Republicans want it both ways: less gun control and Hunter Biden gun charges

Conservative efforts to expand the second amendment are exactly what may help Hunter Biden in court

Analysis

Joan E Greve

THE GUARDIAN

Wed 20 Sep 2023 

After spending years attacking Hunter Biden over his allegedly illegal behavior, Republicans reacted to the news of his indictment last week with a measure of disappointment.

Congressman James Comer, the Republican chair of the House oversight committee who has focused his investigative work on the president’s son and his business dealings, described the three-felony gun charges filed against Hunter Biden as “a very small start”. In a post shared to his social media platform Truth Social, Donald Trump lamented that the gun charges were “the only crime that Hunter Biden committed that does not implicate Crooked Joe Biden”.

Despite Republicans’ gripes, a number of legal experts have framed Hunter Biden’s indictment as unusually harsh, given that prosecutors rarely bring such gun charges. The law underlying one of the three criminal counts is also now facing legal challenges after the supreme court’s recent expansion of second amendment rights.


Hunter Biden: the moments that pushed president’s son into spotlight

Meanwhile, the legal morass has put conservatives in an awkward position, as they simultaneously pillory Hunter Biden and champion the loosening of firearm regulations that could get his charges thrown out.

News broke on Thursday that Hunter Biden had been indicted on three charges brought by David Weiss, the special counsel who has been investigating the president’s son for about five years. The first two charges accuse Hunter Biden of lying on an official form to obtain a gun in 2018, when he was struggling with an addiction to crack cocaine. The third count alleges that the president’s son illegally possessed the firearm while addicted to a controlled substance. If convicted, Hunter Biden could face up to 25 years in prison. In a Tuesday court filing, his attorney said he would plead not guilty to federal gun charges.

The indictment, which marked the first time in US history that federal criminal charges were brought against the child of a sitting president, came months after prosecutors’ plea deal with Hunter Biden collapsed amid scrutiny from the judge overseeing the case. That deal would have allowed Hunter Biden to plead guilty to two misdemeanor tax offenses while having the gun charge dismissed, assuming he met the conditions of a pre-trial diversion agreement.

Republicans had attacked the original plea agreement as a “sweetheart deal”, but legal experts described the terms as notably punitive given the crimes alleged. According to data compiled by the US sentencing commission, of the 6,549 people sentenced in the US in 2021 for illegal gun possession, only 5% (or roughly 350 people) were charged for their drug use.

“I have charged many defendants with gun offenses in my former career as a federal prosecutor,” Renato Mariotti, a legal affairs columnist for Politico Magazine, wrote in June. “But until this week I had never heard of a prosecution of anyone for possessing a firearm while addicted to a controlled substance before the Hunter Biden case.”

Charges over lying on forms necessary to purchase firearms are similarly rare, with fewer than 300 cases being brought in the year that Hunter Biden bought his gun, according to data compiled by the Washington Post.

Charges over lying on forms necessary to buy firearms are rare, with fewer than 300 cases brought in the year Hunter Biden bought his gun. 

Photograph: George Frey/AFP/Getty Images

Hunter Biden’s legal team has criticized the case against him as flimsy, accusing Weiss of bowing to political pressure from Republicans.

“As expected, prosecutors filed charges today that they deemed were not warranted just six weeks ago following a five-year investigation into this case,” Abbe Lowell, one of Hunter Biden’s attorneys, said on Thursday. “We believe these charges are barred by the agreement the prosecutors made with Mr Biden, the recent rulings by several federal courts that this statute is unconstitutional, and the facts that he did not violate that law, and we plan to demonstrate all of that in court.”

Those recent rulings include an August decision from the New Orleans-based US court of appeals for the fifth circuit that challenged the law barring users of illegal drugs from possessing firearms. The conservative-leaning court ruled that the supreme court’s decision last year in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc v Bruen, which established a new standard for reviewing firearm regulations in a historical context, rendered the 1968 law unconstitutional.

“In short, our history and tradition may support some limits on an intoxicated person’s right to carry a weapon, but it does not justify disarming a sober citizen based exclusively on his past drug usage,” Judge Jerry Smith wrote in the ruling. “Nor do more generalized traditions of disarming dangerous persons support this restriction on nonviolent drug users.”

Because the fifth circuit oversees only Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi, the decision will not have a direct impact on Hunter Biden’s case in Delaware. But Hunter Biden’s legal team may cite the fifth circuit’s ruling to build a broader argument challenging the constitutionality of the charges against him.

“Other courts of appeals’ decisions are oftentimes persuasive to their sister circuits, especially on a case like this where there hasn’t been a lot of post-Bruen precedent,” said Jacob Charles, a professor at Pepperdine University’s Caruso School of Law and a constitutional law scholar focusing on the second amendment.

