Two senior allies of Burkina Faso’s deposed former president Blaise Compaore were sentenced to up to 20 years in prison on Monday for organizing a 2015 coup attempt against a transitional government.

Protesters, angered by Compaore’s attempt to change the constitution to extend his 27-year rule, forced him to flee the West African nation in 2014. He now lives in exile in neighboring Ivory Coast.

Troops from the elite Presidential Security Regiment under the command of General Gilbert Diendere, Compaore’s right-hand man, took members of the transitional government hostage less than a month before elections the following year.

The week-long power grab failed, but 14 people were killed and more than 250 others were wounded as they attempted to resist the putsch.

Former spy chief Diendere was sentenced to 20 years in prison for murder and threatening state security.

Compaore’s former foreign minister Djibril Bassole, who was accused of being the coup’s mastermind, was sentenced to 10 years in prison for treason.

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From: MeNeedIt

Kremlin critic Mikhail Khodorkovsky hopes a new documentary film about his life chronicling his journey from being Russia’s richest man to an exiled dissident will open the West’s eyes to the nature of modern Russia.

The film, “Citizen K”, was made by Oscar-winning U.S. filmmaker Alex Gibney and premiered at the Venice Film festival this weekend. It was based on more than 24 hours of interviews that Khodorkovsky, who is now based in Britain, gave over a period of months.

It tells the story of Khodorkovsky’s dramatic 2003 arrest on an icy Siberian runway by armed men and his fall from grace, punishment for what he and his supporters believe was his interest in Russian politics and fighting corruption.

The bespectacled tycoon, then head of the now defunct Yukos oil company, went on to serve a decade in jail on fraud charges he says were politically motivated before being freed in 2013 after President Vladimir Putin pardoned him.

“Today’s Kremlin regime has learned the art of window dressing very well, but it’s important to understand that behind these beautiful windows there is not just an ordinary authoritarian state but a real mafia, which has taken over this state,” Khodorkovsky, 56, told Reuters.

“If we look at how these methods are applied in relation to the West, we will see corruption, blackmail, compromising materials and even violence. While negotiating with the current Russian regime the West should understand it’s dealing with a criminal organization.”

Russia, which rejects his criticism as false, has issued an international arrest warrant for Khodorkovsky, accusing him of ordering at least one successful contract killing in the 1990s, something Khodorkovsky denies.

Putin has said he regards the former businessman as a common thief, while Russian authorities have moved to curb the activities of Open Russia, a pro-democracy movement founded by Khodorkovsky.
“A VERY TALENTED KGB GUY”

In “Citizen K,” Khodorkovsky says he misread Putin when the former Soviet intelligence officer first came to power.

“It seemed to me ideologically that he was one of us. A person who gets it and wants to push Russia in the same direction that we want to. That is towards openness, towards democracy,” said Khodorkovsky.

“Boy was I mistaken. He’s a very talented KGB guy.”

Despite living in Britain, Khodorkovsky said he “lived for Russia” and that it occupied his thoughts for 12 out of every 16 waking hours a day, adding that he and his supporters were acutely aware of the risks they ran.

“If the Kremlin decides to kill somebody, it is very difficult for this person to avoid this fate,” he said, a reference to allegations that Moscow has assassinated some of its critics abroad, a charge the Kremlin flatly rejects.

“I tell all my colleagues that the only thing we can do for you is to help you not to be forgotten, as I was not forgotten during 10 years in prison. But it will be difficult, or even impossible, to save you if anything happens.”

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From: MeNeedIt

Almost every day 20-year-old Rizaldian Syahputra puts on his blue uniform, laces up his high boots and leaves his wooden house on stilts for a job many nature-lovers would envy.

But by next year, he may no longer be employed.

Syahputra works as a wildlife guide at Komodo National Park on the eastern Indonesian island of Komodo, taking visitors around the park on foot to get up close to the leathery Komodo dragons, the world’s largest living lizard species.

The Indonesian government plans to close the island to the public from January next year in a bid to conserve the rare reptiles.

