'LGBTQ landmark': Tokyo opens Olympics Pride House


Issued on: 11/10/2020

LGBTQ rights campaigners in Japan are hoping that Pride House Tokyo will help tackle stigma and raise awareness of discrimination Philip FONG AFP

Tokyo (AFP)

Tokyo on Sunday opened its first major community hub for LGBTQ people this month, part of a pre-Olympics project that campaigners hope will tackle stigma and raise awareness of discrimination.

Pride House Tokyo is based on similar inclusive pop-up sites set up at past Olympics, but will offer a permanent meeting space and information centre, seeking to educate the public about sexual diversity and offer refuge to those suffering harassment or discrimination.

While Japan has some protections for sexual minorities, it remains the only G7 country that does not recognise same-sex unions, and many couples say they can struggle to rent apartments together and are even barred from hospital visits

Those challenges mean spaces like Pride House, set up in coordination with Tokyo 2020 Olympic organisers, are sorely needed in Japan, activists say.

"Japan, not just in sporting circles but society as a whole -- including schools and workplaces -- is not friendly to LGBTQ people, and it is hard to come out," Gon Matsunaka, who heads the project behind Pride House, told AFP.

While the centre is being set up under a recent Olympic tradition, the project is officially named "Pride House Tokyo Legacy", and activists hope its influence will extend beyond the Games.

The venue "will be a landmark that could change the landscape for LGBTQ people in Japanese society," Matsunaka said.

The International Olympic Committee echoed hopes for a lasting legacy.

"In sport, we are all equal," IOC President Thomas Bach said in a statement released Sunday.

"We therefore welcome that Tokyo 2020 has embedded diversity and inclusion in the Olympic Games model," he said, wishing "the Pride House Tokyo success".

- 'Unthinkable to come out' -

The first Pride House -- inspired by the tradition of Olympic hospitality centres for national teams -- was launched at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games.

Temporary venues have since appeared at London 2012 and Rio 2016, and at other international sporting events like the Commonwealth Games.

In 2014, Russian authorities denied a request to open a Pride House at the Sochi Winter Games, the organisation said. Instead, remote spaces were set up internationally for LGBTQ fans to gather.

Those involved in setting up the Tokyo Pride House include Fumino Sugiyama, a former athlete who was on the national women's fencing team before coming out as a transgender man.

"When I was fencing, it was unthinkable to come out in the sports community, which was particularly homophobic," said Sugiyama, 39.

"I faced a dilemma between trying to do the sport I love, where I can't be myself, or trying to be myself and having to stop fencing," he said.

While there are now several openly gay top sportspeople worldwide, from US women's soccer star Megan Rapinoe to British Olympic diver Tom Daley, "not a single top athlete has come out" in Japan, he said.

Some local governments, employers and universities in Japan have taken gradual steps in recent years to expand protections for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender citizens.

In some cities, local districts recognise same-sex partnerships, and some employers and universities have specific protections against discrimination.

- 'Growing number of allies' -

"Society has changed a lot, with a growing number of allies," Sugiyama said.

"But there remains the fundamental issue of the lack of a legal system to ensure LGBTQ rights in Japan, for example, the right to get married."

There is no widespread religious stigma against homosexuality in Japan, and some popular celebrities and TV personalities are openly gay.

And activists have launched several legal challenges recently intended to expand rights for the community, including suits last year accusing the government of discrimination for failing to recognise same-sex unions.

But success is not guaranteed.

In 2019, the Supreme Court upheld strict rules on changing gender on legal documents including a requirement that a transgender person have no reproductive capacity, which can effectively force some to undergo sterilsation to change their documents.

Sugiyama said it would be important for Pride House, in Tokyo's lively Shinjuku area which has a well-known gay district, to stay open beyond the Olympics.

"LGBTQ people face various issues," he said. "Small and big, 24 hours, 365 days a year."

© 2020 AFP

Kenyan filmmaker hopes to follow in Hollywood's LGBTQ footsteps



Issued on: 11/10/2020 -

Murimi is a multiple award-winning director known for tackling complex social issues

 Tolga AKMEN AFP

London (AFP)

The Kenyan director behind a new documentary about a gay couple struggling for acceptance in the east African country hopes its film industry can mirror Hollywood's progressive role in promoting LGBTQ rights.

