500 years after Martin Luther's excommunication: 

A chance for ecumenical Christianity

The first major schism of the Catholic Church was made official in 1521. The pope excommunicated the initiator of the Reformation, Martin Luther. The monk had referred to the pontiff as the "Antichrist."



The German city of Worms is scheduled to become the setting for multimedia events throughout the year marking 'The Luther Moment'

The German city of Worms is preparing for a major centennial. To mark the 500th anniversary of Martin Luther's appearance at the Diet of Worms on the night of April 17/18 1521, the southern German town on the banks of the Rhine is planning an extensive commemorative program in conjunction with the Lutheran Church. More than 80 events are scheduled, despite COVID-19. The only item to fall victim to the pandemic so far is the central exhibition entitled "Hier stehe ich. Gewissen und Protest — 1521 bis 2021" (Here I Stand. Conscience and Protest — 1521 to Today), which was postponed from April to July.

The title is a reference to the words with which, according to popular legend, Luther concluded his defense at Worms: "Here I stand. I can do no other."

To mark these historic days of April 17 to 18, a church in Worms will become the setting for multimedia events throughout the year marking "The Luther Moment." The title is intended as a projection of key moments in everyday people's lives, a reflection of courage and integrity. This key moment in European history in mid-April 1521 continues to reverberate to this day, not least among Catholic and Protestant theologians.


This room in the Wartburg in Eisenach is where Martin Luther translated the New Testament into German

The Church in crisis

It was in the early months of 1521 that the criticism of Martin Luther, an Augustinian monk born in Eisleben in the region of Wittenberg on the banks of the Elbe in 1483 — excoriating the Church practice of selling indulgences — resulted in a full-blown schism of Christianity in Germany. To this day, Christianity is marked by two central pillars of the dispute: On January 3, 1521, Pope Leo X issued a papal bull in Rome excommunicating Martin Luther and his supporters. Luther, for his part, had referred to the pope as the "Antichrist."

At the Diet of Worms, Luther was given an opportunity to recant his criticism of the pope and the synod in the presence of his contemporary political leaders. Yet, he risked his life by sticking to his criticism and escaped the following night while the deliberations continued, ultimately taking refuge in Wartburg Castle, near Eisenach.

Over the years, decades, and centuries, theologians of all Christian denominations have discussed and debated the schism. Many differences have been settled but the core divisions remain: The excommunication of Luther and his followers by the Catholic Church and the designation of the pope by Lutheran dogma as the "Antichrist."

Watch video 04:42 Luther in Eisenach and at Wartburg Castle

'The time is ripe'

In 2020, some 30 theologians who formed a group founded in 1999 calling itself the Altenberg Ecumenical Roundtable, presented a plea covering just a few pages: It called for a revocation of the excommunication bull by the pope and a statement that the allegations against Luther contained therein "do not apply to members of today's PfLinkrotestant and Lutheran Churches." In return, they called on the Lutheran World Federation to abolish Luther's designation of the pope as the Antichrist — on the grounds that it no longer applies to the current papacy and those who hold the office. "The time for this is ripe," read the appeal.

A recently published book about the schism features a historic image of the young Luther beside a photograph of a smiling Pope Francis. The book, entitled "In alle Ewigkeit verdammt?" (Damned for all eternity?) was edited by two members of the group, the Lutheran priest Hans-Georg Link (81), long-serving secretary of the Commission for Faith and Church Dogma in Geneva and Josef Wohlmuth (82), a retired theologian based in Bonn. They agree that "this burning point of contention still requires urgent treatment to this day, so that ecumenical faith can become a reality, hopefully not in the all-too-distant future."

The Altenberg Ecumenical Round Table calls on religious communities in Germany to take a stand, for example, through ecumenical services on the first weekend in January or joint prayers calling for divine intercession on behalf of reconciliation. And all this in the shadow of the COVID-19 pandemic.


The city of Worms you can find images of Luther everywhere

'Stand together for faith'

The pandemic, however, is not only getting in the way of ecumenical efforts. "In this year 2020, it once again became clear how important it is to take a stand for the joint faith in God made human through Christ, for neighborly love and the protection of the weak," said Thies Gundlach, one of the leading theologians of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD), in an interview with Deutsche Welle. He added, "We are grateful for the positive developments towards ecumenism between the Evangelical and Catholic churches, which have led to a deeper sense of community between them in recent years."

For Gundlach, the events surrounding the Diet of Worms "are of great relevance to Church history and the history of the Reformation. With regard to modern ecumenism, we are grateful that the disputes of the past have been overcome." He went on to say that the ecumenical movement had made great contributions to mutual understanding and reconciliation in recent years through constructive theological deliberations.



REBEL OR RUFFIAN: WHO WAS MARTIN LUTHER?
Luther with hammer and nails
Did Luther really nail his 95 theses to the main door of the Wittenberg Castle church? Reformation historians are still discussing this point 500 years later. In fact, Luther himself never mentioned the theses. Belgian historical painter Ferdinand Pauwels didn't seem to care - he painted Luther with hammer and nails anyway. PHOTOS 1234567

Hans-Georg Link, the Protestant priest who has devoted so many decades to ecumenism, warned, however: "Without eliminating the issues of the excommunication and the designation as Antichrist, a closer community between the Evangelical and Catholic churches is unthinkable. The year 2021, 500 years after the schism, would be a good juncture for officials on both sides to draw a line under the dispute."

