Afghan women athletes: prisoners in their own homes

It's eight months since the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and the country has slipped down the news agenda. 'The world forgets about us,' says Friba Rezayee, the first Afghan woman to compete at the Olympics.

Friba Rezayee continues to appeal to sports federations to put pressure on the Taliban

"I wish I didn't exist," Afghan athlete Amira (name changed) writes. "I didn't do anything wrong. The only crime I have committed is to play sports."

Before the Taliban took power in Kabul in August 2021, Amira was one of the best judo fighters in the country. A few weeks ago, the Taliban raided her home for documents that would prove the young woman had been a member of the Afghan national team.

"Fortunately, she was able to escape. She hid in a local cemetery for the whole day, praying that the Taliban would not find her there," Friba Rezayee tells DW. "Had they found these documents in her house, she would have been tried in a Sharia court. That would have meant she would have either received 100 lashes or even been publicly executed."

Rezayee was once a successful judoka herself in Afghanistan. She and track and field sprinter Robina Muqim Yaar became the first women ever to compete for Afghanistan in the Olympics in Athens in 2004.

"That was a sports revolution," Rezayee recalls. In 2011, she fled Afghanistan for Canada. There, the 36-year-old founded the aid organization Women Leaders of Tomorrow (WLT), which provides higher education to female refugees from Afghanistan.

With its GOAL (Girls of Afghanistan Lead) sports program, the organization also supports Afghan women in martial arts. Rezayee keeps in touch with around 130 Afghan female athletes who were not able to escape the country after the Taliban took power.

Aghanistan's female judo team in training shortly before the Taliban took power

Threats from Kabul

These women continue to hide in their homes, "waiting, in a sense, for the Taliban to knock on the door and arrest them," Rezayee says. "The Taliban have sent them threatening letters. They've been intimidate and they can't go outside."

Judoka Amira describes the athletes' dramatic situation this way, "We don't need a prison for women in Afghanistan. Our houses have become prisons for us." Afghanistan, says Mina (name changed), another judoka who remained in the country, "has become a fatherless country where violent children have the power to do whatever they want with women and girls."

The Taliban have not yet officially banned women's sports by law. During the first Taliban rule from 1996 to 2001, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) had excluded Afghanistan from the 2000 Games in Sydney, partly because the radical Islamists discriminated against female athletes.

This attitude of the Taliban has not changed, Rezayee says. "According to their interpretation of Sharia law, women's sports are a sin. They believe that sexual signals are sent to men because a woman's body is visible during physical activity. Women are not even allowed to exercise in a gym."

There is a climate of intimidation and fear in Afghanistan, she explains. For example, a player on the Afghan national volleyball team was recently arrested and "the Taliban brutally beat her up. She had terrible bruises all over her body. The Taliban let her live because they wanted to show other female athletes what happens to them when they play sports."

Armed Taliban soldiers patrol the training room of the judo team

'The world forgets about Afghanistan'

Rezayee and her staff at WLT are still trying to get Afghan female athletes out of the country and to safety. But even if they succeed, there is the question of where the women can then stay.

The Canadian government, for example, focuses its refugee policy on former local Afghan forces of the Canadian army and their families, thus excluding female athletes. "Even in Europe, it's tremendously difficult to get entry visas for them," Rezayee says. The Ukraine war makes things even more complicated. "All the world's attention is focused on the Ukrainian refugees. And the world is forgetting about Afghanistan."

The Afghan sports pioneer feels abandoned by the major sports organizations. Rezayee believes the path of "quiet diplomacy" with the Taliban that federations like the IOC are promoting is wrong.

"If they legitimize it, the Taliban will win. That will set a historical precedent: Evil wins. But we want the principles of sport, education and human rights to win over the men with the guns."

Not enough pressure

After the Taliban took power eight months ago, only the ICC, the world cricket governing body, had threatened to expel Afghanistan because of its stance on women's sports. But eventually, even the ICC eased its position.

Now the federation is apparently playing for time: It will "continue to support the Afghan men's team to play international cricket while monitoring the direction of the sport in the country, including the development of the women's game," it said after a board meeting in Dubai in early April.

Amira (name changed) hid from the Taliban in a cemetery

Rezayee cannot understand the reluctance of sports federations to act. "Now is the perfect time to exert pressure: without girls' education and without women's sports, there is no legitimacy," the exiled Afghan with a Canadian passport demands. International pressure could also make a difference with Afghanistan's radical rulers, she adds.

