ABOLISH THE DEATH PENALTY

Missouri carries out first US execution of a transgender person

Amber McLaughlin, convicted of murder, was executed by lethal injection after being denied clemency.

McLaughlin was executed by lethal injection [File: Jeremy S Weis for the Federal Public Defender Office/AP Photo]

Published On 4 Jan 2023

A Missouri inmate was put to death on Tuesday for a 2003 killing in what is believed to be the first execution of a transgender person in the United States.

Amber McLaughlin, 49, was convicted of stalking and killing a former girlfriend, then dumping the body near the Mississippi River in St Louis.


McLaughlin’s fate was sealed earlier on Tuesday when Republican Governor Mike Parson declined a clemency request.

McLaughlin spoke with a spiritual adviser at her side as the fatal dose of pentobarbital was injected. She was pronounced dead a few minutes later,

In a final written statement, McLaughlin regretted her actions. “I am sorry for what I did,” she said. “I am a loving and caring person.”

A database on the website for the anti-execution Death Penalty Information Center shows that 1,558 people have been executed since the death penalty was reinstated in the mid-1970s. All but 17 of those put to death were men.

The centre said there are no known previous cases of an openly transgender inmate being executed.



McLaughlin began transitioning about three years ago at the state prison in Potosi.

The clemency petition cited McLaughlin’s traumatic childhood and mental health issues, which the jury never heard during her trial.

A foster parent rubbed faeces in her face when she was a toddler and her adoptive father used a stun gun on her, according to the petition. It cited severe depression that resulted in multiple suicide attempts, both as a child and as an adult.

The petition also included reports citing a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, a condition that causes anguish and other symptoms as a result of a disparity between a person’s gender identity and their assigned sex at birth.

But McLaughlin’s sexual identity was “not the main focus” of the clemency request, her lawyer, Larry Komp, said.

In 2003, long before transitioning, McLaughlin was in a relationship with Beverly Guenther. After they stopped dating, McLaughlin would show up at the suburban St Louis office where the 45-year-old Guenther worked, sometimes hiding inside the building, according to court records.

Guenther obtained a restraining order and police officers occasionally escorted her to her car after work.

Guenther’s neighbours called police the night of November 20, 2003, when she failed to return home. Officers went to the office building, where they found a broken knife handle near her car and a trail of blood.

A day later, McLaughlin led police to a location near the Mississippi River in St Louis, where the body had been dumped. Authorities said she had been raped and stabbed repeatedly with a steak knife.

McLaughlin was convicted of first-degree murder in 2006. A judge sentenced McLaughlin to death after a jury was deadlocked on the sentence. Komp said Missouri and Indiana are the only states that allow a judge to sentence someone to death.

A court in 2016 ordered a new sentencing hearing, but a federal appeals court panel reinstated the death penalty in 2021.

“McLaughlin terrorised Ms Guenther in the final years of her life, but we hope her family and loved ones may finally have some peace,” Parson said in a written statement after the execution.

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SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

Opinions|Censorship

The US is inspiring education censorship elsewhere

The US likes to lecture others on democracy and free speech, but is now leading the way on classroom censorship.

Nadine Farid Johnson
Managing Director, PEN America Washington
Published On 4 Jan 2023

In school districts around the United States, book bans are spreading at an alarming rate. PEN America recently documented more than 2,500 book bans issued across 32 different states during the 2021-22 school year.

These bans are not isolated incidents, but part of a coordinated assault on public education that’s taking aim at the teaching of race, gender, LGBTQ+ identities and US history.end of list

While demands to ban books in schools in the US are not new, over the last year and a half, book banning has erupted into a national movement. Coordinated and highly organised activist groups have transformed school board meetings into political battlegrounds, threatening educators and undermining students’ freedom to learn.

These efforts to censor books are an affront to the core principles of free expression and open inquiry that US democracy swears by. But equally worrying is the fact that this pattern of attacks on public education in the US appears to be inspiring similar efforts in other countries, even though such censorship campaigns haven’t had as much success there yet.

In the United Kingdom, officials are raising the spectre of critical race theory in schools — an issue that was not previously a topic of debate or concern — to try and stop the teaching of histories that explore systemic racism. That’s part of what authors and others have described as a mood “shift” in the UK — a budding “culture war” that is leading to the censorship and removal of books from school shelves. Books being removed are often children’s books that look at institutional racism, diversity and LGBTQ+ identities.

Echoes of US-based group tactics are also manifesting in Canada, with parental groups asking school boards to ban certain books — again with LGBTQ+ content — and seeking to change curricular topics that they see as being part of the teaching of critical race theory. The movement is also gaining the attention of politicians. Australia’s Senate voted against the inclusion of critical race theory in the country’s school curriculum in 2021.

