Myanmar's military is charging families $85 to retrieve bodies of relatives killed in crackdown

By Julia Hollingsworth and Akanksha Sharma, CNN 1 hour ago

Myanmar's military is charging families $85 to retrieve the bodies of relatives killed by security forces in a bloody crackdown on Friday, according to activists.

© AP A police vehicle is parked at a road in South Okkalapa township to block anti-coup protesters' gathering in Yangon, Myanmar, Friday, April 9, 2021.

At least 82 people were killed Friday in Bago, 90 kilometers (56 miles) northeast of Yangon, after the city was "raided" by the military's security forces, said advocacy group Assistance Association for Political Prisoners (AAPP).

More than 700 people have died since the military overthrew Myanmar's elected government in a February 1 coup, according to AAPP. Since then, junta security forces made up of police, soldiers and elite counter-insurgency troops have embarked on a systematic crackdown against unarmed and peaceful protesters, detaining around 3,000 people and forcing activists into hiding.

© STR/AFP/Getty Images Protesters march during a demonstration against the military coup in Yangon on April 11, 2021.

Myanmar's military fired on anti-coup protesters in Bago city Friday, using assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades (RPGs), and hand grenades, AAPP said.

An eyewitness who lives in Bago city, who cannot be named for security purposes, told CNN Sunday that many residents have fled to nearby villages since Friday's raid. The internet has been cut off in the area since Friday, the eyewitness said, and security forces are searching the neighborhoods.

"I was living on the main road. The security forces come and station often," the eyewitness told CNN, adding that bodies have piled up at the mortuary following the shootings. "Due to the threat, we had to move into the house in the lane nearby,"

The military is now charging families 120,000 Myanmar kyat ($85) to retrieve the bodies of relatives who died Friday, according to a Facebook post from the Bago University Students' Union.

Radio Free Asia's Burmese service matched the reporting from the Bago University Students' Union. CNN has not independently verified the report and has reached out to the military for comment.

Myanmar's military claimed its forces were assailed by protesters in Bago Friday, according to state-run newspaper Global New Light of Myanmar.

Video: Clarissa Ward asks Major General about video of brutal killing (CNN)


"Security forces were attacked by groups of rioters while removing road barriers solidified by the rioters on the streets in Bago yesterday," Global New Light of Myanmar reported, adding: "rioters used handmade guns, fire bottles, arrows, handmade shields and grenades to attack the security forces."

The newspaper said one protester died during Friday's incident. "Evidence of confiscated grenades and ammunition indicates small arms were used," the report added.

Myanmar's military detained a Red Cross volunteer doctor in Bago on April 2, the organization confirmed to CNN Sunday. The volunteer, Nay Myo, who is also the chair for Red Cross in Bago, has not been charged but remains in detention, Red Cross said.

Another volunteer doctor providing free medical aid on the ground, Wai Yan Myo Lwin, was detained on Sunday in Bago, his family confirmed to CNN.

Backlash to violence

The United States Embassy in Myanmar called for an end to the violence on Sunday.

"We mourn the senseless loss of life in Bago and around the country where regime forces have reportedly used weapons of war against civilians," the embassy said in a post on its official Twitter account.

"The regime has the ability to resolve the crisis and needs to start by ending violence and attacks," it added.

NGO Human Rights Watch published a letter Thursday urging the European Union to "fully implement" sanctions on the military and "urgently adopt additional sanctions."

"The people of Myanmar find themselves once against facing the military's bullets, but they courageously continue their struggle, unrelenting," the letter said. "EU condemnation and efforts to advance accountability and justice for grave, widespread, and systematic abuses by the military junta are welcome and important, yet words and partial steps are not enough."

But the military's commander-in-chief, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing, defended the coup over the weekend, claiming the junta "did not seize power but took measures to strengthen the multiparty democracy system," according to Global New Light of Myanmar.

Military spokesperson Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun previously told CNN the generals are merely "safeguarding" the country while they investigate a "fraudulent" election, and the bloodshed on the streets is the fault of "riotous" protesters.

Why the case against abortion is weak, ethically speaking
Nathan Nobis SALON 4/11/2021

© Provided by Salon Pro-life activists
Pro-life activists demonstrate in front of the the US Supreme Court during the 47th annual March for Life on January 24, 2020 in Washington, DC. OLIVIER DOULIERY/AFP via Getty Images CATHOLIC SCHOOL STUDENTS BUSSED TO DEMO

Abortion rights are under attack. But ethics education can help — and defenders of abortion rights should recognize this, before it's too late.

In recent years, over 250 abortion-restrictive laws have been proposed across 45 states. Arkansas and South Carolina are the most recent states to pass laws to ban abortion after 6 weeks into pregnancy, when a "heartbeat" can be detected in the fetus and before many women even know they are pregnant.

