US Peace Corps volunteers were raped and assaulted. A review says the agency isn’t doing enough to protect them.

Donovan Slack and Tricia L. Nadolny, USA TODAY
Mon, December 13, 2021

LONG READ

Nicole Jacobson, who served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Zambia, said she was repeatedly groped by the father in her host family, but Peace Corps staff waited more than a year before pulling her from the site.

Nicole Jacobson was far from home and feeling alone, placed by the Peace Corps in a remote village in Zambia with a host father who had five wives and a disturbing interest in the young American volunteer.

The man routinely leered at her while touching himself, Jacobson said. He grabbed and groped her, once bursting into her hut and pushing her up against the wall. When she called Peace Corps staff to report him, Jacobson said, they repeatedly dismissed her concerns.

“According to them, I just didn't understand the situation,” she said, adding that one Peace Corps staff member told her, “It just means he likes you.” Jacobson said staff left her there for more than a year before pulling her from the site in 2018.

She and other volunteers who shared their experiences this year in a USA TODAY investigation worry officials are about to place more volunteers at risk as the Peace Corps rushes to reestablish volunteers abroad after service was shut down in March 2020.

Former Peace Corps volunteer Nicole Jacobson took this photo of the view from her hut in Zambia, where the Peace Corps assigned her to live until 2018. She said agency staff dismissed her concerns after she reported being sexually harassed and assaulted by the father in her host family.

The agency is poised to send a new class of recruits into the field as soon as January, but an outside review ordered in response to USA TODAY’s investigation found the agency lacks a comprehensive plan to prevent them from being sexually assaulted.

The Sexual Assault Advisory Council, a panel of specialists tapped by the Peace Corps, recommended the agency hire a violence prevention specialist and called for “a new culture that prioritizes prevention as well as response, strengthens accountability and transparency, and conducts all sexual assault programming using trauma-informed approaches.”

USA TODAY’s investigation found forcible sexual assaults and rapes disclosed by volunteers at the end of their service nearly doubled from 2015 to 2019. The agency knowingly placed volunteers in dangerous situations and inflicted more trauma by bungling its response to volunteer assaults, USA TODAY found.

In the months since, Peace Corps officials pledged a litany of reforms and hired a consultant to evaluate the structure of its sexual assault program – a separate assessment from the council’s review.

Carol Spahn, the agency's chief executive, said in a statement that she and other agency leaders are committed to doing “everything we can to prevent sexual violence and to provide a compassionate response when it does occur.” She and other agency officials declined repeated interview requests.

In the statement, they said staff would analyze the council's recommendations and release a formal response and plan in early 2022. Agency officials said they've made changes to enhance volunteer safety.

CEO Carol Spahn says the Peace Corps is committed to doing “everything we can to prevent sexual violence and to provide a compassionate response when it does occur.”

Many of USA TODAY’s findings and the recommendations from the council’s review – as well as the pledges to fix the shortfalls – mirror those that have been raised before, fueling skepticism among volunteers such as Jacobson that Peace Corps officials are serious about revamping the storied institution.

“I just think it's a lot of talk,” Jacobson said.

“They're kind of trying to do whatever the bare minimum is to make the story go away and to make the exposure go away,” said former volunteer Amanda Moses, who was sexually assaulted in Kyrgyzstan in 2017 on a bus where another volunteer had previously reported being sexually assaulted. “It's like pulling teeth to get one thing, one little initiative.”

Amanda Moses was a Peace Corps volunteer in Kyrgyzstan in 2017 when she says she was sexually assaulted on a bus where another volunteer had previously reported being assaulted.

Even though the council directed the agency to “improve transparency and communication,” Peace Corps officials declined to provide details to USA TODAY about the fixes it promised, delaying and denying requests for information and referring questions to the agency’s Freedom of Information Act Office.

Spahn pledged increased transparency after USA TODAY’s investigation.

Each year, the Peace Corps, a federal agency, deploys thousands of Americans, mostly young women, around the globe. The agency is tasked with vetting where those volunteers live and work during their two years of service, providing medical care and supporting those who are victims of crimes.

USA TODAY revealed in its investigation that 44% of women who finished service in 2019 said they were sexually assaulted in some way, ranging from groping to rape. The analysis found that reporting rates for forcible sexual assault and rape have remained relatively stagnant in recent years, indicating that volunteers are being assaulted more frequently – and not just more likely to report what happened.

A dozen former volunteers who served from 2016 to 2020 shared their experiences with USA TODAY. Reporters corroborated many of their accounts with agency records, contemporaneous messages and interviews with fellow volunteers.

One described being sexually assaulted by a Peace Corps-selected doctor in Ecuador whom another volunteer had reported for inappropriate behavior. Another woman told USA TODAY Peace Corps officials fabricated details in official documents after she reported being raped while serving in Guatemala. She said they wrote that she had initially consented to sexual contact with her attacker. A third, Fellina Fucci, said that after a man in her Samoan village raped her, a Peace Corps safety and security manager questioned her memory, chastised her for not using a rape whistle during the attack and told her the assailant was a friend of his who would probably gossip about her.

“I spent more time during my trauma therapy discussing the Peace Corps staff’s response to my assault rather than the assault itself,” Fucci said.

‘A betrayal of the highest order’

In the months since USA TODAY’s report, the agency said it created staff positions in each country to ensure crimes are documented and reviewed before volunteers are placed; improved screening and training of host families and colleagues; and required in-country staff to conduct formal case reviews of every assault. The agency will allow volunteers to review summaries of their crime reports – after several women told USA TODAY they found inaccuracies in official records.

Spahn asked the agency’s inspector general to investigate what happened in the cases highlighted by USA TODAY. In a report released this month, the inspector general said investigators had finished reviewing one woman’s case. They did not find evidence staff violated policies but found errors in how the sexual assault was documented. The report said reviews of the other cases are ongoing.

After receiving inquiries from USA TODAY, agency officials said they referred an additional case for investigation: Jacobson's.

Members of Congress – who passed reform packages in 2011 and 2018 after volunteers decried substandard care they received while abroad – responded to USA TODAY’s reporting with alarm.

