Wednesday, February 19, 2020

Jewish lawyer’s fight in defence of a British Pakistani Muslim

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LONDON: The Jewish lawyer of a British Pakistani man who won £1.2 million case against Mail on Sunday and David Rose has said that he decided to take up the case of Pakistani man because as a Jew he could feel what it’s like to be discriminated against and maligned.

Defamation law specialist Mark Lewis, who is based both in London and Southern Isarel, told in an interview that as soon as he saw article in Mail on Sunday (MoS) by David Rose targeting Pakistani man Wajed Iqbal, linking him with paedophiles and sex crimes, he could tell that the Pakistani Muslim has been stitched up to create a story.

Three weeks ago the Associated Newspaper Limited (ANL) – the publishers of the Daily Mail, Mail Online and the Mail on Sunday – settled £1.2 million case with Wajed Iqbal after accepting that the allegations made against him in an article published in MoS in August 2017 were false and had no basis in truth.

Wajed Iqbal, speaking to The News and Geo, said he had no doubt that David Rose and MoS had picked on him because he was a Pakistani and Muslim.

Mark Lewis, a leading lawyer fighting anti-semitism and prejudice, said: “The whole thing about Jewish people is that they know what bigotry is like as a Pakistani Muslims in the UK do. I grew up in northern England, like Wajed Iqbal, where my Jewish cousin who has no Pakistani background was hurled the slur of ‘Paki’ by people when we were teenagers and mistook his looks Pakistani youth. Coming from a Jewish background, I know when there is discrimination against a particular community. I choose to stand up for the victims of prejudice.”

Lewis said: “It shows that the poison that exists is due to a hatred of people who are different. They don’t need any rationality of logic.” Mark Lewis said racism and Islamophobia were the main factors why Wajed Iqbal was targeted by Mail on Sunday in its story. He explained: “My client was a low ranking officer in the local authority who was involved in the licensing of taxis.

He was picked on as being the person in charge of licensing taxis because if you get a Pakistani Muslim involved in taxi licensing in England, you invite prejudice. A huge scandal was orchestrated which shook the Pakistani community.

The building blocks of the controversy were Pakistani, Muslim and taxi. Put them all together and you find a scandal. The only thing is that it wasn’t true. If anyone did any research that conclusion would’ve been reached.”

Mark Lewis added: “It seems very obvious to me that he was targeted because he was a Muslim with a Pakistani background. Some people weren’t Pakistani Muslims who were more senior and more involved in taxi licensing in the same department as Wajed Iqbal but they were ignored but my client was targeted because of his background.” He said the MoS received documents from the local authority showing that there wasn’t any truth to these allegations. Mark Lewis said: “Whether its anti-Muslim bigotry or not, the story focused on a Muslim only because he was a Pakistani Muslim. That was the entire story. The test is not what David Rose thought but what the readers thought. David Rose said ‘there is a Pakistani Muslim taxi driver who is involved in something wrong’. It was biased. The timing was also suspicious as that time a BBC programme focused on the Rotherham scandal to mislead the public and created an unnecessary connection.”

Mark Lewis said that the MoS was expecting a non-party disclosure, hoping that the documents from the local authority would show that Wajed Iqbal was guilty however the documents showed quite the opposite. “They showed my client hadn’t done anything he was accused of. Wajed Iqbal took every step to ensure that those who would have committed any wrongdoing were brought to the attention of the local authority. When the Mail on Sunday found this, their initial reaction was to wait for more information from the local authority which exonerated their victim. When he was exonerated, the Mail on Sunday knew they had no other choice but to negotiate with my client.”

Mr Iqbal had been wrongfully accused of acting as a “fixer” for paedophile taxi drivers in the May 2017 article. Wajed Iqbal, 44, had sued Mail on Sunday stating that his life had been ruined by the defamatory article, leaving him reliant on anti-depressants, jobless, and prevented from seeing his children. He had told the court that the Mail on Sunday picked on him because of his Pakistani heritage, his racial background - linking him with a disgusting scandal to create a false story.

Mail on Sunday’s reporter David Mail has stressed that he’s not anti-Pakistan and anti-Muslim. David Rose spoke around three weeks ago after both Mark Lewis and Wajed Iqbal had accused the paper of anti-Muslim bigotry. David Rose says he’s fighter against racism and allegations of racism and bias were false.

Why is Pakistan's Pashtun movement under attack?

Leaders of Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement, which fights for rights of ethnic Pashtuns, have faced intimidation and arrests.

