Colombia's Medellin emerges as surprise COVID-19 pioneer

CHRISTINE ARMARIO, Associated Press•June 13, 2020

Virus Outbreak Colombia - Trailblazing Medellin
In this June 8, 2020 photo, a sign reminding citizens to maintain a safe social distance sits on a park bench between a woman and child, amid the new coronavirus pandemic in Medellin, Colombia, which recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death. The new challenge for Medellin will be to convince citizens to continue abiding by safety measures like wearing face masks and social distancing. In some poor neighborhoods, local activists say they've encountered skepticism about the virus. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 8, 2020 photo, Mayor Daniel Quintero, wearing a protective face mask as a measure to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, talks to the media during a COVID-19 prevention campaign, in Medellin, Colombia. Quintero, Medellin's youngest mayor ever, is an engineer by training who began holding COVID-19 prep meetings in January, weeks after taking office. The virus was a blip on the radar for most Latin American governments back then. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 8, 2020 photo, commuters travel on a train marked with social distancing graphic cues, amid the new coronavirus pandemic, in Medellin, Colombia. The metropolis recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 9, 2020 photo, a nurse measures the body temperature of a shopper at the El Tesoro mall, amid the new coronavirus pandemic, in Medellin, Colombia. The metropolis recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 8, 2020 photo, a stylist, dressed in protective gear as a measure to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, washes a client's hair, in Medellin, Colombia. As COVID-19 cases surge in Latin America, the Colombian city of Medellin is defying expectations and managing to keep numbers remarkably low. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 8, 2020 photo, an El Tesoro mall employee uses his mobile to scan a customer's app to verify he is registered for entry, in Medellin, Colombia, Monday, June 8, 2020. The metropolis recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

In this June 8, 2020 photo, a police officer uses a newly developed software to scan the identification card which determines if a resident has the authorization to be out in public, amid the new coronavirus pandemic, in Medellin, Colombia. Critics of the city’s mayor fear the immense data being collected on citizens amounts to a severe invasion of privacy, but even they admit that it has proven effective in containing COVID-19. (AP Photo/Luis Benavides)

BOGOTA, Colombia (AP) — Two and a half million residents. Four confirmed coronavirus deaths.

As coronavirus cases surge in Latin America, the Colombian city of Medellin is defying expectations and managing to keep numbers remarkably low.

Months into the pandemic, there are just 741 confirmed cases citywide and only 10 patients hospitalized in ICUs with COVID-19. The metropolis recently went five weeks without a single COVID-19 death.

“Medellin can be considered a best-case scenario,” said Dr. Carlos Espinal, director of Florida International University’s Global Health Consortium.

In theory, that shouldn’t be the case. The city is dense, home to many poor residents who will go hungry if they quarantine for too long and connected by a congested public transportation system. All these factors have made the virus especially hard to contain in Latin America.

How has Medellin, so far, defied the odds?

City officials and epidemiologists credit early preparation, a novel app that connected needy residents with food and cash while also collecting important data that later helped track cases, and a medical system that has moved rapidly to treat the sick before they fall critically ill.
Mayor Daniel Quintero’s critics fear the immense data being collected on citizens amounts to a severe invasion of privacy, but even they admit that it has proven effective in containing COVID-19.

“It’s impossible to fight the virus without information,” Quintero, 39, said. “We’d have deaths in the hundreds if we hadn’t made these decisions.”

Quintero, Medellin’s youngest mayor ever, is an engineer by training who began holding COVID-19 prep meetings in January, weeks after taking office. The virus was a blip on the radar for most Latin American governments back then. Some thought he was absurd for worrying about a virus raging in China.

Medellin did many of the things other cities would try in the weeks ahead, but it had some built-in advantages. Its international airport receives far fewer travelers from abroad than bigger cities like Bogota. That made tracking passengers landing from hot spots like Spain and the U.S. easier. It also has what is considered one of the best public health systems in Latin America.

Quintero said he knew that in order for many residents to quarantine, they’d need food and cash. Using his tech background, he led the city in launching Medellin Me Cuida (Medellin Takes Care of Me), an app offering aid to those who signed up and requested help.

The response has been enormous: 1.3 million families – some 3.25 million people in total – from Medellin and surrounding areas registered.

