Drought gives rebirth to Iraqi Kurd village

Issued on: 05/11/2021 - 

An aerial view shows the ruins of the submerged Iraqi Kurdish village of Guiri Qasrouka which have reappeared during a drought 

Ismael ADNAN AFP

Dohuk (Iraq) (AFP) – The ruins of an Iraqi Kurdish village abandoned 36 years ago and submerged under the waters of a dam, have suddenly resurfaced thanks to sinking water levels in the drought-hit country.

The construction of the dam, two kilometres (one mile) north of the town of Dohuk, started in 1985 and prompted the resettlement of Guiri Qasrouka's 50 families.

Guiri Qasrouka was then swallowed by the waters which serve to irrigate surrounding farmland.

"Because of the drought" caused by scant rainfall in Iraq, the Dohuk dam's water level dropped by seven metres (23 feet) in September and brought the village back to the surface, explained the dam's director, Farhad Taher.

"This phenomenon is certainly linked to climate change," Taher said, adding that the ruins had also reappeared in 2009, 1999 and 1992.


People visit the remains of the village, which has also reappeared three times previously when surrounding dam waters dropped sharply Ismael ADNAN AFP

Before the winter rains set in and the village goes under again, visitors on foot can now view the stone walls of a Guiri Qasrouka home that is still standing.

The algae-splattered and shell-indented ruins are set against a backdrop of the towering Kurdish mountains of northern Iraq.

With financial compensation, villagers, who had also fled between 1974 and 1976 during a Kurdish uprising, built a new Guiri Qasrouka nearby.

© 2021 AFP

Ethiopia's wartime emergency decree sets capital on edge

Robbie COREY-BOULET
Fri, 5 November 2021, 

Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, winner of the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, sent troops to topple the TPLF last November, a move he said came in response to TPLF attacks on army camps 

(AFP/Yasuyoshi CHIBA)

Conflict in Ethiopia (AFP/Gal ROMA)




Candles and flags: A memorial service for victims of the Tigray conflict, organised by Addis Ababa's city administration on Wednesday (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)



Front page: The government declared a state of emergency on Tuesday (AFP/EDUARDO SOTERAS)

All week, Bisrat's phone has been buzzing with news of fellow Tigrayans caught up in a fresh round of mass arrests linked to Ethiopia's year-long war.

Police first arrested his former business partner from a shop in central Addis Ababa, then detained his uncle and brother-in-law in house-to-house searches.

Lawyers say they are among thousands of Tigrayans taken into custody since Tuesday, when Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed's government announced a state of emergency it said would protect citizens from Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF) rebels.

The measure -- blasted by rights groups as repressive -- has ratcheted up tensions, especially for Tigrayans, as the TPLF and its allies threaten to march on the capital.

Hoping to avoid their fate, Bisrat has deleted Tigrinya-language songs and pictures of the Tigray region's flag from his phone, and he only speaks Amharic in public.

"It's like we don't have air to breathe," he told AFP.

- Weapons searches -

Abiy's cabinet unveiled the six-month state of emergency after the TPLF claimed control of two key cities about 400 kilometres (250 miles) north of Addis Ababa.

The following day the group said it moved even further south to Kemissie, where it said it was working alongside the Oromo Liberation Army rebel group, which has predicted the capital could fall in a matter of weeks.

Abiy's government Thursday painted an entirely different picture of the current battlefield dynamic, saying the TPLF was "encircled" and close to defeat.

There were few signs of widespread panic in Addis Ababa, though security forces appear to be on edge, conducting extensive searches city-wide.

More than 100 city police officers swarmed one upscale apartment building in central Addis Ababa Friday morning, demanding to inspect tenants' identification documents and search every room for weapons.

Kenea Yadeta, head of the city's security bureau, this week directed residents to organise to defend their neighbourhoods.

The city administration has announced all firearms must be registered, a process that will continue through at least Saturday.

Outside one police station Thursday, an AFP journalist saw dozens of people -- many of whom appeared to be private security guards -- queueing to register Kalashnikovs.

- Amnesty cries foul -

Amnesty International warned Friday that calls for civilians to take up arms -- in Addis Ababa and beyond -- could fuel further abuses.

It also denounced the new emergency measures, which allow for anyone suspected of supporting "terrorist groups" to be searched and held without a warrant.

They also permit authorities to conscript "any military-age citizen who has weapons" and suspend media outlets and NGOs accused of supporting the rebels.

"The sweeping nature of this state of emergency is a blueprint for escalating human rights violations, including arbitrary detention, particularly of human rights defenders, journalists, minorities and government critics," said Amnesty East Africa director Deprose Muchena.

"And it puts detainees at heightened risk of torture and other ill-treatment."

The war in northern Ethiopia has already killed thousands, driven hundreds of thousands into famine-like conditions and given rise to gruesome massacres.

Abiy, winner of the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, sent troops to topple the TPLF last November, a move he said came in response to TPLF attacks on army camps.

He promised a swift victory, yet by late June the TPLF had regrouped to reclaim most of the region, then pressed offensives into the neighbouring Amhara and Afar regions.

- Rising fear -

Much of northern Ethiopia is under a communications blackout and access for journalists is restricted, making it difficult to assess exactly how close the rebels might be to the city.

Nevertheless the US and UK this week urged citizens to reconsider travel to Ethiopia, and the US embassy in Addis Ababa has authorised the voluntary departure of most staff and their families.

