Decline in Number of Young Men in Syria

Wednesday January 19th, 2022 by SY24 (Opposition website)

Migration, violent conflict, and military conscription have reduced the ratio of men to women in Syria drastically, according to SY24.

Young Men Syria

Several pictures circulating on social media at the graduation ceremony of the Faculty of Pharmacy’s students at the University of Tishreen in Lattakia, sparked widespread controversy, due to the decline in the proportion of male students compared to female ones. The pictures revealed a clear decrease in the number of male students.

Dozens of regime loyalists confirmed that the cities of the Syrian coast became without men after Bashar al-Assad engaged the majority of their youth in the war against Syrians in all governorates. This comes in addition to joining the military service and using them to fight or join the ranks of his militias. Another portion of men fled outside Syria, choosing to pursue the path of death -either by land or by the sea- through illegal smuggling routes.

Read Also: Raqqa: Youth Unemployment Increases Significantly

Several statistics, including the first official figure issued by the Syrian government in 2018, eight years after the war, confirmed a high increase in the number of females over males. These figures are according to the announcement of the head of the Supreme Judicial Committee for Local Administration Elections in regime-controlled areas.

In a 2021 report, UNHCR said the situation in Syria had caused the world’s largest refugee crisis, noting that Syria was one of five countries whose residents have been forced to flee outside the borders of their country.  

In related news, a previous report by the New York Times showed the depletion of men in the war over the past years. The newspaper reported that there are entire cities on the Syrian coast free of men, their names were written and their pictures were hung on large murals. People call the city of Tartous the city of widows, a reference to emptying the area of its men.

Syria’s population in the latest UN survey in 2017 was about 18,270 million, with a negative population growth rate of 2.30%, while births were estimated at 18.9 births per 1,000 inhabitants, compared to a death rate of 5.4 people.

 

This article was translated and edited by The Syrian Observer. The Syrian Observer has not verified the content of this story. Responsibility for the information and views set out in this article lies entirely with the author.

Israeli general turned lawmaker emerges as settler critic

Golan, a former deputy military chief, is now a legislator with the dovish (LEFT WING) Meretz party, where he has repeatedly spoken out against settler violence against Palestinians.

Short Url
https://arab.news/9jn6d
AP
January 21, 2022

JERUSALEM: Retired general Yair Golan spent a significant part of his military career serving in the occupied West Bank, protecting Jewish settlements. Today, he is one of their most vocal critics.

Golan, a former deputy military chief, is now a legislator with the dovish Meretz party, where he has repeatedly spoken out against settler violence against Palestinians.

His comments, highlighted by his recent description of violent settlers as “subhuman,” have rattled Israel’s delicate governing coalition, and his opponents have labeled him a radical. He joins a cadre of former security personnel who, after not speaking up while in uniform and positions of influence, have in retirement sounded the alarm over Israel’s five-decade-long military rule of the Palestinians.

“You can’t have a free and democratic state so long as we are controlling people who don’t want to be controlled by us,” Golan told The Associated Press in an interview at his office in the Knesset this week. “What kind of democracy are we building here long term?”

Golan has emerged as a rare critical voice in a society where the occupation is largely an accepted fact and where settlers have successfully pushed their narrative through their proximity to the levers of power. Most members of Israel’s parliament belong to the pro-settlement right wing.

Golan, 59, had a long military career, being wounded in action in Lebanon and filling key positions as head of the country’s northern command and as commander of the West Bank, among others.

Along the way, he gained a reputation as a maverick for decisions that sometimes landed him in hot water. At one point, he reached an unauthorized deal to remove some settlers from the West Bank city of Hebron. He was reprimanded and a promotion was delayed after he permitted the use of Palestinian non-combatants as human shields during arrest raids, a tactic the country’s Supreme Court banned.

At the same time, he was credited with permitting thousands of Syrians wounded in their country’s civil war to enter Israel for medical treatment.

As the deputy military chief, he was passed over for the top job after comparing what he saw as fascistic trends in modern-day Israel to Nazi Germany. He believes the speech cost him the position.

A few years after retirement, he was elected to parliament and eventually joined Meretz, a party that supports Palestinian statehood and is part of the current coalition headed by Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.

Meretz has been one of the few parties to make ending Israel’s occupation a top priority. But since joining the coalition, which has agreed to focus on less divisive issues to maintain its stability, most of its members have appeared to tone down their criticism.
Golan has not. Earlier this month, he caused a firestorm when he lashed out against settlers who vandalized graves in the Palestinian West Bank village of Burqa.

“These are not people, these are subhumans,” Golan told the Knesset Channel. “They must not be given any backing.”

His remarks angered Bennett, a former settler leader, and sparked criticism from others within the coalition.

Golan acknowledged his choice of words was flawed but said he stands by the spirit of his remarks.

