Taliban divisions deepen as Afghan women defy veil edict

By KATHY GANNON

TODAY

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A woman wearing a burka and her children walk in front of their house in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, May 8, 2022. Afghan women are furious and fearful over a recent decree by the country's Taliban leaders that reinstated the burqa and similar outfits as mandatory for them in public. But some are defying the strict interpretation of Islamic dress codes, venturing out with less restrictive versions than that which the Taliban demanded — outfits that only reveal their eyes. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Arooza was furious and afraid, keeping her eyes open for Taliban on patrol as she and a friend shopped Sunday in Kabul’s Macroyan neighborhood.

The math teacher was fearful her large shawl, wrapped tight around her head, and sweeping pale brown coat would not satisfy the latest decree by the country’s religiously driven Taliban government. After all, more than just her eyes were showing. Her face was visible.

Arooza, who asked to be identified by just one name to avoid attracting attention, wasn’t wearing the all-encompassing burqa preferred by the Taliban, who on Saturday issued a new dress code for women appearing in public. The edict said only a woman’s eyes should be visible.

The decree by the Taliban’s hardline leader Hibaitullah Akhunzada even suggested women shouldn’t leave their homes unless necessary and outlines a series of punishments for male relatives of women violating the code.


It was a major blow to the rights of women in Afghanistan, who for two decades had been living with relative freedom before the Taliban takeover last August — when U.S. and other foreign forces withdrew in the chaotic end to a 20-year war.

A reclusive leader, Akhunzada rarely travels outside southern Kandahar, the traditional Taliban heartland. He favors the harsh elements of the group’s previous time in power, in the 1990s, when girls and women were largely barred from school, work and public life.

Like Taliban founder Mullah Mohammad Omar, Akhunzada imposes a strict brand of Islam that marries religion with ancient tribal traditions, often blurring the two.

Akhunzada has taken tribal village traditions where girls often marry at puberty, and rarely leave their homes, and called it a religious demand, analysts say.

The Taliban have been divided between pragmatists and hardliners, as they struggle to transition from an insurgency to a governing body. Meanwhile, their government has been dealing with a worsening economic crisis. And Taliban efforts to win recognition and aid from Western nations have floundered, largely because they have not formed a more representative government, and restricted the rights of girls and women.

Until now, hardliners and pragmatists in the movement have avoided open confrontation.

A burqa-clad woman and her child wait behind fences in Kabul, Afghanistan, on September 17, 2009. The Taliban has ruled that all women in the country must now wear the full-body covering. 

File Photo by Mohammad Kheirkhah/UPI | License Photo

Yet divisions were deepened in March, on the eve of the new school year, when Akhunzada issued a last-minute decision that girls should not be allowed to go to school after completing the sixth grade. In the weeks ahead of the start of the school year, senior Taliban officials had told journalists all girls would be allowed back in school. Akhunzada asserted that allowing the older girls back to school violated Islamic principles.

A prominent Afghan who meets the leadership and is familiar with their internal squabbles said that a senior Cabinet minister expressed his outrage over Akhunzada’s views at a recent leadership meeting. He spoke on condition of anonymity to speak freely.

Torek Farhadi, a former government adviser, said he believes Taliban leaders have opted not to spar in public because they fear any perception of divisions could undermine their rule.

“The leadership does not see eye to eye on a number of matters but they all know that if they don’t keep it together, everything might fall apart,” Farhadi said. “In that case, they might start clashes with each other.”

“For that reason, the elders have decided to put up with each other, including when it comes to non-agreeable decisions which are costing them a lot of uproar inside Afghanistan and internationally,” Farhadi added.

Some of the more pragmatic leaders appear to be looking for quiet workarounds that will soften the hard-line decrees. Since March, there has been a growing chorus, even among the most powerful Taliban leaders, to return older girls to school while quietly ignoring other repressive edicts.

Earlier this month, Anas Haqqani, the younger brother of Sirajuddin, who heads the powerful Haqqani network, told a conference in the eastern city of Khost that girls are entitled to education and that they would soon return to school — though he didn’t say when. He also said that women had a role in building the nation.

“You will receive very good news that will make everyone very happy... this problem will be resolved in the following days,” Haqqani said at the time.

In the Afghan capital of Kabul on Sunday, women wore the customary conservative Muslim dress. Most wore a traditional hijab, consisting of a headscarf and long robe or coat, but few covered their faces, as directed by the Taliban leader a day earlier. Those wearing a burqa, a head-to-toe garment that covers the face and hides the eyes behind netting were in the minority.

“Women in Afghanistan wear the hijab, and many wear the burqa, but this isn’t about hijab, this is about the Taliban wanting to make all women disappear,” said Shabana, who wore bright gold bangles beneath her flowing black coat, her hair hidden behind a black head scarf with sequins. “This is about the Taliban wanting to make us invisible.”

Arooza said the Taliban rulers are driving Afghans to leave their country. “Why should I stay here if they don’t want to give us our human rights? We are human,” she said.

Several women stopped to talk. They all challenged the latest edict.

“We don’t want to live in a prison,” said Parveen, who like the other women wanted only to give one name.

“These edicts attempt to erase a whole gender and generation of Afghans who grew up dreaming of a better world,” said Obaidullah Baheer, a visiting scholar at New York’s New School and former lecturer at the American University in Afghanistan.

“It pushes families to leave the country by any means necessary. It also fuels grievances that would eventually spill over into large-scale mobilization against the Taliban,” he said.

After decades of war, Baheer said it wouldn’t have taken much on the Taliban’s part to make Afghans content with their rule “an opportunity that the Taliban are wasting fast.”

Afghanistan’s Taliban order women to cover up head to toe

By KATHY GANNON

yesterday

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Afghan women wait to receive food rations distributed by a Saudi humanitarian aid group, in Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, April 25, 2022. Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers on Saturday, May 7, ordered all Afghan women to wear head-to-toe clothing in public, a sharp hard-line pivot that confirmed the worst fears of rights activists and was bound to further complicate Taliban dealings with an already distrustful international community. 

(AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)


KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Afghanistan’s Taliban rulers on Saturday ordered all Afghan women to wear head-to-toe clothing in public — a sharp, hard-line pivot that confirmed the worst fears of rights activists and was bound to further complicate Taliban dealings with an already distrustful international community.