Tigrayans told AFP they were increasingly worried about their safety and the possibility that friends and neighbours might denounce them to security forces merely because of their ethnicity.

Abiy's government has long said security forces are only going after TPLF members and supporters.

But Bisrat, who told AFP he personally knows 15 people detained this week, voiced alarm about online hate speech and a general impression that all Tigrayans are suspects.

He recalled riding in a share-taxi this week and hearing another passenger brag loudly into his phone about reporting Tigrayan neighbours to the police, saying they were then "captured".

"He was happy when he said that," Bisrat said. "He was laughing."

rcb/np/yad

NASA Rover Has Found Previously Unknown Organic Molecules on Mars

Curiosity on Mars. (NASA/JPL-Caltech)

SPACE
CARLY CASSELLA
5 NOVEMBER 2021

Using a new on-board experiment, NASA's Curiosity rover has discovered traces of previously undetected organic molecules on Mars.

None of the organic molecules identified in the sand hold unequivocal signs of life, but they do suggest the new technique, which didn't require the rover to drill, is an effective tool when it comes to searching for evidence of carbon-based molecules, which are important building blocks for life as we know it.

The wet-lab experiment came about after Curiosity hit a figurative bump in the road while looking for signs of life on the red planet at the close of 2016.

Just as the rover was preparing to sample the Martian rock at the base of Mt Sharp, its drill suddenly stopped working.

Instead of putting a break on the mission until the issue could be fixed, researchers at NASA simply changed gears.

Rather than pulverizing rock samples into powder, a bit of loose sand that had already been scooped up on Ogunquit Beach was introduced into Curiosity's 'wet chemistry lab'.

This on-board laboratory includes just nine cups of solvent, which can only be used once each, so researchers have to be really picky about which samples they ultimately choose.

Organic compounds within Martian rock are super challenging to detect, because once they are heated, they break up into simpler molecules.

If these organic compounds, however, react with other chemicals first, they are more likely to enter a gas chromatograph and mass spectrometer for analysis without breaking down. Hence, Curiosity's nine cups of solvent.

It's a cleverly designed system that enables us to quickly analyze soil on Mars from the comfort of our own planet. Yet in late 2016, it had never been put to the test.

The team at NASA didn't expect the sand from Ogunquit to be organic rich, but they weren't sure they could keep drilling on the planet going forward, so it was worth a try.

Breaking the first seal for the Ogunquit sand, researchers found several organic compounds including ammonia and benzoic acid. Some of the organic compounds had never been identified on Mars before.

Now, a couple of years later, the results have been peer-reviewed and published.

As mentioned above, the presence of these organic molecules don't definitively mean there was once life on Mars, and no amino-acid derivatives were detected in the sample.

But what's exciting is that this new technique can now be used to look for signs of life, even when without the ability to drill.

"This derivatization experiment on Mars has expanded the inventory of molecules present in Martian samples and demonstrated a powerful tool to further enable the search for polar organic molecules of biotic or prebiotic relevance," wrote the NASA research team, led by astrobiologist Maëva Millan from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and Georgetown University.

In the end, it took over a year before engineers on Earth were able to fix Curiosity's drill and get it back in action, but by then, we knew the wet chemistry cups could work.

By 2019, the second cup was ready to be used for a sample of clay-bearing rock from further up Mt Sharp. Other analyses are soon to follow, not only on Mars but also on Earth.

NASA plans on conducting a mission in the 2030s to collect the rest of Curiosity's samples, so that they can be more carefully analyzed back on our own planet.

The study was published in Nature Astronomy.

Australia’s Great Barrier Reef will survive if warming kept to 1.5°C

Reuters / 10:52 AM November 05, 2021

FILE PHOTO: Coral surrounds two small islands on the Great Barrier Reef, located off the coast of Queensland, near the town of Rockhampton, in Australia, November 15, 2018. REUTERS/David Gray

SYDNEY — A study released on Friday by an Australian university looking at multiple catastrophes hitting the Great Barrier Reef has found for the first time that only 2% of its area has escaped bleaching since 1998, then the world’s hottest year on record.

If global warming is kept to 1.5 degrees [Celsius], the maximum rise in average global temperature that was the focus of the COP26 United Nations climate conference, the mix of corals on the Great Barrier Reef will change but it could still thrive, said the study’s lead author Professor Terry Hughes, of the Australian Research Council’s Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies.

“If we can hold global warming to 1.5°C global average warming then I think we’ll still have a vibrant Great Barrier Reef,” he said.

Bleaching is a stress response by overheated corals during heat waves, where they lose their color and many struggle to survive. Eighty percent of the World Heritage-listed wonder has been bleached severely at least once since 2016, the study by James Cook University in Australia’s Queensland state found.

“Even the most remote, most pristine parts of the Great Barrier Reef have now bleached severely at least once,” Hughes said.

The study found the corals adapted to have a higher heat threshold if they had survived a previous bleaching event, but the gap between bleaching events has shrunk, giving the reefs less time to recover between each episode.

Australia, which last week said it would not back a pledge led by the United States and the European Union to cut methane emissions, needs to do more to cut greenhouse gas emissions, Hughes said.

“The government is still issuing permits for new coal mines and for new methane gas deals and it’s simply irresponsible in terms of Australia’s responsibilities to the Great Barrier Reef,” he said.