“Is the problem the expression that I used or is the problem those same people who go up to Burqa, smash graves, damage property and assault innocent Palestinians?” he said.

Such statements have turned him into a poster boy for what far-right nationalists describe as dangerous forces in the coalition challenging Israel’s role in the West Bank. The Palestinians seek the area, captured by Israel in 1967, as the heartland of a future state.

Some on Israel’s dovish left also have been hesitant to embrace Golan, who continues to defend the army’s actions in the West Bank.

Golan always saw his duty in the territory as primarily combatting Palestinian militants, and he continues to believe that most settlers are law-abiding citizens. The international community overwhelmingly considers all settlements illegal or illegitimate, and the Palestinians and many left-wing Israelis see the military as an enforcer of an unjust occupation.

Breaking the Silence, a whistleblower group for former Israeli soldiers who oppose policies in the West Bank, called for action, not just words, against settler violence.

“Yair Golan knows full well what settler violence looks like and what our violent control over the Palestinian people looks like. That’s why his criticism is valuable, but it’s not enough,” the group said in a statement.

Golan said he always saw Israeli control over Palestinian territories as temporary. He said separating from the Palestinians is the only way to keep Israel a democratic state with a Jewish majority.

In 2006, Golan commanded the violent evacuation of the Amona settlement in the West Bank, which was built on privately owned Palestinian land.

“I can’t come to terms with the idea that someone Jewish who holds Jewish values supports the theft of someone else’s lands,” he said.

In recent months, as violence between settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank has ticked up, videos have emerged of soldiers standing by as settlers rampage. Golan said he never would have allowed such a thing under his command.

“These people don’t accept the essence of Israel and abide by the law only when it’s convenient for them,” he said.

His comments about settlers aren’t the first to rankle the establishment. In a 2016 speech marking Israel’s Holocaust memorial day, Golan, then deputy military chief, said he was witnessing “nauseating processes” in Israeli society that reminded him of the fascism of Nazi-era Germany.

He said the remarks were sparked by the fatal shooting of a subdued Palestinian attacker by a soldier. The soldier was embraced by nationalist politicians, including then-Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Golan said the shooting was nothing short of an execution.

Next to his desk, Golan keeps a photo of Netanyahu arriving for his corruption trial at a Jerusalem courthouse, surrounded by his Likud Party supporters as he rants against police and prosecutors.

Golan said the image is a reminder of what he is fighting against — and for.
“I served the country in uniform for so many years, I really gave it my life,” Golan said. Pointing to the photo, he said: “I didn’t endanger my life countless times for these people.”

Conflict, corruption turning Lebanon, Syria into narco-states: Report

Both countries exporting massive quantities of drug Captagon to prop up ailing economies

Expert: ‘All countries which are under Iranian occupation are technically narco-states’

https://arab.news/psuu8
Updated 18 January 2022
ARAB NEWS


LONDON: The large-scale export of Captagon from Syria and Lebanon is the legacy of a decade of conflict combined with widespread corruption, and reliance on the drug revenues is turning both countries into narco-states, according to a new report by Britain’s Channel 4 News.

In Lebanon, militias and gangs operating in Hezbollah-controlled areas such as the Bekaa Valley are producing up to 600,000 Captagon pills per week — worth around $3 million if sold in the Gulf.

Captagon, a brand name for the amphetamine-type stimulant fenethylline, is a cheap, readily produced drug previously used by Daesh fighters to battle without fear.

An anonymous producer of the drug told Channel 4 News: “Poverty and need forced me to trade in Captagon.”

Lebanon has been grappling with an economic collapse that has driven many of its people out of the country or into illicit activities.

The corruption of the Lebanese state, of which Iran-backed Hezbollah is a major constituent, eases the process for manufacturing and exporting drugs.

“Crime exists alongside corruption in this country. If there was no corruption, there would be no crime,” said the Captagon producer.

The Assad regime in Syria, which is dealing with its own currency crisis and economic collapse, is also becoming a narco-state, said Makram Rabah, a history lecturer at the American University of Beirut.

“At the moment both Lebanon and Syria, and all countries which are under Iranian occupation, are technically narco-states — and we’re being dealt with accordingly,” Rabah told Channel 4.

“This is, unfortunately, a reality which the Lebanese up until now haven’t yet admitted, and it’s something that will prevent us recovering from the ongoing economic collapse.”

For the Assad regime, the trade of drugs is now a lifeline for an economy ravaged by a decade of civil war and crippling international sanctions.

In 2020, legal exports from the country were worth just a fifth of the value of Captagon seized from Syrian drug traders.

According to a report by the Cyprus-based Center for Operational Analysis and Research, “Captagon exports from Syria reached a market value of at least $3.46 billion” in that year.

