Used clothes choke both markets and environment in Ghana

Each week, Ghana receives 15 million items of used clothing sent from the West. But 40% of the products get discarded due to poor quality. They end up at landfills and in bodies of water, polluting entire ecosystems.


In Accra, in a sea of trash, many look for discarded treasures from abroad

The Kantamanto market in Ghana's capital Accra is West Africa's hub for used clothing from the West. Here, traders hastily sort through piles of clothes daily in order to grab the best bargain. But often, there are more rags than riches.

"We didn't get any good clothing at all," a trader told DW after one of these hurried routines.

Recently, the deliveries from the West have increasingly been focused on so-called fast fashion items. These clothes usually wear out after only a few weeks. To some traders, it is actually an imposition to sift through them.

"The goods that are coming now are really affecting our business," another trader said, stressing that such cheap items cannot be resold in the local market.

Scavenging for quality clothes donated from the West is part of the local economy in Accra

Environmental catastrophe in the making

While most of these secondhand clothes are typically donated with good intentions from industrialized countries, many have now become an environmental hazard in Ghana and beyond.

The OR Foundation, an NGO from the United States, estimates that about 15 million individual items of used clothing now arrive in Ghana weekly, while 40% end up discarded due to poor quality. With no use for them, the rejected items first end up at landfills and then travel further into the ocean.

Environmental activists say this is a major catastrophe in the making; groups like the Ghana Water and Sanitation Journalists Network (GWJN) are trying to raise awareness about this underreported issue.

Watch video 04:43 Using excess clothing stock more productively in South Africa

"Because it is secondhand clothing, some of them wear out very quickly, and then they get thrown all over the place. You get to [the] refuse dump, and you find a lot of them dumped over there," Justice Adoboe, the national coordinator of the organization, told DW.

"You go even near water bodies, you realize that as rainfalls and erosion happen, [they carry] a lot of these secondhand clothing wastes towards our water bodies," Adoboe added, highlighting that because some of the items include toxic dyes, "those who drink from these bodies [of water] downstream might not be drinking just water but chemicals."

Furthermore, the discarded clothing items that are flushed into the sea later get washed back up on the country's beaches. For UN Goodwill Ambassador Roberta Annan, this is a disaster in the making for marine life:

"You can't take it out. You have to dig. It's buried. It's stuck. Some of these clothes are polyester and, I would say, synthetic fabrics that also go into the waterway and choke the fish and marine life in there," Annan told DW, as she tried to pull some of the clothing out at a beach in Accra.

Nearly half of all used clothes are thrown away — 

but the other half provides a lifeline to many Ghanians

Finding alterative uses for waste clothing

Meanwhile. some fashion designers are looking into finding solutions to this growing problem. Elisha Ofori Bamfo focuses on upcycling discarded secondhand clothes. But even he is not happy with the quality of some of the clothes he found recently.

Bamfo told DW that it is even difficult to upcycle and recycle some of the secondhand clothes that are imported into the country these days: "Sometimes when you go to the market, there are some clothes that can't be upcycled or can't be sold," Bamfo said, adding that local authorities have to take the lead and ensure that only quality secondhand clothing items are imported.

Other African nations have indeed taken a more proactive and bold approach when it comes to the waste generated by secondhand clothing, issuing bans.

Rwanda, for example, banned secondhand clothes imports in 2018 in order to boost its own textile industry. And other nations have followed suit.
To ban or not to ban

When the coronavirus pandemic emerged in 2020, Kenya outlawed the importation of secondhand clothing to prevent the potential spread of the virus. That ban has since been lifted because of its economic impact on people's livelihoods.

Watch video 01:14 Upcycling becomes fashionable in Kenya

Bamfo agreed that in Ghana, an absolute ban on these products would likely also impose extra economic hardship on many people dependent on them: "Thousands of people depend on secondhand clothing to survive to feed their families," he said.

Adoboe meanwhile believes that Ghana might indeed benefit from a total ban, but says that there is no political will to see such an initiative through. He believes that until political leaders start to take the impact of used clothing on the environment seriously, Ghana will continue to remain helpless in this battle against pollution.

Roberta Annan, however, is resolute in wanting a quick solution to protect not just the environment but the local fashion industry as well: "The fashion industry actually loses $500 billion (€443 billion) a year due to fashion waste," Annan said.

Ghana's government has remained silent so far on the issue, and there is no sign that it might take any action to deal with the problem of secondhand clothes and the impact they have on the local textile industry as well as environment.

Whenever authorities might want to decide to join the fight against this growing issue, it might perhaps be too late.

Watch video 28:31 The fast fashion lie - the empty promise of recycling?