The Great Barrier Reef is comprised of more than 3,000 individual reefs stretching for 2,300km (1,429 miles). The ecosystem supports 65,000 jobs in reef tourism. Globally, hundreds of millions of people depend on the survival of coral reefs for their livelihoods and food security.

“If we go to 3, 4 degrees [Celsius] of global average warming which is tragically the trajectory we are currently on, then there won’t be much left of the Great Barrier Reef or any other coral reefs throughout the tropics,” Hughes told Reuters.

People Are Sharing The Moment They Realized They Had To Quit Their Job, And It's Incredibly Eye-Opening

Wed, November 3, 2021,

One of the silver linings of the pandemic is that it gave everyone more time on their hands to think and possibly figure out what really makes them happy in life.
For some, that included quitting their jobs to find something else more fulfilling and rewarding.


It was reported that 4.3 million Americans quit their jobs in August — and that's not including the record-high number of people who also gave their two-week notice to their employers in the spring and early summer of this year. It's been called "The Great Resignation."Hxyume / Getty Images/iStockphoto / Via Getty ImagesMore
Hearing these numbers sparked our curiosity, so we turned to the BuzzFeed Community and asked them to explain what prompted them to quit their jobs within the last year or two —and what they are doing now instead. Here are their stories.

1."I have changed jobs twice during the pandemic. The first was being planned before the pandemic started because I was getting no opportunity for career growth, but the second I only stayed in for nine months."




"My boss was a monster and the highest-ranked leader for our market. He consistently berated people for having any responsibility outside of work and did not understand why anyone would be unwilling to work 60–80 hours a week. I switched careers and am now extremely happy and working for a company who puts culture above all else, plus I was able to get a small raise in the process."

—jessiem11Ljubaphoto / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
2."I left my job as a high school math teacher in December 2020. I had been teaching for five years in an inner city school and was already struggling with stress and anxiety."

"When I began teaching over Zoom, I reached my breaking point. I’m sure other teachers can relate to the immense workload we were given with very little resources. It was beyond exhausting.

"The environment in my school had always been toxic, but the pandemic really pushed it over the edge. I now work for a publishing company as a math editor. I use all the same skills I learned while teaching, but I now apply it to designing curriculum instead of teaching it. Leaving teaching was 100% the best decision I’ve ever made. I’m so much happier and healthier now. Not to mention, my benefits are way better."

—abat123
3."I worked at a popular grocery chain, Publix, here in Florida for nine years. When the pandemic hit and the customer service industry turned into utter madness — panic buying, rude customers, corporate management’s lack of concern for their associates' safety and well-being (written up and reprimanded for calling out sick) — I made the decision to leave customer service behind. It was the best decision I could have made for myself."




"I now work for a medical cannabis company and I couldn’t be happier or more stress-free. The pandemic may be horrible in many ways, but it did give me the push I needed to get out of a thankless and dead-end career."

—lummis7Jeff Greenberg / Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
4."I was in the healthcare field, not front lines but still coming into contact with patients every day. The amount of abuse we had to take from patients because the new owners of the company didn't think COVID was a big deal or didn't want us to lose patients by telling them to put on a mask was not worth it."

"My company tried to give me a raise to stay. That's when I found out they had been underpaying me the two years I worked for them. No thanks. Now, I work in telecommunications. I get to sit at home and work from a laptop. I will never work with the general public again."

—dc5216_52
5."I had been stuck in a hospitality job for years in a very toxic workplace."




"When we shut down for COVID, it was the kick I needed to say ‘I’m never coming back.' I enrolled in school to get my bachelor's in archaeology, and I absolutely love the challenge and the prospect of a more stimulating career (with less asshole customers and colleagues!)."

—ashapeckKemal Yildirim / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
6."I left my job because I had a baby and even though people were working remotely, my company was pretty rigid and wouldn’t work with me to work out a way I could cut back hours or go part-time."

"I left and started my own practice, and have never looked back! Best thing I have ever done."

—beedas89
7."I was a preschool teacher. I left after they cut my full-time hours down to only three hours a day."




"I decided to take a leave because I had a 30-minute commute with two kids. I already wasn’t seeing my own kids all day. It just wasn’t worth it anymore. After being home for about four months, I began nannying for two families I knew from work and did so for almost a year. In August, I returned to work as a Montessori school assistant. I’m thrilled to be doing something new and learning a new way to be a teacher."

—kdotpopOscar Wong / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
8."I'm a former nursing home employee in charge of activities. I was thinking about leaving in the spring and summer of 2021, but the deal breaker was finding out a PRN coworker was making more than me."

"I was at that place for more than a year before this coworker started. I'm making more money now. The job I have is a lot less stressful and a lot more fun."

—steph44
9."I quit my job when I realized I was replaceable. I always felt like I was a valuable asset to my company, so I worked too hard and chained myself to my desk."




"I thought I was being rewarded for the 60-hour work weeks, but I was actually being taken advantage of. I started waking up with anxiety about my job, going to bed thinking about my job, only talking to friends and family about my job. It wasn't healthy. So I quit. And the company replaced me. I do the same thing now, but I set boundaries and my workload is 100 times more manageable."

—shannonodowdStefan Tomic / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
10."I worked in management in a client-facing role in social care for 15 years. It was hard and thankless, and after being made to work a week in a home full of COVID-positive people, I decided to leave."

"The stress and anxiety about my own safety was crippling and something I still struggle with now. I have since begun working in social work coordination and childhood sexual trauma. I work from home and I am so much happier, more productive, and developing my career further. If you go home at the end of the day wondering if anyone is grateful that you showed up, stop showing up!"