“There’s no excuse for inaction over the years,” said Rep. John Garamendi, D-Calif., the only former Peace Corps volunteer serving in Congress. Garamendi, who said he anticipates agency leaders will make the necessary changes, pushes legislation that would increase the agency’s funding and expand its volunteer ranks.

At a hearing on the bill in September, Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa., questioned any such move until the agency does more to protect volunteers.

“It’s abundantly clear that the Peace Corps has a systemic problem regarding assault,” he said after entering USA TODAY’s investigation into the congressional record. “It's disgusting to read about it. I would not want my daughters to go to the Peace Corps, I'm going to tell you that right now. It is a betrayal of the highest order.”

The agency is moving forward with plans to send volunteers back into the field and invited recruits to begin service in five countries with start dates ranging from January to March “so long as conditions allow,” the Peace Corps said in a newsletter this month. The countries are Belize, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador and Zambia, and the agency plans to add more in 2022.

If the timeline holds, the Peace Corps will deploy volunteers without having resolved numerous safety recommendations from its inspector general, completed the review of its sexual assault program or finished weighing the council’s directives – among other fixes.

Sue Castle, whose son died after receiving inadequate medical care from a Peace Corps doctor while volunteering in China in 2013, said the COVID-19 shutdown has been a “perfect opportunity” for the agency to revamp its sexual assault policies but she does not think that’s happened. She called it “irresponsible” for the agency to redeploy volunteers.

Nick Castle graduated in 2012 from the University of California, Berkeley. He died the next year after receiving inadequate medical care as a Peace Corps volunteer in China. His mother, Sue, right, continues to push lawmakers and Peace Corps officials for improvements.

At least once a year, Castle travels to Washington to meet with lawmakers and agency officials about improvements at the agency. In 2018, Congress passed a law named after her son Nick that enhanced medical care for volunteers and expanded on legislation pertaining to sexual assault.

She said it was heartbreaking to read the accounts shared by USA TODAY.

“It's very frustrating for me. My son, it was poor medical care. Other people, it's sexual assault,” she said. “They need to do better, and they can do better. I don't know why they don't.”

Recurring concerns left unaddressed

Before last month, the agency’s Sexual Assault Advisory Council, which is made up of nearly a dozen experts in violence prevention and response as well as former volunteers, had not issued a public report in five years.

Spahn, in response to USA TODAY’s investigation, asked the council to examine whether the agency had implemented recommendations by prior councils since 2015.

The resulting report in its top conclusions highlights the lack of a comprehensive sexual assault prevention plan – a deficiency the council first flagged in 2015.

At the time, the Peace Corps developed a flow chart that directs staff in each country to develop policies for home and work site selection as well as “crime action plans” where assault rates are high.

In its most recent report, the council said relying on crime action plans for each country is not enough. It recommended the Peace Corps set measurable goals for success, hone a strategy that spans every level of the agency and develop a global core training for volunteer host families and co-workers that “emphasizes unwanted attention, violence prevention, and bystander intervention.”

The panel found staffers don't do enough to support volunteers after they are assaulted, echoing USA TODAY’s findings.

For example, Peace Corps medical officers are required to complete a 90-minute online training session on conducting sexual assault exams that is “inadequate” and “minimally relevant,” the group said. Addressing that shortfall – which the council said it also flagged in 2015, 2019 and 2020 – is “critical to ensure the safety and well-being of sexual assault survivors,” the council concluded.

The council said all Peace Corps staff should be trained annually in trauma-informed responses to sexual assault. Peace Corps officials told USA TODAY the agency is expanding training of medical and other staff.

Kellie Greene, the Peace Corps' first victim advocate, filed a whistleblower complaint in 2015 alleging the agency wasn't doing enough to prevent or respond to sexual assaults of volunteers.

The council’s chair, Elizabeth Arlotti-Parish, who works as a senior adviser at Jhpiego, a global health care nonprofit affiliated with Johns Hopkins University, declined interview requests and referred inquiries to the Peace Corps.

Kellie Greene, who was hired by the Peace Corps nearly a decade ago to be its first victim advocate, said many problems identified in the new advisory council report have been raised before, including by her.

Greene, who left the agency in 2016 after filing a whistleblower complaint alleging the Peace Corps wasn’t doing enough to protect volunteers, said inaction has led to unnecessary volunteer trauma.

“As the Peace Corps prepares to return volunteers to the field, they must focus on how to prevent sexual assaults and demonstrate loyalty towards volunteers,” she said. “I know the Peace Corps has the ability to be a leader in the field of sexual assault. It can do better and must.”

A ‘lack of transparency’

As the agency analyzes the new recommendations, it has yet to close out more than a dozen others from the Peace Corps inspector general that were issued years ago. They include directives – one dating to 2013 – designed to prevent placing volunteers in known danger, to ensure adequate medical staffing and to track staff training on sexual assault.

Peace Corps officials said they are working to address the outstanding recommendations. They said some cannot be resolved until volunteers return to the field but didn’t say which and declined to explain what remains to be done.

On multiple fronts, the Peace Corps declined to provide information that would provide a deeper understanding of sexual assaults experienced by volunteers and what the agency is doing to address the problem.

It declined to provide details or documentation backing up claims that it has strengthened numerous policies to protect volunteers and referred requests to the Freedom of Information Act office.

The agency has yet to release full copies of the advisory council’s reports from 2017 through 2020. In copies provided to USA TODAY, the agency redacted every recommendation the council made.

The Peace Corps contended the agency can withhold the information under the Freedom of Information Act because it is part of a “deliberative process.” “It would only serve to mislead the public if an agency provides detailed information that is still under development and subject to change,” the agency said.

USA TODAY continues to push for access to the information.

Glenn Blumhorst, president and CEO of the National Peace Corps Association, which represents up to 250,000 returned volunteers, said the organization “encouraged Peace Corps leadership to be more forthcoming” about what it’s doing to better protect volunteers.

“I think one of our roles is to do our best to try to hold Peace Corps accountable,” he said in an interview. "It is sometimes challenging, given the lack of transparency and the kind of cyclical nature of Peace Corps leadership and this council itself even.”

Peace Corps volunteer Emma Tremblay reported being sexually assaulted by a doctor during her assignment in Ecuador and left the country in 2019.

