Sudan PM's resignation leaves military in full command

Issued on: 3/01/2022

 
Sudanese demonstrators gather in the capital Khartoum on January 2, 2022. The same day security forces fired tear gas canisters at a thousands of protesters outside the presidential palace in the capital demanding civilian rule. © AFP

The resignation of Sudan's prime minister leaves the military in full command and threatens a return to the repressive policies of the ousted regime of strongman Omar al-Bashir, analysts say

After months of street protests and violent crackdowns that have claimed at least 57 lives, observers fear more bloodshed ahead after premier Abdalla Hamdok stepped down late on Sunday.

In his farewell address on national TV, Hamdok said he had tried to prevent Sudan "from sliding toward disaster" but that it was now at a "dangerous crossroads threatening its very survival".

"Hamdok's resignation has left the military in sole command of the country," said Magdi al-Gizouli of think-tank the Rift Valley Institute. "Protesters will take to the streets again and will be left to face more violence."

Since its independence from Britain and Egypt in 1956, Sudan, now one of the world's poorest countries, has been mostly under military rule with only rare democratic interludes.

It has been navigating a fragile transition toward full civilian rule since the April 2019 ouster of veteran president Bashir following an unprecedented wave of youth-led protests.

Bashir, who is wanted for war crimes in the Darfur region by the International Criminal Court, was jailed as Sudan took steps to rejoin the international community and obtain debt relief, foreign aid and investment.

But the already rocky transition was derailed on October 25 when Sudan's new de facto ruler, top general Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, launched a coup, detaining Hamdok and his cabinet ministers.

The power grab sparked international condemnation and a new wave of street protests, with 57 people killed, hundreds wounded and at least 13 women raped during renewed street unrest.

'Facade removed'

Burhan reversed Hamdok's ouster and reinstated him on November 21, also promising elections in mid-2023 -- but the protest movement had lost all faith in both leaders and kept up their demonstrations.

They accused the civilian leader Hamdok, a former international economist, of "betrayal" and "legitimising the coup regime".

In the weeks since, Hamdok had failed to form a new government, and local media reported in recent days that he had not shown up at his office.

Gizouli said the parties to Sudan's November deal had hoped it would "reduce the agitation on the streets" and allow them to find a way "to rework the constitutional arrangements".

"But all this did not happen," he said.

Instead, Hamdok had found himself "paralysed" and "not able to get anything done, neither politically nor administratively".

Some observers now fear the Hamdok's resignation signals a reversion to the kind of rule Sudan saw under the Islamist-backed regime of Bashir.

Sudanese analyst Kholood Khair wrote on Twitter that Hamdok's resignation "removes any facade the #SudanCoup generals can enjoy and present this coup as anything other than a reversion to the Islamo-military politics of Bashir.

"Though Sudan's future is uncertain, the clarity helps all to see this coup for what it is."

Sudan's ousted president Omar al-Bashir gestures during his trial over the 1989 military coup that brought him to power, at a courthouse in Khartoum on January 19, 2021 (AFP/ASHRAF SHAZLY)

'Stakes are high'

Following Hamdok's resignation, Britain's Minister for Africa Vicky Ford tweeted that she was "deeply saddened" by the departure of the man who "was serving Sudan and its people's desire for a better future.

"Millions have raised their voices since 25/10 coup to demand civilian rule: security forces and other political actors must now respect those demands."

The United States urged Sudanese leaders to "set aside differences, find consensus and ensure continued civilian rule.

"Sudan's next PM and cabinet should be appointed in line with the constitutional declaration to meet the people's goals of freedom, peace and justice," the US Bureau for African Affairs said.

Activists have stepped up their calls for more anti-military protests from Tuesday and called on demonstrators to again head to the presidential palace in Khartoum "until victory is achieved".

Sudan has been navigating a fragile transition toward full civilian rule since the April 2019 ouster of veteran president Bashir following an unprecedented wave of WOMEN AND youth-led protests (AFP/-)

Sudan's military rulers have meanwhile granted themselves heightened powers to stop dissent.

Burhan late last month issued a decree allowing security forces to arrest individuals "over crimes related to the state of emergency" which effectively bans street protests.

It also allows security forces to enter and search "any building or individual" and impose "surveillance of any property and facility"

"The stakes are now very high," said Gizouli, who argued Hamdok had been "a possible mediator between all sides".

"Now it's an open confrontation between security forces and the old system, excluding Omar al-Bashir, and a leaderless movement on the streets based on the activism of young people."

John Prendergast, of The Sentry think tank, argued that foreign powers should not stand idly by.

"The longer the United States and European Union wait to create consequences for the actions of the military rulers," he wrote, "the more the regime is consolidating its economic and political power, to the great detriment of Sudan's population."

(AFP)

Sudanese communists appeal for international solidarity as four shot dead in Khartoum


Defiant: Protesters in Khartoum

THE Sudanese Communist Party has issued an urgent appeal for international solidarity after four protesters were shot dead in Khartoum yesterday while leaders of the resistance were detained.

More than 200 people are reported to have been injured in “bloody repression” by the regime’s forces, which fired tear gas and live bullets into the crowds as they demanded an end to military rule.

At least four people were killed by the notorious Rapid Support Forces, formerly known as the janjaweed, and many leaders of the resistance committees that have been established across Sudan were detained.

The Communist Party described the latest violence by the regime as “a desperate attempt to crush the mounting mass protests movement that has grown since the military coup on October 25.”

Demonstrations have spread across Sudan, calling for a transition to free and democratic elections and an end to the armed forces’ dominant role in politics.

Protests have continued despite the reinstatement of Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok in November as part of a deal which also provides for elections to take place in July 2023.

But the Sudanese people branded the agreement a betrayal of the revolution that ousted authoritarian president Omar al-Bashir in April 2019.

He has since been jailed and faces trial at the International Criminal Court on war crimes charges.

Hundreds were injured in Thursday’s brutality, with doctors and medical associations appealing for urgent help to save lives.

They accused the authorities of blocking the passage of ambulances and preventing critically injured people from receiving hospital treatment.

The Communist Party condemned the latest escalation and vowed to continue working with all forces to establish the broadest front of resistance and defeat the coup.

“We call for urgent international solidarity to demand an end to the bloody repression in Sudan and the immediate release of all political detainees, especially the leaders of the resistance committees,” it said.

