Egypt starts mediating an end to Israel-Gaza strikes, rockets

Issued on: 11/05/2023 - 

01:33

Smoke and flames rise into the sky after the Israeli military said in a statement that it struck Islamic Jihad targets, in Gaza, May 9, 2023. 

© Mohammed Salem, Reuters

Text by: NEWS WIRES

Israel hit Islamic Jihad targets in Gaza for a second day on Wednesday and Palestinian militants launched hundreds of rockets across the border, setting off sirens as far away as Tel Aviv, while Egypt began efforts to mediate an end to the fighting.

The second round of cross-border fire in a week came after Israel launched strikes on Tuesday against three Islamic Jihad commanders it said had planned attacks against Israelis, following months of escalating violence.

Cairo, which has mediated in previous rounds of fighting, had begun brokering a ceasefire, Islamic Jihad spokesman Dawoud Shehab said.

Israel was examining Egypt's proposals, Foreign Minister Eli Cohen told public broadcaster Kan.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in broadcast remarks that Islamic Jihad had sustained a serious blow, but cautioned: "The campaign is not over yet."

The Israeli military said it hit more than 130 targets, including rocket-launching sites, as blasts sounded across the Palestinian enclave.

A late-night bombing of a building in the southern Gaza area of Khan Younis killed the head of Islamic Jihad's rocket launching force, identified as Ali Ghali, and two other militants, the Israeli military and Islamic Jihad said.

Minutes after Wednesday's air-strikes began, sirens sounded in Israel - mostly among border communities but soon also in and around the commercial capital Tel Aviv, 60 km (37 miles) northof Gaza.

More than 400 rockets were fired, Netanyahu said, a quarter of which fell short in Gaza.

The joint command of Gaza's militant groups, which includes Islamic Jihad and the enclave's Hamas rulers, claimed responsibility for the salvoes.

However Israeli military officials said they had seen no signs that Hamas, which is believed to have hundreds of rockets in its arsenal, had fired any missiles itself.

They said Israeli strikes were directed only at targets linked to the smaller Islamic Jihad group, an Iranian-backed militant organization based in Gaza which has been increasingly active in the occupied West Bank for the past year.

White House national security advisor Jake Sullivan emphasised the need for de-escalation during a call on Wednesday with the head of Israel's National Security Council, Tzachi Hanegbi, the White House said.

"Sullivan ... noted continued regional efforts to broker a ceasefire, and emphasized the need to deescalate tensions and prevent further loss of life," according to a White House readout.

CHILDREN AMONG FATALITIES

In total, 24 Palestinians, including at least five women and five children, as well as three senior Islamic Jihad commanders and four gunmen have been killed since fighting began, Palestinian health officials said.

Among the fatalities on Wednesday was a 10-year-old girl, although the circumstances of her death were unclear.

The militant groups said the rocket salvoes were a retaliation for the Israeli strikes, which it described as "a savage and treacherous bombardment of civilian houses that led to several innocent martyrs."

Multiple trails could be seen ascending over Gaza as rockets were launched. Mid-air explosions signalled interceptions by Israel's Iron Dome aerial defence system and there were no reports of casualties in Israel.

Last week, Islamic Jihad fired more than 100 rockets across the border and Israeli jets hit targets in Gaza in an hours-long exchange following the death of an Islamic Jihad hunger striker in Israeli custody.

Even before Wednesday's rocket barrage began, as many as 30% of residents of Israeli border communities had been evacuated as a precaution, municipal head Gadi Yarkoni told Kan radio.

In Gaza, businesses and schools remained closed, Israel kept its two commercial and people crossings with Gaza closed.

The move would stop the entry of goods, fuel and humanitarian aid as well as patients who receive treatment in hospitals in the West Bank and Israel.

Earlier on Wednesday, Israeli forces killed two Palestinian gunmen who the military said had opened fire on them in the West Bank. Islamic Jihad claimed the men as members.

(REUTERS)

GRIFTER Republicans claim Biden family earned millions from shady overseas deals


Wed, 10 May 2023 

© Kevin Lamarque, Reuters


Republicans charged Wednesday that President Joe Biden's family has earned more than $10 million from shady business deals crafted while he was vice president.

With Biden ramping up his bid for a second term as president in the 2024 election, the Republican-controlled House Oversight Committee alleged that the family took in $1 million tied to a business deal with a Romanian tycoon when the then vice-president oversaw relations with the country in 2014-2015.

The deal was allegedly done by Rob Walker, a business partner of Biden's son Hunter.

In a detailed report, committee Republicans said Walker began receiving money from Romanian tycoon Gabriel Popoviciu shortly after Biden welcomed Romanian President Klaus Iohannis to the White House in September 2015.

A Cyprus company allegedly owned by Popoviciu, Bladon Enterprises, paid a private company owned by Walker over $3 million from November 2015 to May 2017.

They said the pattern matches that of an already well-reported business deal Hunter Biden and Walker had with an energy company in China.

