After caravan blocked, Honduran migrants turn anger on president


After caravan blocked, Honduran migrants turn anger on president

FILE PHOTO: Honduran migrants are sent back by Guatemalan authorities

Gustavo Palencia and Lizbeth Diaz
Thu, January 21, 2021, 5:31 PM

TEGUCIGALPA/MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Returned Honduran migrants are directing anger against their president this week after their U.S.-bound caravan was blocked by the region's security forces, accusing him of making their county unlivable while thwarting their escape to a better life.

Honduras is reeling from two back-to-back hurricanes that devastated Central America in November, as well as an historic economic contraction on the back of coronavirus pandemic.

President Juan Orlando Hernandez has also been under fire from U.S. prosecutors that have accused him of having ties to drug cartels, an allegation he has strongly denied.

An estimated 8,000 Hondurans sought to flee this week in a mass caravan hoping to reach the United States. But after regional governments, including Honduras, organized a coordinated military operation to repel the caravan, returned migrants are directing their frustration at their government.

More than 4,500 Hondurans, including more than 600 children, have been returned to the country by Guatemalan authorities over the last week.

Among them was 18-year-old Isaac Portillo, who said he felt so desperate upon his forced return to Honduras that he contemplated suicide.

Like other returned migrants, Portillo's despair quickly turned to anger. He plans to join a march on the capital Tegucigalpa on Friday – only one week after he tried to flee his shattered country.

"We're going to oust this narco-dictator," he said. "I already have my group ready."

The Honduran government did not respond to requests for comment. Hernandez has said the accusations against him come from traffickers angry at his government's crackdown on criminal networks.

WhatsApp, Facebook, and Telegram groups with thousands of members are buzzing with angry messages calling for Hernandez's ouster.

Honduras has been rocked by large anti-government mobilizations in recent years, although it is unclear whether a large protest will materialize on Friday.

Evidence introduced by U.S. prosecutors this month accused Hernandez of taking bribes from drug traffickers and has further stoked ire against the president, whose brother was convicted of drug trafficking in a U.S. court last year.

PRESSURE COOKER

Many Hondurans have been critical of what they say was a lackluster government response to the hurricanes, which caused nearly $2 billion in damages and forced over 90,000 people into emergency storm shelters. Authorities said they provided aid to thousands of families displaced by the storms.

Portillo said his family received no support from the government in the wake of the hurricanes. His father had already lost his job as a security guard when pandemic-related restrictions devastated the economy and his 14-year-old sister had to abandon her studies as the family sank deeper into poverty.

After being deported by Guatemalan authorities this week, Portillo once again found himself living under the bridge where he and his family sought refuge after their home was destroyed in November's floods. After he said the government threatened to evict them, the family fled again, this time to a relative's home.

"All I wanted to do was find work (abroad) so I could help my family and put my little sister back in school," Portillo said.

North-bound migration has traditionally offered Central American nations an escape to alleviate domestic discontent, but former U.S. President Donald Trump pressured regional governments to crack down on migrant flows.

While President Joe Biden has pledged to ease immigration policies and tackle the roots of the issue, there appeared little prospect of a rapid change how regional governments police migrants, particularly of mass movements like caravans.

Tonatiuh Guillen, former head of Mexico's immigration institute, said ongoing containment meant frustration could boil over.

"It's a pressure cooker," said Guillen, who has been critical of the increasing immigration enforcement by the region's militaries.

(Reporting by Laura Gottesdiener in Tapachula, Lizbeth Diaz in Mexico City, additional reporting by Gustavo Palencia in Tegucigalpa and Sofia Menchu in Guatemala City; Writing by Laura Gottesdiener, Editing by Daniel Flynn)

Cybersecurity firm: Booting hackers a complex chore

FILE - This Wednesday, Feb. 11, 2015 file photo shows FireEye offices in Milpitas, Calif. The cybersecurity firm that discovered a cyberespionage campaign that has badly shaken U.S. government agencies and the private sector says efforts to assess the impact and boot the intruders remain in their early stages. FireEye has released a tool and a white paper to help potential victims scour their installations of Microsoft's cloud-based email and collaboration software to determine if hackers broke in and remain active. (AP Photo/Ben Margot, File)

FRANK BAJAK
Tue, January 19, 2021

BOSTON (AP) — Efforts to assess the impact of a more than seven-month-old cyberespionage campaign blamed on Russia — and boot the intruders — remain in their early stages, says the cybersecurity firm that discovered the attack.

The hack has badly shaken the U.S. government and private sector. The firm, FireEye, released a tool and a white paper Tuesday to help potential victims scour their cloud-based installations of Microsoft 365 — where users’ emails, documents and collaborative tools reside — to determine if hackers broke in and remain active.

The aim is not just to ferret out and evict the hackers but to keep them from being able to re-enter, said Matthew McWhirt, the effort's team leader.

“There’s a lot of specific things you have to do — we learned from our investigations — to really eradicate the attacker," he said.

Since FireEye disclosed its discovery in mid-December, infections have been found at federal agencies including the departments of Commerce, Treasury, Justice and federal courts. Also compromised, said FireEye chief technical officer Charles Carmakal, are dozens of private sector targets with a high concentration in the software industry and Washington D.C. policy-oriented think tanks.

On Tuesday, the security software company Malwarebytes announced that it was among the victims — and said it was compromised through the very Microsoft email system the FireEye tool aims to button down.

The intruders have stealthily scooped up intelligence for months, carefully choosing targets from the roughly 18,000 customers infected with malicious code they activated after sneaking it into an update of network management software first pushed out last March by Texas-based SolarWinds.

“We continue to learn about new victims almost every day. I still think that we’re still in the early days of really understanding the scope of the threat-actor activity,” said Carmakal.