The decree says that women should leave the home only when necessary, and that male relatives would face punishment — starting with a summons and escalating up to court hearings and jail time — for women’s dress code violations.

It was the latest in a series of repressive edicts issued by the Taliban leadership, not all of which have been implemented. Last month, for example, the Taliban forbade women to travel alone, but after a day of opposition, that has since been silently ignored.

On Sunday in the capital, Kabul, many women on the street were wearing the same large shawls as before. Women also arrived unaccompanied at Kabul International Airport, while in the city women boarded small buses alone.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan said it was deeply concerned with what appeared to be a formal directive that would be implemented and enforced, adding that it would seek clarifications from the Taliban about the decision.

“This decision contradicts numerous assurances regarding respect for and protection of all Afghans’ human rights, including those of women and girls, that had been provided to the international community by Taliban representatives during discussions and negotiations over the past decade,” it said in a statement.

The decree, which calls for women to only show their eyes and recommends they wear the head-to-toe burqa, evoked similar restrictions on women during the Taliban’s previous rule between 1996 and 2001.

“We want our sisters to live with dignity and safety,” said Khalid Hanafi, acting minister for the Taliban’s vice and virtue ministry.

The Taliban previously decided against reopening schools to girls above grade 6, reneging on an earlier promise and opting to appease their hard-line base at the expense of further alienating the international community. But this decree does not have widespread support among a leadership that’s divided between pragmatists and the hard-liners.


An Afghan burqa-clad woman makes her way through graves at a cemetery next to the Khwaja 'Abd Allah Ansari shrine in Herat, Afghanistan, on August 12, 2009. 

File Photo by Mohammad Kheirkhah/UPI | License Photo

That decision disrupted efforts by the Taliban to win recognition from potential international donors at a time when the country is mired in a worsening humanitarian crisis.

“For all dignified Afghan women wearing Hijab is necessary and the best Hijab is chadori (the head-to-toe burqa) which is part of our tradition and is respectful,” said Shir Mohammad, an official from the vice and virtue ministry in a statement.

“Those women who are not too old or young must cover their face, except the eyes,” he said. “Islamic principles and Islamic ideology are more important to us than anything else.”

Senior Afghanistan researcher Heather Barr of Human Rights Watch urged the international community to put coordinated pressure on the Taliban.

“(It is) far past time for a serious and strategic response to the Taliban’s escalating assault on women’s rights,” she wrote on Twitter.

The Taliban were ousted in 2001 by a U.S.-led coalition for harboring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden and returned to power in the waning days of America’s chaotic departure last year.

The White House National Security Council condemned the Taliban’s Saturday decree and urged them to reverse it.

“We are discussing this with other countries and partners. The legitimacy and support that the Taliban seeks from the international community depend entirely on their conduct, specifically their ability to back stated commitments with actions,” it said in a statement.

Since taking power last August, the Taliban leadership has been squabbling among themselves as they struggle to transition from war to governing. It has pit hard-liners against the more pragmatic among them.

A spokeswoman from Pangea, an Italian non-governmental organization that has assisted women for years in Afghanistan, said the new decree would be particularly difficult for them to swallow since they had lived in relative freedom until the Taliban takeover.

“In the last 20 years, they have had the awareness of human rights, and in the span of a few months have lost them,” Silvia Redigolo said by telephone. “It’s dramatic to (now) have a life that doesn’t exist.”

Infuriating many Afghans is the knowledge that many of the Taliban of the younger generation, like Sirajuddin Haqqani, are educating their girls in Pakistan, while in Afghanistan women and girls have been targeted by their repressive edicts since taking power. Haqqani is a U.N.-designated terrorist and head of the Haqqani network, which has been blamed for some of the deadliest attacks during the 20-year U.S.-led invasion.

Girls have been banned from school beyond grade 6 in most of the country since the Taliban’s return. Universities opened earlier this year in much of the country, but since taking power the Taliban edicts have been erratic. While a handful of provinces continued to provide education to all, most provinces closed educational institutions for girls and women.

The religiously driven Taliban administration fears that going forward with enrolling girls beyond the the sixth grade could alienate their rural base, Hashmi said.

In Kabul, private schools and universities have operated uninterrupted.

_____

Associated Press writer Rahim Faiez in Islamabad, Thomas Strong in Washington and Frances D’Emilio in Rome contributed to this report

Less immigrant labor in US contributing to price hikes
By NICHOLAS RICCARDIMay 7, 2022


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Joshua Correa, left, steadies a scaffolding for Samuel as they work at a home under construction in Plano, Texas, Tuesday, May 3, 2022. There are an estimated 2 million fewer immigrants than expected in the United States, helping fuel a desperate scramble for workers in many sectors, from meatpacking to homebuilding, that are also contributing to shortages and price increases. Correa has struggled to hire supervisors for his work sites, with immigrant job candidates demanding $100,000 yearly pay. 

(AP Photo/LM Otero)

Just 10 miles from the Rio Grande, Mike Helle’s farm is so short of immigrant workers that he’s replaced 450 acres of labor-intensive leafy greens with crops that can be harvested by machinery.

In Houston, Al Flores increased the price of his BBQ restaurant’s brisket plate because the cost of the cut doubled due to meatpacking plants’ inability to fully staff immigrant-heavy production lines. In the Dallas area, Joshua Correa raised prices on the homes his company builds by $150,000 to cover increased costs stemming partly from a lack of immigrant labor.

After immigration to the United States tapered off during the Trump administration — then ground to a near complete halt for 18 months during the coronavirus pandemic — the country is waking up to a labor shortage partly fueled by that slowdown.

The U.S. has, by some estimates, 2 million fewer immigrants than it would have if the pace had stayed the same, helping power a desperate scramble for workers in many sectors, from meatpacking to homebuilding, that is also contributing to supply shortages and price increases.

“These 2 million missing immigrants are part of the reason we have a labor shortage,” said Giovanni Peri, an economist at the University of California at Davis, who calculated the shortfall. “In the short run, we are going to adjust to these shortages in the labor market through an increase in wages and in prices.”