Five takeaways from Trump’s CNN town hall

BY NIALL STANAGE -

THE HILL

 05/10/23 

Former President Donald Trump speaks at the National Rifle Association Convention in Indianapolis, on April 14, 2023. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy)

The biggest event so far in the 2024 election cycle took place in New Hampshire Wednesday evening.

Former President Trump participated in a town hall event hosted by CNN, with Kaitlan Collins serving as moderator.


The fact that the event was happening at all had drawn some criticism beforehand — mostly, but not exclusively, from liberals and the left.

On the other hand, a ratings bonanza was forecast by many media-watchers.

After all the hype, here are the main takeaways.

A disaster for CNN

Trump did not so much win the event as CNN lost it — catastrophically.

Not all of the blame can be placed on Collins, though there were clearly moments when she could have pushed back faster or more strongly.

A far bigger problem was a decision, presumably taken by producers, to have a live audience “made up of Republicans and undeclared voters who tend to take part in New Hampshire’s Republican primary,” as Collins put it in her introductory remarks.

What that meant was an audience loudly supportive of Trump at every turn — and plainly disdainful of Collins.

Around halfway through the event, Trump’s description of Collins as “a nasty person” drew whoops of delight.

Not a single tough question was asked of Trump by any audience member.

Perhaps most strikingly of all, Trump’s denial of ever having met, much less abused, E. Jean Carroll, received raucous approval — despite a nine-person jury having found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation of Carroll only the previous day.

Offering his own spin on Carroll’s story, Trump wondered “What kind of a woman meets somebody and brings them up and within minutes you are playing hanky panky in a dressing room, OK?”

Many in the audience laughed.

Media figures, as well as politicians on the left, reacted with horror.

“I can’t believe this is being allowed on @CNN,” tweeted Gretchen Carlson, the former Fox News anchor whose allegations of sexual harassment sparked the downfall of that network’s one-time supremo, Roger Ailes. “This is promulgating the cult leadership of Trump — and people are laughing at sexual assault.”

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) tweeted, “CNN should be ashamed of themselves. They have lost total control of this ‘town hall’ to again be manipulated into platforming election disinformation, defenses of Jan 6th, and a public attack on a sexual abuse victim.”

Ocasio-Cortez added, “The audience is cheering him on and laughing at the host.”

CNN shouldn’t create programming to please Ocasio-Cortez, of course — any more than it should mold coverage to please Trump.

But the network has serious questions to answer about an event that spiraled so abjectly — and set up one of its own rising stars for a humiliating failure.

Trump was strikingly evasive on abortion

Collins did have some sliver of success when she pressed Trump on his position on abortion.

She was not able to wring from him a specific answer on whether he would sign a federal abortion ban if he were to win back the presidency in 2024. Yet, the vagueness and evasiveness of his response was revealing.

Trump proclaimed that the Supreme Court’s decision striking down Roe v. Wade last June was “a great victory.” His rationale was an unusual one.

The former president contended that the decision “was an incredible thing for pro-life because it gave pro-life something to negotiate with.”

The explanation that followed was not clear, but Trump appeared to be arguing that, with the erstwhile constitutional guarantee of a right to abortion gone, it was easier to make deals between liberals and conservatives on certain limits to abortion.

Trying to distance himself from the most rigid anti-abortion positions in his party — positions that have fared badly at the polls in recent months — he added, “I happen to believe in the exceptions” to outright bans.

Still, Trump several times avoided Collins’s question on whether he would sign a federal ban.

Trump on the debt ceiling: ‘You’re gonna have to do a default’

The former president encouraged his party colleagues on Capitol Hill to hold to a hard line in the ongoing talks about the debt ceiling — even if it came at the price of the kind of U.S. default that virtually all credible economists say would be disastrous.

Trump vigorously backed the position put forward by Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) among others — that the debt ceiling should only be raised if President Biden and the Democrats accede to steep spending cuts.

The White House has declined to countenance that idea. Democrats often note that Republicans voted to raise the debt ceiling three times during Trump’s one term, even as he added more than $7 trillion to the national debt.

Trump insisted Republicans in Congress should stand firm.

“I say to the Republicans out there — congressmen, senators — if they don’t give you massive cuts, you’re gonna have to do a default,” he said.

He predicted that the Democrats would “absolutely cave” in the face of such a strong position.

But, he suggested, even if they did not and the U.S. went into default for the first time in its history, “it’s better than what we’re doing right now because we’re spending money like drunken sailors.”
Election lies and downplaying Jan. 6

Perhaps the most predictable part of Wednesday’s event came with Trump’s standard lines about the 2020 election, and his minimization of what took place on Jan. 6, 2021.

In both cases, Collins tried to push back, but a combination of the Trump-backing crowd and his brash demeanor contributed to her getting steamrollered.

Trump said that 2020 was “a rigged election.”

It was not.

He also said that the protesters on Jan. 6 2021 “were there with love in their heart.”

Around 140 police officers were injured on Jan. 6, when a crowd ransacked the Capitol while seeking to overturn a legitimate presidential election and thwart the peaceful transfer of power.