The Supreme Court now has a majority of justices who identify as "pro-life," and will surely be more receptive to these attacks on abortion rights than previous courts have been. If the issue comes before them, it is unclear how they might rule: they have already restricted a medication used to induce abortions and might welcome further restrictions.

While legal attacks demand immediate legal responses, these responses aren't a long-term, comprehensive strategy to protect legal rights and access to abortion.

Representatives of pro-choice organizations sometimes claim they are "doing all they can" to protect abortion rights, but this is not true: Mary Ziegler recently reported in The Atlantic that, since the 1990s, pro-choice advocates have deliberately avoided engaging moral or ethical questions about abortion; they have focused solely on the legal freedom to choose abortion.

Meanwhile, over that same time period and up to the present, pro-life advocates have seen engaging the ethics of abortion as essential to their cause and have invested heavily into training sessions, educational institutes, and materials to help move their message. Surely they view this "ethics education" as a wise and effective investment, since it has helped bring abortion rights to the legally precarious place they are now.

Given the stakes here, it's time for pro-choice advocates and organizations to rethink the wisdom of avoiding talk of ethics.

Think about what motivates people who want to make abortion illegal. Their primary motivations are, from their perspective, ethical or moral. If asked why abortion should be illegal, they will often reply with an argument like this:

Fetuses are innocent human beings with the right to life, and—since it's always wrong to kill innocent human beings—abortion is murder and should be illegal, with few exceptions.

Advocates of this type of argument include the Catholic Church, evangelical Christians, and organizations like the National Right to Life and Americans United for Life. Pro-life "ethics education" involves training people to advocate for this type of argument.

To defend abortion rights requires refuting such arguments. But the most common pro-choice responses to the pro-life argument don't do this. Observing that making abortion illegal won't reduce abortions, and claiming that abortion opponents have bad motives or are hypocritical, or that opposition to abortion is inherently religious, that abortion is "normal," and offering slogans, such as that abortion is "not up for debate," simply do not engage the core issue: these types of responses do not explain why abortion is not murder or show what's wrong with the argument against abortion.

Even more sophisticated bodily autonomy defenses of abortion—that women's rights to choose what happens to and with their bodies and lives justify abortion—are often at least presented in ways that do not challenge the assumption that abortion is murder, along the lines of, "Say whatever you want about the ethics of abortion: we've got the legal right to it."

But abortion generally is not murder and the ethical arguments given to try to establish this are demonstrably weak. The more people who know and understand why this so and are able to effectively communicate this knowledge, the better, since that would do some good towards helping undercut the primary motivation for making abortion illegal.

⸻

To better recognize the flaws in the core ethical argument against abortion, it is useful to consider two far less controversial medical procedures that also end the lives of human beings. These cases provide insights into some of the core content of pro-choice ethics education.

First, in every U.S. state and most countries, if a person elects to be an organ donor, their organs can be removed for transplant when that person suffers complete brain death—even if their body is still alive. Organ harvesting involves cutting living human beings open and their organs being removed one-by-one until, at last, the heart is detached and the human being dies, having been directly killed by the procedure.

But almost no one believes that such organ donation procedures are immoral. Pro-life organizations have not mobilized against them or even signaled disapproval. And hundreds of thousands of people have signed up to be organ donors with full knowledge that their bodies might be killed in this way if their brains permanently cease functioning.

What this shows is that most people recognize that it's not always wrong to kill human beings. This is true even when those human beings are considered "innocent," as human beings used for organ donation are often categorized. This is a first step in undercutting the pro-life argument.

A second relevant set of cases involves anencephalic infants, or babies born with severely undeveloped brains. These babies usually do not live long, and the widely accepted medical practice is to let these infants die, providing palliative care only, even though they could be kept alive by a machine. This ends their lives, but it is not wrong.

The ethical insight gained from these two common medical practices is that not all human beings have a right to life that trumps all other considerations: it is not always wrong to end the lives of even innocent human beings, if they lack what would make ending their lives wrong.

And these cases share a core feature with the vast majority of U.S. abortions, 88 percent of which take place during the first 12 weeks of pregnancy: the human beings in question do not have brains capable of supporting consciousness, awareness, or feelings. Since these common medical practices concerning organ donation and anencephaly are morally permissible, so are most abortions.

* * *

Abortion opponents will respond that this conclusion about abortion does not follow, given differences among the cases.

Pro-life intellectuals argue that organ donors are not really "human beings." But surely they are human beings—they are living human organisms, with heartbeats. The pro-life premise that it's always wrong to kill human beings implies that organ donation practices are wrong, so this is a good reason to reject the assumption and its application to abortion.

About anencephalic infants, pro-life advocates recognize these babies as human beings and argue that it would be wrong to harvest their organs to use for other children. But either both brain-dead humans and brain-less infants are human beings or neither are, and organ donation is either acceptable from both or neither: the difference in age is immaterial.

