jai Shri
Ram', Killers of Aftab Alam in NCR Said, Police Deny Murder Was Hate Crime
--------
Mideast
• ‘Big Shame’:
Turkey’s Erdogan, European Court of Human Rights Meeting Under Fire
• Israel
planning to exploit COVID-19 to close al-Aqsa, says Palestinian cleric
• Iran’s
Judiciary Chief Condemns Sacrilege of Holy Quran, Islam Prophet
• Spokesman:
G4+1’s Violation of Resolution 2231 to End Iran’s Partnership in N. Deal
• UAE Dissidents
Association Opposes Inauguration of Israel’s Embassy
• Turkey gives
Daesh terrorist 40 life terms for 2017 Istanbul nightclub massacre
• Jordan slams
continued Israeli violations against al-Aqsa Mosque complex
• EU warns
Kosovo, Serbia over Jerusalem al-Quds embassy move
• Israel plans
to construct almost 5,000 new settler units in occupied West Bank
--------
Southeast Asia
• Nearly 300
Rohingya Found on Indonesian Beach After Months at Sea
• To Help Uighur
Muslims, Switzerland Should Negotiate China Trade Pact, Says NGO
• Sarawak NGOs
want authorities to investigate Pasir Puteh MP over Bible remark
• Sabah has five
potential chief ministers, but pundits see only a straight fight — Musa Aman vs
Shafie Apdal
--------
Pakistan
• Islamabad High
Court Wants Imran Khan Briefed on Enforced Disappearances
• Pakistan
Drifting Away from US Towards China: Defence Analyst
• Pakistan
Looking to Diversify Cooperation with S. Arabia: Khattak
• Pakistan says
5 militants killed in raid near Afghan border
• KP Assembly
resolution terms report by British MPs a conspiracy
• ‘Mastermind’
of militant attacks among five killed in North Waziristan
• NA, Senate
sessions slated for next week to get FATF bills passed
--------
North America
• Indigenous
Genocide Finding Hangs Over Canada's Myanmar Court Intervention
• How An Islamic
Terror Sheikh Ended Up Selling Meth In Orange County
--------
Africa
• West African
Body Urges Mali Junta to Restore Democracy
• Turkey’s
Erdogan meets with head of Libya’s GNA
• Tunisian
officer stabbed to death, three ‘terrorists’ killed in firefight
• Car bomb
explosion in Somalia leaves 5 soldiers dead, US officer injured
Compiled by New
Age Islam News Bureau
URL: https://www.newageislam.com/islamic-world-news/un-investigator-says-saudi-prosecutor/d/122817
--------
UN Investigator Says Saudi Prosecutor Allowed High-Level Officials Behind Khashoggi Killing To Walk Free
07 September
2020
UN human rights investigator
Agnes Callamard on Monday called the Saudi prosecutor's verdict on the 2018
murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul a "parody of
justice"
-----
A United Nations
expert has rejected as “parody of justice” a Saudi court ruling that overturned
the death sentence of convicts involved in the gruesome killing of dissident
journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018.
A court in Saudi
Arabia commuted in a final ruling on Monday the death sentence handed to the
five people, with the official Saudi Press Agency saying five defendants had
received 20-year sentences and three others had been sentenced to between seven
to 10 years.
"The Saudi
Prosecutor performed one more act today in this parody of justice. But these
verdicts carry no legal or moral legitimacy," Agnes Callamard, the UN
special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, said in a
tweet later in the day.
#JamalKhashoggi:
1.The Saudi Prosecutor performed one more act today in this parody of justice.
But these verdicts carry no legal or moral legitimacy. They came at the end of
a process which was neither fair, nor just, or transparent. https://t.co/nt4n2CqS21
— Agnes
Callamard (@AgnesCallamard) September 7, 2020
Callamard also
denounced in a series of tweets the fact that "the high-level officials
who organized and embraced the execution of Jamal Khashoggi have walked free
from the start.”
The UN official
underlined that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman "has remained well
protected against any kind of meaningful scrutiny in his country.”
At an earlier
stage of the trial in December, the court sentenced five people to death and
three to jail, claiming that the killing was not premeditated but carried out
"at the spur of the moment.”
Khashoggi’s
fiancee calls Saudi verdict ‘farce’
Hatice Cengiz,
the fiancee of the slain Saudi dissident, also censured on Monday as a
"farce" the court ruling that overturned the death sentences.
"The ruling
handed down today in Saudi Arabia again makes a complete mockery of
justice," Cengiz said in a statement posted on Twitter. "The
international community will not accept this farce.”
This is my
statement in response to the ruling today. #Khashoggi
pic.twitter.com/rPxzWhetb1
— Hatice Cengiz
/ خديجة (@mercan_resifi) September 7, 2020
The Saudi court
did not reveal the identity of the eight convicts involved in the case.
"The Saudi
authorities are closing the case without the world knowing the truth of who is
responsible for Jamal's murder," Cengiz added. "Who planned it, who
ordered it, where is the body? These are the most important questions that
remain totally unanswered."
Khashoggi's
sons, under alleged pressure from Riyadh, announced in May they had
"pardoned" the killers of their father, a move dismissed at the time
as "the antithesis of justice" by a UN expert, who concluded that
Khashoggi was "the victim of a deliberate, premeditated execution"
for which the Saudi kingdom was responsible.
Khashoggi, a
former advocate of the Saudi royal court who later became a critic of bin
Salman, was killed in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on October 2, 2018, after
he entered the perimeter to collect documents for his planned wedding. He had
been falsely promised the documents.
The Washington
Post, for which Khashoggi was a columnist, reported in November 2018 that the
CIA had concluded that bin Salman personally ordered his killing.
Khashoggi’s
killing damaged the ties between Ankara and Riyadh, and tarnished the prince's
international image.
Ankara has
called Khashoggi’s killing “premeditated murder,” and has pressed the kingdom
for information on his dismembered body’s whereabouts.
Riyadh, which
initially claimed Khashoggi left the consulate on the day, later admitted that
he was killed, blaming the murder on a “rogue” group and putting 11 unnamed
individuals on trial.
The Saudi crown
prince accepted responsibility a year after the murder and said, “It happened
under my watch.”
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633553/Saudi-court-parody-Khashoggi
--------
Saudi Scraps
Death Sentences Over Khashoggi Murder, Jails 8
Sep 7, 2020
In this February 1, 2015
photo, Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi speaks during a press conference in
Manama, Bahrain. — AP/File
-------
RIYADH: A Saudi
court on Monday overturned five death sentences over journalist Jamal
Khashoggi's murder in a final ruling that jailed eight defendants to between
seven and 20 years, state media reported.
The ruling comes
after Khashoggi's sons announced in May that they had "pardoned" the
killers, paving the way for a less severe punishment in a case that triggered
an international outcry.
The verdict,
which drew fresh condemnation from campaigners, underscores Saudi efforts to
draw a line under the October 2018 murder as the kingdom seeks to reboot its
international image ahead of November's G20 summit in Riyadh.
"Five of
the convicts were given 20 years in prison and another three were jailed for
7-10 years," the official Saudi Press Agency said, citing a spokesman for
the public prosecutor.
None of the
defendants were named in what was described as the final court ruling on the
murder, which tarnished the global reputation of Crown Prince Mohammed bin
Salman.
Khashoggi -- a
royal family insider turned critic -- was killed and dismembered at the
kingdom's consulate in Istanbul in October 2018, in a case that tarnished the
reputation of the de facto ruler Prince Mohammed.
Khashoggi, a
59-year-old critic of the crown prince, was strangled and his body cut into
pieces by a 15-man Saudi squad inside the consulate, according to Turkish
officials. His remains have not been found.
Riyadh has
described the murder as a "rogue" operation, but both the CIA and a
United Nations special envoy have directly linked Prince Mohammed to the
killing, a charge the kingdom vehemently denies.
Agnes Callamard,
the UN special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions,
slammed Monday's ruling as "one more act today in this parody of
justice".
"These
verdicts carry no legal or moral legitimacy," Callamard wrote on Twitter.
"They came at the end of a process which was neither fair, nor just, or
transparent."
That view was
echoed by other human rights campaigners.
"Since the
beginning, there was never any intent to hold those responsible to account,
only repeated attempts to cover it up," Ines Osman, director of the
Geneva-based MENA Rights Group, told AFP.
"This
verdict is the last nail in the coffin, saying 'the case is now closed'."
In December, a
Saudi court exonerated two of the crown prince's top aides over the murder --
deputy intelligence chief Ahmed al-Assiri and the royal court's media czar Saud
al-Qahtani.
Both aides were
part of Prince Mohammed's tight-knit inner circle and were formally sacked over
the killing.
Five unnamed
people were sentenced to death in the December ruling while three others were
handed jail terms totalling 24 years over the killing.
But the family's
pardon paved the way for Monday's reduced sentences, including sparing the
lives of the five unnamed people sentenced to death.
The Washington
Post reported last year that Khashoggi's children, including his son Salah, had
received multi-million-dollar homes and were being paid thousands of dollars
per month by authorities.
Salah rejected
the report, denying discussing a financial settlement with Saudi Arabia's
authoritarian rulers.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/middle-east/saudi-scraps-death-sentences-over-khashoggi-murder-jails-8/articleshow/77983149.cms
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Taliban Talks
Will Be One Of Hardest Peace Deals In History: Afghan VP Amrullah Saleh
Emily Judd And Omar
Elkatouri
07 September
2020
Afghan VP Amrullah Saleh
-----
Peace talks
between Afghanistan’s government and the Taliban are set to start in the next
couple days, the Afghan vice president told Al Arabiya on Monday, adding that
the negotiations will be one of the “most difficult” in history.
“This is going
to be one of the most difficult peace negotiations of history. In certain ways
this is going to be even more complicated than the Arab peace process,” said
Afghanistan Vice President Amrullah Saleh in an interview with Al Arabiya.
“A lot of blood
has been shed and a lot of divisions have been created. Overcoming these
divisions will not be easy,” he added.
Reuters reported
on Monday that peace talks have been delayed due to logistical issues.
A source told
Reuters the Afghanistan government negotiating team may fly on Tuesday to
Qatar, where the peace talks are set to be held.
Last month the
Afghanistan government released 400 high-risk Taliban prisoners, a demand of
the Taliban leadership.
Saleh said that
if the Taliban backs out of peace talks following this action, it will be a
“slap in the face.”
“Should the
Taliban find another excuse [to avoid peace talks], it will be a slap in the
face to the international community who told us this is the last excuse, and it
will be a slap in the face to peace itself,” said Saleh.
Saleh, who
described himself as being “politically on the opposite side of the Taliban,”
warned that the Taliban will try to “use violence to get more concessions.”
“Each action
they do will complicate the peace,” he said.
While Saleh said
the peace talks will be “extremely complicated,” he believes it will be a
beginning to the path of a comprehensive agreement between the government and
the Taliban.
“Making peace
with the Taliban does not mean surrendering to the Taliban,” Saleh said.
“It means
bringing two ways of life under one national ceiling.”
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/07/Afghanistan-VP-says-talks-with-Taliban-will-be-one-of-most-difficult-peace-negotiati
--------
'Say Jai Shri
Ram', Killers of Aftab Alam in NCR Said, Police Deny Murder Was Hate Crime
Ismat Ara
Sep 08, 2020
Noida: On
Sunday, at around midnight, 20-year-old Mohammad Sabir was told by the police
that they had found the lifeless body of his father, Aftab Alam, tied to the
side of his own car.
Sabir wasn’t
entirely surprised to hear this, he says. A few hours earlier, he had sensed
that something was wrong when he received an unusual call from his father – who
didn’t utter a word after he picked up the phone. Sabir heard “drunk” men on
the other end of the phone asking his father if he would like to drink. Alam said ‘no’, Sabir heard.
The men then
asked him his name, according to Sabir. By then, having sensed that something
was wrong, he began recording the call. In the audio file of the call available
with The Wire, at 8:39 minutes, one of the men can be heard saying, “Jai Shri
Ram bol, bol Jai Shri Ram”.
The chant has
become the rallying cry of violent Hindutva action and has preceded several
lynchings.
Sabir heard no
conversation after that. But 11 minutes later, at the 19:41 minute mark, one of
the men can be heard saying, “Saans ruk gayi.” ‘He has stopped breathing.’
“My father had
gone to drop one of his old clients at Bulandshahr yesterday at around 3 pm. He
made the drop at around 7 pm and left for home. On the way he called me and
told me to recharge his Fast Tag. I did that at around 7:30 pm and then after a
while I got a call again, I think this was from near a toll booth. He had
probably sensed that some men he had come across were not the right sort of
people, so he called me and possibly put the mobile phone in his pocket,” said
Sabir.
Sabir recorded
the call for the next 40 minutes, till his father’s phone apparently switched
off. He immediately went to the nearest police station, Mayur Vihar Phase I,
and asked for help.
“Sub-inspector
Sanjay sir helped me when I told him about the matter. He immediately started
tracking my father’s mobile phone and accessed the last location of the SIM
card,” said Sabir.
This ‘last
location’ was near Badalpur police station, where the police found Aftab Alam’s
bruised, lifeless body. He was taken to a nearby hospital.
Sabir broke down
upon recalling the sight of his dead father. “His tongue area was badly
bruised, ears were bleeding, there was a big cut on his face. This is clearly a
case of mob lynching,” he said, using the phrase which has come to symbolise
hate crimes in India. “But the police has only registered a robbery case.”
Sabir added, “We
are Muslims, but we have a right to live.”
However, the
Badalpur police station house officer denied that it was a case of “mob
lynching” or “hate crime” and said that the case is being investigated.
The FIR,
registered on the same night, charged the anonymous assaulters under sections
394 (voluntarily causing hurt in committing robbery) 302 (punishment for
murder) and 201 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence, or giving false
information to screen offender).
It is not clear
how Alam came across the perpetrators or who and how many they were.
A devoted
father, keen on sons’ education
Aftab Alam was a
resident of Trilokpuri, Noida had been working as a driver since 1996. Driving
was his main livelihood. He has a wife, his three sons, ailing parents and two
siblings, all of whom depend on him and Sabir financially.
During the
lockdown, Alam had not stepped out due to fear of contracting and spreading the
coronavirus, said his family. However, when a family friend, an old client,
called him up to ask if he could drop them from Gurgaon to Bulandshahr in Uttar
Pradesh, he could not refuse. Having earned no money during the lockdown and
struggling to make ends meet, Alam thought that the trip would be a good idea.
Alam’s younger
sons, Mohammad Shahid, 19, and Mohammad Shajid, 17, along with Sabir, are bright students who had
secured good marks in their board examinations.
Sabir is a third
year B.Com student in the School of Open Learning, University of Delhi. Shahid
and Shajid study at Ahlcon Public School in Mayur Vihar, and they scored 76%
and 92% marks respectively in their Class 10 board examinations.
Alam’s father,
65-year-old Mohammad Tahir, said, “Had it been a case of robbery, why wouldn’t
they take the car? They would have stolen the car and thrown his body out on
the street. This was clearly a case of mob lynching. They only took the mobile
phone.”
Shahid is
preparing for his NEET exams and said his father’s only goal was to make sure
that his children get a good education.
“I am a student
who studies in a good school through the Economically Weaker Sections quota.
Even during this health crisis, my father had managed to pay our fees with his
minimal earnings. My brother, Shajid is preparing for the JEE next year,” said
Shahid.
