Monday, June 07, 2021

AUSTERITY BUDGET PRIVATIZES ESSENTIAL WORKERS
More than 100 layoffs looming as City of Edmonton looks to privatize bus cleaning, union calling on council to reconsider

Dustin Cook 
POSTMEDIA
© Provided by Edmonton Journal Harjas Grewal with Bee-Clean sanitizes the high touch surfaces in a Calgary Transit bus. The City of Edmonton is also looking at options to privatize bus cleaning which could lead to layoffs of more than 100 employees.


The City of Edmonton is moving forward on privatizing the cleaning and maintenance of transit buses, which could lead to more than 100 job cuts.

A request for proposals will be issued by the city later this month to contract out cleaning and refuelling duties of the city’s bus fleet in an effort to save about $1.2 million annually. During the fall budget adjustment in December, council asked the city to “complete a review of cleaning processes in transit to identify efficiencies” but didn’t specifically say that the work was going to be contracted out.

This budget reduction was part of the city’s strategy to achieve a zero per cent property tax increase and reduce expenditures.

Steve Bradshaw, president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 469, is sounding the alarm on the potential layoffs that would impact city employees who have been on the front lines of the pandemic ensuring that the city’s transit system was clean. The union has started a button campaign to garner support and also have photos of 1,500 members standing in solidarity that will be unveiled on a banner later this week.

“These people have been there on the front lines making sure that we’ve got a clean and disinfected fleet on the street, protecting their co-workers, protecting the riding public for the past year and a half in a pandemic environment and what’s their reward for that going to be? A pink slip,” Bradshaw said in an interview with Postmedia. “That’s brutal. That is absolutely brutal.”

Bradshaw projects that at least 104 employees will be laid off by the city if privatization goes through, including 61 permanent full-time bus cleaners and 28 full-time temporary bus cleaners brought on board during the COVID-19 pandemic to meet enhanced cleaning practices. There are also 15 full-time employees responsible for refuelling and cleaning the outside of buses that could also be impacted, that weren’t initially included in the budget proposal.

In a response from the city, spokesman Justin Townell said a contract has yet to be finalized and the request for proposal process will give a better understanding on the number of city employees who will be impacted.

“We are going to test the market for bus cleaning and refuelling duties. Once findings from the RFP have been analyzed and evaluated, this will help us determine the next steps,” Townell said in a statement to Postmedia.

But Bradshaw said he hopes council reverses its budget decision and reinstates the $1.2 million annually to keep the bus cleaning in-house. With the cleaning procedures enhanced because of the pandemic, he argued now is not the time to change course. Calgary’s transit system outsourced cleaning last fall, affecting about 100 city employees.

“To the city’s credit, once we raised the standard on the cleanliness of our buses at the beginning of the pandemic, they committed to keeping that standard. We achieved a new standard and it’s a good standard,” he said. “Now I think they’re backsliding on that. By hiring a contractor, that’s setting up circumstances and conditions where that standard is going to slip and fade.”

The city previously announced 60 permanent layoffs in January as a result of another budget decision in the fall to reduce the workforce by 300 full-time positions. About three-quarters of the employees laid off were in union positions while the remainder were in management positions.

Other opportunities to contract out services are being looked at by the city, including the operation of recreation facilities and the three golf courses. Business cases on these options to “reimagine services” are set to be released publicly and discussed by council at the end of June.

There are about 14,000 full-time employees at the City of Edmonton.

ANY CONTRACT WILL GO TO BEE CLEAN
AS THEY HAVE IN THE PAST, WITH NO REVIEW, POOR OR NO MANAGEMENT OVERSIGHT 

LEGACY COSTS WILL GO DOWN FOR THE CITY, AS COST SAVINGS ARE BASED ON CONTRACTER PAYING MINIMUM WAGE NO BENEFITS, AND ILLEGAL USE OF TEMP WORKERS 

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MUSIC
Celebrating Black composers of classical music

The music of African American classical composers is rarely performed on concert stages in Europe and the US. Baritone Thomas Hampson wants to change this.

Watch video06:02 'A Celebration of Black Music': a concert with Thomas Hampson

The songs speak of being Black and proud, of dreams and hopes, of hard work, love and a belief in goodness. Baritone Thomas Hampson loves American art song — classical songs meant to be performed on the concert stage.

His long-term project "Song of America" aims to tell the history of American culture through the voices of poets and composers, and he has toured it repeatedly throughout Europe.

In his newest project, Hampson is focusing on classical music whose words and music were written by African Americans.

"Europeans are always looking for the voice in America that tells them what really is going on, how do people really live, how do they really get along with themselves, what does democracy really look like and function like," Hampson told DW. "This program is about the sound of diversity. Without question, on both sides of the Atlantic a great deal of this repertoire is completely unknown."