Peter Murimi, whose documentary "I Am Samuel" screens at the London Film Festival this weekend, is the latest filmmaker to depict a same-sex relationship in sub-Saharan Africa in the face of religious and cultural conservatism.

He believes portraying more gay people on the big screen across the continent, alongside moves to decriminalise homosexuality, can make LGBTQ rights a mainstream issue.

"The role Hollywood played in furthering LBGTQ rights in the United States was really big, it cannot be understated," Murimi told AFP on the sidelines of the festival.

"You could just see gay people on TV and in Hollywood, and slowly and slowly it became much easier (for them).

"They say 'you win the hearts, and once the hearts are won the law is irrelevant'," he said, adding "film can play that role".

Murimi, 42, a multiple award-winning director known for tackling complex social issues, is unsure if he will get permission from Kenyan authorities to show "I Am Samuel".

He is currently screening it internationally, but believes Kenya is becoming more tolerant, despite the protagonists of his documentary having to move home for their own safety.

The filmmaker said they also have a plan ready should the film provoke a backlash inside Kenya.

"In the last 10 years (LGBTQ rights have) really actually been making a lot of strides in a positive way," Murimi insisted.

"So we'll just try our best and hopefully Kenyans will see it and that's what we want."

Murimi is encouraged by the reception of other recent high-profile African films about gay relationships.

The 2018 movie "Rafiki", about a lesbian love affair, was initially banned by Kenya's censors but that was later overturned, and it went on to have some sold-out screenings.

Meanwhile last year's British-Nigerian co-production "Walking With Shadows", chronicling the fallout from a romantic relationship between two Nigerian men, earned critical acclaim after a limited release in Lagos.

- Not 'us against them' -

"I Am Samuel" tells the story of Samuel and Alex, a gay couple from humble backgrounds living in the Kenyan capital Nairobi and part of a community of fellow queer men.

It comes as the country sees legal challenges to a British colonial-era law punishing "carnal knowledge... against the order of nature" by up to 14 years in jail.

Last year, Kenya's High Court upheld the laws but activists are challenging the ruling in appeals courts.

Murimi believes despite the legislation's historical legacy, the fight for greater acceptance of the LGBTQ community is something best left to Kenyans.

He noted homophobic people in the country criticise gay people for adopting "Western behaviour" and said outsiders' calls for more tolerance are typically characterised as "imposing your culture on us".

"So it is counterproductive and it's better if nothing happens and we just try to sort it out," Murimi added.

His documentary ignores the ongoing legal battles and focuses instead on Samuel's struggles to win acceptance of his relationship from his own family, who live on a farm in a rural part of Kenya.

The filmmaker, a heterosexual who sees himself as an ally of the LGBTQ community, said he wanted to create something that "parents can relate to" as well, broadening the number of people who could appreciate it.

"This film I hope can do that because it is not an 'us against them'. It's very nuanced, it's very balanced, it's a story about a family that is struggling with this issue, having a gay son," he explained.

"There are so many fathers whose children are gay that will relate to this film. There are so many people whose brother or sister is gay and will connect with this film."

© 2020 AFP

The coronavirus pandemic: A threat to food security

For years, the Global Hunger Index has shown global advances in combating malnutrition. But the coronavirus pandemic could undo them, according to the latest report for German aid organization Welthungerhilfe.



Five years ago, the United Nations made it one of its goals to eradicate world hunger by 2030. That meant that every human being, even in the poorest countries, was to have adequate nourishment.

But what is the situation in the world today? And are we on the way to achieving this goal? In 2015, it sounded ambitious but within reach. After all, the global food situation has improved greatly in just a few years. In 2000, the Global Hunger Index gave the entire Earth a score of 28.2, meaning that the situation was seen as serious; today, with a score of 18.2, hunger is rated only as moderate. Zero would mean no hunger at all, while 100 would be the worst score.