The labor issues are among several contributors to the highest inflation in 40 years in the United States — from supply chains mangled by the pandemic to a surge in energy and commodity prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Steve Camarota, a researcher at the Center for Immigration Studies, which advocates for less immigration, believes a spike in illegal immigration under President Joe Biden will make up whatever shortfall lingers from the pandemic. He also contends wage increases in low-paying sectors like agriculture are minor contributors to inflation.

“I don’t think wages going up is bad for the poor, and I think mathematically it is not possible to drive down inflation by limiting wages at the bottom,” Camarota told The Associated Press.

Immigration is rapidly returning to its pre-pandemic levels, researchers say, but the U.S. would need a significant acceleration to make up its deficit. Given a sharp decline in births in the United States over the past two decades, some economists forecast the overall pool of potential workers will start shrinking by 2025.

The immigrant worker shortage comes as the U.S. political system is showing less of an appetite for increasing immigration. Democrats — who control all branches of the federal government and more recently have been the party more friendly to immigration — haven’t tried to advance major legislation permitting more new residents to the country. A recent Gallup poll showed worries about illegal immigration at a two-decade high. With a tough election for their party looming in November, Democrats are increasingly divided about the Biden administration’s attempt to end pandemic-related restrictions on seeking asylum.

“At some point we either decide to become older and smaller or we change our immigration policy,” said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, an economist and former official in President George W. Bush’s administration who is president of the center-right American Action Forum. He acknowledged a change in immigration policy is unlikely: “The bases of both parties are so locked in.”

That’s certainly the case in Republican-dominated Texas, which includes the longest and busiest stretch of the southern border. The Legislature in 2017 forced cities to comply with federal immigration agents seeking people who are in the U.S. illegally. Gov. Greg Abbott sent the Texas National Guard to patrol the border and recently created traffic snarls by ordering more inspections at border ports.

The turn against immigration distresses some Texas business owners. “Immigration is very important for our workforce in the United States,” said Correa. “We just need it.”

He’s seeing delays of two to three months on his projects as he and his subcontractors — from drywallers to plumbers to electricians — struggle to field crews. Correa has raised the standard price of his houses from $500,000 to about $650,000.

“We’re feeling it and, if we’re feeling it at the end of the day as builders and developers, the consumer pays the price,” said Correa, who spoke from Pensacola, Florida, where he brought a construction crew as a favor to a client whose hasn’t been able to find laborers to fix a beach house damaged by Hurricane Sally in 2020.

The share of the U.S. population born in another country — 13.5% in the latest census — is the highest it has been since the 19th century. But even before Donald Trump won the 2016 presidential election vowing to cut immigration, migration to the United States was slowing. The Great Recession dried up many jobs that drew workers to the country, legally or illegally. Rising standards of living in Latin America have prodded more people to stay put — or to return from the United States.

Flores, who runs a chain of Mexican restaurants as well as his barbecue restaurant, said while the COVID-19 pandemic was a bigger shock to his industry, the immigration slowdown has hit it hard — and not just for meatpackers that supply his restaurant’s brisket. “You’ve got a lot of positions that aren’t being filled,” he said.

He’s steadily raised pay, up to $15 an hour recently. “This is a culmination of years and years,” said Flores, who’s president of the Greater Houston Restaurant Association.

Helle, who raises onion, cabbage, melons and kale just outside the border town of McAllen, Texas, is also paying more to his workers, who are almost exclusively immigrants. People born in the U.S., he says, won’t work the fields regardless of the pay.

Before he could find farmworkers just in the region. Now he’s joined a federal program to bring agricultural workers across the border. It’s more expensive for him, but he said it’s the only way he can keep his crops from spoiling in the ground.

Helle, 60, has farmed the area for decades. “I live 10 miles from the Rio Grande river and I never in my life thought we’d be in this situation.”

Brazil’s Lula courts centrists at unofficial campaign launch

By MAURICIO SAVARESE and DÉBORA

MAY 7, 2022

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Confetti showers former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and supporters after the announcement of his candidacy for the country’s upcoming presidential election, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Saturday, May 7, 2022. Brazil's general elections are scheduled for Oct. 2, 2022. 

(AP Photo/Andre Penner)


SAO PAULO (AP) — At the effective launch of his campaign on Saturday, Brazil’s former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva aimed to lure centrists into his coalition to strengthen his bid to unseat incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro.

“We want to unite democrats of all origins and colors to face and beat the totalitarian threat, the hatred,” da Silva told thousands of supporters of his Workers’ Party, members of unions and political allies who gathered in Sao Paulo.

“We want to come back so no one ever again dares to challenge our democracy and so fascism returns to the gutters of history, which it should never have left,” the former president added. “To end this crisis and grow, Brazil needs to be a normal country again.”

The event was technically the launch of da Silva’s pre-campaign, as the law doesn’t permit people to formally declare themselves candidates before Aug. 5. The leftist leads all polls to return to the job he held from 2003 to 2010, but his sizeable advantage against the far-right Bolsonaro in the October election has been narrowing in recent weeks, according to some surveys.

Bolsonaro has challenged Supreme Court justices and their decisions, sown doubt about the reliability of Brazil’s electronic voting system and portrayed upcoming elections as a fight between good and evil. Analysts have expressed concern he is preparing to challenge election results.

The most concrete effort on Da Silva’s part to make inroads with moderates so far was his selection of a rival, Geraldo Alckmin, as his running mate. Alckmin, a center-right Catholic, appeared via video because he tested positive for COVID-19 on Thursday. The former Sao Paulo governor lost his 2006 and 2018 bids for the presidency, during which he fiercely criticized the Workers’ Party administrations.

“No disagreement of the past, no difference with the president and not even the possible discords of today and tomorrow will allow me to excuse myself from supporting and defending with resolve that Lula should return to Brazil’s presidency,” Alckmin said, adding that Bolsonaro’s administration is “the most disastrous and cruel of the country’s history.”

“When President Lula gave me his hand, I saw more than a gesture of reconciliation between two historical opponents. I saw a call to reason,” he said.

Alckmin has been compared to former Vice President José Alencar, who died in 2011 and was instrumental for da Silva’s campaign to pivot to the center and win in 2002.