BLACK CLASSICAL COMPOSERS TO LISTEN TO
Scott Joplin (1868-1917)
He died of syphilitic dementia and was buried in an unmarked grave. His opera "Treemonisha" wasn't performed until seven decades later. But Scott Joplin's "Maple Leaf Rag" and 43 other ragtime piano pieces made him one of the 20th century's most influential composers. Melody in the right hand, accompaniment in the left, and those syncopations! Jazz? No, thoroughly classical in form and structure.
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The music of African American composers

Hampson developed the project with soprano Louise Toppin, eventually bringing conductor Roderick Cox, numerous singers and the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen (German Chamber Orchestra Bremen) on board. The concert, "A Celebration of Black Music," concluded the Hamburg International Music Festival in the Elbphilharmonie concert hall.

Starting June 6 at 8 p.m. local time (1800 UTC), a live recording of the performance will be available to watch online.

One of the pieces on the program is contemporary composer Valerie Coleman's 2019 hymn "Umoja," the Swahili word for unity.

The work has a Swahili folk song sound, Cox said. When the song speaks of hate and injustice, the sounds become dissonant, but the jarring tones resolve at the end, and very sweetly sung notes build up into a unified folk sound, Cox said.

Composer William Grant Still, who lived from 1895 to 1978, had African American and Native American heritage. His "Afro-American Symphony," written in 1930, remained the most performed symphony by an African American composer well into the 1950s.

For his project, Hampson selected excerpts from Still's opera Costaso (1952) and Highway 1 USA (1962).


William Grant Still's "Afro-American Symphony" was his first of five symphonies
Forgotten Pulitzer Prize winner and symphonic composer

George Walker is among the most well-known African American composers and music pedagogues. In 1996 he became the first African American to win the Pulitzer Prize in Music, taking home the award for "Lilacs," a piece for voice and orchestra.

Though orchestras seem to be playing it once again, it was largely absent for a large period of time, Cox said. The celebration program includes Walker's most well-known work, his 1946 "Lyric for Strings," which was a lament for his grandmother, who had been enslaved, Cox said.

Composer Hale Smith comes from the world of jazz. In 1989 he composted "Four Negro Spirituals," complete with grand vocal finale.

Margaret Bonds also drew on the spiritual tradition, creating a popular arrangement of "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands" for high voice and piano in 1963.

Bonds was a student of William Levi Dawson, whose monumental "Negro Folk Symphony" premiered at Carnegie Hall in 1934. A big hit at the time, it later fell into obscurity. During those years of economic hardship in the US, no publisher could be found for the work. Today it remains difficult to find a printed score.

"We had to really take our time to go through it, and even in rehearsal there were notes that were wrong or bars that were missing," Cox said. He would like to raise funds to reprint the work and find a publisher to take it up in its catalog.

Hampson thinks that Dawson's symphony was also not published in part because Black culture in the US was not appreciated enough. "There is another story about Black African American culture, especially the canon of classical music creativity, which seems to have existed throughout most of the 20th century like a parallel universe to the white classical culture in America."

Baritone Thomas Hampson is also a music scholar


Supporting Black musicians

Hampson wants to help bring more attention to classical music by African American composers. "With this rekindled passion, especially in Europe, about Black Lives Matter, it seemed to me to be the exact time to let us hear from the culture itself, to try and get away from some of the political animosity and simply hear the great poets and the great composers tell the story of American culture through their eyes, in their words, in their music, and not through some white filter or some industry filter," he said.

It's part of his broader mission to support intercultural dialogue and understanding through music. To work toward this goal, he founded his Hampsong Foundation in 2003 and the sister initiative "Song of America" in 2009, which "A Celebration of Black Music" is a part of.

Conductor Cox has also founded an initiative. It provides support to African American children who want to learn music.


Cox says support, encouragement and resources are key to helping Black kids get involved in classical music

He had wanted to learn the French horn as a child, but his family didn't have enough money to buy the instrument. A foundation in his hometown ended up providing the funds.

"I didn't have a parent who took me to see Tristan and Isolde at the opera, and I decided: 'Oh, I want to be a conductor one day,'" he said.

Cox arrived for his master's at Northwestern University thinking that he would become a teacher. But he caught the eye of his conducting instructor in class, who told him: "You should be conducting orchestra." This encouragement laid the cornerstone for Cox's career.

"That is what's needed: support, resources, and planting seeds in children's minds where they know that this is possible," he said.

Hampson is already thinking about his next project, which he would like to focus on women's creativity. "We still don't have an equal rights amendment in America. How ridiculous is that in 2021?" Hampson said. "If we really want to say we are a democracy, in whatever country you are, then the next word out of your mouth must be the celebration of diversity. If diversity isn't celebrated, it is not a democracy, in my opinion."

This article was translated from German.

