DDMA Headline Animator

Thursday, November 26, 2020

The lockdown caused a raise of 33% with regards to family violence

[25-11-2020]

The Higher Population Council: 64% of women believe that violence against wife is justified.

Jordan participates in International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

In a statement, the general-secretary of the Higher Population Council, Dr. Ablah Amawi, said that 46% of women and 69% of men believe that violence against wife is justified.

She added that the rate of family violence according to the Population Survey and family health during the full lockdown raised by 33% in contrast with the same period of the last year, according to the family protection department.

The pandemic of COVID-19 and its consequences such as the lockdown is believed to have a great impact on the family violence, she added.

Source: Ammon News.

Link: http://en.ammonnews.net/article/44759.

Jordan reiterates rejection of Israeli attempts to alter status quo at Al Aqsa

Nov 24, 2020

AMMAN — Jordan on Tuesday reiterated that Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif, with its total area of 144 dunums, including its walls and gates, is a place of worship for Muslims only.

According to a Foreign Ministry statement, the Jordan-run Jerusalem Awqaf and Aqsa Affairs Department, under international law and legal and historical status quo, has the exclusive authority to supervise the holy site’s affairs and manage entries.

Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Daifallah Fayez voiced the Kingdom’s rejection of any attempts to alter Al Aqsa Mosque’s historical and legal status quo.

Fayez also reaffirmed that Mughrabi Gate (Bab Al Magharbeh) and the road leading to it, is an integral and inseparable part of Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif, in accordance with UNESCO decisions.

The Mughrabi Gate is like the other gates of Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif, but Israeli authorities have confiscated its keys since 1967,  denying the awqaf department’s right to manage the entries of non-Muslim tourists, which violates the status quo, the statement said, stressing that, the Jerusalem Awqaf and Aqsa Affairs Department, to this day, is still committed to restore it. 

Fayez said that the Kingdom as per the Hashemite custodianship of Jerusalem's Islamic and Christian holy sites will continue its efforts towards protecting Al Aqsa Mosque/Al Haram Al Sharif and preserving the rights of all Muslims.

Source: The Jordan Times.

Link: http://jordantimes.com/news/local/jordan-reiterates-rejection-israeli-attempts-alter-status-quo-al-aqsa.

King inaugurates 300-bed military field hospital dedicated to COVID-19 patients

Nov 24, 2020

AMMAN — His Majesty King Abdullah, the Supreme Commander of the Jordan Armed Forces-Arab Army, on Tuesday inaugurated a field hospital established on the grounds of the Royal Medical Services’ (RMS) Prince Hashim Bin Al Hussein Hospital in Zarqa Governorate.

The field hospital, built at a cost of JD9 million, is dedicated to receiving COVID-19 patients, with the aim of supporting the government’s efforts in countering the pandemic, according to a Royal Court statement.

King Abdullah toured the field hospital, which has a 300-bed capacity, including 48 intensive care unit beds and 12 intermediate care beds ready to be converted into ICU beds.

His Majesty, accompanied by Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Maj. Gen. Yousef Huneiti, was briefed on the field hospital’s medical capabilities and the capacities of its qualified medical and administrative personnel.

The field hospital, covering an area of 5,200 square meters, was built in 14 days.

According to the RMS, two more field hospitals will be opened in the upcoming weeks, with the combined capacity of the three hospitals set to reach 900 beds, including 220 ICU beds.

Source: The Jordan Times.

Link: http://jordantimes.com/news/local/king-inaugurates-300-bed-military-field-hospital-dedicated-covid-19-patients.

Lonely Planet names Amman to its Best in Travel 2021 list

Nov 24, 2020

AMMAN — Lonely Planet, world’s leading publisher of the popular travel guides, has listed Amman in its Best in Travel picks for 2021, “singling out the Jordanian capital as one of the destinations, which are helping transform travel experiences”, the Jordan Tourism Board (JTB) said in a statement.

Amman is recognized as a “welcoming destination”, focusing on diversity and inclusivity.  Lonely Planet’s award showcases people, tourism operators and destinations, which share the stories and experiences of a variety of people from around the world, ensuring a more diverse representation in travel, the JTB said.  

“Amman welcomes the majority of our visitors to Jordan and we are very proud of its reputation as an inclusive destination,” said JTB Director General Abdul Razzaq Arabiyat in the statement. 

“It is also home to some of our most awe-inspiring historical sites, and is becoming renowned for its culinary and shopping experiences.  As the gateway to the rest of the country, spending time in Amman is a highly recommended part of every trip to Jordan and is often cited as the main reason people wish to return to Jordan again and again,” he was quoted in the statement as saying.

Amman is the capital and largest city of Jordan and the country’s economic, political and cultural center. With a population of 4,007,526, Amman is the largest city in the Levant region and the sixth-largest city in the Arab world. As well as being home to Jordan’s world famous historical sites like Mount Nebo, the Roman Theatre, the Citadel and Archeology Museum, which houses some of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the city is among the most popular locations in the Arab world for multinational corporations to set up their regional offices, ensuring a modern, multicultural city, the statement said.

Amman joins other world-class destinations and tour operators in receiving this award from Lonely Planet: Gabby Beckford, Packs Light; Costa Rica; El Hierro, Spain; Hiakai, New Zealand; Jeff Jenkins, Chubby Diaries; Wheels of the World; Karl Krause and Daan Colijn, Couple of Men; Gullah Islands, the US; and San Diego, the US.

Lonely Planet started the process for the Best in Travel 2021 list by seeking nominations from Lonely Planet’s vast community of staff, writers, photographers, videographers, bloggers, publishing partners and more. 

Then, the COVID-19 pandemic struck, and, like the rest of the travel world, Lonely Planet hit the pause button. But other things changed too. The conversation surrounding diversity took a decisive shift. The future of travel moved towards small-group engagement and decades-old issues like over tourism came back to the forefront. As a result, Lonely Planet’s picks fit this new approach and are tailored for travel in 2021 — a year that’s going to be like no other, read the statement.

“Travel is a much more considerate exercise in 2021 than it has been ever before,” Lonely Planet CEO Luis Cabrera said in the statement. 

“Best in Travel 2021 champions people, places and organizations that are making travel a force for good, all the more essential in a year when COVID-19 has disrupted and deprioritized travel. Best in Travel 2021 reflects how travel contributes to sustainability, community and inclusivity and showcases how we can best explore the world responsibly,” Cabrera noted.

After a tumultuous year for travel, Best in Travel also symbolizes Lonely Planet’s commitment to these values, according to the statement. 

“We are taking the chance to re-emphasize what we are here for and why: our mission remains to make travel a force for good,” said Cabrera. 

“Lonely Planet continues to reflect the tourism development values among Jordan’s tourism industry, to create a sustainable, regenerative and inclusive industry that drives positive economic growth across the country,” Arabiyat said.  

“We are very honored to have Amman recognized by Lonely Planet this year.”

Source: The Jordan Times.

Link: http://jordantimes.com/news/local/lonely-planet-names-amman-its-best-travel-2021-list.

Azerbaijanis who fled war look to return home, if it exists

November 22, 2020

BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) — As Azerbaijan regains control of land it lost to Armenian forces a quarter-century ago, civilians who fled the fighting decades ago wonder if they can go back home now — and if there's still a home to go back to.

An estimated 600,000 Azerbaijanis were displaced in the 1990s war that left the Nagorno-Karabakh region under the control of ethnic Armenian separatists and large adjacent territories in Armenia's hands. During six weeks of renewed fighting this fall that ended Nov. 10, Azerbaijan took back parts of Nagorno-Karabakh itself and sizeable swaths of the outlying areas.

More territory is being returned as part of the ceasefire agreement that stopped the latest fighting. But as Azerbaijani forces discovered when the first area, Aghdam, was turned over on Friday, much of the recovered land is uninhabitable. The city of Aghdam, where 50,000 people once lived, is now a shattered ruin.