The GHI scores use four component indicators of hunger as a basis:
Undernourishment (the share of the population that has an insufficient calorie intake)
Child wasting (the share of children under the age of five who have a low weight-for-height, reflecting acute undernutrition)
Child stunting (the share of children under the age of five who have a low height-for-age, reflecting chronic undernutrition)
Child mortality (the mortality rate of children under the age of five)

Mathias Mogge of Welthungerhilfe is concerned about the impact of COVID-19 on food security Read more: Opinion: Nobel Prize for World Food Programme is an appeal for greater cooperation

A moral failure

Despite the progress, recent statistics are still horrifying: Nearly 690 million people worldwide suffer from malnutrition, 144 million children have stunted growth, 47 million children show wasting and in 2018, 5.3 million children died before their fifth birthday, often from undernourishment.

In its latest report, the German aid organization Welthungerhilfe calls world hunger "the greatest moral and ethical failure of our generation." Even if the world average has improved, the differences between individual regions and countries are enormous. Sub-Saharan Africa (27.8) and South Asia (26.0) are the regions with the worst hunger scores in the world.

What is stopping progress in combating this problem? Simone Pott, a spokeswoman for Welthungerhilfe, says "crises and conflicts, along with poverty, inequality, bad health systems and the repercussions of climate change" are the main factors here.5

COVID-19 Special: Could coronavirus provoke the next hunger crisis?

She gives the example of Madagascar: "The GHI score is higher today than in 2012. Problems in the country include increasing poverty and political instability as well as the consequences of climate change." But Congo and the Central African Republic bring up the rear in the report, she says, with "violent conflicts and extreme weather events slowing a positive development."

What Nepal is doing right

But there are also positive examples. In 2000, the situation in two countries, Cameroon and Nepal, was considered to be in the "alarming" category, but today they are among the nations with moderate hunger scores. In Cameroon, the per capita economic output more than doubled, from $650 (€549) to $1,534 (€1,297), between 2000 and 2018, according to World Bank figures. Angola, Ethiopia and Sierra Leone have also made great improvements since 2000, and their GHI scores have gone down by more than 25 points. In 2000, they were still classified in the "extremely alarming" category, mainly because of civil wars, which are among the major causes of hunger and malnutrition.

Simone Pott explains the reasons for the progress in Nepal. "Investments in economic development have reduced poverty here. Interventions in the health sector led to a lower mortality rate in children and better health overall. More investment in agriculture has resulted in more food security," she says.

Cure often worse than the illness

But now the great unknown has entered into the equation: COVID-19 and its fallout. They are not considered in the report. Economic slumps lead to falling revenue. For many countries, that will mean they can import less food. The UN's Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that this could lead to up to 80 million more people becoming malnourished just in countries with a net import of foodstuffs.

Mathias Mogge, the secretary-general of Welthungerhilfe, has similar fears. "The pandemic and its economic consequences have the potential to double the number of people who are affected by acute food crises," he says.

Even in Western countries, it has often been asked whether the economic consequences of the measures taken to curb the spread of the coronavirus are worse than the health problems caused by the virus itself — whether the cure is worse than the illness. Simone Pott believes this is true for many countries in the Global South. "The lockdown has had terrible consequences, especially for the millions of people who work in the informal sector," she says. "From one day to the next, they lost their incomes, local markets had to close and small farmers couldn't cultivate their fields any longer." So it is not easy to weigh up what is worse in each individual country.

And as far as eradication of hunger in the world by 2030 goes, she is not optimistic, either. "Unfortunately, we are not on track," she says. "The overall trend is positive, but progress is too slow. If the food situation develops the way it has up to now, 37 countries will probably not achieve a low hunger level on the GHI scale in 2030. Some 840 million people could be malnourished — and the effects of the coronavirus pandemic have not yet been factored in.

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The coronavirus will lead to a famine of "biblical proportions" unless aid can reach those in dire need immediately, warns the UN agency. But the pandemic is only amplifying famine's causes, which also need tackling.

World Food Programme wins Nobel Peace Prize

United Nations agency the World Food Programme has won the Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee announced in Oslo. The organization combats hunger and famine around the world.