Edited by: Sertan Sanderson

Egypt releases jailed Palestinian activist Ramy Shaath

The Egyptian-Palestinian activist was forced to renounce his Egyptian citizenship and has left for France, his family said. He had been in pre-trial detention for over two years


Ramy Shaath had been detained since July 2019

Egyptian authorities have released Ramy Shaath, an activist and son of a prominent Palestinian politician, his family said on Saturday.

Shaath was freed from jail on Thursday evening.

According to Shaath's family, he was handed to a Palestinian Authority representative at the Cairo International Airport, where he took a flight to Jordan.

He was set to arrive on Saturday in France, where his wife lives.

Celine Lebrun-Shaath, wife of Ramy Shaath, has lobbied the French government to pressure Egypt for his release

There was no immediate comment from Egyptian authorities on Shaath's release.
Released under a 'precondition'

Shaath, a dual Egyptian-Palestinian national, served over 900 days in pre-trial detention. His family said he was forced to renounce his Egyptian citizenship.

"If we are glad that the Egyptian authorities heard our call for freedom, we regret that they forced Ramy to renounce his Egyptian citizenship as a precondition for his release that should have been unconditional," the family statement said.

"No one should have to choose between their freedom and their citizenship. Ramy was born Egyptian, raised as an Egyptian, and Egypt has always been and will always be his homeland," it added.

Why was Ramy Shaath jailed?

In July 2019, the activist was arrested at his home in Cairo. He had been accused of being affiliated to the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood group, which Egypt designated as a terrorist organization in 2013.

His detention, alongside other activists, came amid a crackdown on political dissent, including liberal and Islamist critics of President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi.

ICONS OF EGYPT'S 2011 REVOLUTION: WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Wael Ghonim: From inspiration to despair

Wael Ghonim was in Dubai when he created a Facebook page called "We are all Khaled Said." Ghonim knew Said, a 28-year-old blogger who was beaten to death by police. The page played an organizing role in the January protests. Since 2014, Ghonim has lived in the US. Now 40, his online commentary suggests he's depressed and disillusioned about the situation in Egypt.

123456789

Last year, he was added to Egypt's terrorist list.

Ramy Shaath is a co-founder of the Egyptian branch of "Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions" (BDS), a Palestinian-led movement promoting a boycott of Israel.

He is the son of former Palestinian government minister Nabil Shaath, a close aide to the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
Shaath's wife lobbied in France for his release

Shaath's wife Celine Lebrun Shaath, a French national who had been deported from Egypt, lobbied the French government to pressure Cairo for his release.

Several NGOs issued a statement last month questioning France's President Emmanuel Macron on the fate of Shaath.

Macron had said last year that he brought up Shaath's case with el-Sissi. Still, the French leader insists that Egypt's human rights record would not be a condition for economic and military ties between Paris and Cairo.

In May, France said it would deliver 30 Rafale warplanes to Egypt from 2024 in a €4-billion ($4.8-billion) deal, strengthening its military partnership with Cairo.

Will Reunion Island become the world's sixth digital hub?

A consortium plans to transform the French overseas territory Reunion Island into one of the world's digital hubs. That could help bring down local unemployment.



France's Reunion is not just green landscapes. It's aiming to become a digital hub

France's Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean is famous for its divine beaches and lush green landscapes. Roughly 42% of the overseas territory's surface are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.

But the island could soon become known for something else: An international consortium plans to turn it into one of the world's digital hubs.

The plans could help bring down local unemployment — at least to a certain extent.

The first stage was completed in spring 2021: a super-fast internet cable linking the island to Madagascar, Mauritius and South Africa. The cable is, with a capacity of 24 terabytes, 24 times as fast as Reunion Island's existing connections to the outside world.

"The internet speed on Reunion Island is the country's second-fastest and almost as quick as in the capital Paris — it made perfect sense to create a good export internet cable," Nassir Goulamaly, CEO at Reunion-based group Oceinde, told DW. Oceinde's subsidiary Zeop invested €50 million ($57 million) in the new cable called Metiss, together with its business partners Canal+ and SFR from France, Mauritius-based CEB Fibernet and Emtel as well as Madgascar's Telma.

The consortium intends to spend another €120 million on a second cable linking Reunion Island to India.

What's more, several huge data centers are to be built on the island. "We are hoping to convince companies to invest up to €1 billion and are already in talks with several interested investors," Goulamaly explained.
Europe in the middle of the Indian Ocean

The entrepreneur says choosing Reunion Island as their data hub should be a no-brainer for internet companies — even the so-called GAFAs (Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon).

"There are five big data hubs in the world: two in the US, two in Asia and one in the southern French city of Marseille," he noted.