“In his career
as a driver, he never had one fight with anybody. He went to work, came back
home, invested in his sons’ education and that was it. He never even visited
other people’s houses because he spent all his time earning money for us,” he
added.
Pointing to the
kitchen in his house, he said, “At this time, we are short of ration at home
but look at my bookshelf. My father, despite not having enough money to manage
food for the house, bought me books and notebooks worth Rs 1,800.”
Shajid, the
youngest son and the “brightest” according to the family said, “When we both
got our Class 10 results, Shahid had secured lesser marks than me. But my
father took out a note of Rs 1,000 and asked us to take Rs 500 each, without
giving me preference for securing better marks. He showed faith in both of us
and knew that he [Shahid] would also make him proud someday.”
Alam’s mother,
60-year-old Najmu Nisa wondered how the house would function now.
Alam’s wife,
Rehana Khatoon, 36, had only come to know of his death on Monday afternoon.
Khatoon said she wanted justice for her husband. Consoling his mother Shahid
said he would find a way of securing that. “I will speak to my teachers at
school, they will come up with a solution. What has happened has happened. Now
we will deal with what happens,” the 19-year-old said.
https://thewire.in/communalism/jai-shri-ram-muslim-driver-lynched-death-uttar-pradesh
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‘Big shame’:
Turkey’s Erdogan, European Court of Human Rights meeting under fire
Emily Judd
07 September
2020
Exiled Turkish
journalists and athletes are blasting a major international human rights
organization for visiting Turkey and meeting with President Recep Tayyip
Erdogan.
President of the
European Court for Human Rights (ECHR) Robert Spano embarked on an official
four-day visit to Turkey on Thursday, where he met Erdogan and other Turkish
officials, before receiving an honorary degree from the University of Istanbul.
Victims of human
rights violations by the Turkish government told Al Arabiya English the visit
was a “slap in the face” and hypocritical.
The ECHR ranked
Turkey as having the second highest number of human rights violations on its
list of European countries last year, behind only Russia.
Prominent
Turkish NBA star Enes Kanter, wanted in his native country for speaking out
against what he calls Erdogan’s “dictatorship,” told Al Arabiya English that
the ECHR should be the place where people who “suffer unlawfulness” in Turkey
seek their rights.
But instead, the
visit by the head of ECHR “legitimizes the Turkish government’s unlawful
actions at the highest level and casts a huge shadow on the impartiality of the
institution he leads,” Kanter said in an interview with Al Arabiya English.
Kanter also
called on Spano to resign in a tweet.
The visit makes
ECHR’s “hypocritical stance … crystal clear,” exiled Turkish journalist Bulent
Kenes told Al Arabiya English on Monday.
Kenes, who was
indicted on three life sentences plus 15 years in prison in Turkey after
writing a column critical of Erdogan, said there has always been “huge
suspicion” that ECHR is an accomplice to “crimes of the Erdogan regime.”
Now the visit is
evidence that ECHR has lost its credibility as being a refuge for those seeking
justice, he said.
“It is a big
shame for the judges at the European Court of Human Rights and especially for
Spano,” Kenes said.
Honorary degree
from ‘tainted’ university
During his
visit, Spano met Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul and received an honorary
doctorate from Istanbul University - an institution that both Kanter and Kenes
say purged more professors than any other university in the country in the
aftermath of the 2016 failed coup attempt against Erdogan.
Director of
Human Rights Watch Turkey Emma Sinclair-Webb said it was “astonishing” that
Spano would accept the honorary degree from a university that “summarily
dismissed scores of academics... in an unlawful way.”
The Turkish
government began a campaign of repression against its critics in journalism,
academia, and the military after the coup attempt on July 15, 2016.
During his
acceptance speech, Spano said that “those in power cannot stifle freedom of
speech,” according to ECHR.
Over 6,000
academics have lost their jobs due to the Turkish government’s crackdown since
2016, according to Turkey Purge, an independent group of Turkish journalists.
ECHR’s message
to Turkey
During his
acceptance speech at Istanbul University, Spano mentioned the detention and
conviction of Turkish former judge Alparslan Altan, who is currently serving an
11-year sentence for alleged involvement in the failed coup.
In 2019, the
ECHR ruled Altan’s detention was unlawful. The ruling did not change Turkey’s
stance.
In a 45-minute
meeting with the Turkish president during his visit, Spano spoke to Erdogan
about “the importance of the rule of law and democracy and in particular,”
according to the ECHR. A readout of the meeting was not released.
Exiled Turkish
journalist Ahmet Donmez said he thinks Spano’s visit is an insincere attempt to
convince Erdogan to be more supportive of human rights.
“There are much
more effective and more ethical methods of achieving this,” Donmez told Al
Arabiya English, adding that the visit “gives oxygen to Erdogan’s dark rule.”
Donmez narrowly
escaped imprisonment in Turkey for his critical journalism of the country’s top
leader, after Erdogan filed a case of defamation against him.
Erdogan and
other Turkish officials are now using the visit as “despicable propaganda
material to further legitimize their violations of human rights,” according to
Imam Abdullah Antepli, a native of Turkey and former leader within the Gulen
community, a religious movement that has been targeted by Erdogan.
“The ECHR
president should immediately resign and the court should speed up numerous
Turkish cases that are pending,” Antepli, a professor at Duke University, said.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2020/09/07/After-meeting-Turkey-s-Erdogan-European-Court-of-Human-Rights-under-fire
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Nearly 300
Rohingya found on Indonesian beach after months at sea
SEP 07, 2020
Almost 300
Rohingya who escaped squalid camps in Bangladesh and Myanmar, reached a beach
in Indonesia early Monday after seven months at sea, U.N. officials said.
The migrants,
including 181 women and 14 children, were spotted at sea on a wooden boat by
locals who helped them land near Lhokseumawe city on Sumatra's northern coast,
officials said.
Chris Lewa,
director of the Arakan Project, a nongovernmental organization (NGO) that
focuses on the Rohingya crisis, said the migrants may have been held at sea
while traffickers extorted money from their families. "These people were
actually kept hostage," she said. "They (the traffickers) said they
wouldn't disembark until we're paid."
Thousands of
Rohingya have become stranded in Aceh over the past five years after their
boats drifted while en route to Muslim-majority Malaysia and other countries.
Faced with a repatriation plan, many Rohingya Muslims have been trying to flee
the worsening humanitarian conditions at refugee camps in Myanmar and
Bangladesh. For years, Rohingya on both sides of the border have boarded boats
organized by smugglers in the dry months between November and March, when the
sea is calm. The perilous journey to Thailand and Malaysia, often undertaken in
overcrowded, rickety vessels, has cost many lives. Despite this escape becoming
more perilous as countries like Malaysia shut their borders and threaten to
push refugees back out to sea to protect jobs and resources amid coronavirus
lockdowns, scores of people have been killed in recent years as their
overcrowded vessels have capsized or run out of water and food.
The landing
comes after about 100 Rohingya, mostly women and children, arrived in the same
area in June following what they described as a perilous four-month journey
that saw them beaten by traffickers and forced to drink their own urine to stay
alive.
Both groups that
came ashore in June, and the latest arrivals, may have been part of an
estimated 800 Rohingya who reportedly left southern Bangladesh earlier this
year, Lewa said. About 30 migrants in the original group were believed to have
died at sea, she added.
Around a million
Muslim Rohingya live in cramped and squalid refugee camps in Bangladesh, next
to their native Myanmar, where human traffickers run lucrative operations
promising to find them sanctuary abroad.
Hundreds of
Rohingya had set sail in early April but were pushed back by Malaysian and Thai
authorities in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Lewa said. "This is
the biggest (arrival) we have seen since 2015," Lewa said.
The persecution
of Rohingya Muslims is one of the worst humanitarian tragedies of our time, but
it is also the most overlooked. The Rohingya, described by the United Nations
as one of the most mistreated communities in the world, have been facing
systematic state aggression in the northern Rakhine state of Myanmar since the
early 1970s. The Myanmar government has long been blamed for genocide against
the minority Muslim community. U.N. investigators have accused Myanmar's
military of carrying out mass killings and other atrocities against the Muslim
minority with "genocidal intent" during a 2017 campaign that forced
more than 730,000 across the border into Bangladesh.
https://www.dailysabah.com/world/asia-pacific/nearly-300-rohingya-found-on-indonesian-beach-after-months-at-sea
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Islamabad High
Court Wants Imran Khan Briefed on Enforced Disappearances
Malik Asad
08 Sep 2020
ISLAMABAD: Chief
Justice of the Islamabad High Court (IHC) Justice Athar Minallah on Monday
expressed serious concern over rising number of enforced disappearances in the
federal capital and directed the interior secretary to take up the issue with
the prime minister in order to devise a policy for protection of the
fundamental rights of the citizens.
Separately,
another IHC bench comprising Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani summoned Interior
Minister retired Brig Ijaz Shah in the case of missing person Abdul Quddus who
has remained untraceable since Jan 1, 2020.
If the state and
the courts cannot protect the right to life of a citizen, then there is no
reason for them to continue, remarked IHC Chief Justice Athar Minallah while
hearing a habeas corpus petition seeking the recovery of Securities and
Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) official Sajid Gondal after Interior
Secretary Yousaf Naseem Khokhar told the court that the two police teams
constituted to trace his whereabouts were clueless.
The habeas
corpus petition was filed by Mr Gondal’s mother, who is also a grandmother of
four siblings, the eldest being 13 years old. The SECP official is stated to be
the family’s sole bread-earner who supports his elderly parents, a wife and
four children.
Observes missing
SECP official case is ‘only the tip of the iceberg’
The IHC on Sept
5 issued a direction to the respondents including interior secretary, chief commissioner
and Inspector General of Police, Islamabad Capital Territory to appear in
person in case of failure to trace the SECP official.
On Monday, the
court noted that the respondents appeared but failed to give satisfactory
explanation for the failure of the state and its agents (i.e. public
functionaries) to protect the fundamental rights of citizens by demonstrating a
response that would visibly commensurate with the gravity of the alleged
offence. “The officials, who have appeared today, prima facie, do not seem to
appreciate the gravity of the alleged offence and its consequences, not only
for the loved ones of the citizen who went missing three days ago, but the
general public as well,” the court observed.
The court
observed there were some fundamental rights which were definitely not
negotiable, nor could the violation thereof be ignored by a constitutional
court. “Why is the alleged offence in the matter in hand so grave and shocking?
It has happened in the Capital of Pakistan, spread over an area of 1,400 square
miles only. The highest constitutional court of the country, this court, the
seat of the Federal Government, the offices of the President, Prime Minister,
Federal Ministers and headquarters of the intelligence agencies are situated in
the capital. The police force is headed by the Inspector General who is
assisted by several senior officers and their responsibilities are confined to
1,400 sq miles,” the court order stated.
Justice Minallah
pointed out that the administration of, and maintenance of law and order in the
Islamabad Capital Territory was directly controlled and managed by the federal
government.
The IHC chief
justice observed that the court in the recent past had been inundated with
petitions filed by loved ones alleging the abduction of their close relatives…
it was obvious from the connected petitions that the ministries/agencies and
other state organs were, directly or indirectly, involved in illegal real
estate business.
“Their
involvement in such illegal actions has seriously undermined the rule of law
and the effective enforcement of fundamental rights. The abysmal state of
governance, the lack of rule of law and impunity against crime is evident from
the exponential increase of complaints/grievances and failure of the state and
public functionaries to demonstrably and effectively discharge constitutional
obligations and duties.
“The alleged
abduction of citizens and failure on part of law enforcing agencies to trace
their whereabouts and prosecute and punish the perpetrators of this most
heinous crime appears to have become a norm. There is no accountability. It
appears though the protectors of fundamental rights have become silent
spectators to this most abhorrent violation of fundamental rights,” the court
stated.
It observed this
had serious consequences not only for the victims, their loved ones but for
every citizen because it eroded the rule of law and undermined confidence in
the state’s ability to protect their constitutionally guaranteed right to life
and security. “The case in hand is only the tip of the iceberg,” the order
sated.
“This court has
no hesitation in observing that there is no rule of law within the 1,400 square
miles of the Islamabad Capital Territory for ordinary citizens and that there
is an obvious impunity against serious crimes,” the court observed.
Challenge for
federal govt
The chief
justice remarked that the case related to enforced abduction of Mr Gondal was a
challenge and an opportunity for the federal government to restore the
confidence of the people by ensuring that rule of law prevails and to
demonstrably show its political will to put an end to impunity against crime,
particularly against alleged abductions of citizens.
“Let this case
be a challenge for the federal government to establish rule of law and
demonstrate the will of the state not to tolerate violations of fundamental
rights and to assure every citizen that protection of life and security of
every citizen is their paramount duty,” the IHC chief justice said, adding that
this court expected that the federal government, led by the worthy Prime
Minister, would ensure that rule of law was demonstrably restored in the
Pakistan’s capital by putting an end to impunity against crime.
Justice Minallah
directed the interior secretary to brief the worthy PM and members of his
cabinet regarding the abysmal state of law and order and the obvious impunity
against crime within the 1,400 square miles area. The secretary is supposed to
submit a report regarding decisions taken by the federal government and
measures taken in the instant case. It is expected that copies of this order
would also be placed before the PM and cabinet members in the next meeting of
the federal cabinet.
If there is no
visible progress in the instant case and the petitioner’s son is not recovered,
nor are his whereabouts traced before Sept 17, then the learned Attorney
General for Pakistan shall appear before the IHC to assist the court in
identifying the responsible functionaries and their accountability, the court
ordered.
Interior
minister summoned
Meanwhile,
Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani of the IHC summoned minister for interior Ijaz
Shah and attorney general for Sept 16 in another missing person case.
The Islamabad
capital police have failed to recover missing person Abdul Quddus so far, as
the law enforcement agency told the court that efforts were being made to find
his whereabouts.
An FIR of the
enforced disappearance of Mr Quddus was registered at the Karachi company
police station on Jan 1, 2020.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1578448/ihc-wants-pm-briefed-on-enforced-disappearances
--------
Indigenous
genocide finding hangs over Canada's Myanmar court intervention
Sep 06, 2020
Cries of the pot
calling the kettle black are emerging after Canada joined an international
genocide lawsuit against Myanmar because the national inquiry into missing and
murdered Indigenous women and girls said Canada's Indigenous Peoples are
genocide victims.
Canada and the
Netherlands announced with great fanfare this week that they were joining the
genocide application launched by Gambia against Myanmar at the International
Court of Justice in The Hague as interveners.
Gambia filed the
case last fall on behalf of the 57 Muslim countries in the Organization of
Islamic Co-operation under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
More than
850,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine state after being targeted by
Myanmar security forces, who killed thousands while burning villages and
engaging in ethnic cleansing and gang rape.
Foreign Affairs
Minister François-Philippe Champagne and his Dutch counterpart Stef Blok said
their countries were joining the case to assist Gambia with "complex legal
issues" in the case.
But Bruno Gélinas-Faucher,
a University of Montreal international law expert who has worked at the ICJ,
said Canada's presence could cause delays and complications for the Gambian
case because of an international legal axiom known as the
"clean-hand" principle.
"There's a
risk for Canada to be perceived as adopting a contradictory position of leading
a very active foreign policy based on prevention of genocide abroad, and at
home, not responding to fully for the calls for justice made by the [inquiry],"
he said.
"I think
there is a very important element for Canada not to be seen as putting forth
this contradictory position in the world, and to be coherent — have a coherent
foreign policy that is in line with its domestic policy as well."
