DEMOCRATIC UNION

Volkswagen's Mexico factory workers reject union pay deal
Wednesday

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - Workers at Volkswagen's Mexico factory on Wednesday rejected a deal for a 9% pay hike, according to an official statement, voting for a second time against what would have become the country's largest automaker raise in recent years.


Union at Volkswagen in Mexico holds new contract vote© Reuters/IMELDA MEDINA

The union for workers at the plant in Puebla, in central Mexico, had initially sought a raise of more than 15% to account for soaring inflation, from salaries that range from $15 to $48 per day.

About 3,450 workers had voted against the deal, compared with 3,225 in favor, Mexico's Federal Labor Center said in a statement.

(Reporting by Kylie Madry and Sarah Morland; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)

UKRAINE

The Missing “Peace” in the $13.5 Billion Military Package

BY MARCY WINOGRAD  

 SEPTEMBER 1, 2022

Image by israel palacio.

The Department of Defense recently announced it would send nearly $3 billion more in weapons and assistance to Ukraine. The White House news of the largest Ukraine arms package yet–rockets, drones, 350,000 rounds of ammunition– was drowned out by President Biden’s announcement to cancel federal student loan debt for almost half of the country’s 43-million debt-saddled people. So while our nation debated whether U.S. citizens should be burdened with huge predatory interest for seeking an education; predatory weapons of war were given the greenlight for Ukraine, even though there’s no accountability for who will receive those weapons, including the neo-Nazi Azov Batallion, an official wing of the Ukrainian military.

The latest announcement from the DOD brings the total in weapons, ammunition and military training to escalate the war in Ukraine to at least $13.5 billion dollars.

We cannot call for peace in Ukraine while simultaneously supplying that country with advanced rocket systems and missiles that could lead to a direct war between the US and Russia, the world’s most heavily armed nuclear nations. A new study estimates that a nuclear war would kill five billion people, over 60% of the human population, with 360 million burning up in the immediate aftermath, the rest dying from starvation during a dark subzero winter.

We must step back from the brink. How?

Ultimately, the US, the nuclear states and all NATO countries must become signatories to the United Nations’ Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) to outlaw the development, possession, use and threatened use of nuclear weapons.

In the short term we must support an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine, not simply around the Zaporizhzhia nuclear reactor under shelling in southeastern Ukraine, but throughout the entire country where the Russian invasion has displaced millions and destroyed much of the Soviet-era infrastructure: rail and electrical lines, bridges, hospitals.

We must tell Congress and the White House there is no military solution, only a diplomatic one that acknowledges the security interests of all stakeholders.

If Ukraine and Russia can negotiate grain exports, prisoner exchanges and an international inspection of a nuclear plant, they can reach a negotiated settlement. The more weapons we send, however, the less incentive there is to sit down and talk. Without the US and NATO fueling the war with more weapons, a settlement might have been reached months ago, perhaps as early as last March when Turkey brokered a deal scuttled at the last minute.

This war might have been stopped before it started had NATO not expanded to Russia’s neck and the US not shipped weapons to Ukraine to escalate a civil war with Russian separatists in Ukraine’s industrial region.

It is long past time for President Biden to pick up the phone and engage in direct talks with Russia’s President Vladamir Putin. There is much to talk about, starting with a request that Russia remove nuclear-capable missiles from Kaliningrad, a region sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, in return for US agreement to rejoin US-Russia arms control agreements–Open Skies Treaty and Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty– abandoned under the Trump administration. Also up for negotiation might be the removal of US nuclear weapons from five of Europe’s NATO countries–Turkey, Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands with assurances that both Russia and US-dominated NATO will cease mock nuclear strikes.

Such a conversation could lead to a negotiated settlement in Ukraine. It has in the past. The 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis ended when former President John F. Kennedy agreed to remove US nuclear missiles from Turkey and Italy in exchange for Soviet removal of missiles from Cuba.

We must ask ourselves what is the cost of war?

For the world, the cost is a worsening of the climate crisis with exponentially increased greenhouse gas emissions from missiles, rockets and tanks. Rockets also pollute the soil and groundwater; warships disrupt marine ecosystems.

For the Middle East and Africa, countries dependent for grain on Russia and Ukraine–the breadbasket of the world– the cost is famine.

For Ukraine, the cost of a protracted war is more lives needlessly lost, millions more displaced from their homes.

For the United States, the cost is rising inflation and shrinking paychecks for the working class.

Rather than risk World War III and nuclear annihilation, President Biden and Congress

must consider the urgent needs of people in the United States, where 100 million are steeped in medical debt, 100 million may face eviction, 38 million are food insecure and millions more contend with inflationary woes. Thousands of residents of Flint, Michigan, still have no clean water.

It is unconscionable to hurl money at war profiteers –Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman–for more weapons to fuel a protracted war over there while over here the people struggle to survive.

We have been here before.

In Vietnam. Afghanistan. Iraq–the US launched protracted wars that resulted in millions of civilian deaths. To what end?

Someone needs to tell the White House, Congress, the media, politicians, and political pundits that war is not the answer.

The outlines of a peace agreement–ceasefire, withdrawal of foreign troops and weapons, self-governance for Donetsk and Luhansk, control of state borders by Ukraine–already exist. MINSK II is an agreement signed by Ukraine and Russia in 2015 but never implemented for lack of political will.

The solution must be a diplomatic one centered around reparations and debt forgiveness for Ukraine, release of US sanctions in return for Russian concessions, semi-autonomy for the Donbas and guarantees that Ukraine will not join NATO. The possibility to end the war in Ukraine starts with the missing peace. Diplomacy.

Marcy Winograd is a retired public school teacher and author from California. She is the Coordinator of CODEPINK Congress and the Peace in Ukraine Coalition, which is planning a week of action September 12th-15th to end the war.

“WE FELT LIKE HOSTAGES”: UKRAINIANS DESCRIBE FORCIBLE TRANSFERS AND FILTRATION BY RUSSIAN FORCES

A report from Human Rights Watch documents Russia’s deportation and screening of Ukrainians, but cautions the full extent is not yet known

Civilians are being evacuated along humanitarian corridors from the Ukrainian city of Mariupol under the control of Russian military and pro-Russian separatists, on March 24, 2022. Photo: Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Alice Speri

THE INTERCEPT
September 1 2022

WHEN RUSSIAN FORCES took control of Nataliya’s village outside Kharkiv, on the first day of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, they offered bus rides to residents seeking to evacuate the area but with a catch: They could only go to Russia. Those hoping to escape to Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city, which remained under Ukrainian control, were not allowed to leave.