28 Jan 2020

Members of the Pashtun community rally in Karachi against what they say are human rights violations [Akhtar Soomro/Reuters]

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Islamabad, Pakistan - Having risen to prominence as one of the most strident critics of Pakistan's powerful military, the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM) has subsequently faced a sustained campaign of intimidation, censorship and arrests.

The movement, which advocated for the rights of ethnic Pashtuns affected by Pakistan's war against the Taliban in its northwest, was formed in 2016 by a group of eight university students in the northwestern city of Dera Ismail Khan. All eight hailed from the neighbouring district of South Waziristan.
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On the run for months, Pakistani activist seeks US asylum

Led by veterinary sciences student Manzoor Pashteen, they formed the Mehsud Tahaffuz Movement (MTM), a pressure group seeking to highlight the struggles of the more half a million people who fled their native South Waziristan due to the fighting.

The district, one of the poorest and least developed in Pakistan, was at the time part of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), a region governed under colonial-era regulations that gave citizens no fundamental rights while giving the military and civil administration wide-ranging powers with little oversight.

Pashteen, leader of the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement, was arrested on Monday and charged with sedition [Al Jazeera]

In this legal grey area, where militias thrived and many members of the Afghan Taliban fighting against US and NATO forces in neighbouring Afghanistan took shelter, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), was born under the leadership of Baitullah Mehsud in 2007.

Mehsud brought a range of armed militias fighting to displace the government and impose a strict interpretation of Islamic law on Pakistan under a single umbrella organisation, the TTP.

From 2007, Pakistan's military undertook a series of military operations to defeat or displace the TTP, most notably Operation Zarb-e-Azb in 2014, which finally displaced most of the group's remaining fighters into neighbouring districts in eastern Afghanistan.
The cost of war

The war, however, was not without a cost, as young activists like Pashteen and his comrades in the MTM were quick to point out.

They campaigned against widespread enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings conducted as part of the military's fight in South Waziristan, as well as for the removal of landmines and other unexploded ordnance once the fighting ended.

In 2018, they shot to national prominence when they spearheaded protests against the killing of Naqeebullah Mehsud, a young garment trader and aspiring model shot dead by police in Karachi. At the time, the police had claimed Mehsud was a fighter with armed groups.

From the widespread rallies across the country calling for justice for Naqeebullah, the Pashtun Tahaffuz Movement (PTM) was born.

Ethnic Pashtuns from other areas affected by conflict flocked to Pashteen and his partners, sharing similar experiences to those they had been documenting for years in South Waziristan.

The PTM now represented a generation of Pashtuns who were born in a northwest Pakistan that knew only conflict.

In mid-2018, two PTM leaders - Mohsin Dawar and Ali Wazir - were elected to parliament from North and South Waziristan respectively.
Censorship, intimidation, arrests

With increased prominence came increased pressure from the authorities. In Pakistan, which has been ruled for roughly half of its 73-year history by its army, it is rare to hear direct or public criticism of the military.

Pashteen, however, was regularly leading rallies of thousands, directly holding the military responsible for alleged rights abuses, backed up by data and testimony from citizens. A common rallying cry at PTM rallies became "Yeh jo dehshat gardi he, isske peeche wardi he!". "This terrorism, the military is responsible for it!"

Coverage of PTM events and rallies was censored across almost all domestic news outlets, and cases alleging leaders were involved in "sedition" would regularly be filed following PTM events.

In April 2019, the military took on the PTM directly, warning the group that its "time is up" as it alleged the rights organisation was being funded by foreign intelligence agencies. PTM leaders asked the military to file cases or share evidence of such collusion, which the military did not do.

A month later, a PTM rally in North Waziristan was stopped at a military checkpoint. The ensuing clash saw at least three protesters killed as soldiers opened fire on the demonstration.

Members of Parliament Dawar and Wazir were arrested and kept in custody for more than three months on terrorism charges in connection with the case.

Later, in September, prominent PTM leader Gulalai Ismail emerged in the United States after months in hiding and several unsuccessful security forces raids on her residence in the capital Islamabad.

Ismail said she was seeking asylum due to the threats against her life by the military. The military denies involvement.

On Monday, police launched a midnight raid in the northwestern city of Peshawar to arrest Pashteen himself - the first time he has been taken into custody since the PTM rose to prominence. Polic documents showed that he was accused of sedition and criminal conspiracy.

"Pakistani authorities should stop arresting activists like Manzoor Pashteen who are critical of government actions or policies,” said Brad Adams, Asia director of US-based rights group Human Rights Watch.

