Let’s not pretend the anti-mask babies would have lasted a minute in the blitz

It’s funny that so many of those who bang on about the ‘war effort’ seem unable to do something minor for the public good


‘For all their big talk, you can’t help thinking those unable to bring themselves to wear a mask wouldn’t make the first sacrifice for their fellow humans, let alone the ultimate one.’
Photograph: Martin Pope/SOPA Images/REX/Shutterstock


Marina Hyde
Tue 30 Nov 2021

While the scientists work out how bad the Omicron variant is or isn’t, the government has reimposed mask-wearing in shops and on public transport for at least the next three weeks. Consequently, a number of prams have been swiftly emptied of all toys. Across the airwaves – and up and down the train carriages and the supermarket aisles – you can find multiple refuseniks who suffer from the pandemic version of that old sexual problem: being “too big for condoms”.

To those who have reacted to the precautionary mask-wearing mandate with histrionics and aggression, I think we have to say, very clearly: DO BUCK UP. This really isn’t the attitude that won us the war.

As for mentioning the war, forgive me. Around 70,000 Britons died in second world war bombing raids, most of them in the blitz, while 145,000 have thus far perished from Covid. Yet somehow there does seem to be a large intersection between the Venn diagram sets “People who bang on endlessly about WW2” and “People who cannot cope with having to take a relatively minor public health measure for the greater good”.

Of course, in London, both positions have links with the tube. In December 1940, you’d have been snatching a couple of hours’ troubled sleep on the underground platform while Hitler blew up your house. In December 2021, you’d be on your way to Oxford Street on the Central line to sample the pre-Christmas enticements of JD Sports. Yet still, somehow, managing to see a few minutes of mask-wearing in a non-ventilated space as an outrageous imposition on your personage, with which you – a stone-cold hero – simply shouldn’t be involved.

But why? It’s really not that bad, is it, to have to wear a mask in limited settings, if it might help other people, even a bit? For all their big talk, you can’t help thinking those unable to bring themselves to do it wouldn’t make the first sacrifice for their fellow humans, let alone the ultimate one.

As they shout – or type in capitals – the words “THE BRITISH PEOPLE HAVE HAD ENOUGH”, it’s intriguing to remember that chaps like this really fancy their chances at having been able to cope with the blitz. Picture this person, this person who wets their pants and goes full online Braveheart over being asked to wear a mask between Liverpool Street and Holborn. Assuming they didn’t think air raid sirens were part of some “great reset” and ignored them (fatally), try to imagine this person trudging out of the tube station after the air raid. Try to imagine them discovering they didn’t have a street any more, having to remake their lives and those of their family in an anguished instant, by migrating somewhere else in the country in the clothes they stood in. Or try to imagine them having been taken in by friends or relatives, and turning straight back up to the bomb site with a broom to assist in clearing the rubble. I don’t want to be a bitch, but if you lose your mind over being asked to pop on a face covering in Boots, I honestly don’t think you’d be up to a whole lot of the above.


Covid: as rules on mask wearing in England return, what exactly is the law?

Admittedly, I appreciate that many people would prefer to hear public safety advice from Winston Churchill rather than Boris Johnson. But let’s not kid ourselves the advice would have been massively different, once adjusted for circumstance. For all their constant bleating about the government trying to control them, it’s a shame the poppy-shaggers and online warriors have absolutely zero understanding of how deeply embedded in people’s lives government was in the last world war, in the interests of the wider public good. How would these people have coped with rationing, for years and years on end? Being told by the state how many ounces of basic ingredients you were allowed per week feels a bit more of a pisser than being told to wear a mask while you load up your trolley with pounds and pounds of the stuff in Asda. (I know it’s kilos these days, but I didn’t want to send them really off the dial.)

Then again, maybe I’m wrong. Maybe there was a whole section of British society in 1941 that was convinced the war was not actually real or happening, but was merely part of some great reset cooked up by various international powers. There were certainly enough profiteers at work to make elements of conspiracy theorising understandable, if not remotely excusable.

And maybe that’s also the case in our own day and age. You can see where at least some of the suspicion has crept in. In the first days of the pandemic, when retailers were selling £3 hand sanitiser for £40, and bumping up the price of essentials just because they could, Johnson declared in parliament that there should be laws against this kind of thing. There weren’t any in the end. But we now know that another deeply distasteful type of profit-seeking was in fact directly licensed by the government – and that it resists scrutiny of it to this day.

As well it might. Contracts for PPE were handed out to friends, donors, cronies, firms Owen Paterson worked for, Tory councillors, Matt Hancock’s publican … the list goes on. Much of this happened via VIP lanes and WhatsApps that have now mysteriously disappeared. Billions in taxpayers’ money were spent – but many of those billions were wasted. Individuals made staggering profits, often on items that ended up being unusable. Yet instead of being regarded as social pariahs, these people sail on regardless. Some of them are even in the House of Lords.

It’s not a huge stretch to see how this kind of naked opportunism – some of which was straight profiteering – is a big part of why many ordinary people now feel they too can opt out of the idea of even minimal national effort. Pulling together should come from the top. If our overlords are so obviously out for themselves, how can we really all be in it together?


Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist

UK

Couple discover ferret hiding in their bed as animal flees Storm Arwen gales

A "large" ferret, nicknamed "Snoozy" for his love of sleeping, snuggled into the bed of a Bristol couple on Friday as Storm Arwen wreaked havoc on Friday

'Snoozy' the ferret slipped out of his owner's home last week and went missing

By
Tristan Cork
Ryan Fahey

News Reporter
30 Nov 2021

An escaped ferret has been reunited with its owners after Storm Arwen drove it into a random couple's bed

The creature slipped out of its owner's home in Whitchurch, Bristol last week, sparking a missing ferret appeal.