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Global opera star Jessye Norman has died

One of the contemporary era's most revered opera singers, Jessye Norman has died at the age of 74. A pioneering young black woman in the white world of classical music, she started her career in Berlin.
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ALMO'S MISOGYNIST NEOLIBERALISM
Mexico elections: Ruling party set for reduced majority

Preliminary results suggest President Lopez Obrador's Morena party has lost its absolute majority. The elections were marred by violence, with dozens of candidates killed ahead of the vote.


Nearly 100 million Mexicans were eligible to vote

Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador's leftist National Regeneration Movement (Morena) looks set for a reduced majority in Congress, according to Sunday's preliminary results.

The vote for a new lower house of Congress, state governors and local legislators was seen as a referendum on Lopez Obrador's reform agenda.

Mexicans cast their ballots for over 20,000 positions. Up for grabs were all 500 seats of the lower house of parliament, 15 of Mexico's 31 governorships, almost 2,000 mayorships and about 14,000 seats on local councils.

Watch video 02:39 Mexico election campaign overshadowed by violence

What are the preliminary results?

A preliminary estimate by the National Electoral Institute (INE) after Sunday's elections put Lopez Obrador's ruling coalition on course to win between 265 and 292 of the 500 lower-house seats.

It means he will fall just short of the two-thirds majority he managed to muster in the first half of his term. His Morena party will now have to rely on its allies the Workers Party and Green Party.

Lopez Obrador appeared to acknowledge that Mexicans had failed to give him a ringing endorsement, despite the fact that he managed to cling to a majority.

"You voted for two different and opposed plans, above all in the federal election,'' he said, underlining that his coalition must do more to help the poor.

"Those for the transformation plan are going to have the majority in the Chamber of Deputies and this means guaranteeing the sufficient budget for the most in need.''

The previous two-thirds supermajority in the lower house of Congress allowed Lopez Obrador to amend the constitution without negotiating with his opponents.

Mexico's main opposition alliance of the center-right PRI, PAN and the left-wing PRD were weakened after Lopez Obrador's 2018 landslide victory. They are now projected to secure between 181 and 213 seats.

Violence plagued elections

This election cycle has seen record criminal violence. At least 89 politicians, including 35 candidates, and dozens of their relatives and associates have been killed, according to figures from the consulting firm Etellekt.


Alma Barragan was killed on May 25 while campaigning for the mayorship of the city of Moroleon

Gunmen ambushed and killed five people helping to organize elections in the southern state of Chiapas, AFP news agency reported, citing prosecutors.

In another instance, according to Reuters news agency, a man threw a severed head at a voting station in the border city Tijuana.
A test for Lopez Obrador

Sunday's vote was viewed as critical to Lopez Obrador pushing through reforms under his "Fourth Transformation" plan.

The future of the left-wing populist's agenda was described as hinging on whether voters would punish him for issues such as his handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Mexico has been one of the countries worst affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The country's economy also plunged by 8.5% in 2020, the worst slump in decades.

Nonetheless, Lopez Obrador has enjoyed approval ratings of around 60%.

Much of his popularity is thanks to his social welfare programs, but critics accuse him of a tilt toward authoritarianism with attacks on the judiciary and the National Electoral Institute.

fb/rt (AFP, dpa, Reuters)
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How the Cold War shaped the Berlinale

The first Berlin International Film Festival took place 70 years ago, opening on June 6, 1951. A look back at how politics impacted the event.

Sally Field and Julia Roberts standing on the Berlin Wall with two GDR border guards at Brandenburg Gate in 1990

Instead of taking place as usual in February this year, the Berlinale's public event was pushed to June. Even though the decision was due to the pandemic, it is in ways a return to tradition: Before being moved to the winter months in the 1970s, the film festival was a summer affair.

Showcasing the glamour of the free world

The very first Berlin International Festival kicked off 70 years ago, on June 6, 1951, with a screening of Alfred Hitchcock's Rebecca at the Titania-Palast cinema. Even though the film was from 1940, it was a celebratory premiere for the Germans, who enthusiastically welcomed the film's lead star, Joan Fontaine.

At the time, the city destroyed during World War II was still in rubble, and divided Berlin was at the front line of the Cold War.

West Berlin's physical isolation from the rest of the Federal Republic of Germany was most evident during the Soviets' blockade of the enclave city; from June 1948 to May 1949, the Western Allies compensated by sending supplies to West Berliners by plane in what was known as the Luftbrücke, or air bridge.


Lining up for the Berlinale's inaugural night in June 1951

In this context, the new film festival not only aimed to bring in a bit of glitz to the West German city, but to serve as a "showcase of the free world" in a city located within the borders of East Germany.
The founding director's 'concealed' Nazi past

Among the people who initiated the project was the US military administration's film officer, Oscar Martay (1922-1995), and jurist and film historian Alfred Bauer (1911-1986) — who went on to serve as the director of the festival for a large part of the Cold War years, from 1951 to 1976.