Adil Sharifov, 62, who left his hometown in 1992 during the first war and lives in Azerbaijan's capital, Baku, knows he will find similar devastation if he returns to the city of Jabrayil, which he longs to do.

Jabrayil is one of the outlying areas regained by Azerbaijani troops before the recent fighting ended. Soon after it was taken, one of Sharifov's cousins went there and told him the city was destroyed, including the large house with an orchard where Sharifov's family once lived.

Nonetheless, “the day when I return there will be the greatest happiness for me,” he said. For years, he said, his family had followed reports about Jabrayil on the internet. They knew the destruction was terrible, but Sharifov's late mother retained a desperate hope that their house had been spared and held on to the keys.

"I will build an even better house,” he vowed. Ulviya Jumayeva, 50, can go back to better, though not ideal circumstances in her native Shusha, a city that Azerbaijani forces took in the key offensive of the six-week war.

Her younger brother, Nasimi, took part in the battle and phoned to tell her the apartment their family fled in 1992 was intact, though mostly stripped of the family's possessions. “According to him, it is clear that Armenians lived there after us, and then they took everything away. But our large mirror in the hallway, which we loved to look at as children, remains,” Jumayeva said, adding: “Maybe my grandchildren will look in this mirror.”

“We all have houses in Baku, but everyone considered them to be not permanent, because all these years we lived in the hope that we would return to Shusha," she said. "Our hearts, our thoughts have always been in our hometown.”

But she acknowledged that her feelings toward Armenians have become more bitter. “My school friends were mostly Armenian. I never treated ordinary Armenians badly, believing that their criminal leaders who unleashed the war were to blame for the massacre, war, and grief that they brought to their people as well," Jumayeva said.

”But after the current events, after the shelling of peaceful cities ... after the Armenians who are now leaving our territories, which are even outside of Karabakh, burn down the houses of Azerbaijanis in which they lived illegally ... something fractured in me. I changed my attitude toward them," she said. “I understood that we, Azerbaijanis, will not be able to live peacefully next to the Armenians.”

While Sharifov has less to go back to, he has a more moderate view, saying the two ethnic groups with different religious traditions still have the potential to live together amicably. “If the Armenians observe the laws of Azerbaijan, and do not behave like bearded men who came to kill, then we will live in peace," he said. “The time to shoot is over. Enough casualties. We want peace, we do not want war.”

Associated Press writers Aida Sultanova in London and Jim Heintz in Moscow contributed to this story.

France: Bill on publishing police images sparks protests

November 21, 2020

PARIS (AP) — Thousands of people took to the streets in Paris and other French cities Saturday at the urging of civil liberties campaigners and journalist groups to protest a proposed security law they say would impinge on freedom of information and media rights.

Pending legislation in France's parliament would create a new criminal offense for publishing images of police officers with intent to cause them harm. Offenders would face a maximum penalty of up to one year in prison and a 45,000-euro ($53,000) fine.

The government says the proposal is intended to protect police officers from online calls for violence. Critics fear that, if enacted, the measure would endanger journalists and other observers who take videos of officers at work, especially during violent demonstrations.

In Paris, several thousand demonstrators gathered on the Trocadero square near the Eiffel Tower, chanting “Freedom, freedom” and “Everyone wants to film the police." Police used water cannons to disperse the crowd as minor scuffles broke out at the end of the demonstration. Paris police said 23 people were detained and an officer was slightly injured.

Reporters without Borders, Amnesty International France, the Human Rights League, journalists’ unions and other groups encouraged people to attend the protest. The crowd included many journalists and students.

“We are not here to defend a privilege of our profession, press freedom and journalists' freedom," Edwy Plenel, co-founder and editor of investigative website Mediapart, said. "We are here to defend fundamental rights, the rights of all people.”

Some members of the anti-government yellow vest movement also joined the demonstration. The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights and France’s human rights ombudsman have also voiced concerns that the new provision could undermine fundamental rights.

In response to the criticism, Prime Minister Jean Castex said Thursday that the measure would be amended to specify that it "won’t impede the freedom of information” and that it will focus only on images broadcast with “clear” intent to harm a police officer.

Emmanuel Poupard, secretary general of the National Journalists Union (SNJ), said Saturday that he thinks the new amendment “doesn’t change anything.” The police image law “has only one goal: to boost the sense of impunity of law enforcement officers and make invisible police brutality,” he said.

Protesters argue that recording officers in action is essential to being able to condemn and curb the actions of violent officers. They also worry how courts would determine whether images were posted with intent to harm.

In July, three French police officers were charged with manslaughter over the death of a delivery man, Cedric Chouviat, that bystanders caught on video. Chouviat's death had similarities with the killing of George Floyd in the U.S. state of Minneapolis, which sparked outrage around the world and a series of Black Lives Matter demonstrations in France.

The proposed law is championed by lawmakers from President Emmanuel Macron’s party, which has a majority in the National Assembly. Lawmakers are scheduled to vote Tuesday on the bill, which also includes other security measures. It will then go to the Senate.

Mortar shells hit Kabul residential areas; at least 8 dead

November 21, 2020

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — About 23 mortar shells slammed into different parts of the Afghan capital on Saturday, killing at least eight people and wounding 31 others, an official said. The shells were fired from two cars, Interior Ministry spokesperson Tariq Arian said. No one took immediate responsibility for the early morning attack that also targeted the posh Wazir Akbar Khan area of Kabul, which houses diplomatic missions.

At least one rocket landed in the Iranian Embassy compound. In a tweet, Iran's embassy in Kabul in confirmed that a rocket came down in the courtyard of the embassy compound and “a number of shrapnel” hit the embassy's main building, causing some damage to windows and equipment, without specifying the equipment.

“Fortunately the incident has no casualty and all the staff are in good health,” said the tweet. The Islamic State affiliate in Afghanistan claimed the rocket barrage, according to SITE Intelligence Group. The IS group has carried out similar attacks in the past and claimed responsibility for recent assaults in Kabul including two devastating attacks on educational institutions that killed more than 50 people, many of them students.

As well as insurgent groups, there are several heavily armed warlords with militias living in Kabul with long-standing animosities against each other. Pakistan, whose Prime Minister Imran Khan visited on Tuesday Kabul for the first time since he came to office, condemned the attack and warned “it is important to be vigilant against the spoilers who are working to undermine the peace efforts.” He did not identify “the spoilers.”

The mortar barrage comes as representatives of the Afghan government and the Taliban continued to hold talks in Qatar, though progress has been slow. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was in Doha on Saturday to press for a reduction in violence in his meetings with both the Taliban and government negotiating teams. The Taliban have mostly ignored such previous requests.

Pompeo told members of the government's team, at the outset of their meeting, that America will “sit on the side and help where we can" in the peace negotiations. Pompeo also met with the Taliban’s co-founder, Mulllah Abdul Ghani Baradar.

There are many within the Afghan government who want February's U.S.-Taliban peace deal scrapped. President-elect Joe Biden has previously advocated a small, intelligence based force in Afghanistan to focus on counter-terrorism.

Meanwhile, Abdullah Abdullah, head of the government's High Council for Reconciliation, condemned the attack in a tweet calling it a “cowardly” act. The council oversees the government's negotiating team at the table with the Taliban in Doha.

Hours before the attack rattled Kabul, a bomb attached to a car killed one security personnel and wounded three others in an eastern neighborhood of the capital, said Kabul police spokesperson Ferdaws Faramarz.

Violence in Afghanistan has spiked in recent months with increasingly horrific attacks often claimed by the Islamic State group affiliate. The Taliban have also continued near daily assaults on beleaguered Afghan government forces.