During a Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday, national intelligence director nominee Avril Haines said she's not yet been fully briefed on the campaign but noted that the Department of Homeland Security has deemed it “a grave risk” to government systems, critical infrastructure and the private sector and “it does seem to be extraordinary in its nature and its scope.”

The public has not heard much about who exactly was compromised because many victims still can’t figure out what the attackers have done and thus “may not feel they have an obligation to report on it,” said Carmakal.

“This threat actor is so good, so sophisticated, so disciplined, so patient and so elusive that it’s just hard for organizations to really understand what the scope and impact of the intrusions are. But I can assure you there are a lot of victims beyond what has been made public to date,” Carmakal said.

On top of that, he said, the hackers “will continue to obtain access to organizations. There will be new victims.”

Microsoft disclosed on Dec. 31 t hat the hackers had viewed some of its source code. It said it found “no indications our systems were used to attack others.” On Tuesday, Malwarebytes said it had determined that “the attacker only gained access to a limited subset of internal company emails” and said the conduit — Microsoft's Azure cloud services — are not used in its software production environments.

Carmakal said he believed software companies were prime targets because hackers of this caliber will seek to use their products — as they did with SolarWinds’ Orion module — as conduits for similar so-called supply-chain hacks.

The hackers’ programming acumen let them forge the digital passports — known as certificates and tokens — needed to move around targets' Microsoft 365 installations without logging in and authenticating identity. It's like a ghost hijacking, very difficult to detect.

They tended to zero in on two types of accounts, said Carmakal: Users with access to high-value information and high-level network administrators, to determine what measures were being taken to try to kick them out,

If it’s a software company, the hackers will want to examine the data repositories of top engineers. If it’s a government agency, corporation or think tank, they’ll seek access to emails and documents with national security and trade secrets and other vital intelligence

QAnon Could Splinter into 'Violent Offshoots' After Trump Exit: 'Humiliation Fuels Rage'

BY EWAN PALMER ON 1/21/21 NEWSWEEK

There are fears that followers of the QAnon conspiracy theory may be pushed into more violence as some of the most ardent believers realize they have been had and one of the movement's most important figures appears to call it quits.

The inauguration of President Joe Biden was seen as the last throw of the dice for many supporters whose faith in QAnon had been severely tested down the years.

It didn't matter that Hillary Clinton was not arrested in 2017 or that Donald Trump never took down the "deep state" during his time in office, or that he lost the election then failed to overturn the result—despite an insurrection attempt by some of QAnon's extremist followers—because "the plan" all along was a showdown on January 20.

In the days leading up to the inauguration, high-profile figures in the QAnon movement claimed Trump would implement the Emergency Alert System during the ceremony in Washington, D.C. to announce the arrests and even executions of Democratic "traitors" and satanic pedophiles—a hugely anticipated moment known as "the storm," which has been predicted on several dates down the years.

QAnon advocate Invisible_ET pushed this belief as far as he could, posting on messaging service Telegram "Enjoy the show!" minutes before Biden was sworn in.

As the ceremony ended with no mass arrests or intervention from the military under Trump's secret orders, a number of QAnon supporters described "feeling sick" and let down, announcing, "I've had enough of this," and appearing to accept defeat.

QAnon supporters posting on Telegram after Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th president.SCREENSHOT/TELEGRAM

For many, the moment the towel was thrown in was a message from Ron Watkins, one of the leading figures in the movement.

Watkins is the former admin of messageboard 8kun, originally known as 8chan, which is owned by his father Jim Watkins.

The QAnon conspiracy theory first appeared on 4chan—a forerunner of 8chan—in late 2017 as a series of cryptic messages posted by a figure known only as "Q." These posts were interpreted to form the outlandish claims of the QAnon conspiracy theory.

Q's coded messages or "drops" would later appear on 8kun, although they essentially stopped around the time of the presidential election last November.

On Election Day, Ron Watkins announced that he was stepping down as the 8kun admin, fueling speculation that he played some role in posting Q's drops, which he denies.

Writing on Telegram, where he has nearly 120,000 followers, Watkins seemed to concede that it was time to move on from QAnon, adding that he was "currently fleshing out" a new project.

"We gave it our all. Now we need to keep our chins up and go back to our lives as best we are able," Watkins wrote. "We have a new president sworn in and it is our responsibility as citizens to respect the Constitution regardless of whether or not we agree with the specifics or details regarding officials who are sworn in.

"As we enter into the next administration please remember all the friends and happy memories we made together over the past few years."

Many QAnon supporters saw that as the final straw, questioning why Watkins would leave the movement he has been pushing for more than three years at its most crucial time.

SCREENSHOT/TELEGRAM

A moderator on 8kun even took out his frustration on the site itself, deleting all the messages on the thread used by "Q" and attacking Watkins and the conspiracy theorists in a lengthy post.

"By the way, this is not a punch to your face to strike you down, you poor dumb cattle that you are... no, consider this more a shaft up your a** to wake you up," the moderator wrote.

"I have no allies nor do I want any, I am just performing euthanasia to something I once loved very very much."

The thread and most of its posts were later restored to 8kun.

Experts fear that the divisions in the QAnon movement, which is listed as a domestic terrorist threat by the FBI, and the non-appearance of "the storm" on January 20 may push its followers further into extremism.

Colin P. Clarke, director of policy and research at security consultancy the Soufan Group, tweeted: "If QAnon begins to splinter soon, we'll need to pay attention to the emergence of potentially violent offshoots.

"We know some adherents possess the propensity for extreme violence, those who feel duped could grow exceedingly desperate & seek to lash out. Humiliation fuels rage."

Author and conspiracy theory expert Mike Rothschild added: "I know it seems like QAnon is sinking into history, but Q was always made of reused parts of other conspiracy theories and scams.