As German weekly Die Zeit uncovered in 2020, Bauer had actually been a high-ranking film official under the Nazis who worked to legitimize the regime.

An ensuing study found that Bauer had managed to convince interrogators during the post-war denazification process that he had nevertheless always been a staunch democrat and Nazi opponent. He claimed that he only kept working in the Nazi bureaucracy "to prevent worse things from happening to German cinema."

According to the study, Bauer had joined various National Socialist organizations as early as 1933. In any case, he apparently aligned just as quickly with the Cold War propaganda pushed by the Western Allies.
An embargo on Soviet films

That included boycotting all films from so-called Eastern bloc states, a principle determined from the start by the film festival's advisory board. The stance continued throughout the 1960s, despite unofficial rapprochement attempts — which were however dismissed by the Eastern European countries.


A PHOTO HISTORY OF THE BERLINALE
Stars in a divided city
The Cold War was part of the picture at the Berlinale. Stars coming to the city, such as Italian diva Claudia Cardinale, would often pose in front of the Berlin Wall. A bizarre juxtaposition emerges from these shots, with the grinning glamour of Hollywood set against the backdrop of a divide that caused suffering for many people, not only in Berlin, but on both sides of the Iron Curtain. PHOTOS 12345678910

The first year a Soviet film was screened as part of the festival's official program was in 1974. A year later, many other socialist states also took part in the Berlinale, including, for the first time, films produced by the East German state film company, DEFA.

"The story of the socialist states' absence from the Berlinale," wrote Wolfgang Jacobsen in 50 Years of Berlinale, "is a substantial chapter in the history of East-West tension; a Cold War tragicomedy, a drama with shifting roles and changing protagonists."
At the center of geopolitical tensions

Cold War tensions unfolding in the city were inevitably played out in the Berlin Film Festival.

The third Berlinale began on June 18, 1953, just a day after the violent suppression of the workers' uprising in communist East Germany. The boundary sectors were closed and the audience was notably smaller.

Meanwhile, West Berlin did not quite know how to react when one of the top guest stars of the festival that year, Gary Cooper, criticized McCarthy's communist-hunting investigations in the US.

Hollywood stars such as Jayne Mansfield in 1961 drew enthusiastic crowds

By its fifth year, with a boosted publicity budget, posters advertising the film festival were prominently placed near the border to East Berlin.

However, East German visitors could no longer freely join the screenings from 1962, the Berlin Wall erected in August the previous year having finalized the division of the city.

The Berlinale organizers nevertheless attempted to keep in touch with the East Berlin residents, setting up a so-called "TV Bridge" for the 1963 festival that transmitted part of the program onto screens across the Wall.
Proxy war threatens Berlin festival

But the festival's arguably most important political scandal was not triggered by events in Berlin, but was linked to one of the Cold War proxy conflicts, the Vietnam War.

In 1970, the competition included the West German anti-war film O.K., directed by Michael Verhoeven, which told the story of a Vietnamese girl who is raped and killed by four US soldiers.

The president of the jury that year was director and cinematographer George Stevens, who as a US soldier during World War II had participated in the liberation of the Dachau concentration camp.

He refused to have a German accusing Americans of war crimes in the competition — but not all jury members agreed with him. The jury disbanded and the competition ended without any awards given out that year. It was initially unclear if the festival would ever happen again.


George Stevens (standing) along with other jury members and festival director Alfred Bauer (l) in 1970

Similarly, another Vietnam War film caused protest from the Soviets in 1979, who deemed the film Deer Hunter, by US director Michael Cimino, to be an "insult to the Vietnamese people."

Communist states dropped out of the festival. Despite the walk-outs of the Cubans, East Germans, Hungarians, Bulgarians, Poles and Czechoslovakians, and the resignation of two jury members, the festival managed to continue. Mediation was required to convince the Eastern bloc countries to return to the festival the following year.
The unpredicted fall of the Berlin Wall

A decade later, on November 9, 1989, then Berlinale director Moritz de Hadeln proposed to the East German Film Bureau that the festival program be screened simultaneously in East and West Berlin.

On the evening of that same day, a GDR press conference infamously led to the fall of the Berlin Wall.

The 1990 Berlinale was held in both parts of the city — a symbolic event that however required elaborate organization as separate authorities still ruled newly unified Berlin.

Even after having survived the challenges of Cold War diplomacy, the Berlinale has proudly preserved its reputation for being the most "political" of the major European film festivals.

In the past 20 years, the Golden Bear was awarded three times to Iranian filmmakers facing censorship or persecution in their home countries; while amid the European migrant crisis, the top award went to Fire at Sea, a documentary on the dangerous crossing of the Mediterranean by refugees to reach Europe.


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Germany's Spahn under fire for unfit COVID mask plans

Disabled and homeless people as well as welfare benefit recipients were nearly the recipients of unfit face masks, according to a magazine report.