The Communist Party of Britain sent condolences to the families of those killed during Thursday’s protests and called for the immediate release of the leaders of the resistance committees.

General secretary Rob Griffiths urged the British government to “end its support for the new regime established after the October 25 military coup and its consequential support for financial backing of the new regime by the IMF.”

Rosanne Boyland 

VISUAL INVESTIGATIONS

Videos Show How Rioter Was Trampled in Stampede at Capitol

Rosanne Boyland died after losing consciousness in the crush of a pro-Trump mob as it surged against the police. Here’s how it happened.

Rosanne Boyland was crushed amid this mob as it tried to push past the police and breach an entrance on the west side of the Capitol during the storming of the building on Jan. 6.Credit...Lev Radin/Sipa USA, via Reuters


By Evan Hill, Arielle Ray and Dahlia Kozlowsky

Published Jan. 15, 2021

Updated May 31, 2021

Rosanne Boyland, a 34-year-old Trump supporter from Georgia who died during the attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6, appears to have been killed in a crush of fellow rioters during their attempt to fight through a police line, according to videos reviewed by The Times.

Though the videos have circulated widely, Ms. Boyland’s presence in them had gone unnoticed until now, and the manner of her death had previously been unclear. The videos show her body on the ground just outside a door on the Capitol’s west side that was the scene of some of the day’s worst violence.

Her clothes and backpack strap in the videos match those she was seen wearing in a picture of her taken earlier that day, and two witnesses, one of whom tried to help her, gave similar accounts of her death.



A picture of Ms. Boyland from earlier on Jan. 6 showing her clothes and backpack helped The Times identify her in the crush of the mob.Credit...Justin Winchell


Here is how the fatal rush unfolded.

Around 2:30 p.m., rioters on the west side of the Capitol forced their way through lines of Metropolitan Police officers and swarmed to a second-level promenade. There, they headed toward a door and tunnel traditionally used by presidents when they emerge for their inauguration, hoping to breach the Capitol.

As soon as the crowd entered the tunnel, they were met by a line of riot police. Even as they began to push, a rioter could be heard on video warning: “Stop pushing, somebody’s going to get hurt.”

Within half an hour, the hallway became packed with rioters. Around 2:50 p.m., an independent photojournalist, Jon Farina, entered and began filming.

The mob, which can be seen massed together in a dangerous crush, attacked officers and attempted to use the weight of their combined bodies to push the officers back, trapping many people in the process. Both sides filled the air with chemical irritant sprays they fired back and forth.

The battle inside continued for another hour, as new arrivals eagerly joined the line of rioters filing into the packed hallway to replace those who were injured or tired.

Visible among these new arrivals is Ms. Boyland, identifiable in a YouTube video wearing her American flag sunglasses, packed amid the crowd surging toward the door. Justin Winchell, a friend who attended the protest with her that day, is in the crowd as well but cannot be seen in the video.

A screengrab from a YouTube video shows Boyland inside a tightly packed crowd as it tries to breach a west-side Capitol door defended by police on the afternoon of Jan. 6.Credit...The New York Times/The Black Conservative Preacher, via YouTube

At 4:19 p.m., the mob can be seen making another push into the doorway. Less than a minute later, the police pushed back, and the mob can be seen tumbling out of the door and down the steps. Mr. Winchell, in a bright blue hooded sweatshirt, is now just visible at the top of the steps.

For the next seven minutes, he can be seen pulling people away, appearing to search for Ms. Boyland as rioters continue to tumble out of the door. There is a lull in the fighting, and the crowd chants “I can’t breathe!” — a rallying cry of Black Lives Matter protests

CreditCredit...The New York Times/Mel D. Cole

It is unclear from the videos if Ms. Boyland was alive at this time, but two rioters — one wielding a stick and the other a crutch — launched a new attack on the police at 4:27 p.m., making it virtually impossible for officers to give her aid, if they were able to notice her at all.

Boyland is visible in a video lying on her side in front of the door, her black hooded sweatshirt, arm and face partially visible, as men clash with police above her.

In the chaos, two men spotted Ms. Boyland on the ground and dragged her away from the door.

The men laid Ms. Boyland out on the steps and attempted to resuscitate her. At least two individuals can be seen on video providing CPR. At the top of the steps, another man, wearing a purple jacket, can be seen apparently negotiating with the police so that the rioters can get Ms. Boyland assistance.

Roughly two and a half minutes after she was pulled away from the door, the men carried Ms. Boyland back to the police line, even as other rioters continued to throw poles and other objects at the officers.

At least two people present during the fight at the door recounted on video how they had seen a woman being trampled in the mob.

One man, who livestreams under the name Villain Report, said in a YouTube video posted to his channel that he saw a woman collapse from asphyxiation inside the tunnel. The man said he tried to feel the woman’s pulse after she was dragged away from the door, but found nothing. A Times review of the videos confirmed that he had been among the men surrounding Boyland’s body.

“By the time that they decided to pick the person up and give them to a police officer, she had blue lips and blood was coming out of her nose,” he said on the video. “I don’t think that person will be revived.”

In another video, a rioter identified as 25-year-old Edward Jacob Lang said he also had seen a woman trampled in the tunnel.

“They killed somebody, in front of my eyes.” “Really?” “Yes, she collapsed underneath them, for four minutes she was underneath, not breathing.” “What happened, sir?” “Some — a lady died in front of me. I picked up a — I carried her down the steps. She fainted and she was crushed by about six people.” “Out here? Did she go inside?” “She was purple by the time they got her.” “Oh, my God.” “And white.”

In social media posts, Lang blamed the police for the stampede and shared images of himself participating in the fight at the door. Police and F.B.I. agents arrested Lang from his home in Newburgh, N.Y., on January 16.

According to the Metropolitan Police Department, paramedics who responded to a call regarding a medical emergency at the Capitol arrived to find two Capitol Police officers in the Rotunda performing CPR on Ms. Boyland, who the officers said had collapsed in the protest. The Metropolitan Police declined to confirm whether the woman in the videos was Ms. Boyland, but said she was pronounced dead at a local hospital at 6:09 p.m. The chief medical examiner of Washington, D.C., said Boyland’s cause and manner of death are “pending”.