—annleonard2004
11."I was a senior veterinary nurse at the start of the pandemic and became an EMT to help the healthcare system. I was good at my previous job, but I was overworked and underpaid in a heartbreaking job."

"By becoming an EMT, I felt like I was doing SOMETHING to help with the pandemic. Now I'm making more (still under $15/hr) and have less daily stress. I'm debating upgrading to paramedic for the money. I don't take extra shifts and don't answer work calls on my day off. The pandemic has shown me that nothing is more important than my husband and our home together. It's sad that it took all of this to finally break me free of being a workaholic martyr."

—lilatrainor101114Xavierarnau / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
12."I left my government job because I realized I couldn’t sit at a desk, staring at a computer screen all day, for the next 40 years of my life."

"So I’ve gone back to school to retrain as an occupational therapist. I’ll be making a real difference in people’s lives. My advice to anyone thinking about it? Do it."

—lp244
13."I left my job as the general manager of a popular vegan restaurant in my city. We didn’t close a single day (other than Christmas) once the pandemic hit. We were short staffed, overworked, and expectations weren’t adjusted to match the climate we were in."




"I ended up being diagnosed with a disorder that I don’t think would have shown itself if it weren’t for the stress I was under. The last straw was when they tried to write me up for not going in on my one day off after having already worked 60+ hours that week. I called them out on it since they advocate for work-life balance and being about its people. I was leaving regardless, but they paid me out so I wouldn’t take it to any labor authorities.

"Silver lining: I used that money to get my personal training certification, which I had thought about doing for over a decade. I finally did it and got an awesome job at my favorite gym and feel like an entirely different (and happy) person."

—trainerjamzLourdes Balduque / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
14."I was working in retail when the pandemic hit. My breaking point was when I came in and found out a coworker had called out. I was expected to run and close my department by myself with no one to cover my breaks."

"Which is illegal in my state, by the way. There was somebody who could have been sent over to help me that day, but management refused and basically said I was on my own. I couldn’t stop crying and having panic attacks for about five hours. Then when it came time for my lunch, I just said fuck it, left and never looked back. That was four months ago. Best decision I ever made.

I work in healthcare now, the environment isn’t toxic, and I haven’t had a work-related panic attack since."

—lexie27
15."I had been in child care for five years and was even getting my degree in early learning and child care."



"Once the pandemic hit, I changed daycares. But in the end — with the pandemic and awful management not understanding the risks, and two mental health leaves — I quit it completely. I now work at a dog groomer, and I am so happy."

—genny_kellingtonSouth_agency / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
16."I worked for an apartment management company for five years. During the pandemic, we were given no support at all, no real WFH options, and constant exposure to college kids who refused to wear masks."

"We also did not get hazard pay. I was already miserable, but that was my final straw. I left for a job in a completely different field and have not looked back! I will never work for an employer who doesn’t treat me with basic human dignity again."

—josephineh429d0909f
17."I worked in restaurants/bars for more than 10 years. The pandemic closed my restaurant and it finally gave me a reason to never look back."




"I missed a lot of family events and catching up with friends working opposite schedules, and I have never felt more free — plus, I love my job! I never thought I’d have the heart to quit bartending, but when it closed, it gave me all the reason to start applying to other jobs. Now, I bartend weddings as a side gig on my schedule when I want to."

—kelseymsWillie B. Thomas / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
18."I had worked for a company providing services to families of children with autism for five years. During the pandemic, the workplace culture kept getting more and more toxic."

"When I tried to mention my concerns to my boss and ideas to help, it was ignored. Now, I work for a county ISD supporting children with behavioral challenges. I feel appreciated again."

—emilytheil
19."I worked at a childcare center for three years, splitting my shift between childcare and reception/admin work."




"I was about to receive an offer from my dream job doing admin work for a synagogue when the pandemic hit and they had to withhold the offer because they were no longer going to be able to finance my salary there. So I stayed at the childcare center, but it inspired me to start looking elsewhere. The poor pay, the extra responsibilities I was expected to take on with no increase in pay, the long, hard days with the kids, the exposure risks — it all made it very hard to stay.

"I left a year ago and am now working at a clothing manufacturer for way more money than I ever made working with the kids. And as part of my job, I've made thousands upon thousands of face masks that are helping keep people safe out there, which is extremely gratifying."

—emilys197Alistair Berg / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
20."I left my job as a preschool teaching assistant because no one took COVID seriously there."

"It was before the vaccine had come out, and masks weren’t required. The last straw was when my boss said she was having her wedding with more than 100 people at her house and planned to come to work the next day. I quit the next week. Now, I work as a special education paraprofessional at a school that actually takes COVID seriously, which is a breath of fresh air."

—alyssamalecha
21."I was a manager in charge of three employees. The company kept selling assets and eventually a new CEO was brought in and decided to cut all departments by 35%."




"My entire team was let go and it was expected for me to do all the work myself with no raise. I left two weeks later for a similar job in a lower level analyst position while getting paid $25K more annually."

—alyciad424eeb346Peopleimages / Getty Images / Via Getty ImagesMore
22."I left my job of 10 years because I was tired of the retail industry."

"Tired of being so busy around the holidays, I would dread them instead of enjoying them. I found a similar job at a company in a completely different industry and have been much happier. I’m actually looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas."