"Because as much as the Taliban are married to their ideology, they are very sensitive to what people think about them. They are very brutal, they are evil. But they are also not stupid. They are aware that the world is watching them, especially people on social media."

The last light bulb

Giving up is out of the question for Rezayee, even though she often receives threats from her home country. "I'm used to that," she rebuffs. She continues to fight because she feels committed to her fellow countrywomen who play sports.

"Whenever they call me or send me a message from Afghanistan, they cry and are inconsolable. Their courage to live is dying," Rezayee says.

"When an athlete loses her motivation, it's like you take away a mother's child. The work that we are doing, and that I am also asking the international community to do, is not only to save the lives of female athletes in Afghanistan, but also to keep their hope alive. Hope is the last light bulb left burning. We must not let this light go out."

This article has been translated from German.

Guinea-Bissau: Crackdown on press freedom

Dozens of radio stations have been shut down and broadcasters have been attacked. Journalists fear that freedom of information in the West African nation is on a slippery slope. Is Guinea-Bissau's media freedom eroding?

Many Bissau-Guineans rely on radio broadcasts for news and information

Guinea-Bissau's government closed 79 radio stations nationwide in April after the expiry of a last-minute 72-hour deadline to pay license fees. They fell silent. No information, no news — just dead air.

Only 9 out of 88 registered radio stations appeared at the Communications Ministry to renew their licenses. 

Others have since paid their fees, however their broadcasts are still suspended while they wait for the ministry to ensure their equipment is still operating within the the terms of their licenses. 

Muzzling broadcasters

Those that continue to broadcast without a valid license could face up to three years in prison.

Guinea-Bissau's journalists are in despair: The black hole for information in the West African country is getting bigger.

Journalists fear it's a deliberate move by the government to suppress their voices. 

Augusto Mario da Silva, president of the Guinean League for Human Rights (LGDH), accused the government of making the "final push" to eliminate the democratic rule of law and interfere in the editorial work of the media.  In his view, "there is no protection of the public interest underlying the decision to forcibly close radio stations." 

Augusto Mario da Silva: Gov't making 'final push' to eliminate the rule of law

Hindering freedoms

The government is aiming to establish "a dictatorial regime bent on confiscating all the fundamental rights and freedoms won in this unrelenting struggle for democracy in the country," da Silva said.

Da Silva called for the immediate withdrawal of the decision, "which aims only to cut down on democratic pluralism and hinder the exercise of the fundamental freedoms of citizens guaranteed by the Constitution."

The African Party for the Independence of Guinea and Cabo Verde (PAIGC) also condemned the closure of the radio stations as "drastic and illegal."

The party called on the country's civil society to provide "technical, legal or other support for the restoration and operation of all radio stations and all media" in order to "preserve and consolidate political and civil freedoms" and the right to information and opinion.

Guinea-Bissau legal expert Cabi Sanha said the government is acting "in a vacuum." While there is legislation, it is based on broadcasting laws planned by many previous governments but never passed, Sanha told DW in an interview.

It is "hard to understand how the government decided in the blink of an eye to close radio stations. This is really worrying," he added.

Radio Jovem in Bissau is one of the stations closed by the government

'Drastic, absurd, illegal'

Freedom of information in Guinea-Bissau is hanging by a thread, Diamantino Domingos Lopes, general secretary of the Union of Journalists and Media Technicians (SINJOTECS), said in a DW interview. He called the situation "absurd."

"The closing of the radio stations means that we have suffered another defeat in the fight for press freedom, after several armed attacks on stations critical of the government in the past," he told DW.

The trade unionist stressed that radio stations are already facing several technical and financial difficulties and are unable to pay their employees' salaries. Radio stations have to pay about €400 ($427) annually. The decision has no legal basis, Lopes said. He suspects the government has other intentions. "Maybe they want to withhold information from society. When there is no information, there is disinformation, and the consequences are very devastating."

What is Umaro Sissoco Embalo's plan for Guinea-Bissau's press freedom?

Political crises on all ends

Guinea-Bissau has been plagued by political instability since its independence in 1975, resulting in a lack of development and severe poverty, ongoing violence and intimidation of political opponents.

According to the 2021 Corruption Perceptions Index, corruption in Guinea-Bissau is one of the most serious in the world, ranking 162nd out of 180. The former Portuguese colony has experienced over a dozen coups or attempted coups since 1980, with the most recent successful coup in spring 2012. It brought endless domestic and foreign political problems to Guinea-Bissau.