The aid was key for Maritza Alvarez, who lives with six elderly relatives, two of whom are street vendors. Since signing up, she said they’ve gotten packages of food three times and two cash transfers. That has allowed them to mostly stay indoors instead of going out to earn money and buy food.

The app also asks questions such as who users live with, if they have COVID-19 symptoms and what pre-existing health conditions they suffer. That information has proven key in identifying cases, but it has also raised concerns.

Two cases have been filed in court challenging Medellin’s assertion that downloading and registering with the app is voluntary, noting that businesses and employees are being asked to sign up in order to restart work. A judge ruled in favor of one complainant, agreeing that not all the information requested should be obligatory. Others are concerned about what the data might be used for once the pandemic is over.

“Technology is an important tool in controlling the virus,” Daniel Duque, a councilman, wrote in a recent blog post. “But the pandemic shouldn’t be an excuse for governments to turn into a Big Brother that watches and controls everything.”

In an interview with The Associated Press, Quintero brushed such concerns aside.

“They’re partly right. Medellin is the city in Latin America with the most information on its citizens,” he said via Zoom from his headquarters, brightly lit screens with charts and maps behind him. “But the question of our intentions in how we use this data can’t be doubted.”

In Medellin, medical workers test anyone suspected of having COVID-19 at their home. Those who test positive are given a free oximeter. If their blood oxygen levels dip, nurses bring oxygen to their homes. Those who don’t improve are taken to the hospital.

The app has proven key in quickly tracking down those who may have had contact with someone who tests positive. Medellin does about 40 coronavirus tests for each case diagnosed, a number over double the nationwide average, officials said.

Though Medellin’s per million testing rate is low, several epidemiologists said they believe the city’s more targeted testing is proving effective. Colombian scientists estimate that for each COVID-19 death there are at least 100 more cases. That means in Medellin, which has had four deaths, there should be at least 400 infected people. The city has currently identified about 300 cases on top of that amount.

Bogota, by contrast, has reported at least 339 coronavirus deaths but has only detected around 14,500 cases, suggesting that despite more testing per million people, they still haven’t found many of the existing cases.

Still, confirmed coronavirus cases in Medellin have increased from around five to 16 per day since the city reopened its economy in May. Police officers are using newly developed software to scan ID cards of citizens boarding buses and entering malls to ensure they have permission to be out and about.

“We are entering a new phase now,” said Dr. Juan Carlos Cataño, an epidemiologist with the Antioquia Foundation for Epidemiology. “We hope to count on a health system that is sufficiently prepared.”

Like much of Latin America, Medellin found it difficult to equip hospitals with more ICU beds. Global prices for ventilators skyrocketed at the start of the pandemic and supply dried up. Medellin initially had 332; today it has 453. In an emergency scenario, the city plans to utilize ventilators made at a university in Medellin.

Current projections indicate the city will reach peak caseload in July or October.

The challenge for Medellin will now be to convince citizens to continue abiding by safety measures like wearing face masks and social distancing. In some poor neighborhoods, local activists say they’ve encountered skepticism about the virus.

“People think it’s a lie, that COVID-19 is a government invention,” said Gustavo Lainez, a community leader. “Misinformation is a huge factor.”

Still, he said all but perhaps 2% of the 140,000 people who live in the area where he works have agreed to sign up for Medellin Me Cuida.

Over the last two decades, Medellin has undergone an urban transformation, leaving behind the days marred by the violence of Pablo Escobar’s drug cartel and boosting education, libraries, parks and other civic projects. But the virus has brought new hurdles. Unemployment in the metro area is now at 17.3%, the highest in 18 years.

Locals believe their reputation for discipline and industriousness will carry them through another difficult chapter in Colombia’s history.

“We feel supported,” said Alvarez, the beneficiary of food packages. “I never thought big data would help me.”

Brazilians dig mock mass graves to protest President Bolsonaro's handling of coronavirus outbreak

Our Foreign Staff The Telegraph 12 June 2020

Protesters on Copacabana beach in Rio de Janeiro dug 100 mock graves to protest bad governance - CARL DE SOUZA/AFP

Brazilians critical of their government's ambiguous response to a surging coronavirus pandemic dug 100 graves and stuck black crosses in the sand of Rio's Copacabana beach on Thursday in a tribute to the nearly 40,000 people who have died so far.

The country has become a major epicentre of the global pandemic, with the world's worst outbreak after the United States.

