Critics condemn Egyptian highway project through pyramid plateau


Mike Armstrong

© AP Photo/Nariman El-Mofty 

A man walks under a new highway flyover under construction through the Southern Cemetery, part of the City of the Dead, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, in Cairo, Egypt, on July 28, 2020. The sprawling necropolis has been the burial place of nobles, holy men, scholars, poets and commoners for some 1,300 years as well as a place of life, with tens of thousands of residents and bustling markets. Authorities say no ancient monuments were damaged in the construction, but preservationists say it tears through an urban fabric that was intact for centuries.

Critics say an Egyptian infrastructure project through an area south of Cairo could threaten pyramids in the region and mean undiscovered treasures may never be found.

Two new highways are being constructed across a pyramid plateau, cutting through some of the most important ancient sites in the world.

“It’s as though anywhere you dig there, you’re going to find something,” says Gayle Gibson, one of Canada’s leading Egyptologists.

READ MORE: (Nov. 2, 2017) Secret chamber found in Egypt’s Great Pyramid, purpose is unknown

One new road runs about 2.5 kilometres south of the Great Pyramids, including Giza and the Great Sphinx.

The second new highway is further south, through the desert, linking Helwan to the east and the new settlements of Sixth of October City to the west.

In the 1990s, the Egyptian government suspended a similar project after an international outcry.

Former senior UNESCO official Sail Zulficar fought against that project and says he was flabbergasted to hear it was going ahead again.

“It’s as though all the work I had done 25 years ago is now being put into question,” Zulficar says.

The pyramid fields were declared a UNESCO world heritage site in 1979.

Critics say the new highway will mean more vehicles and an increase in air pollution that could affect the pyramids. They also say it could mean undiscovered archaeological sites could be covered up.

According to UNESCO, it has requested information about the project from the Egyptian government repeatedly, but has heard nothing.

Zulficar says there is a buffer zone around world heritage sites that allow some construction, but that there’s a protocol to follow.

“There’s an environmental impact study made before,” he says. “And if the environmental study is negative, and says that it might impair the site, it should be stopped.”

READ MORE: (Sept. 10, 2018) Inside the 4,000-year-old Egyptian tomb now open to the public

One section of the new highway runs south of the Saqqara necropolis, the burial ground for the ancient Egyptian capital, Memphis. It passes less than 3 km from the Step pyramid, the oldest of all pyramids, built about 4,600 years ago.

The highway passes to the north of the Dahshur necropolis, a burial ground that includes the Red Pyramid and the Bent Pyramid.

“Memphis was the seat of government until the 18th dynasty, which was less than 2,000 years BC,” Zulficar says. “It was a thriving city and it was the largest city in Egypt at the time.”

The eight-lane highways are part of an infrastructure project meant to open up new areas and combat congestion. Cairo, a city of 9.1 million, is one of the world's most congested urban centers.

The country’s minister of tourism and antiquities says the archaeological sites are being protected.

“There isn’t a single artifact in Egypt that anyone can harm, or demolish, or build next to,” says minister Khaled El Anany. “Any bridge, any project in Egypt, takes permission of the antiquities ministry first, to make sure the area doesn’t include antiquities.”

While some critics have gone public, others have not. Some Egyptologists fear if they speak out, the Egyptian government could refuse to give them permits to work in the country in the future.

ONTARIO 

Retired teachers call letter asking them to return to work 'infuriating,' and the result of 'bad planning'


Jessica Cheung


David Maclellan was surprised when an email popped into his inbox this week asking him to come back to work.

The Ontario College of Teachers was asking former and retired members to step back into the classroom due to a shortage of certified teachers.

"I thought it was an interesting offer that I'm not doing," said Maclellan with a chuckle.

Maclellan, who retired in 2009 after teaching for 34 years, said he was stunned when he got the letter. It comes as school boards across the province are experiencing teacher shortages due to smaller class sizes, and an influx of students opting for virtual learning due to surging COVID-19 case numbers in Ontario.

"I was a bit surprised and I think it shows a lack of planning — trying to track down retired teachers almost at the end of September," he told CBC News.  

© CBC David Maclellan, who retired in 2009 after teaching for 34 years, says he was 'a bit surprised' when he received the letter.

In the letter, the college encourages teachers to "pursue these new employment opportunities" with a rallying call: "In short, you are needed."


The letter says: "Ontario is currently experiencing a shortage of certified teachers, which has been magnified by smaller class sizes during the pandemic to improve physical distancing and reduce the risks of spreading the COVID-19 virus."

"If you have always wanted to make an impact in the lives of children and young adults, now is the time," the letter reads.

Earlier this week, the Toronto District School Board, the province's largest, launched online classes only to see thousands of kids left without teachers.

On Monday, the TDSB said 60,000 elementary school students had signed up for virtual learning.

The board said on Tuesday that it still needs to hire about 100 to 150 more teachers to accommodate the number of students registered for online classes.
Letter was 'infuriating,' retired teacher says

Jen Shapka, a retired teacher who now lives in Manitoba, described the letter as "infuriating" and "ridiculous."

"It was, I would even go so far as to say, offensive to read that the college is putting out that messaging," Shapka said.

