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Hakki Akdeniz was living on the street when he arrived to the US in 2001. He went from being homeless to running a successful pizza business in New York, and now gives back to the streets.
Reporter: Anna Nelson, Camera: Vladimir Badikov, Dmitrii Vershinin, Natalia Latukhina; Adapted by: Philip Alexiou; VOA Russian Service
From: MeNeedIt
2020 marks the beginning of a promising decade for Africa, according to African experts and global policymakers who gathered this week for the release of the Brookings Institution’s annual publication on Africa. VOA correspondent Mariama Diallo reports on some of the six key priorities, including climate change, regional integration, and the need to develop the energy and private sectors.
From: MeNeedIt
Ukrainian authorities say they have opened an investigation into whether Marie Yovanovitch, the former U.S. ambassador to Kyiv, was illegally spied on before U.S. President Donald Trump abruptly recalled her from her post last year. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the State Department have not replied to repeated requests for comment on the alleged surveillance and potential physical threats to the 33-year career diplomat. VOA’s Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.
From: MeNeedIt
Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam announced Wednesday that he was declaring a state of emergency over threats of “armed militia groups storming our Capitol” ahead of a gun-rights rally next week.
Northam’s emergency order will ban weapons of all kinds, including firearms, from the Capitol grounds starting Friday and continuing through Tuesday. He said the order was necessary to protect public safety because of potential violence from out-of-state groups at a gun-rights rally scheduled for Monday.
“Let me be clear. These are considered credible, serious threats by our law enforcement agencies,” Northam said at a Capitol news conference.
He added that some of the rhetoric used by groups planning to attend Monday’s rally is similar to what was said in the lead-up to a deadly 2017 white nationalist rally in Charlottesville. “We will not allow that mayhem and violence to happen here.”
Monday is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and is known as “Lobby day” in Virginia politics as advocates for a number of causes use the holiday to try and buttonhole lawmakers. It’s also traditionally when pro-gun and gun-control advocates hold rallies. This year, law enforcement officials are expecting thousands of gun-rights advocates to attend a rally organized by the Virginia Citizens Defense League.
The group said its lawyers are reviewing the governor’s emergency declaration but did not have immediate additional comment.
Republicans were mixed in their response. House Minority Leader Del. Todd Gilbert lamented that “there are legitimate concerns of a few bad actors hijacking the rally.” But Republican Party of Virginia Chairman Jack Wilson condemned Northam’s declaration.
“Northam and the rest of the Virginia Democrats have made their session goal crystal clear: a disarmed, vulnerable, and subservient citizenry,” Wilson said in a statement.
The emergency declaration will mean road closures around the Capitol and limited access to the grounds, including a security checkpoint with metal detectors.
Law enforcement leaders from the Capitol Police, Virginia State Police and Richmond Police said public safety was their top priority and they would not tolerate any acts of violence.
Virginia law enforcement officials have been criticized for their planning and response to the Charlottesville rally that involved heavily armed protesters. One woman was killed and several more were injured when a car plowed into a group of counter protesters.
Northam’s declaration will also ban items like helmets and shields, items that some white nationalists carried in Charlottesville.
Gun laws have become a dominant issue this legislative session and there’s been a heavy police presence at the Capitol.
Northam’s planned announcement comes days after Democratic leaders used a special rules committee to ban guns inside the Capitol and a legislative office building. That ban did not include Capitol grounds, which are under the governor’s control.
Democrats have full control of the statehouse for the first time in a generation and are set to pass a number of gun-control restrictions, including limiting handgun purchases to once a month and universal background checks on gun purchases.
Republicans and gun-rights groups have pledged stiff resistance. Gun owners are descending on local government offices to demand they establish sanctuaries for gun rights. More than 100 counties, cities and towns have declared themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries and vowed to oppose any new “unconstitutional restrictions” on guns.
From: MeNeedIt
Lebanese security forces arrested 59 people, the police said Wednesday, following clashes overnight outside the central bank as angry protesters vented their fury against the country’s ruling elite and the worsening financial crisis.
The hours-long clashes that erupted on Tuesday evening also left 47 policemen injured, the security forces said, as some protesters smashed windows on private banks in Beirut’s key commercial district.
Earlier on Tuesday, protesters rallied outside the central bank in the bustling Hamra neighborhood, denouncing the bank governor and policies they say have only deepened the country’s financial woes.
The rally turned violent as protesters tried to push their way through the security forces deployed outside the bank. In over five hours of pitched street battles, security forces lobbed volleys of tear gas at the protesters, who responded with rocks and firecrackers.
Some protesters, using metal bars and sticks, smashed windows on commercial banks and foreign exchange bureaus nearby. The clashes marked an end to a lull in the three-months-long protests.
Lebanon is facing its worst economic troubles in decades. One of the most highly indebted countries in the world, it imports almost all basic goods but foreign currency sources have dried up. The local currency has lost over 60% of its value, dropping for the first time in nearly three decades from a fixed rate of 1,507 pounds to the dollar to 2,400 in just the past few weeks.
Meanwhile, banks have imposed informal capital controls, limiting withdrawal of dollars and foreign transfers in the country.
