Nicaragua’s best-known daily newspaper La Prensa is aiming to expand its page count and possibly re-hire some laid-off newsroom staff after an 18 month government-enforced blockade of newsprint supplies.

Nicaraguan customs officials on Thursday agreed to release an impounded shipment of ink and paper after a communications channel between the government and the country’s only remaining national newspaper was reopened.

According to news wires, the government’s decision came just days after the Vatican’s top diplomat in Managua intervened on La Prensa’s behalf.

The breakthrough came just days after a La Prensa editorial warned that the newspaper’s days may be numbered.

“Nicaragua would be the only country in the world that would not have a printed newspaper,” said the storied publication’s editorial board, which has long been an irritant of President Daniel Ortega.

2018 seizure

La Presna’s imported newsprint shipments were seized in August 2018, shortly after the paper repeatedly called Ortega a dictator following deadly police crackdowns on a wave of anti-government protests over cuts to social security and calls for his resignation.

Ortega’s government labeled the uprising a U.S.-financed coup attempt, and its violent response claimed more than 320 lives.

“We have not offered anything in return to the government [for the surprise release of print materials],” said La Prensa Director Jaime Chamorro, whose family bought the publication in 1932, just six years after it was founded.

La Presna editor Eduardo Enrique said the seizure forced rationing of newsprint, cutting its standard 36-page daily edition down to eight pages, sacrificing ad revenue and forcing newsroom-wide layoffs.

Over the weekend, La Prensa executives said they plan conduct a market study to determine how many pages they can print in light of their economic losses. Enrique, who now leads of newsroom of 25 journalists that produce multiple publications, also said they’re planning to rehire newsroom personnel lost during the blockade, although he did not give a specific number.

A storied history

“La Prensa used to have a big newsroom with more than 70 journalists,” said Emiliano Chamorro, who was laid off after a 25-year career covering political and religious affairs for La Presna.

“It’s the most important newspaper in the country,” he said. “With more than 94 years of history, the newspaper has survived three dictatorships—two of Somoza, and the first one of Daniel Ortega in the 80s.”

Nicaraguan government officials did not respond to requests to explain why they retained the materials or what prompted them to free it.

Part of broader press clampdown

The violent unrest of 2018 was followed by a severe clampdown on independent media, in which Ortega’s security forces raided news outlets and imprisoned journalists.

Since that time, more than 100 journalists have fled the country in the wake of threats, beatings and arbitrary detentions, according to a July 2019 statement by the UN’s High Commissioner for Human Rights. 

Ortega, whose own family presides over a vast media empire, has repeatedly offered assurances that all Nicaraguans enjoy unrestricted freedom of personal expression.

“In Nicaragua there is an absolute freedom of religion and expression,” the president said during a recent presidential speech.

Carlos Fernando Chamorro, director of independent newsweekly and TV channel Confidencial, told Voice of America he hopes the released paper and ink will be followed by a return of confiscated news facilities, including his 100% Noticias television newsroom.

La Prensa executives say they anticipate printing a full edition in coming weeks, but that they must first assess the quality of the recently released paper, newsprint reel, and plate cylinders.

Washington-imposed sanctions on Nicaragua for human rights violations followed the 2018 unrest, which aimed to pressure Managua into easing restrictions on various organizations.

According to Reuters, Michael Kozak, the Acting Assistant Secretary for the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, said on Twitter that “the long-overdue decision to release @laprensa’s paper & ink from Nicaraguan customs is a step in the right direction.”

Managua-based El Nuevo Diario shut down in September after government officials impounded their newsprint supplies. Leaders of both El Nuevo Diario and La Prensa have accused Ortega’s government of de facto censorship and “economic asphyxiation” for editorials critical of his administration’s response to the 2018 protests.

A report by the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation recorded some 420 press violations between April and October 2018. 

Paris-based Reporters Without Borders ranks Nicaragua 114 out of 180 countries in its 2019 World Press Freedom Index, a 24-point drop from its 2018 ranking.