"If Q is finished, all those parts will be recombined into something else—and easily pull in believers of all its previous components."

In a series of posts on Twitter, Marc-André Argentino, a researcher who studies the movement, wrote that followers would be "going through the stages of grief which will make them quite vulnerable."

"The one thing I am sure about is QAnon as a whole may change, it will likely metastasize, it will likely balkanize, and QAnon adherents no matter what they become will likely remain a threat until they can exit the QAnon space," Argentino wrote.

"Even without QAnon, without 'Q', without Trump, the core elements that lead these individuals to believe in QAnon will still remain and they will need to find outlets for their conspiratorial mindsets and their anti-democratic ideals."

Predictably, many QAnon supporters believe "the plan" is still in place—a claim they have made in the wake of every previous prediction being wrong.

"The plan doesn't care if you don't like it or understand it. Just Sayin," Invisible_ET wrote on Telegram. "This moment is for the whole world and every demographic. We will never forget what is about to happen. Ever. It had to be this way."

Others seem to have seen this coming. One of the biggest figures in the QAnon movement, Joe M, or The Storm Is Upon Us, appeared to jump ship in the days before the inauguration, telling his massive following that he would be "going dark for a while" on January 16 while holding onto a glimmer of hope that something might happen.

"Next week, either Q turns out to be an elaborate well-intentioned hoax promising a level of control that patriots never had, or we are all about to watch the Red Sea part and the unfolding of a new biblical-level chapter in human civilization. I believe it is the second one."

Joe M has yet to comment on President Biden's inauguration.

A QAnon logo is flown with a U.S. flag at the pro-Trump protest outside the Capitol on January 6. There are fears the conspiracy theory's supporters will become more violent.

READ MORE
QAnon Followers Express Disappointment on Social Media After Inauguration
Fears QAnon Preparing for 'Second Revolution' With Repeat of Capitol Riot
Joe Biden Inauguration is Reality Check That QAnon Zealots Will Refuse

'No plan, no Q, nothing': QAnon followers reel as Biden inaugurated

Supporters wearing shirts with the QAnon logo, chat before U.S.

 President Donald Trump takes the stage during his Make America 

Great Again rally in Wilkes-Barre

Joseph Menn, Elizabeth Culliford, Katie Paul and Carrie Monahan
Wed, January 20, 2021

SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK (Reuters) - For three years, adherents of the sprawling QAnon conspiracy theory awaited a so-called Great Awakening, scouring anonymous web postings from a shadowy "Q" figure and parsing statements by former U.S. President Donald Trump, whom they believed to be their champion.

On Wednesday, they grappled with a harsh reality check: Trump had left office with no mass arrests or other victories against the supposed cabal of Satan-worshipping pedophile cannibal elites, especially Democrats, he was ostensibly fighting.


Instead, Democratic President Joseph Biden was calmly sworn into office, leaving legions of QAnon faithful struggling to make sense of what had transpired.

In one Telegram channel with more than 18,400 members, QAnon believers were split between those still urging others to 'trust the plan' and those saying they felt betrayed. "It's obvious now we've been had. No plan, no Q, nothing," wrote one user.

Some messages referenced theories that a coup was going to take place before the end of Inauguration Day. Others moved the goalposts again, speculating that Trump would be sworn into office on Mar. 4.

"Does anybody have any idea what we should be waiting for next or what the next move could be?" asked another user, who said they wanted to have a 'big win' and arrests made.

Jared Holt, a disinformation researcher at the Atlantic Council, said he had never before seen disillusionment in the QAnon communities he monitors at this scale.

"It's the whole 'trust the plan' thing. Q believers have just allowed themselves to be strung from failed promise to failed promise."

"The whole movement is called into question now."

A poll with more than 36,000 votes conducted in another QAnon Telegram channel before Biden's swearing-in ceremony showed that more than 20% of respondents predicted nothing would in fact happen and Biden would become president, according to the Q Origins Project, which tracks the movement.

However, 34% believe "the military & Trump have a plan coming in the near future," even while acknowledging the transfer of presidential power.

JARRING REVERSAL

The anonymous person or people known as "Q" started posting the vague predictions that would become the basis of the QAnon movement on message board 4chan in 2017, claiming to be a Trump administration insider with top secret security clearance.

The number of followers exploded with the arrival of the coronavirus last year, providing a sense of community missing in many people's isolated pandemic lives by encouraging participants to "do their own research" and contribute findings to the crowd.

Q interpreters have become mini-celebrities in their own right, spreading the gospel on mainstream sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube and raising money with appeals to charity or merchandise sales, before the social media platforms cracked down late last year.

Among them was Ron Watkins, who was among a small group of movement leaders who stepped up their public activity after Trump's loss in the Nov. 3 election, as the "drops" from Q slowed and then stopped.

The longtime administrator of 8kun, an unmoderated forum where Q posted alongside violent extremists and racists, Watkins adopted the cryptic tone of Q in the past two months on Twitter and then Telegram.

At the same time he positioned himself as an expert on election fraud, getting retweeted by Trump and interviewed by Trump-favored media outlets such as One America News Network.

In one of the most jarring apparent reversals on Wednesday, Watkins appeared to admit defeat, posting: "We have a new president sworn in and it is our responsibility as citizens to respect the Constitution regardless of whether or not we agree with the specifics."

"Please remember all the friends and happy memories we made together over the past few years." He said he was working on a new venture, but gave no further details.

On TheDonald.win, a reconstituted version of the Reddit forum "The Donald" that long served as an online home for Trump loyalists, users turned on Watkins and accused him of being a "shill" and a CIA plant.

Other fringe groups, including neo-Nazis, said they intended to capitalize on the disarray by stepping up recruitment from among QAnon followers.