Mr. Winchell did not respond to a request for comment. After this story first published, Ms. Boyland’s sister told a Times reporter via text message she was glad to have some answers, but that she is now “left with more questions,” such as why her sister had gotten so close to the violence.

The day after Ms. Boyland’s death, her brother-in-law told reporters that he held President Trump responsible.

“Rosanne was really passionate about her beliefs, like a lot of people are,” he said. “I’ve never tried to be a political person, but it’s my own personal belief that the president’s words incited a riot that killed four of his biggest fans last night.”

Nicholas Bogel-Burroughs contributed reporting. Christina Kelso contributed production.

Correction: Jan. 21, 2021

An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated the times of day when rioters at a doorway into the U.S. Capitol pushed toward and launched a new attack against the police. The times were 4:19 p.m. and 4:27 p.m., not 4:09 p.m. and 4:17 p.m.

Evan Hill is a journalist on the Visual Investigations team, which combines traditional reporting with advanced digital forensics. @evanchill

On Jan. 6, 2021, a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol.

What Happened: Here’s the most complete picture to date of what happened — and why.
Timeline of Jan. 6: A presidential rally turned into a Capitol rampage in a critical two-hour time period. Here’s how.

Key Takeaways: Here are some of the major revelations from The Times’s riot footage analysis.

Death Toll: Five people died in the riot. Here’s what we know about them.

Decoding the Riot Iconography: What do the symbols, slogans and images on display during the violence really mean?

The House investigation. A select committee is scrutinizing the causes of the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, which occurred as Congress met to formalize Joe Biden’s election victory amid various efforts to overturn the results. Here are some people being examined by the panel:

Donald Trump. The former president’s movement and communications on Jan. 6 appear to be a focus of the inquiry. But Mr. Trump has attempted to shield his records, invoking executive privilege. The dispute is making its way through the courts.

Mark Meadows. Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, who initially provided the panel with a trove of documents that showed the extent of his role in the efforts to overturn the election, is now refusing to cooperate. The House voted to recommend holding Mr. Meadows in criminal contempt of Congress.

Scott Perry and Jim Jordan. The Republican representatives of Pennsylvania and Ohio are among a group of G.O.P. congressmen who were deeply involved in efforts to overturn the election. Mr. Perry has refused to meet with the panel.

Phil Waldron. The retired Army colonel has been under scrutiny since a 38-page PowerPoint document he circulated on Capitol Hill was turned over to the panel by Mr. Meadows. The document contained extreme plans to overturn the election.

Fox News anchors. ​​Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Brian Kilmeade texted Mr. Meadows during the Jan. 6 riot urging him to persuade Mr. Trump to make an effort to stop it. The texts were part of the material that Mr. Meadows had turned over to the panel.

Steve Bannon. The former Trump aide has been charged with contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with a subpoena, claiming protection under executive privilege even though he was an outside adviser. His trial is scheduled for next summer.

Michael Flynn. Mr. Trump’s former national security adviser attended an Oval Office meeting on Dec. 18 in which participants discussed seizing voting machines and invoking certain national security emergency powers. Mr. Flynn has filed a lawsuit to block the panel’s subpoenas.

Jeffrey Clark. The little-known official repeatedly pushed his colleagues at the Justice Department to help Mr. Trump undo his loss. The panel has recommended that Mr. Clark be held in criminal contempt of Congress for refusing to cooperate.

John Eastman. The lawyer has been the subject of intense scrutiny since writing a memo that laid out how Mr. Trump could stay in power. Mr. Eastman was present at a meeting of Trump allies at the Willard Hotel that has become a prime focus of the panel.

Ashli Babbitt a martyr? Her past tells a more complex story

This driver's license photo from the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA), provided to AP by the Calvert County Sheriff's Office, shows Ashli Babbitt.                                                       BY MICHAEL BIESECKER

Posted1/3/2022 


LONG READ

WASHINGTON -- The first time Celeste Norris laid eyes on Ashli Babbitt, the future insurrectionist had just rammed her vehicle three times with an SUV and was pounding on the window, challenging her to a fight.

Norris says the bad blood between them began in 2015, when Babbitt engaged in a monthslong extramarital affair with Norris' longtime live-in boyfriend. When she learned of the relationship, Norris called Babbitt's husband and told him she was cheating.

'She pulls up yelling and screaming,' Norris said in an exclusive interview with The Associated Press, recounting the July 29, 2016, road-rage incident in Prince Frederick, Maryland. 'œIt took me a good 30 seconds to figure out who she was. '» Just all sorts of expletives, telling me to get out of the car, that she was going to beat my ass.'

Terrified and confused, Norris dialed 911 and waited for law enforcement. Babbitt was later charged with numerous misdemeanors.

The attack on Norris is an example of erratic and sometimes threatening behavior by Babbitt, who was shot by a police officer while at the vanguard of the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. Former President Donald Trump and his supporters have sought to portray her as a righteous martyr who was unjustly killed.

Trump has called her 'œan incredible person' and he even taped a posthumous birthday greeting to her in October. Trump has also demanded the Justice Department reinvestigate Babbitt's death, though the officer who shot her was cleared of any wrongdoing by two prior federal investigations.

But the life of the Air Force veteran from California, who died while wearing a Trump campaign flag wrapped around her shoulders like a cape, is far more complicated than the heroic portrait presented by Trump and his allies.

In the months before her death, Babbitt had become consumed by pro-Trump conspiracy theories and posted angry screeds on social media. She also had a history of making violent threats.

Babbitt, 35, was fatally shot while attempting to climb through the broken window of a barricaded door leading to the Speaker's Lobby inside the Capitol, where police officers were evacuating members of Congress from the mob supporting Trump's false claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen. She was one of five people who died during or immediately after the riot, including a Capitol Police officer.

On social media, Babbitt identified as a Libertarian and ardent supporter of the Second Amendment. Her posts included videos of profane rants against Democrats, COVID-19 mask mandates and illegal immigration.

Her Twitter account, which was taken down after her death, was rife with references to the QAnon conspiracy theory, which centers on the baseless belief that Trump has secretly battled deep-state enemies and a cabal of Satan-worshiping cannibals that includes prominent Democrats who operate a child sex trafficking ring.