“The persecution of independent media outlets has become much more intense since the political crisis intensified in April 2018,” the report states. “…Although the environment is now extremely violent, non-aligned media outlets cannot afford the bulletproof vests and other protective equipment that their reporters need when covering demonstrations.”

This story originated in VOA’s Latin American Division (( https://www.voanoticias.com )). Some information is from Reuters.

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From: MeNeedIt

Despite criticism by international human rights organizations, opposition leaders and activists, authorities in Pakistan have not released the leader of a prominent rights group in Pakistan who was arrested last month on charges of sedition and contempt for the country’s constitution.

Authorities arrested Manzoor Pashteen, the leader of Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), in January in Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.  

His movement advocates for end to militancy in Pashtun-populated regions, equal rights for Pakistan’s ethnic Pashtuns, an end to forced disappearances, illegal detention, and extrajudicial killings allegedly carried out by Pakistani security forces.  

According to the first incident report (FIR) filed against Pashteen by the police, charges against him include conspiracy, promoting enmity between different ethnic groups, threatening Pakistan’s sovereignty, and sedition for a speech he delivered that allegedly criticized the constitution of Pakistan.  

However, his supporters charge that demanding changes in the constitution is not a crime. 

“Demanding changes in the constitution is not sedition. To silence our voices, they [the military] are involving us in these kinds of fake cases. But they can’t silence us for demanding change, justice and equality.” Mohsin Dawar, a member of Pakistan’s National Assembly and a prominent leader of the Pashtun Tahafuz Movement (PTM), told VOA.

Dawar, who has been arrested by authorities several times for his activism in the past, was also briefly detained after the arrest of Pashteen during a rally where protesters demanded his immediate release.  

Since Pashteen’s arrest, thousands of ethnic Pashtuns have organized big rallies across multiple cities in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, demanding his release.  

Rights organizations

Prominent rights organizations including Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have also demanded the “immediate and unconditional release” of Pashteen.   “

Manzoor Pashteen has been arbitrarily detained for exercising his human rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. He must be released immediately and unconditionally,” Amnesty International said in a tweet following Pashteen’s arrest.  

Human Watch Watch, a global rights group, has also voiced concerns over the arrest of Pashteen. 

“Pakistani authorities should stop arresting activists like Manzoor Pashteen who are critical of government actions or policies,” Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said in a statement released by the rights group.  

Speech in DI Khan  

While addressing his supporters during a speech last month in Dera Ismail Khan region of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, Pashteen accused the Pakistani establishments of systematic discrimination against ethnic Pashtuns and criticized the country’s constitution for not treating Pashtuns fairly.  

“The constitution is not right. It is not based on human rights. It is not based on the equality of ethnic groups. It based on minority and majority. Punjab [ethnic group] will always be the majority and you [Pashtuns] will always be the minority.  The constitution was made with the intention of excluding you from power so that they will be in power or their favored ones will be in power. These mistakes need to be changed,” he said in Pashto.

Several days later, authorities arrested him for contempt of the constitution. He has appeared twice before a court and will have another hearing Tuesday.  

According to his lawyers, due to the sheer number of cases against him, the government picks a different case against him every time he secures acquittal from the court on the previous case.   

“Pashteen has several cases against him; he may be granted bail for some charges but could remain under detention or be arrested again based on the other charges filed against him,” Syed Akhtar, Pashteen’s lawyer, told VOA.  

Government’s reaction

The Pakistani government has issued no official statement regarding the arrest of Pashteen and other PTM members that the police have taken into custody.  

VOA reached out to both the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military’s public affairs office and the country’s Foreign Office (FO) for comments, but received no response.

The Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), the military’s public affairs office and the country’s Foreign Office (FO) did not respond to VOA requests for comments.  

A senior government official, however, reacted to Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s tweets in regards to Pashteen’s arrest and labeled Ghani’s remarks as interference.  

“We have noted with serious concern the recent tweets by President Ashraf Ghani, which are a clear interference in Pakistan’s internal affairs and hence, unwarranted,” Firdous Ashiq Awan, the special assistant to Pakistan’s prime minister on information, said in a tweet in Urdu.   