—maryszczapa

Note: Submissions have been edited for length and clarity.
Did you leave your job during the pandemic? If so, what are you up to now? What advice do you have for others who might want to make a similar move? Tell us in the comments below.

French hotel industry ‘on its knees’ due to staff shortage, CEO says

Issued on: 05/11/2021 - 

Text by:NEWS WIRES

The French hotel industry is on its knees, the head of the hotel group Accor said Friday, as it cannot afford to raise wages and is having trouble recruiting enough staff to handle the recovery as tourists return.

Sebastien Bazin, head of the world’s sixth-largest hotel group, said on French radio station RMC that Accor currently lacks at least 2,000 employees in France as the tourism market there begins to recover and foreign visitors trickle back, but still remains deeply below pre-pandemic levels.

He said many employees had not returned “because they thought about things during the lockdown, because they moved, changed professions, were no longer willing to accept the sacrifice of the working hours.”

The hospitality industry in numerous countries has complained of difficulty rehiring staff and some employers are trying to lure workers with higher wages.

But Bazin said that was only part of the problem.

“If I have to pay more, will that be sufficient? No. Am I capable of doing that? No. That’s the problem.”

Bazin urged the government to lower social charges on new hires to help the sector return to full activity.

“The entire hotel industry is on its knees,” he said and needs to be able to welcome returning tourists to survive.

Bazin also said the industry has to look at how it can change to make its jobs more attractive, particularly in terms of inconvenient working hours, noting that it has trouble recruiting despite full training programmes.

Accor groups luxury brands like Raffles and Sofitel, to premium Pullman and budget Ibis and F1 hotels. It employs 260,000 people in 110 countries at 5,200 hotels.

(AFP)

French bishops recognise church 'responsibility' for child abuse

French bishops acknowledged that the church allowed abuses to become 'systemic' Valentine CHAPUIS AFP

Issued on: 05/11/2021 - 

Paris (AFP) – French bishops said on Friday they accepted that the Catholic church bore an "institutional responsibility" in the many thousands of child abuse cases documented in a shock report, an admission many abuse victims had been pushing for.

The Bishops Conference at its annual meeting also recognised that the church was guilty of allowing the abuses to become "systemic", conference president Eric de Moulins-Beaufort said, a month after the report detailed the abuse of 216,000 minors over seven decades.

"This responsibility implies a duty to provide justice and reparation," the archbishop said following a vote by the bishops.

On October 5, an independent commission examining abuses between 1950 and 2020, called them a "massive phenomenon" that had been covered up for decades by a "veil of silence".

The nearly 2,500-page report found that the "vast majority" of victims were pre-adolescent boys from a variety of social backgrounds.

De Moulins-Beaufort at the time expressed his "shame and horror" at the findings, while Pope Francis said he felt "great sorrow".

In March, the bishops had already announced that the church stood ready to "accept its responsibility by asking forgiveness for these crimes and these shortcomings".

But on Friday de Moulins-Beaufort said the church was now doing so "in a stronger, clearer and more categorical manner".

Although their annual meeting was not entirely dedicated to the response to the report, the 120 bishops from across France have devoted much of their ongoing week-long meeting to "the fight against violence and sexual aggression directed at minors".

Victims of abuse, and the authors of the report, had called on the bishops to admit that, beyond the guilt of individual attackers, the church itself had been at fault as an institution.

Abuse victims had been invited to join the meeting, but many declined, denouncing the decision to make the sexual abuse scandal just one of several topics -- rather than the sole issue on the agenda.

The bishops will spend the remainder of the conference, which ends Monday, examining the other proposals in the report "on this jointly accepted basis".

The commission notably recommended that the church accept civil and social responsibility for the abuses, separately from the individual responsibility of the abusers.

It also said that financial compensation should be calculated for each individual case according to the severity of abuses suffered, instead of making flat rate payments.

The money should be taken from the personal assets of the attackers or from the church, it said, recommending against any call for donations from the Catholic faithful.

© 2021 AFP

 

'No desire for truth' in Spain church over child sex abuse


Victim Fernando Garcia Salmones says abuse in the Spanish Church is 'shameful' 

JAVIER SORIANO AFP

Issued on: 05/11/2021 - 

Madrid (AFP) – Unlike in other countries where child sex scandals have forced the Catholic Church towards accountability, the Spanish church has avoided investigating alleged abuses by its clergy to the fury of victims.

In recent decades, thousands have spoken out about harrowing abuses by clergy across the United States, Europe, Australia and beyond, prompting Church probes in many nations seeking redress for the victims.

In France alone, a study commissioned by the French Catholic Church found last month its clergy had abused some 216,000 minors since 1950.

But in Spain, there are no official statistics on child sex abuse.

The Church says it has counted just 220 cases since 2001, and has ruled out "actively" investigating any such allegations.

"The case of the Church in Spain is... shameful," says Fernando Garcia Salmones, who was abused as a teenager at a school run by Roman Catholic priests in Madrid.

"They have no desire to know the truth," the 60-year-old tour guide told AFP, saying the abuse destroyed his life and left him feeling "dirty", "guilty" and "like a piece of shit".

Historically, Spain has always been a deeply-Catholic country, and some 55 percent of the population identifies as Roman Catholic, a religion deeply embedded in the country's culture.

The Church in Spain has not explained why it is refusing to hold a comprehensive investigation, saying only it has put in place protocols to manage allegations of abuses by its clergy.