The ball is now on both sides of the court at once. Both the pope in Rome and the Lutheran World Federation in Geneva must move toward each other. Meanwhile, in Germany, where it all began, the Churches are planning — to the extent that existing dogmatic regulations allow it — to hold a joint open-air service on Sunday, April 18, on the market square in Worms, under the motto "Here I Stand." The service will be led by the chair of the Council of the German Evangelical Church, Heinrich Bedford-Strohm, and the head of the German Catholic Bishops' Conference, Georg Bätzing.

This text was translated from German.

The Peasant War in Germany by Frederick Engels 1850

www.marxists.org › archive › marx › works › peasant-...

Jul 15, 2020 — The Peasant War in Germany was the first history book to assert that the real motivating force behind the Reformation and 16th-century peasant ...

‎The Twelve Articles · ‎Comments by D. Riazanov · ‎Notes

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AFRICA
Female genital mutilation: The woman fighting Sierra Leone's ritual

Sierra Leone has one of the highest rates of female genital mutilation in Africa. Despite decades of campaigns, the traditional practice has hardly declined. This doesn't deter Rugiatu Turay from fighting cutting.

Rugiatu Turay has been campaigning against FGM since 2002

Campaigner Rugiatu Turay sets up the film screen and projector in the dusty meeting center of Magbanabon village about 40 kilometers (25 miles) from Matotoka Town in the north of Sierra Leone.

She's here to screen a documentary about female genital mutilation (FGM), commonly known as "cutting" in the region.

As night falls, around a hundred men, women and children from the village seat themselves for the screening under the community center's thatched roof.

Many in the audience scream in shock at a scene detailing the cutting, which is normally done without anesthetic using knives, razor blades or even pieces of glass.

Some of the knives used to perform female genital mutilation in Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone has one of the highest rates of FGM in Africa. According to UNICEF figures from 2017, the practice has been performed on an estimated 86% of women and girls in the country. FGM involves the partial or total removal of the female genital organs, such as the clitoris or labia.

Besides severe bleeding, FGM can cause a variety of health issues from infections and cysts to infertility and complications in childbirth.

Among those in Magbanabon watching the documentary are soweis, elderly women who carry out the circumcision as part of girls' initiation into the Bondo society, a secret women's society with an entrenched role in the county's tribal and political life.

Some soweis scream at the cutting scene, others look away, placing their heads in their hands to avoid the graphic footage.

After the screening, Turay sounded out the community's views on what they had seen and offered men and women the opportunity to ask questions and discuss the way forward.
Tackling FGM by listening with respect

Turay is one of Sierra Leone's most well-known anti-FGM campaigners. She founded the grassroots anti-FGM group the Amazonian Initiative Movement in 2002, is a former deputy minister of social welfare, gender and children's affairs and in 2020 won a German human rights prize, the Theodor Haecker award, for her work.

Above all, she has a reputation for talking to all of those involved in cutting, including the soweis, parents, girls and village chiefs.

"One of the things you always have to do as a campaigner is to make sure you are honest to yourself, speak frankly and give respect to people," Turay told DW. "You can see that they look at me as any one of them. I behave like them."

Magbanabon Town Chief PaKapri Kargbo, who attended the documentary screening, said he appreciates Turay's message.

"She didn't threaten us," Kargbo told DW, instead she "simply explained what we didn't know in the past."

But he still questions what comes next for the soweis, who depend on the ritual cutting for their livelihoods.

Finding alternative incomes for elderly cutters

Girls' families supply the soweis with food, clothing, cloth, jewelry and money during the initiation period and still give them occasional gifts long after that.

"If our people eventually agree with her ideas, what would the repercussion be or what would be done for the soweis?" Kargbo asked.

Turay is keenly aware that fighting FGM also means finding alternative sources of income for the soweis.

Her experience being cut as a girl made Rugiatu Turay determined to fight the traditional practice

Later in the week, Turay meets with a group of soweis who have promised to stop practicing FGM during a special Bondo initiation she organized in 2019 that didn't involve any cutting.

The Bondo initiation rituals, which confer womanhood on girls, often occur in isolated forested areas referred to as a Bondo bush. As well as being cut, young girls are taught ritual dances and chants and how to confront spirits, as well as learning how to do domestic chores and be prepared for a husband.

Now, Turay wants to hear how the former soweis are getting on.

She always loved the drumming, dancing and singing part of the Bondo bush, admits former solwei Salamatu Kanu. But over time, she came to dread doing the circumcision, she said, and had to "be highly intoxicated to do the cutting."

"Now that I have experienced Turay's campaign and the effects it is having on me and my peers, there's no reason to return to our old habits," Kanu told DW. "Some of us are now training in tailoring [through Turay's organization] and I consider that more beneficial than what we were engaged in."

Creating new, bloodless Bondo rituals

To break to cycle of FGM, Turay wants to create alternative Bondo rituals to cutting.

"The challenge is to eliminate female genital mutilation but not the Bondo culture, which plays an important role in society," Turay told DW.

Around 100 girls took part in Turay's first "No Blade, No Blood, No Pain" Bondo. One of them was Ramatu S. Bangura, who was 19 at the time.


Ramatu Bangura went through Rugiatu Turay’s 'No Blade, No Blood, No Pain' Bondo bush initiation

Bangura had previously refused to take part in the Bondo bush because she didn't want to endure FGM. This led to enormous teasing from her friends at school and in her community for not being an initiate, she said.

But she jumped at the chance to be part of Turay's special Bondo, she told DW, "because they are not dealing with blood."

"The same people who used to mock at me now think that we are the same because I'm now a member of the Bondo society."