Of course, educational censorship laws and book bans, particularly those aimed at silencing certain peoples, religions, or viewpoints, are tactics that have long been used by governments.

For example, in apartheid South Africa, the notorious Publications Act of 1974 permitted the banning of any “undesirable” material. That could include anything from material that “offended” public morals and religious sensibilities to books that challenged the apartheid ideology or undermined state security.

But the US has always viewed itself as a beacon of democracy — even though it has often failed to live up to its self-declared values and principles. Now, the signs are ominous. In 2021, the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance classified the US as a backsliding democracy for the first time.

This year, a Tennessee school board removed “Maus” from classrooms; this Pulitzer Prize-winning graphic novel about the Holocaust has previously been banned in Russia. School districts in Florida and Pennsylvania have banned biographies of women, including at one point former First Lady Michelle Obama, Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and Nobel Laureate Malala Yousafzai. Others have carried out wholesale removals of books, often with LGBTQ+ protagonists, based on unsupported charges of “obscene” content.

These moves in the US have parallels with what’s happening in other countries Washington often lectures on human rights and liberal values.

Turkey has banned the sale of books such as Good Night Stories for Rebel Girls — which offers a series of inspiring stories about women in history — to children.

Hungary, meanwhile, has banned an entire academic discipline: In 2018, the government officially removed gender studies Master’s and PhD programmes from the list of accredited subjects in the country. Last year, the government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban passed a law banning LGBTQ+ content for minors in schools.

And recently, Russia enacted a sweeping anti-LGBTQ+ bill that expands its definition of “LGBTQ propaganda,” targeting books, films, online and public activity, and advertisements. The law was introduced in reaction to a YA novel with LGBTQ+ protagonists.

Brazil has waged similar campaigns against ‘indoctrination’ and ‘gender ideology’ in schools, with lawmakers at the federal, state, and municipal levels introducing more than 200 legislative proposals since 2014 to ban gender and sexuality education and ‘indoctrination’ in schools. Human Rights Watch has confirmed that at least 21 laws directly or indirectly banning gender and sexuality education remain in force in Brazil as of May 2022.

As in the US, these bans run afoul of constitutional principles, which allow comprehensive sexuality education in Brazil. Educators in South America’s largest nation have reported a chilling effect on their willingness to talk about gender and sexuality in classrooms. Many of them face harassment and intimidation for teaching these subjects.

Teachers in the US have described a similar chilling effect due to book bans and other forms of educational censorship, with many proactively removing books and lesson plans from their classrooms in order to avoid potential backlash.

These trends represent a concerning step backwards for democratic norms: Freedom of expression depends on access to literature and information, especially in our schools, where students are exposed to a wide range of ideas to prepare them for the challenges of democratic citizenship.

Students from historically marginalised communities around the world face the most harm when these narratives are removed from classrooms, as it sends the message that their experiences are not socially acceptable or suitable for school.

Book bans and legislative efforts to restrict academic freedom are anathema to healthy democracies at home and abroad. Fighting back against these coordinated movements is essential to protect free expression and other democratic values across the globe.

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance

Nadine Farid Johnson
Managing Director, PEN America Washington
Nadine Farid Johnson is managing director of PEN America Washington and Free Expression Programs.

Uzbeks without power, Tashkent imam: gas shortage comes from Allah

He incites the population to accept the situation and submit. Critics: he makes a living smuggling a false religion. For social users, bureaucrats and rulers are to blame for the crisis. Local clergy obey state directives.

Moscow (AsiaNews) - A serious energy crisis broke out in Uzbekistan in December. Throughout the country, electricity is rationed for a few hours a day and long queues of motorists are thronging at service stations. Faced with the growing tension among the population, the chief imam of the capital Tashkent, Rakhmatulla Sayfiddinov, who has long been known for his 'scandalous' statements, delivered a solemn speech in which he called on all believers to show gratitude and forbearance.

Sayfiddinov emphasised that 'our ancestors lived without gas and electricity, one must accept the will of Allah'. According to him, local Muslims must not become 'the shame of the world', animatedly raising the issue on all social media. The preacher warned that 'panic, riots and protests will not solve the problems', but these words only caused further upset among the socially active citizens.

Journalist Umid Soriev wrote on his Facebook page that "once again at the most sensitive moment, the campaign for gratitude and patience is being reintroduced, diverting citizens from actions in defence of their rights, and this campaign must be stopped immediately, one must have the courage to express one's discomfort'. In his opinion, the imam 'pushes simple people to live in slavery and subjugation."

