BELLA CIAO APRIL 25 RESISTANCE DAY ITALY

AP PHOTOS: Veterans honor Italy’s WWII uprising from home

By BEATRICE LARCO

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A combo of 15 images showing fifteen former Italian partisans posing at their home in several Italian cities between Thursday, April 23, and Friday, April 24, 2020. On April 25 every year Italy celebrates the end of the Nazi occupation during WWII. The date is also the occasion for the members of the National Association of Italian Partisans to celebrate their uprising against the fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, backed up by the Nazis, with marches throughout the country. The COVID-19 outbreak in Italy this year forced the cancellation of all the activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Italian Liberation Day. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini. Alessandra Tarantino, Luca Bruno, Antonio Calanni, Domenico Stinellis, Bruno Anastasi)

Former partisan Laura Wronowki, 96, poses at her window in Milan, Italy, Friday, April 24, 2020. On April 25 every year Italy celebrates the end of the Nazi occupation during WWII. The date is also the occasion for the members of the National Association of Italian Partisans to celebra Liberation Day. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni) On April 25 every year Italy celebrates the end of the Nazi occupation during WWII. The date is also the occasion for the members of the National Association of Italian Partisans to celebrate their uprising against the fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, backed up by the Nazis, with marches throughout the country. The COVID-19 outbreak in Italy this year forced the cancellation te their uprising against the fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, backed up by the Nazis, with marches throughout the country. The COVID-19 outbreak in Italy this year forced the cancellation of all the activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Italian of all the activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Italian Liberation Day.

Former partisan Teresa Vergalli, 93, nicknamed Annuska, holds a note reading in Italian "Resistance always, long live Aprile 25", as she poses at her window in Rome, Thursday, April 23, 2020. On April 25 every year Italy celebrates the end of the Nazi occupation during WWII. The date is also the occasion for the members of the National Association of Italian Partisans to celebrate their uprising against the fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, backed up by the Nazis, with marches throughout the country. The COVID-19 outbreak in Italy this year forced the cancellation of all the activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Italian Liberation Day. (AP Photo/Andrew Medichini)

Former partisan Rodolfo Lai, 92, nicknamed Rudy, waves from his balcony in Rome, Thursday, April 23, 2020. On April 25 every year Italy celebrates the end of the Nazi occupation during WWII. The date is also the occasion for the members of the National Association of Italian Partisans to celebrate their uprising against the fascist rule of dictator Benito Mussolini, backed up by the Nazis, with marches throughout the country. The COVID-19 outbreak in Italy this year forced the cancellation of all the activities to celebrate the 75th anniversary of the Italian Liberation Day. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)


ROME (AP) — Veterans of Italy’s anti-Fascist World War II resistance have held marches throughout Italy every April 25 since 1945, to honor the uprising that helped end their country’s Nazi occupation.

This year’s 75th anniversary was long anticipated among the dwindling band of elderly survivors. But lockdown measures in the coronavirus-afflicted country mean no marches can be held. So the veterans have resorted to the inventiveness they once employed in sabotage missions and guerrilla tactics against the Germans.

At 3 p.m. on Saturday, when the traditional parade would have started in Milan, where Italian Fascist ruler Benito Mussolini’s body was publicly displayed after his execution by resistance fighters, the National Association of Italian Partisans has invited all to sing “Bella Ciao,” the anthem of Italy’s communist resistance, a major component of the liberation efforts.

On the eve of the anniversary, Associated Press photographers portrayed 15 former partisans at their balconies and windows in several Italian cities. Two display their arrays of medals, most drape the tricolored Italian flag around their necks.

Rodolfo Lai, 92, who, aged 15, killed a German paratrooper with a hand grenade to protect an escaping Italian officer, lamented the cancellation of the marches.

“Never we would have imagined that after 75 years of our resistance against a visible enemy ... today we would have found ourselves resisting an enemy ... invisible and insidious,” Lai said from his Rome apartment, referring to the novel coronavirus.