"Using criminal laws to chill free expression and political opposition has no place in a democracy," he said in a statement.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA NEWS

Judicial Challenges to the Dominance of Pakistan’s Army

By Vinay KauraFebruary 18, 2020

Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, photo via Wikipedia; and Imran Khan, photo by World Economic Forum via Flickr CC

BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 1,451, February 18, 2020

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The government of Pakistan, led by the PTI party, has filed a review petition before the Pakistani Supreme Court against the Court’s decision that the term of Army Chief Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa continue for another six months, during which time the parliament should legislate on the position’s extension or reappointment. The government argues that Bajwa’s term should be extended not for six months but for three years, and that the position’s term is none of the parliament’s business. This leaves no doubt that a civilian politician wishing to enjoy his stay at the prime minister’s residence has essentially no option but to bend to the will of the Army Chief, who is the most powerful person in Pakistan.

The real power in Pakistan resides in the army’s general headquarters in Rawalpindi, not in either the PM’s office or Parliament House in Islamabad.

Almost a month after the Supreme Court’s historic ruling on the six-month—rather than three-year, as the government wanted—extension of the term of Army Chief Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, the government filed a review petition that raises more than two dozen questions of law against the judgment. It pleads for the “preservation of two leading institutions” for the sake of a “healthy democracy”, implying that the judiciary should remain within its limits.

The government asserts that Bajwa’s contributions to national security are so great that the “public at large has warmly welcomed” his reappointment. The review petition also argues that “there is nothing wrong with” not codifying the procedure of the appointment of Army Chief, which has been done without legislation “for seven decades”. Accusing the high court of interfering in “the rarest of rare cases”, the government feels the judiciary has no business “upset[ting] the age-long accepted conventions and the considered policy of the government.”

Bajwa was appointed Army Chief in November 2016, and his three-year term was to have expired in November 2019. But in August, PM Imran Khan extended his tenure by another three years. This occurred two weeks after New Delhi abrogated Article 370 of the Indian Constitution regarding Kashmir, believed by Pakistan to be its “jugular vein”.

The government cited the “regional security environment” as the major reason for its decision to extend Bajwa’s service. But when the judiciary intervened, the extension became a raging controversy.

The petition challenging the Army Chief’s extension was filed by a private individual who later wanted to withdraw it, but the Court decided to examine the legality of the petition on its own. This gave rise to speculation about the invisible hand of generals junior to Bajwa who could have ascended to the position after his retirement.

When the government’s move was challenged by the Supreme Court, it came to light that many procedural errors had been committed by the government when it issued the official notification of Bajwa’s new three-year term. To the utter disbelief of the ruling establishment, the Supreme Court suspended that notification. This forced the government to issue another notification—and that one, too, was thrown into the dustbin by the Court. This put Bajwa in a tight spot and cast a shadow over Khan’s efforts to ensure his own survival.

After keeping the government and Bajwa on tenterhooks, the Supreme Court finally gave in. It granted Bajwa a conditional extension for six months and asked the parliament to pass legislation to avoid future legal ambiguities. In the process, the Court pointedly observed that it had been “labeled as agents of India and the CIA when we examined the Army Act.”

Significantly, Bajwa was part of the discussions at the PM’s house while his case was being addressed and the government’s response to the judiciary was being prepared. This led the Supreme Court to lament that “it is embarrassing that the Army Chief has to keep an eye on summaries instead of the country’s defense.”

The government had 30 days from the time of judgment; i.e., until December 28, 2019, to file a review petition. Unsurprisingly, it waited until after the retirement of Chief Justice Asif Saeed Khosa on December 20. It was Khosa who had given the landmark ruling.

As taking the legislative route would have meant either reaching out to the opposition and cutting political deals with leaders who are currently being hounded by the PTI government, or threatening opposition lawmakers into supporting the government, Khan and Bajwa probably saw the review petition as the easiest route. Also, the case has received widespread publicity, with almost all mainstream media outlets discussing the legal, institutional, political, and strategic fallout in minute detail following each court proceeding. The government wanted an “on-camera” hearing of the review petition.

Bajwa’s case is not an aberration. The Musharraf ruling is another instance of judicial assertiveness in a system heavily tilted in favor of the military.

Former Army Chief and dictator Pervez Musharraf usurped power in 1999 by toppling the government of then PM Nawaz Sharif; he ruled until 2008 before being forced to resign. Days before the Bajwa decision, the military had come down hard against a special court’s order regarding capital punishment for Musharraf for having suspended the constitution in 2007 and imposing a state of emergency.

Military dictatorships in Pakistan have often been legitimized by the US and other foreign countries. Even when civilians run the government, it is often infiltrated by retired military officials who work to ensure that the army’s core interests are preserved.