Members of other moderate political parties not aligned with da Silva also attended, including Sen. Otto Alencar and Sen. Veneziano Vital do Rego.

“We need to broaden this coalition and that’s what today is for, too,” Alencar told reporters. His party is unlikely to field a presidential candidate this year. “If we can’t bring centrist parties to Lula in the first voting round, let them come in the second. We need to have our arms open for every democrat.”

Da Silva’s effort to woo moderates runs in line with what many analysts say he must do in order to ensure victory. Political analyst Bruno Carazza told The Associated Press that polling data shows him consolidating support among leftist voters, but having less success connecting with people elsewhere on the spectrum.

For example, da Silva said on April 5 that he sees the legalization of abortion as a public health issue and defended abortion rights. His comments spurred instant backlash from critics who said he risked unsettling moderates he should be prioritizing.

The next day, da Silva partially walked back his statement, saying in a radio interview he is personally against abortions, but believes they should be legal.

Political scientist Antonio Lavareda told the AP that he sees little room for da Silva’s support to grow, given that he is already Brazil’s best-known politician.

Likewise, polls already reflect the feelings of voters who won’t for him under any circumstance, particularly as a result of his arrest and conviction for corruption and money laundering that sidelined him from the 2018 race. Those convictions have since been annulled, because the judge presiding over the cases was deemed to be biased.

Many of da Silva’s supporters seemed less than excited about his nods to moderates and the right-leaning politician joining him on the ticket.

“I don’t think we can trust people who were against us until very recently,” said Eleonora Santos, a 47-year-old bank teller, wearing a shirt featuring da Silva’s face during his first presidential campaign in 1989. When posing for pictures in front of a giant poster of Da Silva and Alckmin, she stood in front of Alckmin’s image so as to prevent him from appearing next to her candidate.

“I understand Bolsonaro gives us different challenges and we need to have more support. I just don’t think this guy gives us anything,” she said. “His voters will never be Lula voters.”

Most of da Silva’s comments in recent weeks have touted the achievements of his two-term presidency, including lifting tens of millions of people from poverty. He did the same Saturday’, saying his administration put an end to hunger in Brazil, only to have Bolsonaro bring it back.

In a recent interview with Time magazine, he said he wouldn’t discuss economic policy until after winning the election -- despite the fact many Brazilians, struggling to make ends meet amid double-digit inflation and high unemployment, are eager to hear how candidates intend to come to their aid.

“It is clear that he will capitalize on data from his administrations, but Brazil has changed a lot, new demands have arisen,” Carraza said. “The economic situation is much more challenging and much more difficult after the pandemic and with the war in Ukraine. It’s a very different context than the one 20 years ago.”

For now, though, da Silva’s focus appears to be casting himself as a protector of democracy amid a threat of authoritarianism. Wellington Dias, one of the coordinators of da Silva’s campaign, told reporters da Silva will continue to win moderate votes.

“He will increasingly show democrats that their choice is important, that they can accept there are differences, but democracy should be above all,” Dias said. ___ Álvares contributed from Brasilia.

Syrians in desperate need of aid hit hard by Ukraine fallout





- A general view of Karama camp for internally displaced Syrians, Monday, Feb. 14, 2022 by the village of Atma, Idlib province, Syria. Fallout from the 2-month-old war in Ukraine is worsening long-term humanitarian crises elsewhere, including in Syria. (AP Photo/Omar Albam, File)More

BASSEM MROUE
Sun, May 8, 2022

BEIRUT (AP) — Umm Khaled hardly leaves the tent where she lives in northwest Syria, and she says she doesn’t pay attention to the news. But she knows one reason why it is getting harder and harder to feed herself and her children: Ukraine.

“Prices have been going up, and this has been happening to us since the war in Ukraine started,” said the 40-year-old, who has lived in a tent camp for displaced people in the last rebel-held enclave in Syria for the past six years since fleeing a government offensive.

Food prices around the world were already rising, but the war in Ukraine has accelerated the increase since Russia’s invasion began on Feb. 24. The impact is worsening the already dangerous situation of millions of Syrians driven from their homes by their country’s now 11-year-old civil war.

The rebel enclave in Syria’s northwest province of Idlib is packed with some 4 million people, most of whom fled there from elsewhere in the country. Most rely on international aid to survive, for everything from food and shelter to medical care and education.


Because of rising prices, some aid agencies are scaling back their food assistance. The biggest provider, the U.N. World Food Program, began this week to cut the size of the monthly rations it gives to 1.35 million people in the territory.

The Ukraine crisis has also created a whole new group of refugees. European nations and the U.S. have rushed to help more than 5.5 million Ukrainians who have fled to neighboring countries, as well as more than 7 million displaced within Ukraine’s borders.

Aid agencies are hoping to draw some of the world’s attention back to Syria in a two-day donor conference for humanitarian aid to Syrians that begins Monday in Brussels, hosted by the U.N. and the European Union. The funding also goes toward aid to the 5.7 million Syrian refugees living in neighboring countries, particularly Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.

Last year, the EU, the United States and other nations pledged $6.4 billion to help Syrians and neighboring countries hosting refugees. But that fell well short of the $10 billion that the U.N. had sought — and the impact was felt on the ground. In Idlib, 10 of its 50 medical centers lost funding in 2022, forcing them to dramatically cut back services, Amnesty International said in a report released Thursday.

Across Syria, people have been forced to eat less, the Norwegian Refugee Council said. The group surveyed several hundred families around the country and found 87% were skipping meals to meet other living costs.

“While the humanitarian crisis in Ukraine continues to demand world attention, donors and governments meeting in Brussels must not forget about their commitment to Syria,” NRC’s Mideast Regional Director Carsten Hansen said in a report Thursday.

The U.N.’s children’s agency UNICEF said more than 6.5 million children in Syria are in need of assistance calling it the highest recorded since the conflict began. It said that since 2011, over 13,000 children have been confirmed killed or injured.

Meanwhile, UNICEF said funding for humanitarian operations in Syria is dwindling fast, saying it has received less than half of its funding requirements for this year. “We urgently need nearly $20 million for the cross-border operations” in Syria, the agency said in a statement.