The scheme also involves moving about 2,000 villagers off the island. Authorities are holding talks with community leaders on how to relocate the residents, Josef Nae Soi, deputy governor of the province of East Nusa Tenggara, told Reuters recently.

It is hoped that closing the island to tourists will cut the risk of poaching and allow a recovery in the numbers of the animals’ preferred prey, such as deer, buffalo and wild boar.

The island could reopen after a year, but the plan is to make it a premium tourist destination, Soi said.

Syahputra, who says he enjoys his job because of his passion for nature and conservation, shares the fears of many others on the island who rely on tourism for a living.

“The closure is definitely something that makes us unhappy,” he said.

“If we really have to do it, I hope we can find a middle ground on the solution, not closing the whole island but just a certain area.”

More than 176,000 tourists visited Komodo National Park, a conservation area between the islands of Sumbawa and Flores, in 2018. The whole area was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991.

About 1,700 Komodo dragons are estimated to live on Komodo island. Other islands in the national park that are home to more than 1,400 of the giant lizards, such as nearby Rinca and Padar, will remain open to tourists.

Villagers who have lived on Komodo island for generations are unsurprisingly opposed to the idea of having to leave.

“We have been living as one for years with this village,” said resident Dahlia, who gave only one name. “The graves of my father and ancestors are here. If we move, who will take care of those graves?”

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From: MeNeedIt

The U.S. Coast Guard says 34 people are missing after a fire erupted aboard a dive boat off the coast of Southern California.

Local media are reporting that several people died in the fire, but the Coast Guard could not immediately confirm any fatalities.

Coast Guard officials said five crew members were rescued after the fire broke out on the 20-meter commercial dive boat near Santa Cruz Island off the coast of Santa Barbara.

They said are searching for other passengers who have not been accounted for.

Officials say the missing passengers were sleeping below desk when the fire broke out before dawn Monday morning.

An image posted by the fire department showed the dive vessel engulfed in flames. The Coast Guard says most of the fire has now been extinguished.

The boat was on a Labor Day weekend cruise taking divers to the Channel Islands off the coast of Southern California.

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From: MeNeedIt

Wall Street stock futures weakened in early trade on Monday, setting a dour tone for Asian markets after tit-for-tat tariffs between the United States and China took effect, reinforcing investors’ gloomy expectations for global growth prospects.

The E-mini futures for U.S. S&P500 ESc1 fell as much as 1.06% in early trade and last stood down 0.68% at 2,905 while Chicago-traded Nikkei futures NIYcm1 suggest Japan’s Nikkei .N225 is on course to fall 0.7%.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan .MIAPJ0000PUS, which lost 4.7% last month, is likely to stay under pressure.

The United States slapped 15% tariffs on a variety of Chinese goods on Sunday – including footwear, smart watches and flat-panel televisions – while China imposed new duties on U.S. crude, the latest escalation in a bruising trade war.

In EscalatingTrade war, US Consumers May See Higher Prices

In China, authorities began charging higher duties on American imports at midday Sunday

A variety of studies suggest the tariffs will cost U.S. households up to $1,000 a year and the latest round will hit a significant number of U.S. consumer goods.

In retaliation, China started to impose additional tariffs on some of the U.S. goods on a $75 billion target list. Beijing did not specify the value of the goods that face higher tariffs from Sunday.

Many market players say the market’s reaction was likely exaggerated by algorithm-driven players’ flows in thin trading conditions at start of Asian trade on Monday.

Liquidity could be even more limited than usual because of a U.S. market holiday on Monday.

“(The market move) goes to show you how many data mining algos are involved with equity linked compared to forex-linked. Was anyone surprised by these tariffs that took effect yesterday?” said Takeo Kamai, head of execution at CLSA in Tokyo.

Trade War Sowing Seeds of Doubt With US Farmers

The typical routines of life on a family farm carry a heavier burden these days for Pam Johnson.