The death sentence for Musharraf broke a long tradition of ignoring high treason by military dictators. Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan, and Zia-ul Haq were never subjected to such judgments. But one of the judges in the Musharraf case, Waqar Seth, overenthusiastically extended his brief by pronouncing that if Musharraf dies before being executed, his corpse should be dragged to a public square in front of Parliament House in Islamabad and hanged for three days.

Notwithstanding this judicial overreach, which goes against norms of human decency, there was nothing in the judgment that should have shocked the military establishment. But it did, simply by virtue of its having dared to challenge the military’s power at all. By dismissing the verdict as against “humanity, religion, culture, and our values”, Maj. Gen. Asif Ghafoor, the DG of Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR), made clear what the military felt about it.

The episode of Bajwa’s service extension exposes the huge imbalance in civil-military relations in Pakistan. The way Khan handled the issue marks a low point for civilian rule in the country, and ambitious generals now have a template for how to pull the strings from behind the façade of an elected government without removing it through a coup d’état.

Imran Khan is desperate to ensure the smooth extension of Bajwa’s tenure so the top military leadership will continue to shield him. The role played by the military leadership in Khan’s surprising electoral victory in 2018 has never been in doubt. Almost all opposition parties believe Khan became PM because of the military’s overt and covert meddling in the electoral process.

Bajwa’s behavior confirms the Pakistani military’s underlying assumption that it is an independent stakeholder uniquely entitled to remain free of civilian control, including that of the parliament, and its views must be respected in policy-making, particularly foreign and security policy. In these two domains it is the military that has always called the shots—mainly through its notorious intelligence agency, the ISI.

That agency has become a party to the violent conflict inside Jammu and Kashmir, helping train and equip Islamist radicals who are regularly injected into the insurgency against Indian security forces. Recently, Pakistan’s Railways Minister, Sheikh Rashid, claimed that the Kartarpur corridor on the Punjab border between India and Pakistan was Bajwa’s brainchild, and “India will remember forever the kind of wound inflicted on it.” This was a reference to fears among Indian intelligence agencies that Pakistan’s security establishment is trying to create trouble in Indian Punjab by stoking dissension among India’s minority Sikh community.

The PTI government’s incompetence and irresponsibility have allowed Bajwa to play a role in domestic politics that exceeds the military’s normal remit. Moreover, Bajwa is firmly convinced that the Pakistani army is the sole national institution to possess the dual responsibility of defending Pakistan’s ideological frontiers and territorial boundary. After a recent visit to the mausoleum of the country’s founder, Quaid-i-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah, Bajwa asserted that Quaid’s “two-nation theory”—that Hindus and Muslims cannot live together as a single nation—has essentially been vindicated.

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Vinay Kaura is Assistant Professor of International Affairs and Security Studies and Coordinator of the Center for Peace and Conflict Studies at Sardar Patel University of Police, Security and Criminal Justice in Rajasthan, India.

A real global player: Previously unrecognised bacteria as a key group in marine sediments

by Max Planck Society

Marine sediments cover more than two thirds of our planet's surface. Nevertheless, they are scarcely explored, especially in the deeper regions of the oceans. For their nutrition, the bacteria in the deep ocean are almost entirely dependent on remnants of organisms that trickle down from the upper water layers. Depending on how they process this material, it either remains in the depths of the ocean for a long time or moves back to the surface as carbon dioxide. Thus, sea-floor bacteria play an important role in the global carbon cycle, which makes them an exciting and important research object.

Global players at the seafloor

The research team around Christina Bienhold and Katy Hoffmann from the Max Planck Institute in Bremen and Pierre Offre, who now works at the NIOZ on the island of Texel, has now identified and characterised a particularly dominant group of microbes. "Although these bacteria have been known in the literature for some time," Bienhold explains, "nobody has paid much attention to them until now." While the team focused on the role of this group in the deep sea, other researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology investigated its importance in coastal sediments. "Only now does it become clear how numerous and widespread members of Woeseiales are," Bienhold continues. An impressive 40 million cells inhabit each millilitre of deep-sea floor—together with a billion other bacteria. In a thimble full of sediment, there are thus about 120 million cells of Woeseiales. "We know of no other group of bacteria that occurs in the ocean floor at such high abundances." Extrapolated to the entire deep-sea floor, the worldwide population of Woeseiales would amount to 5 x 1026 cells, the authors estimate. "Considering that these estimates include neither the coastal sediments nor the deep biosphere, these bacteria may be one of the most common groups of microorganisms on Earth," explains Bienhold.