"Why you would choose this moment to pay your reinstatement fee to the college, pay your annual fee to the college to go and have poor working conditions. They're out to lunch on that one."  

  

© CBC Jen Shapka, a retired teacher who now lives in Manitoba, says the letter was 'infuriating.'
132,000 members receive email, 600 accept so far

The college, which licenses, governs and regulates all public school teachers and administrators in the province, says a total of 132,000 members received that email, including retirees, members in good standing who are not currently identified as teachers and teacher applicants who have yet to complete the application process.

According to Brian Jamieson, senior communications officer with the college, 600 teachers have already taken them up on their offer since the letter was sent out.

"[It] is a powerful indication of teachers' desire to help," Jamieson said in a statement to CBC Toronto Friday evening.

Jamieson added that the decision is a "personal choice" and the college is "not asking people to do something they're not prepared to do."

We simply wanted to say that, if you want to help and can, here's how."
'Do I want to get in there and help?'

But Martha Foster, chair of the Retired Teachers of Ontario, said the call to action puts retired teachers, especially senior ones, in a tricky position, forcing them to weigh the risk factor of going back into a classroom amid a pandemic that has proved deadly to patients who are over the age of 65, especially those with underlying conditions.

"Do I want to get in there and help, which has been my whole life working with kids? Or is this about me? Do I have to watch out for me?" she said.

"That's the decision all the retired teachers are making." 

© CBC Martha Foster, chair of the Retired Teachers of Ontario, says she estimates that tens of thousands of former and retired teachers received the letter.

Foster said she doesn't expect a lot of retired teachers will take up this offer — a sentiment that is shared by Shapka and Maclellan.

"I would be surprised if a lot of retired teachers wanted to plunge back in right now," Maclellen said.

"I feel very badly for the students and the teachers being, in essence, forced back into school where I'm not totally convinced the planning is 100 per cent in place and 100 per cent safe."

TAX THE CHURCH!

Religion and its services contribute $67.5 billion to the Canadian economy, calculates new study


Tyler Dawson


Provided by National Post

 A service is held at St. Eugene De Mazenod Catholic Church in Brampton.

Even as the proportion of the faithful in Canada declines, the activities of religious people and organizations account for nearly $67.5 billion of economic activity in Canada each year, according to estimates in a new paper from Cardus, a faith-based Canadian think tank.

“There is a broad, wide and overall totally beneficial effect of religion on the lives of everyday Canadians, on our country, on our social safety, and that applies to people not just who are religious,” said Brian Dijkema, vice-president of external affairs at Cardus. “It shows the broader public benefit of religion to Canadian society as a whole.”

The report, the first of its kind in Canada to tally up the economic impact of faith, suggests there are hard-dollar contributions to the economy, worth about $31 billion, which considers the revenues of faith-based charities, organizations and congregations. Then there is a further $37 billion in “halo effects,” which tallies up the economic impact of things such as substance-abuse support, or kosher and halal food sales.

“Understanding the socioeconomic value of religion to Canadian society is especially important in the present era characterized by disaffiliation from organized religion,” the report, released Monday, says. “Of course, faith has much more value than is represented by a dollar estimate, but such a valuation provides a new way of understanding the contribution of faith to Canadian society.”

Of the nearly 38 million people in Canada, roughly half (55 per cent) are Christians of one persuasion or another, according to a PEW study from 2019; a further 29 per cent are some variety of agnostic, up from just four per cent in 1971. A further eight per cent fall among other religions, such as Sikh, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist.

To come up with its estimates, Cardus trawled through charitable returns, school and religious health-care financial documents and religious publication revenues.

Of the direct economic contribution of $31 billion, the lion’s share is publicly funded Catholic schools, which is a total of $14.5 billion. The next most significant economic outlay is congregation revenue at $7 billion, then health care at $4.7 billion. The remainder is made up by independent schools, charities, higher education and religious media.

The most important part of the estimate, said Dijkema, involves the “halo effect” of religion.

“We’re talking about $35 billion worth of activity that takes place simply because these religious communities are committed to making the lives of their members and their community that much better,” he said.

The report catalogues several ways in which religion provides additional economic benefits: religious employees, for example, pay taxes; congregations spend in local economies; churches attract revenue-generating activities such as weddings and provide an “invisible safety net” of social services (Cardus says that 47 per cent of Alcoholics Anonymous meetings happen in churches.)

These estimates use modelling from other studies. To come up with its total indirect spending estimate of $37 billion, Cardus assumes congregations spend what they bring in, approximately $7 billion, but that represents only 20 per cent, per the other research, of total congregation activity.

COVID-19 Religion: Canadian wage subsidy program to help fund congregations hit by pandemic crunch

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The remaining 80 per cent is broken up among the aforementioned activities, again using percentages from other studies, and then the money is calculated from there, for example, 3.5 per cent, or $1.2 billion for safety net supports. The largest cohort, categorized as “individual impact,” is worth about $13.4 billion, or 38 per cent of the total. That includes the benefits, broadly, of providing support “to individuals, couples, and families,” the report says.

“Housing, food banks, care for immigrants and refugees, care for those who are in abusive situations, often it’s people in religious communities who are the first responders to that,” said Dijkema.