But on Friday night, the "quite a large chap for a ferret" snuck in and snuggled up in the bed of a Bristol couple as the storm battered the city outside.

And since being found, he's been nicknamed "Snoozy" by those caring for him because he's done nothing but sleep, Bristol Live reports.

When the baffled couple realised there was a furry animal in their bed, they called the local vets.

Highcroft Vets checked him over on Saturday, and christened him "Stinky Pete" after the character in Toy Story.

But his perpetual dozing led to a renaming when he was transferred to the Bristol Animal Rescue Centre.

"Snoozy", who is described as "quite a large chap for a ferret", was driven into his owner's bed by Storm Arwen

The storm passed over Bristol Friday and Saturday, leaving a trail of destruction

Highcroft Vets said they have been swarmed with ferret-related calls after putting pictures of "Snoozy" on Facebook.

They have asked people to stop calling.

“It must have been quite a shock for the couple,” said a spokesperson for Bristol ARC.

“Ferrets are really clever and love to escape, and they are terrific diggers, so it’s actually quite hard to keep them contained sometimes.

“Obviously he’s got out but found himself at night in the big, cold winter storm so has found a catflap and gone inside to get warm and dry.

Storm Arwen: Body count rises as hundreds of sea creatures wash up on Scottish beach

The death toll of sea life killed by deadly Storm Arwen continues to mount up as hundreds of starfish and other creatures wash up on a beach on the north-east coast of Scotland.

By Ilona Amos
Wednesday, 1st December 2021

Shocking pictures taken near Nairn, on the Moray Firth, show piles of stranded starfish, crabs and shellfish flung up along a large area of the shoreline in the aftermath of last weekend’s extreme weather.

The photographs were taken by Charlie Maciejewski, from Inverness, during a walk at Culbin Sands.

He said the washed-up creatures covered a 100m stretch of sand on the beach.

It is not known if any survived the stranding.

The weekend’s harsh weather, which saw winds of nearly 100mph and massive waves battering the coastline during Storm Arwen – the first official storm of the season – has been blamed.

The discovery comes following the death of more than 800 grey seal pups at a nature reserve in the Scottish Borders.

Read MoreHundreds of seal pups killed after Storm Arwen batters nature reserve on Scottis..

Charlie Maciejewski, from Inverness, was out walking at Culbin Sands when he discovered the stranded sea creatures - which stretched across a 100m expanse of sand on the Moray Firth coast

Hundreds of bodies were discovered in the water in a small area of bay at Pettico Wick, at St Abb’s Head, with many more washing up on the shore.

It is thought around 40 per cent of all the young in the colony perished during Storm Arwen, which struck at the height of pupping season for the species.

Rangers at the National Trust for Scotland, which manages the reserve, said the scale of the devastation was unprecedented.

Ciaran Hatsell, who works at the site, said the storm had left a "pretty grim scene" in its wake.

Hundreds of starfish and other sea creatures were washed up on the beach at Culbin Sands, a nature reserve about five miles east of Nairn, in the aftermath of Storm Arwen. Picture: Charlie Maciejewski

"To see piles of dead pups in the water – just bodies floating – was really hard to see,” he said.

Winds nearing 100mph and massive waves battered the east coast of Scotland during Storm Arwen, leaving a trail of devastation and dead wildlife in its wake - including countless sea creatures and shellfish in the Moray Firth and more than 800 seal pups at a nature reserve at in the Scottish Borders. Picture: Charlie Maciejewski

UK

Government's ‘gross negligence’ contributed to tens of thousands of avoidable deaths

The People’s Covid Inquiry report exposes a catalogue of failures that amount to ‘misconduct in public office’ by ministers
A child looks up at the National Covid Memorial Wall on the Embankment in London

A DAMNING report has found the government guilty of contributing to tens of thousands of avoidable deaths through its “gross negligence” during the coronavirus pandemic.

The People’s Covid Inquiry report, published today, exposes a catalogue of failures that amount to “misconduct in public office” by government ministers.

Evidence given to the inquiry, which included testimonies from former advisers to the government, revealed cronyism that allowed “blatant profiteering” off the back of the pandemic, as billions of pounds of public money was handed out in contracts to private companies.

The inquiry found the government guilty of breaching each of the Nolan principles expected of holders of public office: selflessness, integrity, objectivity, accountability, openness, honesty and leadership.

The inquiry, which began in February and concluded its hearings in the summer, was organised by campaign group Keep Our NHS Public in the absence of a formal public probe.

Key academics, front-line workers and bereaved family members were among those who gave evidence.

The report accuses the government of ignoring recommendations from previous pandemic planning exercises, of failing to protect key populations at increased risk from the virus and of failing to act when such risks were identified.

The inquiry was chaired by respected human rights barrister Michael Mansfield QC, who said: “This People’s Covid Inquiry report is unequivocal — dismal failure in the face of manifestly obvious risks.

“When it mattered most and when lives could have been saved, the various postures adopted by government could not sustain scrutiny.”

He said it had been plain to the inquiry’s organisers that the government’s words were “bloated hot air, hoping to delay and obfuscate.

“Within this narrative lies a theme of behaviour amounting to gross negligence by the government, whether examined singularly or collectively,” he said.

“There were lives lost and lives devastated, which was foreseeable and preventable.

“From lack of preparation and coherent policy, unconscionable delay, through to preferred and wasteful procurement, to ministers themselves breaking the rules, the misconduct is earth-shattering.”