In three months of protests, this was the first time the commercial center of Beirut had become the scene of clashes. The area, which is also home to theaters and restaurants, was left deserted except for protesters, police and smoke from the tear gas.
Traffic resumed Wednesday and shops and banks reopened as pavements were cleared of smashes glass.
Outgoing Prime Minister Saad Hariri, who resigned shortly after the protests first began in mid-October, said the violence in Hamra was “unacceptable” and an aggression on the heart of the capital. He urged for an investigation. A new prime minister designate was named in December but has still been unable to form a new government.
From: MeNeedIt
Russian President Vladimir Putin has used his annual state-of-the-nation address to parliament to focus on domestic affairs, including measures to counter Russia’s declining population.
In his January 15 speech to Russia’s two-chamber parliament — the Federal Assembly — Putin said that authorities need to do more to raise the country’s birthrate and support young families.
Putin said low incomes remain an obstacle to increase the population, now at about 147 million as the country faces the consequences of the post-Soviet economic collapse that led to a steep drop in the birthrate.
To bolster population growth, Putin promised the government would offer additional subsidies to families that have children.
The speech comes with the country still under Western sanctions for its actions in Ukraine and Syria, as well as its election meddling in the United States.
The sanctions have hampered the country’s economic growth, leading to rising poverty rates and growing discontent highlighted by mass protests last summer in Moscow and other cities.
A poll by a Russian state pollster in May 2019 found public trust in Putin had fallen to its lowest level in 13 years.
Putin, 67, has dominated politics in Russia for two decades, serving as president or prime minister since 1999. In 2018, Putin was reelected to another six-year term.
The address at Moscow’s Manezh exhibition hall is one of three regularly scheduled national appearances the president makes each year — the others being a lavish question-and-answer session with the public and a stage-managed annual press conference.
It is the 16th time Putin has delivered the address before an audience that also includes government ministers, judges from the constitutional and supreme courts, leading regional officials, and other members of Russia’s political elite.
In his address last year, Putin used his 90-minute speech to issue fresh threats against the United States if Washington were to deploy intermediate-range missiles in Europe.
In 2018, Putin focused mainly on claims about breakthroughs in the nation’s military arsenal and unveiled six nuclear-capable weapons that he said were unparalleled in the world.
From: MeNeedIt
A surge of terrorist violence in Africa’s Sahel region is forcing West African nations to reconsider their strategy and unify military forces. Leaders invited by French President Emmanuel Macron to a G5 summit in the southern French city of Pau on Monday agreed to pursue their engagements with France – and put aside their differences with the former colonial power – to fight against jihadism. For VOA, Daniel Gillet reports from Pau.
From: MeNeedIt
The fiancée of murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi called last month’s death sentences for five unnamed assailants a mockery of justice in her first ever English-language interview.
“It’s like a joke to me. It’s unacceptable, really, because we don’t know any details about this investigation,” Hatice Cengiz told Oslo-based Skavlan in a television interview on Sunday.
“They told us of only five men without names,” she said. “And why they are five? More than 10 people came to Turkey!
“We want real punishment, even for [those who gave the] orders,” she told host Fredrik Skavlan.
A court in Saudi Arabia sentenced five people to death and three others to prison in connection with the October 2018 killing of Khashoggi at Riyadh’s consulate in Istanbul.
The brutal murder and dismemberment of the Saudi dissident writer with a bone saw occurred as Cengiz awaited his return outside the consulate walls.
The December 23 Saudi ruling, the outcome of largely secret murder trial proceedings, has been widely dismissed for punishing those who carried out the attack while protecting those who ordered it.
“Bottom line: the hit-men are guilty, sentenced to death, and the masterminds not only walk free, they have barely been touched by the investigation and the trial,” said Agnes Callamard, special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions for the United Nations human rights office.
“That is the antithesis of Justice. It is a mockery,” Callamard said
Riyadh’s public prosecutor defended the ruling, explaining that death sentences targeted those who committed and directly participated in the murder, while imprisoning others “for their role in covering up this crime.”
Callamard’s June 2019 U.N. probe concluded that 15 Saudi agents “acted under cover of their official status and used state means to execute Mr. Khashoggi.”
The U.N. report also found “credible evidence” linking Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to the killing, and a U.S. CIA assessment said the crown prince ordered the killing.
From: MeNeedIt
U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the House of Representatives will vote Wednesday to send official impeachment charges to the Senate, bringing the start of U.S. President Donald Trump’s historical impeachment trial one step closer to reality.
Pelosi made the announcement in a statement that was released shortly after discussing the impeachment proceedings at a private meeting with House Democrats nearly a month after the Democrat-led House voted to impeach Trump on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.“
The American people will fully understand the Senate’s move to begin the trial without witnesses and documents as a pure political cover-up,” the statement said. ‘(Senate Majority) Leader (Mitch) McConnell and the President are afraid of more facts coming to light. The American people deserve the truth, and the Constitution demands a trial.”
Pelosi said the House would also vote Wednesday to name the impeachment managers.