“Often people, when they think of religion, they think of people praying privately … but I think what this shows is the religious character of many communities in Canada have vast and under-appreciated public effects.”

The study doesn’t consider some all potential effects of faith, though. While Christmas, for example, is worth about $10 billion to the Canadian economy, Cardus ignores it, since it is not necessarily directly attributable to faith.

As well, Cardus cautions the study doesn’t account for some of the negative influences of religious life. They also say the “most important” limitation is that the estimate of the value of goods and services “is based on the proposition that the findings from other halo-effect studies can be extrapolated up to the national level.”




CARDUS IS A NEO CALVANIST THINK TANK FROM THE SOUTH AFRICAN BASED DUTCH REFORM CHURCH AND ITS FORMER RIGHT WING LABOUR THINK TANK THAT BECAME CLAC THEIR MANAGEMENT UNION AND NOW CARDUS. IT HIRES DUTCH SOUTH AFRIKANERS IT IS LINKED TO THE RIGHT WING REFORMED CHURCH MEMEBERS LIKE BETSY DEVOS IN THE USA AND THE AMERICAN RIGHT WING THINK TANK THE ACTON INSTITUTE.

SEVERAL CANADIAN CALVINIST UNIVERSITIES CONTRIBUTE

TO CARDUS/CLAC.

SEE 

http://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2005/03/right-to-life-right-to-work.html

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2005/04/origin-of-clac.html

Rise of the zombies? Europe faces insolvency balancing act

IF BANKS ARE ZOMBIES DO WE SHOOT THE BANKERS IN THE HEAD

© Reuters/Axel Schmidt 

FILE PHOTO: The spread of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in Germany

By Paul Carrel


BERLIN (Reuters) - Even as the European economy slumps into its deepest recession in modern history, the number of bankruptcies across the continent has fallen sharply as government subsidies and a temporary loosening of insolvency rules keep companies afloat.

During the first half of 2020, countries including Britain, France and Spain saw insolvencies fall by an estimated 20-40%year-on-year, official and private sector data show.

But as the region implements new restrictions to control a fresh rise in COVID-19 infections, the question for governments is whether to preserve jobs at the risk of creating a generation of debt-laden "zombie" firms with no real future.

For now, it seems a risk they believe worth taking.

In Germany, Europe's biggest economy, there was a 6.2% year-on-year drop in insolvency filings in the first half after the government temporarily waived a filing obligation. By contrast, U.S. Chapter 11 bankruptcy filings rose 26%, according to legal-services firm Epiq Systems Inc.

Now, Berlin plans to give troubled firms yet more leeway.

Local critics say the first-half fall in insolvencies is proof in itself the state has done more than enough and now risks impeding what economic liberals hail as "creative destruction", the term popularised in the 1940s by Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter to describe unviable firms folding to make way for more dynamic newcomers.

But the issue is knowing how to distinguish the zombies – generally defined as companies which would anyway struggle to cover their interest payments – from basically healthy firms that have run into temporary trouble.

Jan-Marco Luczak, legal and consumer spokesman for Angela Merkel's conservative CDU/CSU, said it was "good and right" that the government helped businesses quickly and without red tape.

"But it is also clear that we must not permanently switch off the self-cleaning process of the market," he told Reuters. "Companies that are not healthy and have no economic prospects independently of corona must exit the market."

Germany's Federal Statistics Office confirms the drop in insolvencies was directly facilitated by government measures, including allowing firms to delay filing for bankruptcy until the end of September, now extended to the end of the year.

A new draft reform, which would take effect at the start of 2021, envisages extending the deadline for firms to file for insolvency to six from three weeks while also giving them the opportunity to terminate onerous contracts.

"The company is given a wide margin of manoeuvre in drawing up the restructuring plan, organising the negotiations and conducting the vote on the restructuring plan," the Justice Ministry said of the proposals in a written statement sent to Reuters.

That has raised alarm bells with the IDW Institute of Public Auditors, which is calling on the government to press struggling companies to restructure earlier, rather than when they face a real threat of insolvency.

(Graphic: German insolvencies fall during lockdown - https://graphics.reuters.com/HEALTH-CORONAVIRUS/jbyprmmdbve/chart.png)



STRUCTURAL CHANGE

Jens Weidmann, president of Germany's national central bank and a known fiscal hawk, also has concerns.

He acknowledges the "balancing act" involved in countering the pandemic's economic fallout with state support measures but, in a speech this month, highlighted the potential to kick-start what many would see as a long overdue structural change in Germany's economy away from its reliance on the industries of the last century. The auto sector is one such example.

"Digital transformation could get a real boost", he said, giving one example of the creative destruction that pro-market advocates are seeking.

Berenberg Bank economist Holger Schmieding said the government was not yet impeding corporate renewal, but was at risk of doing so.

"In this unusual and unusually deep recession, it makes sense to slow down the process of destruction."

"Over the course of next year, the balance will shift," he added. "Extending the moratorium on insolvency proceedings into next year would be wrong, in my view."

REDUCED PROSPECTS

Credit insurance and debt collection group Atradius estimates a 26% rise in insolvencies globally this year as governments start to phase out support schemes. However it predicts that any increase in the second half will be much lower in Europe than elsewhere.