Some of those Syrian drug dealers are known to operate out of the port of Latakia, a stronghold of the regime and under the direct control of President Bashar Assad’s brother, who commands some of the country’s most elite and loyal fighting units.

Rabah said the export of Captagon is not only keeping the Syrian economy from total collapse, but is also being used to seek revenge on Gulf countries that opposed the regime’s violent crackdown on protesters and the war that ensued.

“This drug, particularly recently with the start of the Syrian civil war, has become a weapon, a tool that the Syrian regime, as well as the Iranian regime, uses against both Lebanon and the Gulf,” he added. Captagon “has become synonymous with Hezbollah and also the Assad regime,” he said.

The trade of the drug also presents a problem for Lebanon’s border officials, whose responsibility it is to prevent their export, which is pushed by other factions within the state, namely Hezbollah.

Col. Joseph Musalim of the Lebanese Internal Security Forces said: “The manufacture and smuggling of Captagon didn’t exist in Lebanon before the Syrian crisis. It came after the crisis, and showed traders and manufacturers that it’s a profitable trade.”

Gulf countries have responded to the deluge of Captagon coming out of Lebanon and Syria by tightening customs restrictions of goods often used by drug smugglers.

In April last year, Saudi Arabia announced the suspension of fruit and vegetable imports from Lebanon after the seizure of more than 5 million Captagon pills hidden in fruit.

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

4 Mexican Administrations Have Paid Over $3 Million USD to Company Linked to Mayo Zambada's Family Despite it Being on Sanction List Since 2007

By Socalj 1/18/2022 

"Socalj" for Borderland Beat

Estancia Infantil Niño Feliz SC was named by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 2007 as “illegal sources of income that feed drug trafficking, violence, and corruption” when it was included in the list by the Asset Control Office.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador joined his three predecessors in the last two decades paying contracts that amounted to at least 69 million pesos ($3,382,684 USD) to a company linked to the Sinaloa Cartel through the wife and daughters of Ismael Zambada Garcia, El Mayo.

The amounts began in 2001 with Vicente Fox through the Mexican Social Security Institute (IMSS). By then the company had been established in Culiacán for a few months, where it still operates. But the agreements continued with Felipe Calderón, Enrique Peña Nieto, and the 22.4 million pesos that the López Obrador government delivered since he began his six-year term.

With the government of Felipe Calderón, in January 2007, the IMSS, then headed by Juan Molinar Horcasitas, assigned a multi-year contract to said company valid from 2007 to 2009, for subrogation of childcare service. They were paid at least 5.6 million pesos each of those years. And from 2010 to 2012 they paid him at least 10.4 million according to the documents I have in my possession.

In May 2007, after the contract had been signed, the Treasury Department placed the Niño Feliz Children's Estancia as one of the companies directly linked to the Sinaloa Cartel, and notified Rosario Niebla Cardoza, María Teresa Zambada Niebla and other daughters of "El Mayo" Zambada, who were linked to that and other companies. 

Even so, the Calderón government maintained the contracts with Estancia Infantil Niño Feliz and continued to provide benefits and aid to other companies and companies linked to the Sinaloa Cartel. At that time, the Secretary of Federal Public Security, Genaro García Luna, was in complicity with the Sinaloa Cartel. He received bribes in exchange for protecting the operations of the criminal organization and helping them in drug trafficking, as stated in the criminal accusation made against him by the United States Department of Justice for which he is currently incarcerated and under trial.

Enrique Peña Nieto, in 2013, his government gave the company a contract of 5.6 million pesos. In 2014, the IMSS awarded him a two-year contract for 13.5 million pesos, according to the information I also obtained through the Federal Transparency Law. And in December 2016 they gave him a multi-year contract valid from January 2017 to December 2021. According to said directly awarded contract, that is, without competition with other providers, the IMSS pays Estancia Infantil Niño Feliz with resources of the State Delegation of Sinaloa from the budget item "Direct Provision Nurseries."

According to investigations by the journalist Anabel Hernández, AMLO's administration is the one who has allocated the most money to the business that operates as a nursery for children but is identified by the US Treasury Department as one of the front businesses to launder money by the leader of the transnational drug trafficking group.

The contract with Estancia Infantil Niño Feliz was not canceled by the AMLO government and three “modifying agreements” were signed to increase payments. The first was signed in January 2019 under the concept "Single community neighborhood scheme", when the head of the IMSS was the former member of the PAN, Germán Martínez. The other two agreements signed in January 2020 and January 2021 were under the administration of the current head of IMSS, Zoé Robledo.

From December 1, 2018, to December 2019, 9.6 million pesos were paid to said company. From January 2020 to December 2020, 8.64 million pesos were paid. And from January 2021 to June 2021 - the date on which I made the request for information - 4.24 million pesos were delivered. The average annual amount paid in Q4 is higher than the average annual amount paid in other six-year terms.