Jens Spahn has come under fire after a report emerged, detailing Health Ministry plans to hand out untested face masks to vulnerable groups

German Health Minister Jens Spahn is facing fierce cross-party criticism after a report emerged about his ministry's plans to dispose of unusable face masks by handing them out to vulnerable groups amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The Health Ministry on Saturday hit back at the claims made in the German magazine Der Spiegel, saying all its masks had been tested to a high standard and that protection of the wearer was its top priority.
The unfit face mask scandal

The magazine on Friday reported that the Health Ministry had ordered face masks from China in Spring 2020 for an estimated €1 billion ($1.2 billion). The order was placed amid a global mask shortage and had not been tested to meet EU standards.

Due to this, the masks were unable to be used on arrival and needed to undergo emergency testing to be deemed fit for use.

The Ministry of Health under Spahn drew up plans to distribute the masks to the homeless, the disabled or Hartz IV benefit recipients, the magazine reported.

But the Ministry of Labor, which is responsible for mask safety, refused to give its approval to the plan.

Fierce cross-party criticism

Social Democratic Party (SPD) General Secretary Lars Klingbeil told Der Spiegel on Saturday that the plan was "outrageous and inhumane."

"The minister must explain himself about this as soon as possible, he cannot point the finger at others here," Klingbeil added.

"Attempting to get rid of useless masks by giving them away to needy groups in our society ... this is simply beyond cynicism and absolutely unacceptable," Katja Mast, parliamentary group vice chair, also of the SPD, wrote on Twitter on Saturday.



The parliamentary leader of the Left party, Jan Korte, said that it "no longer seems to matter that the health minister once again seems not to care about the health of disabled and socially-disadvantaged people if his own failures are covered up as a result."

He criticized the lack of a resignation "or any consequences."

The pro-business Free Democratic Party (FDP) Vice Chair Michael Theurer called for a special investigator from the Federal Audit Office to look into the issue of the unused masks, in comments to the Handelsblatt business newspaper.

Health Ministry defends claims

The Health Ministry hit back at the accusations on Saturday, saying that "strict attention" had been paid to quality during the procurement of medical goods, including face masks, during what it described as an "emergency situation."

It said such accusations were "not acceptable" and not based on facts.

As soon as the goods were identified as "defective," the ministry did not pay for them, the BMG added.

"The best possible protection of the citizens and employees living there was at all times in the foreground" when it came to delivering masks to facilities for homeless and disabled people, the ministry also stressed. "Other considerations played no role on the part of the BMG."


Where are the masks now?

According to Der Spiegel, there is currently a plan to store the masks in a national emergency reserve of the federal government. When they reach their expiration date, they will be destroyed.

But the BMG also disputed this, saying: "Decisions on the destruction of stocks have not been made by the federal government." The masks were fully usable for infection control, it said. The BMG said there were plans to transfer the masks to the newly created National Reserve for Health Protection.

kmm/sri (AFP, dpa)
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Namibia genocide: Mbumba says Germany's payment is 'not enough'

The Germany-Namibia genocide accord is on track to be ratified by the Namibian parliament. But Namibian Vice President Nangolo Mbumba is not happy with the amount of money pledged by Berlin.

Nangolo Mbumba thinks Germany's compensation sum is 'not enough'

A German infrastructure program for Namibia — worth €1.1 billion ($1.4 billion) — was no adequate compensation for an early 20th century colonial-era genocide, the Southern African country's vice president said on Friday.

"We need to recognize that the amount of 1.1 billion euros agreed upon between the two governments is not enough and does not adequately address the initial quantum of reparations initially submitted to the German government," Vice President Nangolo Mbumba told a press conference.

"No amount of money in any currency can truly compensate the life of a human being."

Mbumba is only the latest Namibian public figure to criticize the amount offered on May 28 by former colonizer Germany for the massacre of tens of thousands of Herero and Nama people from 1904 to 1908.

The politician also said that Germany "has agreed to commit to revisit and renegotiate the amount as the implementation of the reparations ensues."

The bilateral deal has yet to be ratified but will likely be approved by Namibian lawmakers.


Herero chief Vikuii Reinhard Rukoro says he and other Namibian leaders are still unhappy about the deal with Germany

Why is the deal controversial in Namibia?

The two nations reached the financial agreement last week as part of a deal in which Germany acknowledged the massacres were a genocide. The accord marks the end of negotiations that had begun in 2015.

Many Namibians have since rejected the outcome of the talks and dismissed the offered amount as insulting. They called on Germany to directly compensate victims in the form of "reparations" — a term Berlin has pointedly avoided. Many are also angry over a statement by German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas, who said that the killings were a genocide "from today's perspective."