The Paris-based Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) last week urged governments to review and refocus pandemic support measures as the recovery progresses.

Failure to do so could hinder the recovery by trapping resources in non-productive firms and jobs, reducing prospects for shifting jobs to more productive and higher-paid ones, it said.

In Spain, one of hardest hit European countries both economically and in health terms, some 130 leading economists are urging the government to fine-tune employment protection schemes to avoid non-viable companies being subsidised.

"It is key to avoid problems of incentives that could delay the revival of the economy and the reallocation of workers towards more productive enterprises," they wrote.

Britain is taking a different tack. While it has announced a wage subsidy scheme modelled loosely on Germany's long-running 'Kurzarbeit" short-time work programme, Finance Minister Rishi Sunak has made it clear the initiative – a much less costly replacement to furlough measures expiring next month - was not intended to save jobs that were not viable in the long term.

(Additional reporting by Belen Carreno in Madrid; Editing by Kirsten Donovan)

One Year After The First Climate Strike, Here’s What Greta Thunberg Has Accomplished


Erin Corbett SEPT 21, 2020

© Provided by Refinery29

Greta Thunberg, the 17-year-old Swedish climate activist is back to school after taking a year off to continue campaigning to stop global warming. On this day one year ago, Thunderg led the largest global climate strike in history, as more than 4 million people across 161 different countries went on strike to demand climate action. Students, trade unionists, workers, and labor organizers were among the many who joined the massive walkout, with a message to their governments that together they would not be stopped.

Thunberg’s activism started gaining international attention during the 2018 summer when she launched a weekly climate direct action called “Fridays for Future” or “School Strike for Climate.” Every Friday, Thunberg encouraged students everywhere to skip school and demand their governments take action to save our planet. And the striking has continued for the past year.

So, what has Thunberg been up to the past year? Although the 17-year-old has taken a backseat in the news in recent months due to the chaos of the presidential election, ongoing uprisings for racial justice, the pandemic, and aliens, Thunberg has been very busy. In the last year, she has taken her environmental activism around the globe, to the United Nations Climate Action Summit in New York City and the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

During her trip to New York, the young activist delivered a now-famous, passionate speech that put world leaders to shame. “I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean,” Thunberg said. “Yet you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you. You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.”

In Davos, Thunberg took on U.S. President Donald Trump in a speech to audience members urging world leaders to take steps to fix a problem they created. After all, 100 companies alone are responsible for 71% of global emissions and more than 20% of greenhouse gas emissions in the U.S. come from the oil and gas industry.

“You say children shouldn’t worry. You say, ‘Just leave this to us. We will fix this. We promise we won’t let you down. ‘Don’t be so pessimistic,’” she said, directing her ire at Trump, who during an earlier address suggested climate activists should not be pessimistic about the future of our planet.

Greta Thunberg

@GretaThunberg

School strike week 106. Back outside the Swedish Parliament! We will not go away until you #FaceTheClimateEmergency . If you strike, remember to keep social distance and follow COVID-19 restrictions. #climatestrike #fridaysforfuture #schoolstrike4climate #flattenthecurve

1:04 AM · Aug 28, 2020

Much like the rest of the world, Thunberg has had to adapt to changes in her everyday life due to the global public health crisis we face. As a result, she took her weekly climate strikes to the internet, and organized a digital strike every Friday. Thunberg invited participants to post of photo of themselves striking with their protest signs and the hashtag #ClimateStrikeOnline. In some of her free time, the 17-year-old said she also started “doing some school” after her gap year travels were interrupted. “It doesn’t really count, but just because I love studying so much,” said Thunberg.

Even in the middle of the pandemic, as we all took steps to social distance and stay home whenever possible, Thunberg continues to raise awareness about social issues and hold world leaders accountable. In June when Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro criticized stay-at-home measures and shutting down non-essential businesses, Thunberg launched a crowdfunding campaign with Fridays for Future to purchase medical supplies and make telemedicine services accessible to people living in the Amazon rainforest.

But it seems that one year later, the teen continues to organize and boost weekly digital climate strikes, and has moved to start striking in-person again. In August, the climate activist took her socially distanced strike back to the Swedish Parliament, and continued to amplify calls for action. Thunberg along with thousands of journalists, activists, scientists, and professors signed an open letter demanding the European Union and global leaders make a number of changes to slow global warming, including halting investments in fossil fuel exploration and extraction, enacting climate policies that protect workers, and making ecocide an international crime, among others.

Despite her warnings last year that school strikes have not achieved enough and her admission that it’s just not sustainable, Thunberg remains a force for change and inspiration to youth organizers the world over.


Greta Thunberg's CNN Debut Causes Twitter Backlash

Greta Thunberg's New TV Show Follows Her Journey

Greta Thunberg Gets Nobel Prize Nomination Again   

The Last Months Of A Canadian Who Died Of COVID-19 In ICE Custody

MURDER BY ANY OTHER NAME WOULD BE MOST FOUL

KILLED FOR PILL PUSHING LIKE RUSH LIMBAUGH

AMERICA IS A CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY

PRISON NATION RUN BY PRIVATE JAILS

Samantha Beattie HUFFPOST CANADA 

SEPT 21,2020

© Provided by HuffPost Canada James Hill, in an updated photo, died of COVID-19 in August in an American immigration detention centre.