Former volunteer Emma Tremblay, who reported being sexually assaulted by a doctor whom a previous volunteer had reported for inappropriate behavior, said it’s long past time to hold the agency accountable.

Before ending her service in Ecuador in 2019, Tremblay started an Instagram account where she shares stories of volunteers disillusioned with the agency. In recent months, she and others organized town halls for former volunteers and others concerned by the agency’s shortfalls.

“What remains to be seen,” Tremblay said, “is whether the Peace Corps holds itself accountable to volunteers this time.”

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Sexual assault in Peace Corps: Review identifies agency failures

PRISON NATION USA

SOUTH CAROLINA
We covered the executioners’ toll and exposed SC execution secrecy. 

The impact was immediate


Chiara Eisner

Sun, December 12, 2021

After The State Media Co. published a series of stories that revealed the hidden toll of execution work, unprecedented secrecy surrounding executions and firing squad preparations at the S.C. Department of Corrections and the state’s unique execution history over the past 300 years, government and readers reacted to the reporting immediately.

Two weeks after the Secrets of the Death Chamber series was published, Corrections provided the newspaper with execution records it had initially declined to share with the public. The new records show that since April, the agency has considered over 100 employees to be members of its execution team, though previous teams in South Carolina had consisted of fewer than 10 people, former execution workers said. The agency required each of those employees to sign restrictive confidentiality agreements that threatened law enforcement action for noncompliance, the documents show. Corrections shared additional records that revealed how it had spent over $23,000 on additional firing squad purchases, including orders for ballistic glass and armored plates.

The series also generated responses from lawmakers.

Sen. Dick Harpootlian, D-Richland, who proposed the state approve the firing squad as its newest execution method in May and prosecuted Donald “Pee Wee” Gaskins, South Carolina’s infamous serial killer who was executed in 1991, said the newspaper had “probed it all” in the series.

“At the end of the day, the decision of whether or not we have a death penalty is obviously the primary question,” he said. “And then if you do have a death penalty, what is the most humane way to do that?”

Other state representatives and lawyers from Ohio to Kentucky mentioned the story about the hidden executioners’ toll had caused them to think about capital punishment in new ways, and that they would use the content to inform how they presented legislation or worked in the court room.

“Your article has the entire death penalty community thinking,” one said, after sharing that they had never before considered the toll taken on workers who have to do the job. “I believe this is evidence that a jury should have access to before they vote to take a life.”

And more than a hundred readers from Aiken to the United Kingdom reached out to express how the reporting on executioners had affected them.

One of those, Charles Taylor, called to say that the articles had sparked his memory of what it had been like to witness the last execution conducted in South Carolina before death sentences were temporarily banned nationwide. That was the electrocution of a Black man named Ray Young in 1962, who had been sentenced to die for killing a liquor store owner with an ice pick in Greenville during an attempted robbery.

A cousin of Taylor’s had a friend who worked at the South Carolina Penitentiary, what the Central Correctional Institute was then named and where executions used to be conducted near the Congaree River before they were continued at the Broad River Correctional Institution. That friend had helped secure Taylor a pass to view the execution, he said.. About 25 to 30 members of the public were there, too, Taylor remembered. In recent executions, no such passes were made available to the public, though select members of the press have been admitted to watch.

“It seemed like a dream or nightmare,” Taylor recalled about seeing Young die. Slowly, a metal cap was placed on Young’s shaved head, while the state electrician who would soon flip the switch on the electric chair stood nearby. Taylor, now 85, caught Young’s eye before the thousands of electric volts jolted his body up and the smell of burning flesh filled the chamber.

“I prayed, ‘God have mercy on you,’” he said, reading aloud from a description of the incident he had written.

Dr. David Dangerfield, an assistant professor of history at University of South Carolina Salkehatchie, emailed to note his interest in the series and to comment on the “truly medieval form” in which some of South Carolina’s executions had been conducted.

“Public execution by burning was sometimes used in the colonial era through 1830,” he wrote. “When this method was used, it was more often, though not always, meted out to enslaved individuals and free people of color.”

Since 1718, 11 people in South Carolina were burned to death after being sentenced to an execution. Three were gibbeted, their corpses left to dangle and rot inside a metal encasement, The State’s reporting showed, and executions issued in South Carolina for sexual assault have indicated racist sentencing patterns.

A photo dated April 6, 1961, first published in The State Newspaper, shows Everett Small, the new switchman for the electric chair at the State Penitentiary.

Many readers expressed compassion for the execution workers interviewed in the articles and gratitude to the reporters for providing a “powerful” and “chilling” story about the toll the employees suffered.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you for this important and rarely considered perspective,” said Mandy Halloran, on Twitter.

Some indicated they believed the newspaper should continue reporting on trauma related to death row, but focus next on the suffering of the victims of the condemned men.

“Why don’t you do a follow up on all those families who had their loved ones snatched away from them like a thief in the night?” Mark Sharp asked on the platform. “Those families were destroyed as well.”

A few readers called to offer to do executions for the state of South Carolina.

“I would volunteer to kill these people,” a veteran who served in Vietnam told a reporter, though he said he sympathized with the workers who suffered trauma after performing executions. Some of the bravest people the Fort Jackson resident said he ever met experienced similar consequences when they had to kill in combat, he remembered, but that didn’t happen to him.

“They’re wired different, they’re not better or worse,” he said.

Of the execution workers who were interviewed in the story, a couple shared that the reporting had positively impacted them or their families. One said he was proud that two of their relatives had been moved to change their stance on the death penalty after reading the story. Another indicated reading about other workers’ experiences made him feel less alone.

Nieman Storyboard, an outlet of the Nieman Foundation at Harvard, reached out to Chiara Eisner, who reported the series, and invited her to discuss her process of interviewing and writing about those men. In the article the outlet published, Nieman reporter Trevor Pyle pointed out that until The State’s article was published, “little has been known about the functionaries who carry out society’s final edict.”

Journalists from The New York Times, WIRED, ProPublica, The Economist, The Marshall Project, the Associated Press and The News and Observer recommended the story to their followers on Twitter. When Jamelle Bouie, an opinion columnist at The New York Times, shared the work, his tweet that called the article “a remarkable story” was liked over 800 times.

