What will become of families stranded in Vietnam since their Moroccan fathers defected from the French army in 1953?
In the 1940s, young Moroccans joined the French army to earn a living and support their families.
In 1953, many were serving in Indo-China when they learned of the exile of King Mohamed V and deserted to join the forces of Ho Chi Minh.
Some soldiers moved to Huang Houn in northern Vietnam, and continued to live in the region for years, marrying local women and starting families there.
Unusual in that they were half-Vietnamese and half-Moroccan, these families nevertheless made lives for themselves in the region.
After a lengthy absence abroad, most of the soldiers eventually returned to Morocco in 1972. But three families remained stranded in Vietnam.
They are unable to return to Morocco because their fathers have died and their mothers are unable to prove Moroccan parentage.
Now all many of them can do is wait for the Moroccan government to decide their fate, as they remain forgotten victims of a war that ended decades ago.
Next of kin have been asked for DNA samples to help identify the victims.
The Airbus A320-200, carrying 162 people from Surabaya to
Singapore, disappeared on Sunday and remains were located in the sea on
Tuesday.
The authorities say seven bodies have been retrieved, but bad weather is hampering further salvage efforts.
A public memorial will be held in Surabaya on Wednesday
evening local time, and the governor of East Java province has told the
BBC that all New Year'sEve celebrations have been cancelled.
On board the plane were 137 adult passengers, 17 children and one infant, along with two pilots and five crew.
It is not yet clear what happened to the plane but its last
communication was a request from air traffic control to climb to avoid
bad weather. The pilot did not respond when given permission.
Japanese family who tended Briton's grave for 140 years finally learn his identity
The Murai family receive a letter of thanks from the British ambassador after mystery of ex-pat’s remains is solved
More than 140 years after their ancestors started tending the grave of a British man who died in obscurity, a Japanese family has finally learned his identity – and received an official message of thanks from the British government.
For much of that period, members of the Murai family, who live in Ishikawa prefecture on the Japan Sea coast, thought they were maintaining the last resting place of a man named Philip Ward.
In fact, the grave belongs to Bernard George Littlewood, who came to Japan to teach English in 1870, just as the country was beginning to modernise.
Homeland criticised by Pakistan officials for portraying country as a 'grimy hellhole'
Other complaints include misrepresentation of language and lack of greenery
Pakistan officials have criticised producers of hit dramaHomeland for portraying their country as a “grimy hellhole”.
The show’s fourth season, which ended on Sunday night, sawClaire Danes’ character Carrie Mathison thwart a terror plot while working at the US embassy in Islamabad.
Members of the Pakistani government and its intelligence agency were revealed to be involved in the conspiracy over the course of twelve tense episodes.
“Maligning a country that has been a close partner and ally of the US […] is a disservice not only to the security interests of the US but also to the people of the US,” Nadeem Hotiana, Pakistan Embassy spokesman, told the New York Post.
Migrant ship Blue Sky M arrives in Italy
A large freighter with no crew and hundreds of hopeful migrants has been intercepted by the Italian navy following a distress call. There were many questions as the ship was brought to a port in southern Italy.
The Blue Sky M docked in the port of Gallipoli early on Wednesday after the Italian Navy undertook an operation to save some 700 migrants aboard the Moldovan-flagged freighter after a distress signal was sent out. Despite the distress signal, there appeared to be nothing mechanically wrong with the ship. It was most likely activated by one of the migrants, who were in need of food and blankets.
Police and maritime authorities have said they would investigate how the migrants, reportedly mainly from Syria and including a heavily pregnant woman, came to be hidden on the cargo ship, which was headed for the Croatian port of Rijeka.
With climate change, Himalayas' future is warmer, not necessarily brighter
By Madison Park, CNN
December 31, 2014 -- Updated 0349 GMT (1149 HKT)
As snow layered the trail before him, Hari Chaudhary thought it was odd. The veteran trekking guide had never seen snow on the trail in early October.
The popular 21-day Annapurna Circuit takes trekkers in a horseshoe-shaped route around a majestic segment of the Himalayas in Nepal.