Some would respond that organ donation and anencephalic newborns cases involve human beings who, tragically, have lost even the potential for valuable futures. Yet fetuses, they argue, have lives, or potential lives, before them, and so have rights to those lives. And they are "innocent" too.

But calling fetuses "innocent" assumes that they are persons: "innocence" implies the potential for guilt, and that's only true of persons. Nobody would refer to human eggs or tissue as "innocent," because nobody thinks these things are persons. And for someone to have a potential future seems to require that "someone" be a person: for any future to be someone's future, there must be a person whose future that belongs to. So are fetuses persons?

"Personhood" is a controversial concept, but the organ donation and anencephaly cases can help us understand it. First, we should all agree that it's usually wrong to end the lives of persons: persons have the right to life. But since organ donation practices and how anencephalic newborns are treated is not wrong, we can conclude that these human beings are not persons: if they were persons, ending their lives would be wrong. And these humans are not persons because, again, they lack brains capable of supporting any type of consciousness: they were persons in cases of organ donation and cannot be persons in cases of anencephaly. And this suggests that beginning fetuses are not persons either, since they too lack consciousness-enabling brains. So the pro-life claim that all embryos and fetuses are persons is not true.

So, in sum, the "abortion is murder" charge doesn't stick: it's not always wrong to kill human beings; at least early-term fetuses are not persons with the right to life; and "innocence" is a concept that just doesn't apply to fetuses. Ethical arguments—and ethics education—can support the pro-choice side after all, and the more people making these types of critiques, in different ways and for different audiences, the better.

* * *

Why, though, should we think that abortion is generally morally acceptable? Why think attempts to ban abortion are unjust attempts to criminalize morally acceptable behavior? The simple failure to show that abortion is wrong might be enough for that, but we can offer positive arguments as well.

The ethical framework most medical ethicists use to determine whether a human being has moral rights, such as the right to life, involves the question of whether the individual has "interests." Interests are what make someone's life go well or poorly for them: respecting and promoting someone's interests typically promotes their well-being; ignoring or denigrating their interests typically harms them. Interests are the basis for concerns about "equality," which are about equal consideration of interests.

Rights protect interests, and interests are not possible without a sufficiently developed brain. What determines how an individual should be treated is not the simple fact of whether they are biologically human organisms; rather, it's factors that depend on their having a brain that allows for any form of consciousness: minds matter, not heartbeats or human DNA. The basis of human rights is not human biology, as statements of human rights might misleadingly suggest, but having interests, and most fetuses—at the stages of pregnancy when most are aborted—do not have interests, given their undeveloped brains and nervous systems.

Pregnant women, of course, have interests and the resulting rights to life, liberty, and control of their bodies. Fetuses would have the right to women's bodies, labor, and time only if they are explicitly granted that right, and, of course, women who seek abortions have not given the fetus that right. While women's rights to autonomy may be sufficient to justify abortion, that argument is surely easier to make if fetuses are not persons, do not have basic moral rights, and so abortion is not murder.

To be sure, fetuses in the third trimester (after 27 weeks) likely have interests, as research on fetal pain suggests. And even most pro-choice ethicists agree that third-trimester abortions raise pressing moral concerns, although these concerns are complicated when such abortions are sought due to newly discovered fatal anomalies or threats to the health of the prospective mother. But pro-life advocacy is not focused on the unique ethical issues concerning later abortions, which account for less than 1 percent of all abortions; their goal is prohibiting nearly all abortions, the overwhelming majority of which affect fetuses without interests.

* * *

So, is abortion murder? Does it violate human rights? Not unless other widely-accepted medical procedures that end human life are also wrong. But they aren't, and neither is abortion. Ethics education—of many types, at many levels, for many different audiences—helps people better understand why this is so.

Enabling more people to more productively engage the many ethical arguments about abortion won't, by itself, solve any social or political problems: no single strategy would. But ethics education is an essential part of any successful comprehensive strategy to ensure abortion rights and access, and so pro-choice advocates should engage in it. More generally, our political culture needs genuinely fair and balanced, honest and respectful engagement of arguments and truth-seeking: more people practicing this with the complex topic of abortion would help set a better intellectual and moral tone that would enable us all to better engage the many other polarizing issues that confront our society.

If the legal right to abortion is lost, however, pro-choice advocates will be forced to engage with the study of ethics in trying to rebuild their case for abortion rights. So they might as well start that now, while they still have the law on their side. That's not just smart strategy: ethics demands it.

Top official admits Chinese vaccines have low effectiveness

BEIJING — In a rare admission of the weakness of Chinese coronavirus vaccines, the country's top disease control official says their effectiveness is low and the government is considering mixing them to get a boost.© Provided by The Canadian Press

Chinese vaccines “don’t have very high protection rates,” said the director of the China Centers for Disease Control, Gao Fu, at a conference Saturday in the southwestern city of Chengdu.


Beijing has distributed hundreds of millions of doses abroad while trying to promote doubt about the effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine made using the previously experimental messenger RNA, or mRNA, process.