Umm Khaled is among those who rely on food aid. With her aid rations reduced, she has gone deeper in debt to feed her family.

Her husband and eldest son were killed in a Syrian government airstrike in their home city of Aleppo in 2016. Soon after, she escaped with her three surviving children to the rebel enclave in Idlib province. Ever since, they have lived in a tent camp with other displaced people on the outskirts of the town of Atmeh near the Turkish border.

Her family lives on two meals a day -- a small breakfast and a main meal late in the afternoon that serves as lunch and dinner. Her only income is from picking olives for a few weeks a year, making 20 Turkish liras ($1.35) a day.

“We used to get enough rice, bulgur, lentils and others. Now they keep reducing them,” she said by telephone from the camp. She spoke on condition her full name is not made public, fearing repercussions. She lives with her two daughters, ages six and 16, and 12-year-old son, who suffered head and arm injuries in the strike that killed his brother and father.

The price of essential food items in northwest Syria has already increased by between 22% and 67% since the start of the Ukraine conflict, according to the aid group Mercy Corps. There have also been shortages in sunflower oil, sugar and flour.

Mercy Corps provides cash assistance to displaced Syrians to buy food and other needs and it says it has no plans to reduce the amount.

“Even before the war in Ukraine, bread was already becoming increasingly unaffordable,” said Mercy Corps Syria Country Director, Kieren Barnes. The vast majority of wheat brought into northwest Syria is of Ukrainian origin, and the territory doesn’t produce enough wheat for its own needs.

“The world is witnessing a year of catastrophic hunger with a huge gap between the resources and the needs of the millions of people around the world,” said WFP spokeswoman Abeer Etefa.

In many of its operations around the world, WFP is reducing the size of the rations it provides, she said. Starting this month in northwest Syria, the provisions will go down to 1,177 calories a day, from 1,340. The food basket will continue to provide a mix of commodities, including wheat flour, rice, chickpeas, lentils, bulgur wheat, sugar and oil.

Rising prices have increased the cost of WFP’s food assistance by 51% since 2019 and that cost will likely go even higher as the impact of the Ukraine crisis is felt, Etefa said.

Earlier in the year, before the Ukraine conflict began, a 29% jump in costs prompted the Czech aid agency People in Need to switch from providing food packages to giving food vouchers. The vouchers, worth $60, buy less food than the group's target level, but it had to take the step to “maximize its coverage of food assistance to the most vulnerable,” a spokesperson told The Associated Press.

As the world turns to other conflicts, “Syria is on the verge of becoming yet another forgotten crisis,” Assistant U.N. Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Joyce Msuya warned in late April.

In northwest Syria, “a staggering 4.1 million people” need humanitarian aid, Msuya said — not just food, but also medicines, blankets, school supplies and shelter. She said almost a million people in the territory, mainly women and children, live in tents, “half of which are beyond their normal lifespan.”

Many fear that the situation could only get worse in July, because Russia may force international aid for the northwest to be delivered through parts of Syria under the control of its ally, President Bashar Assad.

Currently, aid enters the Idlib enclave directly from Turkey via a single border crossing, Bab al-Hawa. The U.N. mandate allowing deliveries through Bab al-Hawa ends on July 9, and Russia has hinted it will veto a Security Council resolution renewing the mandate.

A Russian veto would effectively hand Assad control over the flow of aid to the opposition enclave and the U.S. and EU had warned earlier they will stop funding in that case.

The result will be a severe humanitarian crisis, likely triggering a new flood of Syrian migrants into Turkey and Europe, the German Institute for International and Security Affairs warned in a report.

Umm Khaled said she has no choice but to endure her deteriorating living conditions.

“They keep reducing our food basket,” she said. “May God protect us if they cut it completely.”

Petrobras’s Profits Slammed by Bolsonaro in Election Year



Mariana Durao
Fri, May 6, 2022,

(Bloomberg) -- Petrobras posted strong first quarter results thanks to growing oil production during this year’s rally, prompting a rebuke from President Jair Bolsonaro who wants it to contain fuel prices ahead of an October election.

Chief Executive Officer Jose Mauro Coelho responded on Friday by saying that gasoline and diesel prices, which are currently lagging international levels, must go up eventually, signaling that he will continue with a policy of tracking global benchmarks while shielding consumers from short-term volatility. Shares were up 3% at 32.97 reais ($6.49) at 3:57 p.m in Sao Paulo.

Bolsonaro on Thursday said Petrobras’s profits are unacceptable during a crisis, putting recently-elected Coelho under political pressure. The state-controlled company said the Brazilian public is the main beneficiary of the company’s solid results because it increases taxes and dividends to the state.

“Look at the abusive profit,” Bolsonaro said Thursday in a weekly address on Facebook, adding that he can’t interfere in how Petrobras sets prices. “I ask Petrobras to be responsible, and not increase the price of diesel.”

Brazil’s oil giant readjusted prices in March, but is selling fuel below international rates again, raising concern among investors who saw it turn from the world’s most indebted oil producer to a cash cow in the past five years. In a statement, Petrobras said artificially low prices could hinder fuel imports and result in shortages in the domestic market.

Petroleo Brasileiro SA, as Rio de Janeiro-based producer is formally known, reported adjusted earnings before items, a measure of profitability, of 77.71 billion reais, beating the 74.4 billion-real average analyst estimate compiled by Bloomberg, according to an earnings report filed Thursday.

Latin America’s biggest oil producer announced 48.5 billion reais in additional dividends to be paid in 2022, which mainly correspond to results from the first quarter. It exceeds the 44.56 billion reais it reported in net income for the period.

After years subsidizing gasoline to contain inflation, in 2016 Petrobras adopted a policy of tracking international prices. The move has caused plenty of drama.

Since then, three of the company’s CEOs lost their jobs amid fuel-price disputes. The list includes Coelho’s predecessor Joaquim Silva e Luna, ousted by President Jair Bolsonaro after raising fuel in response to the war in Ukraine, even though Petrobras delayed the adjustment by more than two months.

“Petrobras’s main short-term risk is if there will be a change in the pricing policy,” said Fernando Valle, an equity analyst at Bloomberg Intelligence who covers Petrobras. He highlighted that the company was slow to pass through higher fuel costs to consumers in the first quarter.