Humanitarian activist Musannif Adkham stated in turn that 'blaming people who are shivering in the cold, who spend their nights waiting for their turn at petrol stations and wander in the dark, accusing them of ingratitude and inciting them to endure a situation that seems to have no end, all this is blasphemous, a way of making a living by smuggling a false religion'. The Telegram channel Platforma.uz wrote that today "politicians are turning into petulant and bigoted mullahs, while the servants of the cult devote themselves to geopolitics."

Users of social networks respond to Imam Sayfiddinov that it is not the people who should be criticised, but the bureaucrats and rulers who failed to take the necessary measures to prepare for the winter season last summer. The imam, who was appointed to the highest religious dignity in the capital last year, has long been stirring up heated discussions with his controversial lectures on various social issues.

Already in 2018, as imam of the 'MirzaYusuf' cathedral mosque, he had made a plea at Friday prayers to get rid of the 'shameful phenomenon' of male gynaecologists, and had lashed out against the evil influence of Turkey's TV dramas about the genocide of the Uzbeks. During his homily, he had also proclaimed that 'women who during the sexual act with their husbands have fantasies about other men, perhaps handsome actors, will end up producing gay children'.

The grand imam of Tashkent, by the way, is not the only spiritual leader in Uzbekistan to incite the population to submission and gratitude during the energy crisis, but he is in tune with most of his colleagues and brethren, and many believe that these are actually directives distributed by the State Administration for Religious Affairs, together with the Committee for Religion at the Council of Ministers. The Soviet inheritance, characteristic for all Central Asian countries, still considers religion as an 'instrumentum regni', and this also applies to Islam, assimilated more to the 'Byzantine symphony' than to the Mohammedan theocracy, forcing the local clergy to obey state directives.

MONOPOLY CAPITALI$M

Indian tribunal rejects Google's request to suspend antitrust ruling

In October, the Competition Commission of India (CCI) fined Alphabet Inc's Google $161 million for exploiting its dominant position in markets such as online search and the Android app store.

The Google logo pictured on the side of the Google India office building in Hyderabad

 (file)/ (Noah Seelam / AFP)

An Indian tribunal declined a request on Wednesday by Google to block an antitrust ruling that ordered the tech giant to change its approach to its Android platform, dealing the US firm a setback in a key growth market.

The CCI has also asked it to change curbs on smartphone makers related to pre-installing apps.

During the hearing, Google's counsel, Abhishek Manu Singhvi, repeatedly pushed for putting the decision on hold, or extending the date of implementation of CCI's directives beyond January 19. He said the CCI's decision will force the company to change its business model and harm consumer interest.

READ MORE: Google fined over $160M by Indian watchdog over market dominance

The tribunal did not agree. "We are of opinion that at the moment given the voluminous nature of the appeal, there is no need to pass any interim order," the two-member tribunal panel said.

Google told the tribunal in a legal filing that CCI's investigation unit copied parts of a European ruling against the US firm from a similar verdict on abuse of market dominance of its Android operating system, Reuters reported on Tuesday.

The CCI investigators "copy-pasted extensively from a European Commission decision, deploying evidence from Europe that was not examined in India", Google alleged.

The CCI has not responded yet to those allegations.

Google faces second antitrust charge by EU

Google blocks Chinese app TikTok in India after court order

Huawei says nine-month revenue up despite US pressure

Life of Muslims in 'Modi-fied' India

Sharjah satellite blasts off to space from Cape Canaveral
Sharjah Sat 1 taken to low-Earth orbit on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket

The Sharjah Sat 1 satellite about to launch on the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at Cape Canaveral, Florida. Photo: Wam

The National
Jan 04, 2023

Sheikh Sultan bin Ahmed Al Qasimi, Deputy Ruler of Sharjah, praised the launch of the Sharjah Sat 1 satellite that blasted off to space on Tuesday.

The miniature satellite, which weights less than 4kg, was carried by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that lifted off from Cape Canaveral in Florida, state news agency Wam reported.

It has an expected life span of about three years during which it will conduct various scientific tasks such as studying the Sun, X-ray emissions and space weather during its mission in low-Earth orbit at an altitude of 550km.

It is equipped with sensors, camera and communication devices and will boost the University of Sharjah's capacity to handle larger projects.

Sheikh Sultan watched the launch at the Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences and Technology at the university. The satellite was built by teams from the academy and university, in co-operation with international partners.


Sheikh Sultan, who is president of the university, said it continues to work hard to establish scientific and research projects that serve humanity and enable students and researchers to develop their skills.