"But there is a gap in the Indian Ocean — and Reunion Island could perfectly fill that gap," Goulamaly added.

After all, the island is part of Europe.

"And that means companies can rely on European standards when it comes to data protection, plus they'll have access to very well-trained staff and excellent health care," he argued.

The island's strengths have already won over Beatrice Goujon, CEO and founder of Reunion-based Logipren, a digital platform calculating exact doses of medication for newborns. The pediatrician launched the company in 2016 after having seen in her former job that every sixth prescription for small children is a toxic overdose.

Beatrice Goujon is excited about Reunion's internet speed and engineering staff

"My co-founder and I deliberately based our company on Reunion Island, as the internet speed here is so fast, there is well-trained management and engineering staff available and we are getting discounts on employer's charges," she told DW.

The company is now profitable with a turnover of €2.7 million in 2021. The platform will soon go live in Morocco, Spain, and Belgium and discussions with hospitals in the UK are ongoing.

But with 15 additional jobs in 2021 — out of a total of 40 staff — the company is now starting to struggle to find new programmers.

Goujon therefore says that turning Reunion Island into one of the world's digital hubs would be good news.

"That would certainly incite more IT specialists to come to Reunion Island and make it easier for us to recruit new staff," she said.
Investors are 'already getting interested'

Reunion Island is meanwhile already on digital companies' radar, thinks Stephane Colombel, chairman of industry association Digital Reunion. The group represents a sector that includes 500 companies with roughly 5,000 staff.

"Investors are increasingly contacting us to obtain information on Reunion Island," he told DW while welcoming visitors at NXSE, an annual digital trade fair in the island's capital Saint-Denis. Since the event's first edition six years ago, the number of participants has tripled to 900.

Colombel reckons the construction of huge data centers would increase the island's appeal to investors. "Reunion Island is well connected to the outside world, but it's always good to back up data locally — that increases data security," he explained.

Philippe Jean-Pierre hopes for a lot more jobs in the digital sector

Additional jobs in the digital sector would also be beneficial for the island's economy and its 900,000 inhabitants, says Philippe Jean-Pierre, professor for economics at the University of Saint-Denis.

"Unemployment is at 18%, that's more than twice the national average," he told DW.

"The digital sector could generate thousands of additional direct jobs, which would translate into indirect jobs in other sectors," he added.

But not all the unemployed would be soaked up by the new activities, he qualified. "There are people who have been working in traditional sectors all their lives and they can't just be retrained for a digital job overnight."

Edited by: Hardy Graupner

Anglo-Irish Treaty ratified 100 years ago
Updated / Friday, 7 Jan 2022

Michael Collins arrives at Earlsfort Terrace for the debate on the ratification of the Anglo-Irish Treaty in January 1922 (Pic: Getty Images)

By Shane McElhatton
Series Editor, Decade of Commemorations

One hundred years ago today, the Dáil voted to ratify the Anglo-Irish Treaty. After a passionate, sometimes ill-tempered debate lasting three weeks, the vote in favour was extraordinarily close: 64 votes to 57.

The vote paved the way for the new Irish government to take power from the British, but also set in motion the events that led to the Civil War six months later.

The vote took place exactly a month after the signing of the Treaty in London.

The Treaty had to be ratified by a vote of the British parliament in London and the Irish parliament in Dublin.

Technically, the 'parliament' in Dublin was not the Dáil, but the Southern Parliament that the British had envisaged as the equivalent of the new Northern Ireland Parliament.

But realistically, the only Irish vote on the Treaty that mattered was the vote of the Dáil.

Events moved swiftly. Within a week of the signing in London, TDs were debating the Treaty in their temporary location in the Council Chamber of University College Dublin in Earlsfort Terrace (now the National Concert Hall).

It was here, on Saturday 7 January, 1922, that the Dáil voted to ratify the Anglo-Irish Treaty.

The margin of victory was so tiny that four TDs changing their vote would have meant rejection of the Treaty, with consequences no one could have predicted.

The outcome of the vote triggered an immediate and irrevocable split in the Republican government and the Dáil. Eamon de Valera resigned as President and led the anti-Treaty TDs out of the chamber. They returned later, but the damage was done; the split was permanent.

The very next weekend, Michael Collins as Chairman of the Provisional Government, led a small delegation into Dublin Castle.

In a low-key ceremony behind closed doors, the Lord Lieutenant, the British government’s representative at the top of its administration in Ireland, formally passed authority to Michael Collins, and the Provisional Government was in power.

US: Amnesty urges Biden to keep promise to close Guantanamo Bay

The US president was clear on the campaign trail that he wanted to close the controversial detention facility set up in the wake of 9/11 attacks. But US lawmakers oppose the idea.

