US reaches out to Palestinian leaders many angrily reject

By JOSEPH KRAUSS 

AP 

MAY 24,2021

1 of 4

FILE - In this Friday, May 21, 2021 file photo, Palestinians wave national and Hamas flags in front of the Dome of the Rock shrine at the al-Aqsa mosque complex in Jerusalem. The U.S. and the international community are planning to engage with the Palestinians to revive peace efforts, after weeks of unrest and a devastating 11-day war in Gaza. But when U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits this week, he will meet with unelected leaders who were sidelined by the protests and outmaneuvered by Gaza's militant Hamas rulers. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean, File)

JERUSALEM (AP) — After weeks of unrest and a devastating 11-day war in Gaza, the U.S. and the international community plan to engage with the Palestinians to revive peace efforts.

But when U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken visits on Tuesday, he will meet with Palestinian leaders who were sidelined by the protests and outmaneuvered by the militant Hamas group — and who seem to be more despised by Palestinians than at any time in their long reign.

The Palestinian Authority is no closer to statehood than it was when Mahmoud Abbas, now 85, was elected president in 2005 after the death of Yasser Arafat, and the Palestinians are far more deeply divided. Abbas called off the first elections in 15 years last month, when it looked like his splintering Fatah party would suffer an embarrassing defeat.

However, the PA maintains close security ties with Israel and is deeply invested in the idea of a two-state solution. Internationally, that’s seen as the only way to resolve the conflict, even though there have been no substantive peace talks in more than a decade.

The Islamic militant group Hamas won a landslide victory in the last elections in 2006 and was poised to do well again. But it does not recognize Israel’s right to exist and is blacklisted as a terrorist organization. The protests in Jerusalem and elsewhere are mostly leaderless.

“The option is either to engage with Hamas or an incredibly unrepresentative and defunct governing — somewhat of a governing — authority that holds absolutely no legitimacy,” said Tahani Mustafa, an analyst at the Crisis Group, an international think tank.

Israel and the U.S. appear to be taking the second route, with officials in both countries saying they hope to strengthen the PA at the expense of Hamas, something that has been tried and failed repeatedly since Hamas seized power in Gaza from Abbas’ forces in 2007.

Many Palestinians have come to see the PA as part of an entrenched and increasingly unbearable system of Israeli domination that extends far beyond the occupied West Bank, where the PA administers major population centers under overarching Israeli control.

Their anger boiled over last month with protests and clashes in Jerusalem that eventually spread across the region, drawing in Palestinian citizens of Israel and triggering the Gaza war.

It was on vivid display at Friday prayers at the Al-Aqsa Mosque, the combustible holy site at the heart of the recent unrest, when thousands of Palestinian worshippers chanted “Dogs of the authority, get out!” in response to a sermon from a PA-appointed mufti.

That was in sharp contrast to raucous rallies held at Al-Aqsa and elsewhere in support of Hamas and Mohammed Deif, the shadowy commander of the group’s armed wing.

Unlike the PA, which released sternly-worded statements against Israel’s policing of Al-Aqsa and attempts by Jewish settlers to evict dozens of families from a nearby neighborhood, Deif issued an ultimatum. When time ran out, Hamas fired long-range rockets that disrupted an Israeli parade celebrating its claims to the city.

That triggered a devastating Gaza war that killed more than 250 people, the vast majority of them Palestinians, and caused widespread destruction in the impoverished territory.

But it also allowed Hamas to portray itself as a wily defender of Jerusalem, to which both sides in the Middle East conflict have deeply emotional ties, and to say it had struck a blow against the far more powerful Israel.

Mkhaimar Abusada, a political science professor at Al-Azhar University in Gaza, says that even there support for Hamas has risen amid widespread disappointment with the PA.

“At the end of the day, it’s Israel that destroyed these buildings,” he said. “We suffer because of Israeli occupation, we suffer because of Israeli oppression... The Palestinians are not going to blame Hamas.”

Hanan Ashrawi, a former senior Palestinian official and veteran of the peace process who broke with the Palestinian leadership last year, partly blames Israel for the downfall of the PA, saying it “sabotaged” attempts at a two-state solution, including by expanding settlements.

“The more this happened, the more (Palestinian leaders) were seen as helpless before Israeli violations,” she said. “Israel proceeded with full impunity to make life more and more miserable for Palestinians.”

Israel says it made various proposals over the years for a Palestinian state in most of the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem — territories it seized in the 1967 war — that were rejected. The Palestinians, negotiating from a position of weakness, said the offers did not go far enough.

Khalil Shikaki, a respected pollster who has been surveying Palestinian public opinion for more than two decades, said Hamas’ popularity normally rises during periods of confrontation only to return to normal when things settle down. But he says the PA’s crisis of legitimacy is real.

“This last war between Israel and Hamas has shown that the emperor is truly naked,” he said.

Hamas was able to argue that it defended Jerusalem when no one else — neither Abbas, nor Arab countries, nor the international community — was willing to do anything, Shikaki said.

“This narrative is absolutely fantastic in terms of its effectiveness, and Hamas got away with it because Abbas has zero credibility among Palestinians,” he said.

That won’t keep Abbas from welcoming Blinken to the presidential palace in Ramallah this week as the leader of the Palestinians, even though he administers less than 40% of the West Bank and his presidential mandate expired more than a decade ago. His forces have no presence in Gaza, and with the elections cancelled, are unlikely to return anytime soon.

For that reason, it’s widely expected that any rebuilding money will go through the U.N. and Qatar. They were already funneling aid to Gaza and carrying out humanitarian projects there as part of informal cease-fires between Israel and Hamas — the only meaningful Israeli-Palestinian agreements reached in recent memory.

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Follow Joseph Krauss on Twitter at www.twitter.com/josephkrauss.