"We start our year by reaching space and we commend the efforts of the Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Science and Technology, and we are proud of the Emirati cadres of engineers and researchers who worked on the completion of Sharjah Sat 1," he said.

Sheikh Sultan bin Ahmed Al Qasimi, Deputy Ruler of Sharjah, at the Sharjah Academy for Astronomy, Space Sciences and Technology for the launch. Photo: Wam

The launch comes in a busy year for the UAE space programme. The country's Rashid Moon rover blasted off in December on a journey that is expected to last five months before a lunar landing is attempted.

Sheikh Sultan congratulated Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Ruler of Sharjah, and the UAE leadership on the launch of Sharjah satellite, saying that the UAE has taken successful and steady steps towards space exploration.

Dr Hamid Al Naimiy, chancellor of the University of Sharjah and director general of the academy, thanked the Ruler and Deputy Ruler for their great support. The event was also attended by officials from the university, teaching staff and a group of specialists, researchers and students.

Why Anti-Taliban Resistance Should be Supported

Taliban 2.0 has proven to be not much different from its previous version

Manish Rai | Ekurd.net

Posted on January 4, 2023 

Recently the Taliban have ordered an indefinite ban on university education for the country’s women, the ministry of higher education said in a letter issued to all government and private universities. Before this drastic decision last year, the Ministry of Women’s Affairs was dissolved. And the sinister Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice has been re-established. This clearly illustrates that the Taliban will carry on with its medieval conservative interpretation of Islam they are nothing more than an extremist group that has grabbed power. In addition to that, the Taliban is still nurturing global jihadi elements they just outrightly lie that they don’t have any global ambitions. This was clearly illustrated when in August last year a U.S. drone killed al Qaeda’s leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in a Kabul apartment reportedly owned by Taliban’s senior leader and interior minister Sirajuddin Haqqani. Afghanistan after the Taliban’s takeover has become a haven for global and regional terror outfits like-Al-Qaeda, Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, which seeks the overthrow of the Pakistani state.

Taliban 2.0 has proven to be not much different from its previous version in terms of harboring an ultra-conservative ideology, policies, and practices. Hibatullah Akhundzada, the Taliban’s supreme leader, has in his speeches regularly emphasized that the struggle does not end in Afghanistan but goes beyond its borders to help all oppressed Muslims throughout the world. So, if the international community does not want Afghanistan turned into a hub for terrorism, the best option for it is to support the Anti-Taliban resistance groups which will also be a cheaper option than maintaining any form of armed presence. Around 40 Afghan warlords and exiled politicians convened a meeting and formed a High Council of National Resistance in Ankara in May 2022. To showcase that their respective anti-Taliban resistance can form a united front. The members include former Balkh province governor Atta Mohammad Noor, National Resistance Front (NRF) member Ahmad Wali Massoud, and Shia leader Mohammad Mohaqiq.

The most important group leading the resistance is the National Resistance Front (NRF) which is the biggest anti-Taliban armed group. It’s believed to have several thousand fighters and is led by Ahmad Massoud, the son of the late Northern Alliance commander Ahmad Shah Massoud. Despite the limited resources, the NRF is gaining ground mainly due to Talibans’ failings and their own successful operations. The killing of Mullah Zakir Qayyum, an important Taliban commander by NRF in September last year showcased this. It has become self-evident in Afghanistan that once an armed resistance group gains a foothold in an area it becomes hard to root out. This is more so if it is able to mobilize a degree of local support and operates in a geographically remote area. Since the takeover of Afghanistan by the Islamists, NRF appears to have achieved just that in the provinces of Panjshir, Baghlan, and Parwan in the country’s northeast. This has been done despite significant odds and without much outside support.

Ideologically, NRF embraces a moderate central Asian Islamic tradition espousing reason and cultural propagation. It advocates a decentralized political system in Afghanistan based on elections as well as promoting equality regardless of gender, ethnicity, sectarian or linguistic origin. The NRF has the potential to establish territorial enclaves if provided with money and armaments in its northeastern strongholds. With assistance from the United Nations, it could restore some public services as well. Most importantly it could bring back education for girls and provide refuge for those at immediate risk of persecution like Afghanistan’s Shia community. International humanitarian help in NRF-controlled areas might also offer a solution to the likely migration of millions of Afghans to neighboring regions and to Europe.

With domestic and outside support, perhaps the NRF could play its part not only in bringing down the Taliban but in establishing a more moderate and representative government to take its place. In a recent interview with Foreign Policy Research Institute Mr. Ali Nazari, the head of foreign relations of the National Resistance Front said that they are pursuing a resistance strategy divided into various phases. He said now they are in the first stage of gathering strength in the countryside while exhausting their enemy. The NRF hopes to move soon to the next stage of the insurgency by liberating selected regions of the country, which would allow them to gain the resources for the final stage of fighting to overthrow Taliban rule.

It’s a matter of fact that now NRF is the most liberal and democratic force that can be relied on as a counterterrorism ally in Afghanistan. Also, the United States and its allies should strengthen the NRF to fight other terrorist groups in Afghanistan. This approach is already successfully being used by the West in Syria and Iraq by supporting Kurdish fighters to fight against the Islamic State.

Manish Rai, is a columnist for Middle-East and Af-Pak region and Editor of geo-political news agency, Views Around and a contributing writer for Ekurd.net, see below.

The opinions are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of Ekurd.net or its editors.

Copyright © 2023 Ekurd.net. All rights reserved

BURMA/MYANMAR

SPIRIT ANIMAL
Myanmar’s junta trumpets white elephant as sign of right to rule

The white elephant was born in Myanmar's Rakhine state in 2022, and its birth is being portrayed as fortuitous by the junta. 

PHOTO: AFP
UPDATED
31 MINS AGO

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NAYPYITAW - Though it is a pariah on the world stage and battling fierce domestic opposition to its rule, Myanmar’s junta has found grounds for optimism – the birth of a rare albino elephant.

Since seizing power, the junta has crushed democracy protests, jailed ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi and been accused of committing war crimes in its bid to quell dissent.

But the birth of the elephant – more milky-grey than white – in western Rahkine state last year is being portrayed by junta-controlled media as fortuitous.


Ancient rulers regarded white elephants as extremely auspicious, and their appearance was taken as a symbol of righteous political power.

The pale pachyderm will feature on a special postage stamp released this week to mark the 75th anniversary of Myanmar’s independence from Britain, state media said on Tuesday.

A set of gold commemorative coins bearing the animal’s image is also already being cast for the occasion, another report said.

The tusker tot’s highest-profile engagement so far was a meeting with junta chief Min Aung Hlaing in October, when the senior general bestowed it a name at a televised ceremony.

“Rattha Nandaka” comes from the ancient Pali words for “country” and “happiness”.

To bolster the credentials of its newfound good omen, state media has insisted the beast has an almost impeccable pedigree.

According to the experts quoted, it possesses seven of the eight standard characteristics for an albino elephant, including “pearl-coloured eyes” and a “plantain branch-shaped back”.

The Powers of Nature

In Myanmar, where astrological charts are drawn at birth and fortune-tellers consulted for both daily and political decisions – the craze for white elephants goes back hundreds of years.

Traditional chronicles tell of kings in Thailand, Laos and Myanmar – then known as Burma – warring to capture the beasts from rivals.

The ruinous cost of keeping them in appropriately lavish style gave rise to the modern expression in which a “white elephant” is a useless, if beautiful, possession.

One creature inherited by a 19th century Burmese king was waited on by thirty servants and dressed in a “fine red cloth plentifully studded” with rubies and diamonds, according to a visiting British official.

The king, who had usurped his brother, “would gladly hail the capture of a real white elephant in his own day as an assent from the Powers of Nature to his own legitimate royalty,” the envoy added.

But the fortunes of the creatures are tied up with the ruler under whom they were captured.

Two elephants, once feted by a former junta, are now confined to a damp, out-of-the-way compound in commercial hub Yangon where they receive few visitors.

“Rattha Nandaka” will spend its days in a special compound for white elephants in military-built capital NaypyiTaw.

But with swathes of the country still ravaged by fighting and the junta widely reviled, his birth has been met with public scepticism and scorn.

“It seems like they forgot to put suncream on,” one social media user wrote about the baby elephant’s more grey than albino appearance.

“Now it’s black.”

Black or white, another wrote, the baby was “now a prisoner”. AFP

Junta’s biggest threat at bay amid widespread domestic resistance to its rule.

Suu Kyi is being held in a jail in Naypyitaw in solitary confinement, and the military insists she has received due process in an independent court.

Authorities typically release some prisoners to mark the day when Myanmar declared independence from British rule. However, it was not immediately clear if the military would free any political detainees this time.

The United States, the European Union and countries such as Britain and Canada have imposed sanctions on Myanmar’s military and individuals deemed to have helped the junta come to power.

In a further rebuke, the U.N. Security Council last month adopted its first resolution on Myanmar in 74 years, demanding an end to violence and for the junta to free all political detainees.

Referring to international pressure, Min Aung Hlaing hit out at what he said were “disruptions from countries and organizations who want to intervene in Myanmar’s internal affairs.”