Trump soon afterward became the first American president in history to be twice impeached. The second impeachment was for inciting the Jan. 6 riot.

A big night for Trump spells trouble for his GOP rivals

CNN may well have delivered Trump his biggest boost yet in his quest for the 2024 GOP nomination — an ironic twist for a news network to which the former president almost always used to append the term “Fake News.”

All of the traits that Trump’s hardcore supporters admire were on full display on Wednesday — the belligerence, the swatting-aside of criticism and the mocking of opponents and adversaries.

He never came close to being trapped in any politically awkward spot — save perhaps when declining to answer whether he wanted Russia or Ukraine to win the war sparked by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s February 2022 invasion.

GOP lawmaker takes shot at Kaitlan Collins while on CNN panel after Trump town hall 

Trump snaps at CNN’s Kaitlan Collins: ‘You’re a nasty person’

Above all, CNN got humiliated at his hands — a sweet victory for conservatives who detest the network.

The event plainly reinforced Trump’s position as the dominant player in the GOP field.

That is very bad news for the rivals who are already trailing in his wake.

Biden trolls Trump over CNN town hall

BY JARED GANS - THE HILL - 05/10/23 

President Biden trolled former President Trump on Wednesday over a contentious appearance at a CNN town hall on Wednesday, with Biden asking for supporters to donate to his reelection campaign if they don’t want “four more years of that.”

“It’s simple, folks. Do you want four more years of that? If you don’t, pitch in to our campaign,” Biden tweeted. 

His campaign later sent an email seeking to fundraise with the subject line, “So, that happened.”

“If you missed Trump’s CNN town hall, you’re better off for it. But the choice is clear: It’s four more years of Trump or four more years of Biden,” the email states.

Biden’s tweet came after more than an hour of sometimes-intense exchanges between Trump and CNN moderator Kaitlan Collins over a range of topics, including his false claims that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection and whether he would accept the results of the 2024 election. 

Ocasio-Cortez on Trump town hall: ‘CNN should be ashamed of themselves’

BY JULIA SHAPERO THE HILL - 05/10/23

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) slammed CNN over its decision to hold a town hall with former President Trump on Wednesday night.

“CNN should be ashamed of themselves,” Ocasio-Cortez tweeted. “They have lost total control of this ‘town hall’ to again be manipulated into platforming election disinformation, defenses of Jan 6th, and a public attack on a sexual abuse victim. The audience is cheering him on and laughing at the host.”

Trump doubled down on his unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 election was “rigged,” suggested those that descended on the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, had “love in their heart,” and called author E. Jean Carroll a “whack job” at Wednesday’s town hall.

The former president’s comments come just one day after a jury found that he sexually abused Carroll in the 1990s and then defamed her by denying the allegations. Carroll had accused Trump of raping her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store. 

“This falls squarely on CNN,” Ocasio-Cortez added. “Everyone here saw exactly what was going to happen. Instead they put a sexual abuse victim in harm’s way for views. This was a choice to platform lies about the election & Jan 6th w/ no plan but to have their moderator interrupted without consequence.”

In an appearance on MSNBC after the town hall, the congresswoman said Trump’s attacks on Carroll were “a continued demonstration” of the sacrifices that survivors of sexual abuse make to “come forward and challenge power.”

“What we also saw tonight was the consequence of doing that,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “They sacrifice their anonymity, they sacrifice their safety, and they sacrifice all of this because we continue to live in a society where an overwhelming amount of structures allow this abuse to happen and find it permissible.”

“I think it was a profoundly irresponsible decision,” she added of the town hall. “I don’t think that I would be doing my job if I did not say that.”

California readies for treasure hunt as floods wash up ‘Gold Rush 2.0

Party like it’s 1849

’BY SHARON UDASIN 

THE HILL

- 05/07/23

In the aftermath of an unusually wet winter, Californians are bracing not only for flooded fields and raging rapids, but also for a potential treasure hunt that experts are dubbing “Gold Rush 2.0.”

“It’s one of those 100-years events,” Mark Dayton, a Sacramento Valley metal detector expert, told The Hill.

With one atmospheric river after another this past winter, snowpack on the Golden State’s mountain peaks piled up to unprecedented heights. But as that snow gushes down the hillsides, the fast and furious flow is shuttling other materials along with it.

“When it melts, it comes rushing down at crazy speeds through narrow gorges and canyons, and it’s a torrent of raging water,” Dayton said. “This is even crazier than whitewater.”

The flow cascades like a waterfall from about 5,000 feet to 3,500 feet, at which point it begins “meandering into some of the foothills” and into creeks and streams, Dayton explained.

“What happens is the material is being ripped literally right off the walls of the creeks as they reshape themselves,” he added.

By “material,” Dayton means gold. And he said he anticipates a lot of it this year.

“It’s like a generational flood,” agreed Albert Fausel, the third-generation owner of the local Placerville Hardware Store, which opened in 1852.

“It’s been a flood that I’ve never seen in my life,” Fausel continued. “It’s all going to come down at once and just integrate a lot of new material into our river systems.”

