China wrapped up its second International Import Expo on Sunday  a six-day trade show in Shanghai, which has attracted the participation of more than 3,800 companies from 180 countries.

While acknowledging Beijing’s efforts to open up its vast market, exhibitors expressed mixed views toward whether the import-themed national-level expo lived up to their expectations.

And it remains to be seen if the Chinese authorities’ top-down approach to opening-up its market and its reform initiatives can be fully implemented at local levels, observers say

“Local authorities still keep strongly protectionist policies, which are opaque and have posed a worse trade barrier than tariffs. This is a big problem. It will be a huge and questionable task if local governments will fully execute the top leadership’s [open-up] policy,” said Liu Meng-chun, director of the Chung-Hua Institution of Economic Research’s mainland China division in Taipei.

Market open-up

Addressing the expo’s opening ceremony last Tuesday, Chinese President Xi Jinping pledged to further open up the Chinese market and urged global leaders to join hands in resisting protectionism.

“We need to strengthen the mechanisms for sharing benefits globally, and explore new ways of international cooperation. The goal is to give more impetus to economic globalization and remove impediments as much as we could,” Xi said.

Such an expo, however, isn’t enough for China to address its trade imbalance with individual foreign countries or showcase its determination to remove market access barriers, both direct and indirect, facing foreign companies, said Carlo Diego D’Andrea, chairman of the European Union Chamber of Commerce in Shanghai.

“In order to truly encourage more investment for European companies, China will need to follow through on the reform of state-owned enterprises, enacting the principle of competitive neutrality, which means no differences in treatment between government- and private-owned companies,” D’Andrea told VOA.

“And this is one of the reasons why there is the trade friction between the U.S. and China,” he added.

Indirect access barriers

D’Andrea said that 30 percent of his chamber members face indirect market access barriers in China.

For example, legal firms are allowed to operate in China, but restricted to give advice on Chinese laws or to Chinese architecture firms.

And the central government’s procurement regulation looks fair for medical device providers to compete, but local governments’ quota limitations in favor of Chinese products put foreign competitors at a disadvantage, D’Andrea added.

The chamber’s survey on its members which attended last year’s expo showed that only half of them closed deals but most of those deals went unfulfilled with one company saying that its deal existed only as a “symbolic agreement.”

Although 70 percent of respondents were overall satisfied with last year’s expo, those who were not expressed disappointment in things such as meeting bad contacts, feeling “cheated in different ways” and lamenting that the expo was meant more for Chinese public relations than business development. A costly investment of more than $28,000 to enter last year’s expo was another source of dissatisfaction. 

The chamber, however, lauded China’s inking of a bilateral agreement with the EU on Wednesday on geographic indications (GIs) to deepen mutual cooperation.

GI is a sign used on products to prevent counterfeiting and enable consumers of both countries to use authentic high-quality products.

European businesses appear to be a bigger winner at this year’s expo after France walked away with contracts totaling $15 billion in the fields of aeronautics, energy and agriculture during President Emmanuel Macro’s three-day visit in Shanghai.

Twenty French companies are further allowed to export poultry, beef and pork to China.    

Mixed feedback

Despite tariff hikes have hurt the pricing of American imports, nearly 200 American companies showed up at this year’s expo.

Some voiced concern about business prospects shall the U.S.-China trade war drag on while others said that American companies are not yet being stigmatized.

“They’re not going to Philips just because we’re an American company and Philips is a European company. There continues to be a lot of interest,” Steven Lien of Honeywell International Inc. told Reuters on Thursday.

“We quite want to separate politics and business. Our product is very helpful and useful, so we want people to focus on products,” Twiggy Zhao of the California-based lubricants maker WD-40 Co. also told the Reuters, sharing her worries about trade war fallout.

However, Inos Lin, executive vice president of TCI  a contract maker of private-label dietary supplements from Taiwan  finds its first-ever participation at this year’s expo rewarding.

“We’ve met non-corporate clients including state-run or state-owned enterprises, which we normally have no chance of reaching out to. They came to explore products from around the world, which may meet their local needs or present business opportunities,” Lin told VOA.

The event is also a great platform for TCI to gain a better understanding of local consumers and promote the latest trends of needs to nutricyclicals, he said, expressing confidence in finalizing potential deals struck in the past week.

As of Sunday, TCI has reached nearly ten letters of intent at the expo.

…

Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo sign agreements to work on key road networks within 24 months, connecting the two countries to ease business. However, security concerns on the routes remain key for business. 

Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo have signed an agreement to increase trade and investment between the two Great Lakes Region countries.
 
Presidents Yoweri Museveni of Uganda and President Felix Tshisekedi of the DRC noted that there are numerous trade restricting measures and infrastructure obstacles that raise the cost of doing business in the region.
 
Museveni noted that both Uganda and the DRC now import many products from China, Japan and India, instead of manufacturing them at home.
 
The total distance of the three key road networks will be 1,182 kilometers within 24 months after the respective ministers have agreed on implementation details.

“One road we want to work on is from Goli to Mahagi-Bunia. Then the other road would be from Mpondwe to Beni. The other road would be from Bunagana to Rutshuru to Goma. So, when you produce, you supply goods, you supply services. But you also create jobs for the youth,” said Museveni.
 
There have been expressions of fear among business about the militias operating in the eastern D.R.C. that may destabilize trade between the two countries. However, Tshisekedi reassured them that the two countries will ensure there is peace to promote business and development.
 
“We intend to develop or build infrastructure so we can carry out economic activity to lead to economic growth for the benefit of our people. Because as you know, in the absence of development, poverty sets in and becomes a vector of instability,” he said.
 
Trade this year between Uganda and the DRC, through May 18, is over $532 million, with Congo only exporting $30 million in goods to Uganda.
 
Evelyn Anite, Uganda’s state minister for investment, says the launch of the business forum and signing of the agreements will open a DRC market of 80 million for Ugandan businesses just and a Ugandan market of 40 million for the DRC.
 
“What are these things? Cement, scholastic materials, building materials. We have a company in this country that manufactures 10,000 blankets in a month, but only 3,000 gets consumed in the country because the population size is small. So, there’s a lot of natural resources that the Congolese have. They do have gold, they have palm oil. So, if they can process that and bring it to our country, that trade imbalance over time is going to improve,” said Anite.
 
Both countries continue to face the brunt of militia movements especially in the eastern part of the DRC. that has seen thousands killed and thousands more cross into Uganda as refugees.
 
 

…

Former Brazilian leader Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva on Saturday attacked right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro for impoverishing working Brazilians and vowed to unite the left to win the 2022 elections in a speech one day after being freed from jail. 

Lula’s wide-ranging, 45-minute speech to cheering supporters focused broadly on defeating Bolsonaro and improving the economic conditions of the working class. 

Lula, who was president from 2003 to 2010, also took aim at a long list of political enemies, including Bolsonaro, Economy Minister Paulo Guedes and Justice Minister Sergio Moro, a former judge who initially ruled to convict Lula. 

“I want to tell them, I’m back,” the 74-year-old told hundreds of supporters dressed in red, the color of his Workers Party, outside the metalworkers union where he got his political start. 

He said Guedes seeks to remake Brazil economically in the image of Chile, long seen as a model of financially conservative governance, but that those policies are the reason for the widespread street protests paralyzing its Latin American neighbor. 

Court ruling

A judge ordered that Lula be freed on Friday, a day after Brazil’s Supreme Court issued a broader ruling ending the mandatory imprisonment of convicted criminals after they lose their first appeal. Lula had been imprisoned on a corruption conviction carrying a nearly nine-year sentence. 

Bolsonaro told reporters in Brasilia, “Let’s not give space to compromise with a convict.”  

Earlier on Twitter, the president called for supporters to rally around his government’s agenda, which has included a severe tightening of public spending, saying that they must not allow Brazil’s next phase of recovery to be derailed. 

“Do not give ammunition to the scoundrel, who is momentarily free but full of guilt,” Bolsonaro said.  

While Bolsonaro did not mention Lula by name, his left-wing rival took direct aim at the president. 

“If we work hard, in 2022 the so-called left that Bolsonaro is so afraid of will defeat the ultra-right,” he said. 

Ineligible to run

Lula, who left the presidency with sky-high approval ratings, is ineligible to stand for office until 2025 under Brazil’s “Clean Record” law because of a conviction for taking bribes. But his release is expected to energize the left ahead of next year’s municipal elections. 

He was imprisoned in 2018 after being found guilty of receiving bribes from construction companies in return for public contracts. 

Lula has maintained his innocence. On Saturday he repeated that Justice Minister Moro, prosecutors and police were lying about his guilt for political reasons. 

“[I’m] not responding to criminals, jailed or freed. Some people deserve to be ignored,” Moro responded on Twitter. 

…

Bolivian President Evo Morales denounced the actions of “violent groups” early Saturday, hours after police forces were seen joining scattered protests, but the military weighed in later, saying it would not “confront the people” in a standoff over a disputed election. 

Morales, Latin America’s longest-standing leader, won the election on October 20, but a delay of nearly a day in the vote count has sparked allegations of fraud and led to protests, strikes and roadblocks. 

On Friday night, local television showed police in several Bolivian cities marching alongside protesters in apparent acts of disobedience and joining chants regularly used by the opposition. 

Adding to the pressure on Morales, the Armed Forces said in a statement on Saturday “that we will never confront the people to whom we have a duty and we will always ensure peace, co-existence and the development of our homeland.” 

Criticism from foreign ministry

In a tweet in the early hours of Saturday, Morales repeated accusations that “violent groups” were launching a coup against the state. The foreign ministry released a statement saying some police officers had “abandoned their constitutional role of ensuring the security of society and state institutions.” 

At a news conference later in the day, Morales called an urgent meeting with the four political parties represented in parliament. By Saturday afternoon, at least two opposition parties had rejected Morales’ invitation and one had accepted. 

Morales said he would also invite international organizations, including the Vatican, the United Nations and the Organization of American States, which is conducting an audit of the October vote. 

Luis Fernando Camacho, a civic leader from the eastern city of Santa Cruz who has become a symbol of the opposition, and Carlos Mesa, the runner-up in October, reiterated their calls for Morales — the country’s leader since 2006 — to step down.  

“What we want here is to unite all Bolivians in a single cause. We want President Evo Morales to leave,” Camacho told a news conference. 

March set for Monday

Camacho plans to lead a march to the government palace on Monday with a symbolic resignation letter for Morales to sign. 

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro tweeted his support for Morales on Saturday. 

“We denounce before the world the attempted coup d’etat in progress against the brother President Evo Morales,” said Maduro, who has been accused of corruption and human rights violations. 

…

Waving separatist flags and chanting, “Freedom for political prisoners!” thousands of supporters of Catalan independence gathered in Barcelona for concerts and rallies on Saturday, while some protesters faced off with police, a day before Spain heads to the polls for a general election. 

Mostly organized by secretive Catalan protest group Democratic Tsunami, the demonstrations aim to force Spaniards to reflect on the prison sentences handed down last month to nine separatist leaders who spearheaded a failed independence bid in 2017, organizers said. 

In one protest called by CDR, another separatist group that favors direct action such as blocking highways, several hundred demonstrators tried to reach the Spanish police headquarters, the flashpoint of some of last month’s riots, but were blocked by police. 

Tense exchanges

There were tense moments as masked protesters, singing the Catalan anthem, threw eggs and other objects at the police and tried to barricade the road with waste bins. Officers responded by chasing them through central Barcelona’s restaurant-packed streets until the crowd dispersed. 

Local media said there was no immediate word of any arrests. A spokesman for the Catalan police could not confirm whether any arrests were made during the protest. 

The election campaign has been dominated by the Catalonia separatist issue after weeks of sometimes violent protests that followed the Supreme Court’s ruling on the Catalan leaders. 

Attending the rally, Jovita Mezquita, 69, praised Democratic Tsunami’s initiatives, including its first protest, which disrupted Barcelona’s airport in mid-October. 

“We have to be imaginative,” she said.  

“We have to do things that have impact in the world,” she added, arguing that separatists were not taken into account in the rest of Spain. 

‘Very complicated’

But away from the protests, some Barcelona residents were skeptical that things could change for the region, where separatism is a highly divisive issue. 

“I see [it as] very complicated for the situation in Catalonia to be resolved, because at the national level, that is to say at the Spanish level, I do not see that there is a great desire to do it,” said Maria Rodriguez, a 33-year-old actress. 

Democratic Tsunami, which advocates nonviolent action, called on supporters to demonstrate across the region Saturday afternoon and suggested there would be more to come if Spanish politicians refused to engage with separatists. 

“As long as there is no dialogue, instability will continue,” it said in a statement late Saturday. “The [Spanish] state will not be able to continue with repression without having a citizens’ response.” 

The group, whose leadership remains unknown, said the controversial app it uses to organize events had received more than 1,000 attacks. 

The campaign for Catalan independence has been mostly peaceful for years, but some protests turned violent last month, with a minority of mostly young demonstrators torching cars and launching petrol bombs at police. 

Extra police

Madrid sent around 2,500 additional national police officers — including anti-riot units — to support Catalonia’s regional police force ahead of the election, a national police spokesman in Barcelona told Reuters. 

The goal is to “guarantee that everyone can exercise their right to vote,” the spokesman said. 

A Catalan police spokeswoman declined to comment on the force’s security plans. 

Carme Martin, 68, who attended Saturday’s protest, said she could understand some of the youths’ frustration after last month’s riots in Barcelona.  

“I don’t like violence but [I understand] if it is defensive,” she said. 

…

Chancellor Angela Merkel led a series of commemorations Saturday in the German capital to mark the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, which divided the city during the Cold War until it was breached and torn down on November 9, 1989. 
 
Merkel, who grew up in Communist East Germany, said, “The Berlin Wall is gone and that teaches us that no wall that excludes people and restricts freedom is so high or so wide that it cannot be broken through.” 
 
November 9 also is the anniversary of Kristallnacht, when Jews were attacked across Nazi Germany in 1938 — a foretaste of the horrors that would follow in the Holocaust.  

“The 9th of November, which reflects in a special way both the horrible and the happy moments of our history, makes us aware that we have to face hatred, racism and anti-Semitism resolutely,” Merkel said in a speech at the Chapel of Reconciliation, located where the Berlin Wall once stood. “It urges us to do everything in our power to defend freedom and democracy, human dignity and the rule of law.”  

International attendance 
 
Leaders from Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic also attended a ceremony at Bernauer Strasse, site of one of the last remaining sections of the Berlin Wall. They placed roses between gaps in the barrier that divided the city for 28 years. 
 
Germany President Frank-Walter Steinmeier paid tribute to the pro-democracy protesters in the former Soviet bloc countries. 
 
“In gratitude, we remember today with our friends the historical events of 30 years ago,” Steinmeier said. “Without the courage, without the will for freedom of the Poles, the Hungarians, the Czechs and the Slovaks, the peaceful revolutions in Eastern Europe, and German unity, would not have been possible.” 
 
A weeklong series of events in Berlin was capped off Saturday night with a concert at the famous Brandenburg Gate, involving several German and international performers.  

Then-U.S. President Ronald Reagan famously gave a speech in front of the landmark in 1987, demanding of his Soviet counterpart: “Mr. [Mikhail] Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” A statue of Reagan, who died in 2004, was unveiled Friday next to the Brandenburg Gate. 
 
The wall was constructed in 1961 to stop the flood of East Germans fleeing to capitalist West Berlin to escape communist rule. It was officially called the “anti-fascist protection rampart” by the East German government. Hundreds of people were shot dead trying to cross it. 
 
Following growing pressure across the Warsaw Pact countries in 1989, pro-democracy protests spread to East Germany. 
 
On November 4, 1989, a half-million demonstrators gathered in Alexanderplatz in East Berlin. Five days later, a government spokesperson mistakenly said the East Germans were now free to travel to the West, prompting tens of thousands to rush to crossing points along the 43-kilometer barrier. 
 
In the confusion, border guards opened the gates and thousands of people surged across the frontier, cheered by crowds on both sides of the wall. Within hours, Berlin residents were taking pickaxes to the concrete wall, as the city erupted in wild celebrations.  

The fall of the wall is seen as a key moment in the collapse of communism. Just two years later, the Soviet Union imploded and the Cold War was declared over. 
 
Tensions between East-West 
 
However, tensions between East and West have resurfaced. Relations between Russia and the West plummeted following Moscow’s forceful annexation of Crimea and support for rebel fighters in eastern Ukraine in 2014. Arms control treaties have been ditched, and many world leaders have warned of a new Cold War. 
 
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also attended the ceremonies to mark the fall of the Berlin Wall. In a speech on the eve of the anniversary, Pompeo warned that “the West lost our way in the afterglow of that proud moment,” adding that the U.S. and its allies should “defend what was so hard won.” 
 
“We thought we could divert our resources away from alliances, and our militaries. We were wrong,” Pompeo said. “Today, Russia — led by a former KGB officer once stationed in Dresden [President Vladimir Putin] — invades its neighbors and slays political opponents.”  

Pompeo also criticized Russia’s treatment of the political opposition. He said China was now using methods of oppression against its own people that would be “horrifyingly familiar to former East Germans.” 
 
Beijing labeled Pompeo’s comments as “extremely dangerous” and said they exposed his “sinister intentions.” 
 
Pompeo also warned that NATO needed to evolve as the alliance approaches its 70th anniversary. His comments followed sharp criticism from French President Emmanuel Macron, who warned this week in an interview with The Economist that NATO was becoming “brain-dead” in the absence of U.S. leadership. 
 
Washington has repeatedly called on European NATO members to meet the bloc’s military spending target of 2% of gross domestic product, warning it will no longer shoulder the burden of European defense. 

…

Iraqi security forces killed at least five people Saturday as they pushed protesters back toward their main camp in central Baghdad using live ammunition, tear gas and sound bombs, police and medics said. 

The clashes wounded scores more people and put security forces back in control of all except one major bridge linking the Iraqi capital’s eastern residential and business districts to government headquarters across the Tigris river. 

The government promised reforms aimed at ending the crisis. Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi said Saturday that political parties had “made mistakes” in their running of the country, recognized the legitimacy of protest to bring about political change and pledged electoral reform. 

Mass protests began at Tahrir Square in Baghdad on Oct. 1 as demonstrators demanded jobs and services, and rallies have swelled in the capital and southern cities with calls for an overhaul of the sectarian political system. 

It is the biggest and most complex challenge in years to the political order set up after a U.S.-led invasion that toppled dictator Saddam Hussein in 2003. 

Political class vs. jobless youths

Iraq, exhausted by decades of conflict and sanctions, had enjoyed relative calm after Islamic State was defeated in 2017. 

But the government has been unable to find an answer to the current round of unrest, which pits the entire political class against mostly unemployed youths who have seen no improvement in their lives, even in peacetime. 

Despite government pledges of reform, security forces have used lethal force since the start and killed more than 280 people across the country. 

On Saturday, forces drove protesters back from some of the bridges they had tried to occupy during the week and toward Tahrir Square, the main gathering point for demonstrators. 

The protesters still hold a portion of the adjacent Jumhuriya Bridge, where they have erected barricades in a standoff with police. 

But demonstrators fear the next police target will be Tahrir Square and Jumhuriya Bridge. Fresh clashes erupted after nightfall near Tahrir Square, with the sound of tear gas and stun grenades being fired echoing around central Baghdad, as it had nightly for the past week two weeks. 

“Police have retaken almost the entire area up ahead of us. They’re advancing and my guess is tonight they’ll try to take Tahrir,” said one protester, who gave his name only as Abdullah.  

Gas bombs

On Saturday, some demonstrators threw Molotov cocktails toward security forces at another bridge, and young men took unlit homemade petrol bombs up a tall building nearby, preparing for further clashes. 

At a nearby makeshift clinic, volunteer medic Manar Hamad said she had helped treat dozens of wounded on Saturday alone. 

“Many get hit by shrapnel from sound bombs, and others choke on tear gas or are hit directly by gas canisters. People have died that way,” she said as live gunfire rang out and ambulance sirens wailed. 

Police and medics said five people were shot to death and more than 140 wounded in Baghdad on Saturday. A Reuters cameraman saw one man carried away by medical volunteers after a tear gas canister struck him directly in the head. 

As the violence flared, Abdul Mahdi issued a statement that appeared to take a more conciliatory tone and urged a return to normal life after weeks of unrest that have cost the country tens of millions of dollars, although crucial oil exports have not been affected. 

“Political forces and parties are important institutions in any democratic system, and have made great sacrifices, but they’ve also made many mistakes,” he said. 

He said protests were a legitimate engine of political change but urged demonstrators not to interrupt “normal life.” 

Weapons ban

Abdul Mahdi promised electoral reform and said authorities would ban possession of weapons by nonstate armed groups who have been accused of killing protesters, and that there would be investigations into demonstrator deaths. 

His remarks came a day after Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, Iraq’s powerful senior Shiite Muslim cleric, urged politicians to seek a peaceful way out of the crisis and held security forces accountable for avoiding further violence. 

In southern Iraq, operations resumed at Umm Qasr commodities 
port, a port official said, after it was closed for nearly 10 days while protesters blocked its entrances. 

Umm Qasr receives imports of grain, vegetable oils and sugar shipments that feed a country largely dependent on imported 
food. 

Authorities in downtown Basra, Iraq’s oil-rich second city, erected a security perimeter, preventing protesters from gathering on Saturday, after two people were killed there on Friday in clashes between protesters and security forces. 

The Kuwaiti Consulate in Basra said it was withdrawing its staff from the city, amid the deteriorating security situation, a consular official said. 

…

Wildfires razing Australia’s drought-stricken east coast have left two people dead and several missing, more than 30 injured and more than 100 homes destroyed, officials said Saturday.

Around 1,500 firefighters were battling 70 fires across Australia’s most populous state, New South Wales, with the most intense in the northeast where flames were fanned by strong winds, Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said.

Firefighters found a body Saturday in a burned car near Glen Innes, he said.

A woman who was found Friday unconscious and with serious burns near Glen Innes had died in a hospital, he said.

Another seven people have been reported missing in the vicinity of the same fire.

Toll expected to climb

“We are expecting that number (of missing persons) to climb today,” Fitzsimmons told reporters. “There are really grave concerns that there could be more losses or indeed more fatalities.”

More than 30 people including firefighters received medical treatment for burns and one patient had a heart attack, he said.

At least 100 homes were estimated to have been destroyed since Friday, but that damage toll could rise significantly as firefighters were able to extinguish flames and access fire zones, Fitzsimmons said.

Hundreds flee in Queensland

Hundreds of people evacuated their homes along a 500-kilometer (310-mile) swath of the eastern seaboard from the Queensland state border south to Forster.

Forster is a town 300 kilometers (190 miles) north of Sydney, Australia’s largest city. Many spent the night in evacuation centers while some slept in cars.

In Queensland, more than 30 wildfires were raging Saturday. At least one house was lost, a firefighter suffered a broken leg and 2,000 residents were evacuated from two towns in the state’s southeast, authorities said.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison warned Australia to expect more bad news from the fire zones.

“The devastating and horrific fires that we have seen particularly in New South Wales but also in Queensland have been absolutely chilling,” Morrison told reporters in Sydney.

‘It’s going to be horrific’

In the New South Wales town of Taree, more than 300 people evacuated overnight to a social club, including Club Taree’s chief executive Morgan Stewart.

“It was pretty scary,” Stewart said. “We’re hearing lots of stories of lost houses, lost property, goods and effects, animals, land. It’s going to be horrific, I think.”

Peter Lean spent the night on the roof of his house in the town of Wallabi Point, extinguishing burning embers carried on strong winds.

“I’ve never seen the sky so red since 2000,” Lean said. “We’ve got winds blowing, they’re circling, it’s like a cyclone.”

The fire danger reached unprecedented levels in New South Wales on Friday, when 17 fires were burning at the most extreme danger rating known as the Emergency Warning Level.

“I can only recall a figure of less than 10 that we (previously) got to, which was an extraordinary event in years past,” Fitzsimmons said.

“The fact that we have 17 at once yesterday and another nine burning at Watch and Act (Level) is a magnitude that we simply haven’t seen before, commanding so much attention, so much priority, so much competition for resources and need to get to different communities,” he added.

Only two fires were burning at the highest danger rating by Saturday.

The annual Australian fire season, which peaks during the Southern Hemisphere summer, has started early after an unusually warm and dry winter.
 

…

India’s Supreme Court has ruled in favor of a Hindu temple on a disputed religious ground and ordered that alternative land be given to Muslims. 

The dispute over land ownership has been one of the country’s most contentious issues. 

The 16th-century Babri Masjid mosque was destroyed by Hindu hard-liners in December 1992.

The Supreme Court said in a judgment Saturday that 5 acres (2.02 hectares) of land will be allotted to the Muslim community in the northern Indian town of Ayodhya. 

The disputed land will be given to a board of trustees for the construction of a temple for Hindu god Ram.

…

Seven Hong Kong pro-democracy lawmakers have either been detained or face arrest Saturday, in a move expected to escalate public fury a day after the death of a student linked to months of anti-government protests.

A police statement said three of the lawmakers had been detained and charged Saturday with obstructing the local assembly during a raucous May 11 meeting over a now-shelved China extradition bill that sparked five months of protests calling for democratic reforms.

The others received summons to turn up at police stations Saturday to face arrest.

Pro-democracy lawmakers slammed the government clampdown as a calculated move to provoke more violence as an excuse to postpone or cancel Nov. 24 district elections — low-level polls viewed as a barometer of public sentiment in the semi-autonomous Chinese territory.

Anger has deepened against the police after Friday’s death of a 22-year-old who fell off a parking garage after police fired tear gas during recent clashes.

“We’ll say no to their plans,” lawmaker Tanya Chan told a news conference. Referring to the upcoming vote, she said “it is a de facto referendum for all Hong Kong voters to cast their vote and say no to police brutality and say no to our unjust system. And this is definitely our chance to show our determination.”

She said the polls will send a crucial message also to Beijing, accused by protesters of interfering in the city’s freedoms and rights promised when the former British colony returned to Chinese control in 1997.

Gary Fan, one of the lawmakers who received the police notice, said the arrest was a “dirty tactic” that is adding fuel to the fire.

“This is political suppression. People can see clearly that (Hong Kong leader) Carrie Lam continues to hide behind the police and is now using the legal system against the movement,” he said.

The city’s Constitutional and Mainland Affairs Secretary Patrick Nip denied the arrests were linked to the polls.

“There is no correlation between the two. The police are doing their job and investigating each and every case and take appropriate action,” Nip said.

He said the government aims to conduct the polls smoothly and peacefully.

Thousands attended multiple memorial events across the city Friday night, calling for truth and justice for Chow Tsz-Lok, the student who died Friday of injuries sustained in a fall.

More protests

Violence erupted later in familiar scenes that have beset the city with police firing tear gas to disperse hard-core protesters who set street fires, blocked roads and vandalized shops and public utilities. More protests are being planned this weekend.

Although the circumstances of Chow’s fall have not been determined, many blamed police, who have been accused of heavy-handed tactics including widespread use of tear gas and pepper spray since the protests demanding democratic reforms started in June. His death will also complicate efforts by the government to cool tensions.

There have been only few fatalities during the unrest, including some reported deaths by suicide and a man who fell to his death while hanging pro-democracy banners on a building.

More than 3,300 people have been arrested in the movement, that has since expanded to include calls for direct elections for the city’s leaders and other demands.

…

President Donald Trump prepares to welcome Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to the White House Nov. 13, just weeks after Turkey launched an assault in Syria on Kurdish fighters — longtime allies of the United States in the fight against Islamic State terrorists. U.S. lawmakers from both  parties have slammed the president for his announcement that he plans to withdraw most U.S. troops from Syria, and Democratic lawmakers are also blasting his invitation to Erdogan while Turkey continues its attacks on the Kurds. VOA’s Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.
 

…

A Serbian health minister who used his medical credentials to help mobsters avoid trial, a Belgrade mayor’s dozens of personal bank accounts, ties between a convicted drug kingpin and Montenegro’s president.

Stevan Dojčinović, the reporter behind some of the highest-profile scandals to hit the Western Balkans in 2018, was on hand to receive the 2019 Knight International Journalism Award at the 35th annual ICFJ dinner in Washington this week. 

Honored alongside Marty Baron of The Washington Post, Elizabeth Palmer of CBS News and Rose Wangui of Nairobi-headquartered NTV, Dojčinović used his acceptance speech to warn about spreading nationalist tendencies.

“Many in the United States were shocked by the victory of Donald Trump, the Brexit turmoil, and the rise of populism, extremism and nationalism around the world,” he said to an estimated 600 guests in attendance. “In Serbia and the countries in the shadow of Russia, we got a head start. I’ve been reporting on it in my country for decades.

“Finally, Eastern Europe does something first!” he quipped.

Founding editor of the Belgrade-based Crime and Corruption Reporting Network, KRIK, and a regional contributor to the International Center for Journalists-partnered Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, OCCRP, Dojčinović has repeatedly been the target of threats and intimidation campaigns.

In its 2019 World Press Freedom Index, Paris-based Reporters Without Borders called Serbia a place where “practicing journalism is neither safe nor supported by the state.” Since 2013, the news media watchdog group lowered Serbia’s press freedom ranking from 63 to 90, on a scale of the 180 countries surveyed.

Last month, the executive producer of Serbia’s privately owned N1TV blamed Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic for a recent campaign of harassment targeting the broadcaster and journalists throughout the country.

The Vucic government denies targeting N1TV or any reporters, and the president’s media adviser, Suzana Vasiljevic, told VOA that Serbians enjoy a free press, and that neither Vucic nor his officials incriminate or harass journalists.

The Knight International Journalism Award is given once annually to reporters, editors or media professionals who have produced journalism of the highest standard in the faces of threats or unusually difficult circumstances.

This story originated in VOA’s Serbian Service.

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