“This is a nightmare,” one reader wrote in response.

“Honestly, I’ve thought of this before, but like the article said, no one really talks about it,” wrote another. “The traumatic experience of those made to enforce [the death penalty] needs to be added to the conversation.”

Danish lawmakers, former FMs call for release of Kurdish leader DemirtaşDemirtas, the former co-chair of the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party (HDP), remains jailed by Turkish authorities despite two European Court of Human Rights rulings calling for his immediate release.

Wladimir van Wilgenburg 2021/12/06 
Danish lawmakers, former FMs call for release of Kurdish leader Selahattin Demirtaş. (Photo: Nikolaj Villumsen/Twitter)
Europe Turkey HDP Bakur Denmark EU


ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – In a joint statement published in Danish daily newspaper Information, 31 Danish lawmakers from eight different parties and three former Danish foreign ministers on Monday called for the immediate release of Kurdish opposition politician Selahattin Demirtas from a Turkish jail.

Demirtas, the former co-chair of the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party (HDP), remains jailed by Turkish authorities despite two European Court of Human Rights rulings calling for his immediate release.

"We have a clear judgment from the European Court of Human Rights that Erdogan refuses to follow," said Nikolaj Villumsen, an EU lawmaker representing The Red-Green Alliance from Denmark.

"This is totally unacceptable and European countries should take action in order to force Turkey to live up to its obligations."

"The fact that members from such a broad part of the Danish Parliament and even former ministers of foreign affairs stand together in this call for action shows the strength of the campaign to free Selahattin Demirtas," he concluded.

Related Article: Council of Europe again calls for release of Kurdish leader Demirtas

Former US Ambassador Robert Ford speaks to Kurdistan 24 about Syria, Peshmerga

 Mustafa Shilani 2021/11/17 

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Former United States Ambassador to Syria Robert Ford spoke on Wednesday in an interview with Kurdistan 24 about US policy in Syria and also said he expected that his government would continue its long history of cooperation with Kurdistan Region Peshmerga forces as an important partner on the world stage.

He made the comments while participating in a panel discussion at the Middle East Peace and Security Forum (MEPS21) held this week in the American University of Kurdistan (AUK) in Duhok.

When asked about American intentions in Syria, Ford pointed out that the US does not yet have firm plans for its path forward in the embattled nation, but that its first priority in Syria is to fight ISIS in northeastern Syria and provide humanitarian aid there.

He also indicated that the US’ second priority is to “try to help to find accountability for war crimes committed by Syrian government officials, but none of these will bring peace to Syria.”

“We should be honest about it; the Americans cannot bring peace to Syria.”

“When you talk about ceasefires,” he continued, “for the Americans, the most important ceasefires are in northwest Syria and northeast Syria, and the Americans support these things, but of course other countries including Turkey and Russia and the Syrian government have a big role and it is not only an American question.”

After being asked about US attempts to reduce Iran's presence in Syria, Ford said, “I do not think the Biden administration has a realistic hope that American policy can compel - can force Iran to withdraw all its forces from Syria.” Although the former Trump Administration had some notion to try to do so, “the Biden administration is more realistic.”

“It is interesting that the number one country which is attacking Iran in Syria is not the United States; it is Israel,” he said. “Of course the Americans support the Israeli air attack against Iranian positions - there was another one yesterday - but the Americans do not think Iran will withdraw all its forces from Syria.”

The diplomat explained that the fighting in Syria will not affect the Iran nuclear negotiations in Geneva and that Tehran understands that “you can negotiate one problem even while you continue to argue and even fight in another different area.”

“I think the Americans understand that Iran is going to have a role in Iraq and Syria, but the Americans do not want for the Iranian presence in Syria to be a threat against neighboring countries such as Israel or Jordan or Turkey,” he told the forum's participants and attendees, saying, “Americans want the final deciders who make decisions about policy in Iraq to be Iraqi officials and not Iranian.”

Turning the conversation to events farther eastward, Ford explained, “American policy in Afghanistan could never succeed because American strategy depended on a strong Afghan partner, and Afghan partner was never strong,” for multiple reasons.

In answering a question regarding the struggle of the major powers in the Middle East and additionally whether the new US administration can succeed in shifting the balance of power, guessing that “we will probably see in the next years the Americans work closely with allies in the region, including Kurdish regional government and Iraq’s federal government in Baghdad as well as in other countries in the Gulf region, Jordan, Israel, and I hope someday Turkey.”

Addressing the Kurdistan Region's Peshmerga forces, he stated, “The Americans are continuing an assistance program with the Peshmerga. We have a long history of cooperation with the Peshmerga. Since the first time I came to Iraq in 2003, we had cooperation with Peshmerga then and it has continued ever since.”

“I don’t think the cooperation with Peshmerga will end; I think it will continue, but I also think the Americans want to reduce their role in Iraq’s defense and give more responsibility to Iraqi security forces, including Peshmerga in the Kurdish region,” Ford added.

Regarding the Sinjar (Shingal) Agreement, signed by the governments of Erbil and Baghdad to bring security and governance to the Yezidi(Ezidi)-majority district, that has yet to be fully implemented due to the presence of multiple outlaw militias groups in the area.

“Sinjar is a complicated question, as there are many sides involved.”

“The important thing to understand is that, in the time of Biden Administration,” he concluded, “the Americans will leave this to Iraqis from the Iraqi Kurdish region and other parts of Iraq to find the answers, and it would be a very different kind of American approach from what you saw 10 or 15 years ago.”

Turkish defense minister should look up Ottoman-era documents to see if Kurdistan exists: Peshmerga Ministry

“Can he tell us where did he [Akar] visit and what was the name of it?” the ministry asked rhetorically.

 
 Halgurd Sherwani 2021/11/21 

The KRG Peshmerga Minister, Shorish Ismael, walks alongside his Turkish counterpart Hulusi Akar (left) at the Kurdistan Region's Erbil International Airport, Jan. 18, 2021. (Photo: Turkish Defense Ministry)

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The Kurdistan Regional Government’s (KRG) Ministry of Peshmerga on Sunday responded to Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar recent comment that denied the existence of the Kurdistan Region.