'Nothing will stop us,' Babbitt tweeted Jan. 5. 'œThey can try and try and try but the storm is here and it is descending upon DC in less than 24 hours....dark to light!'

Among Q followers, 'œThe Storm' refers to the predicted day Trump would finally unmask the pedophile cabal, arrest and execute those deemed traitors and restore America to greatness.

Trump has repeatedly insisted Babbitt was murdered, and she has achieved martyr status among Trump supporters. Her name and likeness now appear on T-shirts and flags at pro-Trump rallies.

A Maryland personal injury lawyer representing Babbitt's husband, Aaron Babbitt, has raised $375,000 through a Christian crowdfunding site and has threatened to file a lawsuit against the Capitol Police.

Key to that wrongful death claim is the contention that Babbitt, a former military police officer who was 5-foot-2 and weighed 115 pounds, would have peacefully surrendered had Capitol officers attempted to arrest her.

Aaron Babbitt declined to comment in October when a reporter knocked on the door of the San Diego apartment he shared with Ashli and another woman. In a June interview with Tucker Carson of Fox News, Babbitt said he has been sickened by some of what he has seen written about his deceased wife.

'There's never been a person who Ashli ran across in her daily life that didn't love her,' said Babbitt, 40.

That is not how Norris felt about her.

Court records involving the violent 2016 confrontation between Babbitt and Norris have previously been reported by media outlets, including the AP. But Norris, now 39, agreed to speak about it publicly for the first time in an interview with the AP and shared previously unreported details. She also provided documents and photos from the crash scene to support her account.

Norris was in a six-year relationship with Aaron Babbitt when she said she learned he was cheating on her with a married co-worker from his job as a security guard at a nuclear power plant near the Chesapeake Bay. She eventually found out the other woman was Ashli McEntee, who at the time went by the last name of her then-husband.

'He was telling me about this foulmouthed chick that's on his shift, blah, blah, blah,' Norris recounted. 'Come to find out a few months later ... they were basically having this relationship while they were at work.'

When she learned of the affair, she reached out to Babbitt's husband, Timothy McEntee.

'œYou know, I was trying to keep my home life together,' she said.

Norris said she tried for a few months to salvage her relationship with Aaron Babbitt before finally deciding to move out of their house. Within days, Norris said, Ashli moved in.

A few weeks later, Norris was waiting at a stop sign in Prince Frederick, about an hour southeast of Washington, D.C., when she says a white Ford Explorer passed her going the other direction.

Norris saw the SUV pulling a U-turn before speeding up behind her. She recounts that the SUV's driver began swerving erratically, laying on the horn and attempting to pass a Chevrolet Suburban that was in between them on the narrow two-lane road.

When the driver of the Chevy pulled over, Norris said the white Ford SUV accelerated and rammed into her rear bumper. She said the SUV rammed her a second time and then a third, all while the vehicles continued to roll down the road.

After Norris dialed 911, an emergency dispatcher advised her to pull over to the shoulder and stop. As she waited for help, Babbitt got out of her vehicle and came up to Norris' driver's-side window, banging on the glass.

Norris said the force of the impact caused her seatbelt to lock tight, preventing her from getting out of her car. Within minutes, deputies arrived.

A case report from the Calvert County Sheriff's Office obtained by the AP shows Ashli Babbitt was issued a criminal summons on charges of reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor defined under Maryland law as engaging in conduct 'œthat creates a substantial risk of death or serious physical injury to another' and punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. She was also charged with malicious destruction of property for the damage to Norris' vehicle.

Court records show those charges were later updated to include traffic offenses - reckless driving, negligent driving and failure to control a vehicle's speed to avoid a collision.

Photos from the scene provided to the AP by Norris show Babbitt's white Ford Explorer with its front bumper smashed in. The SUV's grill is also pushed in and the hood dented. The rear bumper of Norris' Escape is pushed in on the passenger side, with the detached Maryland license plate from the front bumper of Babbitt's SUV wedged into it.

Following the altercation, Norris and a friend went to the courthouse in neighboring St. Mary's County, where she lived at the time, and petitioned for a peace order, a type of restraining order, against Ashli Babbitt. The resulting judicial order barred Ashli Babbitt from attempting to contact Norris, committing further acts of violence against her and going to her home or workplace.

A copy of the order, dated the same day as the altercation, contains Norris' contemporaneous account of what occurred, as written down by her friend. Norris' hands were still shaking so badly she couldn't write down what happened for herself, according to a note on the document.

In the weeks after the incident, Norris said, Babbitt falsely claimed to authorities that the collisions had occurred when Norris repeatedly backed her vehicle into Babbitt's SUV. But when the case went to trial, Norris said, Babbitt changed her story, admitting under oath that she had collided with Norris' vehicle but portraying it as an accident.

No transcript from the hearing was available, but Norris said the lawyer defending Babbitt made repeated references to her employment at the local nuclear power plant and years of military service, which included deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. Babbitt served on active duty with the U.S. Air Force, and then in the reserves and the Air National Guard until 2016. A judge acquitted Babbitt on the criminal charges.

In February 2017, records show Norris asked for and received a second peace order against Ashli Babbitt, citing ongoing harassment and stalking. In a handwritten petition, Norris says that Babbitt had recently followed her home from work and that she had also received repeated calls in the middle of the night from an unlisted number.

'œI lived in fear because I didn't know what she was capable of,' Norris told the AP. 'œI was constantly looking over my shoulder.'

In 2019, Norris filed a personal injury lawsuit against Ashli Babbitt, seeking $74,500 in damages, and she said she settled out of court with Babbitt's insurance carrier for an undisclosed sum.

By then, Aaron and Ashli had moved to California, where she grew up and still had family. Timothy McEntee was granted a divorce in Maryland in May 2019. McEntee did not respond to voicemails and messages left at his home.

Ashli posted on Facebook that she married Aaron Babbitt the following month. Records show the couple owned a pool cleaning service with Ashli's brother. When a reporter visited the business the day after her death, a large sign on the locked door declared the building to be 'œMask Free Autonomous Zone Better Known as America.'

In the year since Babbitt's death, Trump and many Republicans in Congress have sought to recast the Jan. 6 insurrection as nonviolent - a contention directly contradicted by hours of video footage and the public testimony of Capitol Police officers, 140 of whom were injured in the melee.