Estancia Infantil Niño Feliz SC was named by the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) in 2007 as “illegal sources of income that feed drug trafficking, violence, and corruption” when it was included in the list by the Asset Control Office.

At that time, five more companies were named under the Kingpin Law, along with Mayo Zambada's first wife, Rosario Niebla Cardoza, and their four daughters: María Teresa, Midiam Patricia, Mónica del Rosario, and Modesta.

The company was created in Culiacán, Sinaloa, on August 2, 2001, with public deed 10131, before the notary José Antonio Núñez Bedoya, who has helped “El Mayo” Zambada to create most of the companies that according to the United States government are part of its criminal network.

According to the content of the deed that gives legal certainty of the company to the contract and agreements with the IMSS, the partners are María Teresa Zambada Niebla, daughter of the couple formed by the drug trafficker “El Mayo” Zambada and Rosario Niebla Cardoza.

It should be remembered that the US has prosecuted three sons of "El Mayo": Vicente Zambada Niebla, Serafín Zambada Ortiz and Ismael Zambada Imperial; and his brother Jesús Zambada García.

The children of María Teresa are also listed as partners in the deed: Mayte Diaz Zambada, Javier Ernesto Diaz Zambada and Rosa María Zazueta Zambada.

María Teresa Zambada Niebla is the eldest daughter of the leader of the Sinaloa Cartel and is a central figure in practically all the companies linked to the drug boss: Nueva Industria de Ganaderos de Culiacán, Establo Puerto Rico, Autotransportes JYM, and Jamaro Constructores, among others. .

The company was established to carry out 21 different activities (corporate purpose), "predominantly economic in nature", as stated in the document. One of the activities is: "Provision of professional care and teaching services to children who have not reached the age to access preschool education, as well as teaching and teaching children, young people, adults and the elderly in education. preschool, primary, secondary, university education, postgraduate and master's degrees (...) in order to strengthen the intellectual, moral and social training of students..."

Source

HCH

Infobae

‘Come to Work With Covid’ Demand Stirs Union Anger in Australia

Sybilla Gross, Bloomberg News

Jan 18, 2022

A healthcare worker adjusts traffic cones near cars queued at a drive-thru Covid-19 testing site in Sydney, Australia, 

on Wednesday, Dec. 29, 2021. Hospitalizations due to coronavirus in Australias most-populous state have reached

 the highest level since mid-October, as a surge in omicron cases throughout most of the nation pressures the

 health system. , Photographer: Bloomberg/Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Australian workplaces have been put on notice by more than 30 unions to ramp up Covid-19 safety measures as businesses find increasingly risky solutions to cope with mass staff absences.

Unions are demanding better protection from the virus and free rapid antigen tests for employees, sparked by mounting anger surrounding a South Australia abattoir that told workers they should still come to work even if infected with the virus, unless their symptoms rendered them too unwell. 

The case has become a flashpoint for unions, with many industries facing worker shortages as staff are struck down with Covid or forced to isolate as the country endures its worst wave of cases yet. Australia’s government is determined to avoid further lockdowns and keep the economy open despite record hospitalizations and rising death numbers.

“Essential workers are being expected to put themselves in harm’s way to keep the country going and in many cases without the protections they need,” the Australian Council of Trade Unions said in a statement Tuesday after a meeting of leaders of national unions. 

“Where employers do not fulfil their obligations, the union movement determines to do everything within its power to ensure the safety of workers and the community. This may include ceasing work or banning unsafe practices.”

Teys, part-owned by U.S. agricultural giant Cargill, recently backed down from the mandate for positive workers at its abattoir following a widespread backlash. South Australia Health confirmed that more than 140 positive cases were now linked to the site. The firm said it followed rules from the state health department, which confirmed it had permitted some Covid-positive staff in critical fields to keep working.

Covid-positive workers at the plant were being separated and forced to wear yellow hairnets to show their infection status, according to press reports. Grocery giant Woolworths also temporarily suspended orders from the factory. 

A spokesperson for Teys declined to comment.

Supermarkets Shelves Bare in Sydney as Covid Isolates Staff 

ACTU secretary Sally McManus said staff shortages were worst in the hospitality and retail industries, in a radio interview Tuesday. As much as 50% of the workforce in some industries was on sick leave, McManus said.

In an attempt to remedy the crisis, Prime Minister Scott Morrison last week introduced amendments to isolation rules for workers in critical services industries including transport and freight -- who are now no longer required to isolate even if they are deemed a close contact.

©2022 Bloomberg L.P.

 

Increase In Marine Heat Waves Threatens Coastal Habitats

Lead author Dr. Piero Mazzini (R) measures ocean conditions during an oceanographic field project. CREDIT: Oregon State University.