For months, Nataliya stayed behind, even as some neighbors chose to go to Russia as the conflict escalated. Then last May, Russian forces occupying the village told residents that a corridor had been opened to Ukrainian-controlled territory. Nataliya and others boarded a bus that they were told was headed to Kharkiv. But when the bus stopped, she realized they were in Shebekino, a city just across the border.

“I suddenly realized that we were in Russia,” Nataliya told human rights investigators. “We didn’t even go through a border crossing.”

Over the next days, Nataliya and others from her village were taken to a motorsport complex turned makeshift transit camp for thousands of Ukrainians, she told investigators. Russian officials photographed her, took her fingerprints, and made her fill out an immigration form. After a few days sleeping in tents, most people boarded buses to other destinations in Russia, but Nataliya managed to take a train to Moscow, then traveled to Poland and back into Ukraine, eventually reaching Kharkiv.


Nataliya’s ordeal is one of several documented in a Human Rights Watch report published Thursday, which paints the most detailed picture yet of so-called filtration and forcible transfers of Ukrainians by Russian forces. Allegations that thousands of Ukrainians seeking to flee the fighting were forced to undergo interrogations and an invasive screening process, and that many were deceived or pressured into moving to Russian-controlled territory or across the border into the Russian federation itself, have emerged consistently over the last several months. But access to people subjected to forced screenings and transfers has been a challenge, making it difficult for investigators to understand their scope and scale. In April, Russian authorities shut down Human Rights Watch’s office in the country along with those of a dozen other human rights organizations, making it impossible for the group to investigate alleged abuses from within Russia.

In the new report, based on dozens of interviews, including 18 with people who traveled to Russia and were ultimately able to leave, Human Rights Watch concludes that an unknown number of Ukrainians were transported to Russia in “organized mass transfers” conducted in a manner and context that rendered them illegal forcible transfers — a war crime and potential crime against humanity. Forcible transfers include cases in which a person consents to move “only because they fear consequences such as violence, duress, or detention if they remain, and the occupying power is taking advantage of a coercive environment to transfer them,” the rights group wrote.

“When Russian forces transfer Ukrainian civilians from areas of active hostilities to areas of Ukraine under Russian occupation or to the Russian Federation, under the guise of evacuations, they are not merely removing civilians from the hazards of war,” the report concluded. “They are implementing policy ambitions articulated by Russia’s leadership in the lead up to and during the current conflict.”

Russian and Ukrainian officials have each pointed to the movement of tens of thousands of Ukrainians across the border as supporting evidence for their narratives about the conflict, but observers argue that the full picture is more complex and nuanced. Iryna Vereshchuk, Ukraine’s deputy prime minister, said earlier this summer that 1.2 million Ukrainians had been forcibly taken to Russia, including 240,000 children. Russian officials, for their part, claimed that over 2.8 million Ukrainians had entered the Russian federation from Ukraine, including 448,000 children, at least half of which came from areas of Ukraine that had been under Russian control since 2014. The Ukrainian and Russian governments did not respond to requests for comment from The Intercept.

While Human Rights Watch documents the forcible transfer of several people, the group couldn’t determine how many Ukrainians have been forced into Russia that way, and it warned against drawing generalized conclusions about the movement of people amid ongoing conflict. Some Ukrainians felt they had no choice but to go to Russia, which they saw as the only way to escape relentless shelling — and a decision made under such conditions, Human Rights Watch notes, amounts to forcible transfer. While in Russia, some of the people transferred there were pressured to sign declarations stating that they had witnessed war crimes by Ukrainian forces, the group added.

But many Ukrainians also made the journey to Russia or Russian-controlled territory voluntarily, either because they held pro-Russian views, had family ties in Russia, or as a way to travel on to other destinations after the Ukrainian government imposed martial law, forbidding most adult males from leaving the country.

“One really needs to be very careful in determining in each case whether a forcible transfer has occurred, and one cannot generalize and say, ‘OK, the Russians are saying it’s 2 million Ukrainians so we then say, 2 million Ukrainians have been forcibly transferred to Russia,’” Belkis Wille, the report’s lead researcher, told The Intercept. “There are some Ukrainians who have chosen to go to Russia, including because they wanted to transit on to Europe. … Even if we had the numbers on how many people went to Russia, that doesn’t mean that that many people were forcibly transferred.”

Human Rights Watch also noted that because reaching transferred Ukrainians remains a challenge, and because many were too fearful to speak to investigators, its report was based almost exclusively on interviews with those with access to social media or to a network of activists who helped them eventually leave Russia. “Their experiences are not necessarily representative of the many other Ukrainians who are still in Russia, who neither went there or remain there by choice,” the group wrote, calling for further research “to understand the full range of abuses that forcibly transferred Ukrainians in Russia may have experienced and be experiencing.”


Civilians flee the Ukrainian city of Mariupol, on March 24, 2022.
Photo: Stringer/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images

Kharkiv and Mariupol

According to the report, most of those who were forcibly transferred to Russia or Russian-controlled territory came from the region around Kharkiv and from the city of Mariupol, which was under siege for 10 weeks before falling under Russian control in May. As several Ukrainian government attempts to evacuate civilians from Mariupol to Ukrainian-controlled territory failed throughout the siege, thousands of residents attempted to leave the destroyed city, escaping at times on foot, under heavy shelling, through streets filled with dead bodies. Many of these civilians were made to believe that in order to be allowed passage out of areas with active hostilities they had to submit to a “filtration” process by Russian forces, which included surrendering their phones and passports, having their biometrics recorded, and undergoing body searches and interrogations about their jobs and political views.

Those with access to private vehicles were often able to skirt the process, Human Rights Watch noted. But thousands of those who were reliant on evacuation buses to flee the violence or who were made to believe that they needed to show filtration “receipts” in order to move through Russian-controlled areas spent days and in some cases weeks in schools, community centers, tents, or vehicles waiting for clearance, often in squalid conditions and with little food. Those who failed the screening because of suspected ties to the Ukrainian military or nationalist groups were detained in Russian-controlled territory and the whereabouts of several remain unknown, according to family members interviewed by Human Rights Watch. The group warned that they may be at risk of torture and enforced disappearance.

