Thursday, September 30, 2021
Gaza: 60-Minute Warning | Al Jazeera World
In May 2021, missiles from Israeli jets struck and completely demolished four towers in Gaza – that is a fact. What was not clear was the reason for the attacks. Why were these buildings selected for destruction?
Israel claimed the towers were used by Hamas, whose military wing was launching rocket attacks on Israeli towns and cities at the time. Local Palestinians in Gaza, as well as international media and political leaders, disputed this and maintained that the towers housed only businesses, residential apartments and media organisations, including Al Jazeera Media Network and American news agency The Associated Press.
Inside Japan's WORST Hotel Room
Japan's hotels are typically amongst the cleanest in the world. This one wasn't.
As Connor and I head off for a Wacky Weekend around Shikoku, we confront a terrifying bridge, a village inhabited by 350 scarecrows and the worst hotel room in Japan.
Is America in decline? | The Economist
America is reeling from a failed war in Afghanistan, political polarisation and increasing social division. Could the superpower be in decline?
Has India’s democracy suffered long-term damage in the pandemic?
India’s official death toll from the coronavirus pandemic is nearly half a million, second only to the United States. Many fear the actual figure is much higher. At the beginning of the year the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi vowed it had defeated the virus.
Six In The Morning Thursday 30 September 2021
Relatives of family killed in Kabul missile strike are seeking resettlement in America
Updated 0657 GMT (1457 HKT) September 30, 2021
Every day for the past month, Emal Ahmadi's 7-year-old daughter Hada has asked him the same thing: "Where is my sister?"
She misses playing with her younger sister Malika, he says. She cries a lot, wondering when she is coming home.
The tragic answer is that she won't return.
Malika died in a US drone strike in the courtyard of their family home in Afghanistan's capital on August 29, along with nine other relatives, six of them children.
The US military has since conceded it made a "tragic mistake," admitting that all of the 10 people killed were civilians -- and none were associated with terror group ISIS-K, as they initially claimed.
Top Republicans rub shoulders with extremists in secretive rightwing group, leak reveals
Wednesday, September 29, 2021
Is Parkinson's disease related to pesticide use?
Around the world, more and more people are developing Parkinson's disease. Many of those affected have chosen a supposedly healthy life among orchards or vineyards in the countryside. Is the disease related to the use of pesticides?
Life at 50°C: Extreme heat and Mexico’s struggle for water - BBC Newsnight
In the run up to the COP26 UN Summit, we’re exploring how people are adapting to rising global temperatures through our series Life at 50°C. What happens when the water dries up in Mexico?
Six In The Morning Wednesday 29 September 2021
Afghanistan is the world's opium king. Can the Taliban afford to kill off their 'un-Islamic' cash cow?
Updated 0426 GMT (1226 HKT) September 29, 2021
When the khaki-colored landscapes of Afghanistan are transformed by a patchwork of pink, white and purple each spring, farmers rejoice. Their cash crop of poppies is ready for harvesting.
Opium cultivation has long been a source of income for rural communities across the country, a land besieged by decades of war. But for the United States, those same colorful scenes symbolized the enemy.
"When I see a poppy field, I see it turning into money and then into IEDs [improvised explosive devices], AKs [assault rifles], and RPGs [rocket-propelled grenades]," said Gen. Dan McNeill, commander of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.
Fears grow for photojournalist arrested by Taliban as executions resume
Taliban deny Morteza Samadi, 21, has been sentenced to death but family concerned for his safety after he was detained while covering women’s protests in Herat
Fears are growing for a photojournalist who has been detained by the Taliban for more than three weeks after being arrested while covering the women’s protests in Herat.
Morteza Samadi, 21, a freelance photographer, was one of several journalists who were arrested at street protests at the beginning of September. All were quickly released except Morteza, whose whereabouts is not known. Some of those detained in Kabul have alleged they were badly beaten and tortured.
Fears for Morteza have grown after the bodies of executed convicts were put on public display in Herat’s main squares – a draconian practice brought back by the Taliban. A veteran leader of the Taliban, Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, said in an interview with Associated Press that the new government will be bringing back executions, as well as amputations as punishment for petty crimes.
Wary of China, US and EU forge alliance on technology
With Beijing on the rise as a tech superpower, Brussels and Washington want to close ranks. But divisions loom over the new "Trade and Technology Council" alliance — and previous efforts have a mixed track record.
The chip crisis turned dire when the coronavirus hit. As demand for electronics was skyrocketing in the spring of 2020, manufacturers warned they were running short of semiconductors — key components needed to make devices from smartphones to cars.
They had good reasons: In the following months, the shortage forced factories to shut down assembly lines. Tech companies postponed product launches. Computers were delivered months too late.
The first major massacre in the ‘Holocaust by bullets’: Babi Yar, 80 years on
On September 29 and 30, 1941, more than 33,000 people, mostly Jews, were executed in the Babi Yar ravine near the Ukrainian capital Kyiv – one of the largest mass murders in the Holocaust. FRANCE 24 looks back at this unspeakable event 80 years on, as plans are finally underway for an official museum honouring the victims’ memory.
“A policeman told me to undress and pushed me to the edge of the pit, where a group of people were awaiting their fate. Before the shooting started, I was so scared that I fell into the pit. I fell onto dead bodies. At first I didn’t understand a thing: where was I? How did I end up there? I thought I was going inside. The shooting went on; people were still falling. I came to my senses – and suddenly I understood everything. I could feel my arms, my legs, my stomach, my head. I wasn’t even injured. I was pretending to be dead. I was on top of dead people – and injured people. I could hear some people breathing; others were moaning in pain. Suddenly I heard a child screaming: ‘Mum!’ It sounded like my little daughter. I burst into tears.” Dina Pronicheva, one of the few survivors of the Babi Yar massacre, captured its horror when she gave testimony in the trial of fifteen German soldiers in Kyiv in 1946.
