Wednesday, August 31, 2016
Can Kashmir anger be a turning point?
India extends a strict curfew over the restive region as separatist leaders call for more protests.
Mid-August is a time of celebration across most of India, as people commemorate the country's independence.
But in the northern region of Kashmir, this time of year often means heightened security and stifled expression. And this year is worse than usual.
After a decade of relative stability, Kashmir has experienced more than a month of violence - triggered by the death of a prominent Kashmiri separatist, Burhan Wani. He was killed by Indian soldiers on July 8.
And Kashmiris across the region took to the streets in protest.
Police swiftly imposed a curfew. Mobile networks have been suspended intermittently for the past month.
And India's security forces have been accused of using unnecessary force. More than 50 protesters have been killed since July.
Six In The Morning Wednesday August 31
US election 2016: Donald Trump to visit Mexican president Enrique Pena Nieto
US Republican candidate Donald Trump is to visit Mexico on Wednesday, hours before he details measures against illegal immigration in a speech.
Mr Trump tweeted that he was looking forward to meeting President Enrique Pena Nieto, who has invited both him and Democrat Hillary Clinton.
Mr Pena Nieto said dialogue would help "protect Mexicans wherever they are".
Mr Trump has condemned Mexican migrants during his campaign and vowed to build a wall between the two countries.
He will visit Mexico in between a fundraising event in California and his immigration speech in Phoenix, Arizona, on Wednesday night.
Chinese dissidents urge Obama to press Xi Jinping on human rights at G20
Activists say Chinese president has presided over dramatic offensive against Communist party’s opponents since taking power
Chinese dissidents have urged Barack Obama to confront Xi Jinping over what they called China’s worst human rights crisis since the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown when he travels to the G20 economic summit in Hangzhou this week.
During a meeting at the White House on Tuesday afternoon, prominent Chinese activists told Susan Rice, Obama’s national security adviser, that China’s president had presided over a dramatic offensive against opponents of the Communist party since taking power in late 2012.
Teng Biao, an exiled human rights lawyer who was among those invited to address Rice, told the Guardian he had called on the US president to publicly speak out on what is likely to be his final presidential visit to Asia.Costa Rica powered by renewable energy for over 100 days
The Latin American country is now aiming for a year without fossil fuels
Costa Rica has powered its electricity grid for over 100 days entirely by renewable energy.
The Latin American country has been run on renewable energy for 121 days and is now aiming for a year without fossil fuels.
Last year, renewable energy sources accounted for 99 per cent of the country's electricity and 285 days were powered completely by renewable sources, Inhabitat reports, citing the Costa Rican Electricity Institute.
Burmese peace talks seek to end decades of ethnic violence
Latest update : 2016-08-31
Hundreds of representatives of Myanmar's ethnic tribes gathered Wednesday in the country's capital for historic peace talks with the government aimed at ending decades of separatist insurgencies that have claimed thousands of lives.
The delegates, dressed in traditional garb and headgear, streamed into a conference hall in Naypyitaw for the five-day talks called by the new government of Aung San Suu Kyi. Although her title is state counsellor she is seen as the country's real leader.
Suu Kyi, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the head of armed forces Gen. Min Aung Hlaing are scheduled to give speeches at the opening of the talks to determine the fate of the country's various ethnic minorities, who make up about 40 percent of the population.
Efficient cookstoves save trees – and chickens – in Kenya
SEARCH FOR SOLUTIONS
A wood-saving ceramic stove that doubles as a chicken brooder is raising incomes and reducing deforestation.
GICHANGI, KENYA — Farmers in Kenya's Laikipia County have found a clever way to reduce their use of wood for fuel while raising more chickens for cash: an efficient ceramic cooking stove that doubles as a chick brooding box.
The locally built stove, used for cooking and home heating in the cool region, contains a separate warming area where chicks can be kept to keep them healthy and safe, farmers say.
The innovation has helped reduce demand for wood in a country hard-hit by deforestation while keeping more chickens alive and raising incomes, farmers say.
Syria's war: Calls for sanctions over chemical weapons
Russia questions evidence from independent inspectors who hold both government forces and ISIL responsible for attacks.
Calls have been made for sanctions against Syria following findings by a UN team that government forces twice used chemical weapons in the ongoing civil war.
The UN investigators also found evidence that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group used mustard gas at least once in the conflict.
However, the UN Security Council failed during a closed-door session on Tuesday to agree on any action, with Russia questioning the evidence from the independent commission.
Tuesday, August 30, 2016
Is the Iraqi army ready to liberate Mosul?