A group with varied ecological roles

In their study, the authors present an ecological synthesis summarising current knowledge about the diversity and environmental distribution of these bacteria. The synthesis was built upon DNA sequence data, which were deposited in public databases over the last two decades, but also included new data, some of which was generated from arctic deep-sea sediments collected at the AWI-maintained long-term observatory HAUSGARTEN. "The analyses reveal that Woeseiales accommodate a myriad of organisms with varied ecologies," explains Pierre Offre, lead author of the study. "For example, different species of Woeseiales co-exist together at any location of the seabed, where they probably fulfill different ecological functions. Our study provides a first ecological guide to these fascinating organisms."

Moreover, the data now available indicate that members of Woeseiales could feed on so-called proteinaceous matter, such as the remains of cell walls and membranes or other leftovers of dead organisms. Considering that proteins are a major source of nitrogen—a fundamental nutrient for all life forms—in marine seafloor sediments, the potential ability of Woeseiales bacteria for protein degradation, may be ecologically important for the re-cycling of nitrogen in benthic ecosystems." I am convinced that further studies of these bacteria will provide new insights into the carbon and nitrogen cycles in marine sediments," concludes Offre, who continues investigating these microorganisms to understand the secret of their ecological success, together with his research team at NIOZ.

Marine extremophiles: The basal level of the food chain

More information: Katy Hoffmann et al, Diversity and metabolism of Woeseiales bacteria, global members of marine sediment communities, The ISME Journal (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41396-020-0588-4

New study results consistent with dog domestication during Ice Age

by Matt McGowan, University of Arkansas

Analysis of Paleolithic-era teeth from a 28,500-year-old fossil site in the Czech Republic provides supporting evidence for two groups of canids—one dog-like and the other wolf-like—with differing diets, which is consistent with the early domestication of dogs.

The study, published in the Journal of Archaeolgical Science, was co-directed by Peter Ungar, Distinguished Professor of anthropology at the University of Arkansas.

The researchers performed dental microwear texture analysis on a sample of fossils from the Předmostí site, which contains both wolf-like and dog-like canids. Canids are simply mammals of the dog family. The researchers identified distinctive microwear patterns for each canid morphotype. Compared to the wolf-like canids, the teeth of the early dog canids—called "protodogs" by the researchers—had larger wear scars, indicating a diet that included hard, brittle foods. The teeth of the wolf-like canids had smaller scars, suggesting they consumed more flesh, likely from mammoth, as shown by previous research.

This greater durophagy—animal eating behavior suggesting the consumption of hard objects—among the dog-like canids means they likely consumed bones and other less desirable food scraps within human settlement areas, Ungar said. It provides supporting evidence that there were two types of canids at the site, each with a distinct diet, which is consistent with other evidence of early-stage domestication.

"Our primary goal was to test whether these two morphotypes expressed notable differences in behavior, based on wear patterns," said Ungar. "Dental microwear is a behavioral signal that can appear generations before morphological changes are established in a population, and it shows great promise in using the archaeological record to distinguish protodogs from wolves."

Dog domestication is the earliest example of animal husbandry and the only type of domestication that occurred well before the earliest definitive evidence of agriculture. However, there is robust scientific debate about the timing and circumstances of the initial domestication of dogs, with estimates varying between 15,000 and 40,000 years ago, well into the Ice Age, when people had a hunter-gatherer way of life. There is also debate about why wolves were first domesticated to become dogs. From an anthropological perspective, the timing of the domestication process is important for understanding early cognition, behavior and the ecology of early Homo sapiens.

3-D analysis of dog fossils sheds light on domestication debate

More information: Kari A. Prassack et al. Dental microwear as a behavioral proxy for distinguishing between canids at the Upper Paleolithic (Gravettian) site of Předmostí, Czech Republic, Journal of Archaeological Science (2020). DOI: 10.1016/j.jas.2020.105092

Tombaugh's discovery of Pluto revolutionized knowledge of our solar system

by New Horizons FEBRUARY 19, 2020

The New Horizons spacecraft carries a small container of Clyde Tombaugh's ashes on its inside upper deck. An inscription on it, written by mission Principal Investigator Alan Stern, reads: "Interred herein are remains of American Clyde W. Tombaugh, discoverer of Pluto and the solar system's "Third Zone," Adelle and Muron's boy, Patricia's husband, Annette and Alden's father, astronomer, teacher, punster, and friend: Clyde W. Tombaugh (1906-1997)." Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute

Ninety years ago today, Clyde Tombaugh, a young astronomer working at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, discovered Pluto. In doing so he unknowingly opened the door to the vast "third zone" of the solar system we now know as the Kuiper Belt, containing countless planetesimals and dwarf planets—the third class of planets in our solar system.