Pope to Vatican’s own media workers: 

Who reads your news?

By NICOLE WINFIELD

Pope Francis leaves after a visit to Radio Vaticana offices 

in Rome Monday, May 24, 2021. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis challenged the Vatican’s own media employees Monday to essentially justify their continued work, asking them how many people actually consume their news in a critique of the office that costs the Holy See more than all its embassies around the world combined.

Francis visited the Dicastry of Communications, Vatican Radio and the headquarters of the Vatican’s newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, which is marking its 160th anniversary. He appeared to use the occasion to lay down the gauntlet at a fraught financial time for the Holy See.

Facing a major pension funding shortage and a projected 50 million euro ($61 million) deficit this year, Francis has ordered salary cuts from 3% to 10% for senior Vatican employees, both lay and religious, and paused seniority bonuses for two years.

Francis has vowed not to fire anyone to offset the economic crisis created by COVID-19 and the pandemic-related shuttering of one of the Holy See’s main sources of revenue, ticket sales from the Vatican Museums.

But in a warning of sorts to the Vatican communications staff, he opened his unscripted remarks Monday with a pointed question.

“There are a lot of reasons to be worried about the Radio, L’Osservatore, but one that touches my heart: How many people listen to the Radio? How many people read L’Osservatore Romano?” Francis asked.

He said their work was good, their offices nice and organized, but that there was a “danger” that their work doesn’t arrive where it is supposed to. He warned them against falling prey to a “lethal” functionality where they go through the motions but don’t actually achieve anything.

The cost-benefit question of the Vatican’s in-house media operations has been posed many times, since the communications office consumes more of the Holy See’s annual budget than any other department. According to the latest figures, the Dicastry for Communications had a 43 million euros ($52.5 million) budget for 2021, around 20 percent of the whole.

Its expenses are are greater than the combined expenses of the 10 smallest Vatican departments.

The Vatican has long justified the costs because its communications operations are at the core of the Holy See’s main mission: to communicate the Catholic faith to all corners of the globe.

To answer Francis’ question about who consumes Vatican media, the Holy See press office provided some data: Vatican Radio is transmitted by 1,000 radio networks worldwide. L’Osservatore Romano says it is seen by 21,500 readers each day via its printed and online version, though that figure rises to 40,000 if its different language editions distributed by dioceses are taken into account.

Vatican News, the main online news portal of the Holy See, averages around 21 million page views per month, though it was unclear if those are unique page views.

The cuts Francis has imposed across the board have sparked a minor revolt among Vatican employees. They penned a blistering open letter May 20 expressing their “dismay and profound discouragement” at salary cuts, lack of overtime and uncompensated increased workload, which they said didn’t conform to the Catholic Church’s social doctrine.

They lamented in particular the great disparities in pay and benefits, especially for some lay managers and outside consultants on whom the Holy See relies heavily to oversee and clean up its finances.

“One cannot ignore the economic difficulties that families are today called to confront as a result of the pandemic,” they lamented in asking for a meeting to discuss their concerns.

Old records shed new light on smallpox outbreaks in 1700s

By WILLIAM J. KOLE

AP

May 21, 2021



In this image provided by the American Ancestors & New England Historic Genealogical Society, a digitized copy of a page from a handwritten 18th century diary by the Rev. Ebenezer Storer, during a period of smallpox, in Boston, shows an April 1764 entry that includes a prayer Storer wrote weeks after arranging to have his own children inoculated. In the prayer, Storer gives thanks for the recovery of family members from the disease. (American Ancestors & New England Historic Genealogical Society via AP)

BOSTON (AP) — A highly contagious disease originating far from America’s shores triggers deadly outbreaks that spread rapidly, infecting the masses. Shots are available, but a divided public agonizes over getting jabbed.

Sound familiar?

Newly digitized records — including a minister’s diary scanned and posted online by Boston’s Congregational Library and Archives — are shedding fresh light on devastating outbreaks of smallpox that hit the city in the 1700s.

And three centuries later, the parallels with the coronavirus pandemic are uncanny.

“How little we’ve changed,” said CLA archivist Zachary Bodnar, who led the digitization effort, working closely with the New England Historic Genealogical Society.

“The fact that we’re finding these similarities in the records of our past is a very interesting parallel,” Bodnar said in an interview. “Sometimes the more we learn, the more we’re still the same, I guess.”

Smallpox was eradicated, but not before it sickened and killed millions worldwide. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention say the last natural outbreak of smallpox in the United States occurred in 1949. In 1980, the World Health Organization’s decision-making arm declared it eradicated, and no cases of naturally occurring smallpox have been reported since.

But in April 1721, after an English ship, the HMS Seahorse, brought it to Boston, it was a clear and present danger. By winter of 1722, it would infect more than half of the city’s population of 11,000 and kill 850.

Much earlier outbreaks, also imported from Europe, killed Native Americans indiscriminately in the 1600s. Now, digitized church records are helping to round out the picture of how the colonists coped when it was their turn to endure pestilence.

The world’s first proper vaccination didn’t occur until the end of that century, when an English country doctor named Edward Jenner inoculated an 8-year-old boy against smallpox in 1796.

Before then, doctors used inoculation, or variolation as it was often called, introducing a trace amount of the smallpox virus into the skin. The procedure, or variations of it, had been practiced since ancient times in Asia. Jenner’s pioneering of vaccination, using instead a less lethal strain of the virus that infected cows, was a huge scientific advance.

Yet just as with COVID-19 vaccines in 2021, some took a skeptical view of smallpox inoculations in the 18th century, digitized documents show. To be sure, there was ample reason to worry: Early smallpox treatments, while effective in many who were inoculated, sickened or even killed others.