Over a thousand migrants land in Spain's Canary Islands

More than a thousand migrants in 485 small boats have landed in the Canary Islands in the past two days. Tightened security along Morocco's coast has pushed migrants and traffickers to risk the Atlantic crossing.


Spain's Canary Islands saw the largest number of migrant arrivals since 2006 in the past 48 hours, the Red Cross said on Saturday.

Between Thursday and Saturday, 1,015 people landed in 485 boats in the seven Spanish islands, a Red Cross spokesman said. They reportedly traveled across the Atlantic in small fishing boats and were met by sea rescue vessels close to the islands.

Spain had seen a surge of sea migration in recent years, but the flow of arrivals had diminished nearly 5.8% between January and September. Arrivals to the Canary Islands, however, have surged by 523.7%, Interior Ministry data shows.

Read more: Germany's refugee population falls for the first time in nine years

Most of the migrants came from North Africa or sub-Saharan African nations. They arrived in good health, though some were suffering symptoms of hypothermia, the Red Cross said.

All of them have been tested for the new coronavirus, the official said.

Canary Islands: New escape route for African migrants
Perilous journey

Local politicians have urged the Spanish government to provide them with more resources to accommodate the influx.

"Our goal is to have a stable network of accommodation resources in the Canary Islands," tweeted Immigration Minister Jose Luis Escriva after a visit to the islands on Saturday.

Read more: EU migration policy: Eastern European leaders get tough on new plans

As Morocco has tightened security on its Mediterranean coast, traffickers and migrants have been pushed to risk the perilous crossing to the Canaries, which is located around 60 miles (97 km) to the west of the Atlantic coast, analysts and rights groups say.

Read more: Migrants from Africa take more dangerous route to Europe

At least 251 people died attempting the dangerous crossing between January 1 and September 17, according to the International Organization for Migration.

jcg,shs (Dpa, Reuters, AFP)

Protests, jeers greet Spanish King Felipe VI in Barcelona

The Spanish king and prime minister took part in the Barcelona New Economy Week in order to promote the country's ailing economy. Local politicians chose not to attend, but hundreds of protesters turned up.



Felip VI, king of Spain, and Pedro Sanchez, the country's prime minister, visited Barcelona on Friday only to be met with loud protests and a boycott from high-ranking Catalan politicians.

Read more: Catalan independence - what you need to know

The king and prime minister were in the capital city of the separatist Catalan region in order to award prizes for innovation as part of the Barcelona New Economy Week.

The region's current acting pro-independence president, Pere Aragones, as well as the left-leaning, but nonseparatist mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, refused to officially receive the monarch. Catalonia's previous president, Quim Torra, was recently removed from office by the Spanish Supreme Court.

Heavy security presence

Police cordoned off the Franca railway station where the ceremony took place. The owners of local apartments and shops were told that they must not obstruct the view of all doors and windows so as to allow for maximum visibility.

Around 800 people had gathered to protest the pair's arrival, according to police sources. The protesters burned pictures of Felipe and chanted that "Catalonia has no king."

The protest occurred without any major incidents. The local police, however, took down a large sign that read, "Juan Carlos first, Felipe last."
Animosity towards the royals

Tensions between the Catalan regional government and Madrid have been on the rise since the central government's prosecution of Catalan pro-independence politicians for their role in the 2017 referendum.

A man sprays an X on a woman's Spanish flag

Not all the acts of protest revolved around the issue of independence. Mayor of Barcelona Ada Colau announced that she would not take part in any events with the royal house until they cleared up some "serious issues" surrounding the former king, Juan Carlos.

The 82-year-old secretly left the country for the United Arab Emirates after getting caught up in a bribery scandal. "The old king fled to a dictatorship. That's not normal in a democracy," Colau said.

'Open and democratic society'

Jaume Collboni, a member of the city council for the regional Socialist party, attended the event. "In an open and democratic society, people may not agree and are free to express that, but we also have respect institutions because they belong to everybody," he told reporters.