Mr Mansfield said the inquiry “performed a much-needed and urgent public service when the nation was hit by a catastrophic pandemic, coincident with an unprecedented period of democratic deficiency.”

Retired consultant paediatrician Dr Tony O’Sullivan, co-chair of Keep Our NHS Public, said the inquiry “filled the deafening silence from government and set out to learn the lessons that could save lives in this and future pandemics.”

He said: “We are shocked at the avoidable loss of tens of thousands of lives through the neglect of pandemic planning, the run-down of the NHS, and the intense inequality in this country.

“The level of government cronyism and resultant profiteering has been blatant and in plain sight.

“Our overall conclusion is that there has been misconduct in public office. This has to be addressed.

“If we ignore it, the country cannot learn the lessons from today to face the challenge of tomorrow.”

Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice co-founder Jo Goodman was among those who gave evidence to the inquiry.

Commenting on the completed report, he said it was vital that bereaved families had been “at the heart of the inquiry and listened to at every turn.

“The loss of our loved ones should be used to learn lessons and save lives — something the government should be entirely focused on and dedicated to.”

Mr Mansfield said the inquiry “afforded an opportunity for the beleaguered citizen to be heard; for the victims to be addressed; for the front-line workers to be recognised; and for independent experts to be respected.”

The government was approached for comment.

MORNINGSTAR

English Government accused of ‘misconduct in public office’ over pandemic handling

People's Covid Inquiry said failures at Westminster had contributed to thousands of avoidable deaths

Inquiry claims Government failed to protect key populations at risk (Image: PA)

An inquiry into the coronavirus pandemic has accused the English Government of “misconduct in public office” and gross negligence over its handling of the crisis.

The People’s Covid Inquiry, which heard evidence from February this year until the summer, said there had been “serious governance failures” at Westminster that contributed to tens of thousands of avoidable deaths.

It said the Government had failed to act to protect key populations at increased risk, and recommendations from previous pandemic planning exercises had been ignored.

Consideration should be given to bringing charges of misconduct in public office, given the available evidence of failures and the “serious consequences” for the public, it added.

The Keep Our NHS Public campaign group organised the inquiry in the absence of a formal investigation.

The Government has said it has committed to holding a full public inquiry next spring as there are lessons to be learnt.

Accusing the Government of “serious governance failures” in a report published today (Wednesday), the People’s Covid Inquiry said: “These contributed to tens of thousands of avoidable deaths and suffering, and they amount to misconduct in public office.”

Its chairman, Michael Mansfield QC, said there had been “dismal failure in the face of manifestly obvious risks”.

He said the probe had identified a “theme of behaviour amounting to gross negligence by the Government, whether examined singularly or collectively”.

Health Secretary Sajid Javid, left, and Prime Minister Boris Johnson during a media briefing in Downing Stree on coronavirus

He continued: “There were lives lost and lives devastated, which was foreseeable and preventable.

“From lack of preparation and coherent policy, unconscionable delay, through to preferred and wasteful procurement, to ministers themselves breaking the rules, the misconduct is earth-shattering.”

The inquiry heard evidence from a range of witnesses and organisations, including academics, frontline workers and bereaved families.

Other findings include:

– The Government treated bereaved families with disrespect and ignored their questions;

– It failed to address the seriousness of the pandemic before the March 2020 lockdown;

– Deep social inequality contributed to a more vulnerable population;

– Financial support for people needing to isolate was not sufficient to effectively reduce infection spread;

– The Government’s delay in issuing advice to healthcare professionals, and advice to the public to rely on NHS 111, contributed to the coronavirus death toll;

– There was, and is, a “misplaced over-reliance on vaccines alone”;

– Government public health messages were often confused and contradictory.

Mr Mansfield said there had been no accountability, and this could not be offset by the success of the vaccine rollout.

Jo Goodman, co-founder of Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, which contributed to the inquiry, said: “It’s vital that bereaved families are at the heart of the forthcoming inquiry, and listened to at every turn, and this report evidences exactly why.

“The loss of our loved ones should be used to learn lessons and save lives – something the Government should be entirely focused on and dedicated to.”

The report will be formally launched at an event in Westminster this morning.

It comes on the heels of a report from the Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice group, which set out the key areas it wants the official inquiry to examine.

These include the “mishandling” of the NHS 111 service, pandemic preparedness, and the disproportionate impact on black, Asian and minority ethnic groups.

A Government spokesman said: “Covid-19 is an unprecedented pandemic which has challenged health systems around the world.

“Thanks to our collective national effort, our preparedness plans, and our frontline NHS workers, we have saved lives, vaccinated tens of millions of people and prevented the NHS from being overwhelmed.

“We prepared for a range of scenarios, and by deploying key elements of our flu preparedness plans we were able to develop new means to tackle the virus quickly such as by setting up our national testing programme and rolling out millions of vaccines.

“Every death from this virus is a tragedy and we have always said there are still lessons to be learnt from the pandemic, which is why we have committed to a full public inquiry in spring.”

UN warns violation of Palestinian rights threatens two-state solution
CGTN

Palestinian children salvage toys from their home at the Al-Jawhara Tower in Gaza City, which was heavily damaged in Israeli airstrikes, May 17, 2021. /CFP

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on Monday that constant violation of the rights of Palestinians threatens the two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

"On this International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, continues to pose a significant challenge to international peace and security. Persistent violations of the rights of Palestinians along with the expansion of settlements risk eroding the prospect of a two-state solution," the UN chief said in a message marking the day.

Even though he was "encouraged" by recent engagements between senior Israeli and Palestinian officials, the top UN official said, "Containing the situation is not sufficient."