The impeachment allegations contend Trump abused the office of the presidency by pressing Ukraine to launch an investigation into one of his main 2020 Democratic challengers, former Vice President Joe Biden, and obstructing congressional efforts to investigate his Ukraine-related actions.
Choosing managers
Democrats at Tuesday’s closed-door meeting said Pelosi is expected to name House managers for the impeachment case on Wednesday.
Pelosi had delayed sending the articles to the Senate in a futile effort to get Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell to agree to hear testimony from key Trump aides who were directly involved with the president as he temporarily withheld nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine while urging Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to open the Biden investigation.
A Wednesday vote would enable the Senate to start the trial as soon as this week. But opening arguments probably won’t be heard until next week at the earliest, as the Senate will likely take several days to complete formalities such as swearing in Chief Justice John Roberts and approving a set of rules.
Trump, only the fourth U.S. president to be targeted with a serious impeachment effort in the country’s 244-year history, has denied any wrongdoing. He has also ridiculed the Democrats’ impeachment effort.
Two other U.S. presidents, Andrew Johnson in the 19th century and Bill Clinton two decades ago, were also impeached by the House but acquitted in Senate trials, while a third U.S. leader, Richard Nixon, resigned in 1974 while facing a certain impeachment in a political corruption scandal.
Acquittal likely
The Republican-controlled Senate is widely expected to acquit Trump, particularly since no Republicans have expressed support for removing him from office.
A two-thirds vote in the 100-member Senate would be needed to convict Trump to remove him from office. At least 20 Republicans would need to turn against Trump for a conviction, if all 47 Democrats voted against the president. A handful of Republicans have criticized Trump’s Ukraine actions, but none has called for his conviction and removal from office.
Trump released the military aid to Ukraine in September without Zelenskiy opening the investigation of Biden, his son Hunter Biden’s work for a Ukrainian natural gas company and a debunked conspiracy theory that Ukraine meddled in the 2016 election to undermine Trump’s campaign. Republicans say releasing the aid is proof Trump did not engage in a reciprocal quid pro quo deal with Ukraine — the military aid for the Biden investigations.
From: MeNeedIt
Pakistan’s newly opened southwestern Gwadar seaport has begun handling transit cargo headed to and from landlocked Afghanistan, marking a significant outcome of Islamabad’s multi-billion-dollar collaboration with China.
Officials said the first ship full of Afghan cargo containers reached Gwadar on Tuesday. The containers will be loaded onto trucks for transport to Afghanistan through the Pakistani border town of Chaman.
Kabul traditionally has relied on Pakistani overland routes and the two main southern seaports of Karachi and Port Qasim for international trade under a bilateral deal with Islamabad, known as the Afghan Transit Trade Agreement (ATTA).
The recent Chinese financial and construction efforts, though, have activated the strategically located Arabian Sea deep-water port of Gwadar, which offers a much shorter overland link, particularly to southern regions of Afghan, for the rapid delivery of goods.
The port is at the center of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is building Pakistani roads, power plants, economic zones and a major airport in Gwadar to improve connectivity between the two allied nations and the region in general.
The massive project is hailed as the flagship of Beijing’s trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative, which has brought about $30 billion to Pakistan in direct investment, soft loans and grants over the past six years.“
CPEC and the Belt and Road Initiative are promoting regional economic ties,” said the Chinese Embassy in Islamabad while announcing the arrival of the first Afghan cargo containers at Gwadar.
Officials in Islamabad say Pakistan constitutes roughly 47 percent of total Afghan exports, while some 60 percent of Afghan transit trade goes through the northwestern Pakistan border crossing of Torkham. The Gwadar Port, they say, will increase the transit trade activity between the two countries.
China and Pakistan say they also plan to link CPEC to Afghanistan once the security situation improves in the war-torn neighbor.
Beijing recently announced it would fund and install modern reception centers, drinking water and cold storage facilities at Chaman and Torkham to better serve the daily movement of thousands of people as well as trade convoys moving in both directions.
China also has initiated a trilateral dialogue to help ease tensions between Kabul and Islamabad to encourage political, security and economic cooperation in the region.
Critics say Chinese infrastructure investments, however, are burdening economically struggling and debt-ridden economies, like Pakistan, with expensive loans that ultimately would turn into a “debt trap” for these nations. Islamabad and Beijing reject those concerns as misplaced.
From: MeNeedIt
The Trump administration is no longer designating China a currency manipulator as it gets ready to sign the first phase of a trade agreement with Beijing.
“China has made enforceable commitments to refrain from competitive devaluation and not target its exchange rate for competitive purposes,” a Treasury Department report to Congress said Monday.
But China will remain on the Treasury’s watch list of countries whose currency practices will be monitored. Others on the list include Germany, Japan, and Vietnam.
Monday’s decision comes five months after the U.S. formally branded China a currency manipulator — the first time any country was given that designation since U.S. President Bill Clinton’s administration designated China as such in 1994.
Currency manipulation occurs when a country artificially lowers the value of its money to make its goods and services cheaper on the world market, giving it an unfair advantage over its competitors.
China has always denied the practice.
From: MeNeedIt