 January 19, 2022  

By Eurasia Review

Heat waves—like the one that blistered the Pacific Northwest last June—also occur underwater. A new study in Frontiers in Marine Science paints a worrisome picture of recent and projected trends in marine heat waves within the nation’s largest estuary, with dire implications for the marine life and coastal economy of the Chesapeake Bay and other similarly impacted shallow-water ecosystems.

The study’s authors, Drs. Piero Mazzini and Cassia Pianca of William & Mary’s Virginia Institute of Marine Science, note they saw “significant upward trends in the frequency and yearly cumulative intensity of marine heat waves within the Chesapeake Bay.” 

The pair based their analysis on long-term measurements of water temperature from 6 sites along the Bay’s 200-mile length, with record length varying between 26 and 35 years. Like other researchers, they defined a marine heat wave as any period of 5 or more consecutive days with water temperatures warmer than 90% of those measured on the same date and in the same spot as in years past. They analyzed the record of Bay heat waves in terms of frequency, intensity, duration, and cumulative temperature stress.

Based on those criteria, Mazzini and Pianca determined that the Chesapeake Bay experienced an average of two 11-day marine heat waves per year between 1986 and 2020, with an average intensity of 5.4 °F (3 °C) and a maximum peak of 14.4 °F (8 °C) above the climatic norm. This translates to an average yearly cumulative intensity of 130 °F (72 °C) days, a measure of heat stress for marine systems similar to the “cooling degree days” used to determine the energy required to keep indoor spaces comfortable for people.

The researcher’s most troubling finding was that the maximum frequency of marine heat waves occurred during the last 10 years, reaching 6-8 events per year compared to only 4-5 events per year prior to 2010. That equals a gain of 1.4 annual heat waves each decade, with a corresponding increase in annual cumulative intensity. The researchers also found that years without marine heat waves were fairly common in Bay waters prior to 2010, but have occurred baywide only once since, in 2014.

“If these trends persist,” says Mazzini, “the Bay will experience heat waves on a monthly basis within the next 50 years, and by the end of the century will reach a semi-permanent heat-wave state, with extreme temperatures present for more than half the year.”

The authors warn this would have devastating impacts on the Bay ecosystem, aggravating the effects of nutrient pollution, increasing the severity of low-oxygen “dead-zones,” stimulating algal blooms, stressing or killing bottom-dwelling communities, causing shifts in species composition, and leading to declines in important commercial fishery species such as striped bass. Similar trends and impacts are likely in other shallow-water coastal systems worldwide given continued global warming.

Although there have been several previous studies of overall warming trends in estuaries (including the Chesapeake Bay), Mazzini and Pianca’s research is the first study of marine heat waves in this type of shallow coastal ecosystem. Their findings not only enhance our basic understanding of these events but can be used to better predict future occurrences and guide management decisions.

Says Pianca, “Future management decisions should focus not only on the effect of long-term temperature changes, but also consider these short, acute events, which could have severe impacts long after they end.”

Causes of Bay heat waves

In addition to studying the characteristics of Bay heat waves and how they might be changing through time, Mazzini and Pianca set out to examine the causes of these extreme events by analyzing three potential and interacting triggers: heating by the atmosphere, input of warm river water, and incursions of balmy seawater.

The researchers approached this puzzle by comparing the timing of marine heat waves both inside and outside the Bay, hypothesizing that heat-wave events with similar start and end dates are likely to share the same cause. For water temperatures outside the Bay, they analyzed data from two ocean observation buoys, one just seaward of the Bay mouth—within a current system known as the Bay plume—and another farther north on the continental shelf. 

Their results show that marine heat waves tend to occur at roughly the same time both along the entire length of the Bay and within nearby coastal waters. They also found a clear correlation between the increased frequency of marine heat waves and the long-term warming of Bay and coastal waters observed in other studies. What they did not find was a pattern of heat waves starting in the Bay and propagating into the ocean, or starting in the ocean and propagating into the Bay.

Mazzini says these findings “demonstrate a strong connection among these different environments” and point to “coherent large-scale forcing” as the main driver of marine heat waves in the Bay region. Drawing on another recent VIMS study, this one of long-term Bay warming, Mazzini says “the most likely candidate to drive the largely coherent marine heat waves in the Bay and plume-ocean region is the transfer of heat from the atmosphere to the water surface.”

A better understanding of the causes of Bay heat waves will improve projections of future conditions and help managers better assess water-quality goals, particularly as they relate to efforts to limit low-oxygen “dead zones,” which can stress mobile animals such as striped bass, and kill attached or slow-moving invertebrates outright. 

“The future increase in marine heat waves as suggested in our study could aggravate hypoxia in the Bay by further stratifying the water column, increasing the oxygen needed by marine life, and decreasing oxygen solubility.” These changes, warns Mazzini, “could push the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem past a dangerous tipping point.”