Guterres reiterated that the overall goal of two states living side by side in peace and security remains. This includes fulfilling the "legitimate national aspirations of both peoples, with borders based on the 1967 lines and Jerusalem as the capital of both states."

The UN chief urged the parties to refrain from measures that would undermine prospects for a peaceful resolution. Ultimately, he urged all parties to engage constructively to "end the closure" of the Gaza strip and improve living conditions for all Palestinians living under occupation.

The message came in advance of a special meeting to discuss Palestine's unresolved question and the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people in New York on Monday.

In 1977, the UN General Assembly called for the annual observance of November 29 as the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People.

(With input from Xinhua News Agency)

US Ambassador: 'Settlement' expansion has reached a critical juncture

US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield criticizes Israel’s construction of homes in Judea and Samaria.

Arutz Sheva Staff , Dec 01 , 2021

Linda Thomas-Greenfield
REUTERS/Mike Segar

US Ambassador to the UN Linda Thomas-Greenfield on Tuesday criticized Israel’s construction of homes in Judea and Samaria.

Speaking at a UN Security Council briefing on the situation in the Middle East, Thomas-Greenfield asserted that the Israeli construction “has reached a critical juncture”.

She recalled her recent visit to Israel, which she said was meant “in part to reaffirm US support for a two-state solution, which we still strongly believe is still viable – a two-state solution in which a Jewish and democratic Israel lives in peace alongside a sovereign, viable Palestinian state.”

On the Israeli construction, the US Ambassador said that during her visit she “was told how many Palestinian families fear eviction from their homes because it is nearly impossible to get building permits as settlements expand.”

“US disapproval of settlement expansion goes back decades. This is nothing new for us. But the practice has reached a critical juncture, and it is now undermining even the very viability of a negotiated two-state solution,” she added.

At the same time, Thomas-Greenfield also criticized the UN’s anti-Israel bias.

“Israelis also shared with me their concern that the United Nations is intrinsically biased against Israel. They interpret the overwhelming focus on Israel in this body as a denial of Israel’s right to exist and an unfair focus on this one country – and they are correct,” said the US envoy.

“The Security Council’s monthly meetings on the situation in the Middle East that focus almost exclusively on Israel are seen by Israelis as another example of this. This Council’s attention should reflect all areas that threaten international peace and security, and we should have open meetings on Lebanon and meet on Iran more regularly. Israel does not define the Middle East,” she added.

“As Council Members know, the animating principle behind the Biden Administration’s approach to Middle East peace is that Israelis and Palestinians deserve equal measures of freedom, dignity, security, and prosperity, which is a goal unto itself and a means to advance a negotiated two-state solution. But we cannot make progress toward this end without a modicum of trust. It is critical to explore opportunities with Israelis and Palestinians to rebuild some degree of confidence in each other,” stated Thomas-Greenfield.

“Fortunately, my meetings yielded several promising ideas we can pursue together. Both sides spoke of the need for confidence-building measures to break down the walls of distrust. Much of this trust-building needs to be worked out between the Israelis and Palestinians themselves, but this Council, however, can play a role in facilitating constructive steps. We can enforce Security Council resolutions intended to constrain Iran’s regional malign activities, nuclear threats, support for terrorist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah,” she continued.

“The Security Council can also speak with one voice in denouncing the incitement to violence, whether by terrorist organizations or individuals. We can promote steps to improving the lives of ordinary Palestinians, from urging Israel to issue more work permits to granting additional building permits in Area C of the West Bank. The Council can also demonstrate its support for new efforts to facilitate humanitarian and reconstruction assistance to Gaza while ensuring protections against diversions to terrorist organizations are robust.”

While she stressed the importance of providing funding to UNRWA, the UN agency for “Palestinian refugees”, Thomas-Greenfield also denounced the anti-Semitism which is prominent in textbooks used by the organization.

“And, finally, the international community can also provide financial contributions to UNRWA that match the political support the Agency enjoys. As more states step up with contributions, they should also join the United States in urging UNRWA to establish a more sustainable financing model and to rigorously adhere to humanitarian principles, including of neutrality, something I personally raised with UNRWA leadership during my visit to include concerns about anti-Semitic references in textbooks used in UNRWA schools,” she said.

She called for the Security Council to support “tangible steps to make a real difference in the lives of Israelis and Palestinians” and added, “But unfortunately, time is running out – we need to move now. Let us all commit, today, to constructive partnership and concrete progress between Israelis and Palestinians. This is the only antidote to despair, mistrust, insecurity, and violence that threatens a two-state solution, which remains our best chance for a sustainable and just peace.”

 

It Is Slavery — Global Issues

 by Global Reports 247

 

 December 1, 2021

 

Teenage women harvest tomatoes on a farm within the state of Sinaloa, in northern Mexico. Credit score: Courtesy of Sinaloa Institute for Grownup Schooling

• by Baher Kamal (madrid)
• Wednesday, December 01, 2021
• Inter Press Service

MADRID, Dec 01 (IPS) – It doesn’t matter what it’s referred to as — it’s the abhorrent every day lifetime of a billion enslaved people.  The actual variety of “fashionable” slaves is understandably unknown. The Worldwide Labour Organisation (ILO) estimates that greater than 40 million individuals worldwide are victims of contemporary slavery.

Though fashionable slavery is just not outlined in legislation, it’s used as an umbrella time period protecting practices comparable to pressured labour, debt bondage, pressured marriage, and human trafficking, it says.

However this determine of 40 million sounds very far-off from being correct. Why? For example, ILO cites pressured marriage as one of many key parts of contemporary slavery. Nevertheless, there are 800 million child-girls pressured to be married.