Aminata M. Kamara, who lives in the Port Loko District in Sierra Leone's north, also took part. She is outspoken in what she sees as the advantages of not having endured FGM.

"Most of our female parents went through that society," she explained to DW. "Some of them weren't able to give birth anymore. Some of their husbands left them because they were not able to enjoy their sex life anymore, because they had removed their clitoris."

"Any man that I have sex with, that man will really enjoy me. And as time goes on, when I get my own pregnancy, I'll be able to give birth easily."

Cuba: Church opens its doors to LGBTQI+ people

Being part of the LGBTQI+ community and a church congregation at the same time is not accepted everywhere, and particularly not in Cuba. But one church there is breaking new ground.

Many LGBTQI+ people are rejected by churches

While most churches in Germany, the US and other Western countries now welcome gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersexual people, that is an exception in Cuba. And that exception is called Iglesia de la Comunidad Metropolitana, a Protestant free church.

"Once I went to a Reformed Church in which they kept talking about homosexuality as a sin," recounts Fernando Cepero Romero in the congregation's social media network. "But as a homosexual, I have never seen it that way. For me, it has always been about love."

He relates that he had heard about the free church from his friends and that he thanks God for it.

His statement forms part of the church's advertising campaign "Christ loves my colors." The congregation forms part of the Metropolitan Community Church (MCC), which was founded at the end of the 1960s in Los Angeles as somewhere for the gay and lesbian scene to find a spiritual refuge. At that time, people who did not correspond to the heterosexual norm were badly discriminated against even in California.

Now, almost all major Protestant communities of faith recognize same-sex partnerships in one way or another, granting them their blessing or placing them on a par with a heterosexual marriage. In Germany, homosexual couples can have their partnership blessed in almost all churches belonging to the national Protestant Church (EKD). In about half of the EKD's regional branches, homosexuals can marry in church just like heterosexuals.

The Catholic Church retains great influence in Cuba

A difficult relationship

In Cuba, it is a different matter. For centuries, the religions followed by indigenous peoples and African slaves mixed with the Catholicism of the Spanish rulers. This occurred more strongly in Cuba than in most other countries in Latin America. Under the influence of the US, the role of Protestant churches also grew.

When Fidel Castro was in power, the practice of religion was initially banned. It was not until 1992 that the communist regime enshrined religious freedom in the constitution.

But even today, many believers feel they are being patronized. At the same time, the Catholic Church in Cuba is seen as an important bridge builder between Cuban civil society and the regime.

But the Vatican still views homosexuality as a sin, despite the presence of Pope Francis, who is seen as much more liberal than his predecessors. And other communities of faith in Cuba, too, are far less open to the LGBTQI+ community than elsewhere.

But even in Cuba, the MCC remains faithful to its worldwide credo of providing people with a spiritual home regardless of their sexual orientation or identity, as the chair of the Cuban MMCC branch, Yivi Cruz, told DW. "Our church is open to all people, but above all to those who have been excluded from or even hurt by other churches," she said.

According to the parent organization, there are MCC congregations in 37 countries on all the inhabited continents. In Cuba, there are three, with the first established in 2015. The only condition that members have to fulfil to be accepted into the congregation is baptism.

But at the MCC church, even people who are unbaptized can take part in Communion, the main sacrament of Protestant communities of faith. In Cuba, these are mostly adherents of African Cuban faiths like Santeria, a widespread religion that has roots in voodoo. "We are a radically inclusive church," says Cruz. "We don't exclude anyone — not because of their gender, not because of their skin color and not because of their religion, either."


The Santeria religion combines Christian elements with African spiritism

Going against the political tide

"I believe that the MCC is an example of respect and community spirit in society even beyond religious issues," said the Cuban journalist Eileen Sosin Martinez, who has written about the MCC in Cuba for the government-critical website openDemocracy. "It offers a space for resistance and hope by including all people" at a time when religious fundamentalism is experiencing a boom in Cuba, she told DW.

Martinez was alluding to the debate about same-sex marriage that is currently going on in Cuba. Before the reform of the constitution in 2019, the Cuban LGBTQI+ community had hoped that the Havana regime would make marriage for all a constitutional right. Various churches objected to the idea; the MCC supported it. In the end, the issue was not included in the constitution. Now the community hopes that same-sex marriage will be enshrined in the Family Code, which is to be amended in 2021.

Whatever decision is taken, the MCC will not let itself be restricted, says Yivi Cruz. "We celebrate weddings for all those who want them, because love must not be a privilege," the pastor says. The congregation also campaigns on other social and political issues, such as education on sexual health and environmental protection.

Cruz says the aim is to found more congregations in Cuba. "We want to be present wherever our liberating theology is needed," she said.

This article was adapted from German

Germany's COVID vaccine procurement labeled a 'gross failure'

The Berlin government is under increasing fire from experts and politicians for not buying enough doses of the BioNTech-Pfizer coronavirus vaccine to quickly roll out its immunization program.



Germany's health minister is under increasing fire for not buying enough vaccine doses

Experts and politicians slammed the German government on Saturday for failing to ensure a sufficient supply of vaccine doses ahead of the country's coronavirus vaccination drive.

As a member of the EU vaccine procurement scheme, Germany is reliant on regulators at the European level granting authorization of the vaccine to prevent COVID-19 infection.

But the EU has taken longer than countries like the UK, US and Canada to give the go-ahead.

So far, only the BioNTech-Pfizer vaccine is permitted in EU member states, but the block as a whole only made an order for 300 million doses during the summer, in the belief that more vaccine alternatives would be available.