“We believe that such statements are not helpful to the promotion of good neighborly relations between the two countries… Pakistan is a sovereign state. It is Pakistan’s law to take legal action against elements who are against the Constitution…Troublemakers cannot be allowed to play with peace,” she added.  

Ghani expressed concerns over Pashteen’s arrest and urged authorities to deal with peaceful movements through dialogue and engagement.  

“…While our region is suffering from atrocities caused by violent extremism and terrorism…governments in the region must support and encourage peaceful civilian movements for justice and must avoid any means of force and violence against these movements. On the contrary, differences with such peaceful movements must be resolved through dialogue and engagement,” Ghani said.  

Accusations

Authorities in Pakistan have accused PTM leadership of receiving support from intelligence agencies of India and Afghanistan, a charge denied by Pashteen and his PTM members.  

Last year, Asif Ghafoor, the previous Director-General of Inter-Services Public Relations (DGISPR), accused PTM of receiving funding from outside.  

“They [PTM] have a lot more money than they claim to have on their official site. We have details. Why don’t they tell us how much they have? Also, who and where did the money come from? According to finances on March 22, 2018 the NDS gave them money to keep their protests going,” Ghafoor said.

Pashteen has rejected the allegations against PTM as baseless. In an interview with VOA last year, he said that there is no proof of them receiving outside support.  

“These are baseless accusations that we receive funding from foreign intelligence agencies. They cannot produce a single evidence,” Pashteen said.  

“They [military] train militants here and then the militants carry out attacks in my country and other countries of the world. With PTM’s emergence as a movement, the military can no longer operate with impunity to do that and their so-called business has been faced with difficulties,” he added.  

Since its establishment, dozens of prominent PTM activists have been arrested and some have been released on bail. This is the first time that authorities have gone after the founder of the group.

VOA’s Adnan Bitani contributed to this report from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

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From: MeNeedIt

Syrian government forces killed five Turkish soldiers and wounded five more on Monday in an attack on a Turkish military post in the Taftanaz area of northwest Syria, broadcaster NTV cited the Turkish Defense Ministry as saying.

Turkey has sent major reinforcements to Syria’s Idlib region where the attack occurred, as Ankara tries to stem rapid advances by Syrian government forces. Turkish officials told Reuters Turkish forces were retaliating after the latest strike.

The Syrian government offensive in Idlib, the last major enclave of opposition to President Bashar al-Assad, has driven more than half a million people from their homes towards the closed Turkish border, threatening a new humanitarian crisis.

A rebel source said Syrian government forces had shelled the military base at Taftanaz, and witnesses said Turkish helicopters flew into northwest Syria to evacuate the wounded.

A rebel commander said the insurgents launched a military operation on Monday against the Syrian army near Saraqeb with the help of Turkish artillery, with witnesses also reporting Turkish shelling of Syrian military positions in the region.

Turkey, which already hosts 3.6 million Syrian refugees, says it cannot absorb any more and has demanded Damascus pull back in Idlib by the end of the month or face Turkish action.

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From: MeNeedIt

KANO, NIGERIA — Jihadists killed at least 30 people and abducted women and children in a raid in northeast Nigeria’s restive Borno state, a regional government spokesman said on Monday.

The attack Sunday evening targeted the village of Auno on a key highway linking to regional capital Maiduguri.

The jihadists stormed in on trucks mounted with heavy weapons, killing, burning and looting before kidnapping women and children, state government spokesman Ahmad Abdurrahman Bundi said.

They aimed at travelers who had stopped for the night and torched vehicles.

The attackers “killed not less than 30 people who are mostly motorists and destroyed 18 vehicles,” Bundi said in a statement after visiting the scene.

The attack, some 25 kilometers (15 miles) west of Maiduguri, occurred in an area where fighters from the Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) have been active, mounting roadblocks to target security forces and civilians.

Witnesses said jihadists set alight 30 vehicles in the raid, including trucks that had stopped overnight on their way to Maiduguri.