Troops from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) have arrived in Guinea-Bissau to stabilize the fragile country after February's failed coup, according to reports by Portuguese news agency Lusa.

The West African nation's political gridlock has weakened the media and journalists, leaving them vulnerable to political pressure and leaving the door open to increasing government interference in state media, Reporters Without Borders said.

The right of access to information is not guaranteed, and journalists self-censor, they said. Some journalists have fled abroad to escape attacks, threats, and intimidation.

Attacks on media and critics

The magnitude of pressure on journalists is illustrated by an example from February 2022 when armed supporters of President Umaro Sissoco Embalo occupied the headquarters of the state radio and television station, Radio Capital, destroying offices and injuring five employees. They accused its journalists of "bias" in favor of Embalo's rivals. A few months later, gunmen attacked another government-critical radio station and destroyed its broadcast facility. 

Besides material damage, the attack on Radio Capital left five people wounded

Political analyst Rui Landim — a well-known critic of the government and host of a program on Radio Capital — was attacked at night by armed and masked men in his home. The government condemned the attacks and promised to investigate. But Rui Landim claims his attackers were wearing the uniform of the police Rapid Reaction Force — and suspects the government and the president to be behind the attack.

Silencing journalists

Media unionist Diamantino Domingos Lopes strongly criticized the behavior of Guinea-Bissau's government. Media play a big role in solving problems, he said, and silencing journalists only benefits those who want to sweep criticism under the rug.

Political analyst Rui Landim says he fears for his life

"For the government, perhaps the best strategy would be to silence them," Lopes said. But Guinea-Bissau, which gained independence from Portugal in 1974 after a decadelong war of independence, won its freedom, and with it freedom of the press and freedom of expression, with a lot of sweat, he says. "And to take that freedom away from this country would be worse than the colonialists acting."

He and other journalists now hope that the government will be willing to compromise to guarantee the survival of radio stations, and thus press freedom in Guinea-Bissau. 

Iancuba Danso, Ines Cardoso and Cristina Krippahl contributed to this article.

Edited by: Keith Walker 

COVID digest: WHO decries worldwide drop in coronavirus testing

The WHO chief has urged countries to ramp up testing to accurately reflect global transmission trends. Meanwhile, Mexico said it is transitioning from pandemic to endemic. DW has the latest.

'When it comes to a deadly virus, ignorance is not bliss,' the WHO chief said

The World Health Organization (WHO) has said a dramatic drop in testing is cause for serious concern as health authorities and the public become less aware of patterns of COVID transmission. 

"As many countries reduce testing, WHO is receiving less and less information about transmission and sequencing," WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreysus told a press conference in Geneva.

"This makes us increasingly blind to patterns of transmission and evolution," he added.

"When it comes to a deadly virus, ignorance is not bliss ... This virus won't go away just because countries stop looking for it," Tedros said. 

WHO said it was notified of just over 15,000 deaths last week, the lowest weekly total since March 2020.

WHO added that while it welcomed the trend, it was concerned that reduced testing was not accurately reflecting the presence of coronavirus. 

Bill Rodriguez, chief executive of FIND, a global alliance for diagnostics, said many governments have simply stopped looking for the virus, and that testing rates have plummeted by 70% to 90% worldwide.

"We have an unprecedented ability to know what is happening," Rodriguez said. "And yet today because testing has been the first casualty of a global decision to let down our guard, we're becoming blind to what is happening with this virus," he added. 

Here are the latest major coronavirus developments from around the world:

Americas

German pharmaceutical company BioNTech and US partner Pfizer filed an application Tuesday with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for an emergency approval of a booster vaccine for children aged between five and 11.

They are also expected to submit applications for approval for their COVID vaccine to other global regulatory agencies like the European Medicines Agency.

US Vice President Kamala Harris tested positive for COVID-19 on Tuesday, but is not showing any symptoms so far, a spokesperson said. 

Harris has not been in contact with the either President Joe Biden or First Lady Jill Biden due to differing schedules, Harris's press secretary said. Harris has also taken Paxlovid, Pfizer's COVID-19 antiviral pill. 

The Biden administration on Tuesday announced it was taking steps to expand the availability of Paxlovid so doctors could prescribe the pill to those who needed it without worrying about falling short of supplies. 