Silvio Anastasi, 88, said life during the war “was much easier for me. The shrewdness, courage and tactical skills we used against the Nazi-Fascists are of no help today in fighting the coronavirus. I feel helpless.”

Elderly people are considered among the most vulnerable for potentially fatal complications of COVID-19.

When Umberto Graziani, 96, was asked how he will celebrate this year, he sounded resigned: “Nothing, no march, I’ll stay home, how sad.”

FEMA field hospitals expand Navajo Nation's COVID-19 response

Care on the Navajo Nation has been expanded with recovery centers built by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and FEMA as the COVID-19 pandemic sickens more reservation residents. Photo via FB Live, courtesy of the Navajo Nation.
DENVER, April 24 (UPI) -- Expecting the cases of COVID-19 on the Navajo Nation to peak in mid-May, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and Federal Emergency Management Agency are constructing three reservation field hospitals to be used as alternative care sites, the tribe said Friday.

"COVID-positive patients will be kept here isolated so they can recover here and then go home," said the nation's President Jonathan Nez said in a live video feed from the Miyamura High School gymnasium in Gallop, N.M., which had been converted into a 60-bed recovery center.

"It looks nice, but believe me, you don't want to end up here, you don't want to be away from your family for a long time. ... We're preparing for a worst-case scenario," Nez said.

Two other care sites are being built in Chinle, Ariz., and Shiprock, N.M., Nez said.

RELATED Navajo Nation extends shelter-in-place order for COVID-19 outbreak

The reservation, with a population of around 175,000 people, has been a national hotspot for reported positive cases of the coronavirus. Its an infection rate is higher than any state except New York and New Jersey, according to state health care department statistics.

The Navajo Epidemiology Center has reported 78 new cases confirmed positive cases since Wednesday, reaching a total of 1,360.

Fifty-two deaths on the reservation have been attributed to the virus, and about 7,500 tests have been completed. The average age of positive virus patients was 43, and the average age of death was 65, the health agency said.

RELATED Navajo leaders self-quarantine after COVID-19 exposure

As the reservation prepares for a third weekend curfew and stay-at-home orders, the tribal government on Thursday organized a drive-through distribution of care packages, food supplies and firewood to about 250 remote reservation residents in Jeddito, Ariz.

The Window Rock, Ariz.,-based Navajo Times newspaper has published a list of resources and non-profit groups that were providing emergency relief to tribal members.

The Navajo Nation, about the size of the state of West Virginia, has only 13 grocery stores, and about 30 percent of residents lack running water or electricity.

RELATED Solar-powered cisterns bring running water to Navajo homes

The Hopi Nation, located within the Navajo Nation, has three villages with no running water, Cassandra Begay, communications director for the non-profit Navajo & Hopi Families COVID-19 Relief Fund, said in a video.

The group has delivered 1,500 food baskets across the two reservations and is coordinating volunteers to sew masks for residents, especially the elderly.

"In many homes on the reservation, there are multi-generational families that live there," Jessica Stago, who coordinates water for the relief effort, said in a statement. "The virus is attacking this important family unit by spreading among entire families who cannot isolate from each other," she said.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the Navajo Nation joined a multi-tribe lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia that asks the U.S. Treasury Department to exclude 230 Alaska Native corporations from the $8 billion in federal COVID-19 relief of CARES Act funds.

Three Sioux tribes, the Cheyenne River, Oglala and Rosebud Sioux, and others, including three Alaskan native tribes, say the corporations are for-profit entities, owned by shareholders, many of them non-Indian.

"Allocating funds from the Coronavirus Relief Fund to the Alaska Native corporations will severely impact the Navajo Nation's ability to fight COVID-19, and will impact every other tribe, as well," Navajo President Nez said in a statement.

SEE  https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/search?q=NAVAJO

Tribes prepare hemp, CBD strategies after USDA approval

The U.S. Department of Agriculture approved an industrial hemp plan for the Sac & Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa, which has incorporated new hemp and CBD companies. Photo courtesy of Sac & Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa

DENVER, April 24 (UPI) -- Newly approved federal plans for tribal industrial hemp production are giving U.S. sovereign nations a competitive advantage in growing the plant and selling CBD, the tribes say.