Champagne: 'This
is about genocide committed in Myanmar'
Gélinas-Faucher
said it is likely Myanmar will raise the Canadian genocide finding in legal
arguments that would seek to block Canada from gaining standing in the case. He
said that could further brake the already slow-moving wheels of the
international court and delay the case for as much as a year.
In June 2019,
the landmark Canadian report on the victimizing of Indigenous women issued more
than 200 recommendations and declared that violence against First Nations,
Métis and Inuit women and girls was a form of genocide and that the crisis was
"centuries in the making."
Champagne said
in an interview that he's not concerned about Canada's position on Indigenous
issues at home, and that he is content to let "legal experts debate legal
issues."
"This is
not about Canada. This is about genocide committed in Myanmar, and therefore I
think Canada has every right to be standing side by side with a country like …
Gambia, which is taking the leadership position and being supported by countries
like the Netherlands and Canada," Champagne said.
Canada
positioned to bring international expertise to case
Another leading
international legal expert said Canada has little to worry about, and that it
should be joining the case against Myanmar.
Errol Mendes, a
University of Ottawa international law specialist who has served as a United
Nations adviser, said there is much to distinguish Canada from Myanmar on the
question of genocide.
"I hope our
many attempts to reconcile with our Indigenous Peoples will set us apart from
the type of actions in Myanmar that we have not seen since the Nazi regime, the
Rwanda genocide and the Bosnian genocide," said Mendes.
"We are far
from angels, but hopefully we are not in the same league of those that were
involved in these genocides."
Canada also
brings a lot of international expertise to the case because it helped create
the Rome Statute that established the International Criminal Court, he said.
"We helped
develop the Statute of the Court that includes express provisions on gender
violence and rape as indicia of genocide," said Mendes, which he said is
relevant in the case against Myanmar at the separate International Court of
Justice because of the allegations of sexual violence against its military.
Gélinas-Faucher
said Canada's feminist foreign policy does leave it well-suited to add value to
the case against Myanmar. But the government will have to take concrete action
to address the domestic genocide allegations contained in last year's inquiry
report.
"It has to
show clearly its commitment to implement fully the recommendations and one of
the elements is they said they would create a task force to implement these
recommendations, which we haven't seen yet," he said.
Champagne said
Canada is consulting with Gambia and believes its feminist foreign policy has a
role to play in the case.
"We've seen
acts of genocide, systemic murder, sexual violence, torture," the minister
said. "The international community is more seized now than ever with the
plight of the Rohingya."
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-myanmar-court-intervention-1.5714246
--------
Europe
Turkey tops
agenda of France’s Macron, Greek PM talks at ‘MED7’ summit in Corsica
07 September
2020
French President
Emmanuel Macron will discuss the European Union’s strained relationship with
Turkey this week with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, Macron’s office
said on Monday.
Macron and
Mitsotakis will attend a ‘MED7’ summit on the French island of Corsica on Sept
10 along with the leaders of Portugal, Spain, Italy, Cyprus and Malta.
For all the
latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
NATO allies
Turkey and France have sharply different views on Syria, Libya and Ankara’s
dispute with Greece over energy resources in the eastern Mediterranean.
Paris and Ankara
have traded barbs in recent weeks
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/07/urkey-tops-agenda-of-France-s-Macron-Greek-PM-talks-at-MED7-summit-in-Corsica
--------
UK backs German
efforts to resolve east Mediterranean dispute between Greece, Turkey
Layelle Saad and
Omar Elkatouri
06 September
2020
UK Defense
Minister Ben Wallace has thrown his support behind German efforts to mediate a
dispute between Turkey and Greece over gas drilling rights in the Eastern
Mediterranean Sea.
Tensions have
escalated in recent weeks after Turkey dispatched ships to the Greek
continental shelf. Turkey accuses Greece of snatching an unfair share of
maritime resources while both Greece and Cyprus have accused Turkey of
breaching their sovereignty by drilling in the waters.
For all the
latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
German
Chancellor Angela Merkel held talks with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
on Thursday, in a bid to bridge differences between Greece and Turkey and get
the two disputing countries to talk.
However, it
remains unclear whether technical talks can proceed due to disagreements over
pre-conditions. An effort by NATO to get the two disputing parties together at
the negotiating table fell flat after Greece refused to meet until Turkey
withdrew its ships from Greek waters.
“I have taken a
very strict view with them. We need Turkey and Greece to get behind German
efforts to broker a mediation and de-escalation of this,” Wallace said on
Sunday during an exclusive interview with Al Arabiya.
Wallace stressed
that the UK was “not here to take sides” and was interested in upholding
international law.
Greece’s refusal
to hold talks has incensed Erdogan. On Saturday, he threatened Athens to either
come to the negotiating table or face consequences.
"They will
understand that Turkey has the political, economic and military strength to
tear up immoral maps and documents," he said at a hospital's opening
ceremony in Istanbul.
Erdogan’s threat
has worried European countries that tensions could spiral into a possible
military confrontation.
“It is in no
one’s interest for the East Mediterranean to become a place of disagreement
between two NATO allies,” he added. “This is not what we want.”
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/06/UK-backs-German-efforts-to-resolve-east-Mediterranean-d
--------
UK Supreme Court
to hear extremist bride’s citizenship case in November
September 07,
2020
LONDON: The UK
Supreme Court will hear arguments in November for and against the government’s
decision to remove the UK citizenship of a British-born woman who went to Syria
as a schoolgirl to join Daesh.
The case of
Shamima Begum has been the subject of a heated debate in Britain, pitting those
who say she forsook her right to citizenship and is a security threat, against
those who argue she should not be left stateless but rather face trial in
Britain.
Begum, who was
born to Bangladeshi parents, left London in 2015 when she was 15 and traveled
to Syria via Turkey with two schoolfriends. In Syria, she married a Daesh fighter
and lived in the capital of the violent extremist group’s self-declared
caliphate.
Britain stripped
her of her citizenship after she was discovered in 2019 in a detention camp in
Syria, where three of her children died. The government argued Begum was a
threat to national security and should not be allowed to return.
But the Court of
Appeal ruled in July that Begum should be let back into Britain to give her a
chance to appeal against the removal of her citizenship, a ruling the
government called “very disappointing.”
Five Supreme
Court justices will hear the government’s appeal against the July ruling as
well as Begum’s appeal against the original decision to strip her of her
citizenship during two days of hearings on Nov. 23 and 24.
Begum angered
many Britons by appearing unrepentant about seeing severed heads and saying a
suicide attack that killed 22 people in the English city of Manchester in 2017
was justified.
https://www.arabnews.com/node/1730996/world
--------
'Turkey to
continue supporting Gagauzia, Moldova'
Dmitri
Chirciu
07.09.2020
Turkey will
continue to help Moldova and Gagauzia, Turkey's ambassador to Moldova said
Monday.
Speaking to
Anadolu Agency, Gurol Sokmensuer said that Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut
Cavusoglu’s visit to Moldova last month confirmed once again both countries’
will to strengthen their strategic partnership.
He cited
Turkey's new consulate in Moldova's autonomous region of Gagauzia – an area
with a large ethnic Turkic population – saying it will contribute to stronger
bilateral relations.
"Our
Consulate General will serve not only Gagauz Autonomous Region, but also
Moldova's Leova, Cimislia, Causeni, Stefan Voda, Cantemir, Basarabeasca, Cahul
and Taraclia regions."
Referring to
medical aid and assistance, Sokmensuer said Turkey will deliver an X-ray device
by the end of this year.
As part of its
support to Moldova in its fight against COVID-19, Turkey last mont sent laptops
and medical equipment to the Eastern European nation.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/europe/turkey-to-continue-supporting-gagauzia-moldova/1965261
--------
Arab World
Khashoggi family
describes final verdicts in murder case as ‘fair ruling’
08 September
2020
The family of
the late Saudi Arabian journalist Jamal Khashoggi described the final verdicts
against eight people involved in the murder case as “fair rulings” as they
“represent a deterrent to every criminal and offender, whoever they are.”
“The crimes
committed by those convicted are major crimes and the sentences include various
prison sentences are just rulings that are accepted by the court that governs
the law of God and public order,” Mutassim Khashoggi, the lawyer for the family
of the Saudi journalist, told Asharq al-Awsat newspaper.
For all the
latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
“It is
considered a deterrent for every offender, whoever they are. As a family, we
have accepted from the beginning the application of Allah's law and his
judgment. There is no court or agency in the world today that applies the law
and ruling of God like the courts of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,” the lawyer
added.
Saudi Arabia’s
Public Prosecution issued its final verdicts on Monday against eight people for
their involvement in the murder of the late journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Five
people were sentenced to 20 years in prison for their involvement in the
murder, the prosecution said, while three other defendants were given a prison
sentence of seven to ten years.
Khashoggi – a
well-known Saudi Arabian journalist – was murdered on October 20, 2018 at Saudi
Arabia’s consulate in the Turkish city of Istanbul. He had been visiting the
consulate to complete paperwork related to his divorce.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/gulf/2020/09/08/Khashoggi-family-describe-final-verdicts-in-murder-case-as-fair-ruling-
--------
Iraqis in
Karbala Hold Anti-US Rallies with Images of General Soleimani, Abu Muhandis
Sep 07, 2020
The protestors
carried images of martyred Commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps
(IRGC) Quds Force Lieutenant General Qassem Soleimani and Deputy Commander of
Iraq's Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis who were
martyred by the US in Iraq in January.
They condemned
Washington’s terrorist acts in Iraq, calling for the withdrawal of the American
forces from their country.
The ralliers
then entered the holy shrine of the third Imam of Shiites, Imam Hossein (AS),
while chanting anti-US slogans and shouting Allah-o Akbar.
Lieutenant
General Soleimani was assassinated in a US drone strike on Baghdad
International Airport in Iraq on January 3.
The airstrike
also martyred al-Muhandis. The two were martyred in an American airstrike that
targeted their vehicle on the road to the airport.
Five Iranian and
five Iraqi military men were martyred by the missiles fired by the US drone at
Baghdad International Airport.
On January 8,
the IRGC Aerospace Force started heavy ballistic missile attacks on US Ein
Al-Assad airbase in Southwestern Iraq near the border with Syria and a US
operated airbase in Erbil in retaliation for the US assassination of ant
General Qassem Soleimani.
Ein Al-Assad is
an airbase with a 4km runway at 188m altitude from sea levels, which is the
main and the largest US airbase in Iraq. Early reports said the radar systems
and missile defense shields in Ein Al-Assad failed to operate and intercept the
Iranian missiles. Unofficial reports said the US army's central radar systems
at Ein Al-Assad had been jammed by electronic warfare.
The second IRGC
reprisal attack targeted a US military base near Erbil airport in Iraqi
Kurdistan Region in the second leg of "Martyr Soleimani" reprisal
operation.
Iraq said the
attacks had not taken any toll from its army men stationed at these two bases.
The US army had blocked entrance into Ein Al-Assad to everyone, including the
Iraqi army.
It was the first
direct attack on the US army ever since world war two.
The IRGC
officials said none of the missiles had been intercepted.
Meantime, Iran
announced in late June that it had issued arrest warrants for 36 officials of
the US and other countries who have been involved in the assassination of the
martyred General Soleimani.
"36
individuals who have been involved or ordered the assassination of Hajj Qassem,
including the political and military officials of the US and other governments,
have been identified and arrest warrants have been issued for them by the
judiciary officials and red alerts have also been issued for them via the
Interpol," Prosecutor-General of Tehran Ali Alqasi Mehr said.
He said that the
prosecuted individuals are accused of murder and terrorist action, adding that
US President Donald Trump stands at the top of the list and will be prosecuted
as soon as he stands down presidency after his term ends.
https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990617000461
--------
Put Lebanon
ahead of Iran and stop Arab interference, Geagea tells Hezbollah
Joseph Haboush
and Omar Elkatouri
September 8,
2020
Iran-backed
Hezbollah must hand over the decision over war and peace to the state, a senior
Lebanese politician said Sunday, adding that it must stop unjustified
interventions in Arab countries.
“It is time to
take the initiative in making a difficult but correct decision to put yourself
at the service of Lebanon and its people ... instead of the Islamic Republic of
Iran,” Lebanese Forces (LF) leader Samir Geagea said.
For all the
latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
Speaking during
a memorial ceremony commemorating fighters of the Christian
militia-turned-political party, Geagea said Hezbollah needed to follow the suit
of all other Lebanese political parties who gave up their weapons and pledged
allegiance to the state.
Hezbollah is the
only side in Lebanon, other than Palestinian factions, to keep their weapons
following the 1975-90 Civil War. Initially supported to fend off Israeli
aggressions and invasions, Hezbollah’s weapons have been turned against
Lebanese citizens on more than one occasion.
The group,
designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and several
European and Arab states, continues to fight alongside Syrian President Bashar
al-Assad’s forces in the neighboring war. It is also providing fighters and
intelligence support in Iraq and Yemen against Arab states and interests,
including Saudi Arabia.
“It is time to
return to Lebanon … Hezbollah must stop its unjustified foreign intervention in
more than one Arab country and stop playing the leading role of the Iranian
project in the Arab region,” Geagea said.
Hassan
Nasrallah, the secretary-general, previously pledged allegiance to Iranian
Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and admitted to receiving funding and weapons from
Tehran.
This has dealt a
significant blow to Lebanon’s ties with the Gulf and its traditional allies in
the international community.
“Are you waiting
for complete starvation?” Geagea asked, referring to Hezbollah’s continued
intervention in other countries’ affairs.
“Hezbollah must
hand off the decision of war and peace to the country,” he said.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2020/09/07/Put-Lebanon-ahead-of-Iran-and-stop-Arab-interference-Geagea-tells-Hezbollah
--------
Arab Coalition
destroys explosive-laden Houthi drone targeting Saudi Arabia
Joanne Serrieh
September 8,
2020
The Arab
Coalition intercepted and destroyed an explosive-laden drone launched on
Tuesday toward Saudi Arabia by the Iran-backed Houthi militia, the official
Saudi Press Agency reported.
For all the
latest headlines follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
Spokesman for
the Arab Coalition forces, Colonel Turki al-Maliki, confirmed in a statement
carried by SPA that the drone targeting civilians had been intercepted and
destroyed.
Cross-border
attacks by Iran-aligned Houthi forces have escalated since late May, when a
truce prompted by the coronavirus pandemic expired. In late June, missiles
reached the Saudi capital Riyadh.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/gulf/2020/09/08/Arab-Coalition-intercepts-destroys-Houthi-drone-targeting-Saudi-Arabia-
--------
Two SDF
militants killed in northeastern Syria: SANA
07 September
2020
Two members of
the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which enjoy Washington’s
support, have been killed in separate incidents of bomb and gun attacks in
northeastern Syria, a report says.
The official
news agency SANA, citing local sources, reported on Monday that the first
fatality took place after a vehicle transporting SDF militants was hit by an
improvised explosive device (IED) in the east of the city of Raqqah.
The other SDF
militant was killed after a vehicle working in close cooperation with the US
military came under fire by heavily-armed assailants in southern Hasakah.
The security
situation has apparently been deteriorating in the areas controlled by the SDF
in the provinces of Hasakah and Dayr al-Zawr.
The White House
has long been providing the SDF with arms and militants. Washington says they
are a key partner in the purported fight against the Daesh Takfiri terrorist
group.
Many observers,
however, see the support in the context of Washington’s plans to carve out a
foothold in Syria.