There have been increasing calls for a cease-fire if peace talks are to continue. The Taliban have been steadfast in their refusal, demanding that any truce be part of the negotiations.

Gannon reported from Islamabad.

EU urges reforms in Bosnia on 25th anniversary of peace deal

November 21, 2020

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — The European Union's foreign policy chief used the 25th anniversary of the peace agreement that ended the Bosnian War to urge Bosnia's political leaders to overcome their persistent ethnic divisions and prepare their nation to join the EU fold.

“We have to commemorate the past, but we have to look to the future,” EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said during a visit to Sarajevo for Saturday's anniversary, adding that the U.S.-brokered peace agreement for Bosnia concluded “one of the most shameful episodes in the modern history of Europe.”

The peace agreement, initialed at a U.S. Air Force base outside Dayton, Ohio on Nov. 21, 2015 and formally signed in Paris a few weeks later, ended the 44-month war in which Bosnia's three main ethnic factions — Muslim Bosniaks, Catholic Croats and Orthodox Christian Serbs — fought for control after the break-up of Yugoslavia.

Over 100,000 people were killed during the war, most of them Bosniaks, and upward of 2 million, or over half of Bosnia's population, were driven from their homes during the conflict. While it stopped the bloodshed, the peace agreement formalized the ethnic divisions in Bosnia by establishing a complicated and fragmented state structure linked by weak joint institutions. Over the years, the country’s complex administrative system has allowed its ethno-nationalist elites to take full control of all levers of government and plunder public coffers with impunity while engaging in the same arguments that led to the war.

The European Union accepted Bosnia’s membership application in 2016, but its government has failed to make the deep structural reforms required before the country can move forward with the process of joining the EU. The bloc expects to see changes in how Bosnia's judiciary and economy are run, intensified efforts to fight corruption, the safeguarding of human rights, among other reforms.

The EU priorities are largely shared by Bosnia’s citizens, but continue to be sidelined by their ethnic leaders under the cover of nationalist rhetoric. After meeting with members of the country’s tripartite presidency, Borrell said Bosnia’s “future is European” but that in order to get there “authorities must step up their efforts to deliver on the reform priorities.”

Bulgaria is latest block in North Macedonia's bid to join EU

November 21, 2020

SOFIA, Bulgaria (AP) — It's not easy to plan your future in a region like the Balkans, where history often clouds the present. One of Europe’s youngest nations, North Macedonia, spent years resolving differences with Greece that prevented it joining the European Union and NATO. This week, that path was blocked again, this time by another neighbor, Bulgaria.

The government in Sofia wants North Macedonia to formally recognize that its language has Bulgarian roots and to stamp out what it says is anti-Bulgarian rhetoric. Launching accession talks with a prospective member country requires unanimous approval from all 27 EU nations. Foreign Minister Ekaterina Zaharieva told Bulgaria’s lawmakers that their country withheld its consent Tuesday because North Macedonia was not observing a 2017 bilateral friendship treaty and was fueling hatred through some of its policies.

“Hysteria has been whipped up in their media, fueled by open hate speech toward Bulgaria, and by branding anyone who expresses a dissenting opinion a traitor,” Zaharieva said. “In effect, Skopje has continued its policy of maintaining unfounded claims about minority rights, history and language, among other matters,” Zaharieva said.

Bulgaria insists that instead of “Macedonian language” the formulation "the official language of the Republic of North Macedonia” should be used in the negotiating framework. Sofia considers the language a dialect of Bulgarian, arguing that the official language of its neighbor was artificially created after 1944.

Bulgaria also wants a text in the roadmap to state that claims that there is a Macedonian minority in Bulgaria will not be supported in any form. According to a 2011 census, some 1,600 of Bulgaria’s 7 million citizens call themselves Macedonians. Historians in Sofia claim that these people are not a minority but refugees who moved to Bulgaria after the Balkan wars at the beginning of the 20th century.

Zaharieva said Bulgaria wants legal guarantees before it will give the green light to membership negotiations that were slated to start next month. North Macedonia says its national identity and language are not open to discussion. A commission of renowned historians from both countries has been working to resolve the standoff but has so far failed to find enough common ground to satisfy the two nations.

Bulgaria, which joined the EU in 2007, has been an active supporter of letting in the six Western Balkan countries, believing it could help improve living standards and insulate the region against the influence of Russia and China.

North Macedonia’s government said Wednesday that it remains “committed to the European path.” During times of tension, “European values need to be demonstrated. Dialogue instead of conflict,” government spokesman Dushko Arsovski told reporters. “Calmness and readiness for cooperation, instead of nationalism for domestic use and new isolation.”

North Macedonia, a country of 2 million, applied for EU membership in 2004 and received a positive response from the executive European Commission a year later. However, a long-running dispute over the country’s name — when it declared independence from Yugoslavia, it was called Macedonia, the same as a neighboring Greek province — kept Greece blocking the move for years. The dispute was resolved when the country was renamed North Macedonia early last year.

A year ago, France demanded a postponement in starting the talks, arguing that with Britain preparing to pull out of the EU and other pressing issues, the bloc had too much on its plate. EU leaders finally agreed in March to begin the process for opening formal accession talks with both North Macedonia and Albania. But that can't happen for North Macedonia until Bulgaria is on board.

Officials from Germany, which currently holds the EU’s rotating EU presidency, said they hoped Bulgaria and North Macedonia will be able to find a compromise and the membership talks can begin before the end of the year.

Other Western Balkan countries are at varying stages of EU membership talks: Serbia and Montenegro have already started negotiating some chapters of the final deal; Kosovo and Bosnia-Herzegovina have signed the Stabilization and Association Agreement, the first step on the path.

Konstantin Testorides in Skopje, North Macedonia, contributed to this report.

She fled Ethiopia's fighting. Now she warns of 'catastrophe'

November 21, 2020

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) — Shaken by the gunfire erupting around her town in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region, the woman decided to get out. She joined a long line at the local government office for the paperwork needed to travel. But when she reached the official, he told her she had wasted her time.

“This is for people who are volunteering to fight,” he said. As Ethiopia's government wages war in its Tigray region and seeks to arrest its defiant leaders, who regard the federal government as illegitimate after a falling-out over power, the fighting that could destabilize the Horn of Africa is hidden from outside view. Communications are severed, roads blocked and airports closed.

But as one of the few hundred people who were evacuated this week from Tigray, the woman in an interview with The Associated Press offered rare details of anger, desperation and growing hunger as both sides reject international calls for dialogue, or even a humanitarian corridor for aid, in their third week of deadly fighting. The United Nations says food and other essentials “will soon be exhausted, putting millions at risk.”

With supplies blocked at the Tigray borders and frantic aid workers using a dwindling number of satellite phones to reach the world, it is extremely difficult to hear accounts from those suffering on the ground. At least several hundred people have been killed, and the United Nations has condemned ”targeted attacks against civilians based on their ethnicity or religion."

The woman, an Ethiopian aid expert who spoke on condition of anonymity out of concern for herself and loved ones, gave one of the most detailed accounts yet of a population of some 6 million short of food, fuel, cash and even water, and without electricity as Ethiopia’s army marches closer to the Tigray capital every day.

“I am telling you, people will slowly start to die,” she said. Not all of her account could be verified. But the description of her passage through the Tigray capital, Mekele, to Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, fit with others that have trickled out from aid workers, diplomats, a senior university official and some of the more than 35,000 refugees who have fled into Sudan after the fighting began Nov. 4. She was connected with the AP by a foreign evacuee.

As borders, roads and airports swiftly closed after Ethiopia's prime minister announced that Tigray forces had attacked a military base, the woman felt torn. She had family in Addis Ababa and wanted to be with them.

Banks had closed, but loved ones gave her enough money to travel to Mekele. As she drove, she squeezed her car through makeshift barriers of stones piled up by local youth. She said she did not see fighting.