Even though cases have been falling overall, infections have risen in some parts of the US because of the spread of sub variant of the omicron strain, called BA.2.

Mexico said Tuesday it was considering coronavirus as an endemic, rather than a pandemic, because COVID rates were falling and its impact has more manageable. Death rates have also fallen sharply.

"It is now retreating almost completely," President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador said, referring to the virus. But that may be because Mexico, which was never particularly big on testing, is screening fewer people now. Mexico has recorded nearly 325,000 confirmed deaths from the virus, but experts say the actual death toll is higher.

Opinion: Turkey's judiciary does government's bidding in Osman Kavala trial

Turkish activist and philanthropist Osman Kavala has been sentenced to life behind bars. Though harsh, this verdict is unsurprising. Turkey's judiciary, after all, does the government's bidding, says DW's Erkan Arikan.

Kavala supporters hold placards reading 'The Gezi resistance continues'

It's one of those days where I'm left wondering which standards are applied by Turkish courts. While activist and philanthropist Osman Kavala has been acquitted of espionage in connection with the 2016 coup attempt, he has now been sentenced to life in relation to the 2013 Gezi park protests. The court found him guilty of trying to overthrow the government. This ruling is laughable, and as ridiculous as, say, jailing Micky Maus at Guantanamo on terrorism charges.

Erkan Arikan heads DW's Turkish service

The ruling leaves me speechless and disappointed. Numerous backers of Kavala, who had come to show their support in court felt similarly, and were moved to tears. Following the announcement of the verdict, supporters began chanting "Taksim is everywhere, resistance is everywhere" in allusion to the Gezi park protests on Taksim square.

No fair trial

Lawyers and legal experts, including Kaval's attorneys, have highlighted that no evidence was presented during the entire trial to substantiate the accusations against Kavala. The European Court of Human Rights similarly criticized a lack of evidence. Numerous urgent calls were therefore issued for Kavala's release.  

Over the years, his attorneys meticulously prepared their defense of Kavala for every single day in court. I spent much time talking to one of his lawyers, Ilkan Koyuncu. He is convinced Kavala never had a fair chance. He was certainKavala was going to be convicted.

And so, when Kavala received the judges' ruling via videocall, after 1,637 days locked up at Silivri maximum-security prison near Istanbul, it did not come as surprise. Upon hearing the verdict, Kavala replied: "This is an assassination, made possible by the judiciary."

Erdogan affronts West, again

It is apparent that Turkey wishes to make an example ofOsman Kavala. President Erdogan wants to show the world that anyone who challenges him will lose. Kavala, in short, could never expect a fair trial. Indeed, opposition lawmaker Ahmet Sik has dismissed the judges in question as robed mafiosi. And he is right.

Kavala's sentencing is an affront against Justitia, the goddess of justice. Turkish judges have been stripped of their balance scales and blindfolds.

This article has been translated from German.

NO RIGHT TO HABEUS CORPUS
Relief and alarm as El Salvador rounds up 'gangsters'





Salvadoran police and military rounded up more than 18,000 alleged gang members in just a month (AFP/-)


Carlos Mario MARQUEZ
Tue, April 26, 2022, 

An unprecedented round up of alleged gangsters in El Salvador has netted thousands of suspects and brought relief to citizens living in constant fear.

But the clampdown has drawn complaints of rights abuses, and experts say mass arrests are but a stop-gap as long as so many Salvadorans have no feasible exit from a life of penury.

With a poverty rate of 30.7 percent and sky-high unemployment that pushes ever more people to emigrate, a career as a gangster is one of few options available to those who remain.

The most prominent gangs, Mara Salvatrucha (MS-13) and Barrio 18, count some 70,000 members in the country of 6.5 million people. Almost half are thought to be behind bars.


They eke out a living by extorting protection money from anyone who wishes to avoid harm and from drug dealing that brings them into regular conflict with one another.

In a particularly bloody weekend in March, 87 ordinary civilians died at the hands of gangs in 72 hours of violence around the country.

That bloodbath prompted President Nayib Bukele to announce a state of emergency that has allowed the police and military to round up more than 18,000 alleged gang members in just a month.

- 'Trade is flowing' -

In the short term, removing criminals from the streets has allowed residents and entrepreneurs to breathe a sigh of relief. At least temporarily.

"On some of my routes, the criminals are no longer collecting protection money," bus company operator Juan Pablo Alvarez told AFP.