Such support has
also angered Turkey, which views militants of the People’s Protection Units
(YPG), the backbone of the SDF, as a terrorist organization tied to the
homegrown Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633555/SDF-Syria-SANA
--------
Another US
logistic convoy hit by explosion north of Baghdad: Reports
07 September
2020
An explosion has
targeted a US-led coalition convoy carrying logistic supplies north of the
Iraqi capital of Baghdad, the second such incident in three days.
The coalition
vehicles were targeted by a bomb which exploded on Monday night along the
al-Taji road, north of Baghdad, according to Iraqi media reports.
A statement by
the Iraqi military says the blast took place when the vehicles were getting out
of the Taji base and at the beginning of al-Shula highway.
It also said the
explosion has had no casualties and just damaged one of the vehicles.
The blast came
two days after a security member and a civilian were wounded in a roadside bomb
explosion near a convoy of trucks belonging to the US-led coalition forces in
the northwest of Baghdad.
The Saturday
night’s attack took place in al-Shula neighborhood when the roadside bomb went
off near a vehicle belonging to an Iraqi security company contracted with the
international coalition to escort its trucks in Iraq, the media office of the
Iraqi Joint Operations Command said in a brief statement.
The blast resulted
in the wounding of a security member from the Iraqi company and a civilian, the
statement said.
No group has so
far claimed responsibility for the attacks, but unidentified militant groups
have frequently targeted convoys belonging to the US-led coalition forces in
Iraq, which usually travel from neighboring Kuwait to the coalition bases in
central and northern Iraq.
The Monday
attack against the US convoy came a few hours after a march against the United
States in the holy Iraqi city of Karbala.
The Iraqi people
attending the march carried pictures of General Soleimani and Abu Mahdi
al-Muhandis.
The
demonstrators condemned the acts of terrorism committed by the US in their
country, chanting slogans such as “The US is the biggest devil”.
Carrying pictures
of "the leaders of victory" as well as other resistance fighters, the
protesters called for the expulsion of all American forces from the Arab
country.
The protesters
continued their march until they reached the holy shrines of Imam Hussein (AS,
the grandson of Prophet Muhammad (Peace be upon Him), and his half-brother
Hazrat Abbas (AS) in the holy city.
The Iraqi-US
relations have witnessed rising tension since January 3 when a US drone struck
a convoy at Baghdad airport, assassinating the former commander of the Quds
Force of Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps Lieutenant General Qassem
Soleimani and Deputy Chief of Iraq’s Hashd al-Sha’abi forces Abu Mahdi
al-Muhandis.
Just two days
later, Iraqi lawmakers unanimously passed a bill mandating the withdrawal of
all foreign troops from Iraq.
Anti-American
sentiments have been running high in Iraq following the January attack.
Iraqi resistance
groups have pledged to take up arms against US forces if Washington fails to
comply with the parliamentary order.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633565/Iraq-US-convoy-explosion-baghdad
--------
Saudi Arabia’s
Abha International Airport targeted again in Yemeni drone attacks
08 September
2020
The Yemeni army
has launched a series of retaliatory attacks against the Abha International
Airport in Saudi Arabia’s southwestern region of Asir, using a squadron of
domestically-manufactured Sammad-3 (Invincible-3) combat drones.
The spokesman
for Yemeni Armed Forces, Brigadier General Yahya Saree, said in a brief statement
posted on his Twitter page on Tuesday that the unmanned aerial vehicles struck
the designated targets with great precision, noting that the drone attacks
halted air traffic for several hours.
He added that
the airstrikes come within Yemen’s legitimate right to respond to the Saudi-led
coalition’s devastating military campaign and all-out blockade.
Saree reiterated
that Yemeni soldiers and allied popular fighters will continue to carry out
such strikes deep inside Saudi Arabia as long as the Riyadh regime presses
ahead with its deadly aggression and siege.
The development
took place only two days after Yemeni army forces and their allied fighters
struck the same Saudi airport.
Sana’a airport
to stop operations due to Saudi-led blockade
Separately, Minister
of Transport in Yemen’s National Salvation Government, Zakaria al-Shami,
roundly denounced the continuing Saudi-led naval and air blockade on his
country, saying the Sana’a International Airport will soon stop its operations
due to a lack of fuel.
Shami said all
incoming flights by the United Nations and international humanitarian agencies
to the airport will be suspended as of Wednesday because of the scarcity of oil
derivatives needed to operate the facility.
“The coalition
of aggression seeks to make up for its losses during ground operation by means
of such acts. The continued detention of oil tankers and not allowing the
vessels to offload their cargos at the port of Hudaydah have created a
humanitarian catastrophe for Yemeni people, especially for patients receiving
treatment in hospitals and newborn babies,” he pointed out.
He further said
thousands of Yemeni patients need to travel abroad to seek medical treatment,
but they are unable to do so due to the airport’s closure.
Shami then
criticized the UN for its failure to lift the blockade on the Sana’a airport,
noting that the closure of the airport is in violation of international
conventions and treaties.
The Yemeni
minister said the United Nations has not managed to carry out its obligations
to establish a medical air bridge for Yemeni patients through the Sana’a
airport.
Such a failure,
he added, points to the lack of seriousness on the part of the international
community and the UN to stop the appalling tragedy in Yemen.
Moreover,
Chairman of Yemen’s Civil Aviation and Meteorology Institute (CAMI), Mohammed
Abdulkader, said officials at the Sana’a International Airport have no option
but to close the airport to international flights due to the depletion of fuel.
Abdulkader noted
that the Saudi-led military coalition has destroyed the airport’s
infrastructure as well as its communication devices and radar systems as part
of attempts to paralyze air traffic management there.
The CAMI chief
went on to censure the Saudi-led blockade on the airport as an illegal and
inhumane measure, which has isolated Yemen and sharply restricted the free
movement of millions of Yemenis.
Abdulkader also
called for an end to the Saudi-led siege and a UN Security Council resolution
that would help the airport operate civilian flights.
Saudi Arabia and
a number of its regional allies launched the campaign against Yemen in March
2015, with the goal of bringing the government of former president Abd Rabbuh
Mansur Hadi back to power.
The US-based
Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit
conflict-research organization, estimates that the war has claimed more than
100,000 lives for more than the past five years.
The Houthi
movement, backed by the armed forces, has been defending Yemen against the
Saudi-led alliance, preventing the aggressors from fulfilling the objectives of
their deadly campaign.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/08/633582/Saudi-Arabia-Abha-International-Airport-targeted-again-in-Yemeni-drone-attacks
--------
South Asia
Taliban Office
Says its Prisoners Not Fully Released
By Mohammad Arif
Sheva
08 Sep 2020
KABUL,
Afghanistan – The Taliban’s political office said a number of its detainees
have not yet been released, which slows down the preparation for intra-Afghan
talks to take place in Qatari capital Doha.
Mohammad Naeem
Wardak, a spokesman for Taliban’s political office, said in a tweet once the
process of freeing its prisoners are done, they will be ready to sit with
Afghans and negotiate on peace in the country.
Meanwhile, the
Presidential Palace announced preparations for the intra-Afghan negotiations
are being finalized and the delay is due to Taliban’s unpreparedness for the
talks.
Sources said the
delay is due to issues within the leadership of the Taliban’s negotiating team,
adding demands are being made on both sides.
Recently, the
Taliban announced a 21-member negotiating team led by the group’s chief
justice, Mawlawi Abdul Hakim, with former chief negotiator Abbas Stanekzai now
serving as deputy.
“Technical
issues and preparations are almost complete. We hope that the Taliban also
finishes their preparations so that our delegation can travel (to Doha),” said
Sediq Sediqqi, presidential spokesman, as quoted by local media.
“We have no
problems. Everyone is ready for the trip,” said Abdul Hafiz Mansoor, a member
of the government negotiating team. “We have been waiting for the flight for
the past few days, but we are told repeatedly that the Taliban’s delegation in
Qatar is not ready.”
https://www.khaama.com/taliban-office-says-its-prisoners-not-fully-released-34534/
--------
Security Pact
Reinforces “Militarization”: Rahmani
By Mohammad Arif
Sheva
08 Sep 2020
KABUL,
Afghanistan – The speaker of the House of Representatives Mir Rahman Rahmani,
in response to the government’s draft on security pact, said Monday it promotes
and reinforces “militarization”, disregarding security bodies in the country.
In a plenary
session of the parliament, Rahmani said the government should stop making
unilateral decisions, which potentially affects relations between the executive
and the legislature bodies of the government.
“The recent
proposed security pact by the government has raised a number of serious
concerns amongst the people and politicians, as it casts and reinforces
militarization,” he said. “This is while the people of Afghanistan do not have
happy memories of militarization.”
“Those who
voluntarily work to apply security pact have discredited security institutions;
and the government needs to strengthen these institutions, not those volunteers
whose identities are still unknown and has worried our honorable people,” he
added.
Rahmani’s
remarks came a month after the government introduced a new security plan called
the “Security Pact” to eradicate criminal offenses, prevent terrorist attacks
and mobilize people to provide security in their areas.
Although
security officials assess the plan functional, it caused a mixed of reaction
among some, considering the “Security Plan” not as effective as it should be to
address crimes in the country – mainly the Afghan capital Kabul.
https://www.khaama.com/security-pact-reinforces-militarization-rahmani/
--------
Narayanganj
mosque blast: Titas suspends 8 officials, employees
September 07,
2020
The authority of
Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Limited has suspended its eight
officials and staffers in connection with the blast in a Narayanganj mosque
which has claimed 26 lives so far.
In two separate
letters, the Titas authority suspended them for negligence.
The authority
also issued show-cause notices against them.
https://www.thedailystar.net/country/news/narayanganj-mosque-blast-titas-suspends-8-officials-employees-1957377
--------
Kabul Hails EU,
Canada Stance on Afghan Peace Process
By Mohammad Arif
Sheva
07 Sep 2020
KABUL,
Afghanistan – Kabul welcomed the statement issued by the Heads of Mission of
the European Union and Canada on the imminent peace talks between the Afghan
government and the Taliban delegation, Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a
statement Monday.
“The statement
rightly identifies the historic opportunity that these talks represent,” the
statement read. “The Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan is fully
intending to seize the opportunity to end the conflict through negotiations.”
“The Afghan
Government is entering these talks with a spirit of goodwill and constructive
intent, as evident in the release of the Taliban prisoners, which the statement
recognizes as a goodwill gesture to build confidence, that goes beyond the
Afghan Government’s obligations,” the Ministry elaborated.
Meanwhile, the
Afghan government urged the Taliban to reciprocate by agreeing on a “ceasefire
and agree to an immediate reduction of violence,” adding the country visions all
Afghans, including women, to thrive their fundamental rights.
“Afghanistan
would like to thank the EU and other friendly nations for their unwavering
support to the peace process in Afghanistan,” the statement said.
______
[Earlier:
Intra-Afghan Talks must Preserve ‘Democratic and Human Rights’: EU, Canada]
The EU Head of
Mission in Kabul and the Ambassador of Canada said the upcoming Intra-Afghan
talks must preserve the “democratic and human rights” of people in the country.
In a joint
statement on Sunday, both representatives said achievements of the past two
decades are “human rights, rule of law and democratic freedoms, including the
increased respect for the rights and freedoms of women and girls” that should
be considered during the peace negotiations.
“We especially
urge for the full participation of women in all aspects of the negotiations,”
the statement said as quoted by local media.
It came at a
time both the Afghan and Taliban delegation are preparing to hold Intra-Afghan
talks that will determine not only the security but also the future of
Afghanistan.
“There is no
military solution to the conflict and the still unacceptably high level of
violence is contrary to expectations of a meaningful peace process and the
principles of the UN Charter,” the statement read.
“We urge the
Taliban to respect the desire of the citizens of Afghanistan and heed the UN
Secretary-General’s and the UN Security Council’s unanimous call for an
immediate unconditional, comprehensive, and nationwide ceasefire.”
https://www.khaama.com/kabul-hails-eu-canada-stance-on-afghan-peace-process-345345/
--------
Kabul to push
for ceasefire in talks with Taliban: Afghan official
06 September
2020
Afghan
government negotiators will push for a ceasefire when talks begin with the
Taliban, a top official said Sunday, signaling that the two foes could parley
for a long time.
A date for the
opening round of talks to be hosted in Doha has not been set, but both sides
indicated that negotiations could begin soon after they wrapped up a
controversial and months-long prisoner exchange last week.
For all the
latest headlines, follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
The Taliban’s
seriousness about peace will be evident from the outset, when Kabul’s
negotiating team pushes for a permanent ceasefire, Vice President Amrullah
Saleh said.
“The first test
for the Taliban is (a) ceasefire,” Saleh told Tolo News, the country’s biggest
private television network.
“If they accept
the ceasefire, they are committed to peace. If not, they are not.”
Saleh said the
Afghan delegation would go to Doha after all logistical issues are sorted.
“We will not go
until everything is in place... like desks, our flag and what to call each
other,” he said.
“It is a war of
symbols now and we are not going to give up on it. We have to be assured that
we are respected. We will not give in to any pressure.”
Saleh said the
start of the talks were delayed over opposition to the release of some
militants.
“We had to reach
an agreement with our allies about six blacklisted prisoners,” he said,
referring to France and Australia.
Paris and
Canberra objected because of their links to the murders of French and
Australian civilians and troops in Afghanistan.
Saleh said it
was agreed that these prisoners “will be sent to Qatar for a specific period.”
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/06/Kabul-to-push-for-ceasefire-in-talks-with-Taliban-Afghan-official
--------
Mideast
Israel planning
to exploit COVID-19 to close al-Aqsa, says Palestinian cleric
07 September
2020
Sheikh Ekrima
Sa’id Sabri is a former Grand Mufti of Jerusalem al-Quds who has come out in
denunciation of Israeli intentions for exploiting the coronavirus crisis to
close the al-Aqsa Mosque compound to Muslim worshipers.
The cleric, who
is currently heading the Higher Islamic Council in Occupied Jerusalem al-Quds,
warned on Monday that the Palestinian people and the Department of Islamic
Endowments in al-Quds would not allow the closure to happen.
The occupation
is using the pandemic as a flimsy pretext to escalate the situation at al-Aqsa,
carry out its plans, take the mosque’s affairs off the hands of the Islamic
Awqaf and shut it down, the preacher said.
He expressed
regret that the mosque is no more a priority or has no spot on the agenda of
the Arabs and Muslims, saying their “compass has deviated from Jerusalem
al-Quds.”
Israeli forces
raided the house of Sheikh Sabri in April.
Soldiers
accompanied by intelligence officers broke into the residence in al-Suwana neighborhood.
“Israel should
not be allowed to take advantage of the coronavirus pandemic and attempt to
impose new restrictions on al-Aqsa Mosque,” the al-Aqsa preacher said at the
time.
The mosque
compound, which has remained closed for several months due to COVID-19, sits
just above the Western Wall plaza and houses both the Dome of the Rock and the
al-Aqsa Mosque.
According to an
agreement signed between Israel and the Jordanian government after Israel’s
occupation of East Jerusalem al-Quds in 1967, non-Muslim worship at the
compound is prohibited. However, Israeli settlers and lawmakers frequently
violate the agreement, storm the compound and observe their religious rituals
there.
Last month,
Sabri denounced desperate attempts by a number of Arab states to normalize
diplomatic relations with Israel, warning that such measures would encourage
the Tel Aviv regime to further press ahead with its criminal acts of aggression
against the Palestinian nation.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633535/Israel-COVID-19-Aqsa
--------
Iran’s Judiciary
Chief Condemns Sacrilege of Holy Quran, Islam Prophet
Sep 07, 2020
Rayeesi made the
remarks, addressing the Judiciary officials in Tehran on Monday.