“It’s now under formal consideration whether we should use different vaccines from different technical lines for the immunization process,” Gao said.

Officials at a news conference Sunday didn’t respond directly to questions about Gao’s comment or possible changes in official plans. But another CDC official said developers are working on mRNA-based vaccines.

Gao did not respond to a phone call requesting further comment.

“The mRNA vaccines developed in our country have also entered the clinical trial stage,” said the official, Wang Huaqing. He gave no timeline for possible use.

Experts say mixing vaccines, or sequential immunization, might boost effectiveness. Researchers in Britain are studying a possible combination of Pfizer-BioNTech and the traditional AstraZeneca vaccine.

The coronavirus pandemic, which began in central China in late 2019, marks the first time the Chinese drug industry has played a role in responding to a global health emergency.

Vaccines made by Sinovac, a private company, and Sinopharm, a state-owned firm, have made up the majority of Chinese vaccines distributed to several dozen countries including Mexico, Turkey, Indonesia, Hungary, Brazil and Turkey.

The effectiveness of a Sinovac vaccine at preventing symptomatic infections was found to be as low as 50.4% by researchers in Brazil, near the 50% threshold at which health experts say a vaccine is useful. By comparison, the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine has been found to be 97% effective.

Health experts say Chinese vaccines are unlikely to be sold to the United States, western Europe and Japan due to the complexity of the approval process.

A Sinovac spokesman, Liu Peicheng, acknowledged varying levels of effectiveness have been found but said that can be due to the age of people in a study, the strain of virus and other factors.

Beijing has yet to approve any foreign vaccines for use in China.

Gao gave no details of possible changes in strategy but cited mRNA as a possibility.

“Everyone should consider the benefits mRNA vaccines can bring for humanity,” Gao said. “We must follow it carefully and not ignore it just because we already have several types of vaccines already.”

Gao previously questioned the safety of mRNA vaccines. He was quoted by the official Xinhua News Agency as saying in December he couldn’t rule out negative side effects because they were being used for the first time on healthy people.

Chinese state media and popular health and science blogs also have questioned the safety and effectiveness of the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine.

As of April 2, some 34 million people in China have received both of the two doses required for Chinese vaccines and about 65 million received one, according to Gao.

The Sinovac spokesman, Liu, said studies find protection "may be better” if time between vaccinations is longer than the current 14 days but gave no indication that might be made standard practice.

21 Chinese coal miners trapped by underground flood

BEIJING — Rescuers on Sunday were trying to reach 21 coal miners who were trapped by an underground flood in China's northwest, a state news agency reported.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

The mine in Hutubi County in the Xinjiang region flooded at about 6:10 p.m. on Saturday, the Xinhua News Agency said. It said eight people were rescued.

China's coal mines are among the world's deadliest, regularly suffering explosions and gas leaks despite repeated safety crackdowns.

The Associated Press

China: 21 miners trapped in flooded Xinjiang mine

Rescuers are trying to pump water out of the flooded mine shaft while piping air to the trapped workers.

   

The entrance to a flooded coal mine in Hutubi county, China

Rescuers were trying to reach 21 miners trapped by an underground flood in the Xinjiang region of China, a state news agency reported on Sunday.

The Fengyuan coal mine in Hutubi County in the northwest of the country flooded at around 6:10 p.m. local time (1010 GMT/UTC) on Saturday, the Xinhua News Agency said.

It added eight of the 29 miners working at the location had already been rescued.

Staff were carrying out upgrading works at the site when disaster struck.

Complex operation

Chinese state-controlled broadcaster CCTV reported that 12 miners were on one platform, with eight more on a second platform, and the last worker is currently trapped in an escape route where water had originally entered.

"The working platform with 12 people is 1,200 meters (3,900 feet) from ground level and the underground terrain is complex, making rescue difficult," CCTV said.

Coal mines in China are among the world's most dangerous, with explosions and gas leaks a regular occurrence.

Mining accidents in eastern Shandong province in January and the southwest city of Chongqing in December killed more than 30 miners.

Pope celebrates mass of 'mercy' with prisoners, refugees

Among them, there were inmates of two Roman prisons and one youth detention centre; refugees from Syria, Nigeria and Egypt; and nursing staff from a nearby hospital.

He also recalled how early Christians had no concept of private property and shared everything, noting: "This is not communism, but pure Christianity." 

FUNNY THEODORE REUSS SAID THAT OF THE OTO

Issued on: 11/04/2021- 

Pope Francis stressed the importance for Christians of serving others 

Handout VATICAN MEDIA/AFP

Rome (AFP)

Pope Francis made a rare Sunday outing from Vatican grounds to celebrate a mass on "divine mercy" with prisoners, refugees and health workers.

The service was held in a church just off St Peter's Square, in front of a reduced congregation of about 80 people, due to coronavirus restrictions.