On the 10th day of the tour, Chaudhary and his clients, two young Israeli women, were descending from the highest point of the trail, Thorung La Pass, to the next destination, a walk that would normally take about seven hours.
Now, after more than 10 hours of heading downhill, the snow pelted.
The flurry fell heavier and faster, obstructing their vision. There was nowhere to stop or rest; they had to keep walking.
"You couldn't see the trail, there was snow everywhere, making it easy to get lost," said Chaudhary. "It was all white, in the distance you could only see shadows of people walking."
Iraqi forces 'retake Dhuluiyah from ISIL'
Pro-government forces complete recapture of strategic town which had been held by ISIL for months, commanders say.
Last updated: 31 Dec 2014 00:44
Iraqi forces have completed the recapture of Dhuluiyah, parts of which had been held by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) for months, commanders have said.
Pro-government forces had pushed into the town, located 90km outside Baghdad, from the north two days earlier, fighting their way south.
"Forces from the army and the police and [militiamen] and tribal fighters succeeded today in regaining control of Dhuluiyah," an army major general told the AFP news agency on Tuesday.
The officer said that 50 military vehicles advanced from the north and linked up with allied forces in the town's southern Jubur area, which had resisted repeated assault by ISIL.
In Colombia, a palm oil boom with roots in conflict
MAPIRIPAN, Colombia — Long before the massacre, when Mapiripan was just a faraway little place not worth fighting for, Aida Gordilla and her family came to the wide-open grasslands outside town and fenced off a homestead. They called it Macondo, like the enchanted village in the Colombian novel popular at the time, “One Hundred Years of Solitude.”
Today, a sign at the edge of town still reads “Macondo Way,” but the road leads to a palm oil processing plant amid a vast orchard of a million trees, sown in tidy rows by a Spanish-Italian company, Poligrow. Gordilla’s family and the others are gone.
What drove them from Mapiripan and Macondo is only one dark little episode in the civil conflict that has scarred Colombia for half a century, leaving at least 220,000 dead and 5.7 million uprooted by four-way violence among leftist rebels, government forces, right-wing paramilitary groups and criminal gangs.
Cho Hyun-ah the the daughter of the chairman of Korean Airlines and former executive for KAL could be facing sometime at the gray bar hotel following her age regression tantrum for being served macadamia nuts in bag instead of on plate. Yes, she was in charge of inflight services but was it really necessary for little Hyun-ah to act like the spoiled little heiress brat that she is? In her vapid little mind it was as she was born with a silver poll shoved up where the sun never shines.
A Seoul court has issued an arrest warrant for a former executive of
South Korea's top airline, who came under heavy criticism over a
controversial 'nut rage' incident early this month.
Cho Hyun-ah attended a court session on Tuesday which reviewed
the validity of her arrest warrant. Cho had resigned as the airline's
vice-president for cabin service four days after a national uproar over
her conduct aboard a Seoul-bound Korean Air flight from New York on
December 5.
Cho, the eldest daughter of Korean Air chairman Cho Yang-ho, had
forced the plane to return to the gate and kicked off the chief flight
attendant because she had been served nuts in a bag, not on a plate. Cho said the crew did not follow the proper procedure for serving nuts to first-class passengers.
The flight was subsequently returned to the gate, causing an
11-minute delay in its arrival at Seoul's main gateway, Incheon
International Airport. More than 250 passengers were on board.
Annual producers' special from Spain, Tunisia, Japan and Hong KongIt is the end of the year - and a chance for a recap of some of the stories The Listening Post has looked at in 2014. So the producers on the show have chosen a story they found most interesting and we have come up with a media medley of sorts.
Nic Muirhead went to Tunis to take a look at the country's post revolutionary media - to see whether the media is meeting the expectations of Tunisia in a post Ben Ali era.
The year that streets of Hong Kong erupted with pro-democracy protests, Meenakshi Ravi takes a look at how the mainland is reigning in the media.
Marcela Pizarro went to Spain to find out why 3 editors of the biggest papers were let go this year - and the challenges for the historic papers of record in times of crisis.
Will Yong explores that space for democracy to triumph - or for all hell to break lose - the online comments section.
And finally, Gouri Shama takes a look at how Japanese media has coverage the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster - and how well that coverage has served the public.