ILO additionally consists of baby pressured labour as one other key element of slavery. However the UN estimates that there are 160 million youngsters victims of kid pressured labour.

In actual fact, the exact same world organisation states that greater than 150 million youngsters are topic to baby labour, accounting for nearly one in ten youngsters around the globe.

Not to mention the variety of victims of smuggling and trafficking in human beings who’re exploited and recruited as child-soldiers in armed conflicts hitting a number of creating international locations.

One billion slaves

Consequently, solely these two figures mixed increase the variety of ‘fashionable slaves’ to almost one billion.

In keeping with the UN, slavery primarily refers to conditions of exploitation that an individual can not refuse or go away due to threats, violence, coercion, deception, and/or abuse of energy.

Marking the 2021 Worldwide Day for the Abolition of Slavery on 2 December, the world physique says that slavery is just not merely a historic relic.

Coincidently, the Worldwide Day for the Abolition of Slavery marks the date of the adoption, by the UN Common Meeting, of the United Nations Conference for the Suppression of the Visitors in Individuals and of the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others on 2 December 1949.

The main focus of this Day is on eradicating modern types of slavery, comparable to trafficking in individuals, sexual exploitation, the worst types of baby labour, pressured marriage, and the pressured recruitment of kids to be used in armed battle, the UN remarks.

Most important Types of Trendy Slavery

Slavery has developed and manifested itself in numerous methods all through historical past. Right this moment some conventional types of slavery nonetheless persist of their earlier varieties, whereas others have been remodeled into new ones, in response to the Worldwide Day for the Abolition of Slavery.

“The UN human rights our bodies have documented the persistence of previous types of slavery which can be embedded in conventional beliefs and customs. These types of slavery are the results of long-standing discrimination in opposition to essentially the most weak teams in societies, comparable to these thought to be being of low caste, tribal minorities and indigenous peoples.”

Compelled labour

Alongside conventional types of pressured labour, comparable to bonded labour and debt bondage there now exist extra modern types of pressured labour, comparable to migrant staff, who’ve been trafficked for financial exploitation of each type on the planet economic system: work in home servitude, the development trade, the meals and garment trade, the agricultural sector and in pressured prostitution.

Baby labour

Globally, one in ten youngsters works. Nearly all of the kid labour that happens right now is for financial exploitation. That goes in opposition to the Conference on the Rights of the Baby, which recognises “the suitable of the kid to be protected against financial exploitation and from performing any work that’s more likely to be hazardous or to intrude with the kid’s schooling, or to be dangerous to the kid’s well being or bodily, psychological, non secular, ethical or social improvement.”

All this along with youngsters pushed into begging by prison teams, simply for example.

Trafficking

In keeping with the Protocol to Forestall, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Individuals Particularly Ladies and Kids, trafficking in individuals means the recruitment, transportation, switch, harbouring or receipt of individuals, via the menace or use of drive or different types of coercion for the aim of exploitation.

Prostitution, servitude, removing of organs…

“Exploitation consists of prostitution of others or different types of sexual exploitation, pressured labour or providers, slavery or practices just like slavery, servitude or the removing of organs. The consent of the particular person trafficked for exploitation is irrelevant and if the trafficked particular person is a baby, it’s a crime even with out the usage of drive.”

And there may be an unquantified variety of victims of debt-slavery, which is extra extensively unfold in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.

In view of the above, there can be many extra slavery victims than the official estimates.

© Inter Press Service (2021) — All Rights ReservedUnique supply: Inter Press Service

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MEPs list crimes of ‘Kremlin proxy’ mercenaries

 by Global Reports 247

 

 November 28, 2021

 

MEPs have urged the EU to blacklist members of Russia’s mercenary Wagner Group, whereas itemizing its crimes in a number of battle zones.

The EU must impose “focused EU sanctions towards the related people and entities affiliated with the Wagner Group, in addition to people and entities working with them,” they mentioned in a decision on Thursday (25 November), which handed by a whopping 585 votes towards 40.

Nearly all of the 40 pro-Wagner MEPs have been from the far-right Identification and Democracy Group.

The EU Parliament’s advice is just not binding on member states.

However France and the EU overseas service mentioned final week they have been taking a look at sanctions after the Wagner Group appeared poised to start out operations in Mali, the place French troopers are already concerned in preventing Islamist cells.

The MEPs additionally referred to as “on the [EU] Fee to make sure that EU funds can’t beneath any circumstances be utilized by recipient international locations to fund personal navy firms with such human rights data”.

They usually urged the Central Africa Republic (CAR), the place Wagner Group already had a big presence, “to chop all ties with the group and its staff”.

Thursday’s decision famous that Wagner Group, which has some 10,000 personnel, has been “concerned in conflicts” in Syria, Sudan, Mozambique, Libya, the Central African Republic, Venezuela, and Ukraine.

It famous that the Kremlin was making an attempt to make use of the group’s shadowy authorized standing “to keep up believable deniability relating to the actions and crimes dedicated by the group”.

Nevertheless it voiced “agency conviction that the Wagner Group … ought to be handled as a proxy organisation of the Russian state” and as a part of “Russia’s fashionable hybrid warfare”.

“The Wagner Group allegedly depends on Russian navy infrastructure, shares a base with the Russian navy, is transported by Russian navy plane and makes use of navy healthcare providers … it’s financed partially by multimillion-dollar catering and development contracts for the Russian armed forces awarded to firms linked to Yevgeny Prigozhin, a detailed ally of Russian president Vladimir Putin,” the MEPs mentioned.