“Many of the drivers and their assistants who were sleeping the vehicles were burnt alive,” civilian militia fighter, Babakura Kolo told AFP.

The jihadists combed through the village, looting and burning shops and property before withdrawing, he said.

Auno lies on the 120-kilometre highway linking Maiduguri to Damaturu, a major regional city in neighboring Yobe state.

The highway has been increasingly targeted by ISWAP militants in recent months.

The surge has followed the creation of so-called “super camps” by the Nigerian military in the northeast — a strategy under which small army camps have withdrawn from several areas and combined into fewer, larger bases.

Last month, four Nigerian soldiers were killed and seven injured when the jihadists attacked troops positioned in Auno.

The decade-long Islamist insurgency has killed 36,000 people and displaced around two million from their homes in northeast Nigeria.

The violence has spread to neighboring Niger, Chad and Cameroon, prompting a regional military coalition to fight the insurgents.

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From: MeNeedIt

A Russian delegation returned to Turkey on Monday for further talks over rising tensions in Syria’s northwestern Idlib province, after an initial round last week failed to yield results, Turkey’s foreign minister said. An airstrike in a nearby rebel-held region, meanwhile, killed nine people including children, opposition activists said.

Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces, backed by Russian air cover, have been advancing into the last rebel-held areas of Idlib and nearby Aleppo countryside, seizing dozens of towns and sparking a large-scale humanitarian crisis with some 600,000 people fleeing from their homes toward safer areas near the border with Turkey.

Most of the displaced are living in open-air shelters and temporary homes in freezing winter conditions close to the border. Half of the displaced are believed to be children.

The fighting led to the collapse of a fragile cease-fire that was brokered by Turkey and Russia in 2018. The two countries back opposing sides in the Syrian war: Turkey supports the Syrian rebels, while Russia has heavily backed the Syrian government’s offensive.

Turkey sent hundreds of military vehicles and troops into Idlib province in the past week. The buildup and the continued government advances sparked a rare clash on Feb. 3 between Turkish and Syrian soldiers that killed eight Turkish military personnel and 13 Syrian troops. Turkey has warned Syria to retreat to the cease-fire lines that were agreed in 2018.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Turkish and Russian delegations exchanged proposals over the situation in Idlib during a first meeting in Ankara on Saturday. On Monday, the Russian team returned to Ankara from a visit to Jordan, for further discussions, he said.

“If a compromise had been reached there would have been no need for today’s meeting,” Cavusoglu told reporters. He said the Turkish and Russian leaders could step in if no compromise is reached.

Syria’s military has vowed to keep up its campaign.

The early morning airstrike on the village of Ibbin in Aleppo province killed nine people, including six children, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, and the Step news agency, an activist collective. At least 10 people were also wounded in the airstrike.

The Syrian government’s campaign appears to be aimed at securing a strategic highway in rebel-controlled territory for now, rather than seizing the entire province and its the densely populated capital, Idlib.

The government-controlled Syrian Central Military Media released a map of the area of fighting showing that Syrian troops only have 15 kilometers (9 miles) left from seizing full control of the strategic highway, know as M5. The highway links the national capital of Damascus with the country’s north, which has for years been divided between government and opposition forces.

Meanwhile, a car bomb exploded Monday in a Syrian town controlled by Turkey-backed opposition fighters, killing at least four people and wounding 15 others, Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The attack was the latest in a series of explosions in Turkish-controlled regions that have killed and wounded scores of people. Turkey has blamed the attacks on on the Syrian Kurdish militia, known as the People’s Protection Units.

The bomb went off on a main street in the town of Afrin, which Turkey took control of following a military incursion in 2018, Anadolu reported. It said some of the wounded were in serious condition, adding that the death toll was likely to rise.

The Turkish offensive has aimed at pushing Kurdish fighters away from the border. Those Kurdish fighters had been key U.S. allies in the fight against the Islamic State group. Turkey considers the Syrian Kurdish fighters terrorists linked to a Kurdish insurgency within Turkey.