German President Frank Walter-Steinmeier is expected to give an official reconciliation speech to the Namibian parliament, although the date for his visit has yet to be announced. In an interview published by German tabloid newspaper Bild on Saturday, a senior Herero chief, Vikuii Reinhard Rukoro, warned that some opposition politicians were planning to disrupt Steinmeier's address. Rukoro also said he himself wanted to "expose" Germany and cause a diplomatic incident.

Previously, Vice President Mbumba urged Namibians to "remain calm" and "think deeply" about their response to the deal.

"We have made remarkable progress over the past five years of negotiations and there is an opportunity we should not waste," he added.

Watch video02:50 Namibia: Mixed reactions to compensation deal with Germany


What did Namibia's top negotiator tell DW?

Zed Ngavirue, the chief negotiator for the Namibian government said he was confident in the deal and that he expects it to be formally approved:

"I'm satisfied that we arrived at a common understanding," he told DW on Thursday.

Ngavirue also defended the amount of financial aid agreed under the deal. "The damage that we suffered is incalculable. Loss of life, loss of land, loss of stock, slave labor and so on. When you are negotiating with another party, you want to know what is realizable," he said.

What happens next?

The agreement is being reviewed by Namibia's Attorney General and will be presented to parliament for ratification next week.

If Namibia's parliament ratifies the document, it can be signed by the foreign ministers of the two countries.

Mbumba said all ethnic groups will be called upon to make sure the agreement is successful and to help plot a path toward the future. "A lot of work lies ahead," he said.

kmm/dj (AFP, Reuters, dpa)
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Colombia president announces policing changes after protest criticism

The government has announced an effort to "modernize" the nation's police force after accusations of police brutality during recent anti-government protests.



Protesters want Duque to denounce excessive use of force by police

Colombian President Ivan Duque on Sunday announced plans to "modernize" the country's police, who have been widely criticized forviolently curbing recent anti-government protests.

Calling for a "transformation" of the national police, Duque announced "a decree that will modernize the structure of the national police, especially to strengthen the policy... on human rights."

Changes to police force

Duque said a human rights directorate headed by an outside expert would be created as part of the changes. The Defense Ministry said in a statement that there would be a training review, use of ID badges and bodycams, and better follow-up of citizen complaints.

Congress is expected to approve the creation of the directorate this month, which will seek international help for the creation of policies.

Colombian troops tighten grip on Cali following more protests

Defense Minister Diego Molano told AFP news agency that there would be "professionalization so that all police officers are trained in (human) rights and use of force."

The announcement came as a delegation from the Washington-based Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) arrived in Colombia for a four-day visit to the country to evaluate the clashes in the cities of Bogota and Cali. The delegation was greeted by hundreds of supporters on the streets of Bogota.


Watch video 02:12BProtesters in Colombia condemn police crackdown

Protests continue

Demonstrations that started on April 28 against proposed tax hikes have turned into widespread protests against the government's social and economic policies. The police has been accused of using excessive force to quell the protests.

At least 61 people, mostly civilians, have died in the clashes.

The government has blamed blockades by protesters for crippling the nation's economy.

Watch video 02:27 Colombia calls in army to quash anti-government protests

Government delegates and protest leaders have held talks aimed at defusing the crisis, so far without success. Protesters want Duque to denounce excessive force by police and act to address yawning inequities in the country.

tg/sri (AFP, Reuters)
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German church officials face charges for helping refugees

The number of legal cases against members of the Catholic Church is on the rise, as the German government takes a harder stance against asylum seekers taking refuge in churches.

 "It must not be that this act of Christian charity is made impossible by the threat of punishment from the state."


German churches have taken in hundreds of refugees over several decades


Juliana Seelmann, a nun from the Franciscan nunnery at the Oberzell monastery in southern Germany, was found guilty this week of aiding the unauthorized residence in Germany of two Nigerian women. She was fined several hundred euros.

She had aided two women from Nigeria who said they were trying to escape forced prostitution in Italy, where they had first fled to. After German officials sent them back to Italy, where forced prostitution again awaited them, they were able to find their way into the church's protection, under a practice often referred to in Germany as "church asylum." 


Juliana Seelmann was found guilty of aiding the unauthorized residence in Germany of Nigerian refugees

Church asylum means the temporary admission of refugees by a parish in order to avert deportation. The aim is the resumption or reexamination of the asylum or immigration procedure for the individual refugee. The practice has a long history in Germany.

After the influx of refugees to Germany in 2015 and 2016, several asylum-seekers saw their applications rejected.

Churches prevented 498 deportations in the first quarter of 2018, but in 2019 authorities rejected almost all church asylum cases. The nuns and priests point to article 4 of the German constitution, which guarantees the freedom of faith and conscience.

That is also what nun Seelmann cited in her defense


No legal exception for the churches

But German prosecutors argue that church premises do not enjoy any legal exception or special status. And police and the public prosecutor's office must have access to the people staying there to conduct deportations if these have been ordered.