Concerns regarding the impact of warming on Bay health and restoration goals were emphasized earlier this year when the Chesapeake Bay Executive Council signed a new directive for collective action to address the threats of climate change in all aspects of the partnership’s work.

Mercenaries in Libya | Turkish-backed factions order Syrian fighters to pack up for returning to Syria
On Jan 19, 2022

Reliable sources have told SOHR that three Turkish-backed factions in Libya have ordered their fighters to pack up and get ready to leave Libya to Turkey in the incoming hours. According to SOHR sources, the command of Al-Hamza, Suleiman Shah and Sultan Murad Divisions informed nearly 150 militiamen that they would leave Libya on Thursday, after the Turkish government had agreed on allowing these fighters to have a rest in Syria.

On the other hand, SOHR sources have confirmed that a new batch of mercenaries left Syria to Turkey yesterday. However, the destination of this batch remained unknown. Also, SOHR sources confirmed that back-and-forth transfer operations of Syrian mercenaries from and to Libya will be resumed, after being suspended for weeks.

On December 15, reliable sources informed SOHR that the Turkish authorities gave orders suspending the leaves and back-and-forth transfer operations of Turkish-backed Syrian mercenaries from and to Syria in that time. The mercenaries in Libya were informed by their commanders that the leaves and back-and-forth transfer operations would be resumed after the end of the presidential election in Libya, schedule to be launched on December 24, 2021.

SOHR sources also confirmed that the Syrian fighters of the Turkish-backed “National Army” in Libya received their monthly salaries in the past few days.

It is worth noting that there are nearly 7,000 Turkish-backed Syrian mercenaries in Libya, operating under the banner of various factions of the “National Army”.

On the other hand, the Syrian mercenaries recruited by the Russian security company “Wagner” have been still maintained in the Libyan territory.

We, at the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), call for the evacuation of all Syrians who have been turned into mercenaries by the Turkish government and engaged in the Libyan conflict. We also demand the Turks and Russians stop using the Syrians and turning them into mercenaries serving their narrow interests.

SCURVY

Fruit and veggie outages in Canada get worse with trucker shortages

Jen Skerritt, Elizabeth Elkin, David Marino and Lydia Mulvany, Bloomberg News

Canadian border agents began refusing entry to unvaccinated American truckers just days ago, and it’s already causing chaos -- particularly in fruit and vegetable markets.A mandate starting Jan. 15 requires truck drivers crossing into Canada to be vaccinated. However, only about half of American truck drivers have gotten their shots. Meanwhile, as much as 90 per cent of Canada’s fruits and vegetables comes from the U.S. during winter, and grocery stores are already having trouble getting some shipments, according to the Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers.

“We’re seeing shortages,” said Gary Sands, senior vice president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers. “We’re hearing from members they’re going into some stores where there’s no oranges or bananas.'”

The mandate is adding to Canada’s supply chain turmoil that was already abundant due to recent storms as well as the pandemic. Shipping snarls and logistical headwinds have been blamed for rising inflation across the globe. Prices for consumers will likely rise as freight costs soar. Sending one truckload of fresh produce from California or Arizona to Canada is now US$9,500, up from an average of US$7,000, according to North American Produce Buyers. That works out to an additional cost of 12 Canadian cents per head of lettuce, according to the company.

The price to bring food and other exports over the border has doubled on some routes given the drop in eligible truckers, according to Alex Crane, operations manager at Paige Logistics, a freight broker in Surrey, British Columbia. That’s leaving hundreds of shipments bound for the U.S. waiting in warehouses to be picked up and trucked when and if carriers can find drivers to haul them, he said. The goods include everything from food to plumbing parts to gazebos.

“We have shipments all over the place not going out,’’ Crane said by phone. “They are just sitting at warehouses, waiting waiting.’

The situation is only set to worsen with the U.S. imposing its own vaccine mandate on foreign travelers starting Jan. 22. The Canadian Trucking Association estimates the mandate will take as many as 16,000 drivers off the road.

The forgotten black explorers of the Northwest Passage
https://www.scmp.com/.../remembering-forgotten-explorers-northwest-passage
2021-10-11 · Scurvy was rife. The summer passed and the ice did not melt. By 1853, little hope remained but McClure was not ready to give up on his dream of making it through the Northwest Passage. He devised a...


The story of Sir John Franklin's lost Northwest Passage ...
https://www.strangeoutdoors.com/historical-strangeness/franklin-expedition
2021-03-27 · The Northwest Passage is a route connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean,

The lack of truckers could potentially create “more of a shortage than what we’re experiencing now,” said Victor Smith, chief executive officer of JV Smith Companies, a grower and distributor of leafy greens. That’s because trucking is the only option for transportation. Rail service isn’t available everywhere, and shipping by air is too expensive.