Frauke Zipp, a neurologist and member of the advisory Leopoldina Academy of Sciences, on Saturday slammed German lawmakers for their lack of foresight over vaccine procurement.

"I consider the current situation a gross failure," she told Die Welt newspaper. "Why didn't they order much more of the vaccine during the summer just to be safe?"

Watch video 01:59 Germany kicks off coronavirus vaccination drive

The BioNTech founders said on Friday that they were scrambling to boost production after being pressured to fill the gaps caused by the EU's blunder.

German Health Minister Jens Spahn has shrugged off any suggestion the government has been lackadaisical in its approach towards vaccinating the country. "Things are going exactly as it was planned," he told broadcaster RTL.

Spahn said he anticipated a shortfall at the beginning and that the government would have to "prioritize" who would be vaccinated but that all nursing home residents would receive the inoculation by the end of January.

Vaccination is a 'race against time'

Luxembourg's foreign minister, Jean Asselborn, defended the EU's vaccine strategy on German radio broadcaster RBB, saying that the Commission had secured almost two billion doses with six different manufacturers.

However, Karl Lauterbach, health expert for the center-left Social Democrats, told the Rheinische Post newspaper that the failure by Brussels to buy more of the Moderna vaccine was "regrettable."

"It was clear early on that the Moderna vaccine had a strong efficacy and could be used by GPs."

Lauterbach thinks it's too late for the Moderna vaccine to play any major role in Germany's short-term vaccination needs. He also criticized the EU for not having ordered more BioNTech-Pfizer vaccines early on.

Watch video 02:13 Will Germans get vaccinated against the coronavirus?

Bernd Riexinger, co-chair of the socialist Left Party, called on Health Minister Jens Spahn directly to ensure the further production of BioNTech-Pfizer jabs.

He said given the spread of the new COVID-19 variant in the UK, "a successful vaccine strategy is also a race against time."

Lockdown must not end too early

Chancellor Angela Merkel is due to meet with state premiers on Tuesday to discuss a probable extension of the current lockdown — which is set to end on January 10.

Ahead of those talks, Uwe Janssens, president of the German Interdisciplinary Association for Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine, called for the government to rethink its plans.

He told the Rheinischer Post that tough curbs should remain in place, even if the government reaches its infection-rate goal of 50 per 100,000 people.

"We intensive care physicians strongly advise that no relaxation should be considered until the incidence value is below 25 new infections per 100,000 population per week," Janssens said.

The current infection rate in Germany is 141.2 according to the Robert Koch Institute. However, this number varies hugely across the country, with some regions of Saxony recording rates of over 500.

US officials defend troubled vaccine rollout

Issued on: 03/01/2021 -

Number of deaths officially linked to Covid-19 in 2020, by age group,
according to provisional US CDC data. Patricio ARANA AFP

Washington (AFP)

US officials on Sunday defended the stumbling campaign to vaccinate millions of Americans against the coronavirus, saying they expected much more to be done in coming weeks after delays.

"There have been a couple of glitches, that's understandable," top US scientist Anthony Fauci said on ABC. He said there would always be challenges in "trying to get a massive vaccine program started and getting off on the right foot."

Some 4.2 million Americans have received initial doses of the two-dose vaccines from Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna, but that is far below official predictions of 20 million by the new year.

Part of the problem, Surgeon General Jerome Adams said on CNN, is that "this virus also occurred in the midst of a surge, and a lot of the local capacity to be able to vaccinate was being used for testing and responding to surges."

President Donald Trump has placed the onus on the states to orchestrate vaccine distribution once they receive their supplies.

"The vaccines are being delivered to the states by the Federal Government far faster than they can be administered!" he tweeted Sunday.

- Trump dismisses death toll -

Fauci said he saw "some little glimmer of hope" in the fact that 500,000 people are now being inoculated a day, a far better number than when the program started last month, and "I think we can get there if we really accelerate, get some momentum going."

Adams said he, too, expects vaccinations to "rapidly ramp up in the new year."

Troubling reports have emerged of vaccine going bad due to poor organization, lack of healthcare professionals to administer it and, in one isolated case, sabotage.

Some people have also waited in line for hours only to be turned away.

In Tennessee, elder citizens, some with walkers, were reported standing along a busy highway while waiting for their vaccinations.

Health officials also rejected unsubstantiated suggestions by Trump that the Covid-19 toll -- total deaths now surpass 350,000 -- has been exaggerated.

The president tweeted Sunday that "the number of cases and deaths of the China Virus is far exaggerated in the United States because of @CDCgov's ridiculous method of determination compared to other countries, many of whom report, purposely, very inaccurately and low. 'When in doubt, call it Covid.' Fake News!"

But Adams, who was nominated by Trump, said he saw no reason to question the numbers from the federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

Fauci said that "those are real numbers, real people and real deaths."

© 2021 AFP

Norway landslide: Seventh body found among collapsed houses

Rescue workers are still searching for three people who remain unaccounted for after a landslide swallowed homes in the Norwegian town of Ask.



Rescue teams have been working day and night in difficult conditions in the hope of finding survivors

Norwegian rescue teams discovered a seventh body on Sunday, four days after a landslide buried several homes in a small village near the capital, Oslo.

A police statement announced that the body had been found at about 5.30 p.m. local time. A sixth body had been recovered just before 1 p.m.

Rescue teams again worked through the night in the village of Ask, where a landslide swallowed homes on Wednesday. Three people are still believed to be missing. 

"We are working hard in the depression created by the landslide," the head of the rescue operation, Goran Syversen, told journalists.