(Reporting by Joseph Menn, Elizabeth Culliford, Katie Paul and Carrie Monahan; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)

‘I’m About to Puke’: QAnon in Chaos as Biden Takes Office
Wed, January 20, 2021

THE DAILY BEAST

Win McNamee

As the rest of the country waited for Joe Biden to be inaugurated, believers in the QAnon conspiracy theory thought they were about to see something else: the long-awaited mass arrests of Biden and a host of other “deep-state” Democrats, followed by the restoration of the Trump presidency.

“Trump will walk out during the arrest and thank America for reelection,” one QAnon supporter posted on a forum shortly before the inauguration. “This will be remembered as the greatest day since D-Day.”

As Biden was sworn in, though, the mass arrests that QAnon believers call “The Storm,” stubbornly refused to happen. Trump really did appear to have left office, rather than springing the sly trap as they had all hoped. The Democrats really did have control of the White House and both chambers of Congress.

The tens of thousands of National Guard soldiers QAnon believers thought would help Trump retake Washington instead appeared to be there for a more obvious purpose: protecting the city from the same crazed QAnon believers who had violently attacked the Capitol two weeks earlier.

“I’m about to puke,” one QAnon fan watching Biden take the oath of office wrote.

For more than three years, tens of thousands of QAnon believers have pinned their hopes for the future on a second Trump term. They’ve become convinced that the government is run by a cabal of satanic pedophile-cannibals and that Trump is the only way to restore justice. Many of them, egged on by promises that Trump’s “plan” included the eradication of diseases and personal debt, pinned their dreams on QAnon as well, alienating friends and family with their ideas.

Then, on Wednesday afternoon, the QAnon future vanished, presenting the ever-expanding conspiracy theory with its greatest challenge yet.

As Biden’s inauguration became ever more certain on Wednesday, QAnon believers rapidly cycled through rationalizations. They claimed that Trump was stepping down as the head of the United States “corporation”—an idea borrowed from fringe sovereign citizen legal theories—to become the head of a restored republic. Some QAnon leaders claimed that Biden himself was in on the scheme, and would soon help Trump carry out the arrests.

As Biden finally took office, however, the mood changed quickly on QAnon forums. QAnon channels on messaging app Telegram filled with gifs of far-right mascot Pepe the Frog crying, as believers claimed they had been duped. Believers said they felt sick, or wanted to throw up.

“Trump fooled us,” complained one Telegram commenter.

“All my family and co-workers think I’m crazy,” wrote another.

“I feel stupid,” wrote a third.

Even major QAnon boosters saw their faith in the bizarre conspiracy theory shaken on Monday. QAnon booster Roy Davis co-authored a bestselling book promoting QAnon under the alias “Captain Roy,” even getting his sports car painted with a giant, blazing “Q” on the hood.

As Biden was sworn in, Davis initially told The Daily Beast he didn’t want to comment until he was sure Biden was really president. But as Biden’s new title became official, Davis said he was ready to move on from Q—something his doctor has long urged him to do anyway.

“We misinterpreted it,” Davis said. “Maybe we should have done something different.”

Biden’s Intelligence Pick Pledges Threat Assessment on QAnon

Other top QAnon figures appeared to be backing away. As the former administrator of QAnon clues website 8kun, Ron Watkins had control over who posted as the mysterious “Q”—and has been accused of being Q himself. But on Wednesday, Watkins suggested that the QAnon fight was over.

“Please remember all the friends and happy memories we made together over the past few years,” Watkins wrote in a Telegram post.

Still, there are many signs that QAnon and the kind of unreal world it promoted will persist.

As Trump’s defeat became more certain, QAnon followers changed their claims, beginning to insist that the president’s war against the “deep state” had only begun. As the shock of Biden’s inauguration wore off on Wednesday, QAnon forum posters encouraged one another to “hold the line,” claiming that they had merely misunderstood the QAnon clues.

QAnon believer Jenny Hatch has followed the conspiracy theory since 2018, when she thought Trump referenced QAnon in a speech he gave at a White House Easter Egg Roll. Hatch had felt sure that Biden would have already been arrested on Jan. 6, and was “quite demoralized” when Biden was instead sworn in two weeks later.

“I fully expected some sort of military arrest of Joe Biden and many of the people who were on the dais with him,” Hatch said.

Hatch, a Colorado resident, said her husband doesn’t believe in QAnon, and she suspects her adult children have read articles about how to handle a family member believing in QAnon. But while Hatch was saddened that the mass arrests failed to happen on Wednesday, QAnon’s utter failure to come true somehow hasn’t shaken her faith in the conspiracy theory.

“I’m still all in with Q,” Hatch said. “I have not distanced myself from what Q meant to me personally.”

The problem created by QAnon seems set to remain as well. QAnon has been tied to three murders and a terrorist incident near the Hoover Dam, along with a series of other crimes. Biden’s top intelligence chief has promised an analysis of the threat posed by the conspiracy theory.

Even as he distances himself from QAnon, for example, Davis still thinks “Q” really was a government whistleblower revealing the truth about the world.

“It wasn’t some kid in a basement,” Davis said.

SEE

As Trump departs office, reality sets in for QAnon cult

CYPRUS

As the world looks elsewhere, Erdogan makes Varosha a Muslim city.

January 21, 2021


Immersed in its own nest of problems, the Arab World has paid little attention to what Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been doing in the nearby island of Cyprus, divided due to Turkish occupation since 1974. In addition to offshore drilling in Cypriot waters, which has received its fair share of media coverage, the Turkish leader has been silent re-opening the ghost town of Varosha, an abandoned southern quarter of the Cypriot city of Famagusta, with plans to transform it into a Muslim-majority town. Its original inhabitants were almost entirely Christian, and they fled with the Turkish invasion nearly of 1974. According to UNSCR 550, only the original habitants of Varosha are allowed to return to their homes, but Erdogan it seems, has other plans.