Dairy trade between Canada and the U.S. may also take a hit. Canada is the sixth largest destination for U.S. exports, and nearly all of the volume moves by truck, said Nate Donnay, director of dairy market insight at StoneX Group.

“Any significant hiccup in the movement of dairy into Canada isn’t good news for dairy farmers,’’ Donnay said.

Scurvy

Also known as: vitamin c deficiency, scorbutus

• OVERVIEW
• SYMPTOMS
• DIAGNOSIS
• TREATMENT

A disease caused by lack of vitamin C, characterized by general weakness, anaemia, gum disease, and skin haemorrhages.

Very rare (Fewer than 1,000 cases per year in Canada)

Urgent medical attention is usually recommended in severe cases by healthcare providers

Treatable by a medical professional

Requires lab test or imaging

Can last several weeks or months

Behind Dr. Oz's Curtain

by Benjamin Baird
National Review
December 23, 2021

Benjamin Baird is the director of Islamism in Politics, a project of the Middle East Forum.

Dr. Mehmet Oz implores travelers to fly Turkish Airlines, a company part-owned by Turkey's majority Justice and Development Party, just one of the Senate candidate's numerous entanglements with Turkey's Islamist government.

After announcing his decision to run for U.S. Senate from Pennsylvania, celebrity doctor Mehmet Oz has been publicly lambasted for peddling "miracle" weight-loss supplements and other medical misinformation. However, Pennsylvania voters should be far more concerned with the daytime television star's connections to Turkey's Islamist government.

Oz's links to Turkey's authoritarian Justice and Development Party (AKP) extend to foreign agents and proxies accused of operating a secret lobby in the U.S. and spying on American citizens. These associations raise urgent questions about the Senate candidate's loyalty to an illiberal, often antagonistic foreign government that finds itself increasingly at odds with American interests.

The Emmy Award–winning host of the Dr. Oz Show entered a crowded field of GOP contenders after announcing his bid to replace retiring senator Pat Toomey in 2022. Critics point to Oz's reputation for hawking dubious supplements and questionable medical advice, in addition to rumors that the heart surgeon continues to live in his northern New Jersey mansion, despite claiming Pennsylvania residency late last year.

However, Oz's backers point to his undeniable name recognition and deep pockets, and with no clear standout candidate in the Republican primary, he may have a fighting chance. That is, if his relationship with bad actors from Turkey's majority AKP stands up to scrutiny.

"I had the privilege, as the son of immigrant parents, to grow up American while staying deeply in touch with my Turkish roots," Oz told SJ Magazine in a 2011 interview. "I have a great deal of family back in Turkey, I lived there for a period as a boy, and I served in the Turkish military, which is compulsory for dual citizenship."

But does Oz continue to serve Turkey's national interests? Critics have called on him to renounce his Turkish citizenship — not because he is legally obligated to do so as a Senate candidate, but out of concern that his loyalties may be divided.

The extent of Oz's relationship with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (right) is unclear.

Yet, the doctor's ties to Turkey extend beyond family relations and citizenship status to the highest reaches of government office. This includes a 2014 encounter with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey's increasingly authoritarian Islamist leader.

Oz has met with other AKP leaders as well, including Minister of Justice Abdulhamit Gül, who stood arm-in-arm with the TV doctor during a 2019 Turkish-heritage parade in Brooklyn, N.Y. Less than a year earlier, Gül was personally sanctioned by the U.S. Treasury Department for leading "an entity that has engaged in . . . serious human rights abuses," including the unjust detention of American pastor Andrew Brunson.

Oz has a deep personal stake in Turkish state-business interests. In 2011 the talk-show host was elected to the High Advisory Council of the World Turkish Business Council (DTİK), the international business-lobbying arm of Turkey's Foreign Economic Relations Board (DEİK).

In 2014, the Turkish parliament stripped DEİK of its independent status as a nongovernmental business association and switched it to promoting the interests of President Erdoğan and the AKP. Many Western companies stopped doing business with DEİK after it was absorbed by the state, and U.S. lobbying firms representing DEIK subsidiaries have registered as foreign agents.

Dr. Oz, left, pictured at a World Turkish Business Council event in 2019 with Gunay Evinch, a registered foreign agent of Turkey.

Oz participated in DEİK functions as recently as 2019, when he spoke at a DTİK conference in NYC. This event was co-hosted by Gunay Evinch, a foreign agent of Turkey who was retained by the Turkish embassy in 2019 to collect personal information on the AKP's enemies in America. He also represented Erdoğan's bodyguards after they assaulted anti-AKP protestors in Washington, D.C.

Since at least 2017, the celebrity surgeon has served as the public face of Turkish Airlines, Turkey's state-owned commercial airline, which is staffed by leading AKP figures close to the Erdoğan family. He appeared in a lucrative Super Bowl commercial touting the Turkish Airlines, brand and is currently featured in a pre-flight safety video advising passengers on every flight about coronavirus travel tips.