The Rev. Cotton Mather, one of the era’s most influential ministers, had actively promoted inoculation. In a sign of how resistant some colonists were to the new technology, someone tossed an explosive device through his window in November 1721.

Fortunately, it didn’t explode, but researchers at Harvard say this menacing message was attached: “Cotton Mather, you dog, damn you! I’ll inoculate you with this; with a pox to you.”

Among the recently digitized Congregational Church records are handwritten diary entries scrawled by the Rev. Ebenezer Storer, a pastor in Cambridge, Massachusetts. On March 11, 1764, as smallpox once again raged through Boston, Storer penned a prayer in his journal after arranging to have his own children inoculated.

The deeply devout Storer, his diary shows, had faith in science.

“Blessed be thy name for any discoveries that have been made to soften the severity of the distemper. Grant thy blessing on the means used,” he wrote.

Three weeks later, Storer gave thanks to God “for his great mercy to me in recovering my dear children and the others in my family from the smallpox.”

For Bodnar, the archivist, it’s a testament to the insights church records can contain.

“They’re fascinating,” he said. “They’re essentially town records — they not only tell the story of the daily accounting of the church, but also the story of what people were doing at that time and what was going on.”

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Follow AP New England editor Bill Kole on Twitter at http://twitter.com/billkole.

Murder, rape, torture: Court hears Darfur atrocities case

By MIKE CORDER

FILE - In this Tuesday Aug. 28, 2018 file photo, Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda at the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands. The International Criminal Court Prosecutor opened a hearing Monday, May 24, 2021 of evidence against an alleged leader of a notorious militia blamed for atrocities in Darfur, calling him a “willing and energetic” perpetrator of crimes in the conflict-torn region of Sudan in 2003-2004. Fatou Bensouda was addressing judges at the start of the first presentation at the global court of evidence against a suspect charged with involvement in crimes by the Janjaweed militia in Darfur. (Bas Czerwinski/Pool file via AP, File)

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — An alleged leader of a notorious militia blamed for atrocities in the Darfur conflict oversaw the summary execution of a group of about 100 captured men and boys in 2004, a prosecutor said Monday at the opening of a pretrial hearing at the International Criminal Court.

Pubudu Sachithanandan was speaking at the first presentation at the global court of evidence against a suspect charged with involvement in crimes by the Janjaweed militia in Darfur in 2003 and 2004.

Earlier, the court’s chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, said she felt privileged to be in court “when finally one of the suspects in the Darfur situation is before this court to face independent and impartial justice.”

Bensouda, whose nine-year term in office ends next month, paid tribute to “the courage, patience and resilience of the Darfur victims who have waited for so long for this day to arrive.”

Ali Mohammed Ali Abdul Rahman Ali, known as Ali Kushayb, is charged with a total of 31 counts of crimes against humanity and war crimes dating back to the deadly Darfur conflict in 2003 and 2004 including murder, rape, torture and persecution.

He has not entered a plea to the charges but at a hearing last year he told judges the allegations were “untrue.” His lawyer, Cyril Laucci, disputes the court’s jurisdiction in the case.

Bensouda told judges that Abdul Rahman “was a knowing, willing and energetic perpetrator of these crimes. He played a crucial role leading attacks, committing murders and ordering other murders.”

She said Janjaweed forces used rape as a weapon to terrorize and humiliate women. She recounted the story of a woman captured by a Janjaweed fighter and raped at knife point. Bensouda told judges that the victim, who is also a witness in the case, said: “I screamed and another ... Janjaweed came with a sword, put it in my mouth and said he would cut me if I screamed.”

ICC COURT IN THE HAGUE

Outlining witness testimony in the mistreatment and execution of around 100 men and boys who were rounded up and imprisoned at a police station in the town of Mukjar early in 2004, Sachithanandan said Abdul Rahman played a key role.

He hit detainees with an ax, spoke to government officials about what to do with the captives, who included prominent community leaders from the Fur tribal group, and ultimately ordered them shot.

After the massacre of one group, Adbul Rahman told gunmen: “Repeat, repeat for these people. Maybe there are some that you have missed. Repeat for these people,” Sachithanandan said, citing witness testimony.

Monday’s hearing is not a trial. Instead, it is intended to establish whether evidence against Abdul Rahman is strong enough to merit putting him on trial at the global court. A decision is expected later this year.

The conflict in Darfur broke out when rebels from the territory’s ethnic central and sub-Saharan African community launched an insurgency in 2003, complaining of oppression by the Arab-dominated government in Khartoum.

The government of now-deposed President Omar al-Bashir’s government responded with a scorched-earth campaign of aerial bombings and unleashed Janjaweed militias, who are accused of mass killings and rapes. Up to 300,000 people were killed and 2.7 million were driven from their homes.

Al-Bashir has been charged with crimes including genocide for masterminding the operation. He has been in jail in Khartoum since his 2019 ouster and faces several trials in Sudanese courts related to his three decades of strongman rule.

Bensouda visited Khartoum last year to discuss cooperation in efforts to bring to justice suspects charged by the Hague-based court with involvement in Darfur atrocities. She said Monday she will visit again next week, including her first trip to Darfur.

Human Rights Watch welcomed Monday’s hearing as an important step toward justice for victims, but the group’s associate international justice director Elise Keppler added that “the absence of al-Bashir and the three other Darfur suspects at the ICC is a major shortcoming that the Sudanese authorities should promptly address.”

Abdul Rahman surrendered to authorities in a remote corner of northern Central African Republic, near the country’s border with Sudan, more than 13 years after the ICC first issued an international arrest warrant for him.

A group of victims in the case is being represented in the case by lawyer Amal Clooney, who joined the hearing by video link.