"We have five teams working at the same time. They are doing very difficult work which is not without risk. Nevertheless, we are making good progress."


During the winter months Norway has a limited number of daylight hours which has furthered hampered rescue efforts

A fifth body was discovered earlier on Sunday. Police uncovered three bodies on Saturday and one on Friday.

The first deceased person found on Friday has been identified as a 31-year-old man, while the identities of the other victims have not been released.

Search teams have been hindered by unstable ground, poor weather conditions and a limited number of daylight hours.

As such, they have resorted to the use of heat-sensitive drones, helicopters and rescue dogs.

Authorities say the chances of a second landslide are relatively low.

Norway's second-biggest earthfall

On Wednesday morning, a torrent of mud buried parts of the Ask village, 25 kilometers (15 miles) northeast of the capital Oslo.

At least 10 people were injured, one of which had to be transported to Oslo for treatment.

Norway's King Harald V and his family visited the village on Sunday to pay their respects. "I'm having trouble finding something to say, because it's absolutely horrible," the king said after the visit.

"This terrible event impacts us all. I sympathize with you who are beginning the new year with sadness and uncertainty," he added in a televised statement. 

Prime Minister Erna Solberg called it one of the biggest landslides in the country's history.

Experts explained that the disaster was caused by a "quick clay slide" measuring around 800 by 300 meters (2624 by 984 feet).

There had been warnings of potential accidents due to the clay since 2005.

More than 1,000 people from the 5,000 living in the village were evacuated and authorities said that up to 1,500 may have to be relocated.

nm,ab/mm (dpa, AFP, LUSA)

Death toll continues to rise days after major landslide in Norway

Issued on: 03/01/2021 - 

Rescue crews work in the area at Ask in Gjerdrum, Saturday Jan. 2, 2021, 

after a massive landslide smashed into a residential area near the 

Norwegian capital on Wednesday. AP - Tor Erik Schroeder

Text by: NEWS WIRES

Rescue workers have uncovered a sixth body from a landslide that buried homes in a village near Norway's capital Oslo, police said Sunday, with four people still missing.

The body was recovered just before 1 pm (1200 GMT), a police statement said. Rescue teams still hope to find survivors four days after the tragedy occurred.

A torrent of mud shifted houses hundreds of metres (yards), destroying many of them, in the village of Ask, 25 kilometres (15 miles) northeast of Oslo, on Wednesday.

The head of the rescue operation, Goran Syversen, told journalists earlier Sunday: "We are working hard in the depression created by the landslide.

"We have five teams working at the same time. They are doing very difficult work which is not without risk. Nevertheless, we are making good progress."

Search and rescue teams have been using sniffer dogs, helicopters and drones in a bid to find survivors.

"We are searching where we believe we might still find survivors," said the head of the team of firefighters, Kenneth Wangen, adding that the search zone had been expanded.

The teams, who are also seeking to rescue family pets, were digging channels in the ground to evacuate casualties.

Police said earlier that a fifth body had been found just before 6 am on Sunday. Three were discovered on Friday and one on Saturday.

The first person found on Friday was identified as 31-year-old Eirik Gronolen, while the identities of the four other dead have not been released.

But police have published the names of all 10 people, including a two-year-old and a 13-year-old, who went missing on Wednesday.

Ten people were also injured in the landslide, including one seriously who was transferred to Oslo for treatment.

About 1,000 people of the town's population of 5,000 have been evacuated, because of fears for the safety of their homes as the land continues to move.

"It is a completely surreal and terrible situation," one of the evacuees, Olav Gjerdingen, told AFP, adding that his family were sheltering at a hotel.

Royal visit

The rescuers received a visit Sunday from King Harald, his wife Sonja and Crown Prince Haakon, who lit candles for the victims in a local church.

"I'm having trouble finding something to say, because it's absolutely horrible," the king said after the visit.

"This terrible event impacts us all. I sympathise with you who are beginning the new year with sadness and uncertainty," he said in a televised statement.

The authorities have banned all aircraft from the disaster area until 3 pm Monday as they conduct aerial searches.

The Norwegian Water Resources and Energy Directorate (NVE) said the disaster was a "quick clay slide" of approximately 300 by 800 metres (yards).

Quick clay is a sort of clay found in Norway and Sweden that can collapse and turn to fluid when overstressed.

(AFP)

 DEC 30, 2020

Fifth body found in Norway mudslide, five still missing

Issued on: 03/01/2021 -

Oslo (AFP)

Rescue workers have uncovered a fifth body four days after a landslide buried homes near Norway's capital, police said Sunday, as the search goes on for five people still missing.

The tragedy occurred in the early hours of Wednesday when houses were destroyed and shifted hundreds of metres under a torrent of mud at the village of Ask, 25 kilometres (15 miles) northeast of Oslo.

"Just before six am a deceased person was found," a police statement said.

The discovery of a fourth body had been made Saturday after three were recovered the day before at the bleak, snow-covered scene at Ask, in Gjerdrum municipality.

Police on Saturday identified the body of the first person found on Friday as 31-year-old Eirik Grønolen.

The identities of the four other dead have not been released.

But police on Friday published a list of the names of all the eight adults, a two-year-old and a 13-year-old child who went missing on Wednesday.

Ten people were also injured in the landslide, including one seriously who was transferred to Oslo for treatment.

About a thousand people have been evacuated out of a local population of 5,000, because of fears for the safety of their homes as the land continues to move.

Search and rescue teams have been using sniffer dogs, helicopters and drones in a bid to find survivors.