Amnesty will hold protests to mark the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Guantanamo Bay detention center

Human rights group Amnesty International has urged US President Joe Biden to keep his promise to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center as the 20th anniversary of its opening approaches next year.

Designed to detain foreign suspects apprehended by the US in its "war on terror," the facility at a US military base in Cuba is notorious because of harsh interrogation methods used there that critics say amounted to torture.

"The longer the prison remains in use, the longer it continues to undermine US credibility globally on human rights," Daphne Eviatar, director of the security with human rights program at Amnesty International USA, said in a statement.

9/11 'mastermind' still at Gitmo

Roughly 780 people have been detained in Guantanamo since its establishment on January 12, 2002, many of whom haven't been charged with a crime.

The camp currently has 39 detainees left, including Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the suspected planner of the Sept.11 terrorist attacks.

Even decades after the attacks, however, the case against Mohammed and four other defendants remains in the pretrial phase due to numerous delays. They are to face 9/11-related charges before a military tribunal, but no trial date has been set.

Khalid Sheikh Mohammed is one of the detainees at Guantanamo Bay

At least 10 other detainees have been cleared for release.

Guantanamo sets a "dangerous precedent" both with regard to the lack of due process of law "and in terms of impunity for the most serious human rights violations, such as torture and enforced disappearances," Matthias Schreiber of Amnesty International in Germany told the AFP news agency.

He said detainees have no access to "fair trials under the rule of law."

Schreiber urged the international community to pressure the US to close the facility.
Why is Guantanamo still open?

Former US President Barack Obama already ordered it to be closed in 2009 but failed to get it done during his presidency.

Biden's predecessor, President Donald Trump, wanted to retain the facility, which is also known as Gitmo.

But Biden promised during his election campaign that he would close it before his tenure is up.

Watch video01:57 USA: New effort to close Guantanamo Bay

Biden is facing strong resistance from Congress. The federal government is still barred by law from transferring any inmates to prisons on the US mainland.

In December, lawmakers specifically wrote provisions into the defense spending bill to bar the use of funds to transfer Guantanamo Bay detainees to the custody of certain foreign countries or into the United States.

"It is the longstanding position of [the White House] that these provisions unduly impair the ability of the executive branch to determine when and where to prosecute Guantanamo Bay detainees and where to send them upon release," Biden said in a statement.

Amnesty International representative Schreiber suggested more inmates could be transferred to countries like Germany, which has already taken in three Guantanamo inmates and might be able to accept more.

lo/dj (AFP, dpa)

Meet the snow hunters tracking melt in Scotland's mountains

Each year a small group of dedicated volunteers survey the mountains of Scotland's Highlands to monitor the UK's last patches of snow. Their data is invaluable for scientists measuring the effects of climate change.

Snow hunter Iain Cameron has been fascinated by Scotland's Highland snow patches since he was a teenager

From a distance, the snow patch looks brilliant white, but up close it's pitted with gray stones and grit from the cliffs above. Despite its scruffy appearance, snow hunter Iain Cameron is delighted to find this fragment in October.

Below the rocky ramparts of Scotland's 1,234-meter (4,050 feet) Aonach Beag, he puts down his rucksack and takes out a large measuring tape. The patch is only around 30 by 20 meters and, he estimates, a couple of meters thick. It's small but will turn out to be the sole remaining patch of snow in Scotland — and the UK — in 2021 to last from the previous winter.

Aonach Beag lies near the Highland west coast close to the UK's highest mountain, Ben Nevis. The longest-lasting snow patches in the Scotland are all in the Ben Nevis area or in the high, rounded Cairngorm Mountains, 70 kilometers (43 miles) to the east

.

The last remaining year-round snow patch in Scotland. The patches are an indicator of changing temperatures in the Highlands

The first recorded disappearance of all snow in the Scottish mountains was in 1933 and, since then, a disturbing pattern has emerged, says Cameron.

"The snow only vanished completely again in 1959, then it went in 1996, 2003, 2006 and 2017, and it very nearly melted in 2019 as well," he says. "It doesn't take a genius to see that the rate of disappearance is accelerating — and climatologists tell us this is down to climate change."

Cameron, a hardy hillwalker and, by profession, a health and safety adviser, is Scotland's unofficial chief snow-patch expert. The 48-year-old first became captivated by the patches as a teenager when he saw one last throughout the whole summer.

He's part of a small, informal group of walkers, skiers and mountaineers, linked up through social media, who hunt these snow patches, monitoring them as often as possible through summer and autumn. They're all amateurs driven by a love of snow and a desire to quantify the changes they see in the mountain climate.