“Russia’s navy intelligence company GRU, its ministry of defence, and its consular providers are absolutely concerned within the funding, recruitment, coaching, and safety of Wagner operatives,” they added.

Additionally they listed “the gross human rights violations which have been documented [by the UN] and of which it has been accused” in latest occasions.

In CAR, this included “mass abstract executions, arbitrary detentions, sexual violence, looting, enforced disappearances, and torture throughout interrogations” in its efforts to safe revenue from the nation’s pure assets.

In Libya, Wagner Group was “concerned in struggle crimes, together with abstract executions of civilians and detainees, enslavement, the planting of internationally banned anti-personnel landmines, and the killing or maiming of civilians together with kids, for instance within the al-Sbeaa village south of Tripoli”.

Wagner “mercenaries have dedicated and filmed ugly crimes towards the Syrian inhabitants, reminiscent of torturing, murdering, and beheading civilians close to Palmyra”, the MEPs added.

And three Russian journalists have been “murdered” in 2018 whereas making an attempt to research its actions, they mentioned.

The EU additionally has navy and civilian coaching missions in CAR, Libya, Mali, and Ukraine.

However “EU missions and operations can’t correctly ship and obtain peace, safety, and stability in accomplice international locations when personal safety firms accused of gross human rights violations are working concurrently in the identical nation”, the MEPs warned.

In the meantime, EU states already blacklisted Prigozhin final 12 months for Wagner’s “deliv­ery of arms in addition to deployment of mercen­aries into Libya”.

The 60-year outdated from St Petersburg was “a Russian businessman with shut hyperlinks, together with financially, to the personal navy firm Wagner Group”, who was “engaged in and professional­viding assist for Wagner Group’s actions”, the EU sanctions notice mentioned.

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RESEARCHERS SLAM EU SAFETY REVIEW OF GLYPHOSATE


Frida Qi
November 29, 2021

Researchers have slammed a preliminary EU settlement on Friday (26 November) which determined that the controversial and widely-used weedkiller glyphosate is protected.

The EU’s authorisation of glyphosate expires in December 2022 however is about to be renewed subsequent yr, and has now acquired an preliminary optimistic safety review.

In accordance with an impartial review by most cancers researchers, the EU determination relies on a defective evaluation carried out by the German pharmaceutical and chemical large Bayer – one of the most important producers of glyphosate-based merchandise on the earth.

Researchers related to Global2000, an impartial Austrian environmental organisation, discovered that 33 out of 35 research Bayer primarily based its advice on have been incomplete.

Global200 discovered solely two research have been dependable. One other 15 have been “partly reliable”, and 18 weren’t dependable.

“None of the most important knowledge gaps were addressed,” lead creator Siegfried Knasmüller mentioned in a press release.

The producer has omitted well-known research utilizing fashionable strategies that present glyphosate damages DNA within the liver and different inside organs.

Check techniques used within the analysis Bayer primarily based its conclusions on are greater than 30 years previous. “The models used in these studies detect only five to six out of 10 carcinogens,” in accordance with Knasmüller.

In 2015, the World Well being Group’s Worldwide Company for Analysis on Most cancers (IARC) additionally concluded there’s “strong evidence” publicity to glyphosate may cause DNA injury.

However the officers within the Evaluation Group on Glyphosate (AGG) – consisting of EU member states France, Hungary, the Netherlands and Sweden – rejected these research and concluded that glyphosate is protected and may very well be re-licensed.

“Now it appears that the EU is repeating the same mistake,” Knasmüller mentioned.

In 2019, a US courtroom discovered that Roundup – a Bayer-produced glyphosate-based herbicide – in all probability causes most cancers and Bayer had acted maliciously in hiding this reality.
€9BN IN SETTLEMENTS ALREADY

The corporate has since been focused by greater than 125,000 lawsuits from plaintiffs who declare the use of glyphosate contributed to their non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. The corporate has already paid out nearly €9bn in settlements final yr.

“Worryingly, these industry-sponsored studies are now at the heart of the current EU market approval process of Glyphosate,” Angeliki Lyssimachou, a science coverage officer on the Brussels primarily based NGO Well being and Atmosphere Alliance (HEAL) mentioned.

EU officers have previously refused to share particulars of the producer’s literature research, however a March 2019 ruling by the European Court docket of Justice (ECJ) discovered this was unlawful.

This allowed impartial researchers to review the supplies for the primary time.

In a separate growth this week, the incoming German coalition authorities agreed to chop the use of the weedkiller and take away glyphosate from the market by the top of 2023.

“The writing is on the wall for glyphosate,” Global2000 researcher Helmut Burtscher Schaden mentioned in a press release. “Yet here we see EU officials deliberately baking in another relicensing. That is bad.”

A last determination on glyphosate will probably be taken by EU member states subsequent yr.



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EUROPE
CONSULTANCIES POCKETING EU MILLIONS PROMPTS MEP GRILLING

Frida Qi
November 29, 2021

MEP price range sleuths will on 6 December grill the European Fee for handing out increasingly-lucrative contracts, value tons of of millions of euros, to giant consultancy companies.

Amongst these are PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), KPMG, Deloitte and EY – also referred to as the ‘Large 4’.

Collectively, they’ve landed over €462 million in contracts between 2016 and 2019, in keeping with a report earlier this 12 months by the Brussels-based Euractiv media outlet.

Monika Hohlmeier, a German centre-right MEP, chairs the parliament’s budgetary management committee.

“Requesting consulting services by external parties is not a problem per se as not all knowledge is available within the EU institutions,” she mentioned in an e mail on Friday (26 November).

“However, the significant increase and the unusual concentration on the so-called Big Four require some explanation by the Commission,” she mentioned.

