Austria’s Foreign Ministry is facing a “serious cyberattack,” it said late Saturday, warning another country could be responsible. 
 
“Due to the gravity and nature of the attack, it cannot be excluded that it is a targeted attack by a state actor,” the ministry said in a statement shortly before 11 p.m. (2200 GMT), adding that the attack was ongoing. 
 
“In the past, other European countries have been the target of similar attacks,” the statement continued. 
 
Immediate measures had been taken and a “coordination committee” set up, it said without elaborating. 
 
The attack came as Austria’s Greens on Saturday gave the go-ahead to a coalition with the country’s conservatives at a party congress in Salzburg, removing the last obstacle to the unprecedented alliance. 
 
The German government’s IT network in 2018 was hit by a cyberattack. 
 
Last year, the EU adopted powers to punish those outside the bloc who launch cyberattacks that cripple hospitals and banks, sway elections, or steal company secrets or funds. 

…

The death toll has risen to at least 24 and 23 more people are listed as injured in the collapse of a building in Cambodia that trapped workers under rubble, officials said Sunday. 

The seven-story concrete building collapsed Friday in the coastal town of Kep, about 160 km (100 miles) southwest of Phnom Penh. It occurred a year after another construction site collapsed, 
killing 28 people in Preah Sihanouk province. 

“Twenty-four people have died so far,” Kep Governor Ken Satha told Reuters. “Three of the bodies are not yet at hospital. They have not been pulled out yet.” 

An unknown number of workers remained trapped, Satha said, 
adding that authorities had detained a Cambodian couple, the 
owners of the building, for questioning. 

Prime Minister Hun Sen said Saturday that rescuers were still struggling to reach those missing in the rubble. 

Cambodia is undergoing a construction boom to serve growing 
crowds of Chinese tourists and investors. 

…

Bulgarian veterinary authorities say they will cull 24,000 additional pigs amid signs of an outbreak of African swine fever at a pig farm in the northeast part of the country. 
 
The report Friday represented a continuation of an outbreak that was first detected at six breeding farms in the summer and led to the culling of more than 130,000 pigs in August. 
 
The latest outbreak was detected at a farm in the village of Nikola Kozlevo in the region of Shumen, food safety officials said. 
 
Health officials said there were 42 registered outbreaks of African swine fever in the country in 2019. 
 
The disease does not affect humans but is highly contagious among pigs. 
 
In August, industry officials expressed concerns that the virus could hit the nation’s entire pig herd of 500,000 and cause more than $1.1 billion in damage. 
 
The European Commission has set aside about $10 million to help fight the disease. Bulgarian lawmakers have approved legislation for 2020 intended to regulate conditions for raising domestic pigs and enhance biosecurity measures. 
 
This article contains material from Reuters and The Sofia Globe. 

…

A father and son who were battling flames for two days became the latest victims of the worst wildfire season in Australian history, and the path of destruction widened in at least three states Saturday because of strong winds and high temperatures. 
 
The death toll in the wildfire crisis rose to 23, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said after calling up about 3,000 reservists to battle the escalating fires, which were expected to be particularly fierce throughout the weekend. 
 
“We are facing another extremely difficult next 24 hours,” Morrison said at a televised news conference. “In recent times, particularly over the course of the balance of this week, we have seen this disaster escalate to an entirely new level.” 
 
Dick Lang, 78, an acclaimed bush pilot and outback safari operator, and his son Clayton, 43, were identified by Australian authorities after their bodies were found Saturday on a highway on Kangaroo Island. Their family said the losses left them “heartbroken and reeling from this double tragedy.” 
 
Lang, known as “Desert Dick,” led tours for travelers throughout Australia and other countries. “He loved the bush, he loved adventure and he loved Kangaroo Island,” his family said. 
 
Clayton Lang, one of Dick’s four sons, was a renowned plastic surgeon who specialized in hand surgery. 

The fire danger increased as temperatures rose Saturday to record levels across Australia, surpassing 43 degrees Celsius (109 Fahrenheit) in Canberra, the capital, and reaching a record-high 48.9 C (120 F) in Penrith, in Sydney’s western suburbs. 
 
Video and images shared on social media showed blood red skies taking over Mallacoota, a coastal town in Victoria where as many as 4,000 residents and tourists were forced to shelter on beaches as the navy tried to evacuate as many people as possible. 

‘It’s not safe to move’
 
By Saturday evening, 3,600 firefighters were battling blazes across New South Wales state. Power was lost in some areas as fires downed transmission lines, and residents were warned that the worst might be yet to come. 
 
“We are now in a position where we are saying to people it’s not safe to move, it’s not safe to leave these areas,” state Premier Gladys Berejiklian told reporters. “We are in for a long night and I make no bones about that. We are still yet to hit the worst of it.” 
 
Morrison said the governor general had signed off on the calling up of reserves “to search and bring every possible capability to bear by deploying army brigades to fire-affected communities.” 
 
Defense Minister Linda Reynolds said it was the first time that reservists had been called up “in this way in living memory and, in fact, I believe for the first time in our nation’s history.” 

The deadly wildfires, which have been raging since September, have already burned about 5 million hectares (12.35 million acres) and destroyed more than 1,500 homes. 
 
The early and devastating start to Australia’s summer wildfires has also been catastrophic for the country’s wildlife, likely killing nearly 500 million birds, reptiles and mammals in New South Wales alone, Sydney University ecologist Chris Dickman told the Sydney Morning Herald. Frogs, bats and insects are excluded from his estimate, making the toll on creatures much greater. 

Climate change effects
 
Experts say climate change has exacerbated the unprecedented wildfires around the world. Morrison has been criticized for his repeated refusal to say climate change has been affecting the fires, instead deeming them a natural disaster. 
 
Some residents yelled at the prime minister earlier in the week during his visit to New South Wales, where people were upset with the lack of fire equipment their towns had. After fielding criticism for taking a family vacation in Hawaii as the wildfire crisis unfolded in December, Morrison announced he was postponing visits to India and Japan that were scheduled for this month. 
 
The government has committed 20 million Australian dollars ($14 million) to lease four firefighting aircraft for the duration of the crisis, and the helicopter-equipped HMAS Adelaide was deployed to assist evacuations from fire-ravaged areas. 

The deadly fire on Kangaroo Island broke containment lines Friday and was described as “virtually unstoppable” as it destroyed buildings and burned through more than 14,000 hectares (35,000 acres) of Flinders Chase National Park. While the warning level for the fire was reduced Saturday, the Country Fire Service said it was still a risk to lives and property. 
 
Rob Rogers, New South Wales Rural Fire Service deputy commissioner, warned that the fires could move “frighteningly quick.” Embers carried by the wind had the potential to spark new fires or enlarge existing blazes. 
 
Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fizsimmons said the 264,000-hectare (652,000-acre) Green Wattle Creek fire in a national park west of Sydney could spread into Sydney’s western suburbs. He said crews had been doing “extraordinary work” by setting controlled fires and using aircraft and machinery to try to keep the flames away. 
 
More than 130 fires were burning in New South Wales, with at least half of them out of control. 
 
Firefighters were battling a total of 53 fires across Victoria state, and conditions were expected to worsen with a southerly wind change. About 900,000 hectares (2.2 million acres) of bushland has already been burned through. 

Something positive
 
In a rare piece of good news, the number of people listed as missing or unaccounted for in Victoria was reduced from 28 to six. 
 
“We still have those dynamic and dangerous conditions — the low humidity, the strong winds and, what underpins that, the state is tinder dry,” Victoria Emergency Services Commissioner Andrew Crisp said. 
 
Thousands have already fled fire-threatened areas in Victoria, and local police reported heavy traffic flows on major roads. 
 
“If you might be thinking about whether you get out on a particular road close to you, well, there’s every chance that a fire could hit that particular road and you can’t get out,” Crisp said. 

…

Wildfires are burning out of control in southeastern Australia.

Thousands of people have already fled their homes but some have waited too long.

The New South Wales Rural Fire Service has advised those who have not evacuated areas at risk that, “It is too late to leave.  Seek shelter as the fire approaches.”

Australia Calls up 3,000 Reservists as Fire Threats Escalate

In recent days, ‘we have seen this disaster escalate to an entirely new level,’ Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said

Late Saturday evening, Victoria had 14 fires rated at emergency or evacuation warning levels, while New South Wales, home to more than 100  fires, had 11 emergency fires.

CNN reported that fire officials said Saturday three fires combined overnight in Victoria and are now larger than Manhattan in New York City.

Army reservists have been called in to assist the firefighters. Defense Minister Linda Reynolds said this is the first time the reservists have been called up to help combat fires “in living memory and, in fact, I believe for the first time in our nation’s history.”

‘Millions of Sparks’: Weather Raises Australia’s Fire Danger

Navy ships plucked hundreds of people from beaches and tens of thousands were urged to flee before hot weather and strong winds in the forecast worsen Australia’s already-devastating wildfires

Andy Gillham, the incident controller in the Victorian town of Bairnsdale, told Reuters that this has been an exceptional fire season.  

“In a normal year, we would start to see the fire season kick off in a big way around early January and we’re already up towards a million hectares of burnt country. This is a marathon event and we expect to be busy managing these fires for at least the next eight weeks,” he said.

…

Africa could emerge as a venue for confrontation between the U.S. and Iran as Tehran threatens to retaliate after the U.S. airstrike that killed the Iranian Quds Force commander, General Qassem Soleimani.

Iran has sought to increase its influence in certain countries in Africa in recent years through activities such as arms sales, training fighters for combat in the Middle East and funding Shia sects. It also has significant trade relations with several countries, including South Africa.

Phillip Smyth, a Soref Fellow at The Washington Institute who studies Shia Islamist militarism, said that he does not necessarily expect the Iranians to strike immediately. He noted that they have historically been cautious and look for what he calls “plausible deniability” to avoid detection when they attack.

When they do strike, he said, it is possible they will look for a soft target in an unexpected location.

“The Iranians are going to want to show that they have influence on a global scale and they may look for low-hanging fruit or easier targets that they can go after,” Smyth said. “And that may very well occur in Africa. And it could very well occur in North America or Europe or in many other places,” he said.

Smyth said Hezbollah, which is supported by Iran, has recruited and trained Nigerians for years. A 2018 report by the Middle East Institute said Iran had instructed Hezbollah to increase its training of Nigerians and hoped to use Nigeria as a base of operations to launch attacks and “thwart Israeli and Western ambitions in the region.”

There have also been West African fighters who, after converting to Shia Islam, traveled and fought alongside Iranians in Syria. Iranians have similarly supported fighters from other parts of the world to join them in various conflicts.

“There are tens of thousands of fighters that the Iranians have mobilized and used for conflicts in Iraq, in Syria and in Yemen. They have a very strong alliance and kind of proxy relationship with Ansar Allah, also known as the Houthis. So they have quite an extensive presence and they have continued to try and grow that presence,” Smyth said.

Terror cells

A June 2019 report by the British newspaper The Telegraph said that Iranians were setting up terror cells in Africa under Soleimani’s direction. The paper reported that Iranian cells may be active in Sudan, Chad, Ghana, Niger, The Gambia and the Central African Republic.

However, Ryan Cummings, director of Signal Risk, an Africa-focused political and security risk management consultancy, said there is no evidence to date that Shia groups in Africa pose a threat to the U.S. or the West.

“Groups which have a distinct Shia theology — and which would place them in the orbit of Iran — have demonstrated no intent to carry out acts of violence against U.S./Western interests on the continent despite suggestions that they have embedded in these countries for several years,” he told VOA in a written statement.

Profit motives

Much of Iran’s engagement on the continent is less ideological and more profit-driven. One favored outlet has been weapons smuggling. A 2013 Conflict Armament Research report found Iranian bullets in 14 locations across nine African countries. At the time, the group said Sudan was partnering with Iran to funnel the ammunition to African armed groups.

“There’s actually a whole issue over the past couple of years of Iranian ammunition winding up throughout Africa,” Smyth said. “I mean from east to west. And it was rather interesting how these weapons systems and also the ammunition was arriving there.”

Smyth added that, in some cases, weapons are sent to Somalia, packed in wooden ships known as dhows and then smuggled across the Red Sea to Houthi fighters in Yemen.

Iran has also sought to exert influence on the African continent through religion. One prominent example of this is the Shia sect the Islamic Movement in Nigeria and its controversial leader Sheikh Ibrahim El-Zakzaky. The group has been charged with inciting violence and El-Zakzaky has been imprisoned and formally accused by the Nigerian government of trying to form an “Islamic State in Nigeria” with the backing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Although Africa does not appear to be a focal point of the emerging conflict between Iran and the U.S., that could change. Smyth noted that al-Qaida linked groups historically sought to attack U.S. interests in Africa, viewing it as a more favorable operating environment for terror groups. This occurred in the 1998 embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania and a 2002 attack against an Israeli-owned hotel and a failed attempt to shoot down a passenger jet taking off from Mombassa, Kenya.

“People will look at the continent and say, ‘Can we smuggle weapons in, are there populations there that we can target, do they have lower security, how is the connection that goes back to, let’s say, the Israeli, or back to the Americans,’“ Smyth said.

He added that Iran will not want to damage its own trade and diplomatic relations in Africa but it will look for ways to make a loud and, possibly violent, statement.

“They don’t want to harm their other interests in the continent. However, I believe, if push came to shove, and if they really thought it would be a good place to get their revenge, they may actually pick the continent to do it on,” he said.

…

The U.S. airstrike that killed a top Iranian commander at Baghdad’s airport in Iraq has created an earthquake that will have “reverberations around the globe,” according to Jason Brodsky, policy director of the advocacy group United Against Nuclear Iran.

“Qassem Soleimani was not just a symbol. He also had substantive power and authority in the Islamic Republic,” he said.

Brodsky said in an interview with VOA that Soleimani had achieved rock-star status in the region, developing a “cultlike following.”

Soleimani was Iran’s top military strategist and head of the elite Revolutionary Guard Corps Quds Force.

U.S. President Donald Trump said he ordered the strike to prevent imminent attacks against Americans in the region.

Institutional knowledge

Soleimani was “the face of the resistance axis,” Brodsky said. “I think it’s an interesting move by the supreme leader to appoint his deputy, Esmail Qaani as his successor. Qaani has been with Soleimani since the beginning of his tenure. There is an attempt, at least by the regime, not to lose any institutional knowledge or expertise at this critical moment in the life of the Islamic Republic.”

The death of Soleimani is “much more important” than the killings of Osama bin Laden and Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi,” Michael Doran, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told VOA.

Their organizations “had been severely degraded by the time they were killed,” Doran said. “But the Iranian threat is a much more serious threat, because Iran is on the verge of obtaining a nuclear weapon.”

Iran “has these militias all around the region to which it’s distributing precision-guided weapons, which can threaten the United States and its allies,” Doran said. “That’s a real strategic threat. And Qassem Soleimani was the architect of that entire strategy.

“So this is a shift in regional politics,” he said, in a way that the other assassinations were not.

Comparisons to bin Laden

Ilan Berman, the senior vice president of the American Foreign Policy Council, disagreed with Doran, telling VOA the killing of Soleimani is “on par” with the Obama administration’s killing of bin Laden and the Trump administration targeting of al-Baghdadi.

“Soleimani’s involvement in regional instability, his direct orchestration and coordination of an array of terror proxies throughout the region is well known, certainly well known to the U.S. government. And the strike, I think, is a very important signal that the Trump administration is prepared to exact consequences on individuals like Soleimani who engage in this sort of behavior.”

“This was a great blow against Iran’s interests,” political analyst Ayeed al-Manna’l told VOA, “because Qassem Soleimani was the first Iranian extreme commander to spread religious and political ideology in the region and grow the influence of his country at the expense of other countries in the region.”

U.S. State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said Trump “was faced with a difficult decision, which is, is America safer with Qassem Soleimani dead or alive, and the president decided that the world was safer with him dead.”  

VOA’s Shahram Bahraminejad and Persian Service contributed to this report. 

…

Thousands of mourners gathered Saturday for a funeral procession through Baghdad for Iran’s top general and Iraqi militant leaders killed in a U.S. airstrike that has caused regional tensions to soar.

Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s elite Quds force and mastermind of its regional security strategy, was killed in an airstrike early Friday near the Iraqi capital’s international airport.

Soleimani was the architect of Iran’s regional policy of mobilizing militias across Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, including in the war against the Islamic State group. He was also blamed for attacks on U.S. troops and American allies going back to the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Many of the mourners were dressed in black, and they carried Iraqi flags and the flags of Iran-backed militias that are fiercely loyal to Soleimani. They were also mourning Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, a senior Iraqi militia commander who was killed in the same strike.

Airstrike condemned

The procession began at the Imam Kadhim shrine in Baghdad, one of the most revered sites in Shiite Islam. Mourners marched in the streets alongside militia vehicles in a solemn procession.

Iraq, which is closely allied with both Washington and Tehran, condemned the airstrike that killed Soleimani and called it an attack on its national sovereignty. Parliament is to meet for an emergency session Sunday, and the government has come under mounting pressure to expel the 5,200 American troops based in the country, who are there to help prevent a resurgence of the Islamic State group.

The U.S. has ordered all of its citizens to leave Iraq and has closed its embassy in Baghdad, where Iran-backed militiamen and their supporters staged two days of violent protests earlier this week in which they breached the compound. 

No one was hurt in the protests, which came in response to U.S. airstrikes that killed 25 Iran-backed militiamen in Iraq and Syria. The U.S. said the strikes were in response to a rocket attack that killed a U.S. contractor in northern Iraq, which Washington blamed on the militias.

Iran nuclear deal

The killing of Soleimani comes after months of rising tensions between the U.S. and Iran stemming from Trump’s decision to withdraw from the 2015 nuclear deal and restore crippling sanctions. 

The administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign has led Iran to openly abandon commitments under the deal. The U.S. has also blamed Iran for a wave of increasingly provocative attacks in the region, including the sabotage of oil tankers in the Persian Gulf and an attack on Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure in September that temporarily halved its production.

‘Revenge is on the way’

In Iran on Saturday, every major newspaper and state-controlled TV broadcast focused on Soleimani’s death, with even reformist newspapers like Aftab-e Yazd warning that “revenge is on the way.”

In the hard-line Kayhan newspaper, editor-in-chief Hossein Shariatmadari wrote Saturday that Iran shouldn’t hesitate to retaliate. He criticized an earlier statement by the country’s Supreme National Security Council saying an attack would come at the “right place and right time.”

“America and its allies are sitting in a glass room and are vulnerable on every side, so we can say for sure that all the preparations are ready for harsh revenge on terrorist America,” wrote Shariatmadari, who was appointed by Khamenei.

The “glass room” comment may refer to the United Arab Emirates, home to the skyscraper-studded city Dubai, which Kayhan previously has warned was a target for Iranian-backed forces. The UAE also hosts some 5,000 American troops at Abu Dhabi’s Al-Dhafra Air Base. Dubai’s Jebel Ali port is the U.S. Navy’s busiest port of call outside of the U.S.

…

Australia’s prime minister called up about 3,000 reservists as the threat of wildfires escalated Saturday in at least three states with two more deaths. Strong winds and high temperatures were forecast to bring flames to populated areas including the suburbs of Sydney.

Scott Morrison said 23 deaths have been confirmed so far this summer, including the two in a blaze on a highway on Kangaroo Island off the coast of South Australia. “We are facing another extremely difficult next 24 hours,” he told a televised news conference. 

“In recent times, particularly over the course of the balance of this week, we have seen this disaster escalate to an entirely new level,” Morrison said. 

He also confirmed that his scheduled visits to India and Japan later this month have been postponed. He was to visit India Jan. 13-16 and Japan immediately afterward. Morrison came under fire for taking a family vacation in Hawaii as the wildfire crisis unfolded in December. 

“Just around half an hour ago the governor general signed off on the call-out of the Australian Defense Force Reserve to search and bring every possible capability to bear by deploying army brigades to fire-affected communities,” he said.

Defense Minister Linda Reynolds said this was the first time that reservists have been called out “in this way in living memory and, in fact, I believe for the first time in our nation’s history.” 

Firefighting aircraft

The government has committed 20 million Australian dollars ($14 million) to lease four fire-fighting aircraft for the duration of the crisis, and the helicopter-equipped HMAS Adelaide was deployed to assist evacuations from fire-ravaged areas.

The fire danger increased as temperatures rose to record levels across Australia, surpassing 43 degrees Celsius (109 Fahrenheit) in the capital Canberra and 48 C (118 F) in Penrith, in Sydney’s western suburbs.

New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said her state was facing “another terrible day” and called on people in areas threatened by the fires to leave while they can.

“I’m pleased to say that we’ve never been as prepared as we are today for the onslaught we’re likely to face,” Berejiklian told reporters. “All of the major road networks are still open but we can’t guarantee that beyond the next few hours. So there are still windows for people to get out.”

Fire ‘virtually unstoppable’

The deadly fire on Kangaroo Island broke containment lines Friday and was described as “virtually unstoppable” as it destroyed buildings and burned through more than 14,000 hectares (35,000 acres) of Flinders Chase National Park. While the warning level for the fire was reduced Saturday, the Country Fire Service said it was still a risk to lives and property.

New South Wales Rural Fire Service Deputy Commissioner Rob Rogers warned the fires could move “frighteningly quick.” Embers carried by the wind had the potential to spark new fires or enlarge existing blazes.

Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fizsimmons said the 264,000-hectare (652,000-acre) Green Wattle Creek fire in a national park west of Sydney had the potential to spread into Sydney’s western suburbs.

He said crews have been doing “extraordinary work” by setting controlled fires and using aircraft and machinery to try to keep the flames away. 

Fitzsimmons called on residents and tourists in the path of the fires to evacuate as soon as possible.

“Our message has been to make sure you leave yesterday,” he said. “Leaving it until today is cutting it fine. The sooner you make that decision the better and I would say do it now. Don’t leave it any longer because the window will shrink and will shrink very quickly.”

Hundred-plus fires, half out of control

More than 130 fires were burning in New South Wales and at least half of those were out of control. Temperatures in parts of the state are expected to soar in the mid-40s C (about 113 F) amid strong winds and low humidity.

A total of 48 fires were burning across almost 320,000 hectares (791,000 acres) in Victoria state and conditions were expected to worsen with a southerly wind change.

“We still have those dynamic and dangerous conditions, the low humidity, the strong winds and, what underpins that, the state is tinder dry,” Victoria Emergency Services Commissioner Andrew Crisp said.

Thousands have already fled fire-threatened areas in Victoria, and Crisp urged more people to leave.

“If you might be thinking about ‘I can get out’ on a particular road close to you, well there’s every chance that a fire could hit that particular road and you can’t get out,” he said.

Victoria police reported heavy traffic on major roads and praised motorists for their patient and orderly behavior.

The early and devastating start to Australia’s summer wildfires has burned about 5 million hectares (12.35 million acres) of land and destroyed more than 1,500 homes. That’s more acres burned in Australia than any one year in the U.S. since Harry Truman was president.

…

Congress opened for the new year Friday with President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial deeply in flux and the crisis in the Middle East only adding to the uncertainty about how lawmakers will proceed.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is set to deliver remarks as the Senate gavels into session. But Trump’s Senate trial cannot begin until House Speaker Nancy Pelosi delivers the articles of impeachment, which she is refusing to do until the Republican leader provides details on whether Democrats will be able to call more witnesses. McConnell has said the trial should start and then senators can decide the scope.

“Why won’t Trump & McConnell allow a fair trial?” Pelosi tweeted this week.

The Constitution requires that the House and Senate convene on Jan. 3, but few lawmakers are in town for the perfunctory session. But the Senate leaders’ remarks are being closely watched for signs of next steps amid the crisis in the Middle East after the U.S. killed a top Iranian general with airstrikes in Iraq.

McConnell is hoping for a speedy trial to acquit Trump of the charges, but Democrats believe their push to hear from additional witnesses was strengthened in the two weeks since the House voted to impeach Trump.

Trump, only the third president in U.S. history to be impeached, faces charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress over his actions toward Ukraine. The president wants not only acquittal in the trial but also vindication from his GOP allies.

Four potential witnesses

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is pressing for at least four new witnesses, all of whom refused to appear in the House proceedings. They are Trump’s former national security adviser John Bolton, acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney and two other officials who were directly involved with Trump’s decision to withhold nearly $400 million in military aide for Ukraine, which the ally depends on to counter Russia, until President Volodymyr Zelenskiy agreed to publicly announce an investigation into Trump rival Joe Biden.

Democrats believe their demands for witnesses are bolstered by new reports about the withheld aid and unease among some GOP senators over the situation.

Two Republican senators, Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins, indicated they were open to hearing from more witnesses and registered their concerns about McConnell’s claim that he was working closely with the White House on the format for the trial.

But McConnell has showed few signs of changing course. He prefers to stick with his plan to follow the process used during Bill Clinton’s impeachment, in which the trial was convened and then votes were taken to decide if additional witnesses were needed.
 

…

For decades, the Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians in Montana have lived in a state of neitherness — neither completely Native American nor non-Native American.   But last month, its 5,400 members received a gift they have waited decades for — federal recognition.
 
The Little Shell Tribe of Chippewa Indians Restoration Act, sponsored by Senators Jon Tester and Steve Daines and Representative Greg Giaforte, was tucked into the National Defense Authorization Act, which U.S. President Donald Trump signed into law on December 20.

The bill gives the tribe the same benefits afforded treaty tribes and other recognized tribes the right to self-govern and a small land base of 200 acres, which the tribe must purchase and which will be held in trust by the government.  Tribe members will be eligible for assistance with education, health care, social services, law enforcement, and other programs.  

“It might not seem like a big deal to the folks who aren’t impacted,” Tester told reporters during a December 17 conference call, “but the truth is that this is going to allow the Little Shell to really move forward in a way that they’ve been trying to do for 150 years.”

Little Shell Tribe member Rylee Mitchell, a resident of Great Falls, Montana, is in her last year of high school and looking forward to attending college.

“I can apply for scholarships now because there are thousands of them open,” she said.  “But without being federally recognized, I could apply for only eight.”

The Mitchell family will now be able to access health care through the Indian Health Service, a federal agency that provides health care services to Native Americans and Alaska Natives.

Most importantly, federal recognition will give tribe members a sense of legitimacy they’ve been denied for more than a century.

“The other tribes in Montana, they have their own high schools and their own sports programs,” said Rylee’s mother Julie Mitchell.  “They get to keep their language and their traditions and their culture together.  

Nobody really understands the Little Shells’ history, she said, or how they ended up landless.

It’s a complex, spotty and much-disputed history: The Little Shell Band is descended from the Pembina, one of dozens of bands of Chippewa, (Ojibwe) who followed the buffalo from the western Great Lakes across the Plains states.   They eventually settled along the Red River dividing Minnesota and North Dakota and flowing north into Canada.  

They were what Montana historian Nicholas Vrooman referred to as a mixed-culture recombinant group — some having pure Chippewa ancestry, but the majority having mixed Ojibwe, Cree, Assiniboine, European and Metis heritage.  Despite their varied ancestry, they were a cohesive group with its own cultural identity.

The mid-19th Century brought great change to the Chippewa. The fur trade, which had previously sustained them, now declined. Buffalo were quickly disappearing from the Plains.  White settlers and the railroad were encroaching, and the U.S. government was working furiously to push Native Americans onto reservations or across the border into Canada.  

The turning point for the Little Shell Pembina came in 1892, when Chief Little Shell, the third of a succession of leaders by the same name, refused to sign the so-called “Ten Cent” treaty ceding nearly 10 million acres (4 million hectares) of prime farm land in the Red River Valley for 10 cents an acre and omitting many Little Shell families from the rolls.

Little Shell and most of his followers migrated into Montana, where they scattered, living in poverty and squalor on the fringes of settler towns “like they didn’t even exist,” said Little Shell Tribe member, historian and genealogist Brenda Snider.
   
“We never felt welcome by any of the other Montana tribes,” Snider said. “It was like we weren’t real Indians but ‘wannabe’ Indians.   And to the white people, we were just ‘trashy half-breeds.’”

Those attitudes, said Snider, persisted well into the present day.

Though scattered, Snider said the Little Shell managed to maintain their sense of unity and political cohesion.

“We call it the ‘Moccasin Telegraph,’” quipped Snider. “The families kept in touch with each other.”

They never stopped looking for federal recognition and a land base to call their own.  Tribes can be recognized either through an act of Congress or by petitioning the Interior Department (DOI) and meeting seven strict criteria proving historical, genealogical, and anthropological proof they have existed as a continuous governing body.

The Little Shell pursued both tracks.  With support from the Native American Rights Fund, they submitted tens of thousands of documents to DOI, but were ultimately turned down.    

It was a separate congressional effort led by U.S. Senators Steve Daines and Jon Tester and U.S. Representative Greg Gianforte that finally paid off.

Snider said the tribe must still submit an updated list of its members. It has not yet decided where their 200-acre reservation will be located.

“The government will sit together with our chairman and find a piece of available federal land in Montana.  One that has the right of access and water,” she said, chuckling, “not just some piece along Rattlesnake River.”

Two hundred acres is hardly enough land to accommodate an entire tribe, but it’s enough to house tribal offices and a cultural center.  

“I’m hoping we can educate more of our people and get some job training done,” she said.

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Illinois, the largest Midwestern state in the U.S.,  is beginning 2020 with the implementation of a new law that allows people to legally buy marijuana for recreational use. The Cannabis Regulation and Tax Act also also allows the governor to pardon thousands for past low-level cannabis convictions. VOA’s Mariama Diallo reports

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