The search teams were also digging channels in the ground to evacuate casualties.

Experts say the disaster was a "quick clay slide" of approximately 300 by 800 metres (yards).

Quick clay is found in Norway and Sweden and notorious for collapsing after turning to fluid when overstressed.

The royal court said in a statement that King Harald, his wife Sonja and Crown Prince Haakon were to visit the disaster area later Sunday morning.

© 2021 AFP

Brazil wildfires surge again in 2020
Issued on: 03/01/2021 - 

Burnt areas of the Amazon rainforest, near Boca do Acre, Brazil, 

in 2019 -- the number of wildfires in Brazil increased 12.7 percent 

in 2020 Lula SAMPAIO AFP/File

Rio de Janeiro (AFP)

The number of wildfires in Brazil increased 12.7 percent last year to a decade-high, according to official figures likely to add to pressure on President Jair Bolsonaro's government over the destruction of the Amazon rainforest.

There were a total of 222,798 wildfires across Brazil in 2020, the highest number since 2010, according to the Brazilian space agency, INPE.

That included more than 103,000 fires in the Brazilian Amazon, an annual increase of nearly 16 percent, said INPE, which uses satellite images to track fires and deforestation.

It also included more than 22,000 fires in Brazil's share of the Pantanal, the world's largest wetlands, which were devastated last year by an annual increase of more than 120 percent.

The Amazon and Pantanal are two of Earth's most valuable ecosystems.

The Amazon, the world's biggest rainforest, is considered vital to curbing climate change because of the carbon dioxide it absorbs from the atmosphere.

About 60 percent of the rainforest is in Brazil.

The Pantanal, further south, is a paradise of biodiversity that stretches from Brazil into Bolivia and Paraguay.

Nearly a quarter of the Brazilian Pantanal was devastated by fires last year, amid the region's worst drought in nearly half a century.

Images of charred landscapes strewn with animal carcasses shocked the world, drawing criticism of Bolsonaro's government for failing to stop the destruction.

Bolsonaro, a far-right climate change skeptic, also faces attacks over the sharp rise in Amazon deforestation on his watch.

Activists say his push to open protected Amazon lands to agribusiness and mining and his government's funding cuts for environmental protection programs are fueling the destruction.

Deforestation wiped out an area larger than Jamaica in the Brazilian Amazon in the year to August, a 12-year high, according to the space agency's PRODES monitoring program.

Experts say the fires in the Amazon are mostly set by people clearing land for farming and ranching.

The number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon had already risen by 48.7 percent in 2019, Bolsonaro's first year in office, triggering global outcry.

© 2021 AFP

Woman Brilliantly Trolls Anti-Vaxxer Facebook Group

By James Felton  28 DEC 2020

A woman has brilliantly trolled an anti-vaxxer Facebook group named "vaccines exposed".

Anti-vaxxers have infiltrated much of social media in a way that's of concern as the new COVID-19 vaccines are rolled out. Between July and August alone, engagement with anti-vaccine Facebook posts trebled, according to analysis from the Guardian.

Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook have all promised to take measures to deal with misleading content about vaccines and vaccine safety, from removing posts to deleting groups and users in violation of the rules.

Of particular concern are closed Facebook groups where only those who have been allowed to join can view the posts, making it difficult for others to counter any misinformation therein. One such group, "vaccines exposed", contains a lot of misinformation you've probably seen screenshots of elsewhere. Think 5G causes COVID-19 (which, as we've pointed out before, is as non-sensical as saying the radio causes super gonorrhea or Tom Cruise causes bread), or the vaccine contains a tracking chip.

Fortunately, there are heroes out there who will correct people within these groups, or at least annoy them thoroughly. An Internet user that goes by the name of Deb Deblinger (actually seasoned troll Ben Palmer) falls into the latter category and is quite effective at it.

In a troll for the ages, she managed to join the group by telling them that she was one of the participants in the Pfizer vaccine, and had a "horrible experience" that she needed to share with everyone.

Like a classic troll, she waited patiently for somebody to ask her what had happened, before leaping into some nonsense now that she'd got them on the hook.

"So when I first got there, there was absolutely NO place to park," the post read. "Then, I left my keys in the locked car. So I had to call Triple A and wait for them to get there. And of course that took forever. Then, as I was waiting, some guy walked by me and gave me a rude look like I was loitering or something.

Then when Triple A got there I found out the doors weren't even locked. Ugh. So then I was like an hour late for the study and so I was last in line to get the vaccine. I got vaccinated though so now I have a decreased chance of contracting COVID. So that's cool. But it was one of the worst experiences I've ever had."

Well played, Deb (by which we mean Ben).

Conspiracy theories run wild on Amazon

The e-commerce giant has become a hotbed for Covid-19 and QAnon disinformation.


Amazon says that, like other book sellers, it offered customers titles from a wide variety of viewpoints, and its content policies dictated what could be sold on its online marketplace. | Michel Spingler/AP Photo


By MARK SCOTT

12/23/2020 

LONDON — Amazon is profiting from disinformation linked to Covid-19 falsehoods and QAnon, the debunked conspiracy theory, according to POLITICO’s analysis of hundreds of books sold on the e-commerce giant’s global online marketplace.

Across the company’s multiple European and U.S. sites, more than 80 titles advancing claims that the ongoing pandemic is a hoax; that vaccines are harmful; and that people should be wary of national lockdowns are easily found — often promoted by Amazon’s own algorithms to entice people to buy conspiracy-laden books.


Roughly 100 books associated with the QAnon movement — or unproven claims there is a so-called deep state plot to undermine Donald Trump’s presidency — are also readily available within Amazon’s online marketplace, in several languages, based on the analysis.

These titles have often garnered thousands of positive reviews in which customers praise conspiracy theories which hold that Bill Gates, Angela Merkel and other global leaders are using the ongoing pandemic to undermine people’s freedoms for their own gain. Many of the books are included in Amazon’s subscription services, Kindle Unlimited and Audible, which allow people to read and listen to a selection of e-books and audio books for a monthly charge.

Other social media giants like Facebook and Google’s YouTube have banned QAnon content from their networks, in part because of its connections to real-world violence. These platforms have clamped down on Covid-19 disinformation, including Facebook banning anti-vaccine ads and other dubious content from its global network.

On Amazon, many of the Covid-19 and QAnon books are either self-published or promoted by small publishing houses, then printed and sold through the company’s own publishing division. The e-commerce giant typically takes at least a one-third cut of all e-book sales, while it pockets around 15 percent when people purchase traditional books, according to the company’s policies.

POLITICO could not determine how much money the U.S. tech giant had made through the sale of these digital and traditional books, though it is likely to be a mere fraction of its yearly book revenue — a figure that Amazon does not break out from its financial earnings. But many of the conspiracy theory titles, including “Vaccines Are Dangerous – And Don’t Work” by Vernon Coleman, a well-known anti-vaccine influencer, are best-sellers in several health, politics and alternative medicine book categories on Amazon, according to POLITICO’s analysis.

“Amazon is falling short by allowing people to promote these conspiracy theories,” said Ciaran O’Connor, a disinformation researcher at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a think tank in London that tracks extremist material online. It “offers online influencers with an infrastructure to monetize content and material directly linked to disinformation.”

In response, Amazon said that, like other book sellers, it offered customers titles from a wide variety of viewpoints, and its content policies dictated what could be sold on its online marketplace. The tech giant outlaws pirated content and counterfeit goods from being sold on its platform, but does not have specific rules linked to disinformation or conspiracy theories. The company has also removed several QAnon and Covid-19 conspiracy books from its sites in recent months.

“Our shopping and discovery tools are not designed to generate results oriented to a specific point of view,” said Dagmar Wickham, a company spokesperson, when asked why Amazon was recommending QAnon and Covid-19 conspiracy theory books to people on its sites.
Shift in focus

For much of 2020, attention has centered on how the biggest social networks — Facebook, Google and Twitter — have become hotbeds for disinformation tied to Covid-19 and QAnon. But as these platforms have taken steps to remove such material, online users have shifted their focus to less-policed parts of the web to spread conspiracy theories across digital audiences, according to disinformation experts.

That has thrown up difficult questions about the right to publish and read content that, while objectionable to some people, does not break specific laws, and whether tech companies should clamp down on material that either promotes political divisions or undermines medical responses to the global pandemic.

Since the summer, Spotify, Soundcloud and other audio streaming services have seen a marked increase in conspiracy podcasts. Fringe online groups have also promoted Amazon, whose online marketplace has become a go-to source for many during national lockdowns, as a key source of income and influence, based on POLITICO’s review of hundreds of conversations on Telegram, an internet messaging service favored by white nationalists and other extremist groups.

“A lot of this stuff exists because platforms haven’t had to think about it before,” said Jonathan Bright, a senior research fellow at the Oxford Internet Institute. “Junk content will exist in the least regulated parts of the internet.”

To determine how widespread disinformation was on Amazon, POLITICO worked with researchers from King’s College London and the University of Amsterdam who started with 16 widely available QAnon and Covid-19 conspiracy books on the e-commerce giant. The academics then relied on the company’s own recommendations — based on automated algorithms that serve up other titles that may be interesting to its customers — to compile a list of more than 100 books with ties to disinformation and conspiracy theories.

POLITICO also conducted a separate review of Amazon’s U.S., British, German and French sites by searching for books associated with QAnon and Covid-19, and similarly used the company’s own recommendations to put together a list of 70 different books. While the English-language online marketplaces had the most conspiracy theory content, Amazon’s German and French versions also listed reams of such material, often associated with local groups like Germany’s right-wing identitarian movement and Didier Raoult, the French doctor who promoted an antimalarial drug to treat Covid-19.

“Amazon’s ecosystem, even before Covid-19, seems to have been a rich place for hyper-partisan literature that skews predominantly to the right,” said Marc Tuters, an assistant professor at the University of Amsterdam, who worked on the disinformation project. “Predominantly rightwing publishers are using Amazon to reach the widest audience possible.”

Everywhere you look

It does not take long to find disinformation on Amazon.

A search for QAnon or Covid-19 returns scores of books with titles like “Scamdemic: the COVID-19 agenda” and “QAnon: the awakening begins,” based on POLITICO’s analysis.

Many of these titles are written by leading online influencers such as Alex Berenson, whose skeptical take on the global pandemic was initially rejected by Amazon’s self-publishing division. His book was eventually added to the online marketplace, and became a bestseller, after Elon Musk, Tesla’s chief executive who has also expressed doubt about nationwide lockdowns, criticized the e-commerce giant on social media for censoring the book. The company said it had removed Berenson’s book “in error.”

Much of this material blurs the line between political, often anti-government, content and outright falsehoods, making it difficult, if not impossible, to remove the books for breaching Amazon’s content policies. But unlike other platforms that have tried to reduce the spread of conspiracy theory-related posts and videos, the e-commerce giant has actively promoted these titles to potential customers, based on POLITICO’s review of the company’s online sales network.