No accountability

For Garcia Salmones, memories of abuse still haunt him today.

"I was studying at the Claretian School of Madrid, I was 14 and one day, the priest jumped on me and continued abusing me every day for practically a whole year," he said.

On one occasion, he was "abused by the priest and another person who came into the room", leading him to conclude that the school "knew what was happening and protected" his abuser.

He didn't speak about his ordeal until he was 40 but by then, the crime was too old to be investigated.

The priest he accused of abuse died in 2009 "without any kind of accountability".

After Garcia Salmones went public in 2018, he said the school moved to prevent any fresh abuses, with a management statement stressing its "zero tolerance" of any such conduct and commitment "to always investigate any inappropriate behaviour by its members".

But he says the first reaction of the Spanish Bishops' Conference (CEE) was to dismiss his account as "a bid to seek financial compensation".

'Stonewalling and denial'

The Bishops' Conference declined an interview with AFP.

In a written response, it said it had put in place "protocols for action where cases of abuse were identified and specific training for people working with young people and children".

It "was aware of 220 cases that had been investigated since 2001", and had set up offices for "child protection and abuse prevention" in its 70 dioceses where complaints could be filed.

Such offices could also "help victims" and "investigate, where possible, the circumstances under which (abuses) occurred".

According to the CEE's website, its 2010 action protocol outlined steps such as barring anyone accused of abuses from working with children.

In 2019, a committee presented a draft child protection decree, which remains unfinished.

But the Church has ruled out any exhaustive inquiry.

"We are not going to proactively engage in a comprehensive investigation of the matter," Monsignor Luis Arguello, the CEE's secretary general said in September.

The Church "gives the appearance of doing something but it's not," says Juan Cuatrecasas, head of victims' association Infancia Robada, or 'stolen childhood' in English.

"It is doing its homework very quickly and very badly," he says, pointing to a bigger picture of "stonewalling and denial".

'Damaging human rights'

Jesus Zudaire, who runs a victims' association in the northern Navarre region and was himself abused, says Spain could "easily" have a similar number of cases to France.

He highlights the power of the Church in Spanish society and its cosy arrangement with the decades-long dictatorship of Francisco Franco, which ended in 1975.

El Pais newspaper began investigating abuse allegations in 2018 and has since received details of 932 cases.

In not taking a proactive approach, the Church "is damaging human rights" and inflicting further harm on the victims, says campaigner Cuatrecasas, whose 24-year-old son was abused by a teacher at a Catholic school in Bilbao between 2008 and 2010.

The teacher was initially handed 11 years in jail but the Supreme Court reduced his sentence to two years, and as a first offender he spent no time behind bars.

Although the Church follows abuse prevention protocols in line with those laid out by the Vatican, victims' groups want the Spanish government to step in with legislation to prevent Church cover-ups.

Earlier this year, Spain's parliament approved a child protection law extending the statute of limitations for abuse cases, meaning survivors can report abuses for up to 15 years after they turn 35.

Previously, the clock started when they were 18.

Although victims wanted the legislation to be retroactive, they hailed the step as a positive first move.

© 2021 AFP

MURDER MOST FOUL

Israel troops kill teen in West Bank: Palestinian ministry

Issued on: 05/11/2021 

Palestinian protesters run from tear gas fired by Israeli security forces, during a demonstration against the establishment of Israeli outposts on Palestinian lands, in Beit Dajan, in the occupied West Bank JAAFAR ASHTIYEH AFP

Jerusalem (AFP) – A 13-year-old Palestinian was shot and fatally wounded Friday by Israeli troops in the occupied West Bank, the Palestinian health ministry said.

It said Mohammed Daadas died in hospital after being shot in the stomach during clashes between Palestinian protesters and Israeli forces in Deir al-Hatab village, east of Nablus.

The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the report.

Two other Palestinians were injured Friday in clashes in Beita, another West Bank village where locals have struggled for months to dislodge Israeli settlers and the military from a hilltop.

The clashes come days after Israel announced it would advance plans for 3,000 more homes for Jewish settlers in the West Bank, despite international criticism.

Israel has also advanced plans to build about 1,300 homes for Palestinians in the West Bank, but critics see the move as an attempt to parry global condemnation of settlement construction.

Palestinians eye the West Bank as part of a future state, while hardline Israelis including Prime Minister Naftali Bennett say it is a heartland of Jewish history.

Israel seized the West Bank and east Jerusalem in the 1967 Middle East war.

Hundreds of thousands of Israelis have since moved into settlements that most of the international community regard as illegal.

Bennett has ruled out formal peace talks with the Palestinian Authority, saying he prefers to focus on economic improvements.

© 2021 AFP

Palestinians: 13-year-old dies by Israeli fire in West Bank yesterday


RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — A 13-year-old Palestinian boy was shot and killed by Israeli fire during clashes in the occupied West Bank on Friday, Palestinian health officials said.

The teen, identified as Mohammad Daadas, died as a result of a gunshot wound to the stomach during clashes with Israeli forces near the northern West Bank village of Deir al-Hatab, said the health officials’ statement. Daadas was taken to a nearby hospital, where medical staff pronounced him dead.

The Palestinian Red Crescent medical service said the Israeli army fired live ammunition, as well as tear gas and rubber bullets, at protesters while also closing off surrounding roads, preventing their ambulances from entering the site. No other serious injuries were reported.