Among them, there were inmates of two Roman prisons and one youth detention centre; refugees from Syria, Nigeria and Egypt; and nursing staff from a nearby hospital.

In his homily, the leader of the world's 1.3 billion Catholics stressed the importance for Christians of serving others.

"Sister, brother, do you want proof that God has touched your life? See if you can stoop to bind the wounds of others," he said.

"Let us not remain indifferent. Let us not live a one-way faith, a faith that receives but does not give... Having received mercy, let us now become merciful," Francis added.

He also recalled how early Christians had no concept of private property and shared everything, noting: "This is not communism, but pure Christianity."

The pope, who is 84 and was vaccinated for the coronavirus ahead of his trip to Iraq in early March, did not wear a face mask during the service.

The mass celebrated Divine Mercy Sunday, a Catholic Feast falling on the first Sunday after Easter, established by Pope John Paul II in 2000.

ARRET!
Top French publishing house asks would-be authors to stop sending manuscripts

Issued on: 11/04/2021 - 

This photograph taken on November 2, 2020 shows books displayed at the Librairie des Abbesses bookstore in the Montmartre district in Paris on November 2, 2020. © Stéphane de Sakutin, AFP

Text by: Catherine Bennett


Stop sending us your manuscripts! That’s the message that French publishing house Gallimard sent out to would-be authors in April, after receiving a deluge of submissions.

Gallimard, known for publishing Marcel Proust, Simone de Beauvoir and Albert Camus, wrote politely on its website and on Twitter: “Given the exceptional circumstances, we ask you to defer sending your manuscripts. Take care of yourselves and happy reading.”

Successive Covid-19 lockdowns in France have given budding writers the time to finally work on that idea for a novel or to polish up an old manuscript languishing in a drawer. As a result, publishers are overwhelmed. Before the pandemic, Gallimard received around 30 manuscripts a day; now they receive around 50.

Gallimard isn’t the only French publisher facing an uptick in submissions. Publisher Seuil normally receives around 3,500 manuscripts a year. In the first three months of 2021, it had already received 1,200.

Reading an essential business

In addition to the mountain of submissions to wade through, the publishing industry is already facing a backlog. Bookshops in France were ordered to close during the country’s first March-May lockdown, and were only open for click-and-collect in the second October-December lockdown.

In February 2021 the government decided to class bookshops as "essential" services, authorising them to open amidst regional restrictions and during this month's third nationwide lockdown. But those breaks in the industry’s normal publishing schedule mean that many editors postponed some books’ publications, leaving the 2021 publishing calendar already full.

Véronique Cardi, director of publishing house JC Lattès, told France Culture that they’ve never been so prepared for France’s rentrée littéraire – the autumn period when publishing houses traditionally publish a wave of new releases. “Our authors have had the time to finish their manuscripts,” she explained. “And we’ve acquired a lot of new authors, people who took advantage of being in lockdown or under curfew to write."

Going the self-publishing route

If getting published has always been tricky, increased competition has made it even harder. Many writers are turning to self-publishing, bypassing the need for a publishing house.

Librinova, an agency that helps authors self-publish their books, published 40% more books in 2020 compared to the year before – and 90% more in April 2020 alone. The self-publishing platform Books on Demand also saw similar growth in France.

More than 5 million French people began a writing project during the first lockdown, according to a poll by Harris Interactive.
cribe

But while the French may be writing more, they’re also reading less.

While the French remain avid readers (more than 80% of French people read at least one book in 2020), there was an overall drop in reading last year, according to a report released in March by the Centre national du livre (National Centre for Publishing).

The study’s authors attributed the decline to the closure of reading spaces such as libraries, the loss of the valuable reading time that a commute affords many French workers, and the difficulty of separating work from leisure time when working from home.

French people’s reading habits also changed with readers favouring non-fiction and journalism over novels.

So if budding French novelists want to get published, they’ll have to get reading again.

Rhino population in Nepal grows in conservation boost


Issued on: 11/04/2021 - 

Thousands of one-horned rhinos once roamed the southern plains 

PRAKASH MATHEMA AFP

Kathmandu (AFP)

Nepal's population of endangered one-horned rhinoceros has grown by more than a hundred over the past six years, officials said, with campaigners hailing the increase as a conservation "milestone".

The population rose to 752 across four national parks in the southern plains, up from 645 in 2015, the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation said Saturday.

"The increase of rhinos is exciting news for us," the department's information officer, Haribhadra Acharya, told AFP on Sunday.

"But we have challenges ahead to expand the habitat areas of this animal to maintain the growth."

Thousands of one-horned rhinos once roamed the southern plains, but rampant poaching and human encroachment on their habitat reduced their numbers to around 100 in Nepal in the 1960s.

Since 1994, the Himalayan nation has conducted a rhino census once every five years, as authorities stepped up their efforts to boost population numbers for the species listed as vulnerable by the International Union for the Conservation for Nature.