Oz can also be found on the life and communications platform BiP, offering viewers real-time medical advice and "healthy recipes, information on cardiac and mental health, fitness, beauty and motivation." As it happens, BiP is owned by Turkcell, Europe's leading mobile-service provider, which is majority-owned by the Erdoğan-controlled Turkish Wealth Fund after being acquired in 2020 under shady pretenses. Since then, critics worry that the telecommunications giant has been used as a tool of government repression.

In addition to Oz's connections to Turkey's business and government leaders, the Senate candidate is involved with known and suspected AKP proxies. He was the special guest at an October 25, 2019, fundraiser co-sponsored by the Turkish American National Steering Committee (TASC) and the Diyanet Center of America (DCA). Both groups are extensions of the Turkish state.

TASC co-chairs Halil Mutlu (left) and Gunay Evinch (right) meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Istanbul in July 2019.

Co-chaired by Erdoğan's cousin, Halil Mutlu, TASC essentially serves as the Turkish president's publicity machine in the U.S. In a spectacle reminiscent of the cult of personality common among totalitarian regimes, TASC commissioned a box truck in September to drive throughout NYC displaying digital images of the Turkish president with the caption: "Love Erdoğan."

DCA is a massive religious center located just outside the Beltway that hosts diplomatic functions for Erdoğan and the ruling AKP. Pro-AKP sermons are reportedly prepared in advance by the government, and some of America's most radical Islamists are regularly featured as guest preachers.

Oz is known to attend a Diyanet mosque in New Jersey whose "ownership, administration and control is subordinate to the Presidency of Religious Affairs of the Republic of Turkey."

Photographs from the TASC/DCA fundraiser show Oz seated in the place of honor next to the event's host, Murat Güzel, a Turkish-American businessman caught up in multiple FBI probes regarding attempts to interfere in U.S. politics. Hacked emails show Güzel coordinating his political activities with regime officials, and federal agents interrogated Güzel in 2019 regarding his dealings and financial exchanges with Imaad Zuberi, who is facing charges for acting as an unregistered agent of Turkey.

Oz, center, seated at the place of honor at a TASC/DCA event next to Murat Güzel, right, a Turkish American businessman embroiled in at least two separate FBI investigations involving political espionage.

The Doctor Oz campaign failed to respond to questions about the candidate's links to Turkish business and political interests.

Less than two hours after Oz publicly announced his intent to run for office, he received a congratulatory phone call from ambassador Hasan Murat Mercan of the Turkish embassy in Washington. Oz is familiar with Mercan, having attended a breakfast in June with the Turkish ambassador and current NYC mayor-elect Eric Adams at Ali Baba Turkish Restaurant in Midtown Manhattan.

The restaurant's owner, Ali Riza Dogan, is a longtime supporter of both Oz and Adams. Ali Baba, located just next door to the Turkish consulate, was also involved in a 2017 lawsuit involving a former employee who claimed that he was fired, assaulted, and called a "terrorist" after the establishment's owners learned he was a Kurd, a persecuted ethnic minority in Turkey.

Oz, center, enjoys a Turkish breakfast with NYC Mayor-elect Eric Adams, left, and Turkish Ambassador to the U.S. Hasan Murat Mercan (second from right).

Throughout his political career, Adams has been a beneficiary of Turkish-government largesse, taking trips to Turkey on the consulate's dime and accepting donations from known AKP lackeys. For instance, Güzel gave over $10,000 to the Adams campaign last summer.

Oz's proximity to lobbyists, businessmen, and politicians beholden to Ankara casts serious doubts on his suitability for public office. Amnesty International has documented appalling human-rights abuses in Turkey, including the jailing of thousands of journalists and opposition politicians following a 2016 failed coup attempt.

Erdoğan blames Fethullah Gülen, an exiled cleric living in rural Pennsylvania who oversees an international network of schools and charities, for attempting to overthrow his government, a claim discredited by many Western intelligence sources. Nonetheless, AKP officials have aggressively lobbied for Gülen's extradition for years, even offering U.S. congressional candidates $30,000 for statements critical of the aging cleric (and threatening to fund the candidates' opponents if they refuse).

Oz should renounce the AKP and fully divest from AKP-owned businesses and lobbies.

Oz has already shown himself willing to look the other way when it comes to the AKP's long record of human-rights abuses and stunning repression of civil liberties. He must answer tough questions about his relationship with an authoritarian, Islamist government and its agents based in the U.S.

Oz should fully divest his stake in AKP-owned businesses and lobbies and issue firm public statements renouncing the AKP and its illiberal, inhumane record of governance. Otherwise, the talk-show host should stick to his day job.