The gangs have extracted a heavy toll from him over the years, he said.

"I have had to bury my brother, more than 10 colleagues and 25 employees, mainly drivers," he added.

In the city center of San Salvador, where even vegetable sellers fall victim to racketeers, vendor Felipe told AFP he, too, was enjoying a reprieve from being shaken down.

"We are not paying anything, the guys (gangsters) have not been seen, they have practically disappeared and the trade is flowing," said Felipe, who preferred to withhold his last name for fear of reprisal.

Clients "have stopped being afraid of coming to the (city) center."

Eduardo Cader, president of the Salvadoran Industry Association, said delivery trucks were, for the first time in a long time, able to enter certain areas where they previously had to pay bribes.

According to a recent CID Gallup poll, an overwhelming majority of Salvadorans support Bukele's anti-gang operation.

And on Sunday, lawmakers extended the state of emergency for another month.

But not everyone is on board.

- 'Criminal populism' -

Emergency powers have done away with the need for arrest warrants, and sentences for gang membership have been raised five-fold to up to 45 years.

Rights observers say innocent people are getting caught in the dragnet and journalists have raised censorship fears over jail terms of up to 15 years for "sharing" gang-related messages in the media.

Rather than ordinary courts, suspected gangsters are brought before judges whose identities are hidden, ostensibly to protect them.

But sitting judge Juan Antonio Duran told AFP these were measures of "criminal populism."

He pointed out that trial by an anonymous judge, without witnesses or even the defendant present -- as has happened -- "is prohibited by the constitution."

On Monday, Amnesty International said Bukele's state of emergency "has created a perfect storm of human rights violations."

And US Secretary of State Antony Blinken reminded Bukele last week that "we can tackle violence and crime while also protecting civil rights and fundamental freedoms."

Veronica Aguirre, 26, claimed her husband was arrested groundlessly, telling AFP that under the state of emergency, "we cannot provide proof" of innocence.

Attorney General Rodolfo Delgado has insisted "honest people have nothing to fear."

But Jose Maria Tojeira, former director of the Central American University's Human Rights Institute, said El Salvador had "a strong tendency for generalized punishments which... are a source of violations of the law."

Bukele, 40, has likened El Salvador's gangs to "a metastasized cancer" and vowed there are only two paths for members: "prison or death."

For Jose Miguel Cruz, a researcher at the Florida International University, the only long-term solution was disarming and rehabilitating former gangsters and productively reintegrating them into society.

What El Salvador needed, he said, was a plan to "modify the conditions that make a good sector of the population resort to a life of crime to survive."

cmm/mav/mlr/sw

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Gabon's Loango national park: Public observation of gorillas resumes after shutdown

After two years of a total shutdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the executive secretary of the National Parks Agency (ANPN) has decided to resume public observations of Gabon's gorillas, hoping the iconic species will serve as a "loss leader" to boost niche tourism.

Cereal killer: Kellogg's challenges UK over obesity strategy


The UK government is introducing new rules to reduce the prominence of sugary foods in English shops from October (AFP/Daniel LEAL)

Wed, April 27, 2022, 3:54 AM·2 min read

Cereals giant Kellogg's said Wednesday it had launched a legal challenge against new rules that will limit the prominence of sugary foods in English shops as part of a new campaign against obesity.

The government's strategy only calculated the fat, salt and sugar content of cereals when eaten dry, not when taken with milk, the US company said in a statement announcing the judicial review.

"We've tried to have a reasonable conversation with the UK government over the past 12 months about making this change, but to no avail," Kellogg's UK managing director Chris Silcock said.

"All of this matters because, unless you take account of the nutritional elements added when cereal is eaten with milk, the full nutritional value of the meal is not measured," he said.


The new regulations, which take effect in England in October, will also ban television advertising of unhealthy foods before 9:00 p.m., to try to limit children's exposure.

The state-funded National Health Service (NHS) estimates that some 10 percent of four- and five-year-olds are obese, and it is double that figure for those aged 10 and 11.

It adds that one in four adults are obese, with cheap, high-calorie foods blamed in part.

The government said it would resist the challenge by Kellogg's, noting that obesity costs the NHS more than £6 billion ($7.5 billion) a year and is the second biggest cause of cancer in the UK.

"Breakfast cereals contribute seven percent -- a significant amount -– to the average daily free sugar intakes of children," a health ministry spokesman said.

