MBS 'clampdown' fuels surge in numbers of Saudi refugees
Updated 0342 GMT (1142 HKT) February 3, 2019
Dawn was breaking in Sydney when Nourah's phone rang. "I need you to help me. I need you to speak to people on my behalf," the 20-year-old Saudi asylum-seeker recalled the caller saying.
The woman -- a Saudi teen who identified herself as Rahaf al-Qunun -- explained to Nourah that her passport had been confiscated at a Bangkok airport, and Thai authorities were threatening to deport her. Qunun's story captured international attention last month with her impassioned Twitter plea for asylum.
While Qunun barricaded herself in an airport hotel room to prevent her deportation, Nourah -- who declined to reveal her full name for security reasons -- was pacing up and down a public park in Sydney, making calls to Western news outlets. She had never met Qunun, but Nourah had recently also fled Saudi Arabia. She didn't need to know who Qunun was, she said, to understand the urgency of her situation. Within days, Qunun was granted asylum in Canada.
'Divide and conquer': China puts the pressure on US allies
Criticism of Canada’s case against Meng Wanzhou seen as part of attempt to isolate US
Lily Kuo
As tensions between China and the US mount over trade and the extradition of a senior Huawei executive, Beijing has reserved its most colourful language for America’s allies.
On Tuesday, China’s ministry of foreign affairs called on Canada to “stop pulling chestnuts out of the fire for the US” after the unsealing of a 13-count indictment against the Huawei chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, who was arrested in Canada in December. An editorial in the state-run Global Times put it more bluntly: “You cannot live the life of a whore and expect a monument to your chastity … If Canada insists on wrong practice, it must pay for it.”
Iran unveils new cruise missile with 800-mile range to mark revolution's 40th anniversary
Weapon 'needs a very short time for its preparedness and can fly at a low altitude', claims defence ministerAgencies
Iran has unveiled a new cruise missile with a range of 800 miles (1,300km), state television reported, as the Middle Eastern country displays its achievements during celebrations marking the 40th anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution
"With a range of more than 1,300 km ... this cruise missile needs a very short time for its preparedness and can fly at a low altitude," Iranian defence minister, Amir Hatami, said in remarks carried by state television during the unveiling ceremony.
Mr Hatami said the new surface-to-surface missile, named Hoveizeh, was from the Soumar family of cruise missiles, which were unveiled in 2015.
For Egypt’s Copts, always another fire around the corner
by Elle Kurancid
CAIRO — ‘When there is humanity,’ reflects Egyptian photojournalist Roger Anis, last November, ‘you forget about politics, religions, divisions — about everything.’
Perhaps, for you too, that sentiment evokes the enduring message of the 1955 Bertrand Russell–Albert Einstein Manifesto, which, in the shadow of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and on the precipice of a merciless US-led death spiral in Vietnam, called for the elimination of nuclear weapons and war altogether. ‘We appeal, as human beings, to human beings,’ its signatories urged: ‘Remember your humanity and forget the rest.’
Venezuela crisis: Rival protests held in Caracas
Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets of Venezuela's capital Caracas in support of President Nicolás Maduro - and his self-proclaimed interim successor Juan Guaidó.
Mr Guaidó said the country's opposition movement would "carry on in the streets". Mr Maduro told supporters he was the only president of Venezuela.
Mr Guaidó declared himself president last month and is backed by the US and several Latin American countries.
Russia and China back President Maduro.
“‘VICIOUS’ AND ‘BRUTAL'” — LIFE INSIDE A FREEZING FEDERAL PRISON WITH NO HEAT
ON SATURDAY MORNING, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., arrived at the Metropolitan Detention Center in New York City to demand answers.
Hundreds of people incarcerated at the federal detention facility in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn have been living without heat, light, telephone access, and lawyers for the past week, as the region endured arctic temperatures. After touring the facility with other elected officials, Nadler, the newly seated chair of the House Judiciary Committee, which oversees the Federal Bureau of Prisons, said what he found was disturbing.
“There’s a total lack of urgency or concern on the part of the prison administration with respect to getting the heat and the hot water, getting the services we need,” he said on the steps of the detention facility after his visit. Several hundred people, many of whom have family members inside, had gathered in protest outside the facility. While some cells did have heat, others were extremely cold, Nadler said, and all were without power.
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