Lowell Observatory's namesake, Percival Lowell, first proposed the existence of a "Planet X" somewhere beyond the orbit of Neptune. Unable to find it before his death in 1916, the search for Planet X stalled for nearly a decade until renewed when Tombaugh was hired in 1929. Tombaugh found the object on February 18, 1930, at the age of 24, using a Zeiss blink comparator, a device that allowed him to spot moving objects against the background star fields he had photographed.

"What Tombaugh didn't know then was that Planet X would launch the era of exploration in the third zone of the solar system," said Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. "Science builds on science, and this discovery helped pave the way for New Horizons' exploration of this uncharted region."

Although he died in 1997, Tombaugh's ashes were aboard NASA's New Horizons spacecraft when it launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, in January 2006. Those ashes, carried in a small canister on the spacecraft, traveled with New Horizons on a nine-year, three-billion-mile journey to Pluto to make the first exploration of Tombaugh's planet.

NASA's New Horizons spacecraft captured this high-resolution enhanced color view of Pluto on July 14, 2015. The image combines blue, red and infrared images taken by the Ralph/Multispectral Visual Imaging Camera (MVIC). Pluto's surface sports a remarkable range of subtle colors, enhanced in this view to a rainbow of pale blues, yellows, oranges, and deep reds. Many landforms have their own distinct colors, telling a complex geological and climatological story that scientists have only just begun to decode. The image resolves details and colors on scales as small as 0.8 miles (1.3 kilometers). Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute

The spacecraft flew past Pluto and its five moons on July 14, 2015, coming to within 7,800 miles (12,500 kilometers) of the surface and delivering the now iconic images of Pluto and its heart, as well as all five of its moons: Charon, Nix, Hydra, Styx and Kerberos. The flyby revolutionized humankind's understanding of the Pluto system and dwarf planets. From the variety in its geological landforms, to its complex atmosphere, to its intriguing moons, Pluto showed a level of physical diversity and complexity that few expected to find.

Once thought by some to be only an icy rock, New Horizons discovered that Pluto is actually geologically active. From strange, bladed methane mountains to nitrogen glaciers, to ice volcanoes and the now suspected presence of a liquid water ocean inside the planet, Pluto has literally caused planetary scientists to rethink how complex and active small planets can be. Pluto also has a brilliant blue nitrogen atmosphere, replete with hazes stretching half a million meters into its sky and possible ground fogs and clouds.

Following the success of the Pluto flyby, NASA extended the New Horizons mission to fly past a small Kuiper Belt object a billion miles beyond Pluto. On Jan. 1, 2019, New Horizons brought that ancient body, Arrokoth, into focus and, in doing so, revealed how planetesimals—the building blocks of planets like Pluto—were formed.

"Looking back, Tombaugh's discovery was so much more than just the discovery of the ninth planet," said New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute. "It was the harbinger of a whole new region of the solar system and two different and completely new types of bodies—dwarf planets and Kuiper Belt objects. I only wish that Clyde had lived to see all that New Horizons discovered and how stunningly beautiful Pluto is."

Explore further SwRI to plan Pluto orbiter mission
Provided by New Horizons

Germany to tighten screws on online hate speech

by Mathieu Foulkes

Members of Germany's Greens party staged a protest against hate speech in September 2019

With the danger growing from far-right extremists and torrents of threats against politicians, Germany plans to toughen online speech laws and tighten the screws on social networks.

Ministers in Chancellor Angela Merkel's government approved a new package of measures on Wednesday, days after 12 men were arrested for planning deadly attacks on mosques, communicating in part via chat groups.

The draft law now passes to parliament for MPs to deliberate.

"In future, those who make threats or spread hate online will be prosecuted in a tougher and more effective way," Justice Minister Christine Lambrecht said on her ministry's website.

One headline measure in the bill will step up the pressure on social networking firms such as Facebook and Twitter to quickly remove the offending content.

In future, the Silicon Valley giants will also have to report certain types of illegal posts to the federal police, who will be able to pass on actionable data to prosecutors.

'End up where they belong'

Neo-Nazi propaganda or plans to commit a terrorist attack would be covered under such rules.

But people approving crimes, making death or rape threats or sharing child pornography images could also be caught in the widened net.

One measure in the German bill will step up the pressure on social networking giants like Facebook and Twitter to quickly remove offending content

Social media platforms that refuse to cooperate will face fines of up to 50 million euros.