A separate case considered by the third circuit, which does cover Delaware, could also have some bearing on Hunter Biden’s case. In Range v Attorney General, the third circuit issued what the judges called a “narrow” decision indicating that the federal government cannot ban people convicted of non-violent crimes from possessing guns.

“There’s distinctions that a court might find relevant, but it’s certainly a case within the circuit that I think Hunter Biden’s attorneys would probably cite if they’re going to challenge this,” Charles said.

The stakes of Hunter Biden’s case have presented a challenge for gun rights groups. Although those groups oppose the gun laws now being used against Hunter Biden, they jumped at the opportunity to attack a president they view as hostile to their mission.

“Gun Owners of America opposes all gun control, but so long as this President continues to use every tool at his disposal to harass and criminalize guns, gun owners and gun dealers, his son should be receiving the same treatment and scrutiny as all of us,” Erich Pratt, senior vice-president of Gun Owners of America, said in a statement last week.

Other gun rights groups remained silent, indicating a reluctance to engage in a case that underscores the murky legal questions lingering in the wake of the supreme court’s decision in Bruen. Lower courts have struggled in their efforts to interpret and enforce the new Bruen standard, and the supreme court will probably have to weigh in soon with more guidance on evaluating gun regulations, including the law barring drug users from possessing firearms.

“It’s certainly possible that either the [supreme] court could decide a question that’s relevant to [Hunter Biden’s] case, and then it’s going to affect this case, or even decide a case that’s about this particular provision and then directly control this case,” Charles said.

So the president’s son may soon find himself smack dab in the middle of a much larger battle over the second amendment and gun rights in America.

Republicans Are Losing Their Mind Over the Senate’s New Dress Code

Republicans are so pissed that Senator John Fetterman can keep wearing his shorts and hoodies. Meanwhile, the government hurtles toward shutdown.

DREW ANGERER/GETTY IMAGES
Senator John Fetterman (left) with an aide

THE NEW REPUBLIC

This weekend, Senator Chuck Schumer announced that the Senate will no longer enforce a formal dress code—and Republicans have been losing their mind ever since.

In particular, Republicans are mad that Senator John Fetterman’s casual fashion sense is officially acceptable. The Pennsylvania senator has become known for forgoing the suit and tie worn by his colleagues and wearing shorts and sweatshirts instead.

On Sunday, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene took to X, formerly known as Twitter, to lambaste the change in the Senate’s dress code as a “disgraceful” attempt to “appease Fetterman.”

“Dress code is one of society’s standards that set etiquette and respect for our institutions,” Greene wrote. “Stop lowering the bar!”

In response, Fetterman reminded everyone that it was actually Greene who’d lowered the bar.

“Thankfully, the nation’s lower chamber lives by a higher code of conduct: displaying ding-a-ling-pics in a public hearing,” he wrote in a post on X, referring to MTG’s decision to hold up poster-size prints of Hunter Biden’s nude photos during a House Oversight Committee hearing this summer.

But Greene isn’t the only Republican making a stink.

On Monday morning, former Trump political adviser Stephen Miller took a break from his new career of filing lawsuits against Pop-Tarts and M&Ms to also criticize the new dress code.

Fox News has similarly been quick to pick up the supposed controversy. In an interview on Fox Business on Sunday, Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin was asked about the change in Senate dress code and called Fetterman’s outfits “completely disrespectful.”

“There’s a side of me that’s super excited about it because I hate wearing a tie, and I’d rather be in blue jeans and a pair of boots and a white T-shirt,” Mullin admitted in surprising detail. “But the fact is, that you do dress for the job. And we need to be respectful of the position we hold,” he added.

When asked if the change in dress code was Schumer’s attempt to appease Fetterman, Mullin replied, “Of course it is. Hundred percent.”

Last week, Representative Matt Gaetz also freaked out about Fetterman’s clothes. In an interview with Steve Bannon, Gaetz remarked, “That is the best-dressed we have ever seen John Fetterman.”

“His shirt had both buttons, and the entire pant was not elastic. There were elastic features, but it was not exclusively elastic,” Gaetz said.

Fetterman had this to say to Gaetz: “Instead of crying about how I dress, how about you get your shit together and do your job, bud?”

As the government hurtles toward another shutdown, it’s good to know that Republicans have more interest in fashion commentary than governing.

Menswear experts on Fetterman’s style: ‘More politicians should look like that’

Rightwingers are blaming the Pennsylvania Democrat for Senate’s dress code change

Alaina Demopoulos

Wed 20 Sep 2023 

Are sweatsuits in Congress a sign of the country’s eroding morals? 

Photograph: Jacquelyn Martin/AP

Does it matter what politicians wear? It’s an issue pundits have long debated – especially when the subjects are women. This time, though, the target is John Fetterman, a Pennsylvania Democrat, whose wardrobe is drawing ire, as rightwingers seek to blame him for recent relaxation of the Senate dress code policy.