He wants to transform it into a hub for Turkish investors and tourism, while changing its demographics and populating it with Turkish Muslims. Once through with his scheme, he hopes to give permanent residency status or Turkish Cypriot citizenship to those newcomers, tipping the religious balance of Cyprus between Muslims and Christians. Two years ago, he defied the UN by sending his agents to Varosha, ostensibly to carry out an inventory of abandoned buildings, churches, and government offices. Then in August 2019, he invited Turkish journalists to the town, followed by the Turkish Bar Association. Since last October, around 10,000 “visitors” have been admitted to Varosha, inching the town dangerously close to becoming a Turkish colony. Erdogan justifies his actions by saying that a big share of Varosha’s territory (1,472 titles out of 6,082) belongs to the Turkish Department of Religious Endowments (Awqaf), dating back to the Ottoman era in 1571. This includes crown land and the entire seaside, he says. That territory belongs to a deceased Ottoman official named Abdullah Pasha, and not to Greek Cypriots. Abdullah Pasha made the land an endowment to the Ottoman state, a legal pretext that remains binding as of 2021. He plans to eventually take the matter to court, a process that can last for years, and would require determining the price of the areas in-dispute, and then, paying compensation money for their original owners, depending on who wins the case.

The Ersin Tatar Factor

Backing his claim for Varosha is the recently elected President of Turkish Cyprus, Ersin Tatar, a protégé of the Turkish president who has vowed to transform Varosha into another Las Vegas. Erdogan moved heaven and earth to make him president last October, replacing Mustafa Akinci, a man who had vowed never to re-open Varosha unless through a negotiated deal with the Government of Cyprus. Akinci had famously said: “Instead of living side by side with a corpse, let Verosha become a lively city where people live, where contractors from both communities do business together, and where young people can find jobs.” But that should only happen, he added, under a federal roof—never unilaterally.

Erdogan despised Akinci, who was vocally opposed to Turkey’s violation of Cyprus waters and its 2019 invasion of northern Syria. That certainly was not what Erdogan expected from Akinci when he was made president of Turkish Cyprus in 2015. He was recently quoted saying: “He should know his place. His post was given to him through the Republic of Turkey.” Unseating him was not too difficult for Turkish President, however, thanks to the immense political, economic, and military influence that he enjoys in Turkish Cyprus, along with 35,000 troops. The current president, Ersin Tatar has warmly embraced the unilateral re-opening of Varosha, considering parts of it now an open region for Turkish tourists and investors.

It is interesting to see how Turkish plans for Varosha have developed, from initial insistence that they had no intention but to inventory the area, into current ambitions into making it a regional Las Vegas. Erdogan is using Varosha as a bargaining chip to increase his clout in all Turkey-related talks across the region, which he wants intertwined. That is exactly what his predecessor Kenan Evren had said, when he was commander of the Turkish unit that entered the city occupied it back in 1974. “Taking Varosha was not among our targets and planning. When the Greek Cypriots started firing, our soldiers followed, and the city came under our control without our wish. We closed it to civilians in order to use it in later negotiations.” And that is exactly what Erdogan is doing today. The Turkish President is in battle mood, especially after his most recent victories in Libya against Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar. The Libyan episode proves just how far he is willing to go to support his regional ambitions, and allies. He feels that due to sheer bullying, Turkey maintains the upper hand in its relationship with Europe. They will never take real action against him, fearing that he will drown Europe with refugees, a threat that he has repeatedly made. “You may take this lightly,” he once said, “but these doors to Europe will open and these ISIS members will be sent to you. Do not try to threaten Turkey over developments in Cyprus.”

Seeing that Turkish membership talks with the EU are going nowhere, he has no incentive whatsoever, to back down on Cyprus. The State Department has frequently expressed concern over Erdogan’s actions, but under the now former Trump Administration, no steps were made at ending his expansionism. With Joe Biden now at the White House that ought to change, given the new American President’s well-known criticism of Erdogan’s ambitions and support for regional non-state players with a jihadi agenda. Now with Akinci out of the way, Erdogan’s next step is to bring down Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades, whose term expires in 2023. Constitutionally he is incapable of seeking a third term, which is music to Erdogan’s ears since he too was in favor of reconciliation with Turkish Cyprus, and a negotiated deal on Varosha. The international community regards Anastasiades as a brave leader who went out of his way at trying to find a way out of the historic crisis, famously agreeing to peace talks in Switzerland back in 2017 and more recently, offering to share 30% of energy revenue with Turkish Cyprus but only if Ankara recognized Nicosia’s energy exploration rights. He had offered Erdogan a federal union with a joint senate in Cyprus composed of 40 MPs (20 Greek and 20 Turkish Cypriots). The talks also explored the idea of a lower house of parliament, composed of 36 Greeks and 12 Turkish Cypriots. Both suggestions, however, were flatly rejected by Ankara. Erdogan has a hard time dealing with moderates and would love to see a hardliner get elected instead of Anastasiades, but it is too early to predict who will come next.

Erdogan is betting upon one thing, which is complete lack of EU/American appetite to confront him. In as much as they would like to sanction Turkey for what they believe is terrorist-linked activity across the region, they are also aware of the fact that they need Turkey to prevent the reoccurrence of the exact same activity in the future. Much of Erdogan recent bravado is derived from the null reaction of the Americans, whether in defense of Saudi Arabia after the 2019 attack on Aramco, or of the Kurds after the Turkish invasion of the Syrian northeast that October. Unlike Syria, however, there is no Russian superpower calling the shots in Cyprus. And he considers Turkish Cyprus as his own backyard—a matter of life and death for his regional influence, future ambitions, economic need, and legacy.