"Hate crimes will finally end up where they belong: before a court," Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said.

On top of the new reporting processes, Berlin wants to toughen potential sentences, including up to three years in prison for online death or rape threats.

Especially in recent months, there has been a growing spread of anti-Semitic messages online—including a bizarre screed written by the perpetrator of an attack targeting a synagogue in the eastern city of Halle in October 2019.

The draft law would sharpen sentences still further for crimes arising from an anti-Semitic motive, which the justice ministry says have increased 40 percent since 2013.

But there are limits to the rules, leaving it up to the person affected to pursue cases of insult or libel.

In the most serious cases, such as terrorism or murder, network operators will be required to give up users' passwords to the authorities if ordered to by a judge—including if they are encrypted.

The office of Karamba Diaby, Germany's only black MP, was targeted in January

"Extremists don't radicalise themselves out of nowhere," Justice Minister Lambrecht said.

"Inhuman spreading of hate and threats online lowers the thresholds" to violence, she added.

Ministers' plans have not gone unopposed in Germany, where debate is fierce between those who value online anonymity as a shield against the state and those who see unregulated online spaces as a threat.

Bullied out of office

Elsewhere in the draft law, the government aims to reinforce its ability to protect prominent personalities.

Threats and verbal or physical attacks have become more common against office holders, with 1,241 politically-motivated attacks targeting elected officials in 2019 and increasing numbers requiring police protection.

Some local politicians have in recent months given up their posts or said they will not stand for re-election following such threats.

A synagogue in the city of Halle was targeted in an attack in October 2019

In mid-January, bullet holes apparently inflicted by a pellet gun appeared overnight in the windows of an office belonging to Germany's only black MP, Karamba Diaby, provoking widespread outrage.

Politicians from across the spectrum declared solidarity with Diaby.

The apparent attack came months after regional politician Walter Luebcke, a vocal proponent of accepting refugees, was murdered outside his home last June.

A neo-Nazi with a history of racially-motivated violent crimes is the prime suspect in the case.

In future, the authorities will be able to more easily protect personal data, including on public registers, belonging to people in the public eye like politicians, journalists and activists.

Such individuals will be warned if someone else requests their personal information.

Germany threatens online giants with 50 mn euro hate speech fines

Airbus Defence and Space to cut over 2,300 jobs

France-based Airbus last week reported a net loss of 1.36 billion euros in 2019

European plane-maker Airbus said Wednesday it planned to cut 2,362 jobs in its Defence and Space division over the next two years.

Airbus cited a "flat space market and postponed contracts on the defence side" for the decision to cut 829 jobs in Germany, 630 in Spain, 404 in France and 357 in Britain.

A further 142 jobs will be cut in other countries, it said, adding that it was in talks with its European works council on the restructuring.

"Airbus Defence and Space will provide updates on its plans and continues a constructive dialogue with employee representatives," it said in a statement.

The Defence and Space division accounts for 15 percent of the group's revenue.

It posted operating losses of 881 million euros ($951 million) in 2019.

Airbus said that "while the underlying business perspectives, especially in the core business, remain solid", job cuts were necessary after the book-to-bill ratio—the ratio of orders received to amounts billed—fell below 1 for the third year in a row.

France-based Airbus last week reported a net loss of 1.36 billion euros in 2019, mainly due to a 3.6-billion-euro fine over a bribery scandal and extra development costs for the A400M transport aircraft.

Fines cause turbulence for Airbus results

EU proposes rules for artificial intelligence to limit risks

by Kelvin Chan

The European Union unveiled proposals Wednesday to regulate artificial intelligence that call for strict rules and safeguards on risky applications of the rapidly developing technology.

The report is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. Big tech companies seeking to tap Europe's vast and lucrative market, including those from the U.S. and China, would have to play by any new rules that come into force.

The EU's executive Commission said it wants to develop a "framework for trustworthy artificial intelligence." European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen had ordered her top deputies to come up with a coordinated European approach to artificial intelligence and data strategy 100 days after she took office in December.

"We will be particularly careful where essential human rights and interests are at stake," von der Leyen told reporters in Brussels. "Artificial intelligence must serve people, and therefore artificial intelligence must always comply with people's rights."

EU leaders, keen on establishing "technological sovereignty," also released a strategy to unlock data from the continent's businesses and the public sector so it can be harnessed for further innovation in artificial intelligence. Officials in Europe, which doesn't have any homegrown tech giants, hope to to catch up with the U.S. and China by using the bloc's vast and growing trove of industrial data for what they anticipate is a coming wave of digital transformation.