Still, the junta has maintained some international support. The U.N. Security Council remains split over how to deal with the Myanmar crisis, with China and Russia arguing against strong action. They also both abstained from last month’s vote on the resolution, along with India.

Thailand also hosted regional talks last month to discuss the crisis, including rare international appearances by junta ministers, even as several key members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, vocal in their criticism of the junta, did not attend.

ASEAN is leading diplomatic peace efforts and Myanmar’s generals have been barred from the bloc’s high-profile gatherings for failing to honor promises to start talks with opponents linked to Suu Kyi’s ousted government.

 

Myanmar’s junta pardons more than 7,000 prisoners

The Independence Day amnesty includes a former National League for Democracy minister, authors and journalists.

By RFA Burmese
2023.01.04

Family members greet prisoners being released from Insein Prison, Yangon on Jan. 4, 2023 RFA

Myanmar’s military rulers ordered the release of 7,012 inmates, including some political prisoners, in an Independence Day amnesty Wednesday.

Detainees held in prisons and police stations across the country had their sentences reduced in accordance with Section 401 of the Penal Code, according to junta news releases received by RFA.

Wednesday marks the 75th anniversary of the end of British colonial rule.

Lawyers, who wished to remain anonymous, told RFA some political prisoners had already returned to their homes early Wednesday, while families of others were still waiting outside prisons.

Minister of Religious Affairs under the National League for Democracy-led government, Thura Aung Ko, was released from Yangon’s Insein Prison Tuesday night. He had been serving a 12-year sentence for alleged corruption. Police officers and soldiers took him to his home in Yangon, his daughter wrote on her Facebook page.

The National League for Democracy won a landslide victory in 2020 elections but the NLD-led government was overthrown in a February, 2021 coup. The junta has arrested many party members along with the country’s ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi, who was sentenced to a total of 33 years in prison, and President Win Myint who faces 12 years behind bars.

There was no indication that Suu Kyi or Win Myint were included in the amnesty.

Author Than Myint Aung shortly after her release from Insein Prison, 

Yangon on Jan. 4, 2023. Credit: RFA

Writers freed

Among those released from Yangon’s Insein prison were authors Than Myint Aung and Htin Lin Oo, a Yangon lawyer, who didn’t want to be named for safety reasons, told RFA.

Than Myint Aung is a well-known fiction writer who also worked for many charities in Myanmar. She had been serving a three-year sentence for alleged incitement. Htin Lin Oo was also sentenced to three years in prison for sedition.

Poet Myo Tay Zar Maung, who had been sentenced to two years for sedition, was freed from Yamethin Prison north of Naypyidaw Wednesday.

Journalists Kyaw Zeya and Ah Hla Lay Thu Zar were also among those set to be freed as was Naing Ngan Lin, the social affairs minister for Yangon region under the NLD-led government.

In spite of the Independence Day amnesty, and one on National Day last November, the junta continues to target opposition politicians and real or alleged pro-democracy activists. More than 16,800 have arrested since the coup, according to Thailand-based monitoring group, the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (Burma). Ahead of Wednesday’s amnesty, it said 13,375 political prisoners were still being held.

Translated by RFA Burmese. Written in English by Mike Firn.

San Antonio-area militia spins COVID conspiracy after collapse of Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin

This Is Texas Freedom Force, the extremist group spreading the claim, is the same one that recently staged an armed demonstration against a San Antonio drag show.

By Michael Karlis on Tue, Jan 3, 2023

Instagram / d.ham3

Buffalo Bill's safety Damar Hamlin, 24, (pictured above) collapsed on the field Monday night after making a tackle against Cincinnati Bengals wide receiver Tee Higgins.A San Antonio-area militia group known for protesting drag shows and stirring up trouble at BLM demonstrations wasted no time spinning COVID-19 vaccine conspiracies about Monday's collapse of Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin.

Less than an hour after Hamlin, 24, suffered cardiac arrest during the Bills game, This Is Texas Freedom Force (TITFF) posted an online poll suggesting that Hamlin's health issue — which the far-right group incorrectly diagnosed as fatal — was related to the COVID-19 vaccine.

"What are the odds the Covid vaccine played a role in the death of the Buffalo Bills player on the field?" TITFF posed in its tweet.

TITFF later corrected its original Tweet, following reports confirming that Hamlin hadn't died. However, as of Tuesday afternoon, the athlete remains in critical condition.

Twitter users blasted TITFF, saying the timing of its poll was inappropriate.

"It's despicable that you would post such a poll at this time," user @DonaldBRouseJr commented on the poll. "You might consider looking up the definition of "class" as you guys have none."

"This is a disgusting poll." You should be ashamed of yourself," user @OGBillyBaroo chimed in.