El Dorado and the ‘Brass Medic’

Prospectors should expect to find “several different pockets of gold” in relatively shallow waters, as the snowmelt washes “all that material into the waterway,” according to Dayton. The heavier pieces, he explained, will stay up at higher altitudes.

“But most of the small stuff that we typically find year-to-year as gold prospectors is going to make its way not only down to where we typically look for it, in the 2,000-3,500-foot range, but all the way down literally to the Sacramento Valley,” he said.

Dayton, a former firefighter-paramedic turned self-proclaimed “Brass Medic,” has been treasure hunting for more than three decades in Northern California’s El Dorado County. From the Spanish meaning “The Golden,” the region is home to the original mid-19th century gold discovery.

That find came in 1848, when carpenter James Marshall spotted flecks of gold in a diversion channel adjacent to the sawmill he was building in Coloma, northeast of Sacramento.

News of his find soon spread, and the state’s non-American Indian population grew from about 14,000 in 1848 to some 250,000 by 1852, according to California’s Department Parks and Recreation.

That’s also the same year that the Placerville Hardware Store opened its doors, and its owner now believes that this season will bring “a little new mini gold rush.”

“I have a lot of people coming from all over. They’re looking for places to go, they’re planning their family vacations out here,” said Fausel, whose business is about 9 miles from the historic discovery site.

“I try kind of guiding them to local campsites, to good places to find gold, to the right tools to find gold — like gold pans or metal detectors,” he added.

In the “old days,” miners would begin by panning in a river, where they would find small pieces of gold, and then go up the river as the pieces became bigger and bigger, according to Dayton.

When the pieces “just dead stopped,” they’d know they were above the source of gold, he explained.

With the so-called “Forty-Niners” flocking into the region, the local Native American population particularly suffered as the newcomers devastated lands, water, space and other resources, the National Parks Service noted.

The Golden State lives up to its name

While gold mining occurred across California, the biggest concentration of mines was in the vicinity of the original discovery, according to a historic map from the California Department of Conservation.

From a geological perspective, this part of Northern California has a lot of quartz, which Dayton described as “the one matrix in which gold is formed in the Earth.”

“We have so much quartz here, and quartz outcroppings that are literally just sticking right out of the dirt all over the Gold Country,” he said.

Over time, he explained, the quartz that was “down inside the Earth has made its way up to the surface,” furnishing this region with gold.

Dayton is a jack of all trades when it comes to gold prospecting, although he said that metal detecting is his professional specialty. He stressed, however, that he likes to “do it all,” including methods such as panning, sniping and sluicing.

Sniping requires lying down in a creek bed and prying the gold piece by piece from the bedrock. Sluicing, meanwhile, involves flushing a gravel-gold mix with water in a tilted box designed to trap the gold, which is heavier than the gravel.

California has a lot of region-specific regulations, however, with many areas only allowing panning.

“We call it hands-and-pans — that means you cannot use a shovel to dig. You can only use your hands and a pan,” Dayton said, noting that this rule applies to most state park lands.

At state parks, one person can gather only up to 15 pounds of mineral material each day, and such material cannot be sold or used commercially for profit, according to the Parks Department.

Public lands administered by the federal government fall under the Mining Law of 1872, which allows U.S. citizens to explore, discover and purchase certain mineral deposits, per the Bureau of Land Management.

There are more than 5,000 mining claims — for gold, silver, gemstones and other minerals — on California public lands today. Mining claims can still be “staked” for locatable minerals, such as gold, on public domain lands.

Before staking a claim, however, prospectors must check both federal records and markings on the ground for prior claims, according to the Bureau. Most states require that markings be “conspicuous and substantial monuments,” such as stone mounds or wood or metal posts.

The Gold Country Treasure Seekers — a club in which Dayton is a member — stressed in a recent Facebook post that prospectors must abide by a “detecting mining code of ethics.”

That code of ethics advises gold seekers to “respect the country code,” as well as avoid trespassing, refrain from contaminating water supplies, fill holes, stay away from archeological monuments and report all finds to landowners.

 

Party like it’s 1849

At the Placerville Hardware Store, Fausel said that he is trying to teach his customers some of the rules, so that “we can all keep doing what we’d like to do” in California’s strict regulatory environment.

As treasure hunting season gets underway, Dayton said that he expects to see tourists flocking to the region “to get out and do something fun,” particularly since the price of gold is so high.

He predicted that panning and sluicing will work best for early explorers in June — once the water levels drop enough to “not have to worry about drowning.”

“But later when the water really starts to recede and it starts to dry out around August September, metal detectors will rule the world,” Dayton said. 

“They will be the ones getting in and finding all the easy stuff — big and easy stuff,” he added.

For his part, Fausel said that he is excited to welcome families to the region and to teach new enthusiasts how to pan for gold.

“When they find that first piece of gold it really lights them up,” he added. “It’s exciting for them. It’s exciting for me because I’ve taught somebody kind of a new hobby.”