In the first census in 1994, 466 rhinos were counted.

Some 250 personnel -- including enumerators, soldiers and veterinarians -- rode on 57 elephants for nearly three weeks from late March to count the rhinos.

The census -- delayed for a year due to the coronavirus pandemic -- was carried out using GPS equipment, binoculars and cameras.

"Rhinos were counted through a direct observation method, where the counting team reached as close as 100 metres (330 feet) from the wild animal," Acharya added.

During the census, an elephant mahout was attacked and killed by a tiger, authorities said. Another official was injured when a wild elephant attacked the team.

Global conservation group the World Wildlife Fund -- which provides financial and technical assistance for the census -- called the population increase a "milestone" for Nepal.

"The overall growth in population size is indicative of ongoing protection and habitat management efforts by protected area authorities despite challenging contexts these past years," the WWF's Nepal representative, Ghana Gurung, said in a statement.

The rhino population has climbed in recent years amid the government's anti-poaching and conservation initiatives.

But the illegal trade of rhino horns -- prized in China and Southeast Asia for their supposed medicinal properties -- remains a threat.

Some 26 rhinos died in Nepal last year, including four from poaching, the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation said.

© 2021 AFP

Germany's far-right, anti-migrant AfD calls for end to Covid-19 restrictions

Issued on: 11/04/2021 -

Party leaders attend the second day of the congress of far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD - Alternative fuer Deutschland) party in Dresden, eastern Germany, on April 11, 2021. © Jens Schlueter, AFP

Text by: NEWS WIRES

Germany’s far-right AfD party vowed to campaign for an end to coronavirus restrictions, a tougher line on migration and an exit from the EU as it finalised its election manifesto on Sunday.

On the second day of a congress to firm up its strategy ahead of Germany’s election on September 26, the anti-Islam, anti-immigration party voted to call for a complete ban on refugees being joined by family members.

Party members agreed to come out against “any family reunification for refugees”, revising previous wording that had called for such reunions to be allowed only under exceptional circumstances.

The AfD had on Saturday voted to include a call for Germany to leave the European Union in its manifesto, as well as vowing to demand an end to coronavirus measures, complaining of a “politics of fear”.

The AfD has often sought to capitalise on anger over Germany’s coronavirus measures ahead of September’s election—the first in 16 years not to feature Chancellor Angela Merkel, who is bowing out of politics.

Some AfD members have courted controversy by joining anti-vaxxers and “Querdenker” (Lateral Thinkers) at various demonstrations against coronavirus restrictions.

AfD co-leader Joerg Meuthen on Saturday vowed to dispel “these orgies of bans, these jailings, this mania for locking down”.

With Merkel and state leaders expected to tighten infection control measures further this week, the far right unveiled its election slogan of “Germany. But normal”—at least in part targeting coronavirus restrictions

Starting out as an anti-euro outfit in 2013, the AfD capitalised on public anger over Merkel’s 2015 decision to allow in a wave of asylum seekers from conflict-torn countries such as Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq.

The party caused a sensation in Germany’s last election in 2017 when it secured almost 13 percent of the vote, entering parliament for the first time as the largest opposition party.

But it has lost support as Germany reels from the coronavirus pandemic, and has lately been plagued by internal divisions and accusations of ties to neo-Nazi fringe groups.

Latest surveys have the party polling at between 10 and 12 percent, with Merkel’s CDU/CSU on around 27 percent and the surging Greens not far behind.

(AFP)

  

Meeting in Dresden in eastern Germany, the far-right AfD party on Sunday vowed to campaign for an end to Covid-19 restrictions, a tougher line on migration and an exit from the European Union. FRANCE 24 speaks to analyst Götz Frommholz of the Open Society Foundations.

COVID 19 VACCINE CRISIS IN THE NEWS

S. African Covid variant better at bypassing Pfizer/BioNTech jab: Israeli study

Issued on: 11/04/2021 - 

Israel's vaccination campaign has seen 5.3 million people receive a first dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine, while 4.9 million, or 53 percent of the population, have had two shots AHMAD GHARABLI AFP/File

Jerusalem (AFP)

The South African coronavirus variant is better at "breaking through" the defences of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine than other forms of the virus, Israeli experts said Sunday.

However, one of the authors told AFP that while the study showed the variant to be relatively successful in infecting vaccinated people, it did not provide any data on whether it could generate serious illness among vaccinees.

The study by Tel Aviv University and Clalit Health Services, Israel's largest healthcare provider, compared 400 unvaccinated people infected with Covid-19 to 400 partially or fully vaccinated people who also had the virus.

According to the study, published as a draft on Saturday and currently being peer reviewed, the South African variant accounted for less than one percent of coronavirus cases in Israel.

But, among the 150 people in the study who were fully vaccinated and had Covid-19, "the prevalence rate (of the South African variant) was eight times higher than the rate in the unvaccinated (individuals)," the study said.