Fetterman is known for dressing in oversized hoodies, sweatsuits, and shorts. Rightwingers have been blaming him for Senator Chuck Schumer’s introduction of a new dress code last week: lawmakers no longer have to don formalwear before entering the chamber.


“The Senate no longer enforcing a dress code for Senators to appease Fetterman is disgraceful,” wrote Marjorie Taylor Greene on X, formerly known as Twitter. “Dress code is one of society’s standards that set etiquette and respect for our institutions. Stop lowering the bar!”


Governor Ron DeSantis of Florida used the news as a talking point on the campaign trail. “We need to be lifting our standards up in this country, not dumbing down,” he said. Senator Susan Collins of Maine joked that she would wear a bikini to the floor.


Fetterman dresses down critics of US Senate dress code reform

Political fashion has long followed a familiar formula – at least when it comes to men. It’s the bipartisan uniform: black suit, blue or red tie, American flag pin. Since he won his seat last year, Fetterman’s wardrobe has been the subject of praise from constituents who find it relatable, and scorn from those who wish he would try harder.

“I say this with tremendous respect: he looks like he might be an electrician,” says Tres Dean, a menswear editor whose work has appeared in GQ and New York magazine. “More politicians should look like that. It’s more accurate when you think about who he represents.”

The Senate’s new protocol comes at a time when workers in various sectors are rewriting the rules on what’s appropriate for the office. Since the height of the pandemic, many workers have continued to prioritize comfort over formality.

“Dress codes everywhere are relaxing,” Dean says. “It’s cool that if the people who represent us choose to take advantage of these new rules, it will potentially better reflect the people they represent.”

The Senate’s new protocol comes as workers in various sectors rewrite the rules on what’s office-appropriate. Photograph: Michael Reynolds/EPA

The discourse over suits squarely fits in with culture war narratives in the US that pit tradition-loving conservatives against progress-minded liberals. Are sweatsuits in Congress a sign of the country’s eroding morals?

“Forcing people into a very specific type of suit ties back into a greater story of privilege and classism,” says Noah Zagor, a fashion and culture consultant based in Chicago. “I think it’s important to dress for the environment you’re in, and that these boundaries help us function. But those boundaries are being debated right now, and we agree on so little as a country.”

Fetterman has been open about his battle with depression, receiving in-patient care at a hospital this spring. There is a sense of shelter in baggy, comfortable clothing, and voters may associate those visuals with Fetterman’s past struggles.

Fetterman understands the value of sartorial messaging. This is the same man who appeared in a Levi’s ad while serving as the mayor of Braddock, Pennsylvania, in 2010. The town was attempting to revitalize after years of economic decline, partnering with the denim company for a campaign that used residents instead of models. Billboards with taglines such as “ready to work” underscored the point.

For Erik Maza, executive style director of Town & Country, conservative outrage about Fetterman’s sweats feels performative and is reminiscent of the controversy that came with Obama wearing a tan suit at a White House press briefing. The former congressman Peter King, a New York Republican, said Obama’s outfit pointed to a “lack of seriousness”.

Almost 10 years later, the so-called scandal has become a punchline, a symbol of out-of-touch politicians clutching their pearls to distract from real problems.

It is in this spirit that Fetterman has fielded the recent accusations that his proclivity for hoodies has precipitated the downfall of American political fashion. He responded to Greene with a tweet about conservative hypocrisy, after the Republican displayed nude photos of Hunter Biden at a hearing this summer. “Thankfully, the nation’s lower chamber lives by a higher code of conduct: displaying ding-a-ling pics in public hearings,” he wrote. He issued a similar riposte to a Fox news story blaming him for dress code “fury”, tweeting: “I figure if I take up vaping and grabbing the hog during a live musical, they’ll make me a folk hero.”

“Washington DC is not exactly a sartorial mecca,” Maza says. “Voters care much more about the legislation lawmakers pass than if they wear shorts or sweats.”

A gateway to Europe for migrants and a paradise for tourists: The two Lampedusas that rarely intersect

The Italian island that has received 12,000 people in search of a new life this week is also home to a thriving leisure industry that welcomes 30,000 travelers every year

A boat with migrants surrounded by yachts with tourists, this past Monday in Lampedusa.

CECILIA FABIANO/LAPRESSE

LORENA PACHO
Lampedusa - SEP 19, 2023

The Italian coast guard rescues, off the coast of Lampedusa, a drifting barge loaded with migrants trying to reach Europe through the Mediterranean. They are transferred to a military ship and taken to the port. At the dock, they will be identified and treated by doctors. Then they will go to the buses that will take them to the reception center, where they will stay for a few days until they leave the island on a boat heading to the reception centers in Sicily or the mainland. To the tourists who, a few feet from the landing area, mix with the locals in the urban center — full of bars with terraces and shops — after a day at the beach, in the bustle of a September Sunday afternoon (still high season in Lampedusa), they are barely ghosts.