Sami Moubayed

Unilever to insist all suppliers pay living wage by 2030


Consumer giant promises to tackle low pay around the world 

Adam Forrest@adamtomforrest

Conglomerate owns brands like Marmite, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and Dove soap
(EPA)

Multinational consumer goods giant Unilever has promised that all workers in its supply chain will receive a living wage by 2030, as its boss warned of the “widening” divide between rich and poor.

The manufacturer of Marmite, Ben & Jerry’s ice cream and Dove soap – headquartered in the UK – set out its pledge as part of a plan to raise wage levels among people working for smaller suppliers around the world.

The company said it would make sure everyone who directly provides or delivers goods and services for Unilever will earn at least a living wage by the end of the decade.

Unilever defines a living wage as enough money to cover food, water, housing, education, healthcare, transport and clothing – and also includs a provision for unexpected events.

Oxfam International, having worked with the multinational on its plan, said the commitment was a “step in the right direction”.

Read more

Nearly half of supermarket workers ‘earn below real living wage’

In the UK, the Living Wage Foundation has been urging British employers to commit to paying staff an annually-agreed living wage. But campaigners have found it harder to get multinationals to insist on minimum wages across their complex global supply chains.

Alan Jope, chief executive of Unilever, said his company was determined to help tackle social inequality around the world, claiming it had become worse during the coronavirus pandemic.

“The past year has undoubtedly widened the social divide, and decisive and collective action is needed to build a society that helps to improve livelihoods, embraces diversity, nurtures talent, and offers opportunities for everyone,” he said.

“We believe the actions we are committing to will make Unilever a better, stronger business, ready for the huge societal changes we are experiencing today – changes that will only accelerate.”

Unilever said it would work with partners to help set expected rates of pay in each of the 190 countries where it operates, claiming it would mean twice as much as the minimum wage for workers in some parts of the world

Workers at Miko Carte d’Or, part of Unilever, in Saint-Dizier, France
(Reuters)

Leena Nair, chief people officer, said Unilever sees the biggest challenges in Vietnam, the Philippines, Brazil and India. She said there were particular problems regarding inequality and living standards in the production of tea and cocoa.

“It has been really sad to see that social divides have grown globally this year we felt this action was pressing,” said Ms Nair. “It is a systemic issue and will need the support of government and NGOs [non-government organisations], but we are positive about the change that can take place here.”

Globally, Unilever has also committed to spending £1.46bn with suppliers owned and managed by people from under-represented groups by 2025 in a bid to improve the level of diversity of its supply chain.

Gabriela Bucher, executive director of Oxfam, said: “Unilever’s plan shows the kind of responsible action needed from the private sector that can have a great impact on tackling inequality, and help to build a world in which everyone has the power to thrive, not just survive.

Biden wants to remove this controversial word

 from US laws

By Catherine E. Shoichet, CNN

Thu January 21, 2021

(CNN)It's just one small part of the sweeping immigration overhaul President Biden is pushing.

But the symbolic significance is huge.

Biden's proposed bill, if passed, would remove the word "alien" from US immigration laws, replacing it with the term "noncitizen."

It's a deliberate step intended to recognize America as "a nation of immigrants," according to a summary of the bill released by the new administration.


Biden starts fast on immigration by halting border wall and travel ban while embracing DACA

The term "illegal alien," long decried as a dehumanizing slur by immigrant rights advocates, became even more of a lightning rod during the Trump era -- with some top federal officials encouraging its use and several states and local governments taking up measures to ban it.

"The language change on the first day of this administration, with Kamala Harris the daughter of immigrants, to me it's not just symbolic...it's foundational," says Jose Antonio Vargas, an undocumented immigrant whose organization, Define American, pushes for more accurate portrayals of immigrants.

"How we describe people really sticks. It affects how we treat them," he says. "How we talk about immigrants shapes the policies. It frames what are the issues really at stake here. It acknowledges that we're talking about human beings and families."

What the laws say now

US code currently defines "alien" as "any person not a citizen or national of the United States."

Officials in the past have pointed to the term's prevalence in US laws to defend their word choices.

In 2018, former Attorney General Jeff Sessions instructed prosecutors to refer to someone who's illegally in the United States as "an illegal alien," citing the US code in an agency-wide email.

Justice Department: Use 'illegal aliens,' not 'undocumented'

The term "alien" was often invoked by President Trump in speeches as he warned of what he saw as the dangers of unchecked illegal immigration.
Speaking at the Mexico border last week in one of his final addresses as president, Trump used the term at least five times.
"We were in the Trump administration the perennial boogeyman," Vargas said. "Whenever Trump was in trouble, he started talking about the 'illegals' and talking about the border."
But not everyone in the Trump administration was a fan of the language.
In an interview with the Washington Post published shortly before he resigned as acting secretary of Homeland Security in 2019, Kevin McAleenan told the newspaper he avoided using the term "illegal aliens" and instead described people as "migrants."
"I think the words matter a lot," McAleenan said, according to the Post. "If you alienate half of your audience by your use of terminology, it's going to hamper your ability to ever win an argument."

This isn't the first effort to change such wording
California struck "alien" from the state's labor code in 2015.
New York City removed the term from its charter and administrative code last year.



Protesters rally against a Supreme Court decision upholding the travel ban in 2018. 

Throughout President Trump's time in office, immigrant advocates criticized dehumanizing rhetoric.
In guidelines issued in 2019, New York City banned the term "illegal alien" when used "with intent to demean, humiliate or harass a person." Violations, the city warned, could result in fines up to $250,000.
And last year two Colorado lawmakers introduced a bill to replace the term "illegal alien" with "undocumented immigrant." The bill never made it to the state Senate floor for a vote.