"Restricting the promotion and advertising of less healthy foods is an important part of the cross-government strategy to halve childhood obesity by 2030, prevent harmful diseases and improve healthy life expectancy, so we can continue to level up health across the nation."

jit/phz/kjm

Pakistan separatist group warns China of more deadly attacks

Ashraf KHAN
Wed, 27 April 2022

Three Chinese teachers and a Pakistani driver were killed near the gate of a Confucius Institute at Karachi University, when a bomber detonated explosives next to their minibus

(AFP/Rizwan TABASSUM) (Rizwan TABASSUM)

A Pakistan separatist group warned Wednesday of more deadly attacks on Chinese targets, a day after a woman suicide bomber killed four people -- including three teachers posted from Beijing.

The Baloch Liberation Army -- one of several groups fighting for independence in Pakistan's biggest province -- claimed responsibility for Tuesday's blast, saying it was the first time a woman had "self sacrificed" for the group.

Chinese nationals and interests have regularly been targeted by separatists in Balochistan, where Beijing is involved in lucrative mining and energy projects.

"Hundreds of highly trained male and female members of the Baloch Liberation Army's Majeed Brigade are ready to carry out deadly attacks in any part of Balochistan and Pakistan," spokesman Jeeyand Baloch said in a statement published in English.

He threatened Beijing with "even harsher" attacks unless the neighbouring country halted its "exploitation projects" and "occupying of the Pakistani state".

Three Chinese teachers and a Pakistani driver were killed near the gate of the Confucius Institute at Karachi University, when the bomber detonated explosives next to their minibus.

A security official at the university told AFP he had previously raised concerns about the safety of 15 Chinese staff on the campus.

"Reports emerged in February that an attack might be carried out on campus," the source, who asked not be named, told AFP.

The bomber was named as 30-year-old Shaari Baloch, a married mother of an eight-year-old girl and four-year-old boy, the BLA said, adding that she was a science teacher studying for a master's degree.

Police confirmed the details.

Suicide attacks by women are very rare in Pakistan, reported only four times in recent years.

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged Pakistan to ensure the safety of all Chinese citizens and interests in the country and to launch a full investigation.

It also advised citizens to "take strict precautions, and do not go out unless necessary".

China is upgrading energy links and infrastructure as part of a $54 billion programme known as the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, with both nations wary of security threats to the projects.

In April 2021 a suicide bomb attack at a luxury hotel hosting the Chinese ambassador in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan, killed four and wounded dozens.

The ambassador was unhurt in that attack, which was claimed by the Pakistan Taliban.

In July last year, a bus carrying engineers to a construction site near a dam in northwestern Pakistan was hit by a bomb, killing 13 people including nine Chinese workers.

The attack, which went unclaimed, frayed relations between Islamabad and Beijing, and Pakistan later paid millions in compensation to the families of the Chinese workers killed.

zz-ak-sjd/ecl-fox/axn

A mother of 2 and wife of a doctor, Karachi suicide bomber held a master's degree

The Karachi suicide bomber, who carried out a blast, killing four persons, including three Chinese nationals, was a highly educated woman and the mother of two children. She had been associated with the militant organisation, Balochistan Liberation Army for two years.



Gaurav C Sawant Ankit Kumar

Karachi

April 27, 2022

Karachi suicide bomber Shari Baloch.


The woman who carried out the Karachi suicide bombing — that killed four persons, including three Chinese nationals — was a highly educated mother of two.

The suicide bomber, 30-year-old Shari Baloch from Niazar Abad in Balochistan’s Turbat, had completed MSc in zoology and was married to a doctor.

ALSO READ | 3 Chinese nationals killed as mother of two blows up van outside Karachi University

She was pursuing M Phil and was a practising science teacher according to a statement released by the Afghanistan-based militant organisation, Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA), which claimed responsibility for the attack.

Shari Baloch joined the special self-sacrifice squad of the BLA’s Majeed Brigade two years ago. The BLA said that she had been offered the option to opt-out of the squad because of her two young children, but she refused. Majeed Brigade has now threatened to target more Chinese nationals and China’s interests in Balochistan and Pakistan

“Baloch Liberation Army’s Majeed Brigade targeted Chinese officials in an attack on Tuesday in Karachi. Three Chinese officials Huang Guiping, Ding Mufang, and Chen Sai were killed in the attack, whereas, Wang Yuqing and their security guards were injured,” the BLA statement read.