Months after James Hill was supposed to be released from U.S. prison and reunited with his family in Canada, he died alone of COVID-19 in American immigration custody, hooked up to a ventilator and unable to speak.

The former doctor from Newmarket, Ont. was caught in a torrent of events outside his control — immigration delays, the coronavirus pandemic and irresponsible actions on the part of American officials.

“He thought he was going to be free,” Hill’s daughter Verity told HuffPost Canada from her Toronto home.

“I can’t stop thinking that he was ultimately given a death sentence. It’s injustice on top of injustice.”

Hill was released from prison in April after serving 14 years for illegally distributing Oxycontin to patients at his Louisiana family practice, but was immediately detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

With an expired American green card and Canadian passport, Hill, 72, was sent to the for-profit Farmville Detention Center in Virginia to await deportation, scheduled to fly home July 9 — three months after the transfer. HuffPost has pieced together his final months at the facility through interviews, a lawsuit, news stories and public statements.

© Provided by HuffPost Canada The Farmville Detention Center on Aug. 12, 2020 in Farmville, Va. It has seen the worst coronavirus outbreak of any such facility in the United States.


Verity described her father as gentle and understanding, a man who was made an example of by the American justice system during former president George W. Bush’s war on drugs.

The judge and federal prosecutor in the case both said Hill liberally handed out prescriptions for addictive painkillers to his patients, the National Post reported during Hill’s sentencing in 2007.

His criminal defence lawyer, Randal Fish, argued many of Hill’s patients didn’t have health insurance or access to pain specialists and needed help. He was “stunned” at the length of Hill’s sentence.

“I’ve specialized in criminal defence law for close to 27 years now and this has to be, bar none, the most horrible, egregious miscarriage of justice I’ve seen in my life,” he said at the time.

Hill tried to make the most of federal prison, running self-help groups and a horticultural program for other inmates, writing 11 books of poetry, a novel and countless letters to Verity.

But Farmville was like nothing he had experienced before.

© Provided by HuffPost Canada A detainee lays on a dormitory bunk at a detention centre in Lumpkin, Ga. on Nov. 15, 2019.


“My father had lived in four different U.S. prisons. He said Farmville was the worst of any of them,” Verity said, adding Hill called his family regularly from the detention centre to keep them up to date.

“There was no sunlight, no privacy,” she said. “There was a bank of phones against one wall and always a lineup and nobody ever cleaned the phones. It just seems ridiculous.”

This spring, the hundreds of immigrants at Farmville were beginning to panic about the possible spread of COVID-19 — and the lack of resources to protect themselves from it. Hill was no exception. He lived alongside dozens of other men in a poorly ventilated dormitory, sleeping head-to-head in bunk beds and sharing bathrooms, showers and a cafeteria, without consistent access to cleaning supplies or masks.

    

© Provided by HuffPost Canada Detainees talk on the phones at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in Adelanto, Calif. on Aug. 28, 2019.


Meanwhile, protests were erupting across the country as Americans reacted to police killings of Black people, including George Floyd, and demanded an end to systemic racism and discrimination.

In an effort to crack down on largely peaceful demonstrators in Washington, D.C., President Donald Trump’s administration went to dangerous lengths to quickly mobilize tactical teams, including ICE officers, the Washington Post reported last week. ICE arranged charter flights for their officers, under the pretense the agency was transferring 74 detainees from half-empty facilities in Florida and Arizona to Farmville — 270 km south of the capital — according to the Post.

“Immigration used people as plane tickets, while disregarding the health and safety of the people on those planes,” said Adina Appelbaum, a program director at the Capital Area Immigrants’ Rights Coalition. “It’s really upsetting to hear this behaviour led to so many people getting sick.”


Local ICE officials pushed back on the transfers, said Farmville director Jeff Crawford to the town’s council last month, while addressing officials’ concerns about a reported outbreak at the facility.

Farmville had only experienced a handful of COVID-19 cases that spring and staff worried they wouldn’t have enough space for social distancing if more people arrived.

But headquarters assured them the facilities the detainees were coming from “had no instances of COVID-19,” Crawford said.

“In hindsight, we believe we’ve discovered information that this was not accurate, but that is what we were told at the time.”


Of the new detainees that arrived, 51 tested positive for COVID-19, alleges a lawsuit launched by four men against ICE and Farmville for their “woefully inadequate response to the COVID-19 pandemic.” Two of the plaintiffs are being held in custody until their immigration hearings. The other two were granted permission by judges to stay in the U.S., but ICE is appealing those decisions.

The virus spread like “wildfire” throughout the facility, says the lawsuit. By mid-July, at least 315 detainees had tested positive — more than 80 per cent of Farmville’s population — and seven were hospitalized.

In total, more than 5,000 people in ICE custody across the U.S. have come into contact with COVID-19. About 20, including Hill, have died so far in 2020.

The disturbing, chaotic conditions Hill described to his family are similar to those alleged in the lawsuit, which has not yet been proven in court.

Hill saw detainees without masks or gloves clean up vomit and feces of those who were sick, but not isolated, Verity said. Hill tried to sleep during the day to avoid interacting with others. He ate as little as possible, not wanting to go to the mess hall because detainees with COVID-19 symptoms were serving food that was expired, undercooked or infested with bugs.