Wille, the Human Rights Watch researcher, noted that the mass biometric data collection happening as part of the filtration process was especially concerning.

“It fits into a much bigger thing going on in Russia,” she told The Intercept, noting that Human Rights Watch has documented widespread efforts by Russian authorities to build biometric databases for surveillance and monitoring. “They’re trying to, à la Xinjiang, create something quite similar and comprehensive in Russia. And I think this gives them a big kind of ground for experimentation. … I think the consequences are significant because we don’t know yet what they’re going to be.”

Those who spoke to Human Rights Watch noted their fear and helplessness as Russian soldiers made them board buses and either lied to them or refused to disclose their destination. They described being held in filtration centers that were overcrowded and filthy.

“We felt like hostages,” said a man who was detained while walking in Mariopul to check on his grandmother and was held for two weeks in a schoolhouse in Russian-controlled territory. “We were afraid they had some dodgy plans for us.”

Another man, who spent 40 days interned in a village outside Mariupol, described inedible food and sanitary conditions that made many people sick. “But more than anything, it was the uncertainty,” he said. “We kept asking, ‘Why keep us there? When will we get the passports back?’ But [the Donetsk People’s Republic authorities] would not tell us anything coherent.”
Historical Precedent

Both “filtration” and the mass transfer of people have precedents in Russian and Soviet history, though the practices have also been widespread elsewhere. “When we talk about filtration, we should not really attribute it only to Russia,” Alexander Statiev, a history professor at the University of Waterloo in Canada, told The Intercept. “The Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, for instance, it was a filtration center. The Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan, it was also a screening facility.”

Soviet officials established filtration camps during World War II, targeting soldiers who had found themselves in German-controlled areas, to identify suspected defectors and collaborators. “Because of this Stalinist, permanent suspicion of spies and enemy agents, they had to undertake this filtration, this screening process,” said Statiev. Soon, the practice was extended to several million civilians who had been living in German territory.

Population transfers, often along ethnic lines, were also commonplace in Soviet Russia, added Statiev, who pointed to the deportation of 170,000 ethnic Koreans, suspected of sympathizing with the Japanese, from the Soviet Union’s far east to Central Asia.

More recently, filtration camps were a defining feature of the Chechen wars, which started in the 1990s. Some 200,000 Chechens, a fifth of the population, passed through the camps, where they were subjected to widespread and well-documented human rights abuses. “Filtration is a standard counterinsurgency procedure … but if a rebellion is popular — and in Chechnya it was popular — a lot of people support the rebels,” said Statiev, noting that there is no evidence that the filtration currently underway in Ukraine is comparable in terms of scale and treatment. “Russia did it on a very large scale in Chechnya, on a very large scale during the Second World War, but the scale of the current formulation is not really clear.”

The Russian government’s goal when encouraging or forcing Ukrainians to move to Russia is also unclear. Over the last several years, Russian officials dealing with a population decline have been trying to lure citizens of former Soviet countries to regions of the federation facing labor shortages, even though promises of support to those who agree to go often fall short. While some Ukrainians have chosen to move to Russia in the aftermath of their country’s invasion, Russian officials failed to articulate a vision for how the war and the destruction it wrought would serve their ultimate goals.

“I don’t think Russians are clear themselves. The trouble is that they started the war without rationally formulating the end game,” said Statiev. “We don’t really know what they would do with all those people. A great deal of them hate Russia as a state, not so much the people, but Russia as a state. And to find within your state so many people who hate you — what is the point?”

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES

US promises to review impacts of IRA on Korean EV makers

By Jo He-rim
Published : Sept 1, 2022 - 

South Korean National Security Adviser Kim Sung-han arrives at his hotel in Honolulu on Wednesday, after holding bilateral talks with his US and Japanese counterparts, Jake Sullivan and Takeo Akiba, respectively. (Yonhap)


The United States will look into the impact of the Inflation Reduction Act on South Korean automakers, a Korean national security official said after a bilateral talk with his US counterpart on Thursday.

South Korea's National Security Adviser Kim Sung-han held a bilateral meeting with his US counterpart Jake Sullivan on the sidelines of a trilateral security meeting involving Japanese national security adviser Takeo Akiba in Hawaii.

"(Sullivan) said IRA does offer more of advantages than disadvantages for Korea, but also said that the US will look closely to see how the EV subsidy discussion goes, and of the impacts (IRA) would have," Kim said after his meeting with Sullivan.

The US NSC will review the impacts and explain the results of its assessment to Korea before making any administrative order.

In a previous discussion with a Korean delegation of negotiators, the US also was positive on forming an official channel with South Korea to discuss ways to minimize potential damage the new law could have on Korean firms, according to South Korean officials.

The presidential office also said Thursday that the US' new law is a topic that can be discussed in bilateral talks with Washington.

According to Deputy Trade Minister An Sung-il, who led a Korean delegation to Washington to deliver concerns over the act, the US side took their opinions seriously and responded positively on forming a new channel for discussions.

“We relayed our situation and the positions of (Korean firms), the atmosphere at the National Assembly and Korean sentiment, and the US side showed they take this matter seriously,” An said on Wednesday at the airport before returning to Seoul from his three-day trip in Washington.

The Korean government sent a delegation of negotiators, including Lee Mi-yon, director general for Bilateral Economic Affairs of the Foreign Ministry, to relay rising concerns here.

US President Joe Biden signed the IRA into law on Aug. 16. The new law, which encompasses health care, taxation and climate measures, has raised concerns in Korea’s electric vehicle industry, as it stipulates that only those vehicles assembled inside North America are qualified to receive the government’s maximum tax subsidies of $7,500.

While details have not yet been drawn out, the law would also mandate the batteries used in the vehicles not only be produced with materials imported from countries with free trade agreements with the US, but also demand that a certain percentage of the batteries be made in North America.

During the three-day trip, the delegation met with officials of the US Trade Representative and the departments of Commerce, Treasury and State, as well as the legislature.