“Today’s mission was successfully carried out by Majeed Brigade’s fidayeen Shaari Baloch alias Bramsh, resident of Niazar Abad Turbat,” it added. The BLA said that as a student, Shaari was a member of the Baloch Students’ Organisation and “was aware of Baloch genocide and occupation of Balochistan”.

ALSO READ | 2 suspected suicide attackers killed in Jammu, made-in-Pak medicines recovered

Following the Majeed Brigade’s procedures, she was given time to revisit her decision. During these two years, Shaari rendered her services in different units of the Majeed Brigade. Six months ago she confirmed that she stood by her decision of carrying out a self-sacrificing attack. After that, she was actively involved in the mission.

BLA spokesperson Jeeyand Baloch said: “Targeting director and officials of Confucius institute, the symbol of Chinese economic, cultural and political expansionism, was to give a clear message to China that its direct or indirect presence in Balochistan will not be tolerated,” the BLA said. The BLA said that it had warned China several times to “refrain from looting Baloch resources and aiding Pakistan militarily and financially in carrying out Baloch genocide”. “However, China continues to be involved in its expansionist designs in Balochistan,” he said.

ALSO READ | Pakistan: 57 killed, nearly 200 injured in Peshawar mosque blast during Friday prayer

Warning China of “harsher attacks”, Jeeyand Baloch said: “The Baloch Liberation Army once again warns China to immediately halt its exploitation projects and refrain from aiding the occupying Pakistani state. Otherwise, our future attacks will be even harsher.”

He said that “hundreds of highly trained members” of the Baloch Liberation Army’s Majeed Brigade are ready to carry out deadly attacks in any part of Balochistan and Pakistan and asked Pakistan to “peacefully withdraw from Balochistan, recognizing its independence”.
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Female suicide bomber kills three Chinese teachers and Pakistani at Karachi university

A suspected female suicide bomber killed three Chinese teachers in Karachi on Tuesday, police and officials said, drawing strong condemnation from Beijing, in the first major attack this year against nationals of long-time ally China working in Pakistan.

The scene at the university in Karachi shortly after the attack.

 Photo: AFP

The three were among passengers on a minibus returning to Karachi university after a lunch break when the bomb exploded at the entrance to the university's Confucius Institute, killing the Chinese teachers and a Pakistani national, police and officials said.

A separatist group, the Baloch Liberation Army (BLA) based in southwestern Balochistan province bordering Afghanistan and Iran, claimed responsibility for the blast, adding in an email to Reuters the attack was carried out by a woman suicide bomber.

It shared in the email a photo of her clad in a long shawl sitting with two children. The photo could not be verified independently by police or other officials.

Karachi police chief Ghulam Nabi Memon said of the victims: "The reports we have got say they're Chinese."

He added they were teachers at the Confucius Institute, a Chinese language and cultural centre.

"The information we've got is that the female bomber was most probably a student at the university," Memon told Geo News TV.

Police officers examine the van. Photo: AFP

A guard and another Chinese citizen were also wounded in the minibus.

China's Foreign Ministry strongly condemned the attack and "demanded" Pakistan punish the perpetrators, protect Chinese citizens and prevent such incidents from happening again.

"The blood of the Chinese people should not be shed in vain, and those behind this incident will surely pay the price," it said in a statement.

Media showed CCTV footage of a woman dressed in black wearing a backpack standing close to the bus shortly before the bomb went off and sent up clouds of fire and smoke.

Police did not verify the footage.

Pakistani media also showed the wrecked minibus dotted with shrapnel holes, and witnesses said the explosion was so big it rattled the windowpanes of other buildings on the sprawling campus.

The bombing was the first major attack against Chinese nationals in Pakistan since July last year when a suicide bomber blew up a passenger bus in northern Pakistan that killed 13 people, including nine Chinese working on a hydro-power plant.

Other attacks on Chinese working in Pakistan have taken place in Balochistan province, where separatist militants have waged an insurgency against authorities for decades.

Balochistan houses a deep-water port in Gwadar city which Beijing is developing under the China Pakistan Economic-Corridor (CPEC) project as part of President Xi Jinping's Belt and Road initiative to expand trade linkages.

Major challenge for new PM

The incident poses a major challenge to Pakistan's newly elected Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif who took power this month. He condemned what he called a cowardly act of terrorism.