He expressed
regret and condemned sacrilege of Islamic sanctities in certain European states
concurrent with the UAE’s normalization of ties with Israel, and said, “They
are part of a precise scenario compiled in a thinking chamber."
Rayeesi warned
that the West and Israel want to damage Islam’s power and might in the world,
saying that such devilish acts will instead increase public hate for their
plotters.
He said that
sacrilege of the holy Quran is insult to all divine books and blasphemy against
Islam’s Prophet (PBUH) is insult to all prophets (PBUH) and mankind.
During an
illegal gathering on August 28, supporters of right-wing Danish politician
Rasmus Paludan, who leads the anti-Islamic group, Tight Direction (Stram Kurs),
burned a copy of Holy Qur’an in the Southern Swedish city of Malmo.
Also, on
September 1, the ill-reputed French Magazine Charlie Hebdo also republished
blasphemous cartoons of the Prophet of Islam on the eve of the trial of
suspects in a deadly attack on the paper’s office five years ago.
Iranian Foreign
Ministry Spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh strongly condemned the insult to Prophet
Mohammad (PBUH) by the ill-reputed French Magazine Charlie Hebdo, stressing
that the move has injured the feelings of all Muslims in the world.
https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990617000985
--------
Spokesman:
G4+1’s Violation of Resolution 2231 to End Iran’s Partnership in N. Deal
Sep 07, 2020
“If any side
wants to violate the resolution 2231 or its undertakings based on the nuclear
deal one way or another, Iran’s response will be appropriate,” Khatibzadeh
said.
“Iran has
clearly stated that violation of the resolution 2231 by the nuclear deal
members means end of Iran’s presence in the nuclear deal and they are aware of
it and certainly will not play with the last chances for keeping the nuclear
deal alive,” he added.
US President
Donald Trump, a stern critic of the historic deal, unilaterally pulled
Washington out of the JCPOA in May 2018, and unleashed the “toughest ever”
sanctions against the Islamic Republic in defiance of global criticism in an attempt
to strangle the Iranian oil trade, but to no avail since its "so-called
maximum pressure policy" has failed to push Tehran to the negotiating
table.
In response to
the US’ unilateral move, Tehran has so far rowed back on its nuclear
commitments four times in compliance with Articles 26 and 36 of the JCPOA, but
stressed that its retaliatory measures will be reversible as soon as Europe
finds practical ways to shield the mutual trade from the US sanctions.
Tehran has
particularly been disappointed with failure of the three European signatories
to the JCPOA -- Britain, France and Germany -- to protect its business
interests under the deal after the United States' withdrawal.
On January 5,
Iran took a final step in reducing its commitments, and said it would no longer
observe any operational limitations on its nuclear industry, whether concerning
the capacity and level of uranium enrichment, the volume of stockpiled uranium
or research and development.
Now the US has
stepped up attempts aimed at extending the UN arms ban on Iran that is set to
expire as part of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), which has
been endorsed by Security Council Resolution 2231.
The US first
sought to extend the Iran's arms embargo in a fresh UNSC resolution in contradiction
to the contents of the Resolution 2231 in two attempts within a month, but
failed.
The United
Nations Security Council resoundingly rejected last month the second US bid to
extend an arms embargo on Iran, which is due to expire in October.
The resolution
needed support from nine of 15 votes to pass. Eleven members abstained,
including France, Germany and Britain, while the US and the Dominican Republic
were the only “yes” votes.
The United
States has become isolated over Iran at the Security Council following
President Donald Trump’s withdrawal from the multilateral Iran nuclear deal
2018.
Iran had said
that the US resolution would fail to gain the required support at the Security
Council, pointing out that Washington has no legal right to invoke a snapback
mechanism to reinstate sanctions against Tehran under the 2015 nuclear deal
that the US unilaterally left in May 2018.
In relevant
remarks in August, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said it is by
no means justifiable for the US to use Dispute Resolution Mechanism with regard
to UNSC Resolution 2231.
"US
recourse to Dispute Resolution Mechanism in 2231 has NO LEG TO STAND ON,"
Zarif wrote on his Twitter page late Sunday.
"AmbJohnBolton
has repeated today what he said on May 8, 2018, while National Security Advisor
in the Trump administration," he noted, adding, "At least he is
consistent—a trait notably absent in this US administration."
Zarif' tweet
came in reaction to former US National Security Advisor John Bolton's article
in Wall Street Journal where he criticized US' decision to trigger ‘snapback
mechanism’ against Iran, saying, "The agreement [Joint Comprehensive Plan
of Action]’s backers argue that Washington, having withdrawn from the deal, has
no standing to invoke its provisions. They’re right. It’s too cute by half to
say we’re in the nuclear deal for purposes we want but not for those we
don’t."
https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990617000873
--------
UAE Dissidents
Association Opposes Inauguration of Israel’s Embassy
Sep 07, 2020
The association
named in Arabic ‘al-Rabetat al-Emaratiyat Le Moqavemat al-Tatbi’e’ voiced deep
regret about the decision to set up an Israeli mission in the UAE in the next
few months.
“This measure is
like stabbing the Palestinian nation in the back, a nation which is suffering
the Zionist regime’s non-stop violation of laws and attacks,” a statement by
the association said.
‘Al-Rabetat
al-Emaratiyat Le Moqavemat al-Tatbi’e’ was founded in August by several
prominent UAE dissident figures, including Saeed Nasser al-Taniji, Saeed Khadim
bin Touq al-Mari, Ahmad al-Shaybah, Hamid Abdullah al-Nuaymi, Hamad Mohammed
al-Shamesi and Ibrahim Mahmoud Al-e Haram.
The association
is a civil institute which opposes normalization of ties with Israel in all
forms, including in economic, sports, security, political and social fields.
In a statement,
founders of the association have described the UAE’s attempts to normalize
relations with Israel as “betrayal”.
US President
Donald Trump on August 13, announced a deal brokered by his government between
Israel and the UAE which he said would lead to full normalization of ties
between the two.
Critics see the
deal as the latest attempt by Trump to save his presidential campaign against
the Democrat Joe Biden.
Palestinians
have reacted with shock and dismay after Trump unveiled an agreement between
the United Arab Emirates and Israel to normalize ties.
The deal pledges
full normalisation of relationships between the two countries in the areas of
security, tourism, technology and trade in return for suspending Israel's
annexation plans in the West Bank.
Both the
Palestinian leadership and public were caught by surprise when the announcement
came.
"We
absolutely had no prior knowledge of this agreement," Ahmed Majdalani, the
Palestinian Authority's (PA) minister of social affairs, told Al-Jazeera,
adding, "The timing and speed of reaching this agreement were surprising,
especially that it came at a critical moment in the Palestinian struggle."
Former PA
minister Munib al-Masri noted Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, who ruled Abu
Dhabi for more than 30 years before his death in 2004, had always been a strong
supporter of the Palestinians.
"The late
Sheikh Zayed was a dear brother to me, I knew how much he was proud of his
support for Palestine… I never imagined that in my lifetime I would see the day
in which the UAE would simply sell the Palestinians out for the sake of
normalisation," al-Masri said, noting, "It's very shameful. I can't
believe it until now."
Other Palestinian
officials announced though the news came abruptly, it was not much of a
surprise.
"We were
not surprised that much because the Emirati army was never on the borders ready
to fight Israel," said Mustafa al-Barghouti, leader of the Palestinian
National Initiative and member of the PA parliament.
"We've been
seeing recent strange moves by the UAE such as sending direct flights to
Israel, and there were leaks of secret accords between the two in terms of
scientific and economic cooperation. It is clear that these were preliminary
steps to absorb yesterday's shock," he added.
The PA and all
Palestinian factions, including Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, issued official
statements denouncing the UAE-Israel agreement. Palestinian leaders who spoke
to Al-Jazeera called it a "stab in the back".
"We already
knew that there has been normalisation going under the table, but to formalise
and legalise it that way at this critical moment is shocking. It's a stab in
our back and the back of all Arab nations," stated Majida al-Masri, former
PA minister of social affairs.
Al-Barghouti
emphasized the deal "doesn't introduce any change or progress, it's far
from being genuine peace".
"This is an
attempt to enforce the 'Deal of the Century' that aims to liquidate Palestinian
national rights, it represents a denial of Palestinian, Arab and Islamic
rights," he continued.
Palestinian
leaders stated the deal was "a free gift to Israel" and was made to
help the re-election of Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
"The UAE's
position, in terms of its timing and essence, can only be understood as giving
Israel leverage for free," said Wasel Abu Yousef, member of the PLO's
Executive Committee and leader of the Palestine Liberation Front, adding,
"There's no reasonable justification for it except that it gives more
power to the occupation and increases its crimes against the
Palestinians."
https://en.farsnews.ir/newstext.aspx?nn=13990617000640
--------
Turkey gives
Daesh terrorist 40 life terms for 2017 Istanbul nightclub massacre
08 September
2020
A Turkish court
has sentenced to life the main suspect in the 2017 New Year’s Eve attack by the
Daesh Takfiri terrorist group on a nightclub in the city of Istanbul.
On Monday,
Istanbul’s Heavy Penal Court No. 27 gave Abdulkadir Masharipov, an Uzbek
national, the equivalent of 40 life sentences without parole for violating the
Constitution and deliberately killing 39 people, including a police officer.
It also
sentenced Masharipov to a total of 1,368 years for carrying an unlicensed
weapon and the attempted murder of 79 people who escaped the assault with
injuries.
The same
tribunal further sentenced Ilyas Mamasaripov, one of the planners of the
attack, to 1,432 years in prison for assisting the murders and attempted
murders, among other offenses.
It said 48 other
defendants were sentenced to jail terms of varying lengths for membership in a
terrorist organization,while eleven other defendants were acquitted of charges.
Early on January
1, 2017, Masharipov opened fire with an automatic rifle at Istanbul’s Reina
nightclub, where hundreds were partying to celebrate the New Year. He threw
stun grenades to allow himself to reload and shoot the wounded on the ground.
Among those
killed were 12 Turkish nationals and 27 foreigners.
Daesh claimed
responsibility for the attack at the time, saying it was an act of revenge for
Turkey’s military involvement in Syria.
Turkish police
arrested Masharipov at a Daesh hideout in Istanbul after a 17-day manhunt,
saying he had acted on the terror outfit’s behalf.
He initially
admitted guilt for the attack, but later pleaded innocent and disputed the
evidence against him.
In his final
words of defense on Monday, Masharipov asked to be acquitted, saying his
initial testimonies had been taken under “torture and pressure.” He is expected
to appeal his conviction.
The indictment
included requests from the families of the 39 victims as well as 122 others
injured or mentally affected by the attack.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/08/633588/Turkey-court-Istanbul-Daesh-2017-attack
--------
Jordan slams
continued Israeli violations against al-Aqsa Mosque complex
07 September
2020
Jordan has
strongly condemned the ongoing Israeli violations against the al-Aqsa Mosque
compound in the occupied Old City of Jerusalem al-Quds, the latest of which are
the installation of loudspeakers by Israeli police on the walls of the sacred
site and the arrest of employees of the Religious Endowments Authority.
Dhaifullah
al-Fayez, a spokesman for Jordan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates,
said in a statement on Monday that Israeli police actions are a violation of
the legal and historical status quo of the religious site.
“The police
actions are irresponsible tampering, unacceptable and constitute a provocation
to the feelings of Muslims around the world and a flagrant violation of
Israel's obligations as the occupying power under the international law,” the
statement noted.
Fayez then
warned against the dire consequences of the Israeli regime’s continued abuses,
calling for an end to such practices and respect for the historical and legal
status quo of al-Aqsa Mosque.
He emphasized
that al-Aqsa Mosque entirely belongs to Muslims, and that the Jordan-run
Religious Endowments Authority in Jerusalem al-Quds is the exclusive authority
responsible for the mosque’s affairs.
Fayez called on
the international community to pressure Israel to stop its violations, which
run against the long-standing status quo of al-Aqsa Mosque as well as the
international law.
He noted that
the Jordanian foreign ministry has demanded that Israel, as the occupying
power, refrain from such violations and provocations, and respect the mandate
of the Jordan-run authority responsible for overseeing the al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
On Sunday,
Jordanian Minister of Endowment, Islamic Affairs and Holy Places Mohammed Ahmed
al-Khalayleh denounced repeated attacks by Israeli military forces against the
employees of the Religious Endowments Authority in Jerusalem al-Quds, and their
constant summons for investigation.
Khalayleh stated
that such bids are meant to intimidate the staff and seek to kill their
devotion to work for the sacred al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
Palestinians
have repeatedly warned of Israeli attempts to change the status quo of the
al-Aqsa Mosque compound. Al-Aqsa Mosque is the third holiest site in Islam.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633556/Jordan-slams-continued-Israeli-assaults-on-al-Aqsa-Mosque-complex,-employees
--------
EU warns Kosovo,
Serbia over Jerusalem al-Quds embassy move
07 September
2020
The European
Union has warned Serbia and Kosovo over their recent decision to relocate their
embassies in the occupied Palestinian territories from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem
al-Quds, stressing that the move could undermine the two countries’ hopes to
join the bloc.
“There is no EU
member state with an embassy in Jerusalem [al-Quds],” the spokesperson for EU
Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Peter Stano said at a news conference in
the Belgian capital of Brussels on Monday.
“Any diplomatic
steps that could call into question the EU’s common position on Jerusalem
[al-Quds] are a matter of serious concern and regret.”
The EU is still
committed to the so-called "two-state solution" to end the
decades-long Israeli-Palestinian conflict, he said, adding that the bloc
expects prospective members, specifically Serbia, to “align progressively” with
its foreign policy positions.
Stano further
said that “since Kosovo and Serbia identified EU accession or EU integration as
their strategic priority, the EU expects both to act in line with this
commitment, so the European perspective is not undermined.”
The development
comes as Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and Kosovo Prime Minister Avdullah
Hoti are to meet in Brussels for a second round of EU-brokered face-to-face
talks to resolve disputes two decades after they went through a bloody war.
The two sides
have been in EU-led talks for a decade to normalize their relationship, but
little progress has been made.
Relations
between Kosovo and Serbia took a turn for the worse when negotiations over an
exchange of territory and border changes collapsed in 2018.
In an unexpected
move on Friday, US President Donald Trump announced that Washington had
brokered an agreement between Serbia and Kosovo to normalize economic ties.
The announcement
surprised the Europeans, who are leading complex talks between the two
countries on improving their long-strained relations.
From the deal,
however, came out two unexpected decisions too. Serbia said that it would
relocate its embassy from Tel Aviv to occupied Jerusalem al-Quds, some three
years after Washington, in a highly provocative move, recognized the city as
Israel’s “capital.”
Majority-Muslim
Kosovo, for its part, vowed that it would recognize the occupying regime,
adding that it would also set up its diplomatic mission in Jerusalem al-Quds
after earning Israel’s recognition.
The move comes
as Kosovo desperately seeks to further legitimize its declaration of
independence and statehood.
Kosovo declared
independence from Serbia in 2008, after fighting a war in 1998-1999 that ended
with a NATO intervention. Serbia, which refuses to accept its former southern
province as an independent state, has so far blocked it from joining the United
Nations and other international bodies.
Kosovo is,
however, recognized by many countries as an independent state, including the
United States and most members of the EU.