"They (the US) were also taking this issue very seriously and were aware of our concerns. They recognized South Korea as an important ally, and they said they were prepared to continue to discuss the issue together," An said.

In their working-level meetings with the US administration and legislature, officials from White House also joined, the official explained.

A more detailed discussion on how to handle the impacts of the IRA is expected when South Korean Trade Minister Ahn Duk-keun travels to Washington to attend a meeting for the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework next week.

Korean electric-car makers have been left scrambling to deal with the fallout.

The IRA poses a serious threat to Korean automakers, including Hyundai Motor and Kia, who build their flagship electric models here and export them overseas. The companies automatically lost price competitiveness as they were excluded from the US subsidy.

Some 100,000 Korean electric vehicles for export will be affected annually by the IRA, according to an estimate from the Korea Automobile Manufacturers Association.

To minimize losses for Korean companies, time is important. But the US side maintains they need to analyze the situation first, as it has only been a couple of weeks since the law passed.

Seoul views that the US law violates the US-Korea free trade agreement, and has also considered bringing the case to the World Trade Organization for a possible violation of the “most favored nation” principle.

The Federation of Korean Industries has also sent a letter to the US president, delivering the concerns of Korean companies, it said Thursday.

The National Assembly also adopted a resolution highlighting the discriminatory nature of the US law and raised concerns on possible damages. In the plenary meeting held Thursday, 254 lawmakers out of 261 who attended the session voted in favor of the resolution.

U$A

Deadly bird flu returns to Midwest earlier than expected

Bird flu has returned to the Midwest earlier than authorities expected after a lull of several months

By STEVE KARNOWSKI Associated Press
August 31, 2022, 4:03 PM


On Location: September 2, 2022

MINNEAPOLIS -- Bird flu has returned to the Midwest earlier than authorities expected after a lull of several months, with the highly pathogenic disease being detected in two commercial turkey flocks in western Minnesota and a hobby flock in Indiana, officials said Wednesday.

The disease was detected after a farm in Meeker County reported an increase in mortality last weekend, the Minnesota Board of Animal Health said. The flock was euthanized to stop the spread. The board later reported that a second flock in the county tested positive Tuesday evening.

They were the first detections of avian influenza in Minnesota since May 31, when a backyard flock was struck in Becker County. Indiana's case was its first since a backyard flock there tested positive June 8, which had been the last detection in the Midwest before this week.

However, there have been several detections in western states in July and August, including California, where a half-dozen commercial farms have had to kill more than 425,000 chickens and turkeys since last week. There have also been cases in Washington, Oregon and Utah, plus a few in some eastern states.

“While the timing of this detection is a bit sooner than we anticipated, we have been preparing for a resurgence of the avian influenza we dealt with this spring,” said Dr. Shauna Voss, the board's senior veterinarian. “HPAI is here and biosecurity is the first line of defense to protect your birds.”

The Indiana State Board of Animal Health reported that a small hobby flock of chickens, ducks and geese in northern Indiana's Elkhart County tested presumptively positive on Tuesday, though final confirmation from a federal lab was pending.

Across the country, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, 414 flocks in 39 states have been affected since February, costing producers over 40 million birds, mostly commercial turkeys and chickens. The disease has struck 81 Minnesota flocks this year, requiring the killing of nearly 2.7 million birds.

Minnesota produces more turkeys annually than any other state.

This year's outbreak contributed to a spike in egg and meat prices, and killed an alarming number of bald eagles and other wild birds. It also affected some zoos. It appeared to be waning in June, but officials warned then that another surge could take hold this fall.

The disease is typically carried by migrating birds. It only occasionally affects humans, such as farm workers, and the USDA keeps poultry from infected flocks out of the food supply. A widespread outbreak in 2015 killed 50 million birds across 15 states and cost the federal government nearly $1 billion.

FASCISM U$A

Former senator discusses the hushed efforts to change the US Constitution

"It's time to blow the whistle on it," says former Sen. Feingold.

By ABC NEWS
August 31, 2022,


Former senator warns far right groups poses threats to rewrite the Constitution
ABC News’ Kayna Whitworth spoke with former Sen. Russ Feingold about his new book “The Constitution in Jeopardy” on efforts to amend the Constitution through a new constitutional convention.

There is a new strategy that far-right activists are using to attempt to weaken the foundations of our democracy: something called the “convention provision” in the Constitution, according to a former senator.

Former Sen. Russ Feingold spoke with "ABC News Prime" about his new book “The Constitution in Jeopardy,” co-written with attorney Peter Prindiville, about what they see as a coordinated effort to amend the Constitution and making sweeping changes to our democracy using a specific provision in Article 5

MORE: Can election deniers win big in the midterms?


PRIME: Senator Feingold, thank you so much for taking the time to be with us tonight.

FEINGOLD: Thanks so much for having me on.

PRIME: Now, a central theme in your book here is focused on Article 5, which allows Congress to make amendments to the Constitution. But you make the case here that a growing group of far-right activists across the country want to essentially exploit another facet of Article Five, which is the convention provision. So tell us what this provision is and why you think it poses a threat.

FEINGOLD: Well, my co-author Peter Prindiville and I have been studying this very closely for a couple of years. Article Five of the Constitution says that if two thirds of both houses of the Congress propose a constitutional amendment and three fourths of the states ratify it, that can create a constitutional amendment. That's the only way it's ever been done.

But there's another provision there that allows two-thirds of the states to apply for a constitutional convention and if they do, Congress has to call it. And our concern is that the far-right groups realize that there would be no limitation on what could be discussed and considered at a convention like that. So they can really undo our Constitution and there's a growing movement to do it on the far-right, and it's time to blow the whistle on it and have people realize it.

Protesters take over the Inaugural stage during a protest calling for legislators to overturn the election results in President Donald Trump's favor at the Capitol, Jan. 6, 2021.
The Washington Post via Getty Images

PRIME: So on that note, you said in your book that this constitutional convention could, in fact, set in motion attempts to fundamentally alter our system of government. You went on to say, quote, every contentious political and social issue could be on the table. But, I mean, I have to ask, how realistic do you think that scenario is?