On Amazon’s U.S. site, Dave Hayes, a well-known QAnon influencer, has published a series of e-books to decipher the movement, garnering thousands of positive reviews despite the claims being mostly debunked. Almost all the reviews were positive and did not run with disclaimers — steps that other social networks have taken when handling user-generated conspiracy theory content. Such commentary can nudge people to buy the books, but there are few, if any, professional reviews of the QAnon-related content on Amazon, according to the University of Amsterdam’s Tuters.

“The Qanon posts describe an effort to take America back from the globalists and Deep State bureaucrats who’ve been in control of governments, banks, and politicians for decades,” one reviewer, who gave the book five stars, wrote. “This is not some wild story or conspiracy.”

The e-commerce giant also bundles QAnon books together as potential purchasing suggestions for would-be customers.

On Amazon’s British site, for instance, “QAnon: An Invitation to The Great Awakening” — a so-called field guide to the movement — is packaged together with two other titles that associate QAnon with “destroying the new world order.” The bundle, collectively costing £31.15, is “dispatched from and sold by Amazon,” according to each book’s page on the online marketplace.

The company’s recommendation engine, an automated tool that offers up other titles people may be interested in, based on others’ purchasing histories, similarly pushes people towards conspiracy theories and disinformation.

In France, a book titled “COVID-19: the oligarchy exposed,” written by a former senior official from the National Rally, the country’s far-right political party, outlines why global elites are behind the ongoing crisis and how vaccines could prove to be dangerous. It blurs the line between political speech and conspiracy theories

Yet on the book’s Amazon page, the e-commerce giant recommends other books — covering everything from claims Emmanuel Macron, the French president, caused the virus to spread, to why Didier Raoult’s debunked Covid-19 treatments were correct — that skew more toward outright disinformation. Similar suggestions appear on all of the QAnon and Covid-19 books available on the company’s multiple sites reviewed by POLITICO.

“With Covid-19, people are already moving away from trusted institutions,” said Claire Wardle, co-founder of FirstDraft, a nonprofit organization that works with news outlets to combat disinformation, including falsehoods linked to the global pandemic. “They search out information that reinforces their existing beliefs.”

Leonie Cater contributed to this report.

'A violation of trust': Alberta doctors decry government vacations abroad

© Provided by Calgary Herald Rockyview General Hospital. Thursday, Dec. 10, 2020.


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The revelation that at least five Alberta MLAs travelled abroad over the holidays amid strict COVID-19 restrictions has left some doctors in the province feeling frustrated.

The vacation destinations for the elected officials dot North America. Municipal Affairs Minister Tracy Allard and Calgary-Klein MLA Jeremy Nixon both visited Hawaii. Arizona was the sunny locale visited by Red Deer-South MLA Jason Stephan, while Calgary-Peigan MLA Tanya Fir jetted to Las Vegas and backbencher Pat Rehn took a trip to Mexico.

On their website, the Alberta government advises against non-essential travel outside of Canada, aligning with a federal advisory.

Premier Jason Kenney said on New Year’s Day sanctions would not be issued to any government officials who spent their holidays on foreign soil. He said he issued a directive forbidding future out-of-country unrelated to government business.

The news was upsetting for Dr. Fiona Mattatall, an obstetrician-gynecologist at Calgary’s Rockyview General Hospital.

“It made me really angry and frustrated, and as I sorted through where that’s coming from, I realized it’s essentially coming from what I see my patients going through,” Mattatall said, estimating she sees about 50 patients each week.

“They’ve been changing a lot in their lives to keep themselves and their unborn child safe, and (I’ve been) hearing the sacrifices that people are making for their families and for their neighbours. I think it’s been hard coming to terms with knowing as Albertans we’re being given restrictions and then the people who are giving them out are not abiding by them.”

Mattatall worked early Saturday morning, and said she saw patients who felt “extremely angry” because they had altered celebrations around the holidays and foregone interactions with loved ones that would normally be an indispensable part of being an expectant parent.

“It’s extremely frustrating they’re not following the same precautions as the rest of Albertans to keep everyone safe,” she said.

© Provided by Calgary Herald

In mid-December, the province introduced strict measures meant to curb the rapidly rising spread of COVID-19, including implementing an ongoing ban on all social gatherings that lasted over the holidays.

Dr. Shazma Mithani is an emergency room physician in Edmonton. She suggested it was hypocritical for government officials not to follow the “spirit of the rules” while most Albertans give up Christmas traditions to adhere to public-health orders.

“I don’t know if it’s naive, but it did surprise me. Like the premier said yesterday, elected officials and people in public service are held to a higher standard, and knowing that and believing that, I was very surprised to hear that so many of the staffers and MLAs have left the country,” Mithani said.

“Unanimously, everybody is upset. It really feels like a violation of trust.”

Mithani said her family cancelled a ski trip to British Columbia booked months ago as the second wave worsened.

“We chose not even to leave the province, and we haven’t even left the city,” she said. “We chose to stay in Edmonton because it’s the safest thing to do and it’s in the spirit of these recommendations.”

Mattatall said she’s unaware of any colleagues who have left the country, saying a beach vacation is “the further thing” from a health-care worker’s mind currently.

Both doctors said they were frustrated those who travelled did not face consequences from Kenney.

On Wednesday, when the province last provided updated data on severe outcomes from COVID-19, there were 921 Albertans in hospital with COVID-19, 152 of whom were in intensive-care units.

At least 1,046 Albertans have died of the virus, with nearly half of that count coming in December alone.