"The president has not realized that this is one of the most dramatic crises in Brazil's history," said organizer Antonio Carlos Costa, referring to President Jair Bolsonaro. "Families are mourning thousands of dead, and there is unemployment and hunger."


An aerial perspective of the graves dug by the NGO 'Rio De Paz' as part of their protest against President Jair Bolsonaro - Buda Mendes/Getty Images South AmericaMore

"We are here to demand a change of attitude from the president... who must understand that our nation is facing the most difficult moment in its history."

The action comes as a worrying social crisis is brewing in Latin America where the coronavirus pandemic is spiralling, experts are warning.

More than 1.5 million people have been infected in Central and South America - 70,000 of them are already dead - with no signs of the disease slowing, especially in hard-hit Brazil.

The crisis could provoke the region's "worst recession in history", the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) said.

Hong Kong policeman reprimanded for 'I can't breathe' 'BLM' remark

AFP 13 June 2020

Protesters on June 12 marked the one-year anniversary of major clashes between police and pro-democracy demonstrators

Hong Kong police on Saturday said they had reprimanded an officer who shouted "I can't breathe" and "Black Lives Matter" as his unit dispersed reporters covering a pro-democracy rally the night before.

The officer was part of a team of riot police responding to protests on Friday evening in Yau Ma Tei district.

In a video posted online that quickly went viral, he could be heard saying "I can't breathe" at the press as reporters were asked to move back.

He could also be heard saying "Black Lives Matters, here is not America."

The phrase "I can't breathe" has been embraced by racial justice protesters in the United States following the death of George Floyd, a black man killed by a white police officer in Minneapolis on May 25.

Floyd died after gasping the phrase as the officer knelt on his neck for more than eight minutes.

Hong Kong's police force said the officer had been reprimanded for his comments.

"The officer has been rebuked and reminded to always present himself professionally and enhance his sensitivity," the force said in an email statement.

The same officer, identified by his badge number, had shouted "Black Lives Matter" to an AFP journalist the same evening.

When asked what he meant by the phrase, he replied: "That means we are the best in the world."

China, alongside Hong Kong's police and city leaders have seized on the US police response to racial justice protests in recent weeks as a way to exonerate its own reaction to pro-democracy protests in the city.

Hong Kong police spent seven straight months last year battling huge and often violent protests, hammering the force's reputation.

More than 9,000 people have been arrested, while officers fired about 16,000 tear gas rounds and shot three people with live rounds, all of whom survived their wounds.

Rights groups and protesters accuse officers of regularly using disproportionate force and an independent inquiry into the police has been a core demand of the democracy movement for the last year.

Police have denied all brutality accusations, saying their force matched that of protesters.

Last month the city's police watchdog cleared the force of any wrongdoing.

The finding did little to mollify protesters who have long accused the wacthdog of being stacked with government loyalists and lacking teeth.

A group of international experts quit an advisory panel last year saying it was not equipped to properly investigate the police.

The coronavirus outbreak and arrests enforced calm on the city for the first four months of 2020.

But protests have restarted -- albeit on a smaller and less violent scale -- especially after Beijing announced plans to impose a national security law on Hong Kong last month.

New Zealand city takes down statue of British navy commander

 12 June 2020

WELLINGTON (Reuters) - A New Zealand city on Friday took down a statue of a British navy commander accused of killing indigenous Maori people in the 19th century, as global debate swirls over monuments that represent racial oppression.

Statues glorifying colonialists and slave traders have come into focus as part of a broader movement inspired by the Black Lives Matter protests that started in the United States following the death of George Floyd.

Floyd, 46, died on May 25 after a police officer knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes, sparking anti-racism protests around the world.

Protests in Australia and New Zealand have focused on atrocities committed against indigenous people by European colonisers, with thousands of anti-racism protesters marching over the past week.

The statue of British commander John Hamilton in the New Zealand city of Hamilton, named after him, was taken down a day after a Maori leader threatened to tear it down himself.

Mayor Paula Southgate said a growing number of people found the statue personally and culturally offensive.

"We can’t ignore what is happening all over the world and nor should we. At a time when we are trying to build tolerance and understanding between cultures and in the community, I don’t think the statue helps us to bridge those gaps," Southgate said.

Hamilton led a regiment at the Battle of Gate Pā between the colonial government and Maori tribes in the 1860s, where he was killed.