The ministry described the Turkish official’s remarks as “surprising” since they outright deny the very existence of a “historical, demographic, and geographic reality”.

Akar made the comment -- in which he categorically denied the existence of Kurdistan, including Iraqi Kurdistan -- during a recent session in Turkey's parliament.

Akar visited Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan Region in January, where he was received by Peshmerga Minister Shorish Ismael at Erbil International Airport.

“Can he tell us where did he [Akar] visit and what was the name of it?” the ministry asked rhetorically.

The ministry also stated that if the Turkish minister doubts the existence of Kurdistan, he should “look back at Ottoman-era documents and history to see whether Kurdistan exists or not.”

“The mentality of denying a nation and its geography has always sparked tensions and issues and it would lead nowhere,” the statement added.

Akar made his controversial remarks during an exchange with a member of the pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) in Turkey’s parliament on Wednesday.

The discussion was about reports claiming Turkey used chemical weapons against its arch-enemy the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Iraqi Kurdistan, Duvar English reported

The Turkish minister was upset by the HDP lawmaker's use of the word “Kurdistan”.

"There is no Kurdistan in Turkey or elsewhere," Akar said, prompting a follow-up question from the MP.

“Doesn’t Iraqi Kurdistan exist?" the lawmaker asked.

“No,” Akar replied.

Turkish police release Kurdish academic detained for posting 'Long Live Kurdistan' on social media

Kutum’s lawyer Mehmet Emin Aktar tweeted that his client was released after appeal at the 2nd Elazig High Criminal Court, where he was charged.

 
 Wladimir van Wilgenburg 2021/11/10 

Hifzullah Kutum, a research assistant at Fırat University. (Photo: Duvar English)

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Kurdish academic Hifzullah Kutum, who was detained on Nov. 6 after sharing the phrase “Long Live Kurdistan” on his social media account, was released by the Turkish police on Wednesday.

Kutum’s lawyer Mehmet Emin Aktar tweeted that his client was released after appeal at the 2nd Elazig High Criminal Court, where he was charged.

“The (court) case was opened and the court ruled in his favor to release him (on appeal). But in February 2022, the case will continue,” Aktar told Kurdistan 24. “The prosecutor in this indictment accuses Hifzullah Kutum of PKK propaganda.”

In a Sept. 14 tweet, Kutum congratulated all Kurds “on the (anniversary of the) September Revolution. Long Live Kurdistan” accompanied by a picture of Kurdish leader Mullah Mustafa Barzani.

After that tweet, the Fırat University in Elazig suspended Kutum from his position. A Turkish flag was reportedly hung on Kutum’s office door at the university.

In response, Kutum said that the flag in the clip he posted on social media is of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, with which Turkey has diplomatic relations. He also referred to meetings between President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and top Iraqi Kurdish officials.

The September Revolution, spearheaded by the late Mullah Mustafa Barzani, broke out on Sept. 11, 1961, as part of efforts to establish a Kurdish autonomous region within the Iraqi state, then led by Abdul Karim Qasim.

The incident comes one week after Turkish police detained a civilian named Cemil Taşkesen in the Kurdish Siirt province in late October for criticizing the visit of Meral Aksener, the leader of the Turkish ultranationalist Iyi (Good) Party.

Read More: Kurdish civilian detained in Turkey for saying “this is Kurdistan”

Taşkesen was later released after giving his statement to the prosecution.

Also, the Deputy Chairman of the Kurdistan Socialist Party (PSK) Bayram Bozyel was arrested on Nov. 8 by Turkish police in the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir (Amed).

Read More: Kurdish politician arrested by Turkish police in security crackdown

Editing by Paul Iddon.

What makes smaller nuclear power systems so exciting?

Atomic Insights

September 21, 2021

 By Rod Adams 

LONG READEma

et me start by dispelling the notion that I think smaller, modular, manufactured nuclear power systems – often called SMRs or micro reactors – are the be all and end all solution to anything, including climate change or energy security.

Though not THE solution, they have the potential to be a crucial, uniquely capable part of a fully-integrated, 0% emission climate-solving grid. 

The best of the breed build on lessons from aircraft manufacturing, submarine construction, electric vehicles, wind & solar and even computers. They are leavened with six decades worth of experience in building, operating and maintaining extra large nuclear systems. They address some of the public relations challenges that have plagued very large reactors.

Some of the system designers are paying close attention to the social science lessons and teachings of groups like “The Good Energy Collective” and designing their systems with customer needs and wants in mind. They often state that they are planning to build reactors that people want to buy. Many of the people or communities interested in buying those reactors are planning to live, work, and play right next to the power system. (Regarding the “play” part of that statement – at least one of the proposals I’ve seen includes directing the waste heat from the power system to a community swimming pool.)

Economy of series production & operation

As former submarine engineer officer who also had the rare opportunity to plan and budget for fleet level nuclear power training, maintenance and construction programs, I have a personal understanding of how economies of series production and standardization work to help keep costs under control and schedules predictable.

It is enlightening to see how much costs fall when you can train a group of operators in a common speciality and send them out to several dozen plants that have identical equipment, spare parts lockers and layouts. It’s also easy to see how maintenance procedures can be written once and used by all and how alterations can be planned, reviewed and implemented. These are just a few of the examples I can list. Rules protecting confidential information prevent me from sharing quantified details. Space prevents me from listing other examples.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone who has made anything that people learn to do things with experience or that doing the same thing repeatedly produces better results the more often the task is done. Those learning curve-related improvements don’t require mass production of thousands or millions of units, they start improving cost and performance with the second unit.

Widely cited literature from thought leaders like Clay Christensen (Innovators Dilemma and other works) show that there is a relation between costs and doubling of cumulative unit production.

The modern renewable industry – wind and solar energy collection systems – demonstrate the utility of replication. Starting from the high cost systems of the early 2000s, the industry took advantage of tax credit and mandates originally designed to help them build markets and achieve scale economies. Their impressive cost reduction performance is more attributable to the economy of learning by doing than it is to technological innovations and new inventions.