FEINGOLD: Unfortunately, it's very realistic. Peter and I have studied very closely the fact that they are actually doing model conventions now. They are preparing, they're identifying the people that would be the delegates, and they have an agenda that is pretty clear: they want to really gut the ability of the federal government potentially to protect the environment, to protect civil rights laws, to protect voting rights. They could ban abortion in the Constitution. Basically, they could do almost anything.

And by some counts, they're close to the 34 states. We think they're using phony numbers to come up with that, but a new Congress might decide we're just going to count it this way. So we think it's an imminent threat and it would be foolish for people who care about our Constitution to not realize that this is something that could really happen and could be worse than Jan. 6, worse than what's happened with the Supreme Court. It could be the worst thing yet.


PRIME: And while you call this a threat, the argument from these far-right groups, though, is that their proposals would limit the power and the jurisdiction of the federal government and that they would be putting forward procedural amendments, things that wouldn't really garner any headlines. But again, you say perhaps they have a more severe agenda and consequences?

MORE: Authorities monitoring online threats following FBI's Mar-a-Lago raid

FEINGOLD: No, there's no doubt they have a more severe agenda. Rick Santorum, the former senator and presidential candidate, has said it's like having a live weapon and you just need to pull the pin on it. So their agenda is not something mild, they may put it in mild terms, but what they're trying to do is make it so. The federal government can't protect the environment, that the federal government can't stand up to protect reproductive rights of women, that the Voting Rights Act is gutted even further. And so it's in their writings, it's in their statements, it's very clear. In fact, they even want to make it, some of them, that if 30 states say they don't like an act of Congress, they can just override an act of Congress.

PRIME: Well, it has been, though, several decades since the last amendment to the Constitution. In fact, only 27 amendments out of the 11,000 proposals to Congress have even been ratified. And while this convention process would make that easier to do, have you found any potential benefits to pursuing amendments, especially in such a divided nation right now, where many states disagree with these with the federal government's decisions?

FEINGOLD: Yeah, we call this the Constitution in jeopardy for two reasons. One is this far-right movement to rewrite the Constitution and take us back to the 18th century. But the other is we do need amendments, but we need to amend it in a different way. We need to change Article Five so that the people, we the people by a majority vote or by majority votes in the States make the changes.

MORE: After Buffalo shooting, experts question whether America can face its far-right extremism problem

PRIME: And so while you do support some change, are there any specific amendments that you think could actually garner the support needed and that would perhaps benefit our democracy?

FEINGOLD: Yeah, I mean, you know, Congress once almost passed an elimination of the Electoral College in the 1960s. I think that's a pretty popular thing. I think there'd be other things that would be popular, but that's not what's going to come out of this convention if these folks on the right have their way. What's going to come out of it is a gutting of the ability of this country to protect itself. And it's going to be a very hard result for the diverse people who live here in the 21st century. That can't be allowed.

PRIME: Okay, former Senator Russ Feingold, our thanks to you for taking the time to be with us tonight.

FEINGOLD: Thanks so much.

LGBTQ activists in Peru demand autopsy for death in Bali

LGBTQ rights activists in Peru have rallied outside the prosecutor’s office to demand an autopsy be performed on a Peruvian transgender man who died earlier this month after being detained on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali

ByMAURICIO MUÑOZ Associated Press

August 31, 2022, 

Demonstrators protest to demand justice for Rodrigo Ventosilla, a Peruvian transgender man who died in Indonesia, outside the special prosecutor's office in Lima, Peru, Wednesday, Aug. 31, 2022. (AP Photo/Cesar Campos)

The Associated Press

LIMA, Peru -- LGBTQ rights activists rallied outside the prosecutor’s office Wednesday to demand an autopsy be performed on a Peruvian transgender man who died earlier this month after being detained on the Indonesian tourist island of Bali.

Rodrigo Ventocilla, a 32-year-old graduate student at Harvard University, died Aug. 11 at a Bali hospital. He had been detained Aug. 6 after arriving at the island’s airport. His Peruvian husband, Sebastián Marallano, was also detained when he tried to help Ventocilla.

The couple, who married in Chile, went to Bali on their honeymoon.

Ventocilla’s body has been taken from Indonesia and is expected to arrive in Lima soon, and his relatives want officials in Peru to determine the cause of death, saying they suspect Indonesian authorities abused Ventocilla. Indonesian officials deny that.

“He was detained because of his gender identity. His identity document did not match his appearance. That made him a suspect for the Indonesian police. He was extorted, tortured and has died,” Luzmo Henríquez, a representative of the family of the deceased, told The Associated Press.

Indonesian authorities deny any act of violence and discrimination. “Everything went according to standard operation," Stefanus Satake Bayu Setianto, a Bali police spokesman, said Monday.

Officials in Indonesia said customs officers found a package of brownies with Ventocilla that they suspected might contain cannabis and turned him over to police. Officials said Ventocilla was taken to the hospital the morning of Aug. 9 after showing symptoms of depression and complaining of stomach pains. He died in the hospital Aug. 11.

LGBTQ activists protested in front of the Peruvian Foreign Ministry last week, complaining that Peruvian authorities did not independently investigate Ventocilla’s death and welcomed the Indonesian authorities’ version without any questions.

Why China’s Leaders Think Gorbachev Took Wrong Path
September 01, 2022
Cindy Sui

Soviet General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev leans out of the window of his limousine to shake the hand of a Chinese child on hand to greet him as he arrived at Shanghai Airport on May 19, 1989, in Shanghai, China.

HONG KONG —

The death of the Soviet Union’s last leader, Mikhail Gorbachev, whose reforms led to the disintegration of the former communist giant in 1991, is seen by many in China as a reminder to avoid the same fate as its neighbor.

Gorbachev, who died Tuesday at 91, is lauded in China for normalizing Sino-Soviet relations, paving the way for solid ties between the two countries in subsequent years. But Beijing also blames him for bringing about the dissolution of its ally, the former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

While the West saw Gorbachev as a brave hero who brought much needed democratic reforms to his country and freed the Soviet satellite states to be independent, China sees him as a weak leader who failed his country.

Both countries were at a crossroad in the late 1980s. The Soviet Union’s economy was near collapse and changes were urgently needed; China’s people were yearning for political reforms after decades of poverty and political turmoil.