There had been repeated calls by the Maori community to remove the statue. It was vandalised in 2018.

However, not everyone agreed with the idea of taking down statues. Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters called it a "wave of idiocy".

“A country learns from its mistakes and triumphs and its people should have the knowledge and maturity to distinguish between the two,” he said.

WESTPOINT PRODUCED 

GENERAL ROBERT E. LEE, 
GENERAL GEORGE CUSTER, 
AND MIKE POMPEO

THAT SAYS IT ALL 

Clip from "Santa Fe Trail" (1940; 110 min) Santa Fe Trail is a 1940 American western film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, Raymond Massey and Ronald Reagan. Written by Robert Buckner, the film is about the abolitionist John Brown and his fanatical attacks on slavery as a prelude to the American Civil War. Subthemes include J.E.B. Stuart and George Armstrong Custer as they duel for the hand of Kit Carson Holliday. The film was one of the top-grossing films of the year, and the seventh Flynn–de Havilland collaboration.

The film's premise is that many of the major figures of the Civil War- especially the ones who became "boy generals", were all in the West Point Class of 1854 and that several of them served in "bleeding Kansas" and at Harper's Ferry. Some of what the film depicts is true. Some of it is not. John Brown did raid in Kansas in 1855-56 and then made the raid on Harper's Ferry on 10/16/1859.

UH OH
Protests in Trump country test his hold in rural white areas

Polls suggest white voters without college degrees could be more open to supporting Biden than they were to supporting Clinton four years ago

Published: June 13, 2020 By Associated Press

In the lake country 200 miles northwest of Detroit, hundreds danced, prayed and demanded racial justice in Cadillac, a Michigan town that was long home to a neo-Nazi group.

It was not an isolated scene. In eastern Ohio, even more demonstrated in rural Mount Vernon, a town with its own current of racial intolerance, just as others did in Manheim, Pennsylvania, a tiny farming town in Lancaster County, with its small but active Ku Klux Klan presence.

The protest movement over black injustice has quickly spread deep into predominantly white, small-town America, notably throughout parts of the country that delivered the presidency for Donald Trump. Across Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, more than 200 such demonstrations have taken place, many in cities with fewer than 20,000 residents, according to local media, organizers, participants and the online tracking tool CrowdCount.

“That’s what’s so striking, that these protests are taking place in rural places with a white nationalist presence,” said Lynn Tramonte, who grew up near Mount Vernon and is monitoring the Black Lives Matter demonstrations around Ohio.

The protests in these Republican-leaning areas offer a test of the president’s ability to reassemble his older, white voting bloc. If he cannot replicate that coalition, it would leave Trump with few options, especially since he continues to lose support in suburbs.
“If President Trump cannot hold onto white, working-class voters in rural, small-town Michigan, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Ohio, I don’t know how he wins the election,” said Terry Madonna, director of the Center for Public Affairs at Franklin & Marshall College, in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. “Can you rule out he won’t have that same level of enthusiasm? No, you can’t.”

Trump carried Pennsylvania by about 44,000 votes in 2016, in part with overwhelming support from a patchwork of rural, white counties.

The pattern also played out in Michigan and Wisconsin, where he won by even fewer votes. In Ohio, that coalition propelled him to an easy victory.

Trump’s reelection campaign is working chiefly through online outreach to hold onto his largely white base and to identify new voters in rural areas as a defense against inroads by presumptive Democratic nominee Joe Biden.

Some polls suggest that, while white voters without college degrees are still a strong group for Trump, they could be more open to supporting Biden than they were to supporting Democrat Hillary Clinton four years ago.

Trump campaign spokesman Tim Murtaugh did not directly address the protests taking place in counties won by the president, but said more generally in a statement to The Associated Press, “President Trump expressed disgust and shock over what happened to George Floyd and praised the peaceful demonstrations, but also knows that Americans cannot live with riots and lawlessness in cities nationwide.”

But the pace of change over racial justice after Floyd’s death last month by police in Minneapolis has quickened and has sparked protests in hundreds of communities in every state, on a scale rarely, if ever, seen before. It is not that Biden will necessarily win rural counties that Trump carried easily, but he may be able to cut into Trump’s margins enough to bring those states back to the Democratic column.