“The way my dad put it, it was not a matter of if he gets COVID, but when,” Verity said.

© Provided by HuffPost Canada Detainees gather in a common area at the Adelanto ICE Processing Center in Adelanto, Calif., on Aug. 28, 2019, during a media tour.

The immigrants who filed the lawsuit allege they never saw a doctor and were only ever given Tylenol to treat fevers, body pains, headaches and any difficulty breathing. They were not tested for days after first showing symptoms and three continued to live in the dorms.

One of the detainees, 27-year-old Gerson Amilcar Perez Garcia from Honduras, experienced severe COVID-19 symptoms, including diarrhea, a high fever and shortness of breath, and lost a total of 40 pounds, the lawsuit alleges. He was put in isolation with another sick detainee after six days of symptoms and given limited amounts of Tylenol and Gatorade. Guards checked on him once a day.

One night, Perez Garcia felt like he couldn’t breathe for an hour, the lawsuit says.

“He panicked, and he screamed to the guards for help while banging on the window of his cell. He did this for about 10 minutes when he became so exhausted he had to stop.”

No one responded to his cries.

© Provided by HuffPost Canada A detainee sits in a cell at an immigration detention facility in Tacoma, Wash., on Sept. 10, 2019.


Crawford, Farmville’s director, denied the lawsuit’s allegations while speaking to town councillors in August.

“The notion we did not adequately respond to the COVID-19 situation at the facility is false. The notion that our staff and detainees are ill is false,” Crawford said.

“The assertion that our detainees are not receiving medical care is false. The notion we are not conducting COVID-19 testing or that testing is inadequate is false. The notion our detainees don’t have access to (personal protective equipment) or soap is false.”

© Provided by HuffPost Canada Detainees leave the cafeteria under the watch of guards at the Winn Correctional Center in Winnfield, La., on Sept. 26, 2019.


On July 1, guards shot pepper spray into Hill’s dorm when inmates were too ill to stand up for the daily count, Verity said. Hill told his family he was exposed to the gas and began experiencing shortness of breath two days later.

He was taken to the hospital overnight, then returned to his dorm, Crawford told councillors, denying Hill was ever exposed to pepper spray.

Hill’s breathing issues continued, though, so he was sent to the medical unit for observation.

By July 9, Hill’s symptoms had only worsened, to the point he wasn’t allowed to board his flight home, Verity said. The day after he was supposed to be settling back in Canada, he was finally diagnosed with COVID-19 — his oxygen saturation levels were so low he was transferred to a hospital.

“He didn’t want to go on a ventilator because he wanted to remain cognizant,” said Verity. “But at a certain point he was too breathless to speak and didn’t have a choice.”

© Provided by HuffPost Canada Verity and James Hill in 1986 in Richmond Hill, Ont.


For the next four weeks, she and her family spoke to Hill over the phone, hoping he was listening to their words of encouragement. Verity suffered from extreme anxiety, grinding her teeth until they crumbled, fearful she’d lose not only her father, but the chance to reunite.

In a poem about that time, titled “That Contentious Border,” Verity wrote:

“those days

where I was waiting remain

a tense eternity

“I expected

news of your recovery

you had to prevail

or I’d know nothing certainly

“adrift since

between no fixed points of now and then

you were supposed

to share a quality of light, a shade of green with me

on the stage of our reunion

“why how where is that resolved

into a box that transports the remainders

across that contentious border.”

On the night of Aug. 5, hospital staff told Hill’s family they were going to take him off life support. Verity had one last chance to say goodbye.

“I told him that he’d given me his gift and I would use it to write him a life,” Verity said.

Four months after entering ICE custody, Hill died.

“There is tragic news, which is the death of a detainee,” Crawford said at the town council meeting. “But there’s a lot of good news as well.”

Since July 10, he said they’ve administered more than 700 tests and documented no other detainees or staff with symptoms.

“Yes, we’ve had many positive (tests), but there’s a great difference between testing positive and being sick.”

Watch: A public health crisis in unfolding in ICE detention facilities during the pandemic. Story continues below.


However, a recent inspection done for the lawsuit’s plaintiffs found health care staff at Farmville were not monitoring detainees for ongoing symptoms nor properly screening them for COVID-19. Less than a quarter of the detainees were wearing masks.

ICE said in a statement it is conducting a review into Hill’s death.

Canadian officials are aware of Hill’s death and are in contact with local authorities to gather information, said Global Affairs spokesperson Jason Kung. They are providing assistance to Hill’s family, but can provide no further information citing privacy reasons.

Verity has dealt with her grief by sharing Hill’s story with advocacy groups and media, in the hopes it will create change for the people still detained in Farmville — taking the same stance as her father would.

“He had this attitude that humanity is a collective and we’re all responsible for each other. One person’s difficulties we share,” she said. “He didn’t see a divide between people.”

Shortly after Hill was sentenced in 2007, Verity wrote to him, expressing her anguish.

“How do you manage, now that the things you counted on are fantasies?” Verity asked.

Hill’s response then rings true for Verity now.