Whereas Gorbachev allowed political reforms, China’s then-paramount leader Deng Xiaoping crushed protesters and put reformist General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Zhao Ziyang under house arrest.

At that time and even now, China thinks it made the right decision.

“Back in the 1980s, Deng Xiaoping believed Mr. Gorbachev got the perestroika (restructuring) wrong,” said Victor Gao, a former interpreter for Deng. He is currently a professor at China’s Soochow University and vice president of the Center for China and Globalization. “Gorbachev was pushing political reform ahead of economic reform; China under Deng was promoting economic reform ahead of political reform.”

The Soviet flag frames the portrait of Mao Tse-tung in Beijing's Tiananmen Square as President Mikhail Gorbachev arrived in Beijing on May 15, 1989.

Gorbachev loosened control over not only the USSR’s state-controlled economy but also its political society, leading eventually to satellite states such as Latvia and Lithuania and later Eastern European countries splitting off and chaos in the Russian economy.

To Deng, this was not a smart move.

“Deng believed Gorbachev got the priorities and the sequence wrong. By the end of the day, what matters the most is whether you can bring bread and butter to the table for the people,” Gao said.

Stephen Nagy, senior associate professor of international relations at the International Christian University in Japan, said the Soviet Union’s collapse led China’s leadership to harden its commitment to socialism.

To make sure that socialist principles were sustainable, Deng opened up the Chinese economy, starting by setting up special economic zones to grow prosperity, Nagy said.

His successor, Jiang Zemin, allowed the country’s growing number of capitalists to join the Chinese Communist Party. Current leader Xi Jinping, meanwhile, has campaigned to root out corruption to maintain the legitimacy of the party.

Today, China is much wealthier than it was in the 1980s and is soon to become the world’s biggest economy, whereas Russia still suffers serious economic problems.

The two countries’ different fates also may be because of their “very different” political systems, Nagy said.

“Russia today is a kleptocracy, it’s very few men and it’s always men who run the economy, it’s like a mafia state. They don’t have centralized control and a centralized state. It’s very corrupt,” Nagy said.

In China, the Chinese Communist Party has been able to exert centralized control to govern effectively, he said.

“Whatever you can say about the CCP, in China, 800 million people have been pulled out of poverty, they have really good infrastructure, a lot of people are well off, and this is due to relatively good governance of the party,” Nagy said.

Critics argue that China risks eventual collapse, given problems such as an unhealthy property market, a slowing economy and disruptions from its zero-COVID policy that has led to major cities being locked down.

Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and his wife, Raisa, react as they tour China's Great Wall at Badaling, May 17, 1989, in Beijing.

However, a former Taiwanese official who has dealt with China believes that regardless of the challenges China may face, it is impossible for Chinese leaders to ever accept the disintegration of their country as Gorbachev did.

“Chinese people always have a sense that their country must be unified, it can’t be split for whatever reason. This mindset goes back to the first emperor who unified China. This feeling of unification is very strong among Chinese people,” he said. “The Soviet state on the other hand was made up of many countries. Their views of one nation are not so strong.

“China definitely wouldn’t let Tibet, Xinjiang and Taiwan split off,” added the former official, who requested anonymity to avoid problems ahead of upcoming local elections in Taiwan.

It is unclear whether China’s growing economy and attendant problems will ever lead to the kind of political reforms that Gorbachev fostered, he said.

Nagy also questions whether China will ever move toward the kind of political reforms initiated by Gorbachev.

“In the Chinese context, I’m not sure a democratic system will be able to deal with all their challenges and manage the stable economic growth without the current control of the state,” he said. “Something more fractious like Taiwanese democracy could create problems in the internal stability in the Chinese context.

“I don’t think any political system can deal with the challenges in China today: demographics, environmental problems, productivity problems in economy, quality of economic growth, debt, water security, food security, selected diversification from Chinese supply chains.”

At the end of the day, Gao said, the Chinese leadership’s top priority is maintaining political stability.

“The collapse of the USSR under Mr. Gorbachev has been closely studied and analyzed by China. China has been successful in navigating through more than four decades of reform and opening to the outside world,” Gao said.

“However … maintaining political stability has always been a most important task. … China believes reform needs to be steady, but not hasty; gradual, but not in one stroke. Stability needs to be protected at all cost,” Gao said.

“China will continue to push for greater reform and opening to the outside world, in building a unique system of socialism with Chinese characteristics.”

In response to Gorbachev's death, China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian said Wednesday: "Mr. Mikhail Gorbachev made positive contribution to the normalization of relations between China and the Soviet Union. We mourn his passing and extend our condolences to his family."

History’s bookends: Putin reversed many Gorbachev reforms

By ANDREW KATELL

yesterday

1 of 19

Russia's President Vladimir Putin, right, talks with former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev at the start of a news conference at the Castle of Gottorf in Schleswig, northern Germany, Tuesday, Dec. 21, 2004. One stood for freedom, openness, peace and closer ties with the outside world. The other is jailing critics, muzzling journalists, pushing his country deeper into isolation and waging Europe's bloodiest conflict since World War II. Such are history's bookends between Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, and Vladimir Putin, president of Russia. (Carsten Rehder/dpa via AP, File)

NEW YORK (AP) — One stood for freedom, openness, peace and closer ties with the outside world. The other is jailing critics, muzzling journalists, pushing his country deeper into isolation and waging Europe’s bloodiest conflict since World War II.

Such are history’s bookends between Mikhail Gorbachev, the Soviet Union’s last leader, and Vladimir Putin, Russia’s president.

In many ways, Gorbachev, who died Tuesday, unwittingly enabled Putin. The forces Gorbachev unleashed spun out of control, led to his downfall and the Soviet Union’s collapse.

Since coming to power in 1999, Putin has been taking a hard line that resulted in a near-complete reversal of Gorbachev’s reforms.

When Gorbachev came to power as Soviet leader in 1985, he was younger and more vibrant than his predecessors. He broke with the past by moving away from a police state, embracing freedom of the press, ending his country’s war in Afghanistan and letting go of Eastern European countries that had been locked in Moscow’s communist orbit. He ended the isolation that had gripped the USSR since its founding.

It was an exciting, hopeful time for Soviet citizens and the world. Gorbachev brought the promise of a brighter future.