“First thing I do is make a pot of coffee,” she told VOA in an interview in one of the cavernous sheds that contain her green and yellow John Deere farming equipment. Once she has that coffee, she “(goes) to the computer and look at what grain prices have done overnight and usually do a gut clutch, because they’ve been going down. They’re at five-month lows.”

Driven there in part by retaliatory tariffs imposed by one of the largest importers of U.S.

Despite the volatility, the moves lower reflect investors’ underlying worries about increasing costs of Sino-U.S. trade war on the global economy.

An official survey published on Saturday showed factory activity in China shrank in August for the fourth month in a row, further evidence of hit to the world’s second-largest economy from trade war.

Tension is also running high in Hong Kong, with police and protesters clashing in some of the most intense violence since unrest erupted more than three months ago over concerns Beijing is undermining democratic freedoms in the territory.

Thousands of protesters blocked roads and public transport links to Hong Kong airport and police made several arrests after demonstrators smashed CCTV cameras and lamps with metal poles and dismantled station turnstiles.

China, eager to quell the unrest before the 70th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China on Oct. 1, has accused foreign powers, particularly the United States and Britain, of fomenting the unrest.

Oil prices also fell in early Monday trade.

Brent crude LCOc1 futures fell 0.68% to $58.85 a barrel while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude CLc1 lost 0.54% to $54.80 per barrel.

The currency market was calmer for now, with the dollar down slightly against the yen at 106.12 yen JPY=, down 0.13% from late U.S. levels.

The euro stood almost flat at $1.09905 EUR=, not far from two-year low of $1.0963 hit in U.S. trade on Friday.

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From: MeNeedIt

The United States and China on Sunday put in place their latest tariff increases on each other’s goods, potentially raising prices Americans pay for some clothes, shoes, sporting goods and other consumer items before the holiday shopping season.

President Donald Trump said U.S.-China trade talks were still on for September. “We’ll see what happens,” he told reporters as he returned to the White House from the Camp David presidential retreat. “But we can’t allow China to rip us off anymore as a country.”

The 15% U.S. taxes apply to about $112 billion of Chinese imports. All told, more than two-thirds of the consumer goods the United States imports from China now face higher taxes. The administration had largely avoided hitting consumer items in its earlier rounds of tariff increases.

But with prices of many retail goods now likely to rise, the Trump administration’s move threatens the U.S. economy’s main driver: consumer spending. As businesses pull back on investment spending and exports slow in the face of weak global growth, American shoppers have been a key bright spot for the economy.

“We have got a great economy,” said Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa. “But I do think that the uncertainty caused by volatile tariff situation and this developing trade war could jeopardize that strength, and that growth, and that is I think that’s a legitimate concern,” he told ABC’s “This Week.”

As a result of Trump’s higher tariffs, many U.S. companies have warned that they will be forced to pass on to their customers the higher prices they will pay on Chinese imports. Some businesses, though, may decide in the end to absorb the higher costs rather than raise prices for their customers.

In China, authorities began charging higher duties on American imports at midday Sunday, according to employees who answered the phone at customs offices in Beijing and the southern port of Guangzhou. They declined to give their names.

Tariffs of 10% and 5% apply to items ranging from frozen sweet corn and pork liver to marble and bicycle tires, the government announced earlier.

After Sunday’s move, 87% of textiles and clothing the United States buys from China and 52% of shoes will be subject to import taxes.

On Dec. 15, the Trump administration is scheduled to impose a second round of 15% tariffs — this time on roughly $160 billion of imports. If those duties take effect, virtually all goods imported from China will be covered.

The Chinese government has released a list of American imports targeted for penalties on Dec. 15 if the U.S. tariff hikes take effect. In total, Beijing says Sunday’s penalties and the planned December increases will apply to $75 billion of American goods.

Washington and Beijing are locked in a war over U.S. complaints that China steals U.S. trade secrets and unfairly subsidizes its own companies in its drive to develop global competitors in such high-tech industries as artificial intelligence and electric cars.

“I give the president credit for challenging China on some of its really egregious behavior” on intellectual property and technology transfers, for example, Toomey said. He said he hopes that’s what Trump’s focus is, “not just the fact that Chinese clothing and shoes are popular among consumers. That’s not the problem.”