AirAsia QZ8501: Debris and body seen by Indonesia search teams
Search teams have spotted debris at sea in the hunt for missing AirAsia Flight QZ8501, Indonesian officials say.
Several objects and a body were seen floating in the Java Sea off the Indonesian part of Borneo, in one of the search zones for the plane.
An Indonesian official said the debris was 95% likely to be from the missing aircraft.
The Airbus A320-200, carrying 162 people from Surabaya in Indonesia to Singapore, disappeared on Sunday.
The search operation is now in its third day, with the area widened to cover 13 zones over land and sea.
During a news conference by the head of the operation, pictures of the debris were shown, including a body floating on the water.
Relatives of passengers on the plane watching the pictures were visibly shocked.
Search operation head Bambang Soelistyo said he was 95% certain the objects shown were from the plane.
Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny given suspended sentence and brother jailed
Alexei Navalny, who led mass protests against Vladimir Putin, was accused along with his brother in a trial widely seen as part of a campaign to stifle dissent
A Russian court gave Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny a suspended sentence on Tuesday for embezzling money but jailed his brother for three and a half years.
Navalny led mass protests against President Vladimir Putin three years ago, when tens of thousands took to the streets in Moscow and St Petersburg to protest against corruption in Putin’s government and inner circle.
His case has been seen as part of a campaign to stifle dissent.
The Navalny brothers were accused of stealing 30 million roubles, or about £334,000 under the current exchange rate, from two firms, including an affiliate of the French cosmetics company Yves Rocher, between 2008 and 2012.
The Afghan war that didn't really end yesterday ended in defeat
None of the claimed long term objectives for the war in Afghanistan, either from the Bush or Obama administrations, have been achieved.
News websites and broadcasts - and US and NATO press releases - were filled with discussion about the "formal" end of the Afghan war yesterday. But any close reading of the facts will find that they were wrong.
Call it semi-formal, or business casual, whatever you like. The reality remains the same: For American soldiers and for the Afghan people the war that began on Oct. 7, 2001 will go on.
While most of America's NATO allies that hadn't already washed their hands of combat will now do so, American fighting and dying will continue, with 11,000 US troops remaining in the country. There will be talk of "advising," and "training" and "non-combat" presence. But for the most part that can be safely ignored.
Years After Japan's Earthquake Disaster, A Community Struggles To Pick Up The Pieces
The Okawa Elementary School in Ishinomaki, Japan, was the site of one of the worst tragedies that occurred during the earthquake and subsequent tsunami that struck the east of the country in 2011. Three years and nine months after the disaster, the community is still struggling to pick up the pieces.
“I don’t want what happened here at Okawa Elementary to happen again,” says Souta Sasaki, a college student and the son of a former teacher at the school while standing in front of the dilapidated buildings.
Seventy percent of the pupils at Okawa Elementary -- 74 students in total -- either lost their lives or went missing as a result of the tsunami. Ten out of 11 teachers at the school were killed. Souta Sasaki, 19, is the son of one of those teachers.
As Liberia recovers from Ebola, what next?
Weak health care systems in West Africa are everyone’s problem
When I fell ill with Ebola in early October, there were times when the future was uncertain and frightening. With some help, I was able to beat the disease and walk back into a changed life. Liberia, where I contracted the virus, is following the same path. There are now fewer cases of Ebola every week, and there is a sentiment that the worst is over. Earlier projections of tens of thousands of deaths appear to have been based on the false assumption that Liberians would not adapt to the threat they faced. Assisted by volunteers from around the world, Liberians tirelessly fought the outbreak and may soon declare a hard-won victory.
To be sure, the battle against Ebola is not yet over, and sustained efforts are needed to prevent a new spike in cases. Still, Liberia will enter its post-Ebola phase at some point in the near future. Questions will be inevitably be raised about how the disease spread so quickly and what measures must be put into place to prevent future outbreaks. The country’s health care system in particular will require major attention. At least 174 Liberian nurses and doctors have succumbed to Ebola in the nation, according to the World Health Organization. The total breakdown of medical services was one of the worst side effects of Ebola.