The committee plans on asking government vice-president Valdis Dombrovskis what sort of providers the fee had requested and for what function.

In addition they wish to understand how they assess outcomes delivered.

MEPs earlier this 12 months demanded responses in a letter addressed to each European Fee president Ursula von der Leyen and Dombrovskis.

They highlighted attainable conflicts of curiosity given the Large 4 have been more and more coping with the fee’s structural reform help programme.

The programme gives EU states technical help relating to designing public coverage in areas just like the labour market, police, healthcare or social providers.

PWC, as an example, has been concerned within the Belgian nationwide tax management framework as a part of the co-operative tax compliance reform.

On the identical time, they word that PWC delivered coaching and a guidebook for Belgium’s ‘extra revenue’ tax scheme, a scheme thought-about by the fee as an unlawful state assist.

“It is also public knowledge that PwC and the three other consultancy giants took an active part in the elaboration of practices helping more than 340 multinationals to circumvent tax legislation, as revealed by the Luxleaks scandal,” notes the letter.

The structural reform help programme has since been changed by the so-called “technical support instrument”.

HALF A BILLION EUROS FOR RESEARCH

The contract figures are discovered within the EU’s monetary transparency system, a web site that gives an in depth breakdown of how EU funds are spent and on what.

For his half, Dombrovskis, in a observe up letter in June, mentioned that the “chosen provider is not responsible for policy-making.”

He additionally famous that the fee had concluded examine contracts to exterior non-public corporations to the tune of €542.4m between 2016 and 2020.

A breakdown of these prices reveals they spent €93.4m in 2016, €97.8m in 2017, €92.2m in 2018, €134m in 2019 and €123m in 2020.

Among the many greatest spenders are the fee’s directorate generals – branches specialised in coverage areas starting from vitality to commerce and improvement.

Join, a DG coping with communications networks, spent €48.9m over these 4 years.

Others coping with improvement spent simply over €40m, whereas well being points in DG Sante spent a lot much less, at €312,000.

In an e mail final week, a European Fee spokesperson mentioned the establishment doesn’t have limitless entry to human assets and so might flip to exterior consultants.

“The use of external knowledge based services has become increasingly important in times of organisational and digital transformation coupled with the constraints on administrative expenditure,” he mentioned.

It’s a service additionally employed by the fee’s personal secretariat-general. It paid Deloitte €394,209 for 3 research in 2019.

Essentially the most-expensive was titled Easing the Administrative Burden and price €165,785. The secretariat basic then demanded one other examine final 12 months from Deloitte for €87,947.

Different research value significantly extra.

The identical agency final 12 months charged €994,738 to evaluate attainable choices for updating an EU regulation on office security.

“Of course the EU Commission should take in external expertise. But this cannot mean to simply outsource entire lines of work,” mentioned German Inexperienced MEP, Daniel Freund.

“We should have an interest in building up expertise on our own and not to rely on costly consultancies. This would also decrease the risks of potential conflicts of interests when dealing with consultancies.”



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Doubt cast on photos alleged to show Wagner mercenaries training Malian soldiers

Fri, 26 November 2021


Photos allegedly showing Malian soldiers being trained by a Russian instructor, said to be an employee of the Russian private security firm Wagner, have been circulating on Facebook and Telegram. However, there are key details that cast doubt on claims the pictures were taken in Mali. First, the building in the background resembles the palace built by the former ruler of the Central African Republic, Emperor Bokassa. Moreover, there seems to have been some level of coordination behind the dissemination of these photos in various pro-Russian channels.

France announced this summer that it planned to reduce its military presence in Mali. A few months later, news agency Reuters reported that the Malian government had entered negotiations with the Russian private military company Wagner, quickly sparking outrage in Paris. Malian Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdoulaye Diop and his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov both denied that Mali had any kind of agreement with Wagner on November 11, 2021. Both men did, however, maintain that the two countries were coordinating on the security front.

One of the photos that has been circulating online, first posted on Twitter on November 10, 2021, shows two soldiers standing in front of an abandoned building next to an armed man who is directing them where to shoot. One of the soldiers has an insignia from the Malian Armed Forces (FAMa) on his shoulder. Some graffiti on the wall reads, “Welcome to Maliki.”

The Twitter account that shared this photo, Reverse Side of the Medal (RSOTM), describes itself as a “mercenary community”. The community is run by Vladen Tatarsky, a pseudonym used by a fighter from the self-proclaimed autonomous Donetsk People's Republic in eastern Ukraine. Tatarsky also runs a Telegram channel and a YouTube channel (with more than 72,000 subscribers) that feature images of soldiers and fighters from Russian private military firms abroad. These fighters are nicknamed “musicians”, a reference to the Russian Wagner Group, whose mercenaries have fought in Ukraine, Syria, Libya and the Central African Republic.

Our team ran a reverse image search (click here to find out how) and it turns out, this isn’t the first time these photos have been shared online. The photo was posted on Facebook several hours earlier by a user named Moussa Dembélé, alongside another photo showing the same three people in military attire.

There are a few things about Moussa Dembelé’s account that raise red flags and make it look like there may have been a coordinated effort to get this image to circulate widely. But we’ll get back to that later.

Similarities to Emperor Bokassa’s palace in the Central African Republic

But as soon as these photos started circulating online, doubts emerged about where they were taken. A number of social media users claimed that they had, in fact, been taken in the Central African Republic. More specifically, that they had been taken in the former palace of Emperor Bokassa in Berengo, where Russian soldiers have been training the Central African armed forces since 2018.