In Mekele, she met with friends around the university. She was shocked by what she saw. “It was a panic,” she said. “Students were sleeping outside the university because they had come from all over.” There was little to feed them. Supplies in the markets were running low.

While in Mekele, she said, she heard three “bombardments” against the city. Ethiopia’s government has confirmed airstrikes around the city. When Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed in televised comments told civilians in Tigray not to congregate for their safety, “that was a big panic," she said. "People said, ‘Is he going to completely bomb us?’ There was huge anger, people pushing and saying, ‘I want to fight.’”

When she visited a loved one at a university hospital, “a doctor said they have no medicine, no insulin. At all!” she said. “They were hoping the (International Committee of the Red Cross) would give them some.”

Seeking to travel on to Addis Ababa, she found fuel on the black market but was warned her car could be a target. But the U.N. and other aid groups had managed to arrange a convoy to evacuate non-essential staffers to the Ethiopian capital, and she found a space on one of the buses. “I think I was quite lucky,” she said.

But as the buses pulled out of the capital, she was scared. The convoy of some 20 vehicles made its way through the night to the capital of the arid Afar region east of Tigray, then through the restive Amhara region, going slowly from checkpoint to checkpoint, not all of the security forces manning them briefed on the evacuation.

“It took four days in total,” the woman said of the journey, which would have taken a day by the direct route. “I was really afraid.” Tigray special forces watched over the convoy in the beginning, she said. Near the end, federal police accompanied it. They were “very disciplined,” she said.

Now, after arriving in Addis Ababa earlier this week, she adds her voice to the growing calls for dialogue between the two governments, which now regard each other as illegal after the once-dominant Tigray regional party and its members were marginalized under Abiy’s reformist two-year rule.

“I think they should negotiate,” she said. “And we really need a corridor so food and medicine can go in. What about the people?” The prospect of dialogue appears distant. The U.S. Embassy this week told citizens remaining in Tigray to shelter in place if they could not get out safely.

Like other worried families in Ethiopia and the diaspora, the woman cannot reach her relatives left behind. Many foreigners are still trapped in Tigray too, she said. “No one knows who is alive, who is dead,” she said. “This is a catastrophe for me.”

On Thursday, she said, she managed to speak with a university friend in Mekele. The university had been hit by an airstrike. More than 20 students were wounded. “She was crying,” the evacuee said. “She’s a strong woman, I know that.” Her voice was shaking.

Protests staged across France against bill on police images

November 21, 2020

PARIS (AP) — Thousands of people took to the streets in Paris and other French cities Saturday at the urging of civil liberties campaigners and journalist groups to protest a proposed security law they say would impinge on freedom of information and media rights.

Pending legislation in France's parliament would create a new criminal offense for publishing images of police officers with intent to cause them harm. Offenders would face a maximum penalty of up to one year in prison and a 45,000-euro ($53,000) fine.

The government says the proposal is intended to protect police officers from online calls for violence. Critics fear that, if enacted, the measure would endanger journalists and other observers who take videos of officers at work, especially during violent demonstrations.

In Paris, several thousand demonstrators gathered on the Trocadero square near the Eiffel Tower, chanting “Freedom, freedom” and “Everyone wants to film the police." Reporters without Borders, Amnesty International France, the Human Rights League, journalists’ unions and other groups encouraged people to attend the protest. The crowd included many journalists and students.

“We are not here to defend a privilege of our profession, press freedom and journalists' freedom," Edwy Plenel, co-founder and editor of investigative website Mediapart, said. "We are here to defend fundamental rights, the rights of all people.”

Some members of the anti-government yellow vest movement also joined the demonstration. The Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights and France’s human rights ombudsman have also voiced concerns that the new provision could undermine fundamental rights.

In response to the criticism, Prime Minister Jean Castex said Thursday that the measure would be amended to specify that it "won’t impede the freedom of information” and that it will focus only on images broadcast with “clear” intent to harm a police officer.

Emmanuel Poupard, secretary general of the National Journalists Union (SNJ), said Saturday that he thinks the new amendment “doesn’t change anything.” The police image law “has only one goal: to boost the sense of impunity of law enforcement officers and make invisible police brutality,” he said.

Protesters argue that recording officers in action is essential to being able to condemn and curb the actions of violent officers. They also worry how courts would determine whether images were posted with intent to harm.

In July, three French police officers were charged with manslaughter over the death of a delivery man, Cedric Chouviat, that bystanders caught on video. Chouviat's death had similarities with the killing of George Floyd in the U.S. state of Minneapolis, which sparked outrage around the world and a series of Black Lives Matter demonstrations in France.

The proposed law is championed by lawmakers from President Emmanuel Macron’s party, which has a majority in the National Assembly. Lawmakers are scheduled to vote Tuesday on the bill, which also includes other security measures. It will then go to the Senate.

Iraq Sunni leader calls on Biden to support autonomy

November 21, 2020

Leaders of Sunnis in Iraq convened and called for the incoming US administration under President-elect Joe Biden to help them obtain autonomous rule in the areas of Sunni majorities in the north and west of the country, Al-Khaleej Online reported on Friday.

One of the prominent leaders who attended the meeting was Rafi Al-Issawi, the former finance minister and deputy prime minister during the era of Nouri Al-Maliki.

Reporting Intelligence Online, the news website conveyed that these calls came due to "continuous violations" committed by the Shia militias in the areas once controlled by Al-Qaeda, as Shia groups controlled these areas after forcing out Al-Qaeda.

These violations pushed the Sunni leaders to agree on calling on Biden and his deputy Kamala Harris to help them achieve their goal.

Segregating Iraq into three major ethnoreligious groups – Arab Shias, Arab Sunnis, and Kurds – into self-governing regions has been Biden's plan for more than one and a half decades.

One of Iraq's prominent Sunni leaders, who according to the Voice of America vehemently opposed Biden's plan when it was announced, was Misha'an Al-Juburi, who congratulated Biden on his victory by posting on Twitter: "We now look forward to implementing his plan in Iraq, which we previously opposed."

Source: Middle East Monitor.

Link: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201121-iraq-sunni-leader-calls-on-biden-to-support-autonomy/.

Saudi Arabia to invest more than $5bn in artificial intelligence by 2030

November 21, 2020

Saudi Arabia is planning to invest more than 20 billion riyals ($5.3 billion) in artificial intelligence by 2030, Chairman of the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA) Abdullah Bin Sharaf Al-Ghamdi announced yesterday.

"We aim to train 20,000 specialists in artificial intelligence by 2030," Al-Ghamdi told reporters on the sidelines of the media centre program of the G20 summit, which is currently being held in the kingdom's capital city of Riyadh.

The Saudi official pointed out that the kingdom was the third country in the world to use technology to combat the coronavirus, stressing that artificial intelligence was a: "Source of savings and an additional source of income worth investing."

Source: Middle East Monitor.

Link: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201121-saudi-arabia-to-invest-more-than-5bn-in-artificial-intelligence-by-2030/.

New UK Space Command set to follow US with a formal space domain agency

London (Sputnik)

Nov 20, 2020

The UK's newly announced Space Command is likely to pick up a number of projects already begun with its creation in mind and to partner closely with the US Space Force as part of a larger military confrontation with Russia and China in space.

On Wednesday, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the creation of the British Space Command as part of the commonwealth's biggest defense expansion since the end of the Cold War. The news comes less than a year after the US established its own US Space Force (USSF) as a new branch of the US military, ostensibly in response to the growing space capabilities of Russia and China.

According to Johnson, "the international situation is more perilous and more intensely competitive than at any time since the Cold War and Britain must be true to our history and stand alongside our allies. To achieve this, we need to upgrade our capabilities across the board."