He believed in integration with the West, multilateralism and globalism to solve the world’s problems, including ending armed conflicts and reducing the danger of nuclear weapons.

In marked contrast, Putin’s worldview holds that the West is an “empire of lies,” and democracy is chaotic, uncontrolled and dangerous. While mostly refraining from direct criticism, Putin implies that Gorbachev sold out to the West.

Returning to a communist-style mindset, Putin believes the West is imperialistic and arrogant, trying to impose its liberal values and policies on Russia and using the country as a scapegoat for its own problems.

He accuses Western leaders of trying to restart the Cold War and restrain Russia’s development. He seeks a world order with Russia on equal footing with the United States and other major powers, and in some respects is trying to rebuild an empire.

Gorbachev sometimes bowed to Western pressure. Two years after U.S. President Ronald Reagan implored him to “tear down this wall” in a speech at the Berlin Wall, Gorbachev did so, indirectly, by not intervening in populist anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe. The dropping of the Iron Curtain and end of the Cold War followed.

At home, Gorbachev introduced two sweeping and dramatic policies — “glasnost” or openness — and “perestroika,” a restructuring of Soviet society. Previously taboo subjects could now be discussed, in literature, the news media and society in general. He undertook economic reforms to allow private enterprise, moving away from a state-run economy.

He also loosened up on the dreaded police state, freed political prisoners such as Andrei Sakharov, and ended the Communist Party’s monopoly on political power. Freer foreign travel, emigration and religious observances were also part of the mix.

Putin has veered away from Gorbachev’s changes. He focused on restoring order and rebuilding the police state. An increasingly severe crackdown on dissent has involved jailing critics, branding them traitors and extremists, including for merely calling the “special military operation” in Ukraine a war. He sees some critics as foreign-funded collaborators of Russia’s enemies.

In his quest for control, he’s shut down independent news organizations and banned human rights and humanitarian organizations. He demands complete loyalty to the state and emphasizes traditional Russian family, religious and nationalistic values.

Gorbachev’s leadership was not without failures. His more liberal policies were uneven, such as a bloody 1991 Soviet crackdown on the independence movement in the Soviet Baltic republic of Lithuania and the attempted early coverup of the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster.

By 1988, he realized that trying to hide bad events wasn’t working, so when a massive earthquake hit Armenia in December 1988, he opened the borders to emergency international help and allowed transparency about the destruction.

After nearly a decade of fighting in Afghanistan, Gorbachev ordered the withdrawal of Soviet troops in 1989, entered into multiple arms-control and disarmament agreements with the United States and other countries, and helped end the Cold War. For those efforts, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990.

But at home, Gorbachev’s economic reforms didn’t go well. Freeing industries from state control and allowing private enterprise too quickly and haphazardly created widespread shortages of food and consumer goods, worsened corruption and spawned a class of oligarchs.

The burgeoning independence movements in Soviet republics and other problems so angered Communist Party hard-liners that they attempted a coup against him in August 1991, further weakening his grip on power and leading to his resignation four months later.

In the end, many in Russia felt Gorbachev had left them with broken promises, dashed hopes and a weakened, humiliated country.

One who felt that way was Putin. For him, much of what Gorbachev did was a mistake. The biggest was the Soviet Union’s collapse, what Putin called “the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century.”

The Soviet Union was disrespected, defeated and broken into pieces – 15 countries. For Putin, it was also personal, because as a KGB officer stationed in East Germany, he watched in horror as massive crowds staged the popular uprising that led to the removal of the Berlin Wall and Germany’s reunification, at one point besieging his KGB office in Dresden.

To this day, Putin’s perceptions about threats to his country and popular revolutions color his foreign policy and his deep mistrust of the West. They underpin his decision to invade Ukraine on Feb. 24.

As one justification for the war, he cites what he believes was a broken U.S. promise to Gorbachev – a supposed 1990 pledge that NATO would not expand into Eastern Europe. U.S. officials have denied making such a pledge, but Putin believes NATO’s expansion, and specifically the prospect of neighboring Ukraine joining the alliance, pose an existential threat to Russia.

Critics allege that Putin distorts the facts and ignores local sentiments to claim Ukrainians want to be liberated from the Kyiv government and align with Moscow.

He has embarked on a massive effort to modernize and expand Russia’s military might, moving away from arms-control accords that Gorbachev agreed to.

Putin’s war in Ukraine, alleged human rights violations and the 2014 annexation of Crimea have drawn massive international sanctions that are reversing the cultural and economic ties that Gorbachev fostered. But for a few allies, Russia is isolated.

While one might expect Gorbachev to have been more critical of Putin, he supported Russia’s annexation of Crimea, condemned NATO’s eastward expansion and said the West bungled the opportunities the Cold War’s end offered.

But in many other ways, the historic bookends between the two leaders are set far apart.

One observer who sees Gorbachev’s business as unfinished is Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a Russian tycoon who moved to London after spending a decade in a Russian prison on charges widely seen as political revenge for challenging Putin.

“Gorbachev gave freedom not only to Baltic and Eastern European states, he also gave freedom to the Russian nation,” Khodorkovsky said after Gorbachev’s passing. “It’s a different matter that we haven’t quite managed to make use of that freedom.”

___

Andrew Katell was an Associated Press correspondent based in Moscow who covered Gorbachev from 1988 to 1991. Now semi-retired, he has maintained a lifelong interest in Russian affairs and is a contributor to the AP’s coverage of Russia and Ukraine.

PRE-BOLLYWOOD

Satyajit Ray’s Agantuk to be showcased at Toronto film festival

World News

Published on Sep 01, 2022 

Part of the Cinametheque section, Agantuk will be screened as part of the 2022 edition of the 11-day Toronto International Film Festival, which commences on September 8

A still from Satyajit Ray’s final feature, Agantuk. TIFF will feature a world premiere of a digital restoration of the film this month. (Courtesy: TIFF

ByAnirudh Bhattacharyya

TORONTO: Less than a month after staging a retrospective of the legendary Indian filmmaker’s work, the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) will be showcasing Satyajit Ray’s final feature, Agantuk or The Stranger, at its main event.