"It's fascinating, and important to maintain the record," says Cameron, who has written a book on the topic. "And it gives a sense of purpose when you head out into the hills."

Disappearing snow

In the 19th and early 20th centuries climbers from the Scottish Mountaineering Club used to record patches of snow. Scientific study of the patches began in the 1940s, and for the past 25 years data produced by Cameron and friends has been submitted to the UK's Royal Meteorological Society, which publishes an annual paper on the results.

The snow patches are an indicator of temperature changes in Scotland's mountain regions, which are part of the 17 to 18 million square miles of the Earth covered in snow each winter. Its white surface reflects sunlight, helping cool the planet; its melting maintains river levels even in dry weather, and icy meltwater keeps them cool.

Scotland's mountains have no glaciers or permanent snowfields, but most years a few patches of snow survive from one winter into the next. Snowmelt in the spring and summer cools rivers such as the Spey, famous for its salmon. The river is already warmer partly because of lower snow coverage. Fish such as salmon and trout reproduce less well in warmer water.

Warmer waters impact the ability of trout and salmon, for which Scotland is famed, to reproduce

A study led by statistician Mike Spencer from Edinburgh University, based on other data gathered over many decades, found a clear decline in snow cover in the Cairngorm Mountains over a period of 35 winters. He says by 2080, the Cairngorms could have winters without any substantial snow cover at all.
'Invaluable' citizen science

Another snow hunter is Helen Rennie, now 68, from Inverness, who started visiting the ever-shrinking patches when setting a remarkable record of skiing in Scotland every month of the year for 10 successive years.

She would have started in 2006, but a cancer diagnosis that year put an end to that plan. She recovered, and, undeterred, started her record-breaking run in 2009, with only the COVID pandemic stopping her.

She still gets up to the patches when she can. "The snow needs to build up over the year for the patches to be substantial and last," she says. "There are so many variables with snow patches: the direction the snow comes from; the weather after the snow has fallen; if you get many freeze-thaw cycles that solidify the snow into ice. If it's permanently cold, it stays soft and fluffy."

Snow hunters like Cameron and Rennie say they have an emotional attachment to the Highland areas

Snow scientist Alex Priestley from Edinburgh University is studying how snow melts and how that affects snowpack in Scotland and the Alps. As Scotland's mountains are usually in cloud, satellite images are of limited use in snow-cover studies, which makes data from snow hunters like Rennie and Cameron invaluable.

"To understand how these remote places are affected by our changing climate is really important because lots of biodiversity depends on it," says Priestley.

Priestley explains that Scotland is home to animal species, such as the dotterel bird, that are living at the limit of their natural range.

"If they were in the Alps, they would just ascend the mountain a few hundred meters if it got warmer, to get back into their comfort zone. But in Scotland if they are already living at 1,200 meters … they run out of mountain."

Glaciologists explore a glacier cavity in Austria. Receding glaciers and earlier snow melts are affecting temperatures in rivers

He says detailed snow-patch data can be used as a proxy for changes in general snow cover to see how that correlates with changes in wildlife behavior.

"These human observations that are a long-time series of observations of very remote places, the fact that we can have them is in itself just fantastic because they're so difficult to get hold of in other ways."
Harsh realities

In late November, a cold storm front sweeps through the Highlands. The patch on Aonach Beag had melted down to 15 meters but is finally buried in snow. This year at least will be recorded as one when snow survived.

It's a relief to the snow hunters, who had feared another year of total loss. But Cameron knows those years will become more frequent.

"As someone who visits these places and has done for decades now, when you go back to a place time after time you get to know it intimately ... You have this irrational, alomost, attachment to it," says Cameron.

"The people who do this will all express the same sort of feeling and it's a sadness ... an emotional experience as much as it is a scientific experience."

Edited by: Jennifer Collins


CLIMATE CHANGE IS THREATENING THE WORLD'S MOUNTAIN REGIONS
Highly susceptible to climate change
The world's mountains are rugged, but delicate. They have a huge impact on even distant lowlands but are highly sensitive to climate change. Temperatures are rising significantly faster in mountain areas, well outpacing other habitats. As a result, snow and glaciers are disappearing with consequences for water systems, biodiversity, natural disasters, agriculture and tourism.
123456789

New analysis highlights warming atop Mount Washington
January 6, 2022

NORTH CONWAY, N.H. (AP) — A new analysis of meteorological data collected atop the Northeast’s highest peak is shedding light on how climate change is playing out in the mountains.

Georgia Murray, a staff scientist at the Appalachian Mountain Club, says a shortage of data remains a challenge to understanding climate change on mountains, but fortunately the Mount Washington Observatory has maintained an extensive and continuous record.