 

 

ASEAN

Indonesia's Widodo says no real progress on Myanmar peace plan

Martin Abbugao and Allison Jackson
Wed, May 10, 2023 

Indonesian President Joko Widodo (C) said ASEAN member nations have made no real progress in bringing an end to the bloodshed in Myanmar

Southeast Asian nations have made "no significant progress" on implementing a peace plan aimed at ending bloodshed in Myanmar, Indonesian President Joko Widodo said Thursday, on the final day of a summit.

Escalating violence in junta-ruled Myanmar has dominated the three-day meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) on the Indonesian island of Flores.

The regional bloc has spearheaded diplomatic efforts to resolve the crisis, though it has yet to enact a five-point plan agreed upon with Myanmar two years ago.

Since the military ousted Aung San Suu Kyi's government it has overseen a bloody crackdown on dissent, killing thousands of people and battling armed resistance to its rule.

As ASEAN leaders began their final day of talks in the fishing town of Labuan Bajo, Indonesian President Joko Widodo admitted they had made "no significant progress" on implementing the peace plan.

"We need the unity of ASEAN to chart our way forward," Widodo said through a translator.

Divisions among ASEAN members at the summit appear to have hampered those efforts.

An internal report on the foreign ministers' discussions said some countries wanted to invite the junta back to ASEAN meetings because "the time for isolation has served its purpose".

"There was also an observation that ASEAN might be experiencing a 'Myanmar fatigue', which might distract ASEAN from larger goals of ASEAN Community-building," said the document seen by AFP.

"Patience, flexibility and creativity are therefore required since there will be no quick fix to the crisis."

- Hamstrung -

Myanmar still belongs to the 10-member ASEAN bloc but has been barred from its summits due to the junta's failure to implement the peace plan.

The junta has spurned international criticism and refused to engage with its opponents, which include ousted lawmakers, anti-coup "People's Defence Forces" and armed ethnic minority groups.

An air strike on a village in a rebel stronghold last month that reportedly killed about 170 people sparked global condemnation and worsened the junta's isolation.

Jakarta's chairing of the bloc this year had raised hopes ASEAN could push for a peaceful solution, using its economic weight as well as its diplomatic experience.

Sunday's armed attack on a convoy carrying diplomats and officials coordinating ASEAN humanitarian relief in Myanmar had increased pressure for tougher action.

ASEAN has long been decried by critics as a toothless talking shop, but its charter principles of consensus and non-interference have hamstrung its ability to stop the violence in Myanmar.

The latest draft of the end-of-summit statement seen by AFP has left the paragraph on Myanmar open, reflecting diplomatic difficulties over the issue.

A review of the charter was "long overdue", said Lina Alexandra of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Jakarta.

"When you see your next-door neighbour's house is burning, what will you do? Can you just stay silent, it's not my problem?" she said.

mba-amj/lb

Streaming giants battle for anime supremacy


Tomohiro OSAKI
Wed, May 10, 2023 

Producer Haruyasu Makino's Netflix series "Ultraman S3" is part of a rapidly expanding landscape of anime shows populating global streaming giants

From R-rated sci-fi to teen biker gang adventures, streaming platforms are locked in an intensifying battle for dominance in one of the entertainment sector's hottest and most lucrative mediums: anime.

Fuelled in part by the pandemic, the popularity of the cartoons pioneered in Japan has created a goldmine for streaming giants such as Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime.

The global anime market was valued at $28.6 billion in 2022, according to Grand View Research, and is forecast to double in value by 2030.

"The peak may still be ahead of us," Aya Umezu, CEO of Tokyo-based entertainment consulting firm GEM Partners, told AFP.

"We doubt the competition in anime will slow down soon."

Globally, demand for anime increased by 35 percent from 2020 to 2021, according to industry specialist service Parrot Analytics.

It is little wonder, then, that international streamers are scrambling for ways to capitalise on the surging interest.

Recent years have seen Disney+, a relative latecomer to anime, start offering fan favourites also found elsewhere like "Demon Slayer", "Spy x Family" and "Jujutsu Kaisen".

"Having them can prevent subscription cancellations -- that's how strong these IPs (intellectual properties) are," Umezu said.

Offering these titles is seen as a baseline, and far from sufficient to win the loyalty of anime fans with increasingly diverse options available.

That has meant platforms are looking to either secure exclusive rights to content or co-produce their own original anime in a bid to stand out.

- Breaking open the market -

Last year, Disney+ announced exclusive streaming rights to season two of smash-hit teen biker gang saga "Tokyo Revengers", part of a lucrative deal with publishing giant Kodansha.

Amazon Prime has also sought to "monopolise" blockbusters, said anime expert Tadashi Sudo, including "One Piece Film: Red" -- Japan's highest-grossing movie last year.

Netflix has proven something of an outlier in this market, going beyond snatching up existing hits to work directly with animation studios, granting them an unusual amount of creative leeway to make new stories.

Traditionally, Japanese anime emerges from "production committees" made up of publishers, TV broadcasters, toy-makers and other industry players.