So several priests or nuns who gave refugees refuge on church premises have been prosecuted for violating German law. Seelmann's case is the third within the span of only a few years.

Mechthild Thürmer, the abbess of a Bavarian monastery, grabbed the headlines of German newspapers in 2020.

Over several decades she has given refuge to dozens of refugees. In 2020, she was charged with illegally aiding individuals to avoid deportation and was found guilty. She said she received several offers from others to pay her fine of €2,500 ($3,051), but she declined. She is refusing to pay.

"People in such a terrible situation need help," she told DW. 


Mechthild Thürmer

Thürmer argues that in the end, no German court would find someone guilty for trying to help — it is a Christian's "highest duty." A guilty verdict would be simply "inhumane," she said.

"Every person's dignity is equal," she added, paraphrasing the German constitution. "It says, ‘every person.' Not 'every German.'"

In 2019, Protestant pastor Ulrich Gampert was sentenced by a court in southern Germany to pay a fine of €3,000 for taking in an Afghan refugee who had been scheduled for deportation.
Making church asylum 'more difficult'

The latest round of cases does not come as a surprise to Dieter Müller, a Jesuit and deputy chairman of the nonprofit Asylum in the Church. Müller told DW that there has been a "steep rise" in investigations into church asylum in Bavaria since 2017. The southern state's public prosecutor confirmed this. Many of the hundreds of cases against church officials and other members have been dismissed.

"I've had four cases against me, all dismissed," Müller said, though criminal charges are now afoot.

"We're witnessing an escalation," he said. "The case won't be dismissed. Instead, it'll be fully prosecuted in court because three people have so far refused to pay fines."

The state's legal action is an "effort to make church asylum more difficult," Müller said.


Protestant Pastor Ulrich Gampert was sentenced to a fine of €3,000 for taking in an Afghan refugee

Germany introduced a hardship commission in 2005, which re-examines individual cases of rejected asylum seekers. This offers an alternative to church asylum and offers individuals a legal possibility for having their cases revisited.

German politicians rarely comment on the issue of church asylum. But in what is termed a "major election year," activists took the opportunity of an Ecumenical Church Congress in Frankfurt in May to write to the three leading politicians who were present.

Recently, a group of church officials and laypeople put the question of church asylum to top politicians in a letter-writing campaign. Armin Laschet of the Christian Democrats, Olaf Scholz of the Social Democrats, and Annalena Baerbock of the Green party are running to replace Angela Merkel as chancellor in September's general election.

All three were asked whether church asylum can be legally justified. So far only Baerbock replied, writing: "It must not be that this act of Christian charity is made impossible by the threat of punishment from the state."

The Green party politician, who has been riding high in the polls, went on to say that church asylum is often the last "lifeline" for those affected. A constitutional state that wants to prevent this "shows weakness, not strength," she said.

This text has been translated from German.
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CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M
Wirecard: German Parliament slams Scholz and Merkel

A committee of lawmakers in the Bundestag has published its inquiry into the Wirecard fraud affair. The damaging report comes months before Germany's general election.


The committee report has mirrored what lawmakers have long said about the Wirecard affair

The public inquiry into the Wirecard scandal published its concluding report on Monday, criticizing Germany's Finance Minister Olaf Scholz and Chancellor Angela Merkel.

The parliamentary committee consisting of opposition lawmakers ended a monthslong investigation into the scandal with the publication of a 675-page draft report.

The report called out Scholz, who is also the chancellor candidate for the Social Democrats, for his oversight and mishandling of the biggest fraud scandal in post-war Germany.

"Olaf Scholz as finance minister bears political responsibility for the failure of BaFin," the report said. BaFin is Germany's financial regulator and part of Scholz's ministry.

The committee also said that Merkel had been naive about the lobbying efforts by Wirecard.


VIDEO Left Party member of Bundestag: Merkel bears 'personal responsibility' for Wirecard scandal

What was the Wirecard scandal?

Wirecard was once the poster-child for Germany's financial technology sector. Set up in 1999, it processed online payments for gambling and pornography sites. It eventually grew into a top financial services provider with huge growth potential that many people had been encouraged to invest in.

Even Chancellor Merkel herself lobbied on behalf of the company during a trip to China in 2019.

However, in June 2020 the company filed for insolvency after admitting that €1.9 billion ($2.3 billion) supposedly held in trust accounts didn't exist. It was also found to be massively in debt and faced accusations of having falsified balance sheets for years.
What was the outcome of the scandal?

Following the revelations, Wirecard's CEO Markus Braun was detained and its COO Jan Marsalek went into hiding, landing on Europol's wanted list.

Scholz was grilled by the inquiry committee, but rejected the accusation that he was responsible. He argued that most of Wirecard's criminal activity happened before he took office in 2018.

Merkel was also questioned by the committee. However, of the two only Scholz is standing in this year's general election.