In a statement issued later Friday, the army said dozens of Palestinians near Deir al-Hatab began hurling rocks at Israeli troops who responded with live fire.

According to Wafa, the Palestinian news agency, Daadas was from the Askar refugee camp on the outskirts of the northern city of Nablus.

Clashes between Israeli forces and Palestinians are common across the West Bank on Fridays. Over the past six months, there have been weekly clashes in the nearby town of Beita, where Palestinians hold demonstrations against the establishment of an unauthorized Israeli settlement outpost that they say was built on their land. At least five protesters have been killed in the violence.

Under a deal in June between the Israeli government and the settlers of Eviatar, the settlers left the outpost but the settlement’s buildings remain intact and under army guard. The Palestinians have rejected the deal, saying it is a step by Israel towards taking their land.

Last week, the Israeli authorities approved 3,000 new settler homes in the West Bank, while also agreeing on Thursday to build 1,300 housing units for Palestinians who live in areas of the West Bank that are under full Israeli control.

Israel captured the West Bank in the 1967 war and has established dozens of settlements where more than 500,000 settlers live. Palestinians seek the territory — along with east Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip — as part of their future state and view the settlements as a major obstacle to resolving the conflict.

Jack Ma, Trump and Xi: How Chinese billionaire flew close to the sun

Jack Ma, Alibaba Group founder, visits a Dutch flower grower Anthura in the town of Bleiswijk


Julie Zhu and Kane Wu
Thu, November 4, 2021

HONG KONG (Reuters) - This was supposed to be Jack Ma's finest hour: a year ago to the day, his Ant Group was meant to go public in a $37 billion blaze of glory. Instead Beijing reined in his empire, abruptly clipping the wings of corporate China's biggest star.

Now, to the cautious cheer of investors, the billionaire Alibaba e-commerce tycoon is taking his first tentative steps back on to the global stage with a low-key trip to Europe where he's cultivating like horticulture.

It's a far cry from the height of Ma's statesman-like powers in 2017 when he travelled to New York to meet President-elect Donald Trump for one-on-one talks in Trump Tower days before inauguration and promised to create a million American jobs.

That high-profile outing had roiled the Chinese government, which first learned of the meeting and jobs pledge along with the rest of the world when Ma held an informal televised Q&A session with reporters in the lobby of the skyscraper, according to four people close to Alibaba with knowledge of the matter and one Beijing government source.

Alibaba's government relations team was subsequently told by Chinese officials that Beijing was unhappy about Ma meeting Trump without its prior approval, two of the people close to the company said.

Ma's charitable foundation, which handles his media queries, did not respond to a request for comment.

The State Council Information Office and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not respond to requests for comment. All the sources declined to be named due to sensitivity of the matter.

The meeting on Jan. 9 came at a time of taut tensions between the two countries after Trump was critical of China during his election campaign, blaming it for the loss of American jobs.

A spokesperson for Trump did not respond to a request for comment.

The four people close to Alibaba said they believed the meeting was a negative turning point in the relationship between Ma and Beijing. They did not elaborate on their thinking.

Investors are hungry for clues about Ma's situation: the mere sighting of the businessman on the Spanish island of Mallorca last month, his first trip abroad in over a year, immediately saw Alibaba gain as much as $42 billion in value.

The story of his fall from official favour helps illustrate how rapidly China has transformed under Xi Jinping, as he nears what could be a precedent-breaking third term as leader of the economic powerhouse and exerts greater control over some of its most innovative companies.

'A NATURAL FIRST TARGET'

Authorities cracked down on Ma's business empire after he gave a speech in Shanghai in October last year accusing financial watchdogs of stifling innovation. Regulators suspended the $37 billion listing of his fintech firm Ant Group two days before the planned debut on Nov. 5, ordered that Ant be restructured and launched antitrust investigations into Ma's businesses, eventually leading to a record $2.75 billion fine for Alibaba in April.

The clampdown has spread across the private sector, with officials tightening oversight of companies in technology, real estate, gaming, education, cryptocurrencies and finance.

"Given that Jack appeared too provocative, out of step with the new approach to governance espoused by Xi, he was a natural first target to signal that a major change had begun," said Duncan Clark, chairman of Beijing-based investment advisory firm BDA China and author of a book on Alibaba and Ma.

"Jack was rubbing shoulders regularly with foreign presidents, prime ministers, royalty, celebrities at places like Davos or on his own visits overseas. There was a constant stream of VIP visitors to see him in Hangzhou too."

Ma's global outreach did not end after the Trump meeting, though.

Between 2018 and 2020 he held talks with a host of high-profile figures, including U.N. Secretary General António Guterres, Queen Rania of Jordan, Malaysia's veteran politician Mahathir Mohamad and then Belgian premier Charles Michel, according to Alibaba's news portal Alizila and media reports.

At Alibaba's Hangzhou headquarters, it has a building housing the company's museum where Ma and his business partner Joe Tsai would take foreign visitors and show them around, according to another person close to Ma.

Tsai did not respond to a request for comment via Alibaba.

Ma had viewed meetings with foreign politicians as "unofficial diplomacy" for China, which he enjoyed doing, the person added.

Alibaba told Reuters it had a guest reception facility widely known as Pavilion 9 that offered a visual tour of its history and an overview of its businesses. It has hosted a wide variety of guests at the exhibition hall in its headquarters, it added.

The company did not respond to other queries for this story.