Prank callers targeted the term early in the Trump administration
One of the first times the use of the term "alien" drew widespread attention during the Trump administration was in 2017 after officials publicized a hotline for victims of "crimes committed by removable aliens."
Prank callers swiftly flooded the line with reports about space aliens, sharing examples on social media of their comments about Martians and UFOs.

Top-level trolling overloads ICE's undocumented immigrant hotline with calls about space aliens

But Vargas says the term and others used to demonize immigrants are no laughing matter.
"Language has power. And I think we saw that in the Trump administration, how it used dehumanizing terms and how it debased language and in turn debased people," Vargas says. "If you call them 'alien,' of course you're going to put them in jail, of course you're going to lock them up, of course you're not going to care that you're separating little kids from their parents."
Vargas says the new administration's effort to use more respectful language gives him hope that some Americans' views on undocumented immigrants could also shift. Changing just one word, he says, could have a far-reaching impact for millions of people.

Group: Billion in aid needed to help Afghan kids in 2021






Afghanistan

An internally displaced girl poses for photograph outside her temporary home in the city of Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, Jan. 18, 2021. Half of war-ravaged Afghanistan’s population is at risk of not having enough food to eat, including around 10 million children, Save the Children, a humanitarian organization said Tuesday. The group called for $3 billion in donations to pay for assistance in 2021. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)

RAHIM FAIEZ
Mon, January 18, 2021

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Some 10 million children in war-ravaged Afghanistan are at risk of not having enough food to eat in 2021, a humanitarian organization said Tuesday and called for $1.3 billion in new funds for aid.

Just over 18 million Afghans, including 9.7 million children, are badly in need of lifesaving support, including food, Save the Children said in a statement. The group called for $1.3 billion in donations to pay for assistance in 2021.

Chris Nyamandi, the organization's Afghanistan country director, said Afghans are suffering under a combination of violent conflict, poverty and the virus pandemic. “It’s a desperately bad situation that needs urgent attention from the international community,” he said.

The latest round of peace talks between the Taliban and Afghan government negotiators that began earlier this month in Qatar has been slow to produce results as concerns grow over a recent spike in violence across Afghanistan.

The pandemic has also had a disastrous impact on millions of Afghan families. In 2020, the World Bank estimated that the pandemic had hugely disrupted imports, including vital household items, which in turn led to rapid inflation. The added health and economic strains of the pandemic have deepened the humanitarian impact across the country.

Many Afghans also blame runaway government corruption and lawlessness for the country’s poor economy.

The U.N. and its humanitarian partners will seek $1.3 billion in aid for 16 million Afghans in need this year, U.N. secretary-general spokesman Stephane Dujarric, said this month. That’s up from an estimated 2.3 million people last year who needed life-saving assistance.

“It’s a huge increase in people who need aid,” he said.

Nyamandi said that with no immediate end in sight to the decades-long conflict, millions of people will continue to suffer. “It’s especially hard on children, many of whom have known nothing but violence," he said.

According to the U.N., nearly 6,000 people — a third of them children — were killed or wounded in fighting in Afghanistan between January and September last year, Nyamandi said. The violence continues to force hundreds of thousands of people to flee their homes every year and limit people's access to resources including hospitals and clinics.

In a Save the Children report in December, the group said more than 300,000 Afghan children faced freezing winter conditions that could lead to illness and death without proper winter clothing and heating. The organization provided winter kits to more than 100,000 families in 12 of Afghanistan's 34 provinces. The kits included fuel and a heater, blankets and winter clothes, including coats, socks, shoes and hats.

Nyamandi said the plight of the Afghan people is threatened by inadequate humanitarian funding pledged by wealthy nations at a conference in Geneva in November.

“Aid to Afghanistan has dropped alarmingly at a time when humanitarian need is rising. We’re now in the unsustainable position where aid falls far short of what’s needed to meet the needs of the people” he said.

The London-based Save the Children report cites 10-year-old Brishna from eastern Nangarhar province as saying her family was forced to leave their home and move to another district because of the fighting.

“Life is difficult," she said. “My father, who is responsible for bringing us food, is sick.”

Brishna said she and her brother collect garbage for cooking fires and it has been a long time since they had proper food and clothes. “My siblings and I always wish to have three meals in a day with some fruits, and a better life. But sometimes, we sleep with empty stomachs. During the winter we don’t have blankets and heating stuff to warm our house,” she said.

___

Biden inheriting nonexistent coronavirus vaccine distribution plan and must start 'from scratch,' sources say

By MJ Lee, CNN

(CNN)Newly sworn in President Joe Biden and his advisers are inheriting no coronavirus vaccine distribution plan to speak of from the Trump administration, sources tell CNN, posing a significant challenge for the new White House.
The Biden administration has promised to try to turn the Covid-19 pandemic around and drastically speed up the pace of vaccinating Americans against the virus. But in the immediate hours following Biden being sworn into office on Wednesday, sources with direct knowledge of the new administration's Covid-related work told CNN one of the biggest shocks that the Biden team had to digest during the transition period was what they saw as a complete lack of a vaccine distribution strategy under former President Donald Trump, even weeks after multiple vaccines were approved for use in the United States.
"There is nothing for us to rework. We are going to have to build everything from scratch," one source said.
Another source described the moment that it became clear the Biden administration would have to essentially start from "square one" because there simply was no plan as: "Wow, just further affirmation of complete incompetence."