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From: MeNeedIt

A man carrying a knife was arrested outside the White House after he told a U.S. Secret Service officer that he was there to kill the president, police said.

Roger Hedgpeth, 25, was arrested Saturday afternoon on a charge of making threats to do bodily harm, the Metropolitan Police Department said.

Hedgpeth approached a Secret Service officer who was patrolling outside the White House and said he was there to “assassinate” President Donald Trump and “I have a knife to do it with,” according to a police report obtained by The Associated Press.

Police found a 3 1/2-inch knife in a sheath on his left hip, and Hedgpeth also had an empty pistol holster on his right hip, authorities said.

Hedgpeth was taken into custody and brought to a hospital for a mental health evaluation, police said. Officers also impounded his vehicle.

A telephone number listed for Hedgpeth in public records rang unanswered on Sunday. It wasn’t immediately clear where he lives or whether he had an lawyer who could comment on his behalf.

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From: MeNeedIt

Libya’s warring parties will continue talks this month to try to reach a lasting cease-fire in a war for control of the capital, Tripoli, the United Nations said Saturday, after a first round in Geneva recently failed to yield an agreement. 

The U.N. hosted indirect talks between five officers from the Libyan National Army (LNA) led by Khalifa Haftar, which has been trying to take Tripoli since April, and the same number from forces of the internationally recognized government in Tripoli. 

Fighting has calmed down since last month, although skirmishes with artillery have continued in southern Tripoli, which the LNA has been unable to breach in its campaign. 

Both sides had agreed to continue the dialogue, with the U.N. proposing a follow-up meeting on February 18 in Geneva, the U.N. mission to Libya (UNSMIL) said in a statement. 

It said the two sides wanted people displaced by the war to return but had been unable to agree on how to achieve this, without elaborating. 

There was no immediate comment from either side in the conflict. 

Blockade

UNSMIL gave no update on efforts to end a blockade of major oil ports and oilfields by forces and tribesmen loyal to the LNA. 

On Thursday, U.N. Libya envoy Ghassan Salame said he had talked to tribesmen behind the blockade and was awaiting their demands. 

He also said the blockade would be at the top of the agenda at a meeting in Cairo on Sunday between representatives from eastern, western and southern Libya seeking to overcome economic divisions in a country with two governments. 

Diplomats said the Cairo meeting would be mainly attended by technical experts to prepare a wider dialogue to be followed in coming months. 

In a sign that a reopening of ports might not be imminent, tribes and communities in oil-rich areas in eastern Libya held by the LNA said in a statement that they opposed resuming oil exports unless Tripoli was freed of militias, a demand of the LNA. 

Withdrawal of Syrians 

They also demanded the withdrawal of Syrian fighters sent by Turkey to help defend Tripoli against the LNA, which enjoys the backing of Egypt, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Russian mercenaries. 

Furthermore, they called for what they described as a fair distribution of oil revenues, another demand of the LNA and people in the east, where many complain of neglect going back to Moammar Gadhafi, toppled in a 2011 uprising that plunged Libya into chaos. 

State oil firm NOC, which is based in Tripoli and serves the whole country, sends oil revenues to the central bank, which mainly works with the Tripoli government although it also pays some civil servants in the east. 

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From: MeNeedIt

Israel has begun to draw up maps of land in the occupied West Bank that will be annexed in accordance with U.S. President Donald Trump’s proposed peace plan, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Saturday. 

“We are already at the height of the process of mapping the area that, according to the Trump plan, will become part of the state of Israel. It won’t take too long,” Netanyahu said at an election campaign rally in the Maale Adumim settlement. 

Netanyahu said the area would include all Israeli settlements and the Jordan Valley — territory that Israel has kept under military occupation since its capture in the 1967 Middle East war but that Palestinians want in a future state. 

“The only map that can be accepted as the map of Palestine is the map of the Palestinian state on the 1967 borders with Jerusalem as its capital,” said Nabil Abu Rdainah, spokesman for Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. 

Prospects for annexations, which have already been widely condemned, are unclear. 