In Cadillac, branch home of the National Socialist Movement — among the nation’s prominent neo-Nazi groups as recently as 2007 — black organizers were undeterred in staging their event at a lakeside pavilion even as armed opponents associated with the white nationalist group Michigan Militia parked nearby as a show of force.
Trump won Wexford County, home to Cadillac, with 65% of the vote, similar to neighboring counties in the lightly populated region, where unemployment has run higher than average in Michigan.
In neighboring Grand Traverse County, which Trump won by a smaller margin, more than 2,000 packed Traverse City’s Lake Michigan shoreline park to hear protest organizer Courtney Wiggins. The 38-year-old black woman listed demands, including that police in the 95% white town of 14,000 end racial profiling, as armed protesters affiliated with the far-right Proud Boys dotted the perimeter.

Though similar events popped up in exurban Cedarburg and Grafton, keys to Ozaukee County in the GOP-leaning suburbs of Milwaukee, far more have materialized many miles from the major metropolitan areas in these four pivotal states, according to organizers and advocates who have tracked the protests.

In Mount Vernon, Ohio, the seat of Knox County where Trump received 66% of the vote, 700 people turned out on June 6 despite threats from opponents, who staged an impromptu rally later that day.

Dozens of protests have taken place in counties in these four battleground states that Trump flipped from Democrat to Republican. Among them were Macomb County outside Detroit, Portage and Mahoning counties in northeast Ohio, and — perhaps most notably — Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, where voters swung dramatically from President Barack Obama in 2012 to Trump four years later.

Still, the vast majority have taken place in more than 200 small cities and towns across these four states, like Oconto, Wisconsin, Marietta, Ohio, and Meadville, Pennsylvania, all with populations under 20,000 and in counties Trump carried with at least 60% of the vote.

And while the battle for the White House will likely be waged most intensely in these states’ diversifying suburbs, where Democrats made gains in 2018, even a slight uptick among Democrats or a softening of Trump support in the vast spaces between could be enough to alter the election.

If Biden carries every state Clinton did in 2016 and reclaims Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, he would win a majority of the Electoral College votes.

Of those states, none was as close as Michigan, which Trump won by 10,704 votes out of more than 4.7 million ballots cast.

A little more than 11,000 voters backed Obama in 2008 and either didn’t vote or supported Trump in 2016 in Grand Traverse County and the five counties surrounding it, including Cadillac’s home in Wexford County, according to state voting records.

“These marginal numbers, a few extra votes here and there, we’re talking, like, a handful of votes per county, and they exist in my six-county region,” said Betsy Coffia, a Democratic Grand Traverse County commissioner. “This can make a difference.”

AUSTRALIA
Police disrupt planned anti-racism rally in Sydney
RICK RYCROFT, Associated Press•June 12, 2020


Protestors carry an Aboriginal flag as the walk past a statue of British explorer James Cook in Sydney, Friday, June 12, 2020, to support U.S. protests over the death of George Floyd. Hundreds of police disrupted plans for a Black Lives Matter rally but protest organizers have vowed that other rallies will continue around Australia over the weekend despite warnings of the pandemic risk. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)

SYDNEY (AP) — Hundreds of police disrupted plans for an anti-racism rally in downtown Sydney on Friday, but protest organizers vowed that other rallies will continue around Australia over the weekend despite warnings of the coronavirus risk.

Police ringed Sydney Town Hall hours before around 3,000 people were expected to attend a rally inspired by the death of George Floyd while in police custody in Minnesota. Police vans were parked in side streets in preparation for mass arrests for breaching a 10-person limit on public gatherings because of the pandemic.

Protesters instead split, with about 100 dispersing around the hall while a few hundred converged on nearby Hyde Park.

Protesters in the park held a banner reading “Stand up Australia" near a statue. Those near the hall chanted “Too many coppers, not enough justice.” They appeared to obey police directions to leave or be arrested.

Government leaders have urged activists not to attend anti-racism and other rallies planned for the weekend due to the pandemic risk.

Rallies are planned for Australian cities this weekend over Floyd, the coronavirus risk posed to asylum-seekers held in crowded Australian immigration detention centers, and a pandemic threat created by eating meat.

Police largely did not enforce social distancing rules during peaceful anti-racism rallies attended by thousands in Australian cities last weekend that focused on the high incarceration rate of indigenous Australians.

But Prime Minister Scott Morrison urged police to charge protesters with breaching pandemic restrictions during the coming weekend.