These have long had a key role in broadening revenue possibilities for a series, from character merchandising to gaming.

Netflix ruffled industry feathers when it teamed up directly with Tokyo animation studio Production I.G in 2018, bypassing the system.

"Some (in the anime industry) were upset because they thought we would destroy what they had built over all these years," Production I.G president Mitsuhisa Ishikawa said.

He went as far as likening Netflix to the "Black Ships" -- the 19th-century US vessels that forced the opening of Japan after hundreds of years of trade isolation.

"The domestic way of making anime was suddenly forced open," he said.

Netflix has reaped the rewards, with its original content making it "the platform that drove the largest increase in global demand for anime in 2021", said Christofer Hamilton of US-based Parrot Analytics.

- 'Experimental' push -

But even streaming goliaths with worldwide influence have comparatively small audience numbers in Japan.

That raises red flags for some industry players, especially publishers who want maximum exposure for anime adaptations of their manga titles and worry exclusive streaming deals would limit their reach in Japan.

There is "a clash of two opposing interests -- between platforms who want more exclusives and production committee players who want as little of a monopoly (for streaming services) as possible", said anime specialist Sudo.

Experts say this conflict often leads to Netflix original deals being based on works that are less likely to become national sensations like "Demon Slayer".

None of Netflix's original anime made their top-20 most-watched list for Japan users in 2022, according to GEM Partners senior data analyst Shota Ito.

The streamer is, however, an attractive prospect for studios with more commercially challenging projects that the traditional market could find too niche.

Early original content on Netflix reflected this, and was heavy on shows critics say evoked the hardcore sci-fi anime of a few decades ago.

Among these was "Devilman Crybaby", the tale of a "demon-boy" that featured violence and nudity galore.

"My sense is that creators wanted to do something with us that they had little chance to do under the existing system," Netflix chief anime producer Taiki Sakurai told AFP.

That initial "experimental" push has since given way to a broader roster, including comedy, traditional "shonen" targeting young boys and even a stop-motion project starring a teddy bear.

Long-standing fans also have other dedicated services to turn to, including the huge online anime library Crunchyroll.

Netflix content director Yuji Yamano is convinced the market is far from saturated, though, and believes competition will only make "the industry even more exciting".

"Globally, I only see more room for growth in anime."

tmo/sah/kaf/aha/cwl

European Parliament votes on curbs for ChatGPT and other AI

Daniel ARONSSOHN
Wed, May 10, 2023

The emergence of ChatGPT, Midjourney and other AI applications have greatly focused the parliament's attention

EU lawmakers hold a crucial vote Thursday towards setting restrictions on how AI such as ChatGPT can be used in the European Union.

European Parliament committees will set out their position for upcoming negotiations with EU member states that aim to create a law to prevent abuses in the way artificial intelligence is used, while still giving room for innovation.

The bloc wants to be the global pioneer in regulating the technology, which has ignited public and corporate interest in the past few months.

Brussels' move towards that goal actually started two years ago, with a European Commission proposal. EU member states came up with their negotiation position at the end of last year.

But the emergence since then of ChatGPT, Midjourney and other AI applications has greatly focused the parliament's attention on the issue, resulting in an avalanche of amendments that have to be considered.

Once the committees' vote is held on Thursday, the full European Parliament will have its say with a plenary vote next month.

"I think we are putting forward a very good and balanced text" that protects people while allowing innovation, said Brando Benifei, one of the lead MEPs on the text to be voted on Thursday.

- Double-edged sword -

While the promise of AI is vast, it is also a double-edged sword as a tech tool. It could save lives by advancing medical evaluations, for instance, or it could be used by authoritarian regimes to perfect mass surveillance.

For the general public, the arrival of ChatGPT at the end of last year provided a source of curiosity and fascination, with users signing on to watch it write essays, poems or carry out translations within seconds.

Image-generation AI such as Midjourney and DALL-E likewise sparked an online rush to make lookalike Van Goghs or a pope in a puffy jacket, while AI music sites have impressed with their ability to even produce human-like singing.

Nefariously, though, the tech carries great potential for fakery, to fool people and sway public opinion.

That has spurred Elon Musk and some researchers to urge a moratorium until legal frameworks can catch up.

The European Parliament's stance follows the main directions set out in the commission's proposal, which was guided by existing EU laws on product safety that put the onus of checks on the manufacturers.

The core of the EU's approach is to have a list of "high risk" activities for AI.

The commission suggests that designation should cover systems in sensitive domains such as critical infrastructure, education, human resources, public order and migration management.

Some of the proposed rules for that category would ensure human control over AI and that technical documentation is provided, and that there is a system of risk management.

Each EU member state would have a supervising authority to make sure the rules are abided by.

Many MEPs, however, want to limit the criteria of what constitutes "high risk" so that it only covers AI applications deemed to threaten safety, health or fundamental rights. Others, such as the Greens grouping, oppose that.

When it comes to generative AI such as ChatGPT, the parliament is looking at a specific set of obligations similar to those applied to the "high risk" list.