If TITFF's acronym sounds familiar, it may be because this is the same group that made headlines last month by staging an armed protest in front of a drag show at San Antonio's Aztec Theatre. The group claimed without proof that drag performances "groom" children so they can be more easily targeted by sexual predators.

The militia's tweet about the Bills player's collapse is likely alluding to conspiracy theories that falsely claim COVID-19 vaccines are causing people to drop dead. The allegation was circulated in Died Suddenly, a fringe "documentary" that's been debunked by academics and physicians.

It's still unclear what led to Hamlin's sudden heart attack. However, physicians including Dr. Brian Stutterer, a sports medicine expert at the Mayo Clinic, suspect a tackle during the game might have triggered a rare phenomenon known as Commotio Cordis.

"Essentially what can happen is if you have a blunt trauma to the chest that occurs at exactly the right time in the cardiac electrical cycle, your heart can be sent into cardiac arrest," Stutterer said in a now-viral Youtube video.

Commotio Cordis is often associated with baseball and can happen when a player is struck in the chest by a pitch, the physician explained.

While rare, the phenomenon has occurred before in professional sports. During a Stanley Cup Playoff game in 1998, St. Louis Blues defenseman Chris Pronger collapsed after being hit in the chest with a puck. He was rushed to Detroit's Henry Ford Hospital and quickly recovered.

"This is not something that people should go speculate about vaccines or anything like that causing this cardiac arrest," Stutterer said in his video. "There was a clear contact to clear trauma, and I think a clear reason why, unfortunately, this happened for Hamlin."

Exclusive-World Bank seeks more funds to address climate change, other crises -document

By David Lawder
2023/01/03

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The World Bank is seeking to vastly expand its lending capacity to address climate change and other global crises and will negotiate with shareholders ahead of April meetings on proposals that include a capital increase and new lending tools, according to an "evolution roadmap" seen by Reuters on Monday.

The roadmap document - sent to shareholder governments - marks the start of a negotiation process to alter the bank's mission and financial resources and shift it away from a country- and project-specific lending model used since its creation at the end of World War Two.

The World Bank management aims to have specific proposals to change its mission, operating model and financial capacity ready for approval by the joint World Bank and International Monetary Fund Development Committee in October, according to the document.

A World Bank spokesman said that the document aimed to provide details on the scope, approach, and timetable for the evolution, with regular updates for shareholders and decisions later in the year.

The reform of multilateral development banks was a topic of fierce debate in recent months after developing countries faced mounting pressure from inflation, energy and food shortages fueled by Russia's war in Ukraine, slowing growth, mounting debt burdens and growing vulnerability to climate shocks.

The pressures laid bare the inadequacy of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund's (IMF) structures - designed at the end of World War Two to focus on rebuilding peacetime economies - to deal with current global calamities.

AAA  RATING TO STAY

The development lender will explore options like a potential new capital increase, changes to its capital structure to unlock more lending and new financing tools such as guarantees for private sector loans and other ways to mobilize more private capital, according to the document.

But the World Bank Group (WBG) is not ready to bow to demands from some non-profit organizations to abandon its longstanding top-tier credit rating to boost lending, stating: "Management will explore all options that increase the capacity of the WBG whilst maintaining the AAA rating of the WBG entities."

U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has called for the World Bank and others to revamp their business models to boost lending and harness private capital to fund investments that more broadly benefit the world, such as helping middle-income countries transition away from coal power.

A U.S. Treasury spokesperson declined comment on the World Bank document.

A spokesperson for Britain's foreign office said the UK "strongly supports" the World Bank proposals to explore all options to further increase support to developing and emerging economies.

The bank said proposals under consideration include higher statutory lending limits, lower equity-to-loan requirements and the use of callable capital - money pledged but not paid in by member governments - for lending.

Development experts say this shift would greatly increase the amount of lending compared to the current capital structure, which only utilizes paid-in capital.

"The challenges the world is facing call for a massive step up in the international community's support," the bank said in the document. "For the WBG to continue to play a central role in development and climate finance, it will need a concerted effort by both shareholders and management to step up WBG financing capacity."

INADEQUATE FUNDING

The roadmap document cautions that a build-up of lending for climate change, health care, food security and other needs may require a capital increase to boost the capacity of the World Bank's middle-income lending arm, the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD).

IBRD's $13 billion capital increase in 2018 "was designed to be prepared for one mid-sized crisis a decade, and not multiple, overlapping crises" including the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the effects of accelerating climate change, the document said. IBRD's crisis buffers will likely be depleted by mid-2023, it said.