“The very clear message is that people should not attend those events, because it is against the health advice to do so,” Morrison told reporters.

A court on Thursday ruled that a refugee rally planned for Sydney on Saturday is illegal because of the pandemic threat, increasing the range of powers available to police to block it.

Organizer Ian Rintoul said the protest would continue because asylum seekers are in urgent need.

“The point has come, even in terms of the COVID-19 experience in Australia, where the street protests are possible. They can be held safely, and I think we need to insist on that,” Rintoul told Ten Network television.

Animal rights group PETA plans to limit numbers at a Sydney protest on Saturday to avoid police attention. PETA blames the consumption of wildlife sold in Chinese wet markets for the pandemic.

“If a pandemic born out of animal abuse is not the best time to talk about and protest animal abuse, then when is?” PETA spokeswoman Aleesha Naxakis said.

Finance Minister Mathias Cormann suggested demonstrators could lose government welfare payments if they attend rallies, but Morrison later ruled out any such federal retaliation. The government pays a wage subsidy to 3.5 million Australians to keep them in work during the pandemic lockdown.

A protester became sick after attending a Melbourne rally on Saturday and later tested positive for COVID-19. Authorities suspected he was infected before the rally and might have spread the virus to other protesters. Authorities say any disease cluster caused by last weekend’s rallies might not become apparent for weeks.

Australia is relaxing its pandemic restrictions, with 2,000 fans allowed in Adelaide for an Australian rules football match on Saturday, but no protest rallies.

Melbourne is the state capital of Victoria, which is alone among Australia’s eight states and territories to experience community spread of COVID-19 in recent weeks. Most cases involve people who have returned from overseas.

Australia has not recorded any COVID-19 deaths since May 23, when the toll rose to 102. The country has confirmed 7,285 coronavirus cases and 524 cases remain active.

___

Associated Press writer Rod McGuirk in Canberra, Australia, contributed to this report.

Patel condemns ‘unacceptable thuggery’ as ‘statue protectors’ clash with police

NOT PROTECTING THE MANDELA STATUE THEY WERE PROTECTING A STATUE OF CHURCHILL WHO ORDERED TROOPS TO ATTACK STRIKING WORKERS DURING THE 1926 GENERAL STRIKE

Jess Glass and Taz Ali, PA
PA Media: UK News13 June 2020

Police were pelted with bottles during confrontations in central London after large crowds gathered claiming they were there to protect statues from Black Lives Matter protesters.

Hundreds of mostly white men converged on Parliament Square on Saturday after far-right groups, including Britain First, called on supporters to guard the monuments.

Many of those present were drinking and there were a number of clashes with police in riot gear as crowds chanting ‘England’ and raising their arms surged towards lines of officers.

View photos

Police are confronted by protesters in Whitehall near Parliament Square, London (Jonathan Brady/PA)More

As several hundred demonstrators blocked roads around Parliament Square, police tried to corral them onto the pavements.

Other officers, some holding shields, remained in a line blocking access to the Cenotaph in Whitehall, while some in the crowd screamed abuse at them.

Their behaviour was slammed by Home Secretary Priti Patel, who tweeted: “Thoroughly unacceptable thuggery.



Throughly unacceptable thuggery.

Any perpetrators of violence or vandalism should expect to face the full force of the law. Violence towards our police officers will not be tolerated.

Coronavirus remains a threat to us all. Go home to stop the spread of this virus & save lives. https://t.co/HsOx9cgrqD

— Priti Patel (@pritipatel) June 13, 2020

“Any perpetrators of violence or vandalism should expect to face the full force of the law. Violence towards our police officers will not be tolerated.”

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan also took to Twitter to condemn the violence, writing: “This is totally unacceptable. We will not tolerate attacks on our police and perpetrators will feel the full force of the law.

“It is clear that far right groups are causing violence and disorder in central London, I urge people to stay away.”



This is totally unacceptable. We will not tolerate attacks on our police and perpetrators will feel the full force of the law.

It is clear that far right groups are causing violence and disorder in central London, I urge people to stay away. https://t.co/4fzPEbwCQD

— Mayor of London (gov.uk/coronavirus) (@MayorofLondon) June 13, 2020

On Friday, statues in Parliament Square including of Winston Churchill, Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi, were boarded up to prevent them being targeted by protesters both from the Black Lives Matter movement and far-right groups.