"I am deeply grieved on the loss of precious lives including of our Chinese friends in the heinous attack in Karachi today," Sharif said in a statement. He promised a speedy investigation.

The Baloch separatist guerrillas, who say they are fighting for a greater share in regional resources of mines and minerals, usually attack gas projects, infrastructure and the security forces.

They also attack Chinese projects and workers despite Pakistan's assurances that it is doing everything it can to protect the projects.

Islamabad blames neighbouring India for backing the insurgents, a charge New Delhi denies.

_Reuters

Factbox-Who are the Pakistan separatists behind attack on Chinese citizens?

Tue, April 26, 2022

A security guard walks after a blast near a passenger van at the entrance of the Confucius Institute University of Karachi


(Reuters) - The Baloch Liberation Army (BLA), which claimed a deadly attack on Chinese citizens in Karachi on Tuesday, is the most prominent of a number of separatist groups operating against the Pakistani state in the southwestern province of Balochistan.

BLA's stated aim is complete independence for Balochistan, Pakistan's largest province by territory but the smallest in terms of population given its arid mountainous terrain.

The province has seen a decades-long insurgency against what separatists call the unfair exploitation of resources in the mineral-rich region.

Balochistan borders Afghanistan to the north, Iran to the west and has a long coastline on the Arabian Sea. It has Pakistan's largest natural gas field and is believed to have many more undiscovered reserves.

It is also rich in precious metals including gold, the production of which has grown over recent years.

Most of the separatist groups operate independently, but some recent reports in local media have pointed to increasing cooperation between them.

Pakistani security forces have been their main focus, but in recent years they have also targeted Chinese interests, given Beijing's increasing economic footprint in the region.

Among China's major projects in Balochistan is the port of Gwadar, strategically located near the Strait of Hormuz - a crucial oil shipping route in the Arabian Sea. Chinese engineers working at the port came under attack from an operation claimed by the BLA last year.

A Chinese company also operates a major gold and copper mine in Balochistan.

The security of its nationals in Pakistan has become a major issue for Beijing, especially since it launched the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which envisages development projects worth more than $60 billion.

The BLA says it attacks Chinese nationals because Beijing ignored warnings not to enter deals and agreements regarding Balochistan before the province had been "liberated". Reuters has not been able to verify its claims independently.

The group demands that all Pakistani security forces withdraw from Balochistan and has suggested negotiations in the presence of an "international guarantor".

It claims its "Fidayees" (guerrillas) are made up of young, educated Baloch who are disillusioned by hardship and being sidelined from economic development.

Under its current guise, the BLA was led by Balach Marri, scion of an influential Baloch family. Security officials said Marri was killed in neighbouring Afghanistan in 2007, where he had established a base and hideout.

After initially being hampered by Marri's death, the BLA has accelerated its attacks, particularly in the last year.

The group says it is currently led by a man named Bashir Zeb Baloch, the organisation's shadowy commander-in-chief about whom little is known.

The BLA has claimed a number of major attacks in recent months, including a simultaneous storming of two paramilitary bases in Balochistan earlier this year.

Most of the attacks take place in Balochistan or in the southern city of Karachi, Pakistan's commercial hub located close to the province.

The BLA claimed attacks there on the Pakistan Stock Exchange Building in 2020 and the Chinese consulate in 2018.

(Reporting by Gibran Peshimam; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)

SEE LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for BALOCH 

Chip start-ups using light instead of wires gaining speed and investments




Clean room at Ayar Labs in Santa Clara

Mon, April 25, 2022
By Jane Lanhee Lee

(Reuters) - Computers using light rather than electric currents for processing, only years ago seen as research projects, are gaining traction and startups that have solved the engineering challenge of using photons in chips are getting big funding.

In the latest example, Ayar Labs, a startup developing this technology called silicon photonics, said on Tuesday it had raised $130 million from investors including chip giant Nvidia Corp.

While the transistor-based silicon chip has increased computing power exponentially over past decades as transistors have reached the width of several atoms, shrinking them further is challenging. Not only is it hard to make something so miniscule, but as they get smaller, signals can bleed between them.


So, Moore's law, which said every two years the density of the transistors on a chip would double and bring down costs, is slowing, pushing the industry to seek new solutions to handle increasingly heavy artificial intelligence computing needs.

According to data firm PitchBook, last year silicon photonics startups raised over $750 million, doubling from 2020. In 2016 that was about $18 million.

"A.I. is growing like crