A global working group set up by Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Microsoft to remove extremist content will become an independent watchdog working “to respond quicker and work more collaboratively to prevent” attacks like Christchurch, New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said on Monday.

Ardern has pushed for stronger action since New Zealand’s worst peacetime mass shooting in March, when a gunman attacked Muslims attending Friday prayers in Christchurch. He killed 51 people and broadcast the attack live on Facebook.

“In the same way that we respond to natural emergencies like fires and floods, we need to be prepared and ready to respond to a crisis like the one we experienced,” Ardern told reporters on the sidelines of the annual United Nations gathering of world leaders.

The Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism was created in 2017 under pressure from U.S. and European governments after a spate of deadly attacks. It will now become an independent organization led by an executive director, funded by Facebook, Google’s YouTube, Twitter and Microsoft.

Speaking at a joint news conference with Facebook Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg, Ardern said the organization would be governed by an operating board made up of company representatives and would have an independent advisory committee composed of government and civil society members.

Ardern said some of the group’s work would be to fund and coordinate academic research on terrorism and violent extremist operations and on best practices for data sharing.

Sandberg said the forum had already shared some 200,000 digital fingerprints “because when terrorists try to use one platform, they try to use all the platforms; so when one of us find them, we can take them down across multiple platforms.”

She added that while the fastest-growing messaging platforms were encrypted, Facebook was still able to combat extremism while aiming to protect users’ privacy. She noted that even though WhatsApp is encrypted, Facebook and Facebook-owned Instagram are not.

“We are often able to find people on one and then take then down off the encrypted platforms,” Sandberg said.

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The United Nations unveiled plans to plant urban forests over an area four times the size of Hong Kong, seeking to make Africa and Asia’s rapidly growing cities greener.

The U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said the pace of urbanization on both continents was contributing to climate change and planting trees could improve air quality, cut the risk of floods and heatwaves and halt land degradation.

It will discuss plans to create up to half a million hectares of new urban forests – more than four times the size of Hong Kong – by 2030 in New York this week.

“If you look at the urbanization data, particularly in some parts of Asia and Africa, it is happening now,” said Simone Borelli, an expert on urban forestry with the FAO.

“For example, Chinese cities are growing very fast and in 20 years’ time, they may have 20% or 30% more people living there.

“Unless they start planting now, they’ll find themselves in a situation where it’s too late. Trees take a long time to grow,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation on Monday.

If managed well, urban forests could reduce air temperatures by up to 8 degrees Celsius (14.4 F) and cut the cost of air conditioning by up to 40%, the FAO said.

The initial plan is to support 90 cities in 30 countries in Africa and Asia to create green areas, said FAO director-general Qu Dongyu in a statement.

The problem is particularly severe in dry areas, where climate change is expected to make cities and surrounding areas more vulnerable to droughts, heatwaves, extreme winds, floods and landslides, he said.

With almost 70% of the world’s population estimated to be living in cities by 2050, mainly in Africa and Asia, environmental impacts of urbanization could worsen without solutions, experts have warned.

The FAO will work on the project with the U.N. housing agency, Britain’s Kew Royal Botanic Gardens, and the C40, a global network of cities pushing for climate action.

It is also working with Stefano Boeri Architetti, the firm that designed a “vertical forest” in the Italian city of Milan by incorporating trees equivalent to two hectares of forests in two residential towers.

The architects said the towers helped create a microclimate that would produce humidity, absorb carbon dioxide and dust particles and produce oxygen, calling them a model for sustainable residential building.

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A senior United States Treasury official was visiting Beirut on Monday, where he’s explaining the motives behind recent U.S. sanctions targeting Lebanon’s Iranian-backed Hezbollah group, Lebanon’s central bank governor said.

Treasury Department Assistant Secretary Marshall Billingslea met with the prime minister and the speaker of parliament, as well as officials from the Association of Banks in Lebanon and the central bank governor.

Hezbollah holds three cabinet seats, and along with its allies has more power than ever in the parliament and government. It is also among the most effective armed groups in the region, extending Iran’s influence to Israel’s doorstep. Domestically, the group’s power exceeds that of the Lebanese armed forces. 

Lebanon’s Central Bank chief Riad Salameh played down reports in local media that the U.S. will impose further sanctions on the country’s dollar-strapped banking system. He said Billingslea “is not coming here to squeeze Lebanon.”

A U.S. embassy statement said Billingslea “will encourage Lebanon to take the necessary steps to maintain distance from Hezbollah and other malign actors attempting to destabilize Lebanon and its institutions.”

Last month, the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control sanctioned Jammal Trust Bank and added it to its list of global terrorist organizations. The bank denied U.S. charges about “knowingly facilitating banking activities” for Hezbollah militants.

The bank last week was forced to request self-liquidation and the move was accepted by the central bank governor.  

The U.S. has been imposing sanctions on Hezbollah for years, as Washington considers the group a terrorist organization. Such steps have increased in recent months as the Trump administration is using “maximum pressure” against Iran, Hezbollah’s main backer.

In July, the Treasury Department targeted a Hezbollah security official and two members of Lebanon’s parliament, saying they are suspected of using their positions to further the aims of the militant group and “bolster Iran’s malign activities.” It was the first time Washington targeted Hezbollah legislators.

Hezbollah, whose Arabic name translates as “Party of God,” was established by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard months after Israel invaded Lebanon in 1982.

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A school collapsed in Kenya’s capital on Monday and killed at least seven children, officials said, while some outraged residents alleged shoddy construction. Two other children were in critical condition.

“We were in class reading and we heard pupils and teachers screaming, and the class started collapsing and then a stone hit me on the mouth,” one survivor, 10-year-old Tracy Oduor, told The Associated Press. “When we got out of the gate we heard that pupils were dead. I feel so sad!”

Parents wailed over the remains of The Precious Talent Top School in Nairobi, and hundreds of people gathered as emergency workers picked through debris. It was not clear whether anyone was trapped underneath.

Government spokesman Cyrus Oguna confirmed the deaths, and Kenyatta National Hospital later said 64 children had been admitted, most with minor injuries.

“The children here were all running away and crying,” resident Michael Otieno said. More than 800 students are enrolled at the school, officials said.

It was not immediately clear why the building of corrugated metal and wood collapsed around 7:30 a.m. Construction can be poorly regulated in some fast-growing Kenyan communities.

“You can easily break it with your own hands, as easy as that,” Peter Ouko, a resident, said of the building materials. “This is chicken wire, not a construction material, and someone had the guts to use this to build a construction for our kids. I think this is basically premeditated murder.”

Nathaniel Matalanga, a structural engineer with La Femme Engineering Services Ltd., told reporters that he didn’t think “any professionals” were involved in the school’s construction and he blamed “greed.”

There was no immediate comment from school officials.

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Egyptian rights lawyers say security forces have rounded up hundreds of people following small but rare anti-government protests.

The protests broke out in several Egyptian cities including the capital, Cairo, over the weekend, calling for President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi to step down.
 
All protests were quickly broken up by police. But they marked a startling eruption of street unrest, which has been almost completely silenced the past years by draconian measures imposed under el-Sissi.
 

Egypt Warns Media to Take Care in Coverage Amid Protests

The government effectively banned all public protests in 2013 shortly after el-Sissi led the military’s overthrow of the country’s first freely elected civilian president in modern history

Lawyers Malek Adly and Khaled el-Masry said Monday security forces had arrested at least 400 people in Cairo and elsewhere across the country.
 
El-Masry says prosecutors have questioned at least 220 people, over claims that they took part in activities of an outlawed group, a reference to the Muslim Brotherhood group, and disseminating false news.

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Climate change protesters have taken to the streets of Washington, blocking key intersections as part of their effort bring “the whole city to a gridlocked standstill.”

Organizers called on people to skip work and school to participate in the protest, which follows mass rallies Friday of young people in cities around the world that drew hundreds of thousands of people demanding urgent action to combat climate change.

Groups of protesters in Washington blocked several key streets Monday morning.

Traffic was being diverted by police.

Young People Demand Urgent Action on Climate Change video player.

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 At least 40 members of a wedding party, including women and children, were killed and another 13 wounded in an airstrike in southern Afghanistan Sunday night, according to a provincial council member from Helmand province.

Haji Abdul Majed Akhund told VOA that the residents of Musa Qala district, the site of the attack, had informed provincial authorities of the wedding ceremony in advance.

“We brought 13 members of our family to the Emergency hospital in Lashkargah city last night,” a man named Abdullah told VOA.  
 
Helmand health officials confirmed that 13 civilians were shifted from the site of the attack to provincial capital Lashkargah. Abdul Ahad Hazem, the Helmand provincial health director, told VOA that one of them, a woman had since succumbed to her wounds.
 
Omar Zawak a spokesman for the Helmand provincial governor, confirmed the strike but said reports of civilian casualties were not confirmed and the government was investigating. He added that the strike, which was accompanied by a night raid on militants operating in the area, had killed 13 Taliban.

Meanwhile, the Afghan Defense Ministry said at least 22 Taliban were killed, including 5 Pakistanis and one Bangladeshi, and 14 militants were arrested, in an Afghan forces’ operation in Musa Qala.

A separate statement from the office of the governor of neighboring Kandahar province said the target was al-Qaida.

“Last night, Afghan special forces conducted an air and ground operation in Takht Put village in Musa Qala district of Helmand province, killing five key members of the al-Qaida network and arresting three key female members,” the statement read, adding that all these members were from Karachi, Pakistan.

The accusation of civilian casualties comes days after a United States drone strike in Nangarhar province in eastern Afghanistan killed at least 30 civilians, according to local officials. The civilians, mostly laborers had gathered to harvest pine nuts and had informed provincial authorities of their plans ahead of time.

Civilians continue to bear the brunt of the conflict in Afghanistan, with the United Nations recording record high numbers in the last few years. A recent BBC investigation revealed that “an average of 74 men, women and children were killed every day in Afghanistan throughout the month of August.”

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Iranian President Hassan Rouhani says the Trump administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign has failed, and that sanctions it imposed after abandoning the 2015 agreement on Iran’s nuclear program show the United States is desperate.

Speaking before traveling to New York to participate the annual United Nations General Assembly meetings, Rouhani also said the United States and Saudi Arabia have exaggerated the damage done by an attack on Saudi oil facilities earlier this month.

Rouhani accused the Trump administration of wanting to take control of the region.  He said earlier his plans for the U.N. meetings include presenting a regional cooperation plan for peace. 

U.S. and Saudi officials have blamed Iran for the attacks, which shut down half of Saudi Arabia’s oil production.  British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said Monday his government believes there is a “high probability” Iran was responsible.

Iranian officials, including Rouhani, have denied Iran was involved.

While many world leaders will hold talks on the sidelines of the U.N. meetings this week, a meeting between U.S. President Donald Trump and Rouhani seems unlikely.  

Trump said Sunday he had no intention of talking with Rouhani, and the Iranian president has said he would not meet with Trump until the United States lifts economic sanctions.

Trump announced new sanctions against Iran’s national bank Friday, further escalating economic pressure on the Islamic Republic, but pulling back from any direct military action.

“I think the sanctions work,” Trump said.  “The military would work, but that is a very severe form of winning.”

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Egypt’s media authority warned journalists Sunday that it was monitoring coverage to ensure they abide by “professional codes” amid a rare burst of protests against President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi. The warning came hours after the latest small protest was dispersed by police in clouds of tear gas.

Dozens of people including children marched Saturday evening in the port city of Suez, calling for el-Sissi to step down, three witnesses told The Associated Press. Police “pursued the people in the streets … there was lots of gas,” one resident said. The witnesses spoke on condition of anonymity out of fear of reprisals.

Dozens Arrested in Egypt After Rare Anti-Sissi Protests

At least 74 were arrested overnight, a security source told AFP, with plain clothed police patrolling sidestreets of downtown Cairo

The protest came after rare anti-government demonstrations in several Egyptian cities late Friday. Those too were quickly broken up by police. But they marked a startling eruption of street unrest, which has been almost completely silenced the past years by draconian measures imposed under el-Sissi.

The government effectively banned all public protests in 2013 shortly after el-Sissi led the military’s overthrow of the country’s first freely elected civilian president in modern history. Since then, anyone who dared take to the streets was quickly arrested and received years-long prison sentences.

UN Calls for Independent Investigation into Death of Egypt’s Morsi

UN human rights office calls for prompt, impartial, transparent investigation into sudden death of former Egyptian president Mohammed Morsi in Cairo court, where he was on trial on espionage charges

In its statement issued Sunday, the State Information Service, which accredits foreign media representatives, said it has “carefully monitored” the coverage of the protest.

It called for reporters to “strictly abide by professional codes of conduct” and for media to provide a space for “viewpoints to be presented in an equal manner and that includes the viewpoint of the State or who represents it.” The SIS has issued similar statements in the past surrounding sensitive events.

It also warned that “social media outlets should not be considered as sources of news,” because of the numerous “fake accounts and fabrications.”

False information about protests has appeared on social media, including videos of protests from years past presented as if they were happening live.

But social media have also been vital for getting out authentic videos of protests, since they are the only venue not dominated by the government. Nearly all newspapers and television channels in Egypt are under the sway of the government or military and have given almost no coverage to the protests. In recent years, Egypt has imprisoned dozens of reporters and occasionally expelled some foreign journalists.

In the wake of Friday’s protests, security forces have reportedly arrested dozens of people in Cairo and other parts of the country, according to the Egyptian Center for Economic and Social Rights, a non-governmental organization.

How Egypt’s President Tightened his Grip

Behind the scenes, President Abdel Fatah el-Sissi’s closest advisers reworked the constitution to prolong his presidency and tighten his grip on Egypt. Not since the decades-long rule of Hosni Mubarak has so much power been concentrated in the hands of one man

The new protests emerge from an online campaign, led by an Egyptian businessman living in self-imposed exile who has presented himself as a whistleblower against corruption. His calls for demonstrations come at a time when Egypt’s lower and middle classes have been badly squeezed by years of economic reforms and austerity measures.

The businessman, Mohammed Ali, has put out a series of viral videos claiming corruption by the military and government. His videos inspired others — often wearing masks to hide their identity — to post their own videos relating experiences with alleged corruption or mismanagement.

Ali has alleged his contracting business witnessed the largescale misuse of public funds in military-run projects building luxury hotels, presidential palaces and a tomb for el-Sissi’s mother, who died in 2014.

El-Sissi has dismissed the corruption allegations as “sheer lies.” However, he said he would continue building new presidential residences for the good of Egypt. “I am building a new country,” he said.

El-Sissi and government officials have argued that the military is the only institution that can efficiently lead mega-projects aimed at stoking the economy. The president has repeatedly warned that protests and demonstrations risk causing chaos that would disrupt efforts at repairing the country.

Also Sunday, Egyptian prosecutors ordered the brother of a prominent Egyptian activist to remain in custody for 15 days, a rights lawyer told AP.

Wael Ghonim is in self-exile in the U.S. and led a Facebook page that helped ignite the 2011 pro-democracy uprising. He has recently been criticizing el-Sissi on social media, and says his brother’s arrest from their parents’ home in Cairo was retaliation for that criticism.

Mahinour el-Masry, a rights lawyer and notable activist from the 2011 uprising, was arrested Sunday as well.

Egyptian authorities have imposed heavy security in the capital, Cairo, particularly around near Tahrir Square. That was the epicenter of the so-called Arab Spring uprising that toppled longtime autocrat Hosni Mubarak in 2011.

El-Sissi is a former army general who has overseen an unprecedented political crackdown, silencing critics and jailing thousands. Shortly after the military took power in 2013, a sit-in by Islamists was broken up by security forces in an operation that left hundreds dead.

Egypt remains among the world’s worst jailers of journalists, along with Turkey and China, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, a U.S. based non-profit.

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A visiting Afghan Taliban delegation held talks with senior officials in China Sunday to discuss the Islamist insurgent group’s now defunct peace negotiations with the United States.

The insurgent visit comes two weeks after U.S. President Donald Trump had abruptly called off his administration’s months-long peace talks, citing ongoing Taliban deadly attacks in Afghanistan.

The two adversaries were believed to be on the verge of signing an agreement to end the 18-year-old Afghan war before Trump declared the peace process as “dead.”

Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen said the nine-member delegation has traveled to Beijing under the leadership of Mullah Baradar, the head of the group’s political office in Qatar, which hosted the U.S.-Taliban talks.

Pompeo: Trump Correctly Called Off Taliban Talks

The visitors’ opened their tour with a meeting Sunday with Chinese special envoy for Afghanistan, Deng Xijun, the Taliban spokesman said.

“The Chinese special representative said the U.S.-Taliban deal is a good framework for the peaceful solution of the Afghan issue and they support it,” Shaheen noted.

He quoted Baradar as telling the Chinese host the Taliban had initiated the talks with the U.S. and a “comprehensive deal” was also concluded.

“Now, if the American president cannot uphold his words and promises, then the responsibility for further destruction and bloodshed in Afghanistan rests on his shoulders,” Baradar said.

There were was no immediate comments available from Chinese officials about their meetings with the Taliban delegation.

On Friday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman while addressing his regular news conference in Beijing had called for restarting the stalled U.S.-Taliban peace process.

“We stand ready to enhance coordination and cooperation with all parties concerned to contribute to the national reconciliation, peace and stability in Afghanistan at an early date,” said Geng Shuang.

Prior to their visit to China, the Taliban had sent its political representatives to Russia and Iran to discuss developments that had stemmed from President Trump’s cancellation of the talks with insurgents.  

Shaheen, who is part of the delegation visiting Beijing, said that Moscow and Tehran both have also supported the Taliban’s efforts for promoting peace and security in Afghanistan.

The insurgent group’s diplomatic efforts come as Afghanistan is set to hold its fourth presidential election later this week, amid allegations incumbent President Ashraf Ghani, who is seeking reelection, is using state resources to run his campaign. Ghani’s campaign team has rejected the charges.

The Taliban has threatened to launch violent attacks on election-related activities to disrupt the September 28 vote. An insurgent suicide bomber targeted an election rally Ghani was addressing last week in the northern Parwan province that killed around 30 people and injured many more.

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More than 600,000 vacationers who booked through tour operator Thomas Cook were on edge Sunday, wondering if they will be able to get home, as one of the world’s oldest and biggest travel companies teetered on the edge of collapse.
 
The debt-laden company, which confirmed Friday it was seeking 200 million pounds ($250 million) in funding to avoid going bust, was in talks with shareholders and creditors to stave off failure.
 
A collapse could leave around 150,000 travelers from Britain stranded, along with hundreds of thousands from other countries. The company has sought to reassure customers that flights were continuing to operate as normal.
 
Most of Thomas Cook’s British customers are protected by the government-run travel insurance program, which makes sure vacationers can get home if a British-based tour operator goes under while they are abroad.
 
Thomas Cook’s financial difficulties also raised questions about the jobs of the 22,000 people employed by the company around the world, including 9,000 in Britain.
 
Unions and Britain’s opposition Labour Party urged the government to intervene financially to save jobs if the company fails to raise the necessary financing from the private sector.
 
If the company collapsed, Britain’s Civil Aviation Authority would probably be ordered by the government to launch a major operation to fly stranded vacationers home, much as it did when Monarch Airlines went bust nearly two years ago.
 
British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab gave assurances that British vacationers will not be left stranded.
 
 “I don’t want to give all the details of it because it depends on the nature of how people are out there,” he told the BBC. “But I can reassure people that, in the worst-case scenario, the contingency planning is there to avoid people being stranded.”
 
Rebecca Long Bailey, Labour’s business spokesperson, said the government “faces a simple choice between a 200 million-pound government cash injection to save the company now versus a 600 million-pound bill to repatriate U.K. holidaymakers.”
 
Thomas Cook, which began in 1841 with a one-day train excursion in England and now operates in 16 countries, has been struggling over the past few years. It only recently raised 900 million pounds ($1.12 billion), including from leading Chinese shareholder Fosun.
 
In May, the company reported a debt burden of 1.25 billion pounds and cautioned that political uncertainty related to Britain’s departure from the European Union had hurt demand for summer holiday travel. Heat waves over the past couple of summers in Europe have also led many people to stay at home, while higher fuel and hotel costs have weighed on the travel business.
 
The company’s troubles appear to be already affecting those traveling under the Thomas Cook banner.
 
A British vacationer told BBC radio on Sunday that the Les Orangers beach resort in the Tunisian town of Hammamet, near Tunis, demanded that guests who were about to leave pay extra money for fear it wouldn’t be paid what it is owed by Thomas Cook.
 
Ryan Farmer, of Leicestershire, said many tourists refused the demand, since they had already paid Thomas Cook, so security guards shut the hotel’s gates and “were not allowing anyone to leave.”
 
It was like “being held hostage,” said Farmer, who is due to leave Tuesday. He said he would also refuse to pay if the hotel asked him.
 
 The Associated Press called the hotel, as well as the British Embassy in Tunis, but no officials or managers were available for comment.

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U.S. President Donald Trump said Sunday he did nothing wrong in a telephone conversation with the new president of Ukraine amid news report that Trump allegedly urged him to investigate the son of former vice president and 2020 Democratic presidential hopeful Joe Biden.

Speaking to reporters, Trump described his phone call with President Volodymyr Zelensky as “absolutely perfect.”

“The conversation I had was largely congratulatory, was largely corruption, all of the corruption taking place. It was largely the fact that we don’t want our people, like Vice President Biden and his son creating to the corruption already in the Ukraine,” Trump said.

According to news reports, Trump urged Zelensky about eight times during their conversation to investigate Biden’s son. Sources were quoted saying Trump’s intent was to get Zelensky to collaborate with Trump lawyer Rudolph Giuliani on an investigation that could undermine Biden.

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Vadym Prystaiko on Saturday denied Trump had pressured Zelensky during the call, telling the media outlet Hromadski that Ukraine would not take sides in U.S. politics even if the country was in a position to do so.

Trump and Guiliani have pushed for an investigation of the Bidens for weeks, following news reports this year that explored whether a Ukrainian energy company tried to secure influence in the U.S. by employing Biden’s younger son, Hunter.

Democrats are condemning what they perceive as a concerted effort to damage Biden, who has been thrust into the middle of an unidentified whistleblower’s complaint against Trump. Biden is currently the leading candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination.

The Trump administration has blocked procedures under which the whistleblower complaint would have normally been forwarded by the U.S. intelligence community to members of the Democrat-controlled Congress, keeping its contents secret.

Biden said late Friday that if the reports are accurate, “then there is truly no bottom to President Trump’s willingness to abuse his power and abase our country.” Biden also called on Trump to disclose the transcript of his conversation with Zelensky so “the American people can judge for themselves.”

When asked about releasing the transcript,  Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told ABC News that  “those are private conversations between world leaders and it wouldn’t be appropriate to do so except in the most extreme circumstances.”

The intelligence community inspector general has described the whistleblower’s August 12 complaint as “serious” and “urgent,” conditions that would normally require him to forward the complaint to Congress. Trump has characterized the complaint as “just another political hack job.”

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