If China changes its behavior “in a meaningful way in that area … then we will have ended up in a better place. That’s what I’m hoping for. But let’s be honest. In the meantime, we’re doing damage. It’s a double-edged sword,” he said.

To try to force Beijing to reform its trade practices, the Trump administration has imposed import taxes on billions of dollars’ worth of Chinese imports, and China has retaliated with tariffs on U.S. exports.

“It’s a good thing taking on China. Unfortunately, he’s done it the wrong way,” said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said on “Fox News Sunday.”

“To take on China there has to be a multilateral approach. One country can’t take on China to try to dry up its overcapacity because they just send it through to you in other ways,” he said.

Trump has insisted that China itself pays the tariffs. But in fact, economic research has concluded that the costs of the duties fall on U.S. businesses and consumers. Trump had indirectly acknowledged the tariffs’ impact by delaying some of the duties until Dec. 15, after holiday goods are already on store shelves.

A study by J.P. Morgan found that Trump’s tariffs will cost the average U.S. household $1,000 a year. That study was done before Trump raised the Sept. 1 and Dec. 15 tariffs to 15% from 10%.

The president has also announced that existing 25% tariffs on a separate group of $250 billion of Chinese imports will increase to 30% on Oct. 1.

That cost could weaken an already slowing U.S. economy. Though consumer spending grew last quarter at its fastest pace in five years, the overall economy expanded at just a modest 2% annual rate, down from a 3.1% rate in the first three months of the year.

The economy is widely expected to slow further in the months ahead as income growth slows, businesses delay expansions and higher prices from tariffs depress consumer spending. Companies have already reduced investment spending, and exports have dropped against a backdrop of slower global growth.

Americans have already turned more pessimistic. The University of Michigan’s consumer sentiment index, released Friday, fell by the most since December 2012.

“The data indicate that the erosion of consumer confidence due to tariff policies is now well underway,” said Richard Curtin, who oversees the index.

Some retailers may eat the cost of the tariffs. Target confirmed to The Associated Press that it warned suppliers that it won’t accept cost increases arising from the China tariffs. But many smaller retailers won’t have the bargaining power to make such demands and will pass the costs to customers.

Philip Levy, chief economist at the San Francisco freight company Flexport who was an adviser in President George W. Bush administration, said it’s hard to say for sure when the latest tariffs may hit U.S. customers in the form of higher prices.

But, he added, “If you had to pick a time to do it, this is the worst possible time” because it’s when the bulk of holiday goods are brought into the country.

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From: MeNeedIt

The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen staged multiple airstrikes on a detention center operated by the Houthi rebels in the southwestern province of Dhamar, killing at least 100 people and wounding dozens more Sunday, officials and the rebels’ health ministry said.

Franz Rauchenstein, the head of the Red Cross delegation in Yemen, suggested that the death toll could be higher after visiting the site of the attack, saying relatively few detainees survived. A Red Cross statement said the detention center held around 170 detainees. It said 40 of those were being treated for injuries and the rest were presumed dead.

“Witnessing this massive damage, seeing the bodies lying among the rubble, was a real shock. Anger and sadness were natural reactions,” Rauchenstein said.

The attack was the deadliest so far this year by the coalition, according to the Yemen Data Project, a database tracking the war. The coalition has faced international criticism for airstrikes that have hit schools, hospitals and wedding parties, killing thousands of Yemeni civilians.

Saudi Arabia intervened on behalf of the internationally recognized Yemini government in March 2015, after the Iran-backed Houthis took the capital. The conflict has claimed tens of thousands of lives, thrust millions to the brink of famine and spawned the world’s worst humanitarian crisis.

The attack comes as the Saudi-led coalition’s partners — chiefly the United Arab Emirates and an array of Yemeni militias — are increasingly at odds over the war’s aims. The past weeks have seen heavy fighting in Yemen’s south between Saudi-backed and Emirati-backed forces.

Yemeni officials said Sunday’s strikes targeted a college in the city of Dhamar, which the Houthi rebels were using as a detention center. The coalition denied it had struck a detention center, saying it had targeted a military site used by the rebels to restore drones and missiles.

“We were sleeping and around midnight, there were maybe three, or four, or six strikes. They were targeting the jail, I really don’t know the strike numbers,” wounded detainee Nazem Saleh said while on a stretcher in a local hospital. He said the Red Cross had visited the center two times before the airstrike.

A line of over a dozen white body bags were laid out in the rubble beside flattened buildings and crushed cars, while rescue workers dug through the debris.

“We have seen now under the ruble that there are still many, many dead bodies that its very, very difficult to extract,” said Rauchenstein.

The U.N. human rights office for Yemen said 52 detainees were among the dead, and at least 68 detainees were still missing.

The Red Cross, which inspects detention centers as part of its global mission, said it had visited detainees at the site in the past.

Former detainees said the Houthis had previously used the site to store and repair weapons.

Youssef al-Hadhri, a spokesman for the Houthi-run Health Ministry, said at least seven airstrikes hit three buildings in the complex overnight.

The rebels’ Health Ministry said in a statement that more than 60 people were killed in Sunday’s airstrikes and another 50 wounded. Later in the day, health officials said the death toll climbed to 65. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief media.

The Saudi-led coalition said it had hit a military facility “in accordance with international humanitarian law,” and that “all precautionary measures were taken to protect civilians.”

Col. Turki al-Maliki, a spokesman for the coalition, was quoted by the Saudi-owned Al Arabiya TV as denying the target was a prison.

Local residents said family members arrested for being critical of the Houthis were imprisoned in the detention center. They said at least seven airstrikes hit the area.

Omat al-Salam al-Haj, a mother of a detainee, said the center housed anti-Houthi political detainees who were rounded up over suspicions of cooperating with the coalition.

Former detainee Mansour al-Zelai said the Houthis were restoring weapons in and close to the detention center.

Houthi rebels have been using scores of sites as detention centers, including schools, mosques, and houses, filling them with thousands of political detainees to use later in prisoner-swap deals.

The Associated Press documented that many of these sites were rife with torture and abuses including Dhamar’s community college.

Former detainees recalled torture and abuses inside the detention center, which came under a series of airstrikes before.

Rights groups have also previously documented that Houthis place civilian detainees in detention centers as human shields by placing them next to army barracks, under constant threat of airstrikes.

In October 2016, an airstrike by the Saudi-led coalition hit a prison complex in the Red Sea port of Hodeida, killing at least 58 people, mostly prisoners. At the time, the coalition said the prison complex was used as a command center for Houthis.

On Sunday, Sweden’s foreign minister, Margot Wallstrom, met with Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman al-Safadi in Amman to discuss her efforts to relaunch negotiations after years of stalemate between Yemen’s warring sides.

“Yemen has been at the center of my attention,” she said in a statement.

Wallstrom also met with Yemeni Prime Minister Maeen Abdulmalik Saeed and other government officials in Saudi Arabia’s capital, Riyadh, according the official Yemeni news agency SABA.

Airstrikes have also punctuated the infighting between erstwhile coalition allies in southern Yemen.

On Thursday, Emirati jets bombed convoys of Saudi-backed government forces, killing scores in series of airstrikes to prevent them from retaking the interim capital, Aden, from militias backed by the UAE.

The Emirati strikes sparked popular anger in Yemen against the UAE. Activists launched an online petition collecting signatures to “kick Emiratis out of Yemen” and members of the Yemeni government issued a statement demanding the president end the UAE’s role in Yemen.

On Sunday, UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash posted a reminder on Twitter that the coalition’s goal is to “confront the challenge of the Houthi coup.”

…

From: MeNeedIt

Tensions are rising between Israel and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah as the Israeli military said on Sunday that a number of anti-tank missiles were fired from Lebanon, targeting an Israeli military base and vehicles.