Biden's Covid team is nervous about what the Trump team hasn't told them

The incoming White House now faces intense pressure to make good on the promises that Biden made during the campaign and the transition phase to drastically turn things around on the pandemic and conduct himself entirely differently from Trump when it comes to the virus and vaccine distribution. During the transition period, Biden was openly critical of what he described as a "dismal" rollout of the Covid vaccines under the Trump administration, making clear that he placed significant blame on his predecessor for the situation he would ultimately inherit.
Two Covid-19 vaccines were approved for use in the United States before Trump left office. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, around 16.5 million vaccine doses had been administered as of January 20 -- far short of the last administration's goal of administering 20 million vaccine doses by the end of 2020.
The new administration has asked some of the key players who worked on Covid and vaccines under Trump to resign from their roles, including Operation Warp Speed chief scientific adviser Moncef Slaoui and Surgeon General Jerome Adams. It has kept on others such as Dr. Anthony Fauci, who is now serving as Biden's chief medical adviser on Covid-19. Adams was asked to stay on as an adviser.
Prior to Inauguration Day, some of Biden's Covid-19 advisers had wanted to be careful not to be overly critical in public of the Trump administration's handling of the virus and vaccine, given that the Biden transition team was already having a hard time getting critical information and cooperation from the outgoing administration, the source said.
Now that the transition of power has taken place, the Biden administration is hoping that they can quickly start to get a clearer picture of where things actually stand with vaccine distribution and administration across the country, going through something of a "fact-checking" exercise on what exactly the Trump administration had and had not done, they added.
CNN has previously reported that the Biden team's most urgent concerns on Covid-19 include potential vaccine supply problems, coordination between federal and local governments, as well as funding, staffing and other resource needs for local governments. That is in addition to the emerging Covid variants, which the new White House -- in consultation with scientists and experts -- is watching warily.
Biden has made clear that slowing down the spread of Covid-19 and getting 100 million vaccine shots into Americans' arms in his first 100 days in office are of utmost priority -- goals that will shape whether Biden's first years in office are ultimately deemed successful.
Within hours of being sworn into office, Biden signed an executive order requiring masks on all federal property, a part of his campaign promise to push for a federal mask mandate during his first 100 days in office.
"This is going to be the first of many engagements we're going to have in here," Biden said in his first appearance in the Oval Office as president. "I thought with the state of the nation today there's no time to waste. Get to work immediately."
On Biden's first full day in office on Thursday, the White House is focusing on Covid-19 by rolling out a national strategy for getting the pandemic under control including numerous executive actions related to vaccination and testing.
Criticizing the "lack of cooperation" from the Trump administration as an "impediment" for the new administration, White House Covid coordinator Jeff Zients told reporters on Wednesday that he was still confident that the administration can meet its 100 million vaccine shots in 100 days target.
"For almost a year now, Americans could not look to the federal government for any strategy, let alone a comprehensive approach to respond to Covid," Zients said. "And we've seen the tragic costs of that failure. As President Biden steps into office today ... that'll change tomorrow."
This story has been updated with additional reporting.

Reality 'Starting to Sink In,' Says McKibben, After European Investment Bank Chief Admits 'Gas Is Over'

"There's nothing clean about gas—it's not a 'transition fuel' or a 'bridge fuel,' it's a dirty fossil fuel just like coal and oil," said Greenpeace EU. "It's time to stop bankrolling the #ClimateEmergency and stop public money back gas projects."

by

Jon Queally, staff writer

Published on

Thursday, January 21, 2021

by

Common Dreams

Members of the European Parliament rally against fracked gas in 2012. On Wednesday, the head of the European Investment Bank (EIB) declared "Gas is over" during a presentation of the bank's 2020 performance. (Credit: flickr / cc / greensefa)

Noted author and 350.org co-founder Bill McKibben was among the first to celebrate word that the president of the European Investment Bank on Wednesday openly declared, "To put it mildly, gas is over"—an admission that squares with what climate experts and economists have been saying for years if not decades.

Dr. Werner Hoyer, president of the EIB—the investment bank publicly owned by the European Union's member states—made the comments while presenting a review of the institution's 2020 operations at a press conference in Luxembourg.

Calling a future break with fracked gas "a serious departure from the past," Hoer added that "without the end to the use of unabated fossil fuels, we will not be able to reach the climate targets" to which the EU states—and therefore the bank—have committed.

McKibben and others responded to the comments as the most recent promising signal that the financial world is catching up with the climate science that demands a rapid and profound shift away from fossil fuels.

"President of the EIB, Werner Hoyer, clearly knows what's up," tweeted Oil Change International. "We agree. Time to #StopFundingFossils."

Greenpeace EU also heralded the news and stated: "There's nothing clean about gas—it's not a 'transition fuel' or a 'bridge fuel,' it's a dirty fossil fuel just like coal and oil.  It's time to stop bankrolling the #ClimateEmergency and stop public money back gas projects."

According to EurActiv:

The EU aims to reach net zero emissions by 2050 and is expected to adopt a new carbon reduction target of -55% for 2030. However, gas has remained a grey area, with the  European Commission saying it will still be needed to help coal-reliant EU member states transition away from fossil fuels.

Under their climate bank roadmap published in 2020, the EIB plans to use 50% of its activity to support climate and environmental sustainability, unlocking €1 trillion for green funding by 2030. It will also ensure that all activity is aligned with the Paris Agreement.

Others emphasized what a historic shift the comment represents from even just a few years ago:

While many European climate groups and financial watchdogs have criticized the EU member states and the EIB itself for not moving forward fast enough with proposed reforms to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Hoyer said Wednesday that the shift away from fossil fuels is paramount and that even the Covid-19 pandemic wreaking havoc across the continent must not act as a roadblock.

"We have achieved unprecedented impact on climate, preparing the ground for much more," Hoyer said in his remarks. "But the risk of a recovery that neglects climate and the environment remains."

"The fight against climate change cannot wait until the pandemic is over," he added. "The [Covid-19] crisis is not a reason to stop tackling the climate and environmental challenges facing humanity."

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