Aside: Some of the techniques used for the dramatic cost improvements in wind and especially solar power systems are not actions that we will to use to drive down nuclear costs. The sector has an admirable tradition of paying living wages to people who eagerly accept the responsibilities that come with high quality work and a strong safety culture. It also does not concentrate its manufacturing in countries with lower standards. End Aside.

Of course, cost and schedule improvements that result from experience can be lost, team relationships can be broken and skills can atrophy with a lack of practice. Smaller nuclear power systems will not be immune to these advantages and vulnerabilities. But unlike far larger plants that might be able to serve five, ten, or even fifteen years worth of electricity demand growth with a single unit, smaller systems will need numerous units to be steadily brought into service.

Smaller nuclear systems do not replace extra large power plants

Some challenge the idea that we should add small reactors to our product catalog. They believe that we know how to build large reactors, we have proven that we can operate them with incredible safety records and each one can make a big difference in both energy supply security and CO2 emissions. They claim that smaller reactors make the tasks more difficult and that many of the smaller reactors still need many years of operating experience to catch up with larger units.

SMRs and micro reactors are not intended as replacement products for situations when customers want large or very large power units. They are an addition to the options list for those who want or need their power in smaller quantities or who want to learn how to build and operate nuclear plants in a more gradual fashion.

Some object to those of us who characterize modern nuclear power systems as “advanced” because they claim we have done them all before. While it is true that world nuclear energy history includes projects that envisioned or actually used many of the potential combinations of fuel form, coolant, fuel enrichments, and secondary power systems, it isn’t true that they explored all available technological advances. Today’s designs benefit from innovations and developments that were not available back when some of the original research and testing was done.

The fact that there was a thriving market for electric cars that took off in the 1890s, even before the Model T years, does not make the Tesla any less advanced of a vehicle.

Aside: There are numerous smaller and micro reactors that are already in operation today. Two most recently completed examples are Russia’s Akademil Lomonosov and China’s HTR-PM. But the hundreds of reactors that have propelled naval vessels in a half dozen or more countries for decades also demonstrate many of the principles that make commercial SMR worthy of excitement. Indian PHWRs also have many of the characteristics of modern SMRs, including power rating. End Aside.

Note: The Wright Brothers and Henry Ford built internal combustion engines 120 or more years ago. That does not negate the statements by current automobile manufacturers that their power plants are advanced or modern. Modern electric vehicles may be descended from earlier products built on roughly the same combination of features, but they are still marvels of advanced technology.

Security, Insurance and Non-Proliferation

Some claim that rules aimed at ensuring security and preventing the proliferation of nuclear weapons will make smaller systems unaffordable. They overlook the efforts that are going into the system designs to make security easier to implement, the ways that safeguards are being designed into the systems and the fact that some of the rules are being changed because responsible leaders have recognized that they do not actually improve safety or security. Some of them were implemented with the express purpose of slowing nuclear energy development. The immediacy of climate change is stimulating efforts to identify and alter requirements that serve primarily to undermine nuclear economics.

There are even some who cling to the shibboleth claiming that nuclear energy is somehow subsidized because it has a specially designed group insurance program under the 1957 Price Anderson Act (as amended over the years.) While there are changes needed in that Act, it has never been a subsidy for nuclear energy. The truth is that insuring nuclear power plants has never cost taxpayers a dime in paid damages and the insurers that specialize in providing the required commercial insurance have been hugely profitable by collecting premiums and rarely, if ever, paying a claim.

When opponents point to the long-term costs of the accident at Fukushima Dai-ichi as a reason to believe that nuclear plants are under insured, they have some basis in fact. But most of the nuclear-related cleanup costs associated with that accident have been self imposed by the Japanese national, prefecture and local governments. They set radiation exposure standards that were much more stringent than already conservative international standards. Simply using international standards for radiation doses would have greatly reduced evacuation and relocation costs. Basing those actions on a more complete understanding of radiation and its risks would have virtually eliminated costs of actions taken outside of the plant fences.

Rebuilding an area decimated by an earthquake and tsunami isn’t cheap, but it shouldn’t be attributed to events at an industrial facility that did not harm its neighbors.

Are SMRs a good investment?

The answer is, it depends. As with every industry that is experiencing a new generation of technological innovation, some entrepreneurial teams are progressing well, successfully pitching their vision to investors, building their teams, executing against their milestones, learning from set-backs, adjusting to regulatory and market conditions and keeping their eye on the ball. And others not so much.

At Nucleation Capital, the partner team has a combined total of several decades spent investigating and observing the growing potential for advanced nuclear power production. We know that nuclear energy is clean enough to run inside sealed submarines full of people and safe enough for caring parents to not worry when their children work in close proximity to an operating nuclear power plant. We also know that commercial nuclear plants have amassed an admirable safety and reliability record.

That gives us tremendous hope and confidence that great teams will emerge that can learn from our historical performance, from the navy and otherwise, and that new designs will emerge that competitively meet the challenge to deliver clean energy reliably and cost-effectively with newer implementations of amazing carbon-free technology. But we also recognize that not every design will work as hoped or be well-suited to the market demand that exists. Not every team will have what it takes to be successful in a complex market.

Furthermore, we understand the concerns that many people have about the unknowns regarding new designs and the risks of deploying many more small reactors in an widening array of applications. Just as with the deployment of electric vehicles which cannot succeed on the basis of a car design alone but must be matched with a robust national grid of charging stations, this next generation of nuclear ventures will need to solve for an array of related challenges, including nuclear fuel production, long-term waste handling and storage, spent fuel transportation and reprocessing, among other things.

Fortunately, there are quite a lot of groups and entities that are eager to work on these issues, so that new nuclear systems can help us address climate change, provide humanity with reliable power in a climate-stressed world and also succeed in winning public support. There are valid concerns and there are good ways to address them. We also believe that we will have more success overcoming these concerns if coalitions of people across all spectrums participate in helping to solve them collaboratively. 

We are very pleased to be in a position to talk with founders, get briefed on detailed, often non-public information and discuss with them their development goals and challenges, as well as their experiences dealing with a range of potential funders, regulators, suppliers, strategic partners and potential customers. 