The beaches, restaurants, and hotels are still full. In the most prosperous years, up to 30,000 tourists, mostly Italian, come to this island of about 6,000 residents. There is no data to suggest that immigration harms in any way the economic activity of Lampedusa.

A group of migrants arriving this past Monday in Lampedusa

.CIRO FUSCO (EFE)

On summer nights, the streets of the center of the island become an open-air party, with concerts that go on well into the early hours of the morning and souvenir shops still open after midnight. Not far from there, in the church square, long lines of migrants wait to receive a plate of hot food. Although this happens almost every day, they do not come across the tourists, who dine on the terraces of nearby restaurants.

This week has been unusual in every sense. Nearly 12,000 migrants arrived in Lampedusa in just a few days, and the exception that proves the rule occurred: a group of boys from the Gambia, Liberia, Ivory Coast and Nigeria who had just landed on the island danced with tourists and locals to the rhythm of Bob Marley’s reggae. This almost never happens. But most of the neighbors, who have gone out of their way to bring clothes, blankets, water and food, celebrate it as a sign of welcome and normality.

Two reception systems coexist in Lampedusa: one for tourists and one for migrants arriving through the Mediterranean. Some see the island as a holiday paradise. For others, who are fleeing hunger, natural disasters or war, it represents the gateway to Europe, the end of a dangerous sea voyage in which they risk their lives. To date, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that more than 2,000 people who left North Africa trying to reach Italy have died in the central Mediterranean.

Tourists watch a group of migrants in Lampedusa on September 15.

CIRO FUSCO (EFE)

Nevertheless, a tourist could spend weeks on the island without ever knowing what is taking place just a short distance away. Everything is organized so that the immigration issue does not interfere with local life. “There are two parallel channels that do not intersect. When everything is working normally, tourists don’t see migrants. These days of emergency there were migrants on the streets, asking peacefully for food, water. Some chose to offer them assistance, while others chose not to,” Giusi Nicolini, former mayor of Lampedusa, explains to EL PAÍS.

In general, many people who live or work in Lampedusa explain that there are very few points where the experiences of those who arrive by sea on an iron barge coincide with those of the rest of the people on the island.

The reception center is located approximately 1.5 miles from the port, nestled on a small hill, in an area with no hotels or vacation homes. Less than half a mile away, there is a landfill. Seeing the place from the central streets with the naked eye is impossible. In the urban area of Lampedusa, populated by a swarm of sun-drenched low houses, a mural depicts the drama that migrants go through when they take to the sea to reach Europe.

Filippo Mannino, the head of a right-wing coalition, has been the mayor of Lampedusa for a little over a year. Among other things, he has kept in force an ordinance that prohibits people housed in the reception center from leaving the premises. This rule was implemented in 2020 due to the pandemic, and, even though the health reasons no longer apply, the politician decided to maintain it. Currently, only those who have the strength to jump the fence and elude the army — which patrols the outside of the facility — can leave the reception center.

Protesting the government management

Recently, Mannino suggested, without evidence, that if the management of immigrants is too visible, it becomes detrimental to tourism. “The goal of the government and this administration must be to minimize the impact of the reception in this territory, because we actually live from tourism and we want to continue living from it,” he stated. The vice mayor, Attilo Lucia, has echoed this message and has encouraged the locals to protest against Rome’s migration management.

The former mayor, Giusi Nicolini (who a decade ago, in the midst of the refugee crisis, exported an exciting message of welcome that was replicated by many local governments of Europe) rejects that vision. “The presence of migrants is not a problem; if that was the case, this island would be at risk of depopulation. Instead, it is a place that is growing demographically and where profits from tourism are increasing more and more. In fact, it is a positive example that shows that coexistence is possible, and that welcoming people harms no one,” she says.

“We came to spend a few days relaxing at the sea. We met a group of boys asking for food and water. We gave it to them and chatted with them for a while. We learned their stories. It was going to be a normal vacation, and it became an enriching experience,” says Ilaria Benedetti, a Roman tourist who visited the island with her husband and two children.

Many local workers do not think that immigration will affect the island’s image. “We barely see the migrants, because they arrive in the boats, and they’re taken directly from the port to the reception center. Their arrival does not affect tourism in any way, why would it? Hotels and restaurants continue to hang signs announcing that they are full; that is the proof,” says Emanuele, a taxi driver. “Immigration and tourism are different things,” agrees Luciana, who works in a craft store.