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#KASHMIR IS #INDIA'S #GAZA
Kashmir: India tightens grip on government-critical state employees

A series of dismissals of public servants in Kashmir has triggered fears that India is clamping down on state workers in the region. The dismissals were issued under the pretext of protecting "state security."



Six public employees have been dismissed under the pretext of protecting state security

Muhammad Yusuf Ganaie, a schoolteacher in Indian-administered Kashmir, found out that he was fired from his job through a Facebook post last month.

He was the sixth employee in the region to be sacked under the pretext of protecting the "security of the state," and the series of dismissals has sparked fears of a widespread effort to tighten the political reins on public servants in the region.

The General Administration Department issued the order on May 20, shocking Ganaie's family members.

Zahid Ahmad, Ganaie's younger brother, told DW the dismissal was an "injustice."

No specific reasons were given for the sackings, and the six employees affected so far include three teachers, an assistant professor, a police officer and a revenue official.

Critics have called the latest dismissals an effort to intimidate public servants and those who have participated in anti-India protests.

Watch video 09:43 India-Pakistan conflict: A ticking time bomb

'A harsh punishment'

"This order is a harsh punishment," Ahmad said. "This is harming the future of my brother's children," he added.

Ahmad said that his brother, a 42-year-old math teacher at a boys' school, was suspended after being accused of throwing stones during mass uprisings in 2016 against the killing of young insurgent commander Burhan Wani.

After spending a year in jail, Ganaie was again arrested in 2019 when the region's government launched a massive clampdown on leaders, traders and young people.

"He spent two years in jail, and he was hopeful that he would be reinstated. But now his dismissal comes as a shock to the whole family," Ganaie said.

On the day that he was sacked, a similar order of dismissal was issued for two more people, including a teacher from the same district and Devinder Singh, a police officer who was suspended after being caught last year with a Hizbul Mujahideen militant while traveling in a car in south Kashmir.

"Dismissing them without mentioning the reason is not justifiable," Ahmad added.

Watch video03:07 Delhi: Hundreds rally against India's Kashmir policy

Scrutinizing 'anti-national activities'

On April 27, the regional government, which underwent many political changes after being stripped of its limited autonomy in August 2019, ordered the formation of a special task force to scrutinize the cases of employees suspected of being involved in "anti-national activities."

The six employees were fired under an article of the constitution that gives the government authority to remove a public servant from their role without any inquiry.

Critics say the article, which was implemented in 2019, is meant to "instill fear and silence among Muslims in the region."

Muhammad, 43, a government employee from the southern district of Shopian, also feels that the dismissals are discriminatory.

"They can fire anyone, and it's an attack on us because of our religious identity,” Muhammad said.

"At some point in time, everyone, including small children or even women, have been part of the anti-India protests," he said.

The Jammu and Kashmir government is the largest employer in the region, with nearly 450,000 employees.

New hires must undergo 'verification'

On March 3, the regional government passed an order saying that no new employee would be paid their salary or allowances until they had undergone a verification process by the top investigative agency, the Criminal Investigation Department (CID).

The new hires were asked to submit details about their social media accounts like Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, which many experts said "targets freedom of expression."

The government made a change to the Jammu and Kashmir civil service regulations, allowing the authorities to forcibly retire any public servant over 48 years old or who has completed 22 years of service. Many have said the change was politically motivated.

An official involved with the development told DW that the changes are, however, not religiously or regionally motivated.

"Some elements are trying to present it as religiously motivated, but it is not," the official said, adding that all of the employees dismissed so far have been "involved in anti-national activities."

Another official said the sackings took place after finding "proper evidence" of such activities.

"Some people are prone to misconduct that leads to violence in society, and they continue to enjoy the privileges of being public servants," the official said.

Watch video 02:43 Will Kashmir's young politicians bring hope to the region?

Political parties slam sackings

Political parties in the region have condemned the random firings as "inhuman and cruel."

The National Conference, the pro-Indian political party that has ruled for most of the last seven decades in the region, said the measures would "alienate" people.

"The government should have focused on boosting coronavirus care rather than firing employees in an elusive manner in which they cannot even resort to legal recourse to protect their rights," the party said in a statement.

The pro-freedom political parties led by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq called the actions a form of "harassment of government employees."

"To render people jobless in such a manner by invoking a draconian law is intimidation," said Farooq, who heads the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC), a coalition of separatist leaders in the region.

Meanwhile, Habeel Iqbal, a lawyer based in Kashmir, told DW that dismissing an employee from service "without hearing him is against the basic principles of natural justice.”

"It (dismissal) shall be used in exceptional circumstances, to maintain the larger public good," he said, adding that it's "difficult to imagine how a teacher or an assistant professor could be a threat to the national security of a powerful country like India.

"These decisions are subject to judicial review, and I am hopeful that the courts will quash these dismissal orders," he said.
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