As U.S. farmers rush to plant industrial hemp after 80 years of prohibition, tribal sovereign governments find they have an advantage because they can cut through red tape and become the first entrepreneurs in state markets to offer their own CBD and hemp products.




"The tribe is very excited about hemp," said Joseph VanGorp, hemp operations director for the Sac & Fox Tribe of the Mississippi in Iowa. "It's been a long time coming."

The 2018 Farm Bill allowed tribes to apply directly for approval from the U.S. Department of Agriculture for hemp programs. USDA has approved 20 tribal nations' plans, with 18 more under review or in drafting stages.

As sovereign nations, tribes can craft their own hemp plans, and tribal hemp companies do not have to be licensed by the agriculture departments of states in which they are situated.

Tribal-owned hemp operations can potentially bring new revenue into the tribal coffers to pay for member social services.

In Tama, Iowa, the 7,000-acre sovereign Sac & Fox Tribe, or Meskwaki Nation, can use its sovereign jurisdiction to regulate the CBD that the tribe will produce, hemp director VanGorp said.

Iowa has some of the most restrictive laws for CBD, which can only be sold with a doctor's prescription, according to the state attorney general. The tribe will sell its own CBD at its truck stop in Tama and through wholesalers. It already sells tobacco and vaping products.

"CBD is difficult to obtain in Iowa," VanGorp said. "It will be a lot easier for people to just come to Tama and choose what they want to buy."

VanGorp, who formerly worked in Colorado as a chemist in CBD extraction, said the tribe also plans to open an extraction facility -- the first in the state.

RELATED Navajo Nation positive COVID-19 cases, deaths continue to rise

After hemp was allowed again in the 2018 Farm Bill, the Iowa Department of Agriculture approved a hemp plan for 2020 and some farmers are obtaining licenses. But no processing facilities have been approved in the state.

Iowa had a rich history of industrial hemp production before the plant was federally prohibited. "There were about 11 processing plants for hemp in the state in the 1940s," VanGorp said.

In New York's Cayuga Nation, the new hemp program this year will get a jump on other New York farmers, said Clint Halftown, the tribe's federal representative.

New York does not yet appear on the USDA's list of state-approved plans, although Gov. Andrew Cuomo approved hemp regulations in December 2019. As a result, hemp-growing still must be coordinated through a university pilot program.

Approved hemp programs for Cayuga Nation, and the affiliated Seneca Nation, will have more flexibility to grow hemp and market their own CBD products, tribal leader Halftown said.

The tribe, which grows vegetables and soybeans and raises cattle near Seneca Falls, N.Y., plans to plant hemp this spring.

"Our nation-owned and operated hemp program and our own line of CBD will stimulate another avenue revenue source for the community," Halftown said.

The USDA last week also approved a hemp plan for the Montana-based Blackfeet Nation. The tribe belongs to the Blackfoot Confederacy, a family of tribes on both sides of the U.S.-Canadian border.

Canadian farmers have been growing hemp for seed and fiber for more than 20 years, and some Canadian sovereign nations began to grow cannabis last year. Canada legalized recreational marijuana in 2018.

Flight attendants union: Halt leisure travel until coronavirus contained

Grounded commercial aircraft are stored at the Mojave Air and Space Port in Mojave, Calif., on Wednesday. All U.S. carriers have cut most flights and parked aircraft during the coronavirus emergency. Photo by Jim Ruymen/UPI | License Photo

April 24 (UPI) -- The head of a large flight attendants union has called on the Trump administration to end all non-essential flights until the coronavirus has been contained to stop the spread and protect its tens of thousands of members.

In a letter Thursday, the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA urged the U.S. Departments of Transportation and Health and Human Services to bar all leisure travel until the virus is contained.