In his video on Babbitt's birthday, Trump also said: 'œTogether we grieve her terrible loss. There was no reason Ashli should have lost her life that day. We must all demand justice for Ashli and her family, so on this solemn occasion as we celebrate her life, we renew our call for a fair and nonpartisan investigation into the death of Ashli Babbitt.'

Aaron Babbitt's lawyer, Terrell Roberts III, did not respond to numerous phone messages and emails seeking comment. But in written statements to the media, he has said her shooting 'œwas tantamount to an execution without trial.'

'œGiven her background as a 14-year veteran of the Air Force, it is likely that Ashli would have complied with simple verbal commands, thereby making the use of any force unnecessary,' Roberts said.

The Capitol Police officer who shot Babbitt, Lt. Michael Byrd, said in a televised interview in August that he fired as a 'œlast resort.' When he pulled the trigger, he said, he had no idea whether the person jumping through the window was armed.

The U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Columbia cleared Byrd of wrongdoing in April, concluding that he acted in self-defense and in the defense of members of Congress. The U.S. Capitol Police announced in August that they had also cleared Byrd.


'œI tried to wait as long as I could,' Byrd said. 'œI hoped and prayed no one tried to enter through those doors. But their failure to comply required me to take the appropriate action to save the lives of members of Congress and myself and my fellow officers.'



Associated Press correspondent Elliot Spagat in San Diego contributed to this report.

___

Follow AP Investigative Reporter Michael Biesecker at http://twitter.com/mbieseck

___

Contact AP's global investigative team at Investigative@ap.org.

Young Sri Lankan scientist’s research gains attention in the US

3 January 2022 

Sri Lankan born young scientist Dr. Gayani Senevirathne, who has excelled in the fields of Zoology and Molecular Biology brought pride to the country, since her latest research on finding an answer to a human abnormality had gained attention in the United States.

Dr. Senevirathne’s doctorate work discovered a gene in frog development that could be used to answer an abnormality that we can see in the axial column of human babies before birth. This work gained attention in United States and was published in a high-ranked journal called Proceedings of the National Sciences.
Dr. Gayani Senevirathne is an exceptional scholar, who studied in the biological science stream for her G.C.E. Advanced Level Examination at Mahamaya Girls’ College, Kandy and entered the Science Faculty of the University of Peradeniya in 2009.

She received two Presidential awards and an award for the Best Science Research from Sri Lanka Research Institute for her research. However, she earned another award for academic excellence after several publications. After graduating with a First-class degree specializing in Zoology and Molecular Biology, she got a fellowship to complete her doctoral studies at the University of Chicago, which is ranked top 10 in the world.

She completed her PhD in 4 ½ years and joined Harvard University as a post doctor to understand how the pelvic girdle of the humans develop and diseases associated with it. The excellence in her academic career made her win the Helen Hay Whitney fellowship, a prestigious award, given to few of the well-recognized Nobel Laureates in the World. Her goal is to serve the country one day after returning to Sri Lanka by helping girls in science to achieve their dreams. Gayani’s greatest desire in her career life is to run her own laboratory, to build an environment where everyone is accepted, to empower females and minorities, and to address scientific research questions in vertebrate evolution using cutting-edge techniques.

Dr. Senevirathne’s father, Upul Senevirathne is an Assistant Commissioner of the Excise Department and her mother Bhagya Senevirathne is a research assistant in the water purification company, ‘CETEC’. Her brother, Ashan Senevirathne works as a Senior Engineer at the Testra company in Melbourne, Australia, whilst Gayani’s sister, Salani Senevirathne is currently reading for her undergraduate degree majoring in Mechanical Engineering at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA after receiving the 'Chancellor’s Award.'

CLASSIC BLUNDER

The United States Should Avoid Waging a Two-Front Cold War

By Francis P. Sempa

January 03, 2022

Public Domain

The Biden administration appears to be heading in the direction of waging a two-front Cold War over Ukraine in Eastern Europe and Taiwan in East Asia, both of which could turn "hot" any day. The imprudence of such an approach should be obvious, but the great danger is that such "crises" could get out of hand before the leaders involved step back from the brink.

Russia's Vladimir Putin may want to extend Russia's rule to Ukraine and other former Soviet republics, but he definitely wants to ensure the end of NATO expansion. China's Xi Jinping, like all of his predecessors, wants Taiwan unified with the mainland, and while he would prefer to do it peacefully, he may be willing to risk war with the United States to achieve his goal--especially if he believes he can win such a war at an acceptable cost.

That leaves the Biden administration, which to date has been sending mixed signals to both Russia and China. Administration spokespersons have warned of severe consequences should Russia invade Ukraine, but President Biden has stated that those consequences will be primarily economic in the form of sanctions. Meanwhile, President Biden has stated that the United States will defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese attack, but administration spokespersons have walked that back and reaffirmed the U.S. policy of “strategic ambiguity.” This is a recipe for confusion, misunderstanding, and possibly war on two fronts.

This muddled U.S. approach was highlighted at the recent Summit for Democracy, where the U.S. President portrayed international politics as a global struggle between democracies and autocracies and characterized the United States as democracy's "champion." Biden and other American democracy proponents appear to have forgotten the wise counsel of Secretary of State John Quincy Adams that America was the well-wisher of freedom to all but the champion only of her own. The U.S. democracy proponents have likewise forgotten the prudent diplomacy of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger that sought America's geopolitical benefit to exploit the divisions and fissures between the two most powerful autocracies on the Eurasian landmass. And they have forgotten the wise and timeless counsel of Sir Halford Mackinder, the great British geopolitical thinker, who urged the democratic statesmen of his time to reconcile democratic ideals with geopolitical realities.

Foreign policy and strategy involve understanding and prioritizing threats and then devoting the necessary resources to meet those threats. China clearly poses the greatest threat to U.S. national security interests in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond. The Biden administration's focus should be there, and it should allocate resources accordingly. China's President Xi needs to understand that he cannot forcibly annex Taiwan without incurring unacceptable costs in a war with the United States. "Strategic ambiguity" should be replaced by "strategic clarity." Meanwhile, the U.S. should use diplomacy to wean Russia from China's orbit, including foregoing any further expansion of NATO and avoiding the democracy versus autocracy rhetoric. High-sounding principles are no substitute for hard-headed realpolitik. Biden's role model should be John Quincy Adams, or George Washington, or Richard Nixon, or looking across the oceans, Otto von Bismarck or Lee Kuan Yew--statesmen who understood geopolitical realities and who were unbound by so-called universal principles. Or perhaps, Biden could simply emulate Abraham Lincoln, who during the Trent Affair in the midst of the American Civil War, wisely cautioned his Cabinet and military advisers: “One war at a time.”