One of the few places where tourists and migrants do meet is the island’s outpatient clinic, which is divided into three sections: one for the locals, the emergency section for tourists (active from mid-June to mid-September) and the unit that cares for migrants. The three sections are located in different parts of the outpatient clinic, but they share the same waiting room. Here, a tourist injured by a jellyfish on the beach and a woman arriving from Libya with signs of violence after months in immigration detention centers can find themselves sitting next to each other.

The island’s small cemetery is another space that everyone shares. There, the graves of the migrants who lost their lives in the water are not far from the rest. For years (until it ran out of space) some foreign victims of the sea were buried there in unmarked graves that read: “Here lies an unidentified immigrant.” Someone left flowers and a small wooden boat on them, and decorated them with drawings. The IOM estimates that, since 2014, approximately 17,000 people have disappeared in the waters of the Mediterranean while trying to reach Europe.

Ten years after tragedy, tiny Lampedusa at centre of migration crisis again

More than 11,000 people have landed on the island in recent days – a decade on from when hundreds were killed in a shipwreck

An Italian coastguard boat packed with people in the port of the Italian island of Lampedusa. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian


by Angela Giuffrida in Lampedusa
Wed 20 Sep 2023 

Vito Fiorino and his friends were preparing to go fishing after sleeping the night on his boat docked off Lampedusa when one of them, Alessandro, heard piercing screams. It was about 6am on 3 October 2013. The group often ventured out to sea on the abandoned boat that Fiorino had brought back to life after moving to the tiny Sicilian island a few years earlier. But rarely would they spend the night.

“It was a dark night with lots of stars, no wind and a beautiful sea, and so we decided to sleep on the boat, something we hadn’t done in years,” Fiorino said. “Alessandro got the boat going as dawn broke and after a few metres stopped the engine and asked: ‘Did you hear that noise?’ He used a Sicilian word which means ‘cries of anguish’. There was a huge flock of seagulls so I was convinced that the noise was coming from them.”

A boat full of tourists leaves the port of Lampedusa. In the foreground the boats used by migrants to reach the island. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian


Instead of fishing, they sailed further out to sea to explore where the sound was coming from. “After navigating for 800 metres, what I saw in front of me was terrifying,” Fiorino said. “There were about 200 people in the sea, screaming and crying for help.”

Fiorino’s 10-metre boat, called Gama, was the first to arrive on the scene after a flimsy vessel crammed with almost 500 people caught fire and sank not far from the shore of Lampedusa’s famed Rabbit beach.

The bodies of 368 people were recovered in what was one of the Mediterranean’s worst shipwrecks. It was also one of the most shameful episodes for Italy, whose coastguard had ignored repeated SOS calls, and for the EU.

Now, as the 10th anniversary of the tragedy nears, Lampedusa – for years the first port of call for people making the perilous journey by sea from north Africa – and the memories of that night have been thrust back into the spotlight after more than 11,000 people, almost double the island’s population, landed on the island within six days.

Vito Fiorino was among the first responders when a boat full of migrants capsized on 3 October 2013, causing one of the worst shipwrecks ever in the Mediterranean Sea. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian

Lives have again been lost: on Saturday, the body of a baby who died shortly after being born onboard a boat carrying 40 passengers was placed in a white coffin and taken to the island’s cemetery, where the remains of other people who perished making the journey over the years are buried in unmarked graves. Last week, a five-month-old boy drowned during a rescue operation.


Fiorino and his friends managed to save 47 people in the 2013 shipwreck before the coastguard arrived. When the then prime minister, Enrico Letta, visited the island soon after, he was heckled. There was a similar reaction on Sunday when residents disrupted a convoy transporting the current premier, Giorgia Meloni, and Ursula von der Leyen, the president of the European Commission, to the island’s overcrowded reception centre.

People lie on the ground in Lampedusa waiting to board a ship that will transfer them to Sicily. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian

“People are frustrated because in the space of 10 years, nothing has changed,” Fiorino said. “We hear a lot of words, but they are all empty.”

More than 127,000 people have landed on Italian soil so far in 2023 – more than double the number over the same period last year. The majority have set off from Tunisia, where in July Meloni and Von der Leyen signed a controversial £105m deal to stem irregular migration.

Lampedusa, which lies closer to Tunisia than mainland Italy and survives off fishing and tourism, has once again been shouldering most of the burden.

Alfonso Gagliano, who last April rescued migrants who risked drowning a few miles from the coast of the Italian island of Lampedusa. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian

“We will always save lives but we feel abandoned,” said Alfonso Gagliano, a fisher who in April rescued a group of people at sea. “Unfortunately, these frequent arrivals affect us a lot – our livelihoods, healthcare, everything … we just don’t have the services to cope.”

Meloni, who renewed vows to get tough on illegal immigration, said Von der Leyen’s trip to Lampedusa was “a sign of responsibility, not solidarity”. Yet they were spared the scenes of the humanitarian crisis that had played out on the island in the days before their visit.

There had been chaos at the reception centre, which has the capacity to host 400 people, with some sleeping along the rubbish-strewn street that leads up to the facility. Those inside, desperate to find food, tried to climb over a fence. The many who had not got a spot in the centre, which in the past has been criticised for its appalling conditions, bedded down on benches and under trees close to the island’s main thoroughfare, Via Roma.

“Why is it you people think we don’t have a right to refuge or respect?” said Amadou, who was among five young people from the Gambia stranded outside the reception centre on Saturday afternoon. “We are educated, we have studied languages – all we want is a better life.”

By the time Meloni and Von der Leyen arrived the next morning, the majority of people had been transferred off the island to centres in Sicily or mainland Italy, and the area around the reception centre, which the pair toured for about 10 minutes, had been made to look almost pristine.

People wait to board a ship that will transfer them on the mainland. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian

“They really didn’t see anything of the inhumanity,” said Mariangela Greco, a B&B owner. “Neither do they understand the issues we have to deal with.”

Residents empathise with the arrivals – they have rallied to provide clothing and food, with restaurants offering meals and one elderly woman cooking for people in her home. But they feel that their own problems, including bad roads, poor waste management and a hospital bereft of a maternity unit, are being ignored as they are left to deal with a phenomenon that is showing no sign of subsiding. People continue to arrive – more than 700 since Monday.

Greco was among the residents protesting over fears that the island will be transformed into a so-called “tent city”, even more so after Meloni’s far-right government approved a measure on Monday night giving power to authorities to detain those turned down for asylum in reception centres for as long as 18 months.

“We believe they want to provide tents for 3,000 people – we will not allow it,” Greco said. “The island is too small for something so big and will ruin everything – we survive off tourism and fishing, but mostly tourism.”

After the 2013 disaster, there were fears that tourists would stop coming. Instead, visitor numbers have increased, with new hotels springing up in recent years and more flights to the island.

Alessio and Elena Pewvitali, tourists, portrayed on la Guitgia beach in Lampedusa. Photograph: Roberto Salomone/The Guardian

Beaches remained packed in recent days. “I felt guilty eating while seeing people who were hungry,” said Elena Previtali, who was enjoying the late afternoon sun on a beach metres away from a port where people continued to arrive. “It is a desperate situation that is badly managed.”

With the devastating floods in Libya and earthquake in Morocco, there will be “another wave of desperate people coming to Europe,” said her husband, Alessio.

“There is no magic wand to resolve the situation,” he said. “Either way, it involves Europe, not just Italy.

France 'will not welcome migrants' from Lampedusa • FRANCE 24 

 

Azerbaijan announces an 'anti-terrorist operation' targeting Armenian positions in Nagorno-Karabakh

FILE - In this Wednesday, Nov. 25, 2020 file photo, an ethnic Armenian soldier stands guard next to Nagorno-Karabakh's flag atop of the hill near Charektar in the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh at a new border with Kalbajar district turned over to Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan has announced an “anti-terrorist operation” targeting Armenian military positions. A statement from the Azerbaijan defense ministry said the operation began hours after four soldiers and two civilians died in landmine explosions in the Nagorno-Karabakh region. (AP Photo/Sergei Grits, File) 

Avet Demourian, The Associated Press
Published Tuesday, September 19, 2023 8:34AM EDT

YEREVAN, Armenia (AP) — Azerbaijan on Tuesday began what it called an “anti-terrorist operation” targeting Armenian military positions in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and officials in the area reported heavy artillery firing around its capital.

The Azerbaijani defense ministry announced the start of the operation hours after four soldiers and two civilians died in landmine explosions in the Nagorno-Karabakh region. The reports raised concerns that a full-scale war over the region could resume between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which fought heavily for six weeks in 2020.

The ministry did not immediately give details, but said “positions on the front line and in-depth, long-term firing points of the formations of Armenia’s armed forces, as well as combat assets and military facilities are incapacitated using high-precision weapons.”

The Azerbaijani statement said, “Only legitimate military targets are being incapacitated.”

But ethnic Armenian officials in Nagorno-Karabakh said in a statement that the region's capital Stepanakert and other villages were “under intense shelling.”

Earlier Tuesday, Azerbaijan said six people were killed in two separate explosions in the region that is partly under the control of ethnic Armenian forces.

A statement from Azerbaijan's interior ministry, state security service and prosecutor-general said two employees of the highway department died before dawn when their vehicle was blown up by a mine and that a truckload of soldiers responding to the incident hit another mine, killing four.

Nagorno-Karabakh and sizable surrounding territories were under ethnic Armenian control since the 1994 end of a separatist war, but Azerbaijan regained the territories and parts of Nagorno-Karabakh itself in a six-week war in 2020. That war ended with an armistice that placed a Russian peacekeeper contingent in Nagorno-Karabakh.