“A number of hits have been confirmed,” the Israeli military said in a statement, adding that it “is responding with fire towards the sources of fire and targets in southern Lebanon.”

No casualties were reported from the attack, Israeli officials said.

Retaliation

Hours before the incident, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah had vowed to retaliate for the recent “Israeli aggression” in south Beirut.

“This time I wanted to say it would be open-ended where we would retaliate from,” he said during a televised speech Saturday night, which was broadcast on Hezbollah channel al-Manar TV.

Hezbollah: Israeli Drone Crashes Into Hezbollah Media Center

Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri describes crash of two drones as violation and ‘aggression’ against Lebanese sovereignty as well as ‘threat to regional stability’

The leader of the Iranian-backed group said that the first response against Israel was downing its two drones in Lebanon last week.

Two explosive-laden drones crashed and exploded in the Hezbollah stronghold of Dahiyeh in Beirut last Sunday. The attack was blamed on Israel by the Lebanese government and Hezbollah.

Israel hasn’t officially commented on the alleged incident. But Israeli officials have warned that they would target Iran and its proxies should they continue to threaten Israel’s security.

In the meantime, the Lebanese military said on Sunday that “a drone belonging to the Israeli enemy violated the Lebanese airspace… and threw flammable materials over the area, which led to a fire.”

The Lebanese military added that it was following this incident with U.N. forces in Lebanon.

The Sunday exchange of fire were part of a series of recent events in which Israel has targeted Iranian military targets in Syria and reportedly in Iraq.

The “question is whether Hezbollah will regard this [attack on Israel] as a response to both the Beirut events and the Aqraba incident [in Syria],” said Jonathan Spyer, a research fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies.

He told VOA that as long as there are no Israeli causalities, the situation on the Israel-Lebanon border will eventually calm down.

Last week, the Israeli air force also carried out strikes against a cell belonging to the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps near the Syrian capital, Damascus, which Israel says was on its way to launch drone attacks against northern Israel.

Israel believes that Iran, which has a significant military presence in Syria, has been using Hezbollah and its bases in Lebanon and Syria to transport weapons to areas near Israel’s borders with both countries.  

Israel also has accused Iran of helping Hezbollah to stockpile precision-guided missiles that could cause “massive” human casualties in Israel.

Risking Lebanon for Iran?

Experts charge that the Shi’ite militant group has increasingly become a main force for Iran’s hostility towards Israel.  

“Hezbollah seems to be ready to put itself on the frontlines for the Iranians,” said Yaakov Amidror, a former National Security Advisor to the prime minister of Israel and a fellow at the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA).

He told VOA that, “If the Lebanese let Hezbollah and Iran build their launch pads and facilities in Lebanon, at the end of the day the price will be paid by the Lebanese.”

But Lebanese researcher Michel Shamai believes that Hezbollah doesn’t have the capabilities to enter an all-out war with Israel, because it “isn’t ready to risk the entire state of Lebanon for the sake of its masters in Iran.”

“And it won’t stand by idly in front of its audience that has been mobilized with fulfilling promises,” he said in a recent article in the Lebanese daily newspaper An-Nahar.

Since the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah, the two sides have occasionally exchanged attacks. In the wake of Syria’s war, Israel has also hit Hezbollah targets inside Syria.

Deterrence

Israel continues its military buildup on its northern border with Lebanon. The Israeli military has sent artillery batteries to the area and the Israeli navy also has been put on high alert.

Analyst Amidror said that “this build is primarily to deter Hezbollah from making any mistakes.”

“It is a clear message from Israel that any retaliation from Hezbollah will face a big response from Israel. That’s why Hezbollah’s [Sunday] response was very minor,” he said.

The tensions between the two sides are unlikely to escalate, Amidror added.

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From: MeNeedIt

Indonesian police have arrested dozens of people in the easternmost region of Papua following protests last week in which buildings were set ablaze, a police spokesman said Sunday.

The area has been racked by civil unrest for two weeks over perceived racial and ethnic discrimination. Some protesters are also demanding an independence vote, although authorities have ruled out such a possibility.