"This means that the Pfizer-BioNtech vaccine, though highly protective, probably does not provide the same level of protection against the South African (B.1.351) variant of the coronavirus," the study added.

"The South African variant is able, to some extent, to break through the vaccine's protection," said professor Adi Stern of Tel Aviv University's Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research, one of the study's authors.

Stern told AFP Sunday the study did not assess whether the fully vaccinated Israelis with the South African variant -- eight people in total -- developed serious illness.

"Since we found a very small number of vaccinees infected with B.1.351, it is statistically meaningless to report disease outcomes," he said.

- Preventative measures -

Two studies published in February in the New England Journal of Medicine conducted by principal vaccine manufacturers Pfizer/BioNTech and Moderna showed that the presence of antibodies after vaccination was less pronounced in people exposed to the South African variant, indicating diminished protection.

The Israeli study was the first real-world assessment of the South African variant's ability to bypass a vaccine.

Israel's vaccination campaign has seen 5.3 million people receive a first dose, while 4.9 million, or 53 percent of the population, have had two shots.

An earlier study by Clalit on 1.2 million Israelis found that the Pfizer/BioNTech jab gave 94 percent protection against Covid-19.

Following the successful vaccination rollout, Israel has eased many of its restrictions but various measures remain in place including mask-wearing and a "green passport" system that grants access to certain sites only to those vaccinated.

Ran Balicer of Clalit, one of the study's authors, told AFP the results could help inform states on how best to ease restrictions.

Balicer said inoculations, plus mask-wearing and other safety measures had still likely helped limit the spread of the South African variant, despite its apparent ability to break through the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine.

A combination of all these factors "are most likely... preventing the virus strains, including the South African one, from spreading" significantly in Israel, he said.

"As we taper down the non-pharmaceutical interventions, we must do so gradually to ensure we do not cross a threshold that would enable these variants to spread."

© 2021 AFP

India bans export of Covid-19 treatment drug remdesivir

Issued on: 11/04/2021 - 

India has banned the export of remdesivir as infections soared to a new daily high and hospitals grappled with increasing demand for the coronavirus treatment drug Ulrich Perrey POOL/AFP/File

New Delhi (AFP)

India on Sunday banned the export of remdesivir as infections soared to a new daily high and hospitals grappled with increasing demand for the coronavirus treatment drug.

The vast nation has experienced a sharp rise in cases in recent weeks, adding 152,000 new cases on Sunday to take the toll to 13.3 million infections.

The health ministry said the surge in cases has led to a "sudden spike in demand" for the antiviral drug.

"There is a potential of further increase in this demand in the coming days," the ministry said in a statement, adding that the export ban would be in place "till the situation improves".

Remdesivir, made by US pharma giant Gilead, was one of the first drugs to show relative promise in shortening the recovery time for some Covid-19 patients.

But a World Health Organisation-backed study has said that the drug had "little or no effect" on Covid-19 mortality.

Gilead last year signed licensing agreements with generic pharmaceutical producers based in India, Pakistan and Egypt, allowing them to manufacture remdesivir for distribution in 127 mostly low and lower-middle income nations.

Seven firms in India -- the world's biggest producer of generic drugs -- are licensed to manufacture remdesivir.

They have a monthly production capacity of up to 3.88 million injection doses, the ministry added.

The ban came as India's wealthiest state Maharashtra, which has been the main driver of the infection spike, explored announcing a complete lockdown from as early as Monday.

India had shied away from harsh restrictions since a months-long nationwide lockdown -- one of the strictest in the world -- was gradually lifted last year, amid fears of shattering the already battered economy.

But local authorities have increasingly imposed restrictions, including Maharashtra's weekend lockdown and night curfew, as cases continue to rise.

The chief minister of Delhi, India's capital, said Sunday that his government was not in favour of a lockdown, but would consider the drastic measure if hospital beds start running out.

He added that 65 percent of new Covid-19 patients were less than 45 years old.

India, home to the world's biggest vaccine manufacturer, has meanwhile slowed its export of shots due to the spike as several states have warned in recent days that their stocks were running low.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Sunday launched a four-day "vaccine festival" to kick start a "second battle against corona" in a bid to speed up a sluggish vaccination rollout.

© 2021 AFP

'Up to 80 percent' in Sicily refuse AZ vaccine: president

Issued on: 11/04/2021 

Italy's vaccination drive is already struggling and refusal of the AstraZeneca jab could slow it further ANDREAS SOLARO AFP/File

Rome (AFP)

Up to 80 percent of people offered the AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine In Sicily refuse it out of fears over its safety, according to the southern Italian region's president Nello Musumeci.

Public confidence in the Anglo-Swedish jab has been badly shaken by reports linking it to rare, but potentially fatal, blood clots, and by conflicting recommendations on its use.