However, Azerbaijan alleges that Armenia has smuggled in weapons since then. The claims led to a blockade of the road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia, causing severe food and medicine shortages in the region.

Red Cross shipments of flour and medical supplies reached Nagorno-Karabakh on Monday, but local officials said road connections to the region were not fully open.

The hostilities come amid high tensions between Armenia and its longtime ally Russia. Armenia has repeatedly complained that the 3,000-strong Russian peacekeeping force was unable or unwilling to keep the road to Armenia open even though that duty was stipulated in the agreement that ended the 2020 war.

Armenia also angered Russia, which maintains a military base in the country, by holding military exercises with the United States this month and by moving toward ratifying the Rome Convention that created the International Criminal Court, which has indicted Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on Tuesday denied claims that Russia was informed in advance of Azerbaijan's intention to mount the operation, saying the peacekeepers were notified only “a few minutes” before it began.

___

Associated Press writers Jim Heintz in Tallinn, Estonia, and Aida Sultanova in London contributed to this report. 

Russia and Allies Warn UN That SDGs in Jeopardy Without Sanctions Relief

Sep. 19, 2023

Russia’s seat at the United Nations.kurs2030.ru

Russia has threatened to block the adoption of a new political declaration at the UN Sustainable Development Goals Summit in New York, arguing that sanctions undermine its own progress toward achieving them, the Coalition for Sustainable Development of Russia (CSDR) said Monday.

In a joint letter to the UN General Assembly, Russia — along with allies Belarus, Iran, Bolivia, Nicaragua, Cuba, North Korea, Syria, Eritrea, Venezuela, and Zimbabwe — referred to the sanctions imposed on the countries as "unilateral coercive measures" (UCMs), pointing to a significant burden caused by UCMs on countries’ capacities to implement SDGs.

“The issue of the negative impact of UCMs is an existential one for our peoples. A third of the world’s population is affected by these illegal measures,” the countries stated in the document obtained by The Moscow Times.

The move comes as independent experts say Russia is failing to meet its SDGs. Despite having made some progress toward these goals by 2022, the war on Ukraine brought many initiatives in Russia to a halt.

Specifically, CSDR pointed to the suspension of international cooperation in pharmacology, clinical research and drug development, which it said poses a challenge to achieving SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-Being).

Additionally, Russian industry has lost a significant incentive for decarbonization — the European Union's cross-border carbon tax — due to a substantial decline in export markets and the departure of many international companies following the invasion of Ukraine. Progress toward SDG 13 (Climate Action) is further hindered by Russia's lack of reporting of greenhouse gas emissions that result from its military actions in Ukraine.

The exodus of Western renewable energy companies has also put SDG 7 (ensuring access to affordable and clean energy) in jeopardy. Losing access to modern technologies and foreign investment, as well as the country’s economic decline since 2022, have also hampered Russia's progress toward achieving the SDGs.

However, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk said during his speech at the summit that Russia has achieved more than half of the global SDG indicators in recent years.

Overchuk attributed the global slowdown and regression in SDG implementation to macroeconomic policy miscalculations by the U.S. and EU, which led to increased inflation. He also criticized an "unbalanced" energy-climate policy promoting forced economic "greening."

"The negative impact on the global economy [...] was exacerbated by the policy of illegal unilateral sanctions against Russia, which reached unprecedented scales last year,” the minister added.

“As a result, developing countries, especially the least developed ones, have become true hostages of the situation."

Despite the collective appeal from Russia and its allies, the new declaration was adopted at the opening of the SDG Summit on Monday. Nevertheless, experts believe that countries advocating for the lifting of sanctions may still oppose the agreed-upon document in the following days.

Nelya Rakhimova, chair of the Coalition for Sustainable Development of Russia, believes that Russia is using the SDG agenda to manipulate the world into repealing sanctions, prompting other countries to follow suit.

“It's important to understand that these ideas were promoted by Russia during multiple negotiations already before the war in Ukraine,” Rakhimova told The Moscow Times. “Due to political depolarization in the world, more countries have joined this argument to raise the issue of sanctions for SDG implementation.”

Rakhimova also noted that there is no evidence that Russia has been genuinely concerned about SDG implementation from the beginning, pointing out that Russia’s National Projects are not explicitly aligned with the UN’s Sustainable Development Agenda.

“Therefore, I would say that right now the SDGs are just another soft diplomatic tool for Russia,” she concluded.

The 2023 SDG Summit brought together political and thought leaders from around the globe to review the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

Russia, along with other 192 countries, in 2015 signed and adopted the 2030 Agenda, which focuses on 17 Sustainable Development Goals in areas including eradicating poverty, ensuring people live healthy lives, reducing inequality and mitigating climate change.