Petrobras Dividend Surge Clouded by Fuel Prices: Company Outlook

Coelho pledged to keep market-based fuel prices when he took the helm, but it is unclear what will happen to this policy after October elections. Both Bolsonaro and his main adversary, former president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, have come out against fuel price increases, and congress is reviewing bills aimed at limiting volatility.

In a call with analysts on Friday, the new CEO promised to continue producing solid results and tracking international fuel prices.

(Updates with comments from CEO in second paragraph)

Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek

Supreme Court abortion leak investigation and the curious case of Clarence Thomas and Co.


Rex Huppke, USA TODAY
Sun, May 8, 2022,


I was glad to hear U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts launched an investigation into who leaked a draft opinion on abortion rights, and while I don’t claim to be an expert on leaks or investigations or court credibility, I wonder if he might also want to look into how the wife of another justice might have supported an attempt to overthrow the government.

Just throwing that out there in hopes of being helpful.

Roberts reportedly summoned the Marshal of the Court, who I assume carries a badge and has a six-shooter on each hip, to sniff out the leaker who gave Politico a draft opinion showing the court may overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that gave women the constitutional right to abortion. It’s definitely important to get to the bottom of that, but as long as they’re doing some investigating, maybe the marshal could hop on a horse and trot over to this other justice’s office – I think his name is Clarence – and inquire about the far-right activist he’s married to, Ginni Thomas.
The 'integrity of our operations'

In a statement, Roberts said the leak of the draft opinion was “intended to undermine the integrity of our operations” and “was a singular and egregious breach of that trust that is an affront to the court and the community of public servants who work here.”

Virginia "Ginni" Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, arrives to watch Amy Coney Barrett take the Constitutional Oath on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, Monday, Oct. 26, 2020.

All true, for sure. You can’t have a leaky high court.


But we haven’t heard Roberts comment yet on the wife of Justice Clarence Thomas, who, based on text messages turned over to the Jan. 6 committee, thinks the 2020 presidential election was “the greatest Heist of our History” and “the end of Liberty” and that the Bidens, members of the media and other “ballot fraud co-conspirators” will soon “be living in barges off GITMO to face military tribunals for sedition.”

A Mother's Day reminder: We all feel guilty but are trying our best.

I’m just a humble columnist, but she sounds a few flapjacks shy of breakfast, if you know what I mean. Seems any good investigation aimed at preserving the reputation of the court might want to make sure none of that zaniness found its way into Justice Thomas’ head. You know … through osmosis and whatnot.
Why didn't Thomas recuse himself?

Again, I know the leak is a bad thing, but … you know … maybe so is knowing your wife might have sent a batch of unhinged text messages to the White House chief of staff and then not recusing yourself from the case that would allow those text messages to be revealed.

Justice Clarence Thomas during a group photo at the Supreme Court on April 23, 2021.

Because that’s exactly what happened in January, when Justice Thomas was the only member of the court to rule in favor of former President Donald Trump’s request to keep White House records from the Jan. 6 committee.

Are we trying to destroy America? From Tucker to Trump, we're doing a good job of it.

A month earlier, Ginni Thomas had signed her name to a letter sent to conservative leaders lambasting the work of the committee investigating the domestic terrorist attack on the U.S. Capitol building that happened after a “Save America Rally” she attended.
A convenient series of events

To summarize – and I apologize, marshal, I’m not trying to do your work for you – in the wake of Trump’s election loss to President Joe Biden, Thomas sent wildly conspiratorial emails to Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff at the time, then she helped promote and attend the rally that led to the attack on the U.S. Capitol, then she denounced the committee investigating the attack, then her husband on the Supreme Court was the only justice who wanted to block the release of information that would include his wife’s texts to Meadows.

Columnist Rex Huppke: Ginni Thomas' texts show the Big Lie has metastasized into a Big Delusion. Enough already.

US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas (R) and his wife Virginia Thomas, (C) watch as the flag-draped casket of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg arrives at the Supreme Court in Washington, DC, on Sept. 23, 2020.

I’m not a marshal, nor am I trained in tracking down leaks or leakers. I have neither plumbing nor investigative experience. But I still think the Thomas family situation might fall under the “undermine the integrity of our operations” umbrella the Chief Justice opened, so as long as you’ve got your guy doing some poking around, why not turn over a few additional rocks and see what you find?

And while you’re at it – and I say this at the risk of sounding bossy – what about the fact that the court, focused as it is on maintaining credibility, has three new justices who were nominated by a president who lost the popular vote and confirmed by senators representing far fewer voters than the senators opposed to the confirmations?
Representing a minority of voters

Those three justices – Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett – all show up on the leaked draft opinion casting deciding votes to overturn Roe v. Wade. Doesn’t it seems kind of important, court credibility-wise, that the people making decisions on a fundamental right supported by a strong majority of Americans actually represent a strong majority of Americans?

This Court was built by power politics. It doesn't deserve to rule on Roe v. Wade

Otherwise, it starts to seem like a small minority of people driven by certain religious views are determining what the rest of us can and can’t do, and that gets a bit … you know … theocracy-sounding.

Demonstrators protest outside the U.S. Supreme Court on May 3, 2022.

Anyhoo, I probably don’t know what I’m talking about, but just wanted to throw some stuff at the wall of the court and see what sticks.

I wish the marshal good luck finding the leaker. I know we’ll all feel a lot better once the court’s credibility is restored.

Or, as Ginni Thomas might put it, once the leaker is in Guantanamo, President Trump has been rightfully restored to office and all the 5G cellular towers have been torn down so Microsoft’s Bill Gates can no longer turn our pets into communists. Or whatever.

Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on Twitter @RexHuppke and Facebook: facebook.com/RexIsAJerk

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Supreme Court abortion leak investigation needed. What about Thomas?

‘Saturday Night Live’ Cold Open Goes Back To The “Moral Clarity” Of The 13th Century To Spoof Samuel Alito’s Abortion Opinion

Ted Johnson
Sat, May 7, 2022,


Saturday Night Live opened tonight with something a little different: The show went back to the 13th century England to mock Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito’s leaked draft opinion that threatens to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The skit opened with a narrator announcing that Alito explained that “no woman has a right to an abortion and abortion is a crime.”