The aim of the event was to encourage innovation as a means of restarting Spain's weakened economy. The king, speaking in both Catalan and Spanish, told the crowd that "we have the opportunity to do things better. And to do them together."

ab/sms (AP, EFE, dpa)

Germany with massive shortage in day care spots, study finds

The German government has provided states with billions of euros in subsidies for daycare centers. Despite this massive investment, one in seven toddlers won't get a spot in a publicly funded day care.



Even before a child is born in Germany, its parents are beginning their search for a day care. A new study has shown that finding a spot is getting even harder.

Germany currently has a shortage of 342,300 spots in publicly subsidized daycare centers for children under 3 years of age. That is according to a study by the German Economic Institute (IW), a private research institute in Cologne, the results of which were published in the Sunday edition of the Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

That shortage means that about one in seven toddlers, or 14.4%, will not get a spot at a publicly funded day care. Five years ago, this was the case for 10.2%, according to the IW.

Read more: 3 in 4 German daycare children not getting proper care: study

Worse in the west

The shortage is greater in western Germany, particularly Saarland, Bremen and North-Rhine Westphalia. In those three states, about one in five children are without a day care spot.

North-Rhine Westphalia, Germany's most populous state, has the largest so-called care gap at 98,100 spots, according to IW. The Ruhr region, the largest urban area in Germany, has a particularly large demand for day care spots, the IW study found.

By contrast, day care spots is less of an issue in the five German states that made up the former East Germany. Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia all have a care gap of less than 7%.

Why is there a shortage?

Since 2013, all children in Germany have had a legal entitlement to a place in a daycare center or in day care. The government also passed a bill in 2019 that would provide €5.5 billion ($6.51 bullion) in government subsidies by 2022 to Germany's 16 German states for daycare facilities.

But the public day care system has struggled to keep pace. According to Germany's Ministry for Family Affairs, this is because the needs of parents have changed.

"More and more parents want a place for their child at an earlier age," a spokeswoman for the ministry told Welt am Sonntag.

Read more: German minister pushes for kindergarten language testing

In 2019, 49.4% of parents wanted to send their small children to day care, a ministry survey found. This corresponds to 1.17 million day care spots for toddlers, according to the IW. But only 829,200 toddlers eligible for day care got a spot.

The shortage in spots has forced many mothers to stay home longer to look after their little ones. Wido Geis-Thöne, one of the authors of the IW study, said this shortage also has an effect on the German economy.

"Women are, to a very large extent, skilled workers who companies urgently need," Geis-Thöne told Welt am Sonntag. "When the large birth cohorts leave the labor market in the next few years, the problem will intensify."

German research vessel to return from 'dying Arctic'

The German Alfred Wegener Institute's Polarstern ship is set to return to the port on Monday, bringing home devastating proof of a "dying Arctic Ocean" and warnings of ice-free summers in just decades.





Researchers coming back from a year-long research expedition in the Arctic have bad news: the Arctic Ocean is dying.

The Polarstern research vessel will dock in Bremerhaven, Germany on Monday after spending 389 days drifting through the Arctic, where scientists gathered more than 150 terabytes of data and 1,000 ice samples. While it will take up to two years to analyze all of the data, the initial reports said the ocean was failing.

Read more: Arctic ice shrinks to 2nd lowest level on record

"We witnessed how the Arctic Ocean is dying," mission leader Markus Rex told AFP. "We saw this process right outside our windows, or when we walked on the brittle ice."
Climate change accelerating damage

The Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) showed the effect that climate change was having on the Arctic Ocean.

Read more: MOSAiC: Great Arctic expedition starts

Arctic warming is becoming reality

Over 70 research institutes from 20 countries took part in the research, which showed an Arctic Ocean in peril. According to Rex, sometimes so much ice had melted that there were large patches of water that "sometimes stretch[ed] as far as the horizon."

"At the North Pole itself, we found badly eroded, melted, thin and brittle ice," he added.

The Arctic plays a key role in the global ecosystem, as it cools tropical air from the south to create weather and air currents. Without the Arctic cooling tropical air, it would change weather systems and conditions throughout the world.

Rex warned that if the warming trend in the North Pole continued, then there could be "an ice-free Arctic in the summer."