Read more about: United Nations

French reporter arrested over leaked secrets

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IMAGE SOURCE,CPJ

Image caption,

Ariane Lavrilleux

BBC

A French journalist was held overnight and questioned by police in connection with a 2021 report which alleged that French intelligence was used by Egypt to kill civilians.

Police reportedly searched Ariane Lavrilleux's house on 19 September and later took her into custody.

Lavrilleux's lawyer said she was questioned as part of an investigation into compromising national security.

She was released after a night in custody.

Amnesty International's Katia Roux had said she was "very worried" for the journalist at the time of her arrest.

"To put in police custody a journalist for doing her job, moreover for revealing information of public interest, could be a threat to freedom of the press and confidentiality of sources."

Lavrilleux was reportedly questioned by police officers from the French intelligence service - the General Directorate for Internal Security, or DGSI.

Her 2021 report used leaked classified documents to allege that Egyptian authorities used French intelligence to bomb and kill smugglers on the Egyptian-Libyan border between 2016 and 2018.

According to the report, French forces were implicated in "at least 19 bombings" against civilians.

It was published by Disclose, a French investigative journalism website.

Disclose said that French authorities under the presidencies of President François Hollande and President Emmanuel Macron were "constantly informed" of the developments by staff at "several military departments", but that their concerns were ignored.

At the time of publication, Disclose acknowledged that the report included national security secrets but said that it was sharing them "in the name of a fundamental principle of democracy: the right to information".

"The notion of 'classified information' cannot be invoked to protect a campaign of arbitrary executions against civilians," Disclose said.

It also said that, by publishing the report, it was knowingly taking the risk to "contravene the law".

After the articles were published, France's armed forces ministry filed a legal complaint for "violation of national defence secrets".

The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemned Lavrilleux's arrest, asked that all criminal investigations against her are dropped and said police should refrain from questioning her over her sources.

"Journalists must be able to freely report on national defence and security issues. Questioning reporters about their confidential sources places them under unwarranted pressure and could have a chilling effect on defence reporting," said Attila Mong, CPJ's Europe representative.

Rights groups condemn arrest of French journalist over defense reporting

Reuters

September 19, 2023

PARIS, Sept 19 (Reuters) - A French reporter was arrested and her home searched on Tuesday in connection with a report two years ago by online media outlet Disclose that said French intelligence was being misused by Egypt, the outlet and the reporter's lawyer said.

Rights groups condemned the arrest of reporter Ariane Lavrilleux, who authored the report that said French intelligence intended to track jihadist militants had been misused by Egypt to target smugglers on the Libyan border and kill civilians. Its publication prompted France's armed forces minister to call for an investigation.

Lavrilleux's lawyer, Virginie Marquet, said her client was being questioned by a judge and police officers from the French intelligence service DGSI as part of an investigation into compromising national security.

"It's a rather uncommon procedure," Marquet told Reuters. "It goes up a notch when it comes to coercive measures against journalists."

The DGSI did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

Journalist detained, home searched over reporting on French intelligence, news outlet says

French investigative news outlet Disclose says one of its reporters has been arrested and her residence searched by the country’s domestic intelligence agency

ByTHOMAS ADAMSON 

Associated Press
September 19, 2023

PARIS -- A French journalist was arrested and her residence searched Tuesday by the country’s domestic intelligence agency, her employer the investigative news outlet Disclose, said.

Disclose said reporter Ariane Lavrilleux's detention was linked to her reporting on leaked documents implicating French intelligence's alleged role in the Egyptian government's alleged targeting of civilians.

The media outlet called the detention an “unacceptable” assault on press freedoms.

The General Directorate of Internal Security opened an investigation in July 2022 into Disclose's work, which it said was “compromising national defense secrets and revealing information that could lead to the identification of a protected agent."

The allegations stem from a series of exposés initiated in November 2021 in which Disclose chronicled the alleged misuse of French military intelligence by the Egyptian military in an operation originally meant to identify Islamic militants.

The scope of Operation Sirli allegedly expanded to facilitate nearly 20 targeted strikes conducted by the Egyptian military against individuals returning to Egypt from Libya between 2016 and 2018 who were suspected of smuggling. But subsequent reports said many of those targeted were not militants, a severe breach in protocols regarding the targeting of civilians and evoking potential human rights violations.

In a post on the platform X, formerly known as Twitter, Disclose said that its reporting “relied on several hundred top secret documents to unveil a campaign of arbitrary executions” orchestrated by Egyptian leader Abdel Fattah el-Sissi “with the complicity of the French state.”

A spokesman for the Egyptian foreign ministry did not immediately respond to phone calls and a message seeking comment Tuesday.

Tuesday's arrest was likely to intensify scrutiny and prompt questions in French media over the country's alleged role in and record on human rights in Egypt.