She recently published a study based on an analysis that incorporated new data collected over the last 15 years from both the observatory’s summit weather station and nearby Pinkham Notch with an existing data set going back to 1935.

Past research showed that Mount Washington’s summit had not tipped toward a significant warming trend in contrast to the rates of change at lower elevations. But the recent data show that statistically significant warming is in fact taking place at both Mount Washington’s summit and Pinkham Notch.

___

In this story originally published Jan. 2, 2022, The Associated Press reported that Murray recently published a study analyzing meteorological data from the last 15 years from the Mount Washington summit and nearby Pinkham Notch. The story should have made clear that she incorporated new data collected over the last 15 years with an existing data set going back to 1935.

BECAUSE OF COURSE THEY DO
Kazakhstan arrests ex-intelligence agency chief for treason

Security forces appeared to have quelled massive riots in Kazakhstan although the political situation remains volatile. Karim Massimo, a close ally of former president Nursultan Nazarbayev, is now suspected of treason.



Calm has reportedly been restored across Kazakhstan amid heavy security presence, including Russian troops

The former head of Kazakhstan's domestic intelligence agency has been arrested on suspicion of high treason, the National Security Committee said on Saturday.

The news comes after dozens of people were killed in protests triggered by a surge in fuel prices. On Friday, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev declared the constitutional order was "mainly restored", with peacekeepers from Russia and several other ex-Soviet countries now in Kazakhstan.

Watch video02:58
Ex-security chief's arrest suggests power struggle in Kazakh government: Reid Standish

Ex-intelligence chief Karim Massimov was fired earlier in the week as protests raged across the Central Asian country.Authorities now said Massimov and several other officials have been detained. The protests also prompted President Tokayev to remove his predecessor Nursultan Nazarbayev as head of the Security Council.
Kazakh ex-leader urges support for government

Massimov is a close ally of 81-year-old Nazarbayev.

He has twice been prime minister and has also served as head of the presidential administration under the hardline leader.

Nazarbayev has not made a public appearance since the start of protests and also did not directly react to the news of Massimov's arrest.

On Saturday, however, Nazarbayev's spokesman Aidos Ukibay said the former president "calls on everyone to rally around the president of Kazakhstan to overcome current challenges and ensure the integrity of the country."

Much of the demonstrators' anger appeared directed at Nazarbayev, who had ruled Kazakhstan for 29 years. Protesters tore down a bronze statue of him during the unrest.

Watch video 00:51 Tokayev: 'We are dealing with bandits and terrorists'

Putin and Tokayev discuss next steps

Tokayev held a "lengthy" phone conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday.

"The presidents exchanged views on the measures taken to restore order in Kazakhstan," the Kremlin said.

The two leaders agreed to hold a video conference of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), a military alliance of five former Soviet republics, including Russia, soon.

Russia deployed 2,500 troops under a CSTO mandate, in a move that was widely condemned by Western nations.

lo/dj (AFP, Reuters)

Rep. Rashida Tlaib to run for re-election in Michigan's new 12th district

Rep. Rashida Tlaib announced Wednesday that she will run for re-election in Michigan's newly created 12th Congressional District. File Photo by Pat Benic/UPI | License Photo

Jan. 6 (UPI) -- Rep. Rashida Tlaib has announced that she will run for re-election in Michigan's newly created 12th Congressional District.

"The new 12th Congressional District contains nearly two-thirds of the people I currently serve," she said in her announcement on Twitter. "I'm excited to continue to fight for our residents and engage with new neighbors in Wayne and Oakland Counties."

Michigan lost a House seat following the last census, dropping its number of congressional districts from 14 to 13.

The two-term Democrat currently represents Michigan's 13th Congressional District, and said her constituents were divided between the newly created districts 12 and 13 following the reshuffling.

"Please know that no matter if you're in the new 12th or 13th, our work together will continue," she said. "I am excited about the opportunity to expand our work to include more communities that want the same access to a better quality of life, including clean air and water, affordable housing, economic justice and more."

Tlaib announced her re-positioning a day after Rep. Brenda Lawrence, who currently represents the 14th district, said she would not run for re-election.

Lawrence, Michigan's only Black member of Congress, did not specify a reason but said that as they have a new redistricting map, it was time for a new generation of leaders to step up.

"We need to make sure our elected officials in Michigan and across the country look like our communities," she said. "It is not lost on me that I'm currently the only Black member of the Michigan congressional delegation, in both the House and Senate."

In an interview with The Detroit News, Tlaib said many of Lawrence's constituents were redrawn into the new 13th Congressional District and many of hers were repositioned into the 12th.