The researchers also collected water samples from beneath the ice during the polar night to to study plankton and bacteria to better understand how marine ecosystems function under extreme conditions.



kbd/shs (AFP, dpa)

Why polio continues to be a health risk in Pakistan

After Africa was declared polio-free last month, Afghanistan and Pakistan are now the only countries in the world where the disease is found. Why is polio surging in Pakistan and what can be done to curb the disease?



Saira Qadir was only 11 months old when she contracted the polio virus. Now 44, she lives in Rawalpinidi city, near the capital Islamabad.

Qadir told DW that when they were kids, all her siblings received the polio vaccine except her. Apparently, it was a case of parental negligence that resulted in her being infected with the crippling disease.

Last month, the independent Africa Regional Certification Commission (ARCC) for Polio Eradication officially declared that the 47 countries in the UN World Health Organization (WHO) African Region are free of the virus, with no cases reported for four years.

"This is a momentous milestone for Africa. Now future generations of African children can live free of wild polio," said Dr. Matshidiso Moeti, WHO Regional Director for Africa.

Read more: Polio eradication in Africa points to challenges ahead

The disease is now only found in two countries — Afghanistan and Pakistan — with the latter struggling to cope with a surge in cases over the past few months. The Muslim-majority South Asian country has registered 68 polio cases since the start of the year.

The disease, which mainly affects children under the age of five, can infect the spinal cord, causing paralysis.

The government says it has adopted a new strategy to tackle the polio menace by including community and religious leaders to work with them. According to Dr. Rana Safdar, the national coordinator at Pakistan's National Emergency Operation Centre (NEOC), this strategy was effective in bringing down polio cases to as low as eight in 2017 and 12 in 2018.

However, things have changed since Prime Minister Imran Khan came to power in 2018. In 2019, cases rose to 148 from 12 in previous year.

COVID-19 takes priority

Any hope for bringing the numbers down in 2020 was dashed with the start of the coronavirus crisis in March. Experts fear that Pakistan could see more polio cases in coming months as the government suspended nationwide polio campaigns between April and July to focus on efforts to curb COVID-19.

Ahsan Ali, an official with the polio eradication program in the southern port city of Karachi, told DW in May that his vaccination work had not been well received amid the pandemic.

"My role has been changed and people are not tolerating us out of fear that we are potential carriers of the coronavirus due to our door-to-door work," he said.

In response to an enquiry regarding the suspension of vaccine campaigns in Pakistan, GPEI spokesperson Sona Bari told DW that the WHO has "noted several times that services such as immunization are suffering from the impacts of COVID-19 on health systems."
Campaign hampered by militancy

Pakistan started its first nationwide polio eradication campaign in 1994. At the time, the country was recording 20,000 polio cases each year on an average. By 2004, 10 years into the campaign, the number of cases in the country had dropped to only 30 per year. Health experts dubbed it a major achievement.

However, the campaign lost momentum after the September 11, 2001 attacks and the deteriorating security situation in the years following the US invasion of Afghanistan. The US-led war on terror in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region made it difficult for authorities to focus on polio eradication.

''By the mid-2000s, the security situation in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region had dealt a major blow to the campaign," Dr. Safdar told DW.

Read more: Amid Taliban threats, Pakistan hits record polio cases

The Taliban claim that polio eradication campaigns are being used by the West as a cover for spying. They allege that the drives are similar to a hepatitis vaccination program run by the imprisoned Pakistani doctor Shakeel Afridi, who allegedly helped the CIA find al Qaeda's former chief Osama bin Laden. Bin Laden was killed by the US Special Forces at his Abbottabad hideout in May, 2011.

Islamist militants regularly carry out violent attacks against anti-polio workers in northwestern Pakistan.

Policy issues

Besides militancy, experts also blame a flawed government policy for polio's continued existence in Pakistan.

Dr. Adnan Khan, an Islamabad-based researcher on infectious disease and public health, says bad governance is one of the reasons behind the failure of Pakistan's polio eradication program.