Adam Regal, a spokesman for General Coordination for Refugee and Displaced Camps in Darfur, said they would hire lawyers to represent refugees and displaced people before the court. He said they would work with the court to provide possible evidence and help survivors of the atrocities reach the court.

He criticized the transitional government for not yet handing over al-Bashir and other wanted officials.

“This is a legal process not a political one,” he said. “It is the right of the victims and displaced people to see justice achieved.”

____

Associated Press writer Samy Magdy contributed to this story from Cairo.

Biden’s solar ambitions collide with China labor complaints

By JOE McDONALD

Workers install solar panels at a photovoltaic power station in Hami in northwestern China's Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region Monday Aug. 22, 2011. The Biden administration's solar power ambitions are colliding with complaints the global industry depends on Chinese raw materials that might be produced by forced labor. One big hurdle is polysilicon from Xinjiang, commonly used to make photovoltaic cells for solar panels. (Chinatopix via AP)

BEIJING (AP) — The Biden administration’s solar power ambitions are colliding with complaints the global industry depends on Chinese raw materials that might be produced by forced labor.

A big hurdle is polysilicon, used to make photovoltaic cells for solar panels. The global industry gets 45% of its supply from Xinjiang, the northwestern region where the ruling Communist Party is accused of mass incarceration of minorities and other abuses. Other parts of China supply 35%. Only 20% comes from U.S. and other producers.

Biden’s climate envoy, John Kerry, says Washington is deciding whether to keep solar products from Xinjiang out of U.S. markets. That sets up a conflict with President Joe Biden’s plans to cut climate-changing carbon emissions by promoting solar and other renewable energy while also reducing cost

In Xinjiang, more than 1 million Uyghurs and other members of predominantly Muslim ethnic groups have been forced into detention camps, according to foreign researchers and governments. Authorities are accused of forced sterilizations of minorities and of destroying mosques.

Chinese officials reject accusations of abuse and say the camps are for job training aimed at economic development and deterring radicalism.

U.S. and some Chinese solar vendors have pledged to avoid suppliers that might use forced labor. It isn’t clear, however, whether they can meet rising demand without Xinjiang, where Beijing won’t allow independent inspections of workplaces.

The biggest manufacturers all use raw materials from Xinjiang and have a “high risk of forced labor in their supply chains,” according to a May 14 report by researchers Laura T. Murphy and Nyrola Elima of Britain’s Sheffield Hallam University.

The possibility of forced labor “is a problem,” Kerry told U.S. legislators last week. He cited “solar panels that we believe in some cases are being produced by forced labor.”

Western governments have imposed travel and financial restrictions on Chinese officials blamed for abuses. The U.S. government has banned imports of cotton and tomatoes from Xinjiang, citing concerns over forced labor.

The administration was assessing whether to extend that ban to solar panels and raw materials from Xinjiang, Kerry said. He said he didn’t know the status of that review.

At issue is the government’s “labor transfer” program, which places workers in Xinjiang with companies.

Chinese officials say it is voluntary, but Murphy and Elima argue it takes place in “an environment of unprecedented coercion” and is “undergirded by the constant threat of re-education and internment.”

“Many indigenous workers are unable to refuse or walk away from these jobs,” their report says. It says the programs are “tantamount to forcible transfer of populations and enslavement.”

Murphy and Elima said they found 11 companies engaged in forced labor transfers of Uyghurs and other minorities and 90 Chinese and foreign enterprises whose supply chains are affected. They said manufacturers need to make “significant changes” if they want to avoid suppliers that use forced labor.

Murphy and Elima say the biggest global solar equipment manufacturers — JinkoSolar Inc., LONGi Green Energy Technology Co., Trina Solar Energy Co. and JA Solar Holdings Co. — might have forced labor in their supply chains.

Trina and JinkoSolar also have “possible labor transfers” in factories, while a JinkoSolar facility is in an industrial park that also has a prison, according to Murphy and Elima.

JinkoSolar, LONGi, Trina and JA Solar didn’t immediately respond to questions about the report.

At the same time, a supply crunch as demand surges has boosted polysilicon prices more than 100% since January to a 9-year high.

The market is “already undersupplied,” Johannes Bernreuter, head of Germany’s Bernreuter Research, said in an email.

China is both the biggest global market for solar equipment and the biggest producer.

That reflects multibillion-dollar government spending over the past two decades to promote solar energy. The ruling party wants to curb reliance on imported oil and gas, which it sees as a security weakness, and take the lead in an emerging industry.

A supply glut as hundreds of Chinese manufacturers rushed into the industry 15 years ago drove prices down. That hurt Western competitors but accelerated adoption of solar in the United States and Europe.

Seven of the top 10 global producers are Chinese. Canadian Solar Inc. is registered in Canada but its production is in China. South Korea’s Hanwha Q-Cells is No. 6.

The only U.S. producer in the top 10, First Solar Inc., has no exposure to the Xinjiang polysilicon supply chain because the Tempe, Arizona, company uses thin film technology that requires no polysilicon.

Vendors serving U.S. and European markets probably can get enough polysilicon outside Xinjiang, Bernreuter said. But he said supplies might be squeezed if other countries impose the same requirement.

Potential non-Chinese suppliers include Germany’s Wacker Chemie AG and the Malaysian arm of South Korea’s OCI Co.

However, those companies also might buy raw materials from Xinjiang’s biggest supplier, Hoshine Silicon Industry Co., according to Murphy and Elima. They cited documents they said show Hoshine, also known as Hesheng, participates in “labor transfer.”

Hoshine didn’t immediately respond to questions about the report.

U.S. solar equipment vendors have been trying since last year to overhaul supply chains to eliminate problem suppliers, according to their trade group, the Solar Energy Industries Association.