Of course, we cannot be specific about those interactions, but we can express how confident and energized they make us feel for this next generation of reactor developers to broaden the zero-carbon toolset to help reverse the trend of ever increasing CO2 emissions. In the foreseeable future, those new designs will likely contribute to the gargantuan task of reducing the existing emitted inventory of over a trillion tons of greenhouse gases already afflicting our climate, by working in combination with a range of carbon capture and removal technologies.

Our investments do not give us a “conflict of interest.” Rather, we believe they give us a broadening window into the future of decarbonization. We will continue to work with the ventures in our portfolio to help them navigate in the ever-shifting policy, regulatory and investment environments. We will keep our eye on the progress towards commercialization goals and continue to drill down into technological and competitive progress being made, so we can better determine our future investment activity.

We are not policy makers nor government officials. We have “skin in the game.” We will be participating to the extent of working to make sure that the developing advanced nuclear energy industry focuses on meeting customer needs and wants and ensuring that there are cost-effective methods for delivering these over the longer term.

We are also enthused by the opportunity to expand the world of “clean energy” and “climate tech” investing to include nuclear energy. We know that a large portion of the clean, near zero-emission energy produced in the world today comes from long ago investments in nuclear power plants that have been operating reliably for decades. While some look at the hiatus in new builds and believe it indicates that nuclear power is on its way out, we look at the same hiatus as the impetus to improve upon and achieve major strides towards perfecting this extraordinary but still overlooked technology. We will be working our hardest to make sure that we and our investors are able to participate in the growth and success of those ventures which best meet the climate challenge with the right set of products and services.

Related Posts

• Atomic Show #275 - Managing advanced nuclear development during pandemic
• Kairos - Developing advanced nuclear energy in Alameda
• Elite international experts to debate SMRs’ role in nuclear co-generation and hybrid systems
• SMRs - Why Not Now? Then When?
• Atomic Show #186 - SMRs, Climate Change, and Natural Gas Competition
• "Small and Medium Reactors" or "Small Modular Reactors" - Either Way, The US NRC and US DOE Notice a Growing Interest in SMR, Are Listening Carefully and Ready to Engage

About Rod Adams

Rod Adams is an atomic energy expert with small nuclear plant operating and design experience, now serving as a Managing Partner at Nucleation Capital, an emerging climate-focused fund. Rod, a former submarine Engineer Officer and founder of Adams Atomic Engines, Inc., one of the earliest advanced nuclear ventures, has engaged in technical, strategic, political, historic and financial discussion and analysis of the nuclear industry, its technology and policies for several decades. He is the founder of Atomic Insights and host and producer of The Atomic Show Podcast.

Vatican official apologizes for removing LGBTQ outreach video from synod website

Dec 13, 2021

by Christopher White

 

Vatican

NATIONAL CATHOLIC REPORTER

Screen Shot 2021-12-13 at 9.11.36 AM.png

A Synod of Bishops' newsletter offers an apology for removing a link to a video by the Catholic LGBTQ outreach organization New Ways Ministries (NCR screenshot)

ROME — An official from the Vatican's Synod of Bishops' office has apologized for removing a link to a video by the Catholic LGBTQ outreach organization New Ways Ministries and reversed course by re-publishing the original video in question. 

In a Dec. 12 newsletter, the synod's communication manager said he had "personally taken the initiative to de-publish a post promoted by the reality 'New Ways Ministries' for internal procedural reasons." 

"This brought pain to the entire LGBTQ community who once again felt left out," wrote Thierry Bonaventura.

The reversal comes less than a week after the video, "From the Margins to the Center: a Webinar on LGBTQ Catholics and Synodality," was removed on Dec. 7 from the resources website for the 2021-2023 synod on synodality.

The 75-minute video featured an Oct. 24 webinar presentation by Fordham theologian Robert Choiniere, who is also the director of adult formation at St. Francis Xavier Church in Manhattan.

According to conservative Catholic media reports, the video was removed after synod officials were informed that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops had censured New Ways Ministry in 2010 for its support of civil marriage for same-sex couples.

As NCR first reported on Dec. 8, following the video's removal, New Ways Ministry revealed that Pope Francis, in a series of written correspondence, had commended the organization for its outreach to the LGBTQ community. The pope also referred to one of its co-founders, Loretto Sr. Jeannine Gramick, as "a valiant woman" who had suffered much for her ministry.

Executive director of New Ways Ministry, Francis DeBernardo, labeled the original decision to take down the video "a big mistake."

Now, it seems the Vatican's synod office agrees. 

"I feel that I must apologize to all LGBTQ people and to the members of New Ways Ministries for the pain caused," wrote Bonaventure in the official newsletter for the General Secretariat for the Synod of Bishops. 

He went on to express the "firm will" of "the entire General Secretariat of the Synod," along with his personal committment,  "not to exclude those who wish to carry out this synodal process with a sincere heart and a spirit of dialogue and real discernment."

Along with re-publishing the video on the website for synod resources, the video was included in synod newsletter. Bonaventure also invited LGBTQ groups and others who "feel they live on the 'margins' of the Church" to share their materials with the synod office.  

'In walking together," Bonaventure concluded, "sometimes one may fall, the important thing is to get back up with the help of the brothers and sisters." 

Massive software flaw with global reach forces Quebec to shut government websites

MONTREAL — Almost 4,000 Quebec government websites were shut down over the weekend as a preventative measure following threats of a cyberattack, the province's minister of digital transformation said Sunday.

 Provided by The Canadian Press

Éric Caire made the announcement at an afternoon press conference in Quebec City, during which he said all official government websites would be taken offline until further notice.

"We're kind of looking for a needle in a haystack," Caire said. "Not knowing which websites use the software, we decided to shut them all."

The closure comes on the heels of a recently discovered software vulnerability in a Java-based library of an Apache product — known as Log4j — which the Department of National Defence said could affect thousands of organizations worldwide.

The Common Vulnerability Scoring System, also used widely around the world, has assessed the current threat at a 10 out of 10.

Caire said Quebec learned of the issue on Friday and has been working to identify which websites are at risk, one by one, before putting them back online.

"Once a system has been analyzed, if it turns out that it's not using the problematic library, the system is automatically back online," Caire said. "If it uses it, a fix is made. Once we make sure the system is operational, it gets back online.”