Romdhane named Tunisia’s first female PM by President Saied
President Kais Saied appoints Najla Bouden Romdhane as the new prime minister, nearly two months after his power grab.
Tunisian President Kais Saied has named Najla Bouden Romdhane, a little-known university engineer who worked with the World Bank, as the country’s first female prime minister, nearly two months after he seized most powers in a move his foes call a coup.
Romdhane will take office at a time of national crisis, with the democratic gains won in a 2011 revolution in doubt and as a major threat looms over public finances.
North Korea says it fired new 'hypersonic missile'
North Korea has claimed that it successfully tested a new hypersonic missile called Hwasong-8 on Tuesday.
State media said the new missile was one of the "five most important" new weapons systems laid out in its five-year military development plan.
They called the missile a "strategic weapon", which usually means it has nuclear capabilities.
Tuesday's launch is another indication of Pyongyang's growing weapons technology amid strict sanctions.
Tuesday, September 28, 2021
A train ride into Japan's past
Kyushu is said to be the wellspring of Japanese civilization. Yet few tourists visit the southernmost of Japan's main islands. This documentary contrasts modern Japanese cities with traditional customs in the countryside.
Female Afghan judges hunted by the murderers they convicted
More than 220 female Afghan judges are in hiding due to fear of retribution under Taliban rule. Most have passed judgement in cases involving violence against women. The men they sent to prison in the past are now threatening to kill them.
Chinese power cuts force factory closures
A power crunch in some parts of China has shut down factories and left households without electricity. The shortages come as coal prices rise and in some cases because of efforts to meet official energy use targets.
Six In The Morning Wednesday 28 September 2021
China's growing power crunch threatens more global supply chain chaos
Updated 1457 GMT (2257 HKT) September 28, 2021
A growing power supply crunch in China is triggering blackouts for households and forcing factories to cut production, threatening to slow the country's vast economy and place even more strain on global supply chains.
Companies in the country's industrial heartlands have been told to limit their energy consumption in order to reduce demand for power, state media has reported. And supply has been cut to some homes, reportedly even trapping people in elevators.
An "unexpected and unprecedented" power cut hit three northeastern provinces on Monday, according to the Global Times, a state-run tabloid. The newspaper reported Tuesday that power rationing in Heilongjiang, Jilin and Liaoning provinces has "resulted in major disruptions to the daily lives of people and business operations."
‘Blah, blah, blah’: Greta Thunberg lambasts leaders over climate crisis
Exclusive: Activist says there are many fine words but the science does not lie – CO2 emissions are still rising
Damian Carrington Environment editor
Greta Thunberg has excoriated global leaders over their promises to address the climate emergency, dismissing them as “blah, blah, blah”.
She quoted statements by Boris Johnson: “This is not some expensive, politically correct, green act of bunny hugging”, and Narendra Modi: “Fighting climate change calls for innovation, cooperation and willpower” but said the science did not lie.
Carbon emissions are on track to rise by 16% by 2030, according to the UN, rather than fall by half, which is the cut needed to keep global heating under the internationally agreed limit of 1.5C.
'Negligence' by WHO staff to blame for sexual abuse in DRC, independent commission says
Independent investigators mandated by the World Health Organization (WHO) to probe allegations of sexual abuse by its staff in the DR Congo cited “clear structural failures” and “individual negligence” in a report released Tuesday.
The abuses were committed by personnel hired locally as well as members of international teams in the country to fight an Ebola outbreak from 2018 to 2020.
The commission interviewed dozens of women who were offered work in exchange for sex, or who were victims of rape.
Lebanon: Hezbollah seeks to deflect anger through fuel patronage
Analysts say the Iran-backed party’s expanding patronage aims to boost its popularity amid Lebanon’s energy crisis.
28 Sep 2021
When the first convoy of Hezbollah-brokered Iranian diesel fuel arrived in Lebanon earlier this month, it was met with a mixed reaction.
While some feared that the Iran-backed party would use it to further assert its dominance, others welcomed the fuel as a temporary relief in the middle of a crippling energy crisis. And for Hezbollah’s supporters, it was hailed as a victory.
On September 16, convoys of trucks crossed the Syrian border into the cash-strapped country and across its eastern province towards Baalbek. Along the way, municipalities affiliated with Hezbollah displayed banners with photos of the Iran-backed group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah, alongside his trusted allies Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
Tokyo protests S Korean court order to sell assets for WWII compensation
A South Korean court has issued an unprecedented order for assets seized from Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries to be sold to compensate World War II forced laborers, prompting Tokyo to protest on Tuesday.
Japan and South Korea are both democracies, market economies and U.S. allies, but their relationship has been strained for decades over Tokyo's brutal 1910-45 colonial rule of the Korean peninsula.
Around 780,000 Koreans were conscripted into forced labor by Japan during the 35-year occupation, according to data from Seoul, not including women forced into sexual slavery by Japanese troops.
Female Afghan judges hunted by the murderers they convicted
By Claire Press
BBC World Service
They were the trailblazers of women's rights in Afghanistan. They were the staunch defenders of the law, seeking justice for their country's most marginalised. But now, more than 220 female Afghan judges are in hiding due to fear of retribution under Taliban rule. Six former female judges spoke to the BBC from secret locations across Afghanistan. All of their names have been changed for their safety.
Throughout her career as a judge, Masooma has convicted hundreds of men for violence against women, including rape, murder and torture.
But just days after the Taliban took control of her city and thousands of convicted criminals were released from prison, the death threats began.
Text messages, voice notes and unknown numbers began bombarding her phone.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)