They also warned that even more regulation for foreign tech companies is in store with the upcoming "Digital Services Act," a sweeping overhaul of how the bloc treats digital companies, including potentially holding them liable for illegal content posted on their platforms. A steady stream of Silicon Valley tech bosses, including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Microsoft President Brad Smith, have visited Brussels in recent weeks as part of apparent lobbying efforts.

"It is not us that need to adapt to today's platforms. It is the platforms that need to adapt to Europe," said Thierry Breton, commissioner for the internal market. "That is the message that we delivered to CEOs of these platforms when they come to see us."

If the tech companies aren't able to build systems "for our people, then we will regulate, and we are ready to do this in the Digital Services Act at the end of the year," he said.

The EU's report said clear rules are needed to address "high-risk AI systems," such as those in recruitment, healthcare, law enforcement or transport, which should be "transparent, traceable and guarantee human oversight." Other artificial intelligence systems could come with labels certifying that they are in line with EU standards.

Artificial intelligence uses computers to process large sets of data and make decisions without human input. It is used, for example, to trade stocks in financial markets, or, in some countries, to scan faces in crowds to find criminal suspects.

While it can be used to improve healthcare, make farming more efficient or combat climate change, it also brings risks. It can be unclear what data artificial intelligence systems work off. Facial recognition systems can be biased against certain social groups, for example. There are also concerns about privacy and the use of the technology for criminal purposes, the report said.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen speaks during a presentation on Europe's Digital Future at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. A report on artificial intelligence released Wednesday is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)
Eeuropean Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, right, talks to Commissioner for Europe Fit for the Digital Age Margrethe Vestager during a weekly College of Commissioners meeting at the EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. During the meeting, the College will set out plans on the EU's strategy to deal with the challenges of the digital age and the use of artificial intelligence. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Eeuropean Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, center, greets Commissioner for European Green Deal Frans Timmermans, right, next to Commissioner for Economy Paolo Gentiloni during a weekly College of Commissioners meeting at the EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. During the meeting, the College will set out plans on the EU's strategy to deal with the challenges of the digital age and the use of artificial intelligence. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
Eeuropean Commission President Ursula von der Leyen arrives for a weekly College of Commissioners meeting at the EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. During the meeting, the College will set out plans on the EU's strategy to deal with the challenges of the digital age and the use of artificial intelligence. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)
European Commissioner for Europe fit for the Digital Age Margrethe Vestager speaks during a presentation on Europe's Digital Future at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. A report on artificial intelligence released Wednesday is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)
European Commissioner for Europe fit for the Digital Age Margrethe Vestager speaks during a presentation on Europe's Digital Future at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. A report on artificial intelligence released Wednesday is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)
European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton, right, and European Commissioner for Europe fit for the Digital Age Margrethe Vestager participate in a presentation of Europe's Digital Future at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. A report on artificial intelligence released Wednesday is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen speaks during a presentation on Europe's Digital Future at EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. A report on artificial intelligence released Wednesday is part of the bloc's wider digital strategy aimed at maintaining its position as the global pacesetter on technological standards. (AP Photo/Virginia Mayo)
Eeuropean Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, right, talks to Commissioner for Europe Fit for the Digital Age Margrethe Vestager during a weekly College of Commissioners meeting at the EU headquarters in Brussels, Wednesday, Feb. 19, 2020. During the meeting, the College will set out plans on the EU's strategy to deal with the challenges of the digital age and the use of artificial intelligence. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

Human-centered guidelines for artificial intelligence are essential because "none of the positive things will be achieved if we distrust the technology," said Margrethe Vestager, the executive vice president overseeing the EU's digital strategy.

Under the proposals, which are open for public consultation until May 19, EU authorities want to be able to test and certify the data used by the algorithms that power artificial intelligence in the same way they check cosmetics, cars and toys.

It's important to use unbiased data to train high-risk artificial intelligence systems so they can avoid discrimination, the commission said.

Specifically, AI systems could be required to use data reflecting gender, ethnicity and "other possible grounds of prohibited discrimination."

Other ideas include preserving data to help trace any problems and having AI systems clearly spell out their capabilities and limitations. Users should be told when they're interacting with a machine and not a human while humans should be in charge of the system and have the final say on decisions such as rejecting an application for welfare benefits, the report said.

EU leaders said they also wanted to open a debate on when to allow facial recognition in remote identification systems, which are used to scan crowds to check people's faces to those on a database. It's considered the "most intrusive form" of the technology and is prohibited in the EU except in special cases.

Zuckerberg meets EU officials as bloc's new tech rules loom

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