Several sources also pointed out that the lush greenery shown in the photo looks more like somewhere in central Africa rather than a western African nation like Mali. Moreover, Central African and Malian military uniforms look similar. Some soldiers in both countries wear a camouflage pattern called "m81 woodland", according to the military uniform database Camopedia.

Several sources familiar with Berengo Palace, including the son of Emperor Bokassa, politician Jean-Serge Bokassa, and several journalists who had filmed reports on site, said that the wall in the photo said to be taken in Mali actually looked a lot like the abandoned Central African palace.

Our team studied several hours worth of footage from Berengo palace. The buildings do, indeed, have striking similarities to the building shown in the photo. There are several walls just like it in the beginning of this report from the TV channel Al Jazeera from April 2019 called “Russia in Africa: Inside a Military Training Camp in the CAR,” which was filmed in Berengo.

The video shows white edging around the windows, a brown border on the bottom of the wall and walls built of ochre-coloured bricks covered with concrete. There is no roof and lush greenery is growing inside, just like in the photo.

Our team spoke to the head of communications at the Malian Defense Ministry, Souleymane Dembélé, who said the photos were "fake".

He added that “Russia is Mali’s partner, just like France or Germany".

He then said that he recognised a building in the photo from a training site used by the European Union Training Mission in Mali (EUTM) in Koulikoro, Mali. But according to sources who spoke to our team and who have actually visited the site in Koulikoro, the wall in the photo doesn’t look like the buildings there. Koulikoro does have destroyed buildings, but our team wasn’t able to identify a single one that looks like the one shown in the photo.

A coordinated effort to share this post?

Our team also examined the Facebook account that posted the first two photos. In one of the captions, the user, Moussa Dembélé, says that he was sent these images on WhatsApp by friends in the Malian Armed Forces. Our team tried to contact the person behind this account but, so far, got no responses to our requests.

Moussa Dembélé’s Facebook profile has only been active since September 24, 2021, the date when his first profile photo was first posted. This user only has ten friends and his cover photo shows a desert in Namibia and is also available for download on a free desktop wallpapers website. Most of his posts denounce French and Western influence in Mali and support an alliance between Mali and Russia.

Moussa Dembélé’s account posted the photos of the alleged Russian instructor on several Facebook groups that share Malian news along with the caption, “The Russians are already training our guys! Bravo! Long live Mali!” These photos were then picked up by other Facebook accounts and on Reddit, along with the same caption.

Two months ago, the same Reddit user also shared another post from Moussa Dembélé’s account. This one also featured photos alleged to show Russian instructors in Mali.

Even though the photos posted by Moussa Dembélé only garnered a few dozen likes, they were picked up the same day, just a few minutes apart, by several pro-Kremlin Russian media outlets. The posts by these outlets featured links leading directly to the Facebook group.

Our team spoke to two researchers who specialise in Russian influence on social media. They told us that the way these photos were shared online is characteristic of a "strategy of totally artificial dissemination".

IA Rex is one of the dozens of media outlets that picked up the post. The outlet is an official partner of Patriot Media Group, run by Yevgeny Prigozhin. Prigozhin, nicknamed “Putin’s chef,” is accused of carrying out a vast disinformation campaign on social media during the 2016 US presidential election. According to media reports, Prigozhin also runs the Wagner group.

The Wagner group often runs publicity stunts alongside its activities. In the Central African Republic, for example, Russian instructors handed out t-shirts featuring Russian mercenaries to Central African soldiers. A film glorifying the work of Russian instructors in the Central African Republic was even broadcast on Russian television in May 2021. According to Meduza, a Russian media outlet aligned with the opposition, the film was financed by Yevgeny Prigozhin.

An altered photo

The photo posted by the Twitter account Reverse Side of the Medal is not the same as the photo posted by Moussa Dembélé's account. The colours are less vibrant, the faces have not been blurred and, most notably, there is no sign of the Malinki graffiti. Our team used Forensically, a tool that helps to analyse images, which showed that the photo posted by Reverse Side of The Medal has indeed been altered. However, there are certain elements of the photo, like the FAMa emblem on the soldier’s sleeves that doesn’t appear to have been edited.

Jack Margolin, a researcher at the Center for Advanced Defense Studies (C4ADS), says that this modification could simply be a joke. In a Tweet, Margolin said that Telegram channels like Reverse Side of the Medal often craft word games by altering the names of the locations where Russian mercenaries are operating – making them sound more Russian. For example, instead of writing SAR, the Russian acronym for Syria, they might write “SARatov,” which is the name of a town located in southwestern Russia. Malinki is similar to a common Russian name.

Moreover, the Reverse Side of the Medal has a history of staging images of Russian mercenaries abroad. Its Telegram channel often features music videos using amateur images of fighters.

Reverse Side of the Medal has also shared disinformation in the past. In October 2020, the channel posted images out of context, leading followers to believe that Russian mercenaries were participating in the war between Armenia and Azerbaijan in Nagorno-Karabakh.

Conclusion

There are a number of details that make us doubt that these images do actually show a Russian instructor from the Wagner Group in Mali. The way that the images were shared online and picked up by certain Russian media outlets suggest that there was an element of coordination. Moreover, the lush greenery in the photo looks more like central Africa, rather than western Africa. Finally, the wall in the footage looks very similar to the former palace of Emperor Bokassa in Berengo in the Central African Republic, where Russian instructors are currently training the Central African Army.

At this point in time, we can’t say for certain where these photos were taken. We can’t exclude the hypothesis that Malian soldiers might have travelled to the Central African Republic to be trained or that the instructor doesn’t have any connection to the Wagner Group.

If you think you know the spot where this photo was taken, write to us on Facebook