The British government began laying the groundwork for a space command over a year ago, following a Conservative December 2019 election pledge to establish the branch. In April, Air Vice Marshall Harvey Smyth was appointed the ministry's first space commander, tasked with further coordinating what would become the commonwealth's Space Command, with a Pounds 7 billion portfolio for the next decade.

UK Justifications Parallel US Space Force

In July, UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, writing in the Telegraph, warned of "the threat Russia poses to our national security" following a purportedly "provocative test of a weapon-like projectile from a satellite threatening the peaceful use of space."

Two months later, British Air Force Chief Marshal Mike Wigston warned that orbital space surrounding the Earth had become a "contested war-fighting domain" to which London must defend its access.

"Today we can no longer assume the unchallenged access to air or space that we have enjoyed for the last three decades, nor can we ignore the threat of air, ballistic and cruise missile attack," Wigston said, as reported by Sputnik.

The language closely mirrors that used by the Trump administration to justify creation of the US Space Force, a move decried by Russia and China as a serious threat to world peace and the creation of a military entity that does exactly what it claims to mitigate: the militarization of space.

"We can no longer assume that our space superiority is a given. If deterrence fails, we must be ready to fight for space superiority," stated the USSF chief of space operations, Gen. John Raymond, in remarks to federal lawmakers in February 2020.

In its Defense Space Strategy Summary, published in June 2020, the Pentagon outlined that one of its goals in pursuing the Space Force was to "promote burden-sharing with our allies and partners, developing and leveraging cooperative opportunities in policy, strategy, capabilities, and operational realms."

In July, Raymond hailed London's cooperation on the Artemis small satellite program, among other space-based ventures.

"Our Space Force and Air Force teams are currently evaluating where we can best leverage this capability across the space enterprise. Satellite communications is another area where we are working closely together. Our mutual needs for increased communications bandwidth and a more resilient SATCOM [satellite communications] architecture has the United States investigating partnership arrangements and hosted payloads on Advanced Extremely High Frequency [AEHF] evolved strategic satellite communications systems, Skynet and Wideband Global SATCOM [WGS] systems, to name a few," Raymond said, adding,

"Additionally, our nations recently reached agreement on technology safeguards that allows United States companies to support launching spacecraft from the UK."

Also in July, Raytheon's UK subsidiary signed a deal with the Defense Ministry's Defense Equipment and Support office to develop navigation satellites with increased resistance to jamming. The USSF also singled out jamming as a significant potential threat.

Projects Potentially Within the Scope of the Space Command

According to Defense News, the UK's Space Command is likely to take over development of the new Skynet 6 communications satellites and the possible creation of a UK Global Navigation Satellite System, along with surveillance satellites and ballistic missile defense radar networks.

However, the UK has also recently poured money into various international space projects, including half of the $1 billion July purchase of OneWeb, a startup that seeks to launch a broadband internet satellite megaconstellation of up to 650 satellites, which the UK would split with Indian mobile network operator Bharti Global.

In November 2019, London increased its annual financial commitment to the European Space Agency by 15%, to Pounds 474 million. The UK prime minister on Wednesday said that the opening of the commonwealth's Space Command would be accompanied by a new satellite launch site in Scotland, which would "launch its first rocket in 2022." It's unclear if Johnson intends to push the building of another launch pad or expand one of several existing commercial projects.

The Space Hub Sutherland project, a proposal approved in August to build a small rocket pad in Scotland's far north, could become a key launch base for the space program. The site was envisioned as a commercial launch pad for putting microsatellites into orbit, but risked being cancelled last month when US defense contractor Lockheed Martin, a major backer of the space hub, suddenly pulled its support.

Highlands and Islands Enterprise has said it hopes the Sutherland spaceport will be able to launch a rocket by the end of 2022, and noted that the spot's high latitude is ideal for placing satellites into polar orbits.

The Pentagon has been moving toward using smaller, cheaper satellites, leaning heavily on private space firms like SpaceX to adapt their small commercial satellites for military uses. Last month, the US Space Force handed SpaceX a lucrative contract to turn some of its Starlink low-orbit broadband internet satellites into ballistic missile early-warning devices. Another launch site also in the works, the Shetland Space Center, on Scotland's most northerly island, is where Lockheed will move its own program that was earlier planned for Sutherland. The site plans to be able to launch a rocket by 2021.

Source: Space War.

Link: https://www.spacewar.com/reports/New_UK_Space_Command_set_to_follow_US_with_a_formal_space_domain_agency_999.html.

Europe, US 'climate guardian' satellite to monitor oceans

November 20, 2020

BERLIN (AP) — A "climate guardian" satellite set for launching this weekend will greatly help scientists keep track of the rise in sea levels, one of the most daunting effects of global warming, a senior official at the European Space Agency said Friday.

The satellite, known as Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich and jointly developed by Europe and the United States, contains cutting-edge instruments able to capture sea surface height with unprecedented accuracy, adding to space-based measurements going back almost 30 years.

“This is an extremely important parameter for climate monitoring,” said Josef Aschbacher, the European Space Agency's director of Earth observation. Billions of people living in coastal areas around the planet are at risk in the coming decades as melting polar ice and ocean expansion caused by warming push waters ever higher up the shore.

“We know that sea level is rising,” Aschbacher saud. The big question is, by how much, how quickly. Some studies estimate the world’s oceans will rise by at least 2 feet (61 centimeters) by the end of the century, hitting low-lying regions from Bangladesh to Florida.

Aschbacher said measurements dating back to the 1990s show average sea levels rising first by about 3 millimeters (0.12 inches) per year, but in the past couple of years the annual rate was almost 5 millimeters (0.2 inches).

While measurements are also taken at ground level, in harbors and other coastal areas, they don’t provide the same precise uniform standard as a single satellite sweeping the entire globe every 10 days, he said.

“If you measure it at sea level, you have one measurement device in Amsterdam and you have a different one in Bangkok and yet another one in Miami," Aschbacher told The Associated Press by video from ESA offices in Frascati, Italy. "But with a satellite, you can compare these measurements globally because it’s the same instrument that flies over all these areas.”

The probe's most powerful weapon is the Poseidon-4 radar altimeter, named after the trident-wielding Greek god of the sea. The instrument measures how long it takes for radar signals to bounce off the sea surface and back to the satellite.

The new satellite will also collect measurements at higher resolution than its predecessors, allowing researchers to peer more closely at small ocean features, especially along the coastlines. Other instruments on board will measure how radio signals pass through the atmosphere, providing data on atmospheric temperature and humidity that can help improve global weather forecasts.

The satellite is due to be carried into orbit Saturday from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The European Space Agency this week lamented the loss of two satellites when a European-built carrier rocket veered off course shortly after launch.

“This failure on Monday reminded us how risky the space business is,″ Aschbacher said. "We are always at the edge." Sentinel-6 is named after the late director of NASA’s Earth Science Division, Michael Freilich, an oceanographer who was key to getting the U.S. space agency to join the mission.

“We owe him a lot and he more than deserves to have this satellite named after him,” said Aschbacher. “I’m very sorry personally that he cannot push the button tomorrow.” Europe and the United States are sharing the 900-million-euro ($1.1-billion) cost of the 10-year mission, which includes the launch of an identical twin, currently called Sentinel-6B, in 2025.

It’s the first time that another space agency has been involved in ESA’s flagship Copernicus program, which already has seven satellites in orbit measuring the seas, atmosphere and land. Some data collected by the ESA and other agencies recently showed the impact of the coronavirus pandemic as seen from space.

Aschbacher said he hopes NASA and ESA will team up on future missions, too. “NASA is our strongest partner internationally,” he said. “We are discussing right now other options of cooperation based on the model of Sentinel 6-Michael Freilich.”

The two space agencies recently agreed to cooperate on a planned NASA outpost around the moon. But Aschbacher said lunar missions and others looking to Mars and beyond, shouldn't divert attention from the need to keep an eye on our own planet.