"We call on lawmakers and regulators to take further action to limit the spread of the virus by restricting air travel to only that necessary to continue essential services," AFA International President Sara Nelson wrote in the four-page letter, addressed to Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and HHS Secretary Alex Azar.

"While this global system is integral to our modern economy, its essential inter-connectedness also provides a convenient pathway for opportunistic pathogens to hitch rides on unsuspecting crewmembers and travelers and spread all over the world.

"As some of the most frequent travelers, flight attendants feel a deep responsibility to ensure that our workplace risks of acquiring and spreading communicable diseases are minimized as much as possible."

Nelson said flight attendants have been on the front lines of the COVID-19 pandemic and have been "hit hard" as at least 250 of the union's 50,000 members at 20 carriers have so far tested positive for the virus, and some have died.

"The scars run deep," she added. "Recent media reports document the guilt felt by those who question if we are helping to spread the virus, feelings of fear and grief as coworkers die and wonder about when this will all be over."

The letter calls for the departments to mandate the use of masks by crew, employees and passengers on airplanes and in airports, as well as require employers to provide workers with personal protective equipment.

"We believe that ... ensuring air travel is not aiding in spread of the virus requires a halt to all leisure travel until the pandemic is brought under control according to health authorities," it concludes. " In addition, we request messaging from all leadership to encourage the public to end leisure travel until we have 'flattened the curve.'"

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Protest at Slovenian care homes over government 'neglect'

AFP: 24/04/2020
 

Employees at the care home in Domzale staged their protest to demand better conditions while accusing the government of neglecting the elderly Jure Makovec AFP

Domžale (Slovenia) (AFP)

Hundreds of employees from care homes in Slovenia protested on Friday over what they say is government neglect of the elderly and demanded more support to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

The scene at one care home in the town of Domzale, ten kilometres (six miles) north of the capital Ljubljana, was repeated at dozens of sites across the country as care staff came out for around 15 minutes to articulate their grievances with the government.

One of the employees at the home read out a statement from the Slovenian Care Homes' Association stating: "We will not remain silent while (the authorities), using the coronavirus as a cover, try to transform care homes into cheap nursing hospitals".

The statement added care homes in Slovenia had entered the epidemic unprepared and with all their accommodation at full capacity while being understaffed and left to cope with the coronavirus by themselves.

Shortly after Slovenia declared an epidemic in mid-March, a new centre-right government was appointed which moved to implemente a strict lockdown.

The country has been successful in curbing the spread of the infection overall but a number of care homes have been severely hit.

According to the latest available figures, as of April 19 care home residents represented 58 out of the 80 coronavirus patients who have died in Slovenia.

Friday's protest -- backed by over 70 care homes all over Slovenia -- was called to demand a clearer protocol for dealing with infections, including the hospitalisation of all elderly care home residents who test positive for the novel coronavirus.

The health ministry said the protest was "politically" motivated and added the removal of all care home residents infected with coronavirus would be "debatable from an ethical and moral point of view".

The protest comes a day after the public RTV Slovenija TV station ran a report accusing Economy Minister Zdravko Pocivalsek of wrongdoing and abuse of power in relation to the acquisition of masks and protective equipment for hospitals and care homes.

Pocivalsek has rejected the allegations, insisting that he acted in the best interests of the state and to bridge the initial lack of protective equipment.

© 2020 AFP

Transgender players kick down doors in Argentina football



Issued on: 24/04/2020 - 23:34Modified: 24/04/2020 - 23:32

Mara Gomez trains with her team Villa San Carlos in La Plata, Argentina, on February 14, 2020 JUAN MABROMATA AFP

La Plata (Argentina) (AFP)

Out on the pitch, they finally can feel like themselves.

In addition to the sheer joy that football brings them, Mara Gomez and Marcos Rojo have the extra satisfaction of knowing that after a long and difficult journey, they are blazing a trail for transgender players in Argentina.

Tall, slim and with her hair tied back in a ponytail, Gomez plays for the team of Villa San Carlos in La Plata, 60 kilometers (40 miles) south of Buenos Aires.