Francis P. Sempa is the author of Geopolitics: From the Cold War to the 21stCentury, America’s Global Role: Essays and Reviews on National Security, Geopolitics and War, and Somewhere in France, Somewhere in Germany: A Combat Soldier’s Journey through the Second World War. He has written lengthy introductions to two of Mahan’s books, and has written on historical and foreign policy topics for The Diplomat, the University Bookman, Joint Force Quarterly, the Asian Review of Books, the New York Journal of Books, the Claremont Review of Books, American Diplomacy, the Washington Times, and other publications. He is an attorney, an adjunct professor of political science at Wilkes University, and a contributing editor to American Diplomacy.

CPGB
Editorial: Happy new year? Not unless we halt the march to war

A Ukrainian soldier smoking at the line of control against

 anti-fascist resistance forces in the Donbass

THE earliest sources make the festive season a time of peace: “Peace on Earth and goodwill to all” are words Luke the Evangelist ascribes to the angel addressing shepherds on the night of Jesus’s birth.

The peace message dominates a more modern seasonal staple too, with John Lennon’s Happy Xmas (War is Over) enjoining us that war can be a thing of the past. The wish that the new year be “a good one, without any fear” is often explained as a reference to the real fear that the cold war would erupt into a conflict that would end life as we know it.

That’s worth remembering as we enter 2022 with fears of war in Europe once again on the rise. Western powers have accused Russia of massing thousands of troops near Ukraine. Moscow may be planning an invasion, the United States says.

Moscow denies it: warning in turn that Ukraine may be considering an offensive to reconquer the Donetsk and Lugansk regions, areas that split off following the fascist-backed “Maidan” coup of 2014.

Is war likely? US President Joe Biden, who has announced an end to the “forever wars” begun by George W Bush and accepted defeat in Afghanistan, has said that the US is not prepared to fight Russia over Ukraine, but would instead respond to any attack with sanctions.

This is not because Biden is a man of peace but because his administration is primarily concerned with the new cold war on China.

Even so, the US is not prepared to give an inch on its military domination of this continent (though it promised Nato would not move “one inch eastward” in return for the withdrawal of Soviet troops in the 1980s).

Western media portray Russia as the aggressor — but Nato “forward bases” led by US, British and German soldiers are stationed on its borders.

Russian manoeuvres are always depicted as a threat, when US-led military exercises on Russia’s borders are treated as purely defensive — even when they include simulated nuclear launches, as they did in November.

The narrative is maintained by careful avoidance of the facts: “We don’t know what Putin wants, in part because he doesn’t know himself,” intoned Mark Galeotti in this week’s Daily Telegraph.

Actually since Russia presented the United States with a list of proposals on December 17, we do know what it wants — though a host of Atlanticist think tanks and broadsheet pundits compete to assure us that the proposals are “not serious.”

We should go back to basics. Like John Pilger, who asked a US admiral how he would feel if Chinese warships were patrolling the US coast, we need a spirit of reciprocity: to understand that for Russia Nato exercises in Lithuania look as threatening as Russian exercises would in Belgium or Mexico.

We should ask ourselves why particular demands — that both Moscow and Washington agree not to host nuclear weapons in other countries, for example — are “not serious” and whether such a mutual de-escalation would not benefit the peoples of both countries and those in between.

John Lennon’s seasonal favourite was at least released in a world that understood the danger it was in and the importance of compromise: from 1969 the US and Soviets began the Strategic Arms Limitation (Salt) talks that slowed the nuclear arms race and led in turn to the Strategic Arms Reduction (Start) treaties that saw nuclear arsenals begin to shrink, a trend Britain’s government is now reversing.

Today’s politicians understand neither: egging each other on at Westminster to ever more reckless provocations, sending warships to harass China and posing in tanks on Russia’s borders.

The new cold war has heated up over the course of 2021. In 2022 we need a peace movement that brings a breath of sanity back into these questions — all while keeping our eyes on the prize of a peaceful world.

Campaigners launch week of action demanding freedom of Kurds held after chemical weapons protest in Netherlands



CAMPAIGNERS began a week of action today for the release of protesters held in the Netherlands after they occupied the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) building briefly in December.

About 50 people staged a sit-in at the end of the chemical watchdog’s annual conference in The Hague last month, in protest against its failure to investigate the alleged use of banned munitions by Turkey in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Police responded with violence, allegedly breaking the arm of one of the protesters while another was left with a broken nose.

At least four people were hospitalised as a result of the attempts to remove them from the conference floor.

A total of 44 people were hauled into custody and held for several days and will appear before a judge next month. At least one person has been deported from the Netherlands.

But four protesters, who are Kurdish, remain behind bars in detention centres across the Netherlands and will remain there until the court hearing opens on February 23.

“This says everything about the systematic racism of the Dutch state — white activists are generally quickly released after similar actions,” organisers Radical Solidarity told the Morning Star.

“We condemn the excessive police violence in the name of the Dutch state and oppose these ridiculous legal cases.”

Dutch authorities are accused of criminalising the just cause while the OPCW continues to ignore demands for an investigation into Turkey’s actions in Iraqi Kurdistan.

“This is a political case,” campaigners insisted as they highlighted the OPCW’s role as an instrument of state power.

The Star first reported on the alleged use of chemical weapons in May, which led to calls for a commission of inquiry in Turkey’s Grand Assembly.

Ankara denies the use of banned munitions during its illegal war and occupation of Iraqi sovereign territory, which has entered its ninth month.

But the Star has visited the affected region and interviewed dozens of people displaying symptoms that could be attributed to exposure to chemicals.

Medics claim that local security forces seized an initial report that said patients had been treated for symptoms resulting from a chemical attack amid accusations of a cover-up.

Radical Solidarity backed the calls for an investigation and called on the European Union, the Netherlands and the OPCW to break their silence.