He cites a treatise from the 13th century about the quickening of the foetus, and a second treatise that says that if the quick child dieth in her body, it would a great misprision. We go then to that profound moment of moral clarity almost a thousand years ago, which laid such a clear foundation for what our law should be in 2022.

Out comes Benedict Cumberbatch, playing a medieval figure, who wonders if they should pass a law to ban abortion. “We should have a law that could stand the test of time,” he says, “so that hundreds and hundreds of years from now, they will look back and say, ‘No need to update this one at all. They nailed it back in 1235.'”

Earlier this week, Politico posted the draft opinion, setting off alarms that the days of legalized abortion across the country could be coming to an end. In the opinion, Alito, in arguing that Roe was wrongly decided, wrote that “an unbroken tradition of prohibiting abortion on pain of criminal punishment persisted from the earliest days of common law until 1973.”

The SNL cold open spoofs that position as well as other exercises in originalism, even finding absurdity in the idea that rights can be taken away.

Toward the end of the skit Kate McKinnon appears as a witch who can see the future.

“Worry not, dear girl, these barbaric laws will someday be overturned by something called progress — and then, about 50 years after the progress, they’ll be like, ‘Maybe we should undo the progress,'” she says. “I don’t know why all my visions from that time are very confusing. It seems like all the power comes from a place called Florida. And if you think our customs are weird. You should watch the trial of Johnny Depp and Amber Heard!”

The skit also riffs on the right’s revolt against Covid mandates while at the same time seeking restrictions on abortion.

Cecily Strong, as a peasant woman, tells Cumberbatch and the other medieval men, “I don’t understand why you are so obsessed about this issue. What about the fact that no one can read or write? Everyone’s dying of plague.”

One of the men tells her, “Oh, you think just ’cause I have active plague, that means I have to wear a mask. It’s my body, my choice!”

 

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Benedict Cumberbatch, 'SNL' Cast Members & Arcade Fire's Win Butler Show Support For Roe v. Wade


'SNL': Elizabeth Olsen Makes Cameo Alongside 'Doctor Strange In the Multiverse Of Madness' Co-Star Benedict Cumberbatch

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A PR firm that works with Netflix and Starbucks quietly advised clients to 'not take a stance' on abortion rights, a report says



Pro-choice signs hang on a police barricade at the Supreme Court Building.

Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images

Jyoti Mann
Sat, May 7, 2022, 

PR firm Zeno advised clients to stay quiet on abortion rights, Popular Information reported.

A leaked email shows Zeno told clients the topic was a "textbook 50/50" issue.

Zeno told Insider the "50/50" comment was poorly worded and the email didn't accurately reflect its advice.

Public relations firm Zeno quietly advised clients to remain quiet on the draft Supreme Court document that seeks to overturn Roe v. Wade, the Popular Information newsletter reported.

Zeno, whose roster of clients includes Netflix, Starbucks, and Coca-Cola, according to the newsletter, circulated a template email internally to share with its clients. The email reportedly told clients to "steer clear" of news outlets, asking them to "not take a stance" and "avoid media fishing," Popular Information reported.

The email comes after a draft Supreme Court opinion that could seek to overturn Roe v. Wade – a landmark ruling that protects women's right to abortions – was leaked on May 3. If the legislation is overturned it could mean abortion becoming illegal in 23 states.

Zeno, part of the PR giant Edelman, seemingly told clients to "not engage" with the media on its company's position on the issue and said the first company to speak out and make their view known "becomes the lead," per Popular Information.

"This topic is a textbook "50/50" issue. Subjects that divide the country can sometimes be no-win situations for companies because regardless of what they do they will alienate at least 15 to 30 percent of their stakeholders," the email sent by a Zeno executive reportedly said.

"Do not assume that all of your employees, customers or investors share your view," the email reportedly added.

Many companies have already been vocal on the issue as a growing list, including Tesla, Amazon, Apple, Yelp, and Citi, said it would reimburse employees for travel costs if they were seeking abortions.

A Zeno spokesperson told Insider: "Albeit a poor choice of words, the company referring to 'a "50/50" case' was a phrase meant to describe the divisiveness and partisanship tied to controversial issues, and not meant to represent an actual percentage of US sentiment on this issue."

The company said the leaked email did not "accurately reflect" the advice it's giving clients and that the company believes it's a "woman's right" to make their own healthcare decisions.

An Insider investigation found that agencies in 13 states that have abortion "trigger" laws are not prepared for how to implement a ban. They are also not planning for what could happen if the ruling is reversed, per the investigation.

Transgender advocates say the end of Roe would have dire consequences



Olivia McCormack, 

(c) 2022, The Washington Post
Fri, May 6, 2022, 

In the days since Politico published a leaked Supreme Court draft opinion that would overturn Roe v. Wade, conversations about women's reproductive health have abounded. But many transgender men and trans-masculine nonbinary people say they feel left out of the conversation.

On Tuesday, Alex Petrovnia, 25, took to Twitter to express his frustration. "It is so bitter to be excluded from conversations about reproductive care as a trans man, especially as we have been raising the alarms for this very eventuality for years," he wrote.

About a year ago, Petrovnia founded the Trans Formations Project, an organization that provides information about anti-trans legislation and helps individuals identify which state representatives to contact. "For trans people, the crisis has been ongoing," Petrovnia said in an interview.

Access to reproductive health care is a matter very close to Petrovnia, he said: He and his husband, who is also a trans man, have been trying to get hysterectomies for the past two years. With an impending move to St. Louis, Petrovnia feels it's crucial that they get them now.

"This is going to kill people. This is going to kill trans people," he said of the possibility of Roe getting overturned. "Not only through people having to carry pregnancies that they don't want - but many, many trans people get their [hormone therapy] and get other essential medical care through facilities that are going to be shut down."

If Roe is overturned, a majority of people of childbearing age would face new abortion limits. But advocates say that difficulties accessing care are compounded for those in the transgender community - many report facing stigma or discrimination navigating the health-care system. And for trans people of color and low-income trans people, in particular, curbing access to abortion care could result in dire consequences for people's physical and mental health, according to advocates.