Iraq's prime minister says government forces and their allies will retake control of Mosul by the end of the year.
It has been an effective summer for Iraqi forces battling the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also known as ISIS) group.
Now they are fighting to retake Iraq's second biggest city, Mosul, which has been under ISIL control for more than two years.
The Iraqi army, Kurdish forces, Shia militias and the US air force are all converging on the city from different directions.
Iraqi soldiers re-took Qayara on Saturday. It is an oil-producing town about 70km south of Mosul and near a major airbase.
The Iraqi army had been fighting for control of Qayara for several weeks.
Now, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi says Mosul will be captured by the end of the year.
Six In The Morning Tuesday August 30
Apple facing back taxes running into billions over European commission ruling
Irish officials expect European commission to declare the arrangement with Apple unlawful under state aid rules
Apple could face back taxes running into billions with the European commissionexpected to rule against the company on Tuesday over its arrangements with the Irish government.
A ruling by Margrethe Vestager, the European competition commissioner, could make Apple liable for billions of euros. Irish officials expect the commission to declare the arrangements unlawful under state aid rules.
A decision against Apple and Ireland after a two-year investigation would rebuff US efforts to persuade the commission to drop its interest amid warnings about retaliation from Washington.
The commission has been investigating whether Apple’s tax deals with Ireland, which have allowed the company to pay very little tax on income earned throughout Europe, amounted to state aid.
Kim Jong-un executes two North Korea officials 'using anti-aircraft gun'
This story first appeared in the JoongAng Ilbo and cannot be verified
Senior official in education ministry arrested for dozing off during meeting before being killed
Heesu Lee and Sohee Kim
Two senior North Korean officials were executed with an anti-aircraft gun in early August on the orders of Kim Jong-un, South Korea’s JoongAng Ilbo newspaper reported, citing people it did not identify.
Ri Yong Jin, a senior official in the education ministry -- possibly minister -- was arrested for dozing off during a meeting with Kim and charged with corruption before being killed, the paper said. Former Agriculture Minister Hwang Min was purged over a proposed project seen as a direct challenge to Kim’s leadership, it said.
If true, it would mark the first executions ordered by Kim from outside his party or the military, the paper said. A spokesman at South Korea’s Unification Ministry said he couldn’t immediately confirm the JoongAng report.Italy's coastguard: 6,500 migrants rescued off Libyan coast in one day
The central Mediterranean route has witnessed a surge in migrants since the so-called Balkan route was closed. More than 3,000 migrants have died this year attempting the perilous journey.
The Italian coastguard on Monday said it coordinated the rescue of some 6,500 migrants off the coast of Libya, one of the largest single-day operations this year.
"The command center coordinated 40 rescue operations" that included vessels from the EU's border agency Frontex and humanitarian organizations, the coastguard said on its official Twitter account.
The central Mediterranean route has witnessed a surge in migrants making the perilous journey after the so-called Balkan route was effectively shuttered earlier this year.As trial ends, Brazil's president makes one last bid to shape the story
SURFACING MODES OF THOUGHT
Dilma Rousseff was suspended pending the outcome of her impeachment trial, which some see as democracy in action but others decry as an attempted coup.
MEXICO CITY — Brazil’s President Dilma Rousseff, who was suspended pending an impeachment trial, testified before the Senate Monday in her last defense before politicians vote on her permanent removal from office this week. The proceedings, which have officially been under way since April, have divided Brazilians. For some, this is a coup masquerading as democracy. But for others, it’s evidence of a robust democracy at work, holding the leftist leader, whose party has been in power for more than 13 years, responsible for what they see as bending the law to maintain control.
Ms. Rousseff is charged with breaking federal budget laws in an attempt to conceal Brazil’s economic troubles. She and her supporters contend that manipulating the budget is a common practice used by politicians at all levels of government in Brazil – including by her predecessors, former Presidents Fernando Henrique Cardoso and Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The woman who discovered India's first HIV cases
Thirty years ago, India discovered the dreaded HIV virus had reached its shores when blood samples from six sex workers tested positive. It was largely due to the efforts of one young scientist - but until now, her pioneering work has been all but forgotten.
When it was first suggested she screen people for HIV/Aids, Sellappan Nirmala balked.
It was at the end of 1985 and the 32-year-old microbiology student at the medical college in Chennai (Madras), was looking for a topic for her dissertation.
The idea came from her professor and mentor, Suniti Solomon. Formal tracking of Aids cases had begun in the United States in 1982 and the medical authorities in India didn't want to be caught napping if the disease reached India.
The Big Problem With The Trans-Pacific Partnership’s Super Court That We’re Not Talking About
Financiers will use it to bet on lawsuits, while taxpayers foot the bill.