In February, 175 companies including the U.S. arms of JinkoSolar, LONGi, Trina and JA Solar signed a pledge to oppose use of forced labor by their suppliers.

Potential changes should be done by the end of June, according to the group’s president, Abigail Ross Hopper.

“If their customers and the U.S. government are demanding it, they will need to move quickly,” Ross Hopper told PV Magazine USA in February.

Bernreuter warned the Chinese government “might interfere” with an overhaul, though there is no sign that has happened.

____

Sheffield Hallam University report: www.shu.ac.uk/helena-kennedy-centre-international-justice/research-and-projects/all-projects/in-broad-daylight

Bernreuter Research: www.bernreuter.com

Solar Energy Industries Association: www.seia.org

LIKE WAR PROFITEERING

As pandemic spread pain and panic, congressman chased profit

By BRIAN SLODYSKO

AP

May 21, 2021



FILE - In this March 10, 2021, file photo, Rep. Tom Malinowski, D-N.J., speaks during a hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. Malinowski has scolded those looking to capitalize on the once-in-a-century pandemic. But the two term Democrat is not heeding his own admonition. Records show he's bought or sold as much as $1 million of stock in medical and tech companies that had a stake in the virus response. (Ken Cedeno/Pool via AP, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — In the early days of the pandemic, New Jersey Rep. Tom Malinowski scolded those looking to capitalize on the once-in-a-century health crisis.

“This is not the time for anybody to be profiting off of selling ventilators, vaccines, drugs, treatments, PPE (personal protective equipment), anywhere in the world,” the two-term Democrat and former assistant secretary of state told MSNBC in April 2020.

He did not heed his own admonition.

Since early 2020, Malinowski has bought or sold as much as $1 million of stock in medical and tech companies that had a stake in the virus response, according to an analysis of records by The Associated Press. The trades were just one slice of a stock buying and selling spree by the congressman during that time, worth as much as $3.2 million, that he did not properly disclose.

The issue of congressional stock trading took on a new urgency last year when at least three senators were the subject of inquiries about whether they made financial decisions based on insider information. Though no one was charged, their dealings stirred outrage and highlighted the limitations of the Stock Act, a 2012 law intended to curtail stock market speculation by lawmakers.

Malinowski’s trades received little attention at the time. Yet his subsequent failure to report his trading activity to Congress as required by law, which was first reported by Business Insider, have made him the latest to face scrutiny, with two complaints filed against him with the Office of Congressional Ethics.

When millions were out of work and markets were hemorrhaging, Malinowski snapped up securities at bargain prices — profiting when valuations recovered. In other cases, he sold shares before they fell substantially, according to the AP’s analysis of a list of trades that his office said he made in 2020.

He also engaged in the controversial practice of short-selling stocks, placing bets that the values of specific businesses would decline at a time when many companies were pleading with the government for a financial lifeline.

“It boggles my mind why he’s doing it,” said Richard Painter, a University of Minnesota law professor who served as President George W. Bush’s ethics attorney and later ran for Senate as a Democrat. “It’s a huge conflict of interest and not an acceptable situation.”

There is no indication Malinowski acted on inside information to make his investment decisions. Still, it’s difficult to assess the full scope of his financial activity. Nearly six months after 2020 drew to a close, mandatory reports to Congress detailing his trades have not been made public.

In an interview Thursday, Malinowski said his failure to file was “a mistake that I own 100%.” He said the reports, some of which were due over a year ago, have been submitted though not released by the congressional ethics office, which did not respond to a request for comment

Malinowski said his broker handles all of his trading decisions and he does not speak to the firm about specific transactions. His office provided a statement from the firm, Gagnon Securities, stating that it made trades “without Congressman Malinowski’s input or prior knowledge.”

“At no point in the last 25 years have I directed, suggested, or even asked questions about a particular trade being made by my brokerage firm,” Malinowski said. He said the one exception was a request to sell stock that he was obligated to get rid of after joining President Barack Obama’s State Department in 2014.

He also said he was in the process of setting up a blind trust to hold his financial portfolio, which he will have no control over. He said other members of Congress should do the same.

Painter noted that Malinowski had ultimate control over his account when the trades were made, a fact the congressman acknowledged.

“Of course he is going to say his broker makes all the decisions,” Painter said.

The Stock Act, which proponents initially said would end stock speculation among members of Congress, passed with bipartisan support in 2012 in the wake of a stock trading scandal.

The law bars members from using inside information to make investment decisions and requires that all stock trades be reported to Congress within 45 days. Yet in the nearly 10 years since it was enacted, no one has been prosecuted under it even as many members continue to conspicuously trade.

“I thought no congressman or senator would want to get caught in that sort of controversy, even if it just had the appearance of insider trading,” said Craig Holman, a lobbyist for the Washington-based government watchdog group Public Citizen. “But clearly there’s still a significant number of members of Congress who still want to abuse their access to insider knowledge.”

Trades by Malinowski follow a familiar, albeit less overt pattern when compared with others who have drawn scrutiny.

In March 2020, he bought between $190,000 and $625,000 worth of stock as the virus drove a market collapse, records show.

Some of the companies he invested in were developing COVID-19 testing or therapeutics to combat illnesses caused by the disease. Last June, he bought between $1,001 and $15,000 worth of shares of TFF Pharmaceuticals, which is developing an antibody treatment. They have nearly doubled in value since.

In November, he sold between $15,001 and $50,000 worth of stock in drug maker Merck, which he had not previously disclosed owning. The company’s value tumbled two months later after it announced it would end its efforts to develop a COVID-19 vaccine.

In at least one case Malinowski benefited from exceptional timing.

In February 2020, days after members of Congress were briefed on the virus, records show Malinowski sold between $1,001 and $15,000 shares in Kimco Realty, a company that owns shopping centers across the U.S. A month later, when the company’s share price dropped nearly 50%, he bought back far more stock in the company, worth somewhere between $15,001 and $50,000. They’ve increased in value by 50% since.