Last month, the
US president also brokered an agreement between Israel and the United Arab
Emirates that would lead to a full normalization of diplomatic relations
between the two sides.
The highly
controversial deal between Abu Dhabi and Tel Aviv has been widely condemned
across the occupied Palestinian territories and the Muslim world.
The deal comes
in the face of United Nations Security
Council Resolution 478, adopted on August 20, 1980, which prohibits countries
from establishing diplomatic missions in Jerusalem al-Quds.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633552/EU-Kosovo-Serbia-embassy-Jerusalem-al-Quds-talks-diplomatic-ties
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Israel plans to
construct almost 5,000 new settler units in occupied West Bank
07 September
2020
Israeli
officials are planning to construct thousands of more settler units in the West
Bank irrespective of an international outcry against the Tel Aviv regime’s
settlement expansion policies and its contentious plans to annex large parts of
the occupied Palestinian territories.
The Israeli
minister of military affairs and alternate prime minister, Benny Gantz, is
reportedly seeking to approve the construction of some 5,000 new settler units,
after more than six months during which such construction has been frozen,
Israel's Channel 12 television network reported.
According to the
report, which did not cite any sources, Gantz intends to convene the so-called
Civil Administration Planning Committee next week to approve the construction.
Gantz has
reportedly sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office with a
request to assemble the committee.
The move is seen
as a potential maneuver by the 61-year-old leader of the centrist Blue and
White party to strengthen ties with settler leaders, who are currently fuming
at Netanyahu, who purportedly suspended annexation plans and opted instead to
normalize ties with the United Arab Emirates last month.
Israel and the
UAE agreed to a US-brokered deal to normalize relations on August 13. Under the
agreement, the Tel Aviv regime has purportedly agreed to
"temporarily" suspend applying its own rule to further areas in the
occupied West Bank and the strategic Jordan Valley that Netanyahu had pledged
to annex.
While Emirati
officials have described the normalization deal with the Tel Aviv regime as a
successful means to stave off annexation and save the so-called two-state
solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Israeli leaders have lined up to
reject the bluff of Abu Dhabi's crown prince and de facto ruler of the UAE,
Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, that Israel's annexation plans were off
the table.
Netanyahu has
underlined that annexation is not off the table, but has simply been delayed.
The Palestinians
have vehemently censured the UAE-Israel peace deal, which runs counter to a
long-standing Arab consensus that any normalization of ties with the Tel Aviv
regime has to come in the context of the settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian
conflict and the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state.
They say the
UAE, as an important Arab player in the region, has stabbed fellow Palestinians
in the back.
Israeli settler
runs over, injures Palestinian child
Separately, a
Palestinian child sustained moderate injuries after an Israeli settler ran him
over in the southern part of the West Bank.
Palestinian
sources said the victim was struck near Kiryat Arba settlement on the outskirts
of al-Khalil, located 30 kilometers (19 miles) south of Jerusalem al-Quds, on
Sunday evening. The Israeli driver fled the scene after the incident.
The sources
added that Palestinian medical teams provided first aid to the injured child
before taking him to hospital for further treatment.
There have been
a series of “hit-and-run” incidents targeting Palestinians in different parts
of the West Bank over recent months, with most of them going uninvestigated by
Israeli authorities. Some of such events have resulted in fatalities.
More than
600,000 Israelis live in over 230 settlements built since the 1967 Israeli
occupation of Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem
al-Quds. All Israeli settlements are illegal under international law.
The UN Security
Council has condemned Israel’s settlement activities in the occupied
Palestinian territories in several resolutions.
Palestinians
want the West Bank as part of a future independent Palestinian state with East
Jerusalem al-Quds as its capital.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633527/Israel-plans-to-okay-almost-5,000-new-settler-homes-in-occupied-West-Bank-
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Southeast Asia
To help Uighur
Muslims, Switzerland should negotiate China trade pact, says NGO
07 September
2020
Switzerland
should renegotiate its six-year-old free trade agreement with China to bolster
human rights protections for its Uighur Muslim minority, the Society for
Threatened Peoples activist group said on Monday.
The demand to
the Swiss government comes as France, the US and others also pressure China
over the treatment of Uighurs in its far western Xinjiang region, as well as a
Hong Kong security law that some contend infringes on rights in the former
British colony.
UN experts and
activists say at least a million ethnic Uighurs and other Muslims are held in
detention centers in Xinjiang.
China calls them
training centers helping to halt terrorism and extremism and teaching new
skills.
“The current
free trade agreement between Switzerland and China does too little to prevent
forced labor products from reaching Switzerland and even receiving tariff concessions,”
the Germany-based Society for Threatened Peoples said in a statement with other
groups, including the Uighur Association Switzerland.
Switzerland
exported 21.4 billion Swiss francs ($23.41 billion) in goods to China in 2019,
while importing goods worth 15.1 billion francs from China, official data show.
Switzerland
struck its pact with China in 2014, saving Swiss companies and counterparts
potentially hundreds of millions of dollars annually.
The Swiss State
Secretariat for Economic Affairs said there were already mechanisms to address
concerns like those being raised, without the pact being overhauled.
“The Free Trade
Agreement Switzerland-China already has several indirect references to human
rights, so a revision is not necessary,” it said in a statement. “Human rights
initiatives that have a link to the free trade agreement can be brought up in
the agreement’s mixed committee.”
In a media
interview a month ago, Swiss Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis acknowledged
“rising human rights violations” in China and said “if China abandons the ‘one
country, two systems’ principle in Hong Kong, it will affect Swiss companies
invested there.”
The Chinese
consulate in Switzerland did not respond to an email.
China’s
treatment of Uighurs and the Hong Kong security law may be discussed at the
United Nations Human Rights Council regular session that opens Sept. 14.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/07/To-help-Uighur-Muslims-Switzerland-should-negotiate-China-trade-pact-says-NGO
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Sarawak NGOs
want authorities to investigate Pasir Puteh MP over Bible remark
Monday, 07 Sep
2020
KUCHING, Sept 7
— Five local non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have asked the authorities
to investigate Pasir Puteh MP Nik Muhammad Zawawi Nik Salleh over his remark in
Parliament alleging that the Bible was distorted when debating the Road
Transport (Amendment) Bill 2020.
The five NGOs —
Persatuan Adat Asal Bidoyoh, Sarawak Dayak Iban Associaition (Sadia), YATT
Society, Dayak Bukit Kelingkang and Sarawak Association for Peoples’ Aspiration
(Sapa) – made this call after lodging a police report against the Parti Islam
SeMalaysia (PAS) MP at Mile 7 Police Station here today.
The NGOs
demanded the authorities to conduct a proper investigation into the case and
and prevent any person, especially political leaders to harp on religious
sentiments.
Persatuan Adat
Asal Bidoyoh secretary Alim Mideh opined the Pasir Puteh MP was a “big
disgrace” to the Parliament and unfit to be an MP when he said that the
Christians had no right to be offended by his statement, as what he had said
was not an accusation, but a fact.
Alim said
besides demanding for Nik Muhammad Zawawi to apologise and withdraw his
unqualified statements, his association members also demanded Chief Minister
Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg to ban Nik Mohammad from entering
Sarawak.
Sadia secretary
general Nicholas Mujah said the Pasir Puteh MP should not have spoken the way
he had spoken because even among the Iban community, there were Christians,
Muslims and Buddhists living together.
He said the
Pasir Puteh MP’s statement had caused a great concern to the Iban community
because the community did not want to incite their own brothers and sisters in
Sarawak and people from Peninsular Malaysia to hate one another.
“To us, we hope
that the particular parliamentarian must at least show his respect and retract
his statement. I think that is just good enough for the Iban community,” he
added.
YATT Society
representative Freedy Misid said the Pasir Puteh MP’s remark had really hurt
many Christians in Sarawak who made up about 70 per cent of the non-Muslim
population in the state.
“We from YATT,
and I believe most Sarawakians, regardless of any faith and religion, we are
not condoning this kind of issue that was brought up by Pasir Puteh MP from
PAS,” he said.
Dayak Bukit
Kelingkang co-founder Lawrance Clement said his members, which comprised of
Christians, Muslims and other faith were very angry with the Pasir Puteh MP’s
remark and hoped that it would be stopped.
Meanwhile, Sapa
president Dominique Ng believed that Nik Muhammad Zawawi should not be
protected under the parliamentary privilege at all especially when he touched
on religious freedom and sensitivity.
He said
protection should not be accorded to him even if he is an MP, because he must
respect the law and all religions.
“Some more that
statement coming from him came out of nowhere. It wasn’t that somebody was
attacking Islam or somebody was making comments that were inappropriate that he
had to come to that response.
“It was
something in connection with drunk driving. So, it is an uncalled for statement
and what he had said has no place in Sarawak.
“So, it is an
insult not only to the Christian faith, it is an insult to all other faiths.
I’m a practicing Buddhist and I am here to support because what he said was out
of the line,” Ng stressed. — Borneo Post
https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/09/07/sarawak-ngos-want-authorities-to-investigate-pasir-puteh-mp-over-bible-rema/1900960
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Sabah has five
potential chief ministers, but pundits see only a straight fight — Musa Aman vs
Shafie Apdal
08 Sep 2020
BY JULIA CHAN
KOTA KINABALU,
Sept 8 — As newcomer Parti Pribumi Bersatu Malaysia (PPBM) wrestles Umno to
take on Warisan president Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal in the upcoming Sabah
election, political analysts say there is only one real challenger who poses a
major threat for the chief minister post — Tan Sri Musa Aman.
Musa was the
sole Umno representative to retain a state seat in the election two years ago
while PPBM is now working against its 2018 polls partner Pakatan Harapan (PH).
“I think at the
end of the day, it has to be a Musa versus Shafie fight to see any real fight.
“Like it or not,
Musa is the most viable candidate to go up against Shafie and any other fight
won’t be as meaningful,” Singapore Institute of International Affairs senior
fellow Oh Ei Sun told Malay Mail when contacted.
But the battle
to lead Sabah could result in a dark horse winner. Old friendships and even
familial ties are being tested.
State Umno
chairman Datuk Bung Moktar Radin is being pushed to the fore by federal party
leaders based in Kuala Lumpur while PPBM wants its Sabah liaison chief Datuk
Hajiji Noor. However, the two parties are expected to nominate only one
candidate as the next Sabah CM.
Musa’s younger
brother Datuk Seri Anifah Aman who was formerly with Umno is now leading Parti
Cinta Sabah (PCS) and a local alliance front to take over the state government.
Anifah has publicly asked Musa to step aside for younger leaders.
Malay Mail spoke
with several political analysts who weighed in on the pros and cons of the top
five potential contenders to be Sabah chief minister.
Datuk Seri
Shafie Apdal
The Warisan Plus
caretaker government is clear in its leadership. Shafie will be leading the
coalition which consists of Parti Warisan Sabah, PH’s PKR, DAP and Amanah and
Sabah’s United Progressive Kinabalu Organisation (Upko).
Pundits differ
on Shafie’s capability but they agreed that in a crowded playing field, he has
the advantage.
University
Malaysia Sarawak’s Arnold Puyok believes that Shafie, despite having the
experience, personal and public persona and a strong grassroots, is unable to
carry out the state’s aspirations as a leader.
“He hasn’t been
able to show that he has the leadership to initiate real reforms in the
economy/state administration,” Puyok told Malay Mail.
Oh said that
Shafie has competency, but faced a lot of challenges that he could not see
through.
“He is competent
but faced a lot of changes in his term so far. His mandate has been cut short.
He should have a full term to demonstrate his abilities,” said Oh.
“Economically
speaking — there is only so much he can do in this worldwide economic downturn
and pandemic. Whoever is in government would have faced challenges in
developing the state during this time. In that regard, he’s been holding up.
He’s generally considered competent. No one saying he’s incompetent. That’s not
in question,” he said.
Oh said that
Shafie has also done well to promote a multi-racial Sabah with policies that
favour all the races.
He also noted
that while Shafie has the support of the urban Kadazan, Dusun and Murut (KDM)
Momogun communities, those same ethnicities spread out in Sabah’s interior may
be divided.
KDM is a
political and cultural term used to describe several indigenous groups, which
are sometimes lumped as non-Muslim Bumiputera communities.
“Carefully
engineered racial insinuations are played up against Shafie and his party —
they are touted as pirates or Suluk, so this is something he has to struggle
against where PBS and STAR have long history with the KDM,” Oh said, referring
to two local based parties, Parti Bersatu Sabah led by Datuk Seri Maximus
Ongkili, and Parti Solidariti Tanah Air led by Datuk Jeffrey Kitingan
respectively.
Tan Sri Musa
Aman
Musa was the
longest serving chief minister of Sabah for 15 years right up to Election 2018.
The sole assemblyman for Umno until the dissolution of the Sabah assembly, he
was depicted in the brief years prior as ailing and hiding out in London while
other Umno assemblymen left to join PPBM following GE14.
Musa’s fall from
grace and subsequent recovery has been remarkable. Initially struck with 46
corruption court charges, which has since been dropped under the new Perikatan
Nasional federal government, he has seemingly made a full recovery — albeit
still wielding a walking stick — so much so that all the initial Umno
defectors, PPBM assemblymen and two other state lawmakers from PKR and DAP
supported his bid to topple the Warisan state government.
“Musa has more
Umno grassroots support and political and other resources, if compared to Bung.
Put side by side, Musa has got a higher chance of winning. Some Sabahans might
want him back because he is more familiar, with name recognition,” said Oh.
Puyok said that
Musa, even with a chequered history, has the experience, track record and
commands respect among the state representatives.
“He may have
difficulty expressing himself and his ideas but some have soft spot for him
because he is more decisive and has the ability to ‘monetise opportunities’ for
Sabah's economy,” he said.
Umno is also
touted to have better election machinery, evident from its victory during the
Kimanis by election earlier this year. In comparison, PPBM might have to give
way, despite technically having a bigger number of incumbents.
Datuk Bung Moktar
Radin
Infamous for his
parliamentary antics, Bung has strong grassroots support in his east coast and
interior district of Kinabatangan. He has earned the favour of the national
leadership for his loyalty when all other elected representatives deserted Umno
for PPBM in late 2018.
He was named
state Umno chairman and the party here was granted autonomy to groom a new
generation of younger leaders.
“Bung has
experience at the federal level, he networks with federal leaders so that’s
something in his favour.
But both
analysts say that despite his following, he may not have the leadership to
carry out the responsibilities of the chief minister post.
“He may be a
good grassroots leader but lacks the temperament to be in the driver's seat,”
said Puyok.
Oh said that
Bung was more of an entertainer in Parliament with his antics and tendency for
jokes.
“He is more
known as a clown. How to take someone like that seriously?” he said.
Datuk Hajiji
Mohd Noor
The Sulaman
incumbent generally flies under the radar but has a sizeable following among
the Bajau community.
In Musa’s
absence, he has rallied the former Umno assemblymen and together joined PPBM
and was named its state liaison chief. Likeable and with few black marks
against him, he is seen as capable, but less as a leader on a bigger stage.
“He may have a
lot of experience in state politics and understand the inner working of the
Sabah civil service but he doesn’t have the pull factor to enable him to gain
the trust and support among various groups,” said Puyok.
More to the
point, PPBM in Sabah does not have a strong grassroots given that they are
almost all former Umno representatives who won on Umno tickets and benefited
from its well oiled machinery.
“If it’s a match
between Hajiji’s PPBM vs Umno machinery, then PPBM is no match. If PPBM has no
political capital to go against Umno, they will be wiped out in a one on one.