“We all know that (Earth) is undergoing enormous changes, extremely fast changes and changes we never had before on this planet with a speed and intensity caused, obviously, by humans," he said. "And we need to understand how this planet functions for our own survival, for our own future.”

Spain in diplomatic push over migrant flow to Canary Islands

November 20, 2020

MADRID (AP) — The Spanish government is ratcheting up its response to the steady build-up of migrant arrivals to the Canary Islands from Africa, including a fresh diplomatic offensive. Though the government has come under pressure from local officials to transfer a significant number of migrants and asylum seekers to the Spanish mainland, Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska said Friday that the main focus will be on deporting those who don't qualify for refugee status or work in Europe.

“We have to fight against irregular migration and prevent the establishment of irregular entry routes into Europe," the minister said in the Moroccan capital of Rabat following a meeting with his Moroccan counterpart, Abdelouafi Laftit, to discuss how to speed up deportations and stem the departure of boats heading to the Canary Islands.

Moroccans have been the most numerous among recent migrant arrivals to the Spanish archipelago, whose nearest islands lie around 70 miles (110 kms) west of the north African nation. More than 18,000 people fleeing poverty, violence or other circumstances at home have arrived in the islands this year, a 1,000% increase from the same period in 2019, and over 500 have died in the attempt. Around half of those arrivals —and most of the deaths— have been in the past 30 days, a spike that has strained resources on the Canary Islands.

Most of those who survive the perilous Atlantic route to Europe are rescued at sea and transferred to a port in the Gran Canaria island. Around 2,000 have been sleeping in docks for days and even weeks, under Red Cross marquees and often on the hard concrete.

A few hundred have been transferred to a makeshift camp put up by the military in the past couple of days, where the migrants are supposed to spend the 72 first hours under police custody. That is the maximum time the law allows for identification, but testing for coronavirus has often kept them detained for longer, according to human rights groups.

On a visit to the archipelago on Friday, Spain's migration minister, José Luis Escrivá, said authorities will be building by December a network of emergency camps to host up to 7,000 people in three of the islands.

Some of them will be the 5,500 people currently housed in hotels and tourist apartments that are lying empty because of a lack of visitors as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Normally at this time of year, the islands are one of the most popular holiday destinations in Europe.

Spanish Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos, also on the island, pledged more resources to the stretched maritime rescue services. Meanwhile, Spain's Foreign Minister Arancha González-Laya was due to hold talks with officials from the United Nations migration and refugee bodies in Geneva, ahead of a weekend trip to Senegal. The west African country has become a major point of migrant departures even though it is around 950 miles (1,500 kms) away.

Spain restricts asylum to a number of circumstances and countries of origin. It has bilateral agreements with half a dozen neighboring African countries who under normal circumstances take back those who don’t qualify to stay in Europe. But the number returning has slowed sharply this year during the pandemic, which has led to a series of border closures.

Spain is resisting calls for the migrants to be transferred to the mainland, arguing that it would send a message that the archipelago is a stepping stone into Europe. Its strategy is akin to that being undertaken in Greece, which has opted to keep thousands of migrants in refugee camps on its islands.

The government has also faced criticism for not being better prepared for a surge in migrant numbers given that more than 30,000 arrived in the archipelago in 2006. The European border agency, Frontex, and the International Organization for Migration have been warning since July of the incremental number of arrivals and a subsequent humanitarian crisis.

The IOM's Spain envoy, María Jesús Herrera, who was on a field visit in the islands this week, described the situation as “critical." “This has been a big warning to all authorities that we need to work with more speed and greater coordination," Herrera told The Associated Press on Thursday.

She said there was a shortage of police to help identify arrivals, health personnel to perform coronavirus tests, social workers to assist vulnerable people, and lawyers to process asylum applications.

The IOM's Missing Migrants Project has recorded more than 500 deaths on the route to the Canary Islands, most during October and November, compared to 210 last year, but the organization fears the death toll is a low estimate.

Some 60 people are believed to have died in the latest shipwreck reported Sunday after 66 migrants, including children, arrived in Cape Verde on a damaged boat.

Tarik El Barakah in Rabat, Morocco, and Carley Petesch in Dakar, Senegal, contributed to this report.

Bosnia marks 25 years since inking of US-brokered peace deal

November 20, 2020

SARAJEVO, Bosnia-Herzegovina (AP) — As their ethnic leaders gathered around a table outside Dayton, Ohio, to initial a U.S.-brokered peace deal a quarter-century ago, Edisa Sehic and Janko Samoukovic still were enemies in a war in Bosnia that killed over 100,000 people.

But the two, one an ethnic Bosniak woman and the other an ethnic Serb man, have often come together in recent years to visit schools and town halls where they talk about the futility of war from their first-hand experiences.

In many ways, Bosnia today is a country at peace, a testament to the success of the Dayton Accords, which ended more than 3 1/2 years of bloodshed when they were endorsed 25 years ago on Saturday. But more than a generation after the shooting and shelling stopped, full peace still feels elusive in Bosnia, where the April 1992-Dec. 1995 war gave rise to an ethnic cleansing campaign and Europe's first genocide since World War II.

The country's three ethnic groups — Muslim Bosniaks, Orthodox Serbs and Catholic Croats — live in fear of renewed conflict as their nationalist leaders continue to stoke ethnic animosities for political gain.

Some Bosnians hope the election of Joe Biden as the next U.S. president will bolster change by renewing Western interest in the country, one of Europe's poorest. Biden visited Bosnia in 2009 as vice president, becoming the last key U.S. leader to do so.

When the Dayton peace agreement was reached in 1995, Sehic was a soldier with the Bosnian government army and Samoukovic was fighting with Bosnian Serb troops seeking to dismember the country and unite the territory they claimed for their own with neighboring Serbia.

The war was sparked by the break-up of Yugoslavia, which led Bosnia to declare its independence despite opposition from ethnic Serbs, who made up about one-third of its ethnically and religiously mixed population.

Armed and backed by neighboring Serbia, Bosnian Serbs conquered 60% of Bosnia’s territory in less than two months, committing atrocities against their Bosniak and Croat compatriots. Ethnic Croats and Bosniaks also fought against each other for a period of 11 months.

Before the war was over, some 100,000 people had been killed and upward of 2 million, or over a half of the country’s population, were driven from their homes. Samoukovic, a Bosnian Serb who like Sehic, was 23-years-old in 1992, did not crave war. He chose to not leave his home in Pazaric, a small town on the outskirts of Sarajevo. But he and his father were soon arrested by Bosniaks and taken to a makeshift internment camp where prisoners were beaten, used as forced labor and deprived of food.

Sehic, a Muslim, had taken up arms in the early days of the conflict after her older brother was severely injured while defending Maglaj, their hometown in central Bosnia, from advancing Bosnian Serb forces.

She met her husband on the frontline and mourned his death in battle three months after giving birth to their daughter and six months before the war’s end. Bosniaks were by far the greatest victims in the conflict in terms of numbers, accounting for about 80% of the people killed in the conflict.

The General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia, reached at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base outside Dayton, was considered a major U.S foreign policy achievement for the administration of President Bill Clinton.

The agreement was formally signed in Paris on December 14, 1995 by the presidents of Bosnia, Croatia and Serbia - Alija Izetbegovic, Franjo Tudjman and Slobodan Milosevic, respectively. Clinton and 50 other world leaders attending the signing ceremony.

Under the accords, nearly 60,000 international troops were deployed to Bosnia in December 1995 as part of a NATO-led mission to maintain peace and demarcate territory awarded to two semi-autonomous entities created by the agreement: Serb-run Republika Srpska and a federation shared by Bosniaks and Croats.