“I don’t think it would be possible for any investor in the market to instruct their broker not to take into account the most important thing happening in the economy,” Malinowski said of the pandemic.

But it is Malinowski’s short selling of stocks that government watchdogs find particularly troubling.

“A shorting congressman? It’s just nuts,” said Painter, the ethics lawyer.

A short sale is a stock transaction where an investor borrows shares in a company and sells them in hopes of buying them back later at a lower price and pocketing the difference. It’s a practice that during the pandemic has come under criticism from some economists and academic experts because it has the potential to throttle existing market anxiety, drive rumors and lead to irrational buying decisions that could harm otherwise solid companies.

Xu Jiang, a Duke University business school professor, said members of Congress face a “moral responsibility” during such times.

“There is merit to banning short selling during a crisis period,” said Xu Jiang. “It can drive rumors and take down viable firms.”

Malinowski has been a prolific short seller throughout his time in Congress. It’s unclear whether he short sold in 2020 because the list of stock transactions released by his office is incomplete. But a recent disclosure reveals he short sold between $62,000 and $230,000 worth of stock in at least six companies in 2021.

“It is part of how investment on the stock market works in our capitalist system,” Malinowski said, later adding, “I don’t think there’s anything inherently wrong with Americans engaging in these kinds of normal investment activities.”

Whether Malinowski’s trading will pose a liability with voters will be tested as he campaigns for a third term and Democrats are on defense trying to hold their narrow House majority.

Republican Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, of Georgia, both lost their runoff bids for the Senate in January after their own stock trades became a major campaign issue, handing control of the chamber to Democrats. Both were investigated by the Justice Department, but ultimately cleared.

Perdue had dumped between $1 million and $5 million worth of stock in a company where he was formerly a board member. After markets crashed, he bought it back and earned a windfall after its price skyrocketed.

Loeffler and her husband, the CEO and chairman of the parent company of the New York Stock Exchange, dumped millions of dollars in stock following a briefing on the virus.

Republican Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina drew perhaps the most scrutiny for his trades. He stepped aside as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee chairman after the FBI obtained a search warrant to seize a cellphone.

Burr and his wife sold between $600,000 and $1.7 million in more than 30 transactions in late January and mid-February, just before the market began to dive and government health officials began to sound alarms about the virus. Burr was captured in a recording privately warning a group of influential constituents in early 2020 to prepare for economic devastation.

The Justice Department investigated Burr’s actions, but cleared him of wrongdoing.

Despite the spate of cases, congressional leaders have shown little appetite for strengthening stock trading rules. Yet the temptation to use insider information remains.

“We are constantly apprised, before the public has the information, about what specific provisions might benefit particular entities,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., who sponsored a bill that would ban lawmakers from stock trading. “What you saw during COVID was one of the most horrific examples.”

It’s not the first time Malinowski has run afoul of government trading rules.

As an assistant secretary of state during the Obama administration, he agreed to sell shares held in CNinsure Inc. following his 2014 confirmation to the post. In a letter to a State Department ethics lawyer, he acknowledged that the investment in the Chinese insurance company, now known as Fanhua Inc., posed a “heightened prospect of a conflict of interest” given his work, which dealt heavily with human rights abuses, including those by China.

Yet the stock remained in his portfolio for over a year, well beyond a 90-day window to sell that he agreed to, records show. He sold it for more than he initially reported it to be worth, collecting somewhere between $15,001 and $50,000 in June 2015, following a period in which the stock’s value was held down following allegations of fraud made against the company.

Malinowksi said he instructed his broker to sell the shares earlier, but it failed to do so. They were sold after he sent a June 2015 email inquiring about them.

“As we discussed last year, I can’t hold Chinese stocks (or any stocks from countries that might pose conflicts with my State Department job, which, to be safe, would include any country outside Europe/Canada). Could you make sure this is sold?” he said, according to an email provided by his office.

Some members of Congress, acknowledging the shortcomings of the Stock Act, are proposing a bipartisan bill that would require lawmakers to place assets like stock in a blind trust.

“I don’t know that you should be buying and selling stock when the people we represent are facing what will invariably be the most horrific and challenging years of their lives,” said Rep. Abigail Spanberger, a Democrat from Virginia who is co-sponsoring the bill with Republican Rep. Chip Roy of Texas. “If you are not willing to make certain sacrifices to be in public service, then perhaps there might be a different job that’s best for you.”

EXPLAINER: 

Why ‘world’s pharmacy’ India is short on shots

By ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL

AP

May 22, 2021

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FILE- In this Jan. 21, 2021, file photo, employees pack boxes containing vials of Covishield, a version of the AstraZeneca vaccine at the Serum Institute of India in Pune, India. India, the world’s largest maker of vaccines, was expected to play a pivotal role in global efforts to immunize against COVID-19. But its own capacity is proving to be insufficient for its own massive needs amid a ferocious surge of new infections. In past weeks, many people wanting to get vaccines have been turned away. Experts say that this is due to bad planning. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool, File)

NEW DELHI (AP) — Last year, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi told the United Nations his country would make enough COVID-19 vaccines “to help all humanity.” Now India is struggling to meet its own domestic needs for the shots amid a startling surge of infections.

As the world’s largest maker of vaccines, India always was expected to play a pivotal role in global efforts to immunize against COVID-19. But a mixture of overconfidence, poor planning and bad luck has prevented that from happening.

Here’s a look at what went wrong:

CAUGHT OFF GUARD

Officials in India seemed to have been caught off guard by several things, including the speed at which vaccines were approved for use around the world. India like many other countries had been working under the assumption that vaccines wouldn’t be ready for use until mid-2021.

Instead, they started being greenlit in some countries in December — upping the pressure to not only produce but deliver promised shots as soon as possible. India, which approved two vaccines in January, turned out to not be ready for the eventual demand either at home or abroad.

The government’s plan had been to vaccinate 300 million of the India’s nearly 1.4 billion people by August. But it hadn’t actually reserved even close to enough shots to do so. It had just assumed — partly based on projections from the country’s vaccine makers — that there would be enough doses to both vaccinate people at home and fulfill promised orders abroad.

There also was little domestic urgency because India’s infections had been declining consistently for months. In fact, in January, just days after India kicked off its domestic vaccination campaign and also started exporting shots, Modi declared victory over the pandemic at a virtual gathering of the World Economic Forum.

Modi’s government seemed to bask in the early success of its so-called “vaccine diplomacy” and the Foreign Ministry reiterated time and again that exports were calibrated according to the needs of the domestic immunization program.

Experts say that turned out to be a dangerous miscalculation as an explosion of domestic cases was just around the corner.

Dr. Vineeta Bal, who studies immune systems at the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research in Pune city, said the government should’ve been planning for the future instead of celebrating its “victory” over the virus.

“I’ve no idea why people didn’t think about it,” she said. “Did no one do the calculation ... of how many doses will be needed in India?”

PRODUCTION PROBLEMS

India has two main COVID-19 vaccine producers: the Serum Institute of India, which is making the AstraZeneca vaccine, and Bharat Biotech, which is making its own local vaccine.

India allowed the companies to start producing their shots last year as they waited for formal approval from regulators. Both the government and the companies thought that by the time the shots were approved they would have larger stockpiles of the vaccines than they did.

Scaling up manufacturing has turned out to be a problem for both companies.

Serum Institute’s chief executive, Adar Poonawalla, told The Associated Press in December that the target was to make up to 100 million shots monthly by January and to split them equally between India and the world. But the federal government told states last month that the company was producing just 60 million shots a month.

The company has said that a fire in its facilities in January and a U.S. embargo on exporting raw materials needed to make the jabs has hobbled production. Poonawalla told AP that pivoting away from suppliers in the U.S. could result in a delay of up to six months.

Bharat Biotech chairman Krishna Ella told reporters in January that the company was aiming to make 700 million shots in 2021. But India’s federal government told states last month that the company was producing just 10 million shots a month.

The government said last month that it was giving the company millions of dollars in grants to try to help it ramp up production.

Neither company nor India’s Health Ministry responded to requests for comment.

WHAT NEXT?

With India recording hundreds of thousands of new infections each day, the government on May 1 opened up vaccination to all adults. That caused a surge in demand that has laid bare the extent of the shortage.

India has so far received just 196 million shots, including 10 million as a part of COVAX, a worldwide initiative aimed at providing equitable access to vaccines. Just 41 million people have been fully vaccinated, while 104 million more have received the first shot.

But the number of shots administered has declined from an average of 3.6 million a day on April 10 to about 1.4 million a day on May 20.

To help with the shortage, India has greenlit the Russian vaccine Sputnik V, and 200,000 doses of it arrived last week.

The government says supplies will improve soon and expects more than 2 billion shots to be available between August and December, according to Dr. V.K. Paul, a government adviser. That would include 750 million shots made by Serum Institute, 550 million shots made by Bharat Biotech and 156 million shots from Russia.

There also are plans for five Indian companies to make the Russian vaccine locally and for Serum Institute to make a version of the Novavax vaccine and vaccines from five other Indian companies whose shots are still being tested.

But experts warn that such estimates are once again too optimistic.

“These are optimistic estimates ... there are many ifs and buts that one needs to consider,” said Bal.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

Monkey business: Researchers find origins of Florida colony
May 19, 2021

In this undated photo provided by Deborah Williams, a Vervet monkey is seen in Dania Beach, Fla. Williams, is the lead author of a study that determined where a colony of monkeys that has lived for about 70 years in urban South Florida came from. In 1948 a group of monkeys escaped from the Dania Chimpanzee Farm. Most were captured, but some disappeared into the mangrove swamp. The study determined that 41 descendants live in the area today. (Deborah Williams via AP)

DANIA BEACH, Fla. (AP) — A colony of monkeys has lived for about 70 years in urban South Florida, near jets taking off from a nearby airport and fuel storage tanks.

No one was quite sure where they came from. Until now.

Researchers at Florida Atlantic University say they have traced the colony’s origins to the Dania Chimpanzee Farm. The South Florida SunSentinel reported Wednesday there was a monkey escape from the farm in 1948, with most of the monkeys recaptured. But not all of them.

The rest disappeared into a mangrove swamp, where their descendants live today. The FAU team said the colony currently numbers about 41.

The FAU researchers traced the monkeys’ genetics and concluded they were brought to Florida from Africa. The monkeys were sold mainly for medical and military research.

One thing is certain: Residents of the Dania Beach area where the monkeys live are extremely protective of them.

“The community still loves them,” said Deborah “Missy” Williams, lead author of the study, who is in the FAU Biological Sciences Department. “They care for them. They want them protected.”

Williams has founded the Dania Beach Vervet Project to protect them and is trying to raise money to buy land to serve as a sanctuary.

Renowned conservationist Jane Goodall wins Templeton Prize

By DAVID CRARY

AP

May 20, 2021


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This April 3, 2019 file photo shows primatologist Jane Goodall being honored for her lifetime achievements at a ceremony on her 85th birthday in Los Angeles. Goodall was named Thursday, May 20, 2021 as this year’s winner of the prestigious Templeton Prize, honoring individuals whose life’s work embodies a fusion of science and spirituality. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)

Jane Goodall, the conservationist renowned for her expertise on chimpanzees and her globe-spanning advocacy of environmental causes, was named Thursday as this year’s winner of the prestigious Templeton Prize, honoring individuals whose life’s work embodies a fusion of science and spirituality.