But now they are up against Warisan as well, PPBM won’t stand a chance,” said
Oh.
He said that in
a match for a candidate, PPBM might eventually have to give in. There’s no way
most of them can win back their seat that they won on Umno ticket,” he said.
“Hajiji may be a
good grassroots leader, but he will make a mediocre CM,” he said.
Datuk Seri Anifah
Aman
The latest
contender and a former Umno federal minister, Anifah has been charting his own
political career for some time now, focusing on state rights and even getting
together with Opposition leaders with the same agenda during his time under the
Barisan Nastional government.
After being
among the first Sabah leaders to leave Umno in September 2018, Anifah has
remained partyless until recently when he took control of the little known
Parti Cinta Sabah and announced grand plans to take over the state government.
A four-term MP
for Kimanis, and a former federal foreign minister, Anifah has political
resources and a political pedigree with moderate views and eloquence.
“But apart from
his experience, what difference can he make? What alternative ideas and plans
does he have for Sabah? He is a strong advocate of MA63 but others like Jeffrey
Kitingan, Yong Teck Lee, etc have long fought for the same issue,” said Puyok.
“It remains hard
to see how he stands in the Sabah political arena against Warisan and PH
because he’s been in national politics all this while,” said Oh.
“He’s likely to
win his seat but beyond that, I cannot see how his party will stack up.
Oh said that
both Aman brothers, while similar in their leanings, have genuinely different
approaches.
“If you ask
whether their political journeys now are a ploy, I would say no. They have had
these differences in approaches all this while.
“But if, when it
comes to a tie breaker or a hung assembly on the night of the election, if you
ask whether they will work together to form a coalition government, that’s
definitely possible. But if you’re asking whether it’s a premeditated ploy, I
don’t think so,” he said.
For Oh, leaders
like Shafie and Anifah present a more inclusive brand of politics in a country
where race-based politics are the norm.
“This is not the
usual style in Malaysia, it’s nice to see. I think because of this, they might
get more support from Sabahans,” he said.
Analysts like
Puyok and University Malaysia Sabah’s Lee Kuok Tiung have pointed out that the
contenders so far are familiar faces which should pave the way for younger
leaders.
“All are orang
lama — so it will be a challenge for them to get the support of the relatively
younger segments of the electorates,” said Puyok.
“Why can’t they
go beyond the usual faces? Anyone who has the capability, has the most seats
should be given a chance to lead. Why should it be narrowed to these five?”
said Lee.
https://www.malaymail.com/news/malaysia/2020/09/08/sabah-has-five-potential-chief-ministers-but-pundits-see-only-a-straight-fi/1901203
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Pakistan
Pakistan
drifting away from US towards China: Defence analyst
Sep 7, 2020
ISLAMABAD: Amid
the drastic change in US-Pakistan's relationship, China is the only hope for
Pakistan for economic assistance, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic,
said Ayesha Siddiqa, a defence analyst and South Asian politics scholar.
Speaking during
an interview with The News International, Siddiqa said amid the fast-changing
world dynamics wherein the coalition among the United States, India and Saudi
Arabia gains strength, "Pakistan is drifting away from the US towards a
potential alliance between China, Russia and perhaps Iran."
"The nature
of US-Pakistan relations is changing drastically. Even though it has played a
vital role in the US-Taliban negotiations, no one expects the continuation of
American financial assistance to Pakistan. Islamabad joined the American
alliance against the Taliban after 9/11," Siddiqa said.
"While the
dominant narrative popularised by Islamabad was that it was forced into
alignment, governments stuck to the narrow prism of extracting financial
resources from the US, which also meant delivering reluctantly. The foreign
policy debate in Pakistan is silent about our own responsibility in supporting
the Taliban or keeping Osama bin Laden. Ultimately, the relationship collapsed
at a point of overselling of our capabilities with limited capacity to
deliver," she added.
The US-Pakistan
relation has continued to be on a downhill as the latter has failed to take
strong action against the terrorist groups emanating from its soil.
Due to the
deteriorating ties, Siddiqa said, "China appears to be the only option. It
may be Pakistan's only hope for economic assistance, especially in the
aftermath of the pandemic... In the wake of the fast-changing world dynamics,
as the coalition among the United States, India and Saudi Arabia gains
strength, Pakistan is drifting away from the US towards a potential alliance
between China, Russia and perhaps Iran."
She, however,
noted that there are a lot of issues that still need to be worked out between
these countries and Pakistan can benefit only "if it can do its homework
and go beyond the idea of extracting limited benefits."
"There is
an expectation that Pakistan and Iran will come close as a result of both being
part of BRI, especially if Beijing and Tehran sign an agreement that is being
talked about. Right now, we don't know if the agreement will get signed, but
even if it does, I am not sure that we are domestically talking about the
competition between Iran and Pakistan that will happen naturally. It was there
even when both neighbours were once part of an American alignment," she
said.
She further
stated that Pakistan needs to improve its relations with its neighbours
including India, Iran and Afghanistan.
While commenting
on Pakistan's defence and foreign policy, Siddiqa said, "Pakistan's
defence and foreign policy community lacks independent thinking and diversity
of viewpoints. Over the years, alternative voices have been silenced. I was
talking to a diplomat, who said that during her two postings to the country
between 2016 and now, many people that she would talk to are no longer in the
country. The security community that we have now comprising faculty at the
known public sector universities and think tanks only preach to the choir by
communicating dominant narratives of the establishment back to them through
their reports. It is interesting to note that most of the think tanks are
located on the Grand Trunk Road with little input from other parts of the
country."
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/pakistan-drifting-away-from-us-towards-china-defence-analyst/articleshow/77976902.cms
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Pakistan looking
to diversify cooperation with S. Arabia: Khattak
08 Sep 2020
ISLAMABAD:
Defence Minister Pervez Khattak has said that Pakistan values its ties with
Saudi Arabia and is looking to diversify the cooperation between the two
countries.
Mr Khattak was
talking to Saudi envoy Nawaf bin Saeed Al-Maliky, who had called on him here on
Monday.
“We consider
Saudi Arabia as a confident and a trust-worthy friend and we would like to
continue with the same pace and momentum,” the minister said.
“The scope and
scale of cooperation between the two countries is a very huge; therefore, we
should further diversify our relations,” he added.
The Saudi envoy
has visited several key government figures ever since Foreign Minister Shah
Mehmood Qureshi’s criticism of the Saudi-led Organisation of Islamic
Cooperation created a perception of rift in ties. He had met Mr Qureshi as well
on Sept 1.
Army Chief Gen
Qamar Javed Bajwa had visited Saudi Arabia last month for defence talks. His
visit helped overcome the hiccup in ties.
Mr Al-Maliky
said Saudi Arabia’s relations with Pakistan were based on mutual trust.
He said the
kingdom was deeply committed to working with Pakistan and its people to further
expand these ties.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1578474/pakistan-looking-to-diversify-cooperation-with-s-arabia-khattak
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Pakistan says 5
militants killed in raid near Afghan border
Sep 7, 2020
PESHAWAR:
Pakistan's military says security forces shot and killed a local militant
commander along with four of his associates in a raid on Monday near the border
with Afghanistan.
It identified
the slain commander as Wasim Zakaria and said he was involved in multiple
attacks on security forces. The military said he was also involved in the
killing of Zubaidullah Khan, a federal housing official who was gunned down in
May while visiting his village in North Waziristan to celebrate the Islamic
festival of Eid al-Fitr.
North Waziristan
served as headquarters for local and foreign militants until 2017, when the
army said it had cleared the region of insurgents following several operations.
The region still sees sporadic attacks, mainly targeting security forces.
https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/pakistan/pakistan-says-5-militants-killed-in-raid-near-afghan-border/articleshow/77982000.cms
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KP Assembly
resolution terms report by British MPs a conspiracy
Nisar Mahmood
September 8,
2020
KP Assembly
resolution terms report by British MPs a conspiracy
PESHAWAR: The
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly passed a unanimous resolution on Monday against a
report by parliamentarians from the United Kingdom in favour of Ahmadi
community, terming it a conspiracy against Pakistan and Muslims.
The report
compiled by some members of the British Parliament titled ‘Suffocation of the
faithful’ has blamed Pakistan for the exploitation of Ahmadis and cruelties
against them under the state patronage, but it did not include Pakistan’s
version.
The resolution
moved by Mufti Obaidur Rahman of Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid (PML-Q) and
signed by members from the treasury and opposition reads, “The All-Party
Parliamentary Group has blamed Pakistan for cruelties against Ahmadis under the
state patronage and asked the UK government to make financial assistance to
Pakistan conditional with acceptance of recommendations the report. It also
demanded the government of Pakistan to amend laws in favour of Ahmadis and give
them permission of preaching in the educational institutions, though Pakistan’s
point of view was not included in the report. This House recommends to the
federal government and the Foreign Office to get the report withdrawn from the
UK Parliament so as the conspiracy against Muslims and the sovereignty of
Pakistan could be foiled, and if not rooted out, this conspiracy would not only
hurt the emotions of Muslims all over the world but also would cause beginning
of new fitnah in the country.”
The resolution
also condemned the incidents of discretion of Holy Quran and the publication of
blasphemous sketches in Sweden and France. It said such attempts enjoyed the
government’s patronage, which is tantamount to declaring a war on Muslims.
“The French
president instead of condemnation encouraged the move. This House reiterates that
belief in Khatam-e-Nabuwwat, Namoos-e-Resalat and Ahl-e- Bait is part of our
faith and [we] would sacrifice everything including our lives on it. The
government should strongly lodge a protest with the Swedish and French
government,” the resolution added.
The House also
unanimously adopted a resolution condemning the killing of a minor girl in
Karachi and demanding early arrest of the culprits and awarding them exemplary
punishment.
The resolution,
moved by Riaz Khan of PTI and Sardar Hussain Babak of ANP reads, “A
five-year-old girl belonging to a family from the Buner district was brutally
murdered, her body mutilated and burnt in Karachi, which is extremely an
inhuman act and the federal and Sindh government should take serious steps for
the arrest of culprits and award them a severe punishment.”
The assembly
unanimously passed the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa delimitation of Local Councils
(repeal) Bill, 2020; while the KP Appointment of Law Officers (Amendment) Bill,
2020 and Covid-19 (Prevention of Hoarding) Bill, 2020 were introduced in the
assembly.
Speaker Mushtaq
Ahmad Ghani had to adjourn the session till Tuesday (today) leaving the debate
on discrimination in allocation of development funds as members from the Jamiat
Ulema-e Islam protested against not allowing f Naeema Kishwar to speak on her
amendment to the resolution against UK parliamentarians’ report.
Despite the no
permission by the speaker, she continued speaking and interrupted Sardar
Babak’s speech when he initiated the debate on development funds. Babak and JUI
members also exchanged arguments.
https://www.thenews.com.pk/print/711795-kp-assembly-resolution-terms-report-by-british-mps-a-conspiracy
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‘Mastermind’ of
militant attacks among five killed in North Waziristan
08 Sep 2020
PESHAWAR: The
Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) on Monday confirmed that a mastermind of
militant attacks along with four accomplices had been killed during an
intelligence operation in North Waziristan tribal district on Sunday.
The ISPR said in
a statement that 10 notorious terrorists were also arrested during the
operation near Mirali. It said the deceased terrorist, Waseem Zakeria, was the
mastermind of 30 attacks, including targeted killing of government officials
and security forces personnel.
The ISPR said
Zakeria was also involved in an attack on a military convoy near Hasokhel. He
belonged to the Haider Khel area of Mirali sub-division. “Zakeria was
mastermind of 30 attacks since 2019 and wanted by law enforcers,” said the
statement.
Zakeria was also
believed to be involved in the assassination of Zubaidullah Khan, a CSP officer
of the Federal Information Group, posted as director of the Pakistan Housing
Authority in Islamabad.
Mr Khan was
killed along with two others on the first day of Eid in Mirali in May this
year. Gunmen riding a motorbike killed them when they were coming out of the
mosque after offering Eid prayers.
The killing of
the senior civil officer had raised concerns about the state of security in
once-volatile North Waziristan which has seen an uptick in the number of
attacks on security forces since the Zarb-i-Azb operation in June 2014.
A lawmaker from
the tribal district told the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly last week that 200
people had lost lives to targeted killings since February 2018. There was,
however, no official corroboration or denial of the claim by the lawmaker.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1578454/mastermind-of-militant-attacks-among-five-killed-in-north-waziristan
--------
NA, Senate
sessions slated for next week to get FATF bills passed
Syed Irfan Raza
08 Sep 2020
ISLAMABAD: Prime
Minister Imran Khan on Monday decided to hold fresh sessions of the National
Assembly and the Senate on Sept 14 and 15, respectively, in order to get the
Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and other important bills passed from the
two houses.
The decision to
call the fresh sessions was taken during a meeting between the prime minister
and his adviser on parliamentary affairs Dr Babar Awan at the Prime Minister
House.
Dr Awan called
on the prime minister following the postponement of the Senate and National
Assembly sessions scheduled for Monday.
According to a
press release, various matters of importance came under discussion during the
meeting.
“Now it has been
decided that the fresh session of the National Assembly will be held on Sept 14
at 4pm and that of the Senate on Sept 15 at 10.15am,” Dr Awan told Dawn. He
said FATF-related and other bills would be tabled before the two houses for
fresh legislation.
The PM’s adviser
said he had called a meeting of various ministries on Monday in which he
directed the secretaries concerned to present all pending bills and ordinances
relating to their ministries so that they could be extended by parliament
before they lapsed.
PM discusses
matter with parliamentary affairs aide
Asked why
already convened sessions of the Senate and NA were shelved, the adviser said
they were postponed due to devastation caused by the recent rains across the
country. “Since many of our legislators are engaged in relief work, the
government decided to postpone the sessions.”
According to the
press release, the prime minister and Dr Awan also reviewed the Karachi
Transformation Plan, which was unveiled on Saturday.
Regarding the
FATF-related bills, the PM’s adviser said the government would not allow any
delay in the passage of “bills of national interest”.
In reply to a
question about convening of a joint sitting of parliament to get the
FATF-related bills passed if the opposition opposed them again, he said no date
for the sitting had been decided so far.
Two days ago, Mr
Awan had said the government was considering referring the Anti-Money
Laundering (Second Amendment) Bill and the Islamabad Capital Territory Waqf
Properties Bill — both rejected by the Senate — to the joint sitting of
parliament.
Pakistan Peoples
Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari said last week that he had asked
the government to postpone the National Assembly session due to the uncertainty
caused by the recent rains.
Under the 18th
Amendment, if a bill passed by one house of parliament is rejected by the
other, it can become a law only if it is passed by a joint sitting of the two
houses.
The 104-member
opposition-dominated Senate had rejected the two bills on Aug 25 through a
voice vote after it objected to some of the provisions and linked its
cooperation to retraction of remarks made by Leader of the House Dr Shahzad
Waseem about certain leaders. These bills had been passed by the National
Assembly only the previous day.
A day after
rejection of the two bills, the opposition questioned the legality of the
entire proceedings leading to the voting process and opposed convening of a
joint sitting to resolve the matter.
The opposition
has a thin majority of nine votes in the joint sitting, but the government is
hopeful of getting the two bills passed.
Mr Awan said the
government intended to bring the Anti-Terrorism Amendment (ATA) bill as per the
demand of the opposition in the coming sessions of the two houses.