"It's like they switched us," she said.

The announcement came as more than two dozen mostly Black lawmakers in Michigan are suing to block the newly created district maps from taking effect, WWMT reported.

The lawsuit states that the maps disenfranchise Black voters by splitting up minority communities.

"The African American has gotten such a short end of the stick, I don't think they got any of the stick," attorney Nabih Ayad said of the maps, according to WWMT.

USA

QVC to close fire-damaged facility, lay off 2,000 workers

Qurate Retail Group, the parent company of QVC, said it will close its distribution center that was damaged by fire last month. 

Photo courtesy of Rocky Mount Fire Department/Facebook

Jan. 7 (UPI) -- The home shopping channel QVC has told state officials it will close its North Carolina distribution center that was damaged in a fire last month as well as lay off the nearly 2,000 employees who work there.

In a Notice of Closure dated Dec. 29, Qurate Retail Group, the parent company of QVC, notified the North Carolina Department of Commerce that it will be "closing and ceasing" all operations at its Rocky Mount facility, and as a result it "plans to terminate the employment" of all 1,953 employees at the location.

WRAL was the first to report on the closure.

"Employees are expected to be separated from employment beginning on Feb. 1, 2022, with all separations accomplished by mid-2022," the letter said. "The separation dates of a small number of employees may occur after Feb. 1, 2022, in order to facilitate an orderly wind-down of operations."

All staff will be notified of the layoffs "as soon as reasonably practicable," it said.

The company said the 1.2 million-square-foot facility was being closed as a result of the fire, which erupted at the center in the early morning of Dec. 18, resulting in the death of 21-year-old Kevon Ricks.

On Dec. 28, Qurate said in an update that "while we haven't made any long-term decisions about the site, we already know the building will be closed for an extended period of time and there will not be work there for the team for the foreseeable future" with so-called shutdown pay to be given to employees until Feb. 1.

"We will provide career transition services to impacted team members," it said.

Texas lawmakers decry mistreatment of National Guardsmen on border duty
By James Barragán, The Texas Tribune


Members of the Texas National Guard, seen here on December 8, work 12- to 13-hour shifts guarding the Texas border wall, construction crews and materials near Del Rio. Thousands of National Guard troops were deployed to Del Rio after an increase in migration at the southern border. Photo by Kaylee Greenlee Beal for The Texas Tribune


Jan. 7 (UPI) -- Reports that Texas National Guard soldiers deployed to Gov. Greg Abbott's highly touted border security mission are experiencing pay delays and poor working conditions -- and that some have recently died by suicide -- are drawing concern from state lawmakers.

Over the past three months, the Army Times has chronicled habitual pay problems for soldiers on the mission and reported on suicides by soldiers tied to the mission. On Tuesday, Allen West, a GOP candidate for governor, criticized Abbott's handling of the mission and called on the Texas Military Department's top leader to resign.

West, a former lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Army, said soldiers had also reached out to him about unsanitary conditions in camps and a lack of proper equipment.

In a written statement attributed to the Texas Military Department's public affairs staff, the department said only two of the four soldiers who died by suicide reported by the Army Times in December "were on orders in support of Operation Lone Star." The department did not specify which soldiers were not on orders.

One solider whose death was reported by the Army Times was denied a hardship release, according to the publication. Another was on temporary hardship waiver when he died, the Army Times reported.

"It would be a grave assumption to tie these unfortunate incidents to OLS mission as there are many variables which lead to suicide," the department's statement read.

"One suicide within our ranks is one too many, and we all grieve for those who are left behind. In such complex situations, a person's decision to take this desperate measure is again, the result of numerous factors," the statement said. "The Texas Military Department takes pride in the robust set of services available to help service members cope with personal challenges free-of-charge. The services include a resiliency and substance abuse prevention program, 24/7 behavioral health provider, a chaplain and medical health professional, which are located in every OLS task force"

RELATED Texas breaks ground on wall along border with Mexico

Earlier this week, Brandon Jones, a spokesman for the department, addressed other concerns about missing pay and proper equipment surfaced by media reports. He said all service members should be receiving paychecks and detailed pay stubs as of Tuesday.

He also said the department was made aware of unsanitary conditions at some locations that did not have portable restrooms, but that the "scope of the challenge is not large." He said the first wave of personnel may have faced "austere conditions with limited resources" but the infrastructure is put into place over time and the department is working to address the issue.

Operation Lone Star began in March, when Abbott said he would deploy more resources from the Texas Department of Public Safety and the Texas National Guard to the Texas-Mexico border. The rapidly assembled border security operation seeks to stem a surge of crossings at the state's southern border, with many migrants fleeing countries torn by some combination of violence, political turmoil and economic crisis.