MEPs also want AI companies to put in place protections against illegal content and on copyrighted works that might be used to train their algorithms.

The commission's proposal already calls for users to be notified when they are in contact with a machine, and requires image-producing applications to state that their output was created artificially.

Outright bans would be rare, and would only concern applications contrary to values dear to Europe -- for example, the kind of mass surveillance and citizen rating systems used in China.

The lawmakers want to add prohibitions on AI recognising emotions, and to get rid of exceptions that would allow remote biometric identification of people in public places by law enforcement.

They also want to prevent the scraping of photos posted on the internet for training algorithms unless the authorisation of the people concerned is obtained.

aro/rmb/imm/smw

Winds of change buffet Iran's wooden boat building tradition

Jerome Rivet and Ahmad Parhizi
Wed, May 10, 2023 

The potbellied silhouette of Iran's lenj vessels is emblematic of regional maritime traditions

Iranian captain Hassan Rostam has braved the Strait of Hormuz aboard his lenj for four decades, but now watches with despair as the wooden ships are being replaced by cheaper, faster boats.

The sturdy vessels, built by hand, have sailed Gulf waters for centuries, their potbellied silhouette emblematic of regional maritime traditions like the dhows of the Arabian Peninsula.

But these days, "there are fewer and fewer" of them, said Rostam, 62, who has spent his life travelling the waterway between Iran and the United Arab Emirates.

With a lean body and weathered face, he gazes at the calm seas that are criss-crossed by huge tankers taking Gulf oil to the world's markets, and naval vessels patrolling the strategic waterway.

But the island of Qeshm off Bandar Abbas is also home to the much older tradition of building wooden boats, around 30 of which were resting at low tide in the coastal village of Guran.

This small port has long housed several shipyards specialising in their maintenance and repair. But that morning, fewer than two dozen workers were there, barefoot in the mud.

A half-built lenj hull propped on beams will not be finished for lack of money, as its owner plans to dismantle it and use the boards for other projects.

"Today, a new lenj is very expensive" because "the wood comes from abroad" and construction is done entirely by hand, said Ali Pouzan, who supervises the Guran site.

Each lenj is unique and the ships vary in size, with the craft "transmitted from generation to generation", he said.

UNESCO back in 2011 recognised the lenj as intangible cultural heritage requiring "urgent safeguarding".

As modern alternatives have taken the wind out of its sails, "the philosophy, the ritual context and the traditional knowledge linked to navigation in the Persian Gulf... are gradually fading", the UN body warned.

- Open-air museum -

In their golden age, the rustic lenjes were used to transport cereals, dates, dried fish, spices, wood and textiles across the Gulf and as far as the coasts of East Africa and the Indian subcontinent.

But commercial shipping has been taken over by engine-powered boats made of fibreglass or steel, navigating the turquoise waters where huge oil tankers now roam.

Lenj vessels were also used for fishing, as well as the lucrative pearling tradition, which has nearly disappeared altogether.

Younes, a 42-year-old Guran resident, has been repairing lenjes in his native village for more than 20 years.

"It's a painful job," he said in the baking heat, as he used an old technique called "kalfat koobi" to waterproof a vessel with strips of cotton soaked in sesame and coconut oil.

Recognising the demise of shipbuilding in Guran, Pouzan is betting on tourism instead, a promising sector on Qeshm as the island attracts a growing number of visitors.

"We have restored several boats to adapt them to sea trips," he said.

An old ship was being repurposed into a cafe, and there are plans to transform the scenic port, with coloured lenj hulls lying in the sand, into an open-air museum.

Near mangroves on the beach, Pouzan plans to build lenj-inspired huts for tourists. Each will bear the name of the most famous destinations the ships once reached -- from Zanzibar and Mombasa to Kolkata.

Iraqi Kurds keep nervous eye on Turkish election race

Kamal Taha
Wed, May 10, 2023 

A Turkish citizen living in Arbil, the capital of the autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq, casts his ballot for the presidential and parliamentary elections, at the Turkish embassy

As Turkey's presidential vote nears, Iraqi Kurds are keeping a close watch on the tightest electoral battle yet for Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the outcome of which could have major security and economic implications for their region.

For many years, fighting between Turkey's armed forces and Kurdish militants has spilled over into Iraq's autonomous Kurdish north, a rugged mountain region where both sides operate military bases.

Many Kurds in war-scarred Iraq sympathise with the ethnic minority in Turkey, but their own region also relies on the big neighbour for business, with its crucial oil long exported via a pipeline that runs through Turkey.

Political leaders in Arbil are not officially commenting on Turkey's tight electoral race between Erdogan and his challenger Kemal Kilicdaroglu, who has pledged to "bring democracy to this country by changing the one-man regime".

But, whatever the outcome of the Turkish presidential vote, with the first round to be held Sunday, Iraq's Kurdish region will look to preserve its strategic partnership with Ankara, analysts say.

"The media, the political scene, everyone is highly preoccupied with the Turkish elections," said Adel Bakawan, director of the French Centre for Research on Iraq, who stressed that Ankara's role in the region is "fundamental".