“I breathe,” he wrote. “I become this simple act, not an inhabitant of this cell, a server of this sentence, or even a man …. Don’t fight the grief: it will just resurface elsewhere in anger.”

It’s Not Just Hysterectomies: The U.S. Has A Long, Shameful History Of Forced Sterilizations

Britni de la Cretaz
2020-09-18

© Provided by Refinery29 MANHATTAN, NEW YORK, UNITED STATES – 2020/01/06: Protesters holding a banner at the silent protest. Members of the activist group Rise And Resist gathered a silent protest inside The Oculus at the World Trade Center, holding protest signs, a banner reading “U.S. Immigration Policy Is A Crime”, photographs of the children who have died in ICE custody, and photographs of the detention camps to object to Border Patrol and ICE treatment of immigrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, calling on the Trump administration to immediately process all asylum seekers. (Photo by Erik McGregor/LightRocket via Getty Images)

As news broke this week that ICE was performing hysterectomies on non-consenting detainees in Georgia, countless people expressed shock and anger at the news, which was brought to light by whistleblower Dawn Wooten, who had been a nurse at the detention center. But, dismaying as this news was, it was hardly surprising: The U.S. has a well-documented, centuries-long history of forcibly sterilizing people, particularly women of color.

From eugenics campaigns a century ago to the current-day hysterectomies being performed in ICE facilities, attacks on the reproductive freedom of marginalized people are baked into the history of the U.S., and include things like denying hysterectomies for trans men who need them for gender-affirming reasons. It’s important to remember, too, that reproductive justice — a term coined by a group Black women — doesn’t just mean access to abortion; it means the freedom to reproduce on your own terms and to be provided the support and access to resources required to do so. But many people over the course of history have not had that choice.

Forced sterilization has been used as a genocidal tactic, one designed to prevent or limit the ability of certain segments of the population from being able to reproduce. “Forced sterilization is a deliberate, systemic, and targeted devaluation of Black, Brown, and Indigenous women, people, and families,” reproductive justice organization If/When/How wrote on Twitter. “[It] is intended to incite terror in Black and Brown and Indigenous communities here and abroad, to foment despair and hopelessness, and to erase the futures of Black, Brown, and Indigenous families everywhere.”

The practice of experimenting with sterilization officially started in the U.S. nearly 100 years ago. The Racial Integrity Act of 1924 encouraged the sexual sterilization of institutionalized people in Virginia in order to improve the “health of the patient and the welfare of society.” In the 1927 case Buck v. Bell, the Supreme Court upheld that statute and the decision resulted in 70,000 sterilizations of people deemed “unfit” to reproduce, largely due to mental illness, but also because of physical disability, poverty, or race.

Author Adam Cohen, who wrote the book Imbeciles about the Buck case, draws parallels between the rhetoric that allowed those sterilizations and anti-immigrant narratives pushed today, telling NPR, “I think these instincts to say that we need to stop these other people from ‘polluting us,’ from changing the nature of our country, they’re very real.” In that way, there is a direct line from the Buck case to the hysterectomies perpetrated by ICE.

These practices continued for decades, and in the 1970s, the U.S. government forcibly sterilized as many as 70,000 Native women through the Indian Health Service. An estimated 25 percent of Native women of childbearing age were sterilized by 1976. This assault on the reproductive freedom of Native women was occurring at the same time feminists were celebrating the expansion of women’s right to choose, thanks to the 1973 Supreme Court decision Roe v. Wade, making clear the disparities of who had the ability to access that freedom and who did not.

This was also a distinction that could be seen when thousands of Mexican women who had come to the U.S. had been forcibly sterilized between the 1920s and 1950s for being deemed “immigrants of an undesirable type.” In the 1960s and 1970s, Mexican women in Los Angeles were deceived into having non-consensual sterilizations in order to receive medical care or have their babies delivered. That case was brought to light when a brave group of Chicano women spoke out and participated in a class-action lawsuit. Between the 1930s and the 1970s, nearly one-third of women in Puerto Rico were sterilized as part of a mass eugenics campaign, something that continues to impact Puerto Rican women and the larger Puerto Rican community today.

In 1973, two Black sisters, Minnie and Marie Relf, were sterilized under the premise of getting birth control shots, and their lawsuit drew national attention to how poor Black women were being targeted by sterilization efforts by the U.S. government. Research by The Sterilization and Social Justice Lab, which is studying the history of sterilization in the United States, shows that sterilization rates for Black women increased as desegregation efforts expanded, evidence of a backlash to integration intended to reassert “white supremacist control and racial hierarchies specifically through the control of Black reproduction and future Black lives,” according to Dr. Alexandra Minna Stern, Professor of American Culture, History, and Women’s Studies at the University of Michigan, and leader of the Sterilization and Social Justice Lab.

More recently, in 2010, women in California prisons were subjected to sterilization against their will, and in 2015, a Tennessee judge offered probation to a woman in exchange for sterilization. “America is so scared of Black and Brown people ‘taking over,’ that it commits the most horrific atrocities,” Julissa Natzely Arce Raya, author of My (Underground) American Dream, said on Twitter.

With this long and horrifying national history, it’s hard to hold out much hope that things will change, simply because of these most recent allegations. And yet, with so much current movement happening in the fight for racial justice, it’s possible to think there might be action taken. Recently, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has called for an investigation into the allegations brought forward by Wooten.