'JUST LIKE YOU AND ME'

In a sign of how life has changed for one of China's most successful and influential businessmen, Ma requested an audience with at least two people in Xi's inner circle in the weeks following the blocking of Ant's listing, but his requests were turned down by both, said two separate sources briefed by those people.

The billionaire subsequently wrote directly to Xi earlier this year offering to devote the rest of his life to China's rural education, according to a government source who said the president spoke about the letter at a meeting of the country's senior leaders in May.

Reuters could not determine whether Xi approved of or responded to the offer, which has not been previously reported, or precisely when Ma, a former English teacher, penned the missive.

The Alibaba-owned South China Morning Post said last month Ma was visiting Europe on an "agriculture and technology study tour related to environmental issues", citing a person familiar with his itinerary.

Last week the paper published pictures of Ma wearing a white protective gown and holding flowerpots. It said he would continue touring European companies and research institutions involved in agricultural infrastructure and plant breeding, citing people familiar with his plans.

Tsai, the co-founder of Alibaba, played down his long-time associate's influence in a rare interview about the elusive billionaire with CNBC's Squawk Box show in June.

"He's lying low right now. I talk to him every day," Tsai said. "The idea that Jack has this enormous amount of power, I think that's not quite right," he added.

"He is just like you and me, he's a normal individual."

(Reporting by Julie Zhu and Kane Wu in Hong Kong; Editing by Sumeet Chatterjee, Paritosh Bansal and Pravin Char)

It's not just Jack Ma. More and more Chinese tech founders and CEOs are retreating from the spotlight.

Katie Canales

Wed, November 3, 2021, 

• TikTok-owner Bytedance's founder Zhang Yiming has stepped down from the board, per Bloomberg.

• He's the most recent executive to pull back as China cracks down on the tech industry.

• Other tech founders have made similar moves as the communist party strengthens its grip.

Jack Ma famously disappeared from the limelight after his Ant Group's planned IPO imploded- and he's not the only tech exec to do so in the past year.

Bloomberg reported Wednesday that TikTok owner Bytedance's founder Zhang Yiming has stepped down from the company's board of directors. The report comes after Yiming said in May he was retiring from his role as CEO at the company. Bytedance did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

It's yet another prominent Chinese tech CEO pulling back from the public spotlight as the nation's government cracks down on homegrown tech giants. The big tech crackdown, combined with China's growing animosity for billionaires - whose wealth threatens the ruling party's communist principles - has upended how powerful businessmen are perceived in the nation and has caused them to tread lightly in the public eye.

In the months after China pulled Ant Group's IPO, rumors swirled that Ma had disappeared - a phenomenon that had occurred before with other powerful business figures that had disagreed with The Party.

In June, however, an Alibaba executive said that Ma was simply "lying low" as the government cracked down on his empire.

Other tech execs have flat-out quit:

• Colin Huang, the former CEO and chairman of the Chinese e-commerce giant Pinduoduo exited both of those roles earlier this year.

• Kuaishou Technology co-founder Su Hua stepped away as CEO, with co-founder Cheng Yiziao taking his place, according to Reuters.

• The founder and CEO of the online retail giant JD.com stepped back from his day-to-day duties in September, with another executive taking his place, CNBC reported.

The internet economy has been largely unregulated in China, meaning companies have been free to grow unfettered without strict rules that apply to more traditional sectors like banking. In November 2020, China introduced new anti-competitive behavior rules designed to reel in internet giants like Alibaba, which Ma also founded.

Earlier this year, China slapped Alibaba with a fine equaling $2.8 billion over concerns that it was abusing its dominant market position.

Bytedance is not currently under any official regulatory probe, but Chinese officials do have their eyes trained on the company, which is subject to the same regulatory restrictions that the nation has placed on its tech industry at large.

As China zeroes in on the internet economy, Bytedance has attempted to pivot away from online services and toward enterprise software, as Bloomberg noted, and said recently it was reorganizing into six different business units.

GREAT RUSSIAN IMPERIALISM UNDER TSAR PUTIN

Unity Day: Putin proclaims Crimea forever a part of Russia









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Russia Unity Day

Russian President Vladimir Putin delivers his speech at the memorial complex dedicated to the end of the Russian Civil War during marking Unity Day in Sevastopol, Crimea, Thursday, Nov. 4, 2021. 

(AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel)

Thu, November 4, 2021

MOSCOW (AP) — Russian President Vladimir Putin marked the national Unity Day holiday with a trip to Crimea, declaring the region will always be a part of Russia.

Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in 2014 in the wake of the overthrow of Ukraine’s Kremlin-friendly president, a move that Western countries regard as illegitimate.

Putin exalted the annexation while visiting the city that is the home port for Russia’s Black Sea fleet on Thursday.

“Our country has regained its historical unity. This living and unbreakable bond can be especially keenly felt, of course, here, in Sevastopol, in Crimea," he said. "They are with Russia forever now, as that is the sovereign, free and unbending will of the people, of all our people.”

Unity Day marks the expulsion in 1612 of Polish-Lithuanian forces that occupied Moscow; the holiday was started in 2005, replacing the Soviet-era commemoration on that date of the Bolshevik Revolution.

The day also became an occasion for anti-immigrant marches by nationalists, but Moscow authorities banned the event from taking place in the Russian capital this year.

About 20 people were detained as they tried to gather in a Moscow subway station for a nationalist demonstration, according to OVD-Info, a group that monitors political demonstrations and arrests.