30 December 2014Last updated at 00:00
How did Hitler's scar-faced henchman become an Irish farmer?
By Peter CrutchleyBBC Digital & Learning NI
He was Hitler's favourite Nazi commando, famously rescuing Mussolini from an Italian hilltop fortress, and was known as "the most dangerous man in Europe".
After World War Two, he landed in Argentina and became a bodyguard for Eva Perón, with whom he was rumoured to have had an affair.
So when Otto Skorzeny arrived in Ireland in 1959, having bought a rural farmhouse in County Kildare, it caused much intrigue.
At 6ft 4in and 18 stone, known as 'scarface' due to a distinctive scar on his left cheek, Skorzeny was an easily recognisable figure as he popped into the local post office.
In Japan the first Starbucks opened on 2 August 1996 in Ginza Tokyo since then its become a ubiquitous presence in Japan. It's first drive though opened in 2002 in Moriya Ibaraki.
McDonald's came to Japan in May 1971. Since then McDonald's has opened 3,300 outlets the most outside of America. Located in supermarkets, malls and train stations along with stand alone locations.
Japan's Kentucky Fried Chicken has changed the way Japanese viewed Christmas. Instead of turkey which American's usually eat for Christmas dinner Japanese order in advance Christmas dinner from Kentucky Fried Chicken so popular has this tradition become you can't walk into a Kentucky Fried Chicken and buy a bucket of chicken as they've already been reserved.
America is a meticulously constructed brand; it is the indispensable nation with exceptional power. There is no country as adept at branding as the United States.
Popular international mega-brands like Apple and McDonald’s sell neat pre-packaged pieces of the American dream to eager international consumers. A complimentary national branding strategy sells "freedom" and "democracy" over international airwaves, in movie theatres and through diplomatic influence.
But if Brand America is the sum of the effects of its soft powers, can we really separate this cultural imperialism from the nation’s use of hard power?
101 East goes undercover to expose the hidden harm in China's food industry.
Every year two million people die from unsafe food and water around the world. Food safety experts warn these deaths may be caused by human design, and nowhere is this trend more prevalent than in China.
Tracing the making of a bowl of wonton noodle soup, a 101 East investigation exposes the toxic stew this iconic dish has become.
From tainted additives in noodles, to growth hormones in pork, to industrial filler posing as meat, presenter Steve Chao finds that anything is possible for producers looking to cut corners and make a fast buck.
AirAsia QZ8501: Indonesia plane 'at bottom of sea'
The missing AirAsia Indonesia flight QZ8501 is likely to be at the bottom of the sea, the head of Indonesia's search-and-rescue agency has said.
Bambang Soelistyo said the hypothesis was based on the co-ordinates of the plane when contact with it was lost.
The search is continuing for the aircraft, a day after it disappeared with 162 people on board, but no trace has been found so far.
The Airbus A320-200 was on a flight to Singapore.
The pilots had requested a course change because of bad weather but did not send any distress call before the plane disappeared from radar screens.
"Based on the co-ordinates given to us and evaluation that the estimated crash position is in the sea, the hypothesis is the plane is at the bottom of the sea," Bambang Soelistyo, the head of Indonesia's search and rescue agency, told a news conference in Jakarta.
Aircraft accident rates at historic low despite high-profile plane crashes
Figures from the Bureau of Aircraft Accident Archives put the total number of fatalities for 2014 at 1,320 and assume no one on QZ8501 will be found alive
Although the rate of aircraft accidents in 2014 is at a historical low, the loss of AirAsia flight QZ8501 with 162 people on board is likely to result in a significant uptick in the rate of aircraft fatalities compared with the past few years.
Figures from the Bureau of Aircraft Accident Archives put the total number of fatalities for 2014 at 1,320 and assume no passengers on QZ8501 will be found alive. This would make it the the highest annual fatality figure since 2005. The BAAA counts military transport planes and any aircraft capable of carrying six or more passengers.
A Fox News presenter who commented that the missing AirAsia flight QZ8501 may have disappeared because the pilots used metric, rather than imperial, measurement systems has been lambasted online.
Footage appears to show presenter Anna Kooiman link the use of different measurement systems to the safety of flights abroad.