“We must close the camps and every detention center across the country. We need to completely rebuild the entire immigration system with the input and leadership of our communities,” the Colorado Organization for Latina Opportunity and Reproductive Rights (COLOR) said in a statement. “We demand change at every level and in every system to protect and ensure our health, our rights and our dignity.”

A Nurse Reveals ICE Is Performing Hysterectomies

New Details Emerge About The ICE Whistleblower

ICE Is Using COVID-19 To Raid Homes — Again

Nobel laureate refuses local honour over Poland's LGBT 'rift'


16 hrs ago


  

© Provided by The Canadian Press

WARSAW, Poland — Nobel Prize-winning writer Olga Tokarczuk has declined an honorary citizenship from the region of Poland where she lives because she would have had to share the honour with a Roman Catholic bishop who has made hostile comments about the LGBT community.

Tokarczuk said in a tweet Friday that while she appreciated being considered, she “sadly” couldn't accept Lower Silesia’s honorary citizenship. She said that receiving it at the same time as Bishop Ignacy Dec would highlight the “painful rift” in Poland over LGBT rights.

“I do not want to become an object of such actions and an element in this game,” said Tokarczuk, the winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize in literature and a vocal supporter of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people.

Dec has repeatedly described the LGBT rights movement as a threat to the Catholic Church and to Poland, which is predominantly Catholic.

Local councillors linked to Poland's centrist opposition Civic Coalition party nominated Tokarczuk as a honorary citizen, while members of the right-wing Law and Justice party that governs the country recommended Dec.

Tokarczuk, who lives in the southwestern city of Wroclaw, explained her reasons behind declining the honour.

“Instead of being a joyous celebration of a sense of community, it is a vivid illustration of the painful rift in our society,” she said.

Poland has produced heated debates over LGBT rights in recent months, including after right-wing President Andrzej Duda described the movement as worse than communism as part of his reelection campaign earlier this year.

The Associated Press

GOOD NEWS

William Perry Pendley: Federal judge removes acting Bureau of Land Management director after finding he has served unlawfully for 424 days


By Kyle Feldscher and Andy Rose, CNN
 

© US Department of the Interior

A federal judge on Friday ordered acting Bureau of Land Management Director William Perry Pendley to step aside, blocking him from exercising any more authority after finding that he has served unlawfully for more than 400 days.

Chief District Judge Brian Morris of the US District Court of Montana ruled that Pendley has served unlawfully for 424 days, in response to a lawsuit brought by Democratic Montana Gov. Steve Bullock and the Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation. Morris additionally ruled Secretary of the Interior David Bernhardt cannot pick another person to run the Bureau of Land Management as its acting head because that person must be appointed by the President and Senate-confirmed.

The judge gave both sides of the case 10 days to file briefs about which of Pendley's orders must be vacated.

"Pendley has served and continues to serve unlawfully as the Acting BLM Director," Morris wrote in his opinion. "His ascent to Acting BLM Director did not follow any of the permissible paths set forth by the U.S. Constitution or the (Federal Vacancies Reform Act). Pendley has not been nominated by the President and has not been confirmed by the Senate to serve as BLM Director."

He added, "Secretary Bernhardt lacked the authority to appoint Pendley as an Acting BLM Director under the FVRA. Pendley unlawfully took the temporary position beyond the 210-day maximum allowed by the FVRA. Pendley unlawfully served as Acting BLM Director after the President submitted his permanent appointment to the Senate for confirmation -- another violation of the FVRA. And Pendley unlawfully serves as Acting BLM Director today, under color of the Succession Memo."

Pendley was nominated to be the permanent director of the agency in July but the Trump administration withdrew his nomination in September after a series of controversial statements -- including saying that climate change is not real and falsely saying that there was no credible evidence of a hole in the ozone layer -- were made public by CNN's KFile.

The BLM manages 244 million acres of federal lands in the United States -- one out of every 10 acres of land in the country -- along with 30% of the nation's minerals. As acting director of the BLM, Pendley wielded significant authority over the leasing and use of land for mining, recreation, and oil and gas exploration and development along with maintaining environmental protections for federal lands. The agency is currently taking steps to move its headquarters and employees out west.

Last year, Pendley became the fifth person to lead the bureau on a temporary basis after the departure of Director Neil Kornze less than a year into the Trump administration. Bullock filed suit in July challenging Pendley's authority.

Pendley, a conservative activist, commentator and lawyer, was appointed by Bernhardt as acting director in July 2019.

Morris wrote that, by law, the position of Bureau of Land Management director is required to be confirmed by the Senate. The Trump administration argued that Pendley did not officially have the title of acting director, so the requirement does not apply.

"Such arguments prove evasive and undermine the constitutional system of checks and balances," Morris wrote, adding that the administration referred to Pendley publicly as the agency's director.

Interior Department spokesman Conner Swanson told CNN in an email the administration will appeal "immediately."

"This is an outrageous decision that is well outside the bounds of the law," Swanson said.

Bullock, who is challenging GOP Sen. Steve Daines in a competitive Senate race, tweeted, "Today's ruling is a win for the Constitution, the rule of law, and our public lands."