He said the
government had previously planned to introduce a bill seeking an amendment to
the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) to accommodate some conditions of the
Financial Action Task Force to bring the country out of the grey list.
https://www.dawn.com/news/1578478/na-senate-sessions-slated-for-next-week-to-get-fatf-bills-passed
--------
North America
How an Islamic terror
sheikh ended up selling meth in Orange County
Daniel
Greenfield
September 7,
2020
The end of what
law enforcement had called the most imminent Islamic terrorist plot since Sept.
11 came when Gregory Vernon Patterson left his cell phone behind at a gas
station.
Patterson and
his roommate, Levar Haley Washington, had joined Jamiyyat Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh, a
prison Islamic terror group, and had been conducting a robbery spree to finance
terror plots against the LAX airport, the National Guard and local synagogues
during the High Holidays.
The shotgun
robberies by the organization, whose name means “The Association of True
Islam,” were going well. The gang of criminal jihadis had pulled off 11 gas
station heists in Los Angeles and Orange County to raise funds for their terror
spree before Patterson dropped his phone during a robbery at a gas station in
Torrance. The phone led authorities to the South Central apartment being used
by Patterson and Washington, where they found Bin Laden posters and a target list.
The target list
included LAX, which was convenient because Patterson already worked there.
Washington and
Patterson were busted while trying to rob another gas station in Fullerton.
Patterson told
cops that robbing gas stations was “part of a jihad against the U.S.,
particularly against American oil companies who are stealing from our
countries,” and that he wanted to die for Allah. The gas-station robberies had
been meant to raise money to buy weapons and to provide training for Patterson,
who had no criminal record, in how to be a terrorist.
Patterson and
Hammad Riaz Samana, a Pakistani, had all attended the Jamaat-E-Masijudal
mosque, where Washington had recruited the black convert and the Pakistani
Muslim. The two terrorists swore allegiance to Washington and the shotgun
robberies of gas stations began.
Washington, a
former Crip, had done time in Folsom State Prison where he found a copy of the
Koran, began calling himself Abdur Rahman and was recruited by a terror
mastermind.
There were two
unique things about the 2005 terror plot. As Daniel Pipes pointed out at the
time, it was the first “large-scale” terror plot organized by Americans, not
Muslim immigrants.
But it was also
the first Islamic terror plot in America that was organized from prison.
Kevin Lamarr
James, a Crips gang member, had been sent away for a decade for a robbery in
1996. A member of the Nation of Islam, James made the same journey as Malcolm X
and many other black Muslims, away from the racist black nationalist UFO cult
and to mainstream Islam.
On one hand, he
had gotten a tattoo of Allah and on the other, the star and crescent of Islam.
The charismatic
James created Jamiyyat Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh or JIS to spread true Islam, recruit
prisoners and set off a wave of Islamic terrorist atrocities against American
targets in California.
Members were
told to swear an oath of secrecy and to wage war on infidels, especially Jews.
In prison, they practiced Arabic, studied Islamic theology and trained in
martial arts. Out of prison, they were told to blend into society and build the
Caliphate in America through jihad.
By the time the
robberies began, a jihadist group had been secretly operating in Folsom Prison
for nearly a decade and was about to make the leap to carrying out attacks on
the outside.
One of their
target dates for a terror attack was the fourth anniversary of Sept. 11.
“This incident
is the first in a series of incidents to come in a plight to defend and
propagate traditional Islam in its purity,” James, who had changed his name to
Ahmed Binyamin Alasiri, allegedly declared in a press release for the attacks.
“We are not
extremists, radicals, or terrorists. We are only servants of Allah.”
But James hadn’t
picked the best servants for his deity. When Patterson left behind his phone,
the authorities followed the trail right back to Folsom Prison and JIS’s
mastermind.
The four-man
cell was charged with levying war against the United States.
But James was
the one with the brains. While Washington, his patsy, was slapped with a 22-year
prison sentence, his “sheikh,” who had built an entire terror group in prison,
denied everything and then claimed that he suffered from a really bad
childhood.
“Your honor, I’m
thoroughly embarrassed and appalled by my actions. I don’t even recognize who I
was three years ago. Never before in my life before meeting these people, did I
believe in violence or targeting innocent civilians,” the terror sheikh gushed.
Judge Cormac
Carney, who would later illegally declare the death penalty to be
unconstitutional, called James’ missive “the most powerful letter I’ve ever
received.”
The naive judge
was also impressed by all of James’s prison college classes, and his evolution
and repentance, and described him as a victim from a disadvantaged background.
In the portion
of James’s letter that Judge Carney read out loud in court, the terror
mastermind vowed that “my country need never fear from me again.”
That was in
2009.
He was freed in
September 2019. And in August 2020, he was busted for selling meth.
James, now living
in Orange County and officially being called Ahmed Binyamin Alasiri, had been
selling nearly pure methamphetamine for thousands of dollars.
And all of this
was going on while James was on supervised release.
The FBI had
called the terror plot by Jamiyyat Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh “probably the one that
operationally was closest to actually occurring.”
“Americans
watched so-called ‘home-grown’ terrorists unleash multiple bombings in the city
of London. Some in this country may have mistakenly believed that it could not
happen here. Today we have chilling evidence that it is possible,” said
Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez.
The terror plot
had been aimed at military targets, as well as a number of Los Angeles
congregations, including, allegedly, the ultra-progressive B’nai David-Judea,
which would have been struck by armed gunmen pushing their way inside and
opening fire on Yom Kippur.
The heavy
security presence at Los Angeles synagogues, which includes heavily armed
guards and bulletproof vests, is part of the legacy that James and his True
Islam terror group left there.
James had built
up a terrorist operation in prison backed by manifestos and operational
documents making him the closest counterpart to the Blind Sheikh. Instead, he
was given a lighter sentence because the same charismatic gang member turned
preacher who had convinced hardened criminals from rival gangs to believe in
him had turned a judge.
Selling meth may
have been the alleged hobby of a newly freed criminal, or something more. Traffic
in certain drugs, including methamphetamines, has been used by Islamic
terrorist groups to finance their operations. It’s unknown whether this is the
case here, but the FBI, after Obama, is less likely to be looking for it or to
even know what to be on the lookout for.
When Jamiyyat
Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh fell afoul of the FBI in 2005, law enforcement was
acquainted with the methodology, infrastructure and strategies of Islamic
terrorists. During the Obama administration, a cultural revolution was waged
against counterterrorism from the inside.
If James is up
to anything these days, the FBI is unprepared and unready to find out.
Fifteen years
later, the terror plot, once a major event, has been largely forgotten. And the
same is true of most Islamic terrorist attacks except for Sept. 11. As the
country enters another September and begins a countdown to 9/11, everything
afterward is being forgotten.
During the Black
Lives Matter riots, a white Muslim illegal alien stabbed a New York cop,
grabbed his gun, and opened fire on other officers while shouting “Allahu
Akbar.” Despite wounding three cops and claiming “my religion made me do it,”
there’s been little coverage.
In the midst of
a pandemic and nationwide race riots, we should not forget that there is more
than one threat vector. Islamic terrorists don’t go away just because no one is
paying attention. And the same prison system that helped produce the wave of
BLM violence has also incubated Islamic prison terror cells like the one that
plotted to kill Americans on another Sept. 11.
The Nation of
Islam has been a feeder for both Islamic terrorism and Black Lives Matter
violence. All three are deeply violent, bigoted and possessed of a feverish
hatred of America.
Daniel
Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is an
investigative journalist and writer focusing on the radical left and Islamic
terrorism.
https://www.jns.org/opinion/how-an-islamic-terror-sheikh-ended-up-selling-meth-in-orange-county/
--------
Africa
West African
body urges Mali junta to restore democracy
Aurore Bonny
07.09.2020
An influential
15-nation West African bloc on Monday urged coup leaders in Mali to restore
democratic institutions, according to a statement.
The call was
made by Issoufou Mahamadou, Niger’s president, at the 57th session of the
extraordinary summit of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
The
socio-political crisis from last month’s coup in Mali and the COVID-19 pandemic
were the meeting’s main themes.
"In Mali,
the last legislative elections were contested following the proclamation in
April 2020 of the final results by the Constitutional Court, which was the
trigger for a protest movement that led to the coup d'état of Aug. 18, 2020,
thus aggravating the political crisis," said Mahamadou, the bloc’s current
head, in his opening speech.
According to
him, the sub-regional community has the duty to assist Malians in the rapid
restoration of all democratic institutions. He also urged the military to join
this effort.
"The
military junta must help Mali. We hope that it will respond favorably to the
measures taken by our community. Other strategic partners of the Malian people
have the same hope. Let's not disappoint them," said Issoufou.
He also
recommended deepening the vision of an ECOWAS of the peoples with the decisive
step of electing the members of the ECOWAS Parliament by direct universal
suffrage.
His other
recommendations included consideration of all crises as opportunities to
accelerate regional and continental integration and the development of
strategic new reflection.
The latter aims
at "an integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, led by its own citizens
and representing a dynamic force on the international scene".
On the
sub-regional fallout from COVID-19, the plan for a single currency called the
Eco has been modified and will benefit from a new roadmap, announced Mahamadou.
"More
generally, our summit must define the necessary guidelines for the development
of a post-COVID-19 regional economic recovery plan, as all the programs have
been negatively impacted by COVID-19," he said.
https://www.aa.com.tr/en/africa/west-african-body-urges-mali-junta-to-restore-democracy/1965957
--------
Turkey’s Erdogan
meets with head of Libya’s GNA
06 September
2020
President Recep
Tayyip Erdogan held closed-door talks with the head of Libya’s Government of
National Accord (GNA) on Sunday, as a meeting between delegates from the
war-struck country’s rival administrations kicked off south of the Moroccan
capital.
Erdogan’s
meeting with Fayez al-Sarraj, the head of the GNA, took place in Istanbul, the
Turkish presidency said, without giving details.
A picture from
the meeting posted on the presidency’s website showed Erdogan and Sarraj
standing side-by-side, posing for the camera with neutral expressions.
For all the
latest headlines follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
No statement was
made to the media.
Meanwhile,
delegates from Libya’s rival administrations met for talks Sunday in Morocco,
more than two weeks after the two sides announced a ceasefire.
Libya has been
convulsed by political chaos and warfare for much of the period since the 2011
revolution that ousted Muammar Gaddafi.
Turkey backs the
GNA against military general Khalifa Haftar, who is supported by Egypt, the
United Arab Emirates and Russia. Ankara signed security and maritime deals with
the GNA last year.
Last month, the
two warring sides announced separately that they would cease all hostilities
and hold nationwide elections, drawing praise from world powers after a series
of fruitless initiatives in recent years to stop the conflict.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/north-africa/2020/09/06/Turkey-s-Erdogan-meets-with-head-of-Libya-s-GNA
--------
Tunisian officer
stabbed to death, three ‘terrorists’ killed in firefight
06 September
2020
Attackers with
knives killed a Tunisian National Guard officer and wounded another Sunday
before three assailants were shot dead in a firefight, the National Guard said,
labelling it a “terrorist attack.”
The attack took
place in the tourist district of the coastal city of Sousse, the site of the
worst of several extremist attacks in recent years, where 38 people, most of
them Britons, were killed in a 2015 beachside shooting.
“A patrol of two
National Guard officers was attacked with a knife in the center of Sousse,” 140
km (80 miles) south of the capital Tunis, said National Guard spokesman Houcem
Eddine Jebabli.
“One died as a
martyr and the other was wounded and is hospitalized,” he said, adding that
“this was a terrorist attack.”
For all the
latest headlines follow our Google News channel online or via the app.
Security forces
pursued the assailants, who had taken the officers’ guns and vehicle, through
the Akouda district of the city’s tourist area of El-Kantaoui, said Jebabli.
“In a firefight
three terrorists were killed,” he said, adding that security forces “managed to
recover” the car and two pistols the assailants had stolen.
Tunisia, since
its 2011 popular revolution, has been hit by a string of extremist attacks that
have killed dozens of security personnel, civilians and foreign tourists.
A suicide attack
against security forces protecting the US Embassy in Tunis killed a Tunisian
police officer and left several others wounded in March.
2015 was a
particularly bloody year, with three major deadly attacks claimed by ISIS
terrorist group.
An attack at the
capital’s Bardo museum in March killed 21 foreign tourists and a security
guard.
Just three
months later, 38 foreign tourists were killed in the shooting rampage at
Sousse. And that November, a bomb blast on a bus in central Tunis killed 12
presidential guards.
While the
situation has significantly improved since then, Tunisia has maintained a state
of emergency.
Assaults on
security forces have persisted, mainly in remote areas along the border with
Algeria.
Tunisia has been
praised as a rare success story among the 2011 Arab Spring popular uprisings
that swept the region and brought down many autocrats, among them Tunisia’s
long-time president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.
But the small
Mediterranean country of about 11 million people is mired in an economic
crisis, with the official unemployment rate at 18 percent, and in need of new
assistance from the International Monetary Fund.
Last week Tunisia’s
parliament approved a new technocratic government led by Prime Minister Hichem
Mechichi which faces the task of tackling deep social and economic woes in the
North African country.
The 46-year-old
premier pledged to revitalize the economy, including the crucial tourism
sector, which had recovered after the extremist attacks but was then hit hard
by the coronavirus pandemic.
https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/north-africa/2020/09/06/One-Tunisian-national-guard-officer-killed-another-injured-in-terrorist-attack-
--------
Car bomb
explosion in Somalia leaves 5 soldiers dead, US officer injured
07 September
2020
A car bomb
explosion outside a military base in southern Somalia has left five Somali
soldiers dead and a US officer seriously injured.
The Takfiri
al-Shabab terrorist group has claimed responsibility for the attack, which took
place on Monday in Jana Cabdalle village in the country’s southern region of
Jubbaland.
Mohamed Ahmed
Sabriye, director of communications of Jubbaland state palace who confirmed the
deaths, said the car bomb exploded outside the base of Somali special forces
trained by the US called Danab.
The bomber
detonated a vehicle packed with explosives at the entrance to a military base
in Janay Abdalla, a village about 60 kilometres (37 miles) outside the southern
port city of Kismayo.
However,
al-Shabab claimed that more people have been killed in the attack.
"We
attacked US and Somali forces called Danab in Jana Cabdalle village with a
suicide car bomb. We killed four US officers, and 16 Somali forces which they
trained," the military operations spokesman of the al-Shabab group,
Abdiasis Abu Musab, said in a statement.
"We also
wounded 12 Somali soldiers. We also destroyed 3 US armored vehicles.”
Jana Cabdalle
village is located some 60 km (around 40 miles) from the port city of Kismayu,
which is the commercial capital of Jubbaland. The southern Somali region is
still partly controlled by al-Shabab.
The
al-Qaeda-linked al-Shabab militants have been waging an insurgency for more
than a decade in Somalia.
Despite being
ousted from large parts of the south and central Somalia, al-Shabab continues
deadly attacks across the country, which has been ravaged by decades of war and
poverty.
The militant
group aims to oust the government in Mogadishu and drive out African Union
peacekeeping troops. It has been carrying out militancy since 2006.
Al-Shabaab
militants have fought successive Somali governments as well as neighboring
governments in Uganda and Kenya, the latter of which sent troops to Somalia in
2011 to fight the Takfiri group as part of the African Union forces.
Somalia has
faced instability and violence since 1991, when the military government was
overthrown.
https://www.presstv.com/Detail/2020/09/07/633531/Somalia-car-bomb-explosion-military-base--soldiers-al-Shabab-militants
--------
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