“When the (peace) agreement was reached, I was happy that there will be no more blood and death around us, hopeful that together we can start building a better future,” Sehic said. “But as time went by, I realized that the shooting had stopped, but little else had changed.”

While it brought an end to the fighting, the Dayton Accords formalized the ethnic divisions by establishing a complicated and fragmented state structure linked by weak joint institutions. The deal “was essentially an armistice struck between a collection of warlords who are still present in the country, but had refashioned themselves as political leaders,” said Jasmin Mujanovic, a U.S.-based political scientist of Bosnian origin.

In the immediate post-war years, the international community kept Bosnia on a reform course, pressuring its leaders to accept painful compromises in return for financial and other support. But over a decade ago, as the international focus shifted to other global crises, Bosnia was mostly left to its own devices, exposed to the growing influence of Russia, China and Turkey.

Increasingly employing divisive nationalist rhetoric as a smoke screen, the political elites of all ethnic stripes have taken control of all levers of government for the benefit of their partisan loyalists.

Their “criminal-political syndicates ... have been blocking significant democratic reforms for decades,” Mujanovic said. Facing the imminent danger of economic collapse, Bosnia is in dire need of constitutional reform, but the process “cannot even commence” without direct engagement of the United States, Mujanovic believes.

Some in Bosnia, where nearly half of the population lives under or close to the poverty line, hope that U.S. interest will increase under Biden. “I hope that we shall be on the agenda of the Biden administration so that we can finally put behind what happened (during the war) and look into the future,” said Haris Silajdzic, Bosnia’s war-time foreign minister and a Bosniak member of its government's delegation in Dayton, Ohio, in 1995.

While agreeing that only the U.S. can help fix Bosnia’s broken constitution, Mujanovic said real change will also require “the will, the pressure and engagement” of the country’s citizens. It is sometimes an uphill battle.

Samoukovic says his own son, now 26, was attracted by the lure of aggressive nationalist rhetoric when he was in high school but has since come to appreciate his father's embrace of reconciliation. Bosnians could leave the war behind “if people listened to our stories instead of having politicians on the evening news constantly filling their ears with hate speech," Samoukovic said. "But most politicians don’t care about our happiness, they do whatever what works for them.”

Sehic, for her part, says she is driven by a sense or responsibility to make sure that neither her daughter "nor any other child will live through the same horrors as I did.”

Sanders, Warren under scrutiny as Biden weighs Cabinet picks

November 20, 2020

WILMINGTON, Del. (AP) — Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, leaders of the Democratic Party's left wing, are at risk of being excluded from the senior ranks of President-elect Joe Biden's administration as the incoming president balances the demands of his party's progressive base against the political realities of a narrowly divided Senate.

The liberal New England senators remain interested in serving in Biden's Cabinet, but even some of their allies recognize they face major political hurdles getting there. Sensing disappointment, progressive leaders have reluctantly begun to express support for less-controversial alternatives.

Warren, whose political career has been defined by efforts to diminish the power of big banks, is the progressive movement’s top choice for Treasury secretary. Sanders, a self-described democratic socialist, reiterated his desire to serve as Biden's Labor secretary on Thursday, describing himself as particularly well-suited “to focus on the many crises facing working families in this country.”

Whether he is included in Biden’s cabinet or not, Sanders warned Biden not to freeze out progressives as he shapes his government. “It seems to me pretty clear that progressive views need to be expressed within a Biden administration,” Sanders told The Associated Press. “It would be, for example, enormously insulting if Biden put together a ‘team of rivals’ — and there’s some discussion that that’s what he intends to do — which might include Republicans and conservative Democrats — but which ignored the progressive community. I think that would be very, very unfortunate.”

The scrutiny on Biden's staffing decisions reflects the tremendous pressure the president-elect faces as he cobbles together a senior team to execute his policy priorities drawing from his party's disparate factions. He will almost certainly face criticism no matter whom he picks for the most powerful positions, but he can perhaps least afford to lose the support of his vocal progressive base.

In a nod to the left wing, Biden's transition team has hired Analilia Mejia, a Sanders' adviser who served as his presidential campaign's political director, to work on progressive outreach. It's unlikely, however, that mid-level hires during the transition will be enough to satisfy progressives.

Biden told reporters Thursday that he had finalized his choice for Treasury secretary and said the pick would be “someone who will be accepted by all elements of the Democratic party, moderates and progressives.” He sidestepped a specific question about Sanders joining his Cabinet as he walked off stage.

Likely facing a divided Congress that could push back against the vast majority of his agenda, Biden is eyeing a series of executive actions to be implemented by his Cabinet that would force significant changes in health care, banking, environmental regulation, immigration and foreign policy, among other major issues.

Biden's transition team declined to comment publicly about Sanders or Warren. And while progressives have not given up hope that one or both might still be nominated, they acknowledged the possibility — even the likelihood — that the high-profile liberal senators would remain in the Senate.

“It’s safe to say that Elizabeth Warren has definitely earned the trust and the ear of Joe Biden, and will surely have an influential role in agenda setting going forward whether it’s being a very powerful senator or a more formal role in his administration,” said Adam Green, co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, among Warren's most vocal supporters in Washington. “No matter what, she’ll be powerful when it comes to agenda setting for the Democratic Party.”

Waleed Shahid, a spokesman for the Sanders-aligned Justice Democrats, said his group and others recognize that “not every single member of the administration is going to be progressive — that's not who Joe Biden is." He said progressives simply want ”adequate representation" in the Cabinet.

“We are advocating for them to be included, but we also have backup choices," he said of Warren and Sanders. Indeed, liberal groups have tried to rally behind lesser-known progressive leaders such as Michigan Rep. Andy Levin for Labor secretary and former Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen to lead the Department of Treasury.

Like their party's establishment leaders, progressives understand the political challenge Democrats would face should either Sanders or Warren leave the Senate. In both cases, Republican governors would have the ability to nominate their replacements, at least in the short-term.

Sanders noted that Vermont Gov. Phil Scott has promised to fill a prospective vacancy with an independent who caucuses with Democrats, just as Sanders does. “Gov. Scott is a moderate Republican. He is not a right-wing Republican,” Sanders said. “He understands that this is a progressive state and the wise and appropriate thing to do would be, as an interim appointment before the special election took place -- would be to appoint somebody whose views were consistent with mine.”

In a best-case scenario for Democrats, the Senate would be divided 50-50 in January when the new Congress is sworn in, with Vice President-elect Kamala Harris in position to break the tie. But that's only if Democrats win both of Georgia's special elections on Jan. 5.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell holds great sway over Biden’s Cabinet nominees regardless of which party ends up in control. The Senate's top Republican has yet to tip his hand about how he’ll navigate the confirmation process, preferring to wait for Trump to accept the election results and Georgia's Senate elections to play out. But Senate Democrats expect McConnell to impose a full-scale blockade on Cabinet picks he doesn't like.

Biden will be the first Democrat president in modern times trying to set up a first-term administration without his party controlling the Senate, a rare dynamic that will play out before a bitterly divided nation and a hyper-partisan Senate.

The more controversial potential nominees, Warren and Sanders among them, would likely struggle to win confirmation. Some are already running into partisan opposition. Previewing the intense battles ahead, Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz has been producing a series of campaign-style videos opposing both Warren and Sanders.

Yet there is also evidence of resistance from Biden's own coalition, which includes moderate Democrats, independents and even some Republicans. “Choosing Elizabeth Warren or Bernie Sanders, who represent the far left -- and in Bernie’s case an openly socialist view of the world -- is not the leadership that the American people just voted for," said Jennifer Horn, a co-founder of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project that spent millions to support Biden's presidential bid. “I think Joe Biden understands that.”

AP writers Lisa Mascaro and Chris Rugaber in Washington contributed.