Police on horseback pushed back demonstrators near the statues of Mandela and Gandhi on Saturday as protesters continued to throw objects towards them, including at least one smoke bomb.

Large groups of far-right protesters moved to Trafalgar Square, where fireworks were thrown across the crowds.

Police attempted to stop them getting to Hyde Park where a Black Lives Matter demonstration, which had largely been peaceful, was taking place.

View photos

People taking part in a Black Lives Matter protest (Victoria Jones/PA Wire)More



The violence continued as some protesters managed to break metal barriers around the Cenotaph on Whitehall while hurling flag poles, a smoke flare and a traffic cone towards police who were striking them back with batons.

Speaking before the clashes, Paul Golding, leader of Britain First, said the crowds had turned out to “guard our monuments”, telling the PA news agency: “I am extremely fed up with the way that the authorities have allowed two consecutive weekends of vandalism against our national monuments.

Britain First leader Paul Golding (right) shakes hands with a BLM protester in Parliament Square (Jonathan Brady/PA)

“Anyone who comes along today to try and vandalise them will probably be dealt with by all of these Englishmen that turned up, and they’re fed up as well.”

But when asked the Nelson Mandela statue, Mr Golding said: “Why should we have a communist terrorist mass murderer in the capital city of England? It doesn’t make any sense.

“We would like to see that one go, on good grounds, but the rest of them are our historical heritage.”

A demonstrator from south London, who gave her name as Victoria, was in the square with a banner reading “All lives matter”.

Discussing controversial statues, she told PA: “It’s the past. You’ve just gotta learn to live with it, they’ve done w they’ve done but it’s still in the records they hatdid good things.

A protester in Newcastle holds up a picture of George Floyd (Owen Humphreys/PA)

“I’ve got things I don’t want to remember, but I wouldn’t go smashing things up because of it.”

Daisy, a 26-year-old from Pimlico, passed demonstrators in Parliament Square as she went for a run at around 10.30am on Saturday morning and claimed many were already drinking alcohol.

“They were all drinking beers and there was already loads of cans lying round on the floor treating it like it was some sort of football away-day,” she told PA.

“It was a really tense and hostile atmosphere. I didn’t stay too long… it was really uncomfortable.”

In an attempt to avoid a repeat of last week’s sporadic clashes with officers during BLM protests, the Metropolitan Police warned people joining demonstrations on Saturday that they must be off the streets by 5pm or risk being arrested.

In response to the statements by far right groups, BML organisers urged supporters to stay away from central London on Saturday.

Protesters from Black Lives Matter take part in a silent vigil in Brighton (Andrew Matthews/PA)More

There were similar gatherings on Saturday in Belfast, Glasgow and Bristol with crowds massing around monuments.

In Brighton, more than 1,000 protesters formed a line along the seafront in a Black Lives Matter demonstration.

Protests against police brutality and racism have erupted all over the UK and across the globe following the death of African-American George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police nearly three weeks ago.

Last week, the statue of slave trader Edward Colston was pulled down and dumped into Bristol harbour by Black Lives Matter protesters, while the UK’s war-time Prime Minister memorial in London was defaced with the words “was a racist”.

Black Lives Matter protesters form mile-long line along Brighton seafront
Michael Drummond, PA Media: UK News13 June 2020

More than 1,000 protesters have gathered in Brighton to stand in solidarity with Black Lives Matter demonstrations worldwide.

Forming a mile-long line along the seafront, activists wearing black clothes and masks and holding signs held a silent protest on Saturday afternoon.

Anti-racist demonstrators poured in from all over the city for the event for the second week in a row.



Protesters lined up along the sea front for the silent demonstration (Andrew Matthews/PA)More

It comes as people across the world continue to express outrage over the death of George Floyd in the US, and over racism in society.

Observing social distancing where possible, the Brighton protesters joined together in applause in the balmy sun.

Ahead of the silent protest, organiser Ellie Ruewell said to those planning to attend: “We will be lining the closed Madeira Drive road along the seafront to show solidarity to all BIPOC (black, indigenous, people of colour) communities who continuously and tirelessly have their human rights challenged and fear dangerous oppression from authorities and governments alike.

“I need to again stress this is a peaceful, silent protest where we stand in solidarity.”