AirAsia Flight QZ8501 disappeared en route from Indonesia to Singapore on Sunday. Rescue teams, including warships, planes and search boats, have been scrambled in an attempt to locate the missing flight and all 162 passengers on board.
Air strikes escalate Libyan conflict as city and port of Misurata attacked
Forces loyal to Tubruq-based government hit an air base, a port and a steel factory
Borzou Daragahi
Warplanes attacked Libya’s third-largest city of Misurata yesterday, the first time the industrial port of 300,000 has been struck in a seven-month civil conflict that has already set on fire the country’s largest oil terminal.
The three air strikes, launched by forces loyal to the internationally recognised Tubruq-based government of Prime Minister Abdullah al-Thinni, hit an air base, the port and a steel factory.
“The armed forces chief of staff declared Misurata a military zone and it will be besieged from east and west alongside continuous escalating strikes,” said Brig Gen Saqr al-Garoushi, commander of the Thinni government’s airforce, in Libyan media.
Obama's Lists:A Dubious History of Targeted Killings in Afghanistan
By SPIEGEL Staff
Combat operations in Afghanistan may be coming to an end, but a look at secret NATO documents reveals that the US and the UK were far less scrupulous in choosing targets for killing than previously believed. Drug dealers were also on the lists.
Death is circling above Helmand Province on the morning of Feb. 7, 2011, in the form of a British Apache combat helicopter named "Ugly 50." Its crew is searching for an Afghan named Mullah Niaz Mohammed. The pilot has orders to kill him.
The Afghan, who has been given the code name "Doody," is a "mid-level commander" in the Taliban, according to a secret NATO list. The document lists enemy combatants the alliance has approved for targeted killings. "Doody" is number 3,673 on the list and NATO has assigned him a priority level of three on a scale of one to four. In other words, he isn't particularly important within the Taliban leadership structure.
Climate shift in the Pacific may accelerate global warming
December 29, 2014 - 6:07PM
Peter Hannam
With 2014 likely to be declared the world's hottest year on record, the last thing the planet needs is a climate shift to turbo-charge the global warming already under way.
While it's an early call, a measure of surface temperature differences in the Pacific shifted to a positive reading in the five months of November, according to the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration – the longest such run in almost 12 years.
Known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, the El Nino-like pattern typically lasts 15-30 years and is understood to operate as an accelerator on global surface temperatures during its positive phase – and a brake during its negative phase – as the ocean takes up fluctuating amounts of the extra heat being trapped by rising greenhouse gas emissions.
2014 was a particularly dangerous year for media professionals, with the number of attacks and kidnappings soaring.
The past year was a difficult one for journalists. The number of attacks and kidnappings of media workers soared. Carefully staged murders of reporters became all too common. And governments around the world increasingly used national security as an excuse to detain journalists and stifle criticism of their actions.
Some countries were more dangerous for journalists than others. The Middle East, and Syria in particular, was the worst place to be a journalist. China, Iran and Eritrea were among the countries that imprisoned the most journalists.
Freedom House says press freedom around the world is at its lowest level in a decade.
US-led coalition against ISIL is making modest gains despite huge efforts.
Kurdish Peshmerga forces say they have regained control over many parts around Sinjar. ISIL had been in control of the town, located about 125 kilometres west of Mosul.
In the Syrian town of Kobane, along the Turkish border, fighting is still continuing against ISIL, with no breakthrough in sight.
Turkey, though it's been reluctant to fight the armed group, has pledged to cooperate with Iraq on ISIL.
But what does it really take to defeat this group?
LÜLIANG, China — For 10 fat years, this mountainous corner of central China was synonymous with the nation’s energy-hungry economic takeoff. Its rich deposits of coal fueled the most frenetic era of the Chinese boom, turning owners of small mines into millionaires and dirty towns into gleaming cities.
Now, Lüliang is at the center of one of the most sweeping political and economic purges in recent Chinese history. As President Xi Jinping’s campaign against corruption enters its second year, the Communist Party authorities have made an example of this district of 3.7 million, taking down much of its political and business elite in a flurry of headline-grabbing arrests.