At 23, she aims to become the first transgender player in the new women's professional league in her native country.

"I suffered a lot from discrimination, exclusion, verbal abuse in the street and in school. Football was like therapy for me," Gomez told AFP.

She started playing at 15, encouraged by neighbors.

In the women's league in La Plata, Gomez distinguished herself as a leading goal scorer in the past two seasons.

That prompted Villa San Carlos, in last place in the women's professional league, to seek to recruit her.

"She's quick and is very good at kicking on target," said trainer Juan Cruz Vitale.

"Unlike what people and the media were thinking, she isn't that strong. I have a number of girls who are stronger and even though she's fast, I have girls who are faster," he noted.

But Vitale added: "She's smart and learns quickly. And she gets goals, which is what we were lacking."

The club is in the process of submitting its application to the Argentine Football Association to sign Gomez up, once the current coronavirus lockdown ends.

"There is a law on gender identity that they can't get around. We are convinced she is going to be a star," the coach said.

Argentina led Latin America by passing a gender identity law in 2012, which allowed Gomez to officially change her gender on her national identity card when she turned 18.

"I am very happy to know that as a society we are doing a little more, we are opening up minds," she said as she contemplated the prospect of becoming a professional player in a country that has produced some of the world's best footballers, including Diego Maradona and Lionel Messi.

- 'Playing with the men' -

Rojo, 20, started playing this year as a center forward with the club Union del Suburbio in Gualeguaychu in the northeast of the country, the first time he has played on a men's team.

Two years ago, he changed his name and gender on his national identity card, and the team had no qualms about signing him.

The league in the province of Entre Rios will issue his membership as soon as footballing activities restart.

In Rojo's living room hangs a picture of him at his 15th birthday party, when he still officially identified as a girl. His family has given him its full support during his transition.

"I wanted to make the change in my official papers because I had always wanted to play with the men. Since I was little, I felt like I was one of them," Rojo said.

"Football was a big step for me because it was the thing I was always looking for, what I wanted," he said. "The support of a team for this change means a lot."

Rojo said men's football is "much more demanding."

"The boys are all good kickers. For me, it will be a huge achievement if I manage to play in the premier division at some point."

- 'Right to play' -

Sebastian Rajoy, Union del Suburbio's president, said that "everyone has the right to play sports."

"Clubs on the margins are the ones offering the opportunity. Someone has to take the first step, and in this case it is us," he said.

In this early stage of incorporating transgender players, Gomez and Rojo are aware they could be asked to submit to a hormone test before they are fully accepted into the leagues.

"The discussion is linked to the dilemma between biology and respect for people's rights," said Ayelen Pujol, a specialist in gender identity in sports.

© 2020 AFP

Anger over the removal of pro-Kurdish mayors in Turkey
THEY BEAT ERDOGAN'S HAND PICKED CHOICES
 25/04/2020 AFP

Anger and disappointment among residents is clear in the southeastern Turkish city of Mardin where the government replaced the popular mayor BULENT KILIC AFP

Mardin (Turkey) (AFP)

The mix of fury and disappointment among residents was palpable inside a cafe in the southeastern Turkish city of Mardin after the government replaced the popular mayor with a trustee.

One year on from local elections, 40 out of 65 municipalities won by the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) are now under the control of government-appointed trustees.

In Mardin, the HDP's Ahmet Turk, won 56.2 percent of the vote in March 2019.

But in August he was one of the first, along with those in nearby Diyarbakir and Van, to be removed and replaced by the government.

Six months after the move, residents in Mardin, where the governor now runs the city of over 800,000 people, were especially critical of a lack of service and development.

"No one bothers, no one wants to do anything, and no one raises their voice. We're speaking to you now, who knows what will happen to us tomorrow?" cafe manager Firat Kayatar told AFP during a visit late February.

"They may as well not hold elections in the southeast because they had two elections and after both, they appointed trustees," Kayatar, who lives in the old city, said.

"No one listens anyway," one of the cafe's customers, Abdulaziz, 57, chipped in. "We can't complain to anyone. (The governor) brings bananas but we need bread."