A secretive super-court system called ISDS is threatening to blow up President Barack Obama’s highest foreign policy priority.
Investor-state dispute settlement — an integral part of the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal — allows companies to sue entire countries for costing them money when laws or regulations change. Cases are decided by extrajudicial tribunals composed of three corporate lawyers. Buzzfeed, in a multi-part investigation launched Sunday, called it “the court that rules the world.”
Although the ISDS process has existed for years, TPP would drastically expand it. The most common criticisms of the system are that it’s secret, that it’s dominated by unaccountable big-firm lawyers, and that global corporations use it to change sovereign laws and undermine regulations. That’s all true.
Monday, August 29, 2016
Hong Kong's Rooftop Rebels
Three friends sneak up the city's towering skyscrapers in an act of rebellion against the establishment.
Airin and her friends are rooftoppers in Hong Kong. They refuse to play by the rules and sneak to the top of the city’s soaring skyscrapers. But their high-rise antics are not just for thrills.
Two years after the pro-democracy "Umbrella Movement" was cleared from the streets, many young people are in a state of despair.
They are anxious about their futures - from unaffordable housing and wealth inequality to the growing influence of Mainland China.
Airin believes their defiant stunts can inspire others to stand up against powerful elites
Some Of The Best Whiskey In The World Is Made In Japan
The tiny distillery making Japan into a whisky superpower
Ichiro Akuto’s passion for making single malts that are ‘not necessarily easy to drink’ is winning global praiseToday, despite working out of modest premises with just two tiny pot stills in the hills of Chichibu, a town 100 km northwest of Tokyo, Akuto’s single malts are winning rave reviews from the global whisky cognoscenti.
Many are willing to pay hundreds of dollars - and in a few cases much more - for a bottle of single malt from what is Japan’s smallest distillery.
The Whisky Magazine, a British publication, has consistently given awards to Akuto’s firm, Venture Whisky, and its range of “Ichiro’s” single malts now rival those from the bigger and more established Japanese distillers Suntory and Nikka.
This year, Akuto won first prize in the Japanese single malt single class category at the World Whiskies Awards.
He launched Venture Whisky in 2008 and produced his first label – Ichiro’s Vintage Single Malt 1988 – the following year. Much of the rest of the inherited stock went into Venture’s award-winning “card” series, with each small batch labelled with the name of a playing card.
Some might schoff at the idea of the Japanese making award winning spirits, but take step back for a moment ask yourself this question: When the Japanese look at product like whiskey they don't consider how to keep it the same by following tradition. They ask how can that tradition be improved. That's how Akuto has looked at his distilleries methods of production.
If you get the chance to visit Venture Whiskey it's located in Saitama and can be reached by taking the Seibu-Ikebukuro line train from Ikebukuro to Chichibu. The limited express train takes about 87 minutes and costs ¥1,480 one way. The fare includes a seat fee.
Inside Fukushima's Time Bomb
Five years after Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster many residents are still living in a radioactive nightmare.
Bubbling streams, lush forests, cherry blossoms in full bloom – Japan's north is stunningly picturesque.
But nature's beauty hides a lethal secret – dangerous levels of radiation contaminate this area, fall-out from the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
Five years after the twin catastrophes of the tsunami and nuclear meltdown, villages sit silent and empty.
Thousands of workers still toil to clean up the radioactive material but it could be decades before their work is finished.
Six In The Morning Monday August 29
Duterte's crackdown: 6 stories from the front lines
Updated 0235 GMT (1035 HKT) August 29, 2016
Lifeless bodies lying on the streets of the Philippines are a visceral sign of new President Rodrigo Duterte's war on drugs.
So far more than 1,900 people have died. Of those more than 700 have been killed in police operations since Duterte took office in late June, according to police statistics. Many of the unsolved deaths are attributed to vigilantes.
Duterte's tough talk on the country's drug and crime problems won him the election and, 60 days on from his inauguration, he remains extremely popular.
"Double your efforts. Triple them, if need be. We will not stop until the last drug lord, the last financier, and the last pusher have surrendered or put behind bars -- or below the ground, if they so wish," he said in his July 25 State of the Nation speech.
Police snare 'China's Jack the Ripper' after 28-year search for killer – reports
Gao Chengyong, 52, a grocer from Gansu, has confessed to 11 murders after being caught thanks to DNA, says China Daily
Police believe they have captured a serial killer dubbed China’s “Jack the Ripper” for the way he mutilated several of his 11 female victims, state-run media have reported, nearly three decades after the first murder.