Seven of the 13 party bosses who run Shanxi Province, where Lüliang is located, have been stripped of power or thrown in jail, and party propaganda outlets have trumpeted the crackdown in the region as proof that Mr. Xi is serious about rooting out corruption.
War with Isis: The West needs more than a White Knight
World View: Despite billions spent on weapons, the US has not been able to counter the militants' gruesome tactics
There is a scene in Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass in which Alice meets the White Knight who is wearing full armour and riding a horse off which he keeps falling. Alice expresses curiosity about why he has placed spiked metal anklets on his horse's legs just above the hoofs. "To guard against the bites of sharks," he explains, and proudly shows her other ingenious devices attached to himself and his horse.
Alice notices that the knight has a mouse trap fastened to his saddle. "I was wondering what the mouse trap was for," says Alice. "It isn't very likely there would be any mice on the horse's back." "Not very likely, perhaps," says the Knight, "but if they do come, I don't choose to have them running all about." It's as well "to be provided for everything", adds the Knight. As he explains his plans for countering these supposed dangers, he continues to tumble off his horse.
Secret dead of Russia's undeclared war
The Kremlin’s denial that Russian soldiers are fighting in Ukraine has left families of dead servicemen searching for truth and justice.
Anton Tumanov gave up his life for his country - but his country won’t say where, and it won’t say how.
His mother knows. She knows that Mr Tumanov, a 20 year-old junior sergeant in the Russian army, was killed in eastern Ukraine, torn apart in a rocket attack on August 13.
Yelena Tumanova, 41, learned these bare facts about her son’s death from one of his comrades, who saw him get hit and scooped up his body.
“What I don’t understand is what he died for,” she says. “Why couldn’t we let people in Ukraine sort things out for themselves? And seeing as our powers sent Anton there, why can’t they admit it and tell us exactly what happened to him.”
After tsunami recovery, Sharia law now defines Aceh province
In 2004, the Indonesian province of Aceh was a civil war zone. Then came the tsunami. Today the region is at peace, but Aceh has established an Islamist government under the eyes of the Jakarta government.
There are hardly any traces left of the biggest natural disaster in Aceh's history. Several of the ruined villages on the coast have been rebuilt. Modern residential blocks, new mosques, even freshly asphalted roads now cover the area. The markets are full again, the fishermen venture out to sea, and people work in the factories - as if the wave had never come. The wave that, on December 26, 2004, ended the lives of 160,000 people in Aceh alone.
Around $7 billion (5.7 billion euros) in reconstruction aid were sent to the utterly destroyed province from around the world. "Afterwards," explains Felix Heiduk, Indonesia expert at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), "there was a reconstruction the likes of which had hardly ever been seen before in the world. If you compare the Aceh of today with the Aceh of before the tsunami, there has been a clear modernization boost in the past few years."
Modern houses, backward legal system
That's not the case, however, for human rights in the province.
Experts doubt North Korea was behind the big Sony hack
But when its propagandists say it did not hack Sony Pictures before the original release date of the flick that satirizes dictator Kim Jong-un, they might just be telling the truth.
Some U.S. cyber experts say the evidence the FBI has presented to attempt to incriminate hackers working for the communist regime is not enough to pin the blame on Pyongyang.
"It's clear to us, based on both forensic and other evidence we've collected, that unequivocally they are not responsible for orchestrating or initiating the attack on Sony," said Sam Glines, who runs the cybersecurity company Norse.
Myanmar city holds first poll in 60 years
Critics say municipal election in country's biggest city, Yangon, is flawed, with only one vote per household allowed.
Last updated: 28 Dec 2014 03:26
Myanmar's biggest city has gone to the polls for the first municipal elections in six decades but under severe voting restrictions and limited power of the councillors being elected.
Elections in Yangon city on Saturday were closely watched as a test of the country's democratic credentials ahead of a landmark nationwide poll scheduled for November next year.
For many, the ballot for the Yangon City Development Committee was the first chance to vote under the country’s quasi-civilian government, which replaced outright military rule in 2011.
It was also a rare opportunity to have a say over the future of the country's commercial hub, where residents complain about runaway construction and soaring rents, worsening traffic, poor sanitation and weak pollution control.