Another man nearby who did not give his name said young people went to university but were unable to find a job.

"This is the problem Mardin faces too," he says.

The party described the mayors' removals as an "attack" on Kurds but the government has accused the HDP of links to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Kurds make up around 20 percent of Turkey's overall population.

The HDP accused Ankara last month of making it "even harder for the Kurds to fight the coronavirus" through the "repression of Kurdish democratic institutions, their municipalities in particular."

Such actions are not new. Ankara removed 95 HDP mayors after the party won 102 municipalities in 2014.

"When it comes to the HDP, just slapping trumped-up terror charges is the easiest way to go and it's just a political attempt to destroy their legitimacy," said Turkey director of Human Rights Watch (HRW) Emma Sinclair-Webb.

- 'PKK representatives' -

The chairman in Mardin for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party defended the government's actions, accusing the PKK of using the HDP mayors to obtain control.

"In fact these mayors were Qandil representatives," Faruk Kilic said, referring to where the PKK leadership and rear bases are located in a mountainous region in Iraq.

"None of the mayors made statements of their own independent will," Kilic added, a claim which the HDP strongly denies.

The Turkish government has repeatedly accused the HDP mayors of using the municipalities' money to support the PKK, or hiring relatives of PKK militants.

The interior ministry claimed some mayors attended political rallies, demonstrations and even funerals of PKK militants.

The HDP says 21 of its mayors are behind bars.

The PKK has been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984, and the group is blacklisted as a terror organisation by Ankara and its Western allies.

The government's aim was to "collapse any distinction between the HDP, a legal party playing by the rules of the game in parliament and democratically-elected representatives from this party, and an armed organisation," HRW's Sinclair-Webb said.

- Economic motives -

Veteran Kurdish politician Turk was acquitted in February in one case cited against him when he was removed as mayor of Mardin the first time in 2016.

The AKP's Kilic said if mayors were later acquitted on the charges against them, they would return to their posts, but added "there's evidence against many" charged.

Eren Keskin, of the Ankara-based Human Rights Association (IHD), believed there was an "economic" motive to the dismissals.

"The first municipalities they appointed a trustee for -- Diyarbakir, Mardin and Van -- are provinces that are really open to economic development," Keskin said.

Her claim was supported by HDP deputy chairman Saruhan Oluc, who said the government "keeps itself strong through the income and profit from local administrations".

Oluc accused the government of handing out money and favours to their allies as well as companies and foundations close to them through the municipalities' coffers.

© 2020 AFP

Online mystics cash in during Myanmar virus lockdownASTROLOGERS ARE NOT MYSTICS NOR ARE THEY PSYCHICS

Issued on: 25/04/2020 - 

Myanmar has so far recorded 144 confirmed infections and five deaths, but experts say the lack of testing means the real number is likely far higher Ye Aung THU AFP

Yangon (AFP)

Myanmar lawyer Thiri had been excited about her wedding and new job this year -- before the coronavirus threw both into doubt. With the stars very much unaligned, she turned to an astrology app for help.

For a fee of a few dollars, Thiri's online mystic advised the 26-year-old to carry out kind deeds around her home, from donating flowers to feeding animals on the street, to ensure good karma.

"I'm going to follow all her advice," Thiri tells AFP, praising the Min Thein Kha app for its convenience at a time when the doors to her usual real-life astrologer at a downtown Yangon temple are securely shut for the city's lockdown.

The Min Thein Kha platform -- the only one of its kind in Myanmar -- was launched two years ago. Its creators claim to have two million registered customers and 50,000 daily active users.

Users log on, select one of the 23 astrologers profiled on the app and submit a question, paying in advance by bank or mobile phone transfer with the promise of an audio file reply within 48 hours.

Uncertainty caused by the coronavirus outbreak has seen the number of questions rocket by 50 percent, says Bagan Innovation Technology, the company behind the virtual fortune-telling service.

Astrology has long been firmly intertwined with Myanmar's Buddhist beliefs, and few big decisions are made without a soothsayer consultation.