Senators introduce legislation to block $23.7B arms sale to UAE

by Christen Mccurdy

Washington DC (UPI)

Nov 19, 2020

A bipartisan group of lawmakers has introduced legislation to block the Trump administration's effort to expedite the sale of $23.7 billion worth of military equipment to the United Arab Emirates.

Last week, the State Department approved three possible weapons deals, totaling $23.37 billion, to the UAE, including $10.4 billion for 50 F-35A aircraft.

The deal prompted some in the Senate to ask the State Department to certify that it "does not diminish Israel's qualitative military edge and poses no vulnerabilities to U.S. military systems and technology."

On Wednesday, Sens. Bob Menendez, D-N.J., Rand Paul, R-Ky., and Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said they plan to introduce four separate Joint Resolutions of Disapproval rejecting the administration's effort to equip the country with the munitions.

A press release from the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations said the administration "circumvented the informal congressional review process that grants the Congressional committees of jurisdiction time to ensure proposed arms sales of this magnitude are consistent with U.S. values, national security objectives, and the safety of our allies."

"There are a number of outstanding concerns as to how these sales would impact the national security interests of both the United States and of Israel," Menendez said in the release.

"As a result, Congress is once again stepping in to serve as a check to avoid putting profit over U.S. national security and that of our allies, and to hopefully prevent a new arms race in the Middle East," Menendez said.

The administration also refused to respond to Congressional inquiries about potential national security risks related to the sale, the senators said.

"The UAE has violated past arms sales agreements, resulting in U.S. arms ending up in the arms of dangerous militia groups, and they have failed to comply with international law in Libya and Yemen," Murphy said.

"A sale this large and this consequential should not happen in the waning days of a lame duck presidency, and Congress must take steps to stop this dangerous transfer of weapons," Murphy said.

The press release includes a link to a letter Menendez and Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., sent to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and then-Defense Secretary Mark Esper in October with questions about the potential sale.

Source: Space War.

Link: https://www.spacewar.com/reports/Senators_introduce_legislation_to_block_237B_arms_sale_to_UAE_999.html.

Iraq, Saudi Arabia reopen land border after 30 years

By AFP

Nov 18,2020

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraq and Saudi Arabia on Wednesday reopened their land border for the first time in 30 years, with closer trade ties between the two countries irking allies of Riyadh's rival, Tehran.

Top officials including Iraq's interior minister and the head of its border commission travelled from Baghdad to formally open the Arar crossing.

They met up with a delegation who had joined them from Riyadh, all in masks, and cut a red ribbon at the border crossing as a line of cargo trucks waited behind them.

Arar will be open to both goods and people for the first time since Riyadh cut off its diplomatic relationship with Baghdad in 1990, following Iraqi ex-dictator Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait.

Ties have remained rocky ever since, but current Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al Kadhemi has a close personal relationship with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed Bin Salman.

Kadhemi was to travel to Saudi Arabia on his first foreign trip as prime minister in May, but the visit was cancelled at the last minute when Saudi King Salman was hospitalized.

He has yet to make the trip, although Iraqi ministers have visited Riyadh to meet with their counterparts and a top-level Saudi delegation travelled to Baghdad last week.

Baghdad sees Arar as a potential alternative to its crossings with eastern neighbor Iran, through which Iraq brings in a large share of its imports.

The two Arab states are also exploring the reopening of a second border point at Al Jumayma, along Iraq's southern border with the Saudi kingdom.

'Let them invest' 

But pro-Iran factions in Iraq, which call themselves the "Islamic Resistance", have stood firmly against closer ties with Saudi Arabia.

Ahead of Arar's opening, one such group identifying itself as Ashab Al Kahf published a statement announcing its "rejection of the Saudi project in Iraq".

"The intelligence cadres of the Islamic Resistance are following all the details of the Saudi enemy's activities on the Iraqi border," it warned.

Speaking to reporters on Tuesday evening, Kadhemi fired back against those describing the rapprochement as Saudi “colonialism”.

“This is a lie. It’s shameful,” he said.

“Let them invest. Welcome to Iraq,” Kadhemi added, saying Saudi investment could bring in a flood of new jobs to Iraq where more than one-third of youth are unemployed.

The closer ties have been a long time coming.

They did not improve much after Saddam’s toppling in the 2003 US-led invasion, as Riyadh looked at the new Shiite-dominated political class with suspicion due to their ties to Iran.

A thaw began in 2017 when then Saudi foreign minister Adel Al Jubeir travelled to Baghdad — the first such visit in decades — followed by a Riyadh trip by Iraqi premier Haider Al Abadi.

The first commercial flights resumed between the two countries and officials began discussing Arar, with high-profile US diplomat Brett McGurk even visiting the crossing in 2017 to support its reopening.

But those plans were repeatedly delayed, with Arar only opened on rare occasions to allow through Iraqi religious pilgrims on their way to Mecca for the Hajj.

More in the works? 

Iraq is the second-largest producer in the OPEC oil cartel, outranked only by Saudi Arabia.

Its oil, gas and electricity infrastructure is severely outdated and inefficient but low oil prices this year have stymied efforts to revamp it.

Baghdad is also notoriously slow to activate external investment, with international firms and foreign countries complaining that rampant corruption hamstrings more investment.

Kadhemi’s government has sought to fast-track foreign investment including Saudi support for energy and agriculture.

On his trip to Washington this summer, he agreed to a half-dozen projects that would use Saudi funding to finance US energy firms.

Last year, Iraq signed a deal to plug into the Gulf Cooperation Council’s power grid and add up to 500 MW of electricity to its dilapidated electricity sector.

Those deals too have been criticized by pro-Iran factions in Iraq.

Source: The Jordan Times.

Link: http://jordantimes.com/news/region/iraq-saudi-arabia-reopen-land-border-after-30-years.

UK's Labor Party suspends critic of Israel

November 17, 2020

A left-wing member of the governing body of Britain's Labor Party is under investigation for saying that Israel is an apartheid state.

Newly-elected National Executive Committee member Gemma Bolton, who was backed by left wing group Momentum, has been placed under investigation by the party for tweeting in 2018: "If I run the risk of getting suspended for calling Israel an apartheid state then so be it. Suspend me. Because that comrades, is a hill I am perfectly happy to die on."

An article in the Jewish Chronicle article referred to Bolton's views on Israel as "hard line" and attempted to shame her for previous posts completely unrelated to the issue. She was accused of being fond of "sexually explicit humor"; the pro-Israel community newspaper cited a social media post from 2015 in which she said, "I'm torn between wanting to be a high class Westminster politician or a porn star."

In 2017, a UN report said that, "Israel has established an apartheid regime that dominates the Palestinian people as a whole." UN Under-Secretary-General Rima Khalaf said at the time that the report "clearly and frankly concludes that Israel is a racist state that has established an apartheid system that persecutes the Palestinian people." Israel immediately expressed its outrage and dismissed the report as "anti-Semitic".

The latest Labor suspension follows that of former leader Jeremy Corbyn MP, who was suspended after the publication of the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) report into alleged anti-Semitism in the party. Those opposed to such moves point out that anti-Zionism and anti-Semitism are not the same thing, and that legitimate criticism of the Israeli government's policies is not anti-Semitic per se.

Labor leader Keir Starmer sacked left wing Rebecca Long-Bailey from the shadow cabinet earlier this year for sharing an interview with actress Maxine Peake speaking out about police brutality in the wake of the George Floyd murder. Peake mentioned that US police forces receive training from their Israeli counterparts.

Starmer also reportedly gave backbench MP Stephen Kinnock a "dressing down" for suggesting that the government should stop buying goods from illegal Israeli settlements built on Palestinian land. Again, the reality is that such settlements and the movement of people to live on occupied land are illegal in the eyes of international law.

Source: Middle East Monitor.

Link: https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20201117-uks-labour-party-suspends-critic-of-israel/.