Gao Chengyong, 52, was detained at the grocery store he runs with his wife in Baiyin, in the north-west province of Gansu, the China Daily said.
The newspaper said he had confessed to 11 murders in Gansu and the neighbouring region of Inner Mongolia between 1988 and 2002, citing the ministry of public security.
Some 9,000 refugee children reported to have disappeared in Germany
Germany's federal police says the number of missing refugee children has doubled since the start of the year. Most of the children are aged between 14 and 17-years-old.
Germany's Federal Criminal Police Office (Bundeskriminalamt) has confirmed that by July 1, 8,991 unaccompanied refugee children and young people had been reported missing.
The figures, which were requested by the German daily "Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung," showed the number of migrants no longer in contact with authorities was already higher than for the whole of last year. The figure has doubled from January, when 4,749 refugees were known to be missing.
Although most of those who disappeared are teenagers, 867 of them are under 13-years-old.
The myth of 'martyrdom': How our state glorifies death
SULEMAN AKHTAR
Say Balochistan and the first thing that comes to the mind of an average middle-class Pakistani — who reads newspapers and watches news channels — is natural resources. Talk about KP and Fata, and it may very well end up in a discussion about the strategic importance of the region.
The discourse about terrorism is still all about the nefarious designs of an ambiguous enemy that is hell bent on destabilising the country. Such is the callous nature of the state narrative that the one thing that is missing from it is the only thing that matters the most: people.
The tragedy of our times is that people are not talking about themselves but things.
How North Korea’s merchant ships became a target for UN sanctions
PATH TO PROGRESS
A North Korea-flagged ship interdicted in Panama three years ago gave a glimpse into Pyongyang’s efforts to build up its military and nuclear capacity. Intelligence from the ship transformed how UN member nations are policing North Korea.
At a Cuban port in June 2013, the Chong Chon Gang took on secret cargo: some 240 tons of Soviet-era weapons.
Later, under the direction of diplomatic staff stationed in Cuba, the ship’s crew of 32 North Koreans layered thousands of bags of raw sugar over the weapons, concealing them from sight.
Many of the crew were employees of the state, according to a 2016 United Nations report, with salaries paid by a marine ministry in Pyongyang. They were tasked with smuggling home the load of arms by piloting the nearly 40-year-old merchant ship through the Panama Canal, where the ship’s officers had been instructed to declare only the sugar.
Libyan forces make final push to retake Sirte from ISIL
Dozens of fighters loyal to UN-backed government killed in clashes with ISIL as the "final battle for Sirte" begins.
Forces loyal to Libya's UN-backed government have pushed into the last areas of Sirte held by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) as they press a months-long offensive to retake the coastal city from the armed group's fighters.
Sunday's advance saw fighters loyal to the UN-backed Government of National Accord (GNA) "enter the last areas held by Daesh in Sirte: district number one and district number three", a government spokesman said, according to the AFP news agency. Daesh is an Arabic acronym for ISIL, which is also known as ISIS.
"The final battle for Sirte has started," Reda Issa said, adding that about 1,000 fighters allied with the GNA were taking part in the offensive.
Sunday, August 28, 2016
Trump's Tweets As An Early 2000s Emo Song
The song consists whiny of complaints about the media sent by Donald Trump via Twitter.
Omran Daqneesh and the limits of war photography
Why do some war images, like the one of Syrian boy Omran Daqneesh, resonate more than others? Plus, Ecuador's media law.
Images of the powerless
There is no shortage of disturbing images from the war in Syria. But relatively few of them reach you - because editors often deem them too graphic to publish or broadcast. Last week, images of five-year-old Omran Daqneesh travelled around the world and sparked outrage. But to what end? And for how long?
This week, we analyse the power and the limits of war imagery.
Talking us through the story are: Mahmoud Raslan, media activist/photographer; Susie Linfield, author of The Cruel Radiance, Photography and Political Violence; Oksana Boyko, RT; Patrick Baz, Middle East and North Africa photo editor, Agence France-Presse; and Craig Allen, journalist, The New York Times.
Six In The Morning Sunday August 28
Italy earthquake: Museums to donate Sunday revenue to quake relief
Sunday's proceeds from public museums across Italy will be dedicated to rebuilding work after the earthquake that killed 291 people on Wednesday.
Many churches and other medieval buildings were destroyed when the 6.2 magnitude quake struck Amatrice and other parts of the central region.
Amatrice's mayor said he wanted to restore his town to its former glory.
The country's prime minister and president both attended a funeral for 35 victims on Saturday.