Former military rulers kept the nation largely offline and Min Thein Kha is part of a nascent digital community scrambling to catch up.

The app is named after one of the country's most prestigious fortune tellers, whose family and devoted disciples made sure his legacy lived on after his death in 2008.

"We've scaled up the personalised experience," says co-founder Ricky Thet.

"I wanted to show digitising isn't only for new creations but can also improve existing traditions."

- 'Tech revolution' -

Requests for help with the naming of babies and businesses or choosing auspicious wedding and housewarming dates have been replaced with worries about work and fears for the health of family members as the deadly virus spreads in Myanmar.

The underdeveloped country has so far recorded 144 confirmed infections and five deaths, but experts say the lack of testing means the real number is likely far higher.

Love is another recurring theme on the app.

Returning migrant workers ask after sweethearts left behind in Thailand, while other customers come laden with concerns for husbands or lovers working on oil rigs or as sailors, says Thet.

"We can help lift people out of depression and bring back their self-confidence, their hope and future," says 70-year-old astrologer Win Zaw, a brother of the late Min Thein Kha.

He has been in the fortune-telling business for 30 years and calls the switch to online soothsaying a "technological revolution".

But he admits there are downsides.

In a face-to-face session, a trained eye can pick up valuable clues from a client's posture, where they place their hands or how they wear a hairpin, and so distance predictions are sometimes not as accurate, he explains.

Fellow astrologer Htun Aung Lu, 45, claims he foresaw the 2014 Malaysian air crash and correctly predicted who would become Myanmar's president after the last election.

In these troubled times, he offers grounds for optimism, forecasting the pandemic will stabilise in May before some "good news about a vaccine between 2nd and 12th June".

© 2020 AFP

Saudi Arabia abolishes flogging



Issued on: 25/04/2020 - 10:20Modified: 25/04/2020 - 10:18

The most high-profile instance of flogging in Saudi Arabia in recent years was the case of blogger Raif Badawi who was sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes in 2014 TOBIAS SCHWARZ AFP

RAIF IS A CANADIAN RESIDENT, MARRIED TO A CANADIAN
#FREERAIF

Riyadh (AFP)

Saudi Arabia has abolished flogging as a punishment, the supreme court announced, hailing the latest in a series of "human rights advances" made by the king and his powerful son.

Court-ordered floggings in Saudi Arabia -- sometimes extending to hundreds of lashes -- have long drawn condemnation from human rights groups.

But they say the headline legal reforms overseen by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman have brought no let-up in the conservative Islamic kingdom's crushing of dissent, including through the use of the death penalty.

The Saudi supreme court said the latest reform was intended to "bring the kingdom into line with international human rights norms against corporal punishment".

Previously the courts could order the flogging of convicts found guilty of offences ranging from extramarital sex and breach of the peace to murder.

In future, judges will have to choose between fines and/or jail sentences, or non-custodial alternatives like community service, the court said in a statement seen by AFP on Saturday.

The most high-profile instance of flogging in recent years was the case of Saudi blogger Raif Badawi who was sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1,000 lashes in 2014 for "insulting" Islam.

He was awarded the European parliament's Sakharov human rights prize the following year.

The abolition of corporal punishment in Saudi Arabia comes just days after the kingdom's human rights record was again in the spotlight following news of the death from a stroke in custody of leading activist Abullah al-Hamid, 69.

Hamid was a founding member of the Saudi Civil and Political Rights Association (ACPRA) and was sentenced to 11 years in jail in March 2013, campaigners said.

He was convicted on multiple charges, including "breaking allegiance" to the Saudi ruler, "inciting disorder" and seeking to disrupt state security, Amnesty International said.

Criticism of Saudi Arabia's human rights record has grown since King Salman named his son Prince Mohammed crown prince and heir to the throne in June 2017.

The October 2018 murder of vocal critic Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and the increased repression of dissidents at home have overshadowed the prince's pledge to modernise the economy and society.