Caire said the government doesn't keep an inventory of which websites use the Apache software.

"It's like saying how many government offices use 60-watt bulbs, we have to go around and look at each one of them," Caire said, without specifying how long the verification process will take.

The province's Clic Santé portal used for booking COVID-19 vaccine appointments across Quebec was already back online as of Sunday afternoon, while the site for Revenue Québec among others was still down.

Caire said the provincial vaccine passport system was never at risk, saying it doesn't require the Apache software.

Marc-Etienne Léveillé, a cybersecurity expert for the international internet security company ESET, said global internet traffic has spiked significantly since Friday, adding he's noticed many users trying to find vulnerable services to hack.

He said while the software's vulnerability should not impact the general public, websites storing personal data — such as the Canada Revenue Agency —are more at risk of being compromised.

The vulnerability allows code to be executed over the internet, Léveillé said.

"The flaw allows it to bypass security, in other words," he said.

The province, however, has no current indication that systems have been compromised or personal data was accessed, Caire said at the news conference.

The Canada Revenue Agency, which took similar precautions by taking its web-based services offline after learning of the potential vulnerability on Friday, issued a statement saying nothing so far suggests its systems have been compromised.

Léveillé welcomed the government's precautionary measures, saying it might have prevented major data breaches.

"One of the big problems was that everyone was made aware of the flaw at the same time, Léveillé said. "The developers and its users didn't have time to correct the issue before people started to jump on the vulnerability. And since there are a lot of systems that use the software across the world, it will take many months to find which ones are vulnerable to that flaw."

Federal Defence Minister Anita Anand issued a statement Sunday saying the government is aware of the security risk and calling on Canadian organizations to "pay attention to this critical internet vulnerability."

"Out of an abundance of caution, some departments have taken their services off-line while any potential vulnerabilities are assessed and mitigated," Anand said. "At this point, we have no indication these vulnerabilities have been exploited on government servers."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 12, 2021.

Virginie Ann, The Canadian Press

Germany: 'Critical' cybersecurity flaw already exploited

BERLIN (AP) — Germany has activated its national IT crisis center in response to an “extremely critical” flaw in a widely used software tool that the government says has already been exploited internationally.

A spokesman for Germany’s Interior Ministry said the country's federal IT safety agency is urging users to patch their systems as quickly as possible to fend off possible attacks using a bug in the Log4J tool.

“The threat situation is extremely critical," the spokesman, Steve Alter, told reporters in Berlin. "Immediate protective measures are required.”

German authorities have recorded efforts to exploit the bug around the world, including successful attempts, he said, without elaborating. So far no successful attacks against German government entities or networks have been confirmed, though a number have been deemed vulnerable, said Alter.

Germany is in contact with “numerous national and international partners” on the matter, he said.

The flaw is considered so serious because the affected software is used in a wide range of devices that use Java software.

“A successful exploit of this weakness would mean that someone could take complete control of the affected system,” said Alter.

The Associated Press

Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association raise concerns over province’s response to opioid crisis


The Edmonton Zone Medical Staff Association (EZMSA) said the Alberta government's response to the increase in the number of opioid-related poisoning deaths is "insufficient."

 File: A bag of opioid pills.

Nicole Stillger 
Global News

In a recent letter, EZMSA's opioid poisoning committee noted it reviewed the recent announcements made by the province between Dec. 4 to 8.

"I think some of the responses have significant positive elements, but perhaps some not focused in the way that evidence would suggest they should be," said Dr. Stan Houston, U of A professor of medicine in the School of Public Health and member of the EZMSA Opioid Poisoning Committee.

Read more:

Edmonton doctors form opioid response committee to address spiking overdoses

The opioid crisis in Alberta in 2021 has been devastating according to EZMSA who added an average of four Albertans are dying every day from an overdose.

“It's an unfolding disaster in our community,” Houston said.

Over the past week, the province announced several new measures to combat the spike in opioid-related poisoning deaths in Alberta.

Houston is glad the province is taking action but said there is room for improvement.

A week ago, the province announced funding for 8,000 treatment spaces — providing Albertans with the opportunity to access treatment and enter recovery every year, with no user fees.

Read more:

Alberta government announces thousands of new addiction treatment spaces

"Many Albertans have traditionally not been able to access care due to user fees and a lack of funding," Eric Engler said in a statement — press secretary to the associate minister of Mental Health and Addictions.

It’s a move the EZMSA opioid poisoning committee supports but said the treatment is not feasible for many Albertans.

“At any given moment in time there's probably a fairly small proportion of individuals at risk who are ready, willing and able to engage in that kind of treatment," Houston explained.

"There is really not that great evidence for (inpatient treatment) efficacy in people with opiate dependency."

Houston noted it’s not just an addiction problem, the main concern is a toxic supply, something he said the association really wants to address.

“What has really changed dramatically in the last couple of years aside from COVID-19 is fentanyl. It's way more potent and it's unpredictable."

The province has previously said it’s putting together a panel of MLA’s to look at the pros and cons of prescribing medication to people who use drugs.

Read more:

Alberta funds injectable treatment Sublocade as opioid-related EMS calls spike

There’s also been growing criticism about the Digital Overdose Response System (DORS).

It's an app that alerts first responders if a person using substances becomes unresponsive to a preset timer.

The province said to date there have been over 650 downloads with more than 230 registered users.

"The DORS app is working as intended and is providing response to those who need it," Engler added.

"As it is a confidential and anonymous service we will not be commenting any further on usage at this time. To be clear the app is a proven technology and is being successful at accomplishing its goal."

Read more:

Concerns raised about Alberta overdose response app

Houston said there are data issues and there's no indication it's working.

"Really like to have some outcome results to demonstrate that this is safe and effective, which doesn't exist at the present time," Houston said.

"We would really like to have that information at a fairly granular geographic level, so we know where the problems are, where interventions are best placed and that has been distinctly lacking."

The province's statement also acknowledged "addiction involves more than just opioid use and includes other substances and processes."

"Alberta’s government is completely focused on treating addiction as a healthcare issue and making sure that Albertans have access to a comprehensive system of care. This includes everything from prevention, harm reduction and intervention to treatment and recovery," the province stated.