“We demand release of all political prisoners and support the OPCW protesters’ demand for an independent investigation into the use of chemical weapons by Turkey,” it said.

The group called for banner drops, protests at Dutch embassies and for people to write letters of solidarity to the detainees, which can be sent via

radical.solidarity@protonmail.com

Turkish army forced into humiliating retreat in 'biggest war in Kurdistan in recent years'


A PKK guerilla

KURDISH guerilla fighters said they had forced Turkey into a humiliating retreat in “the biggest war in Kurdistan in recent years” today as details of the heavy blows inflicted against Turkish soldiers were revealed.

Nato’s second-largest ground army withdrew troops from three bases in the Zap mountains in Iraqi Kurdistan last month, where it has met fierce resistance from Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) fighters.

The PKK said its forces had launched a number of offensives against Turkish military positions in the area known as the Medya defence zones — the mountainous border region in Duhok province where battle has raged for the past eight months.

“The Turkish army received heavy blows during these actions in which we suffered no casualties, and the tactics of the new guerilla warfare were successful,” a PKK statement said.

It accused Turkey’s armed forces of spreading misinformation to cover up the truth about its defeat at the hands of the resistance fighters.

Turkish forces launched Operation Claw-Lightning in April, claiming that it was a military offensive against the PKK.

But it has been accused of a litany of war crimes including the bombings of a hospital and a refugee camp and the use of chemical weapons against civilian populations, as well as in tunnels belonging to guerilla fighters.

The PKK said it had lost 40 “martyrs” as a result of chemical weapons attacks since Turkey launched “the biggest war in Kurdistan in recent years” in April.

“The fighters who fell after days of encirclement and massive use of chemical weapons were to leave a beacon of resistance,” the PKK said.

Turkey has denied using chemical weapons, insisting that it does not hold a stockpile of banned munitions as a signatory to the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention and a member state of the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW).

But the Morning Star has visited the affected areas and met with dozens of villagers who presented with burns and breathing difficulties after Turkish artillery fire.

Medics reported that they had been threatened and forced by Kurdistan Democratic Party forces to alter reports saying they had treated patients for the effects of chemical weapons attacks.

Turkey’s occupation has seen it establish more than 80 military bases and a military airport from which it launches drones that terrorise the local population.

The Star has seen the ongoing construction of the sites, as well as a network of roads that links them together and enables Turkey to transport resources plundered from the region.

STEVE SWEENEY
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 31, 2021

Editorial:
Blair's knighthood is an offence to the victims of his wars. It is important to oppose it

War criminal Tony Blair

SUCH is the backlash at the knighthood given Tony Blair — with a petition for it to be rescinded exceeding 150,000 signatures within 24 hours — that the Speaker of the House of Commons Sir Lindsay Hoyle has been forced to step in with the ludicrous assertion that “it is not about politics.”

Knighting Blair is a deeply political move — and one wildly out of step with public opinion.

The explosion of anger is not confined to the left. The Daily Mail reports on military mothers describing it as “the ultimate insult” given the deaths of their children in wars Blair took Britain into on the basis of lies.

Hoyle’s defence — that all prime ministers should be knighted regardless of their record — is itself a sign of how toxic Blair’s legacy is.

He argues that it is standard procedure to honour past PMs. But that is one reason it is crucial to oppose it.

Knighting Blair is not a step the Establishment would have tried to make in 2016, the year Jeremy Corbyn offered an apology on behalf of the Labour Party for the invasion of Iraq. It may only have been deemed possible in light of the final end of the war in Afghanistan this summer, two decades after Blair followed George W Bush in invading that country — though the total collapse of the US-led occupation and its puppet regime are hardly a suitable backdrop for honouring one of the instigators of that war.

Left voices are torn between outrage at a public accolade for a war criminal and resignation: many point out that knighthoods are generally given to unsavoury characters and point to the admirable characters who have declined a gong as more worthy of respect than those who have accepted one. All that is true.

Yet Blair’s knighthood matters. It is a bid by the ruling class to draw a line under the period of anti-Establishment revolt that began with the bankers’ crash in the year Blair left Downing Street and continued, through the Occupy movement, Corbynism and Brexit, up to the pandemic.

Blair’s premiership was the last in which the British political system held general legitimacy in public eyes. It was followed quickly by a parliamentary expenses scandal that shredded respect for Westminster, an economic crash that exploded his chancellor and successor Gordon Brown’s vainglorious claims to have discovered a stable form of capitalism and an inquiry into the Iraq war that exposed the dirty tricks his government used to justify an unprovoked attack on a sovereign country that posed no threat to Britain.

By lying to justify the most serious action any government can take, Blair permanently damaged confidence in the institution of government. This is the “irreparable damage to both the constitution of the United Kingdom” mentioned in the petition to rescind the knighthood.

Revolutionary socialists will not regret the loss of confidence in the British state he caused, but must seek to channel it into support for radical, democratising change.

But it is more important still to insist that we do not allow the Establishment to normalise Blair as some elder statesman owed deference whether we agree with his politics or not.

Blair is a war criminal. Starting a war of aggression was defined at Nuremberg as the “supreme international crime,” and he did it, not once but multiple times.

The Iraq war lives on in a violent and unstable Middle East and the global spread of violent jihadist terror. The “crime of the century” cannot be erased. It caused death and suffering on a vast scale.

In the words of WH Auden: “Acts of injustice done
Between the setting and the rising sun
In history lie like bones, each one.”

We must not forget Iraq. Blair should be in the dock. The campaign to hold him accountable for his crimes should only be spurred on by this disgraceful decision.

Peace activists' dismay as warmongering PM Tony Blair knighted


Blair is now Sir Tony, Knight Companion of the 

Most Noble Order of the Garter AND WAR CRIMINAL

PEACE campaigners expressed dismay following the announcement of a knighthood for Tony Blair, the former British prime minister who took the country to war with Iraq based on lies about “weapons of mass destruction” that turned out not to exist.

Mr Blair has been made a Knight Companion of the Most Noble Order of the Garter, Britain’s top chivalric order. Appointments are supposedly made by the Queen without taking advice from the government of the day.

Mr Blair’s 1997-2007 administration is most famous for participating in the unprovoked invasion of Iraq, which left a million dead and permanently destabilised the region. The conflict is widely blamed for the subsequent huge increase in influence and reach by Islamist terror groups such as al-Qaida and later Islamic State.