Election in March

Israel will hold a national election on March 2 and Netanyahu, who is facing criminal corruption charges, is hoping to win a fifth term in office. He presently heads a caretaker government, whose legal authority to annex territory is still undecided by judicial authorities. 

Settlers make up part of Netanyahu’s right-wing voter base and many members of his coalition cabinet view the West Bank as the biblical heartland of the Jewish people. 

Most countries consider Israeli settlements on land captured in war to be a violation of international law. Trump has changed U.S. policy to withdraw such objections. 

Palestinians say the settlements make a future state nonviable. Israel cites security needs as well as biblical and historical ties to the land on which they are built. 

Two-state plan, with conditions

Trump’s plan envisages a two-state solution with Israel and a future Palestinian state living alongside each other, but it includes strict conditions that Palestinians reject. 

The blueprint gives Israel much of what it has long sought, including U.S. recognition of settlements and Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley. 

A redrawn, demilitarized Palestinian state would be subject to Israeli control over its security and would receive tracts of desert in return for arable land settled by Israelis. 

Right after Trump presented the plan on January 28, Netanyahu said his government would begin extending Israeli sovereignty to the settlements and the Jordan Valley within days. 

But Washington then appeared to put the brakes on that and Netanyahu has since faced pressure from settler leaders to annex territory despite any U.S. objections. 

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From: MeNeedIt

A smoking ban in all Malaysian eateries is sparking controversy particularly now that it’s being enforced. The ban officially began a year ago, but violators started being penalized only recently. Dave Grunebaum has the story.
 

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From: MeNeedIt

Suicides in the active-duty Air Force surged last year to the highest total in at least three decades, even as the other military services saw their numbers stabilize or decline, according to officials and unpublished preliminary data.

The reasons for the Air Force increase are not fully understood, coming after years of effort by all of the military services to counter a problem that seems to defy solution and that parallels increases in suicide in the U.S. civilian population.

84 Air Force suicides

According to preliminary figures, the Air Force had 84 suicides among active-duty members last year, up from 60 the year before. The jump followed five years of relative stability, with the service’s yearly totals fluctuating between 60 and 64. Official figures won’t be published until later this year and could vary slightly from preliminary data.

Air Force officials, who confirmed the 2019 total, said they knew of no higher number in recent years. Data and studies previously published by the Pentagon and Air Force show that 64 suicides in 2015 had been the highest total for the Air Force in this century. A 2009 Air Force study said suicides between 1990 and 2004 averaged 42 a year and never exceeded 62.

“Suicide is a difficult national problem without easily identifiable solutions that has the full attention of leadership,” Lt. Gen. Brian Kelly, the Air Force’s deputy chief of staff for manpower, personnel and services, said in a statement. He said the Air Force is focused on immediate, midterm and long-range solutions to a problem faced throughout the military.

Suicide risk factors are often thought to include stress related to deployment to combat zones in Iraq and Afghanistan. But a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in 2013 concluded, based on an assessment of current and former military personnel over a seven-year period, that combat experience and other deployment-related factors were not associated with increased risk of suicide. Instead the study’s results pointed to numerous other factors, including being male, engaging in heavy or binge drinking, and bipolar disorder.

Suicides across the services

Although only the Air Force saw a major increase last year, all the services have struggled with higher suicides since about 2005-2006, which coincided with a cycle of exceptionally stressful deployments to Iraq for the Army and Marine Corps. The Pentagon encourages service members and veterans in need of help to contact the Military Crisis Line.

The Navy last year saw its active-duty suicides rise by four, to 72, and the Marine Corps total dropped by 10, to 47. All the 2019 numbers include confirmed and suspected suicides and are subject to revision based on further medical review. It is not uncommon for a service’s total to get adjusted up or down after further review, but any changes are slight.

The Army declined to reveal its 2019 preliminary total, but The Associated Press determined it was little changed from the previous year’s 139. The Army’s figure is typically the highest in the military because it is by far the biggest service, with about 480,000 soldiers on active duty this year, compared with about 332,000 in the Air Force.