Goodall, born in London in 1934, traveled to Kenya in 1957 and met the famed anthropologist and paleontologist Louis Leakey. In 1960, at his invitation, she began her groundbreaking study of chimpanzees in what is now Tanzania.

Her field research revolutionized the field of primatology, helping transform how scientists and the public perceive the emotional and social complexity of animals. She was the first to observe that chimpanzees engage in activities previously believed to be exclusive to humans, such as creating tools, and she demonstrated that they have individual personalities.

“Her discoveries have profoundly altered the world’s view of animal intelligence and enriched our understanding of humanity in a way that is both humbling and exalting,” said Heather Templeton Dill, president of the John Templeton Foundation, which helps administers the prize.



Established in 1972 by the late philanthropist Sir John Templeton, the Templeton Prize is one of the world’s largest individual awards — currently valued at 1.1 million pounds, or $1.56 million. Past winners include Mother Teresa, the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa.

Last year’s honoree was Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health in the United States and leader of the Human Genome Project.

Goodall, in an interview with The Associated Press ahead of the award’s announcement, recalled how her work with the chimpanzees led to a broader appreciation for nature as she spent hours by herself in the forest.

“Out there in nature by myself, when you’re alone, you can become part of nature and your humanity doesn’t get in the way,” she said. “It’s almost like an out-of-body experience when suddenly you hear different sounds and you smell different smells and you’re actually part of this amazing tapestry of life.”

“Every time a little species vanishes, it may not seem important,” she added. “But the thread is pulled from that tapestry and the picture gets weaker as more threads are pulled, until that tapestry, once so beautiful, is hanging in tatters.”

As her fame grew, she expanded into a diverse range of activities, including humanitarian initiatives and advocacy for the ethical treatment of animals.

She founded the Jane Goodall Institute in 1977 to sustain the study and protection of chimpanzees while also improving the welfare of scores of local communities. In 1991 she founded Roots & Shoots, an environmental and humanitarian program whose hands-on projects have benefited communities, animals and the environment in more than 65 countries.

“Some people seem to believe that we can live separated from nature, but we can’t,” Goodall said.

“We’re animals, too, you know, by definition. ... We just happen to have (less) hair and have had an explosive development of our intellect. But we seem to fail when it comes to wisdom — the wisdom that says, ‘The decision I make now, how will that affect future generations or the health of the planet?’”

In recent decades, Goodall has averaged more than 300 days of travel each year, educating audiences worldwide about nature, conservation and the potential for collective action to bring about change. The coronavirus pandemic halted those travels, she has continued to have a strong influence through virtual participation in events and lectures involving thousands of people in scores of countries.

She launched a podcast from her childhood home in England and, at age 87, is reaching millions of people through social media.

Raised as a Christian, Goodall said she developed her own sense of spirituality in the forests of Tanzania — in essence, believing that all living things and the natural world are connected through a divine force.

She recalled her mother saying to her, when she was a girl, “You will be brought up in a Christian family, so you worship God. But you might have been born in Egypt and then you would worship Allah, or you might have been born in a Buddhist country or one with a Hindu religion.”

“And she said there can only be one God,” Goodall said, “and so the name that we call him or her or, it really doesn’t matter.”

As much as she respects science, she prefers it to have some limits.

“The world is so full of magic and surprises,” she said. “I like to keep an open mind, and I like to think of magic. I don’t want us to find out all the answers. ... One day we will learn the answers, but not on this planet.”

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AP video journalist Emily Leshner contributed to this report.

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Associated Press religion coverage receives support from the Lilly Endowment through The Conversation U.S. The AP is solely responsible for this content.

Indigenous woman named New Zealand's next governor-general

the first Indigenous Maori woman appointed to the role

Nick Perry
The Associated Press Staff
Published Monday, May 24, 2021 

Cindy Kiro, left, and Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, right, walk together through Parliament Building Monday, May 24, 2021, in Wellington, New Zealand. Kiro was named as New Zealand's next governor-general, the first Indigenous Maori woman appointed to the role.(AP Photo/Nick Perry)

WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND -- Children's advocate Cindy Kiro said Monday she hopes to inspire Maori girls after becoming the first Indigenous woman appointed to the role of governor-general.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced she had picked Kiro for the largely ceremonial role as Queen Elizabeth II's representative, and that the queen had approved.

Under New Zealand's constitutional system, the British monarch remains the nation's head of state although doesn't wield any real day-to-day power.

Kiro's five-year term begins in October, when she will replace Patsy Reddy. Both women have been been given the honourific "Dame" for their services to the community.

Kiro, 63, said her mixed Maori and British heritage helped give her a good understanding of New Zealand history and the Treaty of Waitangi, the founding document signed by Maori and British.

Kiro is currently chief executive of the Royal Society, a nonprofit group which advocates for research. She was previously the nation's Children's Commissioner and has held leadership roles at several universities.

"Over many decades, Dame Cindy has demonstrated her passion for the wellbeing of children and young people, as well as education and learning," Ardern said.

Kiro said she grew up in humble circumstances and her career had been driven by a sense of the importance of service.

Asked if it was appropriate in modern times for the queen to remain New Zealand's head of state, Kiro did not answer directly.

"Well, clearly I accept the queen as the head of state of the Commonwealth and I'm here to support her," Kiro said, adding that "This is the constitution we have, and I look forward to basically using it to serve the country."

Ardern said she believed New Zealand would one day become a republic but she didn't get a sense that people urgently wanted change, and so the issue hasn't been a priority for her government.