It was the second weekend in a row that a protest supporting the Black Lives Matter movement had been held in Brighton (Andrew Matthews/PA)More

Protesters held signs calling out racism and prejudice, with one saying: “If you had time to watch Tiger King, you had time to learn.”

Another echoed the phrase chanted across the world: “No justice. No peace.”

The demonstration was watched over by Sussex Police, with officers on foot and motorcycle seen at the edges of the crowd.

Many of the protesters were later expected to join a separate event, marching through the streets of the East Sussex city.

UK considers ending financial support for fossil fuels overseas

Jillian Ambrose The Guardian12 June 2020

Photograph: Maxim Shemetov/Reuters

The UK government is considering steps to end its ongoing financial support for fossil fuels overseas after using £3.5bn of public funds to support polluting projects since signing the Paris climate agreement.

Senior civil servants are understood to be planning a new climate strategy that would phase out financial support for oil and gas infrastructure in developing countries ahead of the UN’s Cop26 international climate talks next year.

The talks come amid growing outcry from MPs and campaign groups over the government’s continuing financial support for fossil fuel projects in Africa and south-ease Asia through its foreign finance institutions.

Separate investigations by campaigners, to be published this week, reveal that the government has offered billions of pounds-worth of overseas fossil fuel financing since the Paris climate accord was agreed in 2016, and forged close links with the fossil fuel industry through a series of hospitality events and gifts.

UK Export Finance (UKEF), a government credit agency, has offered loans, guarantees and insurance worth at least £3bn to UK companies involved in foreign fossil fuel projects since the Paris climate agreement, according to figures unearthed by Global Justice Now.

The campaign group found that the government’s development bank, CDC Group, has directly invested at least £300m in high-emissions projects in Africa and south Asia, including fossil fuel power plants and cement-making.

CDC’s indirect investments include £34.5m for the African Infrastructure Investment Fund III, which has invested some of this money in four different fossil fuel projects, according to Global Justice.

Daniel Willis, a climate campaigner with Global Justice, said the financial support offered by the financial institutions and other aid since the Paris agreement in 2016 has totalled £3.5bn.

“For the government to show real climate leadership ahead of Cop26 and support a global green recovery from Covid-19, it needs to end these highly damaging investments,” he said.

A separate investigation by Global Witness has found that 96% of the gifts and hospitality accepted by UKEF in the past 20 years related to the energy sector were paid for by major fossil fuel companies, including Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil business Saudi Aramco and Gazprom, which is owned by the Russian government.

The gifts include Nokia mobile phones from Sabic, a petrochemical company owned by Saudi Aramco, and trips worth several thousand pounds to visit a gas project in Russia that was paid for by Gazprom.

A modest 4% of UKEF’s energy industry hospitality events were linked to renewable energy companies, according to the report.

Adam McGibbon, a senior campaigner at Global Witness, said UKEF’s hospitality records “underline just how in bed they are with some of the world’s biggest polluters”.

“Hospitality gifts are more than just pleasantries; they are a tried and tested technique for big business to maintain influence over policy. When the UK-hosted Cop26 finally happens in 2021, ending the hypocrisy of exporting pollution abroad will be a key test of just how serious this government is about fighting climate change,” he said.

A UKEF spokesperson said the agency supported UK exports “in all sectors”, and was “proactively developing the breadth of our support for renewable sectors”. UKEF has allocated £2bn to its direct lending facility for clean growth and renewable energy projects, the agency added.

Both UKEF and CDC have increased the proportion of renewable energy within their financial support for energy projects. A CDC spokesman said the development bank will reveal its new climate strategy later this year, which will prioritise investment in renewable energy over fossil fuels.

Government officials are understood to be wary of calling for fossil fuel financing to be ruled out entirely at the expense of helping developing countries achieve other development goals, including access to reliable electricity for almost 1 billion people for the first time.

This stance would likely draw criticism from environmentalists and MPs who believe renewable energy could help power developing economies.

The Labour party leader, Keir Starmer, before his election as leader of the opposition, said earlier this year that “rather than funding fossil fuel projects abroad, we should use our development budget and technical expertise to help other countries skip our bad habits and grow their own low-carbon economies on renewables instead”.

A spokesperson for the Department of International Development said the UK government had agreed that “all future aid spend will be aligned with the Paris agreement” and last year doubled its investment to help developing countries tackle climate change.