"Polio campaigns are basically part of mop up strategies; they are used to fill the gaps left through routine immunization (vaccines given to children at birth). But in Pakistan, door-to-door polio campaigns invariably take up more time and resources as compared to routine immunization," Khan told DW, adding that field teams often cannot cover the entire population in specified areas, which results in some children being left out.

Health officials complain that many people in Pakistan are unwilling to have their children inoculated at birth.

Looking ahead

Countrywide polio eradication campaigns finally resumed last month. Authorities say that around 40 million children across Pakistan will be vaccinated by December.

"The National Emergency Operation Centre plans to invest in regular inoculations as well as health and nutrition programs for the vulnerable children in targeted areas. We hope to show progress in 2021," Dr. Safdar said.

But Dr. Khan says it will be difficult to contain the virus transmission without identifying problematic areas and vaccinating everyone there, including adults.

Read more: How far is Pakistan willing to go to fight polio?

Pakistan bans TikTok for failing to filter 'immoral' content

Video-sharing platform TikTok is now blocked in Pakistan after the country's authorities ordered it to filter its "obscene" content. The decision comes a month after a similar crackdown on dating apps, including Tinder.








Pakistan has banned video-sharing platform TikTok in the country after a "number of complaints from different segments of the society against immoral/indecent content on the video-sharing application," the Telecommunication Authority (PTA) said in a statement.

The telecom regulator said Friday it had issued warnings to TikTok to moderate unlawful content, but the social media company had failed to comply with its instructions.

Arslan Khalid, a digital media adviser to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan, backed the PTA's warning to TikTok in June to filter its "obscene content." He claimed that the "exploitation, objectification [and] sexualization of young girls on TikTok" was causing pain to parents.

On Friday, the telecom authority said that it was ready to review its decision "subject to a satisfactory mechanism by TikTok to moderate unlawful content."

Read more: Pakistani activist Marvi Sirmed: 'I provoke toxic masculinity'

TikTok, owned by Chinese company ByteDance, said it was "committed to following the law in markets where the app is offered."

"We have been in regular communication with the PTA and continue to work with them. We are hopeful to reach a conclusion that helps us continue to serve the country's vibrant and creative online community," the social media company said in a statement.

TikTok stars from Asia worry for app's future

Digital rights activist Usama Khilji, however, called the ban a violation of freedom of speech.

"TikTok is a major source of entertainment for lower- and middle-class Pakistanis, as well as illiterate citizens that includes half the population as it is video-based and easy to use," he told news agency Agence France-Presse.
Rights activists call out 'moral policing'

Global rights organization Amnesty International has slammed the Pakistani crackdown.

"In the name of a campaign against vulgarity, people are being denied the right to express themselves online," Amnesty's South Asia Regional Office said on Twitter.


"The #TikTokBan comes against a backdrop where voices are muted on television, columns vanish from newspapers, websites are blocked and television ads banned," it said.

Last month, Pakistan banned several dating apps, including Tinder and Grindr, in a bid to restrict "immoral" and "indecent" content.

Digital rights activists in Pakistan criticized the announcement as "moral policing" and expressed concerns over the government's creeping censorship and control over the country's internet, print and electronic media.
TikTok battered from all sides

Pakistan's ban on TikTok is the latest blow to the social media company, months after it was blocked in neighboring India, then its largest market by users.

TikTok, along with dozens of other mostly Chinese apps, was banned in June at the height of India's border dispute with China.

The app also faces the threat of being barred in the US after officials said it posed a national security risk, and it has come under intense scrutiny in Australia.

Read more: US judge suspends Trump's TikTok ban

TikTok was banned in Bangladesh last year as part of a clampdown on pornography. Indonesia briefly blocked access to the app in 2018 over blasphemy concerns.

adi/dj (AFP, Reuters)

NEWS FROM CODE PINK

 