Since announcing the initiative, Abbott, who is running for re-election this year, has repeatedly blamed President Joe Biden's less stringent immigration stance for a sharp increase in migrants seeking entry into the United States.

Last year, the Legislature appropriated nearly $3 billion for border security. In a special session last summer, lawmakers devoted $311 million to the Texas Military Department to send an additional 1,800 Texas National Guard soldiers to the border, bringing the total to 2,500. By November, Abbott's office boasted that 10,000 troops had been deployed to Operation Lone Star.

But state Sen. César Blanco, an El Paso Democrat who served in the Navy, said he is concerned that soldiers were not being given hardship releases and were being activated involuntarily after having served on other missions related to COVID-19, beginning in 2020.

"Most of these folks are prior service or have agreed to serve part-time. But these deployments both with Operation Lone Star and COVID -- these guys and gals are out there for three [consecutive] years," he said. "That's not what they signed up for. If they wanted to do that, they would have gone active duty."

Blanco also said he was concerned by the large pay discrepancy between being on state active duty for a state-ordered mission and a federal mission. He also said he was concerned with how long deployments impacted soldiers' retirement benefits and health insurance status.

"These are the questions we're asking, and I think some of these things the Legislature needs to address in the next legislative session," he said. "In the meantime, these are things that can be addressed by leadership in the House, Senate and the governor, as well as members of committee that have oversight over the Texas Military Department."

The respective leaders of the House and Senate, Speaker Dade Phelan and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, did not respond to requests for comment.

Renae Eze, an Abbott representative, said this week the governor's office continues "working with service leaders to ensure all who are deployed in Texas and overseas have the support they need to keep forging ahead and serve our great state and our nation."

Abbott has fielded attacks about his handling of the border from fellow Republicans challenging him in the March 1 GOP primary. That includes West, who retired from the military after he was investigated in 2003 for using improper methods to force information out of an Iraqi detainee. And Abbott's announcement last year that Texas would build its own border wall came after primary opponent Don Huffines launched his campaign proposing that.

The Texas Military Department cautioned that some of the soldier deaths reported by the Army Times are still open investigations, but a representative told the news outlet: "The loss of any service member is a tragedy and mitigating loss through enforcing safety protocols and ensuring resources that promote the total health of the force is something the Texas Military Department takes seriously."

State Sen. Kelly Hancock, R-North Richland Hills, said soldiers in the Texas National Guard are on the border because of the federal government's failure to curb an increase in immigration and they deserve the support of the state.

"Any allegations of inadequate resources or working conditions must be taken very seriously, and as chairman of the Senate Veteran Affairs & Border Security Committee, we are in direct contact with the Texas Military Department to ensure concerns raised are quickly and fully addressed so our heroes on the border know without a doubt that Texas has their backs," Hancock said in a statement.

State Rep. Richard Peña Raymond, D-Laredo, said he was concerned by reports in late December about suicides by soldiers tied to the mission and reached out to Maj. Gen. Tracy Norris, the Texas National Guard's top military leader. Raymond leads the House Defense and Veterans' Affairs Committee, which oversees the military department.

"I want to make sure that our guard are taken care of in terms of their health, in terms of their economic situation," Raymond said.

Norris told him that the Texas Military Department provides resources for mental health, Raymond said. He said he was also told that the department was fixing issues related to pay for soldiers.

Raymond said he was monitoring the situation and would call a legislative hearing if more needed to be done. But he said he trusted Norris' leadership.

"Gen. Norris is a good leader and if there are any issues, she'll get them fixed," he said.

Jones, the military department spokesman, also said that lodging for soldiers on the mission is "in the process of being transformed to long-term deployment living conditions" that soldiers have experienced during overseas deployments.

"Austere conditions are a result of increasing the number of personnel from 1,200 in June 2021 to approximately 10k in five months," he said in an email.

The department disputed claims that its soldiers were missing proper equipment on the mission.

"Every Texas National Guard Service Member manning a security point on the Texas-Mexico border is equipped with the proper protective equipment and the appropriate amount of ammunition," Jones said.

Blanco, the El Paso Democrat, said he had also reached out to the Texas Military Department for more information after reports in the Army Times about soldiers' suicides.

"It's tragic that we've lost four soldiers," Blanco said. "We need to make sure that the Texas Military Department is deploying mental health services to these regions to ensure that these guardsmen are doing OK."

This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune. Read the original here.

The Texas Tribune is a member-supported, nonpartisan newsroom informing and engaging Texans on state politics and policy. Learn more at texastribune.org.