The Air Force in the mid-1990s pioneered a suicide prevention program that was seen as effective, and at various times since the U.S. became entangled in combat in Iraq and Afghanistan the other services have seen troubling increases in their suicide numbers. The Marine Corps, for example, saw its numbers jump from 37 to 57 between 2016 and 2018.

Progress sought

Maj. Craig W. Thomas, a Marine Corps spokesman, said the Marines want further progress after recording 10 fewer active-duty suicides last year. He said unit leaders are encouraged to speak openly with their Marines about stress, mental wellness and suicide.

“When leaders and mental health programs and resources acknowledge that ‘everybody struggles with life, trauma, shame, guilt and uncertainty,’ it helps make asking for assistance more acceptable,” Thomas said.

Last year, the Air Force went public with its concerns as it saw its suicide numbers rising. Last summer, Gen. David Goldfein, the Air Force chief of staff, ordered a “resilience tactical pause” across the force to foster open discussion within the service about suicide prevention. In a July 31 letter, he wrote: “Hopeful to hopeless. What is going on? It is our job to find out.”

Answers are elusive, but the Air Force says the Goldfein “pause” jump-started an effort to promote “connectedness” among airmen.

The military, whose population is generally younger and more fit than America as a whole, is quick to note that suicide is a problem throughout society. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, from 1999 through 2017, the nation’s suicide rates increased for both men and women, with bigger percentage increases occurring after 2006.

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From: MeNeedIt

In just one day, the number of confirmed Coronavirus cases in China grew by almost 4,000 and the death toll climbed by nearly 75.  As the virus continued to spread Thursday, the World Health Organization said it’s still too early to tell if the virus outbreak has peaked, even though on Wednesday the overall number of new cases dropped for the first time.  VOA correspondent Mariama Diallo has more

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From: MeNeedIt

French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday advocated a more coordinated European Union defense strategy in which France, the bloc’s only post-Brexit nuclear power, and its arsenal would hold a central role.
    
Addressing military officers graduating in Paris, Macron set out his country’s nuclear strategy in a bid to show leadership one week after nuclear-armed Britain officially exited the EU.
    
Macron highlighted how France sees its nuclear weapons as a deterrent against attacks from belligerent foes, though he conceded France’s nuclear might is diminished after its military scaled down its arsenal to under 300 nuclear weapons.
    
But the speech aimed to project strength, as Macron refused to sign any treaty at this stage to further reduce the French arsenal, announced an increase in military spending and positioned himself as the driving force for a united EU, using France’s military clout to make his point. Macron also touted the French military’s role in spots such as Africa’s Sahel, where he has just pledged an additional 600 troops to fight extremists.
    
The central idea in the keynote speech, however, was that of a boosted Europe-wide role for the French nuclear arsenal in a more coordinated European defense policy.
    
Macron said it the strategy would prevent Europe “confining itself to a spectator role” in an environment dominated by Russia, the United States and China.
    
“Europeans must collectively realize that, in the absence of a legal framework, they could quickly find themselves exposed to the resumption of a conventional, even nuclear, arms race on their soil,” Macron warned.
    
His remarks come at a time when NATO allies, who would ordinarily look to the United States for help  in a nuclear standoff, worry about Washington’s retreat from the multilateral stage. This could create new tensions within NATO, where Macron ruffled feathers last year by saying the lack of U.S. leadership is causing the “brain death” of the military alliance.
    
Last year, Russia and the US pulled out of the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, dating  from the era of the Soviet Union, and each blamed the other for its failure. Evoking the tearing-up of the INF treaty, Macron said he wanted the Europeans to propose their own “international arms control agenda together.”
    
Friday’s speech was  part of Macron’s long-running push for a stronger European defense, as U.S. President Donald Trump has pulled away from European allies and admonished them to pay more for their own protection.
    
Macron explained his vision as “an offer of dialogue” and “service” to Europeans to assert their autonomy “in defense and arms control.”

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From: MeNeedIt