© 2020 

World leaders launch push for Covid-19 vaccine – but US stays away
Yuan Qiong, senior legal and policy advisor at Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Access Campaign welcomed the pledges but "There shouldn't be any patent monopoly and profiteering out of this pandemic" 


Issued on: 25/04/2020
Text by:NEWS WIRES|
Video by:FRANCE 24

World leaders pledged on Friday to accelerate work on tests, drugs and vaccines against COVID-19 and to share them around the globe, but the United States did not take part in the launch of the World Health Organization (WHO) initiative.

French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa were among those who joined a video conference to launch what the WHO billed as a "landmark collaboration" to fight the pandemic.

The aim is to speed development of safe and effective drugs, tests and vaccines to prevent, diagnose and treat COVID-19, the lung disease caused be the novel coronavirus - and ensure equal access to treatments for rich and poor.

"We are facing a common threat which we can only defeat with a common approach," WHO Director General Tedros Adhanom

Ghebreyesus said as he opened the virtual meeting.

"Experience has told us that even when tools are available they have not been equally available to all. We cannot allow that to happen."

During the H1N1 swine flu pandemic in 2009, there was criticism that distribution of vaccines was not equitable as wealthier countries were able to purchase more.

"We must make sure that people who need them get them," said Peter Sands, head of the Global Fund to Fight on AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. "The lessons from AIDS must be learned. Too many millions died before anti-retroviral medicines were made widely accessible."

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the objective at a global pledging effort on May 4 would be to raise 7.5 billion euros ($8.10 billion) to ramp up work on prevention, diagnostics and treatment.

"This is a first step only, but more will be needed in the future," von der Leyen told the conference.

'Common fight'

Leaders from Asia, the Middle East and the Americas also joined the videoconference, but several big countries did not participate, including China, India and Russia.

A spokesman for the U.S. mission in Geneva had earlier told Reuters that the United States would not be involved.

"Although the United States was not in attendance at the meeting in question, there should be no doubt about our continuing determination to lead on global health matters, including the current COVID crisis," he said by email.

"We remain deeply concerned about the WHO's effectiveness, given that its gross failures helped fuel the current pandemic," he later said.

U.S. President Donald Trump has lambasted the WHO as being slow to react to the outbreak and being "China-centric" and announced a suspension of funding.

Tedros has steadfastly defended the WHO's handling of the pandemic and repeatedly committed to conducting a post-pandemic evaluation, as the agency does with all crises.

Macron, Merkel, Ramaphosa, and Spain's Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez were among those voicing strong support to WHO.

Macron urged all G7 and G20 countries to get behind the initiative, adding: "And I hope we'll manage to reconcile around this joint initiative both China and the U.S., because this is about saying 'the fight against COVID-19 is a common human good and there should be no division in order to win this battle'."

Merkel said: "This concerns a global public good, to produce this vaccine and to distribute it in all parts of the world."

Ramaphosa, chairman of the African Union, warned that the continent - with its generally poor standards of healthcare - was "extremely vulnerable to the ravages of this virus and is in need of support".

Vaccine trials

More than 2.7 million people have been infected with COVID-19 and nearly 190,000 have died from it since the new coronavirus emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year, according to a Reuters tally.


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"As new diagnostics, treatments and vaccines become available, we have a responsibility to get them out equitably with the understanding that all lives have equal value," said Melinda Gates, co-chair of the Gates Foundation, which was WHO's second largest donor last year.

More than 100 potential COVID-19 vaccines are being developed, including six already in clinical trials, said Dr. Seth Berkley, CEO of the GAVI vaccine alliance, a public-private partnership that leads immunisation campaigns in poor countries.

"We need to ensure that there are enough vaccines for everyone, we are going to need global leadership to identify and prioritise vaccine candidates," he told a Geneva news briefing.

Yuan Qiong, senior legal and policy advisor at Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) Access Campaign welcomed the pledges but called for concrete steps. "There shouldn't be any patent monopoly and profiteering out of this pandemic," she told Reuters.

(REUTERS)