Oliver Hall, a trans-masculine nonbinary person, had a self-managed abortion at 19. They said that if they had gone through the traditional health-care system, they would've had to go to the women's surgical center - which they said "signaled to me I was going to have a bad experience, being trans-masculine" - get an ultrasound and be counseled on their other options for the pregnancy.

"That was not something I was willing to go through," they said.

Now 27, Hall is the trans health director for the reproductive justice organization Kentucky Health Justice Network, which helps trans and nonbinary people navigate the health-care system.

Their organization provides patients financial support for abortions, including lodging, child care and transportation, Hall said. It is preparing to continue to provide this care to trans people in Kentucky, no matter the Supreme Court decision, they added.

"If Roe v. Wade is overturned, abortion will be automatically illegal in the state of Kentucky, so we're trying to raise a large amount of money to be able to get people to other states, like Illinois, where they will still be able to access abortion care," Hall said.

Right now, state-mandated counseling and a waiting period mean that many people have to take multiple days off work and find transportation for appointments, according to Hall.

That means access is already difficult for trans people, Hall said, noting that trans people are more likely to live in poverty and be unemployed or underemployed, and are less likely to have insurance.

"All bad health-care policy disproportionately affects trans people," Hall said.

Another difficulty for trans men, in particular, is misinformation about the risk of pregnancy while on hormone therapy, according to Hall. "A lot of doctors give patients the impression that you are infertile after a certain point of being on testosterone, which is absolutely incorrect," Hall said. "So people aren't thinking they need to be taking a pregnancy test even if they've been having unprotected sex, because they don't know that it's a possibility."

Quinn Jackson, 33, a trans man and family medicine physician in Kansas City, Kan., said that while testosterone reduces hormones that cause ovulation, it's not "reliable enough at stopping ovulation to be considered contraception."

Jackson was an abortion provider for two years before he took his current job. He said he doesn't think cisgender people understand the fear that many trans people experience when seeking medical care and obtaining abortions.

"I wish people knew how hard it is, and how scary it is, to access medical care when you're trans," Jackson said. "And how really terrifying it can be and stressful it can be to worry about how you're going to be treated and how you're going to be perceived."

According to one study, about 30 percent of transgender people reported delaying or discontinuing seeking care because of fear of discrimination, and approximately 1 in 4 transgender people said they were denied equal treatment in health-care settings.

Kristofer Thomas, a 24-year-old trans man and screenwriter living in New York City, has been following state bills that seek to restrict gender-affirming care for transgender people. When he learned about one of the proposals to ban hormone therapy for minors, he said he thought, "We are first, and then everyone is going to fall in line. Next is Roe v. Wade and Obergefell."

He had been planning on getting bottom surgery and a hysterectomy but wants to accelerate those plans now, he added.

Emmett Schelling, a 41-year-old trans man and executive director of the Transgender Education Network of Texas, said that the risks facing trans people are dire.

"The people who actually burn when everything burns down are people like me, are Black trans women, are queer kids who have been kicked out on the streets by their family," he said. "[They] are at enormous risk for sexual assault, for physical assault, for a lifetime of poverty, a lifetime of lack of health-care access."

In his time at the Transgender Education Network of Texas, Schelling said his organization has been approached by trans men and nonbinary people seeking safe means to obtain abortions. According to Schelling, even before Texas's six-week abortion ban went into effect, it has been increasingly difficult for individuals to find abortion care in Texas, especially trans men.

That's largely because, Schelling said, trans people's stake in abortion access "has been erased."

As he put it: "What happens when you leave out any people who are affected and impacted directly and deeply, by any piece of policy? ... It produces gaps in strategy, it produces gaps in the understanding of the impact and the effects, and it produces gaps in galvanizing cohesive power."

Brazilian activist says Mexico detained her over 'transvestite' identity




Transgender woman deported from Mexico speaks in Sao Paulo


Fri, May 6, 2022,

(Reuters) -Keila Simpson, a Brazilian activist for trans people and those who identify as "transvestites," says she was detained and denied entry to Mexico City's international airport last Sunday because authorities objected to the discrepancy between her appearance and the name in her passport.

The 57-year-old activist and president of Brazil's Association of Transvestites and Transsexuals (Antra) had been set to attend the 2022 World Social Forum - a gathering of LGBTQ, indigenous and environmental activists - in the Mexican capital. But Simpson says she was detained after showing a passport with her former name, which airport staff allegedly called an "incongruity" with her appearance.

In Brazil, a person can change their social name without the need to change their sex, according to a 2018 Supreme Court ruling. But the choice to do so is up to the individual. Simpson, who identifies as a transvestite and not transgender, had not changed hers.

Simpson told Reuters she had been detained for 10 hours and was not allowed access to her lawyer.

Mexico's Migration entity said in a statement that Simpson did not state the requested information upon arrival, like where she would stay, the activities she was going to participate in and her return ticket information.

"The immigration authority acted based on the law and unrestricted respect for the human rights of migrants, regardless of their ethnic or national origin, sex, age, religion or gender identity," it added.

But Simpson's lawyer, Gustavo Coutinho, said she had all the required documentation with her and that other members of her delegation were granted entry with the same documents.

Mexico's foreign ministry declined comment.

"My documents had my original name, and that's my identity (transvestite). The photo in my passport is new, and it is valid until 2028," added Simpson, who lives in Brazil's northeastern city of Salvador.

While the term "transvestite" is regarded as offensive in many Western countries, in Brazil it refers to a person whose gender identity does not fit into the two commonly used male and female ones - in contrast to transgender people who may go through a transition process.

"The only thing I have that identifies me as a transvestite is my ID," she said. "If I change it, I would erase myself as a transvestite."

Brazil and Mexico are the world's deadliest countries for transgender and gender nonconforming people, according to a survey conducted by Transgender Europe (TGEU), a network of non-profits advocating for trans rights globally.

Despite the efforts by some trans politicians to change rules and fight prejudice, Latin America remains as one of the worst regions for trans people in the world. [L1N2V402R]

(Reporting by Carolina Pulice and Carla Carniel; Additional reporting by Lizbeth Diaz; Editing by Steven Grattan and Aurora Ellis)