"In Sicily, there is an 80-percent refusal rate of the AstraZeneca vaccine. Every 100 people, 80 say no," Musumeci said late Saturday in Catania, according to multiple media reports.

Musumeci added: "It is natural" for people to be particularly concerned, "but we have a duty to believe scientists when they say it is more dangerous not to get vaccinated than to get vaccinated."

The president actually meant to say "up to 80 percent," his spokeswoman Michela Giuffrida told AFP on Sunday, adding, as an example, that in the town of Syracuse the refusal rate was "30 percent."

A large-scale boycott of the AstraZeneca jab would put Italy's vaccination plan -- already struggling with supply shortages and botched priorities -- under further stress.

- 86 cases out of 25 million -

Earlier this week, the European Medicine Agency (EMA) said blood clots should be listed as a "very rare" side effect of the AstraZeneca vaccine, but added that benefits continued to outweigh risks.

The announcement came after EMA examined 86 blood clotting cases, 18 of which were fatal, out of around 25 million people in Europe who received the AstraZeneca vaccine. Most of the cases were in women aged under 60.

In response to the findings, Italy -- which initially recommended the AstraZeneca vaccine for those in the 18-55 age group -- restricted its use to those aged 60 and above.

Similar action was taken in other European countries.

On Friday, the EU medicines regulator also said it was probing a possible link between the AstraZeneca jab and a separate blood vessel disorder causing tissue swelling and a drop in blood pressure.

But the Italian government's top scientific advisor on the coronavirus crisis, Franco Locatelli, insisted in a Sunday interview that fears over the Anglo-Swedish vaccine were "understandable, but unjustified."

"I say that we are offering a vaccine that is safe and effective, which people must accept. That said, if we find ourselves facing a disarming number of defections, we will reconsider the issue," he told La Stampa daily.

Italy is one of the countries worst hit by the pandemic, with almost 114,000 dead, but its vaccination drive has been criticised for failing to focus on the most at-risk group -- the elderly.

People in their 70s are among those most neglected, with only 2.7 percent fully vaccinated compared with 4.1 per cent for people in their 20s.

Overall, Italy has administered almost 13 million doses and fully vaccinated 3.9 million people -- equal to around 6.5 per cent of a total population of some 60 million.

© 2021 AFP

70 dead as battle for Yemen's Marib rages on three fronts

However, the Saudi firepower does not seem to have halted the rebel offensive.

Issued on: 11/04/2021 

Saudi-backed Yemeni loyalist forces are battling a fierce Huthi rebel offensive on the strategic city of Marib STR AFP/File

Dubai (AFP)

Fierce fighting for Yemen's strategic Marib city has killed 70 pro-government and Huthi rebel fighters over the past 24 hours, with battles raging on three fronts, loyalist military officials said Sunday.

The Huthis have been trying to seize Marib, the capital of an oil-rich region and the government's last significant pocket of territory in the north, since February.

Two officials from pro-government forces told AFP that the rebels were mounting a concerted push that had left 26 loyalist soldiers dead as well as 44 from Huthi ranks. The rebels rarely disclose their losses.

The new toll adds to 53 killed on both sides in the previous 24 hours, according to loyalist military officials.

One of the officials said Sunday that the rebels "are launching simultaneous attacks" in the areas of Kassara and Al-Mashjah, northwest of the city, and Jabal Murad in the south.

"They have made progress on the Kassara and Al-Mashjah fronts, but they have been thwarted on the Jabal Murad front," he told AFP.

The other official said that warplanes from the Saudi-led military coalition, which entered the Yemen conflict to support the government in 2015, launched airstrikes that "destroyed 12 Huthi military vehicles, including four tanks and a cannon."

However, the Saudi firepower does not seem to have halted the rebel offensive.

- Fears for civilians -

The Iran-backed Huthis in late 2014 overran the capital Sanaa, 120 kilometres (75 miles) to the west of Marib, along with much of northern Yemen.

The loss of Marib would be a heavy blow for the Yemeni government, currently based in the southern city of Aden, and for its Saudi backers.

It could also lead to humanitarian disaster, as vast numbers of civilians displaced from fighting elsewhere have sought refuge in Marib.

Around 140 sites have sprung up in the region to provide basic shelter for up to two million displaced, according to Yemen's government.

The rebels have stepped up missile and drone strikes against neighbouring Saudi Arabia in recent months, demanding the opening of Yemen's airspace and ports. They have rejected a Saudi proposal for a ceasefire.

The United Nations last month condemned the escalation and warned of a looming humanitarian disaster.

The UN Security Council said the fighting "places one million internally displaced persons at grave risk and threatens efforts to secure a political settlement when the international community is increasingly united to end the conflict".

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has warned that the suffering will only end when a political solution is found between the Huthis and the internationally recognised government.

The conflict in Yemen has killed tens of thousands of people and pushed millions to the brink of famine, in what the the United Nations has described as the world's worst humanitarian crisis.

© 2021 AFP