Polls suggest around one-third of British people believe Mr Blair should face trial at The Hague for the war crime of starting a war of aggression — defined at Nuremberg as “the supreme international crime.”

“He should be in the dock but yet again Tony Blair rewarded for war crimes,” said Stop the War convener Lindsey German, while the People’s Assembly’s John Rees remarked: “Unusual to be knighted for losing a crusade in the Middle East.”

Mr Blair also took Britain to war against Yugoslavia in 1999 and into Afghanistan in 2001, leading to a 20-year occupation that ended in ignominy and defeat this summer.

Within Britain Mr Blair – who will now be known as Sir Tony – introduced the private finance initiative (PFI) which crippled many hospital trusts with debt and was a keen promoter of private-sector delivery of public services.

He is credited with the introduction of Sure Start however and reductions in child poverty later reversed by subsequent Tory administrations.

Since leaving office his business affairs have been shrouded in secrecy but he has amassed a fortune worth hundreds of millions in an operation dubbed “the Blair rich project.”

Mr Blair said his elevation was “an immense honour.” AND A HORROR TO HUMANITY

Austria ready to sue EU over nuclear’s inclusion in green finance taxonomy

By Nikolaus J. Kurmayer | EURACTIV.com

Austrian minister Leonore Gewessler told EURACTIV why nuclear energy had no place in the EU's sustainable finance rules and why her country was prepared to challenge the expected delegated act in court.

 Image Source: Parlamentsdirektion / Thomas Jantzen

Austria’s energy and climate minister Leonore Gewessler told EURACTIV in an exclusive interview that her country was ready to go to court if the EU decides to include nuclear power into the bloc’s taxonomy on sustainable finance.

In October, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced that the EU executive would soon table proposals on gas and nuclear as part of the bloc’s sustainable finance taxonomy, a set of rules designed to provide investors with a common definition of what is green and what is not.

A group of twelve EU countries, led by France and Finland, want nuclear energy included, arguing it is a low-carbon energy source and that radioactive waste can be handled safely if appropriate measures are taken.

But Austria would be ready to challenge that decision in front of the European Court of Justice said Leonore Gewessler, the Austrian minister for climate protection and energy.

“There is no legal basis for including nuclear power in the EU taxonomy,” Gewessler said adding that, “Yes, if the EU taxonomy includes nuclear energy, we are ready to challenge that in court.”

Austria is at the centre of a five-country alliance bringing together Denmark, Germany, Luxembourg and Portugal, which seeks to prevent the inclusion of nuclear energy in the EU’s green finance rules. The alliance was launched during the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow.

Five EU countries form anti-nuclear alliance at COP26

In face of a French-led push to revive nuclear power in Europe, a group of five EU countries led by Germany have banded together to urge the European Commission to keep nuclear out of the EU’s green finance taxonomy.

Legal analysis

For Gewessler, “the credibility of the taxonomy is at stake” when deciding how to classify nuclear under the EU’s green finance rules.

The Austrian energy and climate ministry commissioned a legal analysis earlier this year, which found that “that the inclusion of nuclear energy is not compatible with the legal basis of Article 10 of the Taxonomy Regulation,” she said.

“We have a great responsibility here, in terms of taxonomy, to remain consistent and coherent” with the ambitions of the European Green Deal and maintain trust in the financial markets, she argued.

“The considerable damage caused by nuclear energy is well documented historically,” she explained, citing “the dangers of nuclear power itself” as evidenced by the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters.

The safe disposal of spent radioactive fuel is also a matter of concern. “We have not yet found a global solution for…the question of final storage,” she said.

Besides, nuclear power “is much too expensive and much too slow to make a contribution” to the bloc’s climate goals, Gewessler continued.

The next-generation French reactor currently being built at Flamanville, whose construction started in 2007, has been massively delayed, with completion now scheduled in 2023 while costs have increased fivefold, she remarked.

Earlier this month, leading French EU lawmaker Pascal Canfin proposed letting nuclear energy and gas in the taxonomy as “transition” energy sources while the bloc pursues its long-term switch to renewable energy sources.

Canfin’s suggestion is to label gas a “transition” investment when it replaces coal and provided strict emission thresholds are met.

But Gewessler rejected that proposal too. “Just because something is less bad than coal doesn’t make it good or sustainable. It is still fossil energy,” she said.

Canfin MEP: 'Here is my proposal to find the right compromise on gas and nuclear in the taxonomy'

With proper safeguards in place, both gas and nuclear power can be included in the “transition” category of the EU’s green finance taxonomy, says Pascal Canfin, a leading lawmaker in the European Parliament.


According to Gewessler, Austria will be able to count on the support of Germany and Spain in case it goes to court over the matter.

“Spain shares Austria’s position one-to-one. Spain sees neither nuclear energy nor fossil gas in the taxonomy and has made this very clear before,” she said.

While Spain has been absent from the five-country alliance announced at COP26, it “sent a joint letter [with Austria and others] on nuclear energy to the Commission months ago. There is no room between us,” explained Gewessler.

And Austria’s neighbour Germany can always be counted on in the fight against nuclear power.

“Nuclear power cannot be a solution in the climate crisis, it is too risky, it is too slow, it is too expensive,” explained her German counterpart Svenja Schulze, caretaker minister of the environment, on 11 November.

“No climate activist should rely on nuclear power,” she added.

Luxembourg to join Austria in anti-nuclear EU lawsuit

LUXEMBOURG is to join Austria in suing the European Commission for giving permission to Hungary to expand its Paks nuclear plant.

Environment Minister Carole Dieschbourg told reporters yesterday that her government would add its weight to the case that Austria is to file at the Court of Justice of the European Union, the bloc’s top judicial institution.

“It is important that no public funds be invested in nuclear power,” she said. “It is definitely the wrong way.”

The expansion of the Paks plant had come before the European Commission for approval under state aid laws, which strictly limit government investment in the economy.

After Hungary agreed to several measures to ensure supposed “fair competition,” EU officials said the project, being carried out with Russia’s Rosatom, could go ahead.

The European Commission said it would defend its decision in court.

Based on previous rulings, the court is likely to find in favour of the commission.