Lingering after the service at a sports hall in the town of Ascoli Piceno, Prime Minister Matteo Renzi talked to some of the mourners.
"We will decide all together how to get going again," he told one young person. "But don't give up, that is crucial."
Thailand frees activist 'Da Torpedo' after eight years' jail for insulting monarchy
Daranee Charnchoengsilpakul, imprisoned after speech in 2008, receives royal pardon from remainder of sentence she received under strict lèse–majesté laws
Thailand has freed a political activist after eight years in jail for insulting the country’s widely revered monarchy under royal defamation laws.
Daranee Charnchoengsilpakul, also known as Da Torpedo, was freed on Saturday under an annual series of royal pardons, said Charnchao Chaiyanukij, permanent secretary of the justice ministry.
She was originally sentenced to 15 years in prison, he said.
Daranee, a key supporter of Thaksin Shinawatra, the ousted former prime minister, was convicted of making defamatory comments against the monarchy during a fiery speech at a political rally in 2008.
A criminal court found her guilty on three counts of lèse–majesté.
Black South African politician Andile Mngxitama calls for Mugabe-style ‘land grab’
Exclusive: Andile Mngxitama, the leader of the Black First Land First party has set out a list of demands that include ‘land expropriation without compensation’ as tensions rise following recent municipal elections
A black politician in South Africa has called for a revolution to end “white supremacy” of landownership with a “land grab” – a move similar to Robert Mugabe’s policy in Zimbabwe.
Andile Mngxitama, the leader of Black First Land First has set out a list of demands that include “land expropriation without compensation” and nationalisation of the mainly white-owned mines and banks. Whites own an estimated 80 per cent of farmland.
His call comes as tensions increase in South Africa following municipal elections at the start of this month, and as the pressure grows for the white-dominated Democratic Alliance to go into coalitions with the radical black Economic Freedom Fighters led by Julius Malema.
Syria à la Carte: Turkish Invasion Highlights Rapidly Shifting Alliances
By Maximilian Popp and Christoph ReuterThe Turkish advance into northern Syria marks a turning point in the Syrian conflict. Its nominal target was Islamic State, but with large powers reconsidering their alliances in the region, the Kurds stand to lose the most.
One common description of chaos theory holds that the flapping of a butterfly's wings can trigger a tornado. And it could very well be that the theory is the best tool we currently have available to describe the complex situation in Syria. The butterfly wings in this case was the late July decision by the Syrian regime to recruit new tribal militia fighters in a remote northeastern province. The tornado it triggered four weeks later was threefold: the invasion of northern Syria by the Turkish army; the sudden expulsion of Islamic State from the border town of Jarabulus; and the US military suddenly finding itself on both sides of a new front in Syria -- that between the Turks and the Kurds.
"It is 3:30 p.m. and we have almost reached the center of Jarabulus and have suffered almost no casualties. But we only just crossed the border this morning!" Saif Abu Bakr, a defected lieutenant and commander with the rebel group Hamza Division, sounded on Wednesday as though he couldn't believe what had just happened. "We set off with 20 Turkish tanks and 100 Turkish troops from Karkamis" -- the border town in Turkey -- "and headed through the villages west of the city and then on to Jarabulus."
War-weary Colombians react to peace deal with FARC rebels
By Paula Bravo Medina, CNN en Español
Many Colombians have known nothing but a time of conflict between the government and the guerrillas of FARC.
Now there is a promise of a time of peace, with a deal signed in Havana, Cuba, between officials and a leader of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) to end one of the world's longest-running conflicts, a 52-year war that has claimed 220,000 lives.
In the Colombian capital, Bogota, hundreds celebrated the agreement in a park. On social media, hashtags like #AdiosalaGuerra (farewell to war) and #PazenColombia (peace in Colombia) trended, but other users expressed their dismay.
Some agreed with opposition complaints that the Havana deal fell short.
Zero-days: Why these security flaws are so dangerous and expensive
Hackers hunt for them and governments around the world use them to carry out spy operations. What are zero-days and why are they increasingly valuable?
The National Security Agency practice of finding and hoarding zero-days – previously undiscovered security flaws in computer products – is generating a new wave of criticism from security researchers and tech companies.
That's because an unknown group calling itself the Shadow Brokers recently dumped a cache of hacking tools that contained several zero-days. Many experts and former agency employees have said the tools originated from the NSA.
Since several of the leaked tools target software bugs in security products widely used by American businesses, forcing at least two vendors to rush out fixes for affected products. The leak is also resurfacing long-standing questions about the wisdom of the NSA – and other defense and intelligence agencies – hoarding information on zero-day flaws.
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