We are writing to you today with exciting news. After 18 years of nonstop engagement of this wonderful organization, the two of us—Jodie and Medea— are stepping back from our role as co-directors so that three younger, brilliant and capable women can step forward. The new co-directors will be: Farida Alam, our multi-talented web manager (don't forget to check out our brand new website!), art designer and logistical miracle-maker, who has been with CODEPINK for 15 years, will now also be taking on human resources and organizational planning; Ariel Gold, who came to us 5 years ago as U.S. Middle East foreign policy expert, became co-director in 2018 and will continue in that role; Carley Towne, a dynamo organizer and activist, will lead our Divest from War and Defund the Pentagon programs, as well as team management and community outreach. In the past year, the country has witnessed the bravery and brilliance of young people who have taken to the streets and the suites to build major movements to confront racism and violence. We have witnessed that same flowering of initiative within CODEPINK, making this the perfect moment to pass the torch. As we transition, we want you to engage more with Farida, Ariel, Carley and the whole CODEPINK team. Check out these opportunities to get involved as a peacemaker. We, Jodie and Medea, are not going far. We will be active board members and will continue to work on key CODEPINK campaigns. Jodie will focus on the local peace economy that puts forth an inspiring, life-affirming path for our collective future—a path made even more urgent by the pandemic. And with the new Cold War against her part-time home, China, she will nurture our China Is Not Our Enemy campaign. Medea will consult with our Middle East and Latin America teams, as well as write articles and books about how to transform our foreign policy and build international solidarity. Both will continue to support our Feminist Foreign Policy Project. As supporters of CODEPINK, you have always been our greatest strength and we are counting on you to assist with this transition. Two important ways you can help: Become one of our peacemakers by sharing some of your time. Check out the various ways you can help and sign up here. There is so much we can create together to end war and cultivate peace. Make a monthly pledge or a special one-time gift to ensure that our work to end militarism, defund the Pentagon and divest from war grows and thrives. We are so proud of what we’ve accomplished together over the last 18 years. To mention a few... We carried the anti-war message directly to Presidents Bush, Obama and Trump, to pro-war congressional hearings...and to the streets. We have been told by members of Congress that CODEPINK transformed Congressional hearings by bringing citizen voices into the proceedings—despite the risk of arrest. We built public opposition to drone warfare. We brought the tragic stories from Yemeni and Afghan families to Washington DC, forcing the military to introduce new rules and compensate many of the innocent victims. We advocated for the Iran nuclear deal and embraced citizen diplomacy with Iranians by organizing people-to-people trips to Iran. We helped win the release of political prisoners all over the world—like our friends Mohamed Soltan, who spent 2 years in a brutal Egyptian cell, and Edwin Espinal, who was held in a maximum-security prison in Honduras for 18 months. We worked with cities, universities and banks to divest from war and invest in life-affirming activities. Our message of Defund War was echoed this year in Congress with historic bills to significantly cut the once-untouchable Pentagon budget. We traveled with thousands of you to Gaza, Cuba, Afghanistan, Palestine, Iraq, Iran, Yemen, Pakistan, Honduras, Colombia, Venezuela and Spain. From the U.S.-Mexico border to Greece, we brought material support and messages of peace, connection and love to refugee families. We have forced those who drive us to war to hear from those most affected by the violence—abroad and domestically. Here at home, we joined coalitions to demilitarize our police and arranged for moms who lost their loved ones to police violence to meet with the Justice Department and Congress. We have exposed—and opposed—the ruthless Trump administration’s sanctions on countries such as Cuba, Venezuela and Iran, and worked with Congress on legislation to roll back this illegal economic warfare. Working with groups and communities around the world, including the Poor People’s Campaign, we have been cultivating local peace economies with beautiful examples of how to strengthen our connections to each other and care for what is essential. We have expanded our support base to over half of a million people from all over the world, and we have been educating the public with books, articles, webinars and countless interviews on every outlet from Fox News to Democracy Now. Our webinars during coronavirus have highlighted guests from all over the world—China to Bolivia, Palestine to Brazil. It has been an honor to take part in these campaigns with you. You, our grassroots supporters, have always been the backbone of our successes and we hope we can count on your continued support during this transition to a new generation of leaders. Onward toward a beautiful world of peace and justice, Ariel, Carley, Farida, Jodie and Medea PS  If you're interested in cultivating your local peace economy, watch this Message from the Future II presented by our partners at The Leap. PSS  Check out our “Vote for Peace” posters and other goodies at the store.