Part of the Cinametheque section, Agantuk will be screened as part of the 2022 edition of the 11-day festival, which commences on September 8. The screening will also mark the world premiere of a 4K or high-quality digital restoration of the original movie, which was originally released in 1991. This version comes to TIFF courtesy the National Film Development Corporation of India and the National Film Archive of India.

“Agantuk is an important film in Ray’s oeuvre and one he was quite proud of. We hope it will appeal to audiences less familiar with Ray’s body of work and also be a treat for the many TIFF audiences who came out to enjoy the recent series,” Jessica Smith, Manager, TIFF Cinematheque, told the Hindustan Times via email.

The recent showcase, Satyajit Ray: His Contemporaries and Legacy, was featured in August and consisted of ten films, including four by Ray. It opened with Charulata, released in 1964. That was “timed to commemorate India’s 75th anniversary of Independence”, Smith said and this restoration wasn’t available for that film series.

Five classics are being featured at the TIFF Cinematheque component of the festival, including Agantuk. Also listed are Mary Harron’s I Shot Andy Warhol, Baz Luhrmann’s Strictly Ballroom, Béla Tarr and Ágnes Hranitzky’s Werckmeister Harmonies and Guy Maddin’s Tales from the Gimli Hospital Redux.

Agantuk was described by TIFF as a “remarkably personal final film”.

“The final film by Satyajit Ray has been cited as the auteur’s most philosophical, intellectual, and personal. Ray enthusiasts would probably infer that the views of the protagonist are in fact Ray speaking his mind. Ray’s deep study of human behaviour is reflected most prominently here,” it noted.

Ray, who made is debut with Pather Panchali in 1955, passed away in Kolkata in 1992, less than a month after receiving an Honorary Academy Award.

Oil firms seek U.S. mediation to defuse Iraq-Kurdistan tensions

Rowena Edwards
Thu, September 1, 2022 

A flame rises from a chimney at Taq Taq oilfield in Erbil

(Reuters) - Oil firms operating in Kurdistan have asked the United States to help defuse an upsurge in tension between Iraq's central government and the semi-autonomous region, according to a letter seen by Reuters and three sources.

They say intervention is needed to ensure oil continues to flow from the north of Iraq to Turkey to prevent Turkey having to increase oil shipments from Iran and Russia.

They also say the economy of the Kurdistan region (KRI) could be at risk of collapse if it loses oil revenues.

Relations soured in February when Iraq's federal court deemed an oil and gas law regulating the oil industry in Iraqi Kurdistan was unconstitutional.


Following the ruling, Iraq’s federal government, which has long opposed allowing the Kurdistan regional government (KRG) to independently export oil, has increased its efforts to control export revenues from Erbil, the capital of the KRI.

Before the ruling, Dallas-based HKN Energy wrote to U.S. ambassadors in Baghdad and Ankara in January seeking mediation in a separate case dating back to 2014 concerning the Iraq-Turkey pipeline (ITP), a copy of the letter seen by Reuters shows.

Baghdad claims that Turkey violated the ITP agreement by allowing KRG exports - it deems illegal – through the pipeline to the Turkish port of Ceyhan.

Turkey's energy ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

The final hearing from the case took place in Paris in July, and the International Chamber of Commerce will issue a final decision in the coming months, Iraq's oil ministry said.

Turkey's next steps remain unclear should the court rule in Iraq’s favour, an outcome considered likely, according to three sources directly involved.

At least one other oil firm has engaged at senior levels with four direct and indirect stakeholder governments to encourage engagement, a representative from the company told Reuters, on condition of anonymity.

Other operators in the KRI, Genel Energy and Chevron, declined to comment on the arbitration case, while DNO and Gulf Keystone did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

BARRELS AT RISK

Apart from requiring Turkey to get more crude from Iran and Russia, a cessation of oil flows through the ITP, would cause the KRI's economy to collapse, HKN's letter to U.S. representatives said.

Neither the KRG's ministry of natural resources nor the oil ministry in Baghdad responded to a request for comment.

Already Iraq is getting less than the full benefit of high oil prices, which leapt to 14-year-highs after major oil exporter Russia invaded Ukraine in February and they remain close to $100 a barrel.

The ITP has the capacity to pump up to 900,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude, roughly 1% of daily world oil demand, from state-owned oil marketer SOMO as well as the KRG.

For now it is pumping 500,000 bpd from northern Iraqi fields, which will struggle to boost production further without new investment.

Analysts have said companies will withdraw from the Kurdistan region unless the environment showed improves.

Already many foreign companies have lost interest.

They first came to Kurdistan in the era of former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, when the region was considered more stable and secure than the rest of Iraq.

As security has deteriorated, the handful of mostly small and medium-sized firms left has also sought U.S. engagement to help deter attacks against energy infrastructure and improve security generally.

The firms gave their backing to letters written from U.S. congress members to Secretary of State Antony Blinken sent in August, according to sources directly involved in the matter. They asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue.

The letters urged high-level engagement with Erbil and Baghdad to safeguard the stability of the KRI’s economy and to ensure Iraq is free from Iranian interference.

TEPID U.S. INTEREST

State Department spokesperson Ned Price said on Aug. 16 that disputes between Baghdad and Erbil were between the two sides, but the United States could encourage dialogue.

The State Department summoned U.S. law firm Vinson & Elkins, which is representing Iraq’s oil ministry in Baghdad, for a briefing in Washington on the ITP dispute in July.

A further two briefings are likely to take place in Baghdad and Washington, according to a source familiar with the matter.

"Baghdad would certainly welcome U.S. statements to the KRG leadership that it should follow the Iraqi constitutional arrangements for the oil industry in Iraq," partner at Vinson & Elkins James Loftis said.

The U.S. state department declined to comment but industry experts believe U.S. intervention is unlikely and in any case might not help.

"The U.S. has become disengaged from Iraq over the past decade. No pressure from Washington or other governments will resolve the issues between Baghdad and the Kurds," Raad Alkadiri, managing director for energy, climate, and sustainability at Eurasia Group.

A Kurdish official told Reuters in August the KRG had asked the United States to increase their defence capabilities, but said it was not hopeful as the United States' higher priority is reviving the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran.

(Reporting by Rowena Edwards in London; additional reporting by Amina Ismail in Erbil, Simon Lewis in Washington, and Can Sezer in Istanbul; editing by Barbara Lewis)