Iraq's Kurdish leaders have built relationships with Erdogan, he said, adding that, if "the president changes, the whole relationship between Arbil and Ankara changes... The diplomatic world hates the unknown."

- 'Direction of the war' -

Erdogan, after two decades in power as premier and then president, has strengthened Turkey as a regional player that at times challenges Europe and the United States and negotiates with Russia on Syria's war.

When he first took office, Erdogan launched talks aimed at ending the Kurdish armed struggle for broader autonomy in Turkey's southeast. But the community, estimated to be 15 to 20 million strong, came under pressure when those talks collapsed, and violence resumed in 2015.

Turkey's battle against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), classified as a "terrorist" group by Ankara and its Western allies, has long since flared again across its borders into Iraqi Kurdistan.

The Turkish military maintains dozens of bases in northern Iraq and carries out air strikes and ground operations against the PKK, which operates rear bases in the region.

Iraq's regional Kurdish government rarely rebukes Ankara, despite Turkey routinely bombarding its territory and causing civilian casualties. Instead, Arbil usually limits its public response to press releases condemning violations of Iraq's sovereignty and their impacts on the population.

Kilicdaroglu, while making no concrete proposals to resolve Turkey's Kurdish question, has accused Erdogan of "stigmatising" Kurds.

He has also pledged to free the Kurdish leader of the left-wing Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), Selahattin Demirtas, who has been incarcerated since 2016 for spreading "terrorist propaganda".

According to Bakawan, given the gestures Kilicdaroglu has already made to the Kurdish community, there is "the possibility of appeasement" in the conflict should he win.

"The result of the election will directly impact the direction of this war," said Bakawan, a French-Iraqi political scientist of Kurdish origin.

- 'Betting on relaxation' -

Political scientist Botan Tahseen argued that Turkey's opposition is "betting on relaxation" and wants "to turn a new page" after Erdogan, at a time when the Middle East is thirsty for "political, security and economic stability".

If Erdogan is re-elected, he added, Turkey will still "need an initiative to normalise its relations with its neighbours, especially (Iraqi) Kurdistan".

Ankara remains a strategic economic partner to Arbil. For years, all of Kurdistan's oil exports -- some 450,000 barrels per day -- were sent to Turkey, without the approval of Iraq's federal government.

A legal dispute between Baghdad and Ankara interrupted the trade, but it is expected to resume once technical and financial details are settled.

"Whoever governs in Ankara will obviously have an influence on this issue," said Bakawan.

Illustrating the close ties between Ankara and Arbil, a Turkish HDP parliamentarian was on Sunday turned away from Arbil's airport, local media reported. The provincial government later explained he had been subject to a Baghdad-issued "travel ban".

For Iraq's Kurds, notions of ethnic solidarity and hopes for an end to discrimination of Kurds in Turkey are tempered with caution.

"We hope that the next Turkish government will sit down at the dialogue table with the Kurds," said Nizar Soltan, 60, who works at a university in Arbil.

"Dozens of times they tricked the Kurds and used them to achieve their ends," he said, sitting in a cafe, complaining that the minority invariably ends up being "marginalised".

"This time let's hope they keep their promises, and that the Kurdish regions will regain security and stability."

kt/tgg/noc/fz/smw

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M: THE OLYMPICS

Two more handed suspended jail terms in Tokyo Olympics scandal

AFP
Wed, 10 May 2023 

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics took place a year late because of the pandemic

Two Japanese businessmen were handed suspended prison sentences on Thursday in the latest convictions in a bribery scandal surrounding the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Corruption allegations have spiralled in the aftermath of the pandemic-delayed Games, implicating major companies and damaging Japan's bid to host the 2030 Winter Olympics in Sapporo.

Shigeharu Hisamatsu, a 64-year-old former executive at advertising firm ADK Holdings, received a sentence of 18 months, suspended for three years, a Tokyo District Court spokesman told AFP.

His former assistant, 61-year-old Toshiaki Tada, was given a sentence of one year, also suspended for three years.

The pair did not contest charges during their first hearing in March that they bribed a Tokyo Olympics committee member, according to local media.

The pair were arrested along with former ADK president Shinichi Ueno in October last year.

Local media reported that Ueno admitted in a court hearing in February that he paid over $100,000 to Haruyuki Takahashi, who is facing several separate bribery charges and has reportedly pleaded not guilty.

Last month, the former chairman of a high-street business suit retailer and sponsor of the Tokyo Games became the first person to be convicted in the bribery scandal.

Hironori Aoki, the 84-year-old head of Aoki Holdings, received a suspended prison sentence of two and a half years.

Other parties involved in bribery allegations include a major publishing firm and a merchandise company licensed to sell soft toys of the Games' mascots.

As investigations continue, the country's Olympic chief warned last month that Japan could push its Winter Olympics bid back four years to 2034.

Japanese Olympic Committee president Yasuhiro Yamashita said it would be "difficult to move ahead without gaining people's understanding" following the scandals.

amk/pst