Another option, according to the roadmap, is for World Bank shareholder countries to step up periodic contributions to the lender's fund for the world's poorest countries, the International Development Association (IDA), which have declined in recent years despite increasing needs.

The roadmap also offers the option of creating a new concessional lending trust fund for middle-income countries that would focus on global public goods and be similar in structure to IDA, with regular funding replenishments that would be separate from the bank's capital structure.

"Such a fund may attract donor bilateral resources separate from shareholder budget lines supporting the WBG, and potentially include donors beyond shareholders," such as private foundations, the bank said.

But environmental campaign group Friends of the Earth said the proposal did not go far enough and World Bank shareholders needed to ensure the lender was not "part of the problem".

"A true evolutionary roadmap must commit to ending financing for fossil fuels, industrial animal agriculture, petrochemical infrastructure, corporate-friendly false solutions, and harmful activities in biodiverse areas," Luisa Abbott Galvao, Senior International Policy Campaigner for Friends of the Earth, said in an emailed statement.

The World Bank also said that the evolution of its mission to increase climate lending while maintaining good development outcomes will require additional staff and budget resources, which have declined 3% in real terms over the past 15 years.

(Reporting by David Lawder; additional reporting by David Milliken in London, additional writing by Karin Strohecker, editing by Grant McCool)

© Reuters

Bolivia farm region blocks borders, grain transport as protests lead to clashes

Reuters
January 03, 2023


By Adam Jourdan and Daniel Ramos

SANTA CRUZ/LA PAZ, Bolivia (Reuters) - Protesters in Bolivia's farming region of Santa Cruz are blocking highways out of the province, threatening to snarl the domestic transport of grains and food, as anger simmers following the arrest of local governor Luis Camacho.

The region, a stronghold of the conservative opposition to socialist President Luis Arce, is in its sixth day of protests that have seen thousands of people take to the streets and nights of clashes with weaponized fireworks and cars burned.

On Tuesday hundreds of women marched to the city police headquarters in support of Camacho, demanding his release.

On the nearby streets were burnt-out vehicles, smoldering fires and blockades from the overnight clashes.

The protests, sparked by the Dec. 28 arrest of Camacho over an alleged coup in 2019, are deepening divides between lowland Santa Cruz and the highland, more indigenous political capital La Paz, which have long butted heads over politics and state funds.

Camacho was seized by special police forces, taken out of the province by helicopter and is now in a maximum security jail in the highland city El Alto. He denies all charges that relate to the divisive removal of former socialist leader Evo Morales in 2019.

Santa Cruz leaders pledge to fight until Camacho is released, picketing government buildings and stopping transport of grains. There are also calls for a federal system giving the city more autonomy and state funds.

"We have a mandate from our assembly that nothing leaves Santa Cruz and that is what we are going to do," said Rómulo Calvo, head of the powerful Pro Santa Cruz civic group.

Marcelo Cruz, President of the International Heavy Transport Association of Santa Cruz, said routes were being blocked so no trucks could leave the province.

"No grain, animal or supply from the factories should leave Santa Cruz for the rest of the country. The blocking points are being reinforced," he said.

"OUTLAW STATE"

Morales and allies - including current president Arce - say his ouster was a coup and have prosecuted opposition figures they blame for it. Jeanine Anez, who became interim president after his removal, was jailed for 10 years in 2022.

Human rights groups say the government is using a weak justice system to go after its opponents.

"We are no longer a state of law, we are an outlaw state," said Erwin Bazan, from the right-wing Creemos party, saying the charges against Camacho were politically motivated.

Others blame Camacho for tensions in 2019 which saw dozens killed in protests, including supporters of Morales.

"Let him go to jail for 30 years. We want justice," said Maria Laura, a supporter of the ruling Movement for Socialism (MAS) party.

Morales remains the party's leader though has at times clashed with new president Arce.

Paul Coca, a lawyer and analyst in La Paz, said the internal divisions in the ruling party were partly behind the arrest, with Arce trying to neutralize criticism from Morales.

"(Arce) had to confront his party leader or directly go against Luis Fernando Camacho. And he obviously chose to go all out against Camacho," he said.

The blockade could dent food supply to other parts of the country as well as exports and growth as Bolivia grapples with a large fiscal deficit and low reserves.

"Santa Cruz is the economic stronghold of Bolivia," said Gary Rodríguez, General Manager of the Bolivian Institute of Foreign Trade (IBCE).

The region is the main producer of soy, sugar cane, wheat, rice, corn, and livestock.

"All this great private productive effort is now in danger."

(Reporting by Adam Jourdan and Daniel Ramos; Additional reporting by Monica Machicao, Editing by Angus MacSwan)