Reports of Racism by Indonesian Police Spark Riots in West Papua video player.

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In the provincial capital of Jayapura, 28 people have been arrested and named as suspects, and more face investigation, Papuan police spokesman Ahmad Kamal said by telephone.

“Twenty-eight people are suspects in cases of damaging and burning properties, violence, provocation, and looting,” Kamal said, adding that all had been arrested after a protest in Jayapura Thursday.

The rioters set cars and buildings ablaze, including a local parliament office and a building housing the offices of the state-controlled telco firm, during the protest.

Kamal said the situation in Papua was now calmer.

In Indonesia’s capital of Jakarta, two students suspected of crimes against state security have been arrested, police said in a statement Saturday.

The evidence against them included their mobile telephones, and a shirt and a shawl emblazoned with the Morning Star flag pattern, a banned symbol of Papuan nationhood.

Jakarta Legal Aid lawyer Michael Himan said the two were arrested from a Papuan dormitory in Depok, in a southern part of the capital, late Friday. They were charged with treasonous intent against the unity of the nation, Himan told Reuters Sunday.

In a statement, Jakarta Legal Aid said the police also arrested several other Papuan students and an activist in Jakarta Saturday.

Himan said the reason for the arrest of the rest was still unclear. Spokesmen for national police and Jakarta police were not immediately available to comment.
 

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From: MeNeedIt

A team of researchers and humanitarian professionals have developed a unique approach to combat domestic violence in the refugee camps of Dollo Ado in Ethiopia.

The approach involves the co-creation of a podcast series called Unite for a Better Life, together with Somali refugees living in the camp to target the underlying factors that contribute to intimate partner violence in this setting.

Theodros WoldeGiorgis, research manager and intervention specialist in humanitarian crisis, told VOA displacement and the breakdown of social structures is driving intimate partner violence in the refugee camps.

“People are always on the move, they are suffering from displacement, they are traumatized and their troubles have been aggravated by poverty,” he said.

WoldeGiorgis explained that “when displaced people have [a] shortage of basic needs, they will get into conflict and particularly the women and children are mostly affected.”

Over the past month, eight young Somali refugees have been trained and mentored to produce these podcasts in the local language. Together with researchers on the team, they have been developing content they believe will be effective in changing the way domestic violence is viewed in their community.

Podcaster Ikra Dagan said one episode was about empowering change.  

“So if I talk about a bystander, you don’t just stand by and look as someone is being victimized or subjected to violence. You must take action and help our sisters, mothers and even our friends,” Dagan said after rehearsing her script.

The podcasts tackle a broad range of themes, including understanding gender and gender norms, providing insights into healthy and unhealthy relationships, discussing sexuality and pleasure, and addressing Khat, a stimulant drug derived from a plant that is widely chewed for cultural and social reasons and is linked to intimate partner violence.

How to handle conflict

The Unite for a Better life podcasts give people practical advice on how to build healthy relationships based on, for example, effective listening skills, or handling conflict in a healthy way.

“We gave them some take home messages like violence is never acceptable, there is always an alternative to violence. We also informed them that violence hurts everyone,” said podcaster Mahad Noor.

Belete Seyoum, the humanitarian assistance and program head at the Administration for Refugee/ Returnee Affairs in Bokolmanyo Camp, hopes that the podcasts will help reduce intimate partner violence in the refugee camps.

“It is one of the major Information education communication mechanism to minimize and mitigate any violence happening in the camp,” Seyoum said.

The podcast project is the brainchild of a team of researchers from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Addis Ababa University, and Women and Health Alliance (WAHA) Ethiopia. It builds on research being conducted in the camps since 2014.

Vandana Sharma, the principal investigator of the research study, says there is a growing interest in using technology-based solutions to address intimate partner violence, especially in humanitarian settings.

“Typically, programs addressing intimate partner violence involve in-person participatory sessions.  We believe that an approach such as the podcast series, could have a much farther reach, as people could download the podcasts and share them peer-to-peer and in a humanitarian context. This means we could reach many people very quickly,” she said.

Negussie Deyessa of Addis Ababa University acknowledges that podcasts are a unique and promising intervention that can help relay important messages, change attitudes and behavior and enable community members to unite for a better life.

Already though, the creation of the podcasts has been a transformational experience for the podcasters.

“Whenever I hear about podcasts, I seem to be an expert. Now I can go with my mic, I can record the voice, I can edit, I can produce very fantastic audios, now I am a great podcaster,” said Mahad.

With intimate partner violence in humanitarian settings increasingly coming under the spotlight, podcasts are providing a unique intervention, which can help relay important messages, change attitudes and behaviors and enable community members to unite for a better life.  

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From: MeNeedIt

Using water cannons, gunshots, batons and tear gas, Hong Kong police pursued protesters through city streets and into subway stations, seeking people who defied and blocked police in several districts on a tense and chaotic Saturday. The demonstrations coincided with the fifth anniversary of Beijing’s denial of free, unimpeded elections in the territory.

Before midnight, riot police stormed into two subway stations in the city’s Kowloon area seeking suspects. Videos aired and shared online showed officers snagging a few people, as a phalanx of police charged a train car, whipping and beating seemingly random passengers who cowered and sobbed.

The event was a shocking reminder of the attack in Yuen Long on July 21, when more than 100 white-shirted assailants savagely beat passengers as people frantically called police who didn’t arrive for 39 minutes. Just four men have been charged in the attacks and police actions are under investigation by the city’s corruption agency.

On Saturday, police officials claimed that some protesters vandalized the customer service center and damaged ticket machines in the Mong Kok MTR Station and assaulted citizens and damaged property inside a nearby station in Prince Edward.

At one point, the company that runs rail service, the MTR Corp., suspended service on five lines.

Those events swiftly overshadowed a new tactic in the police arsenal, the spraying of a blue dyed liquid from water cannons to soak protesters. The dye, police have said, would allow them to more easily find violators later.

Protesters responded by throwing Molotov cocktails and setting a fire at a barricade on a major thoroughfare near Hong Kong police headquarters. Police fired two live rounds into the air near Victoria Park on Hong Kong Island, according to journalists at the scene.

“It seems like hurting us doesn’t mean anything, unless we die,” said a 21-year-old protester named Alice, en route to a showdown with police in the neighborhood of Tsim Sha Tsui. “We’re risking our lives. They’re pushing us to do more, crazier things.”

An effort to stop a contentious bill that would allow extraditions to mainland China exploded this spring into a massive campaign for democratic rights.

Residents have marched for 12 straight weekends, initially to demand that the government withdraw the detested extradition bill and, more recently, to seek universal voting rights, a goal that has been repeatedly thwarted in the Chinese territory.

Both Democratic and Republican leaders of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee issued a statement on Hong Kong Saturday saying, “In recent weeks, we’ve seen admirable resolve among Hong Kongers to express their concerns regarding their future. A broad spectrum of Hong Kongers have chosen to put their personal safety and freedom at risk to stand up for their rights because Beijing has denied them a political voice.”

Frustration over the government’s decision to ignore the mass marches prodded younger participants to stage increasingly violent clashes with police. Their refusal to disperse, and to use Molotov cocktails, bricks and poles to fight officers, led officials to deny permission to marches and rallies, saying organizers could not guarantee that the events would be peaceful.

High school students plan to strike Monday. But a coalition of groups, including a major trade union, was denied rally permits for that same day. Police officials said organizers could not guarantee the public’s safety.

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From: MeNeedIt

For more than a century, coal has kept the lights on in the industrialized world. But coal-fired power plants are closing across the United States and Europe. Market forces have shifted to cheaper natural gas and renewables, not to mention the concerns about climate-changing carbon dioxide that the plants produce. But in the state of Wyoming, where coal is an important part of the economy, the government is trying to put the brakes on the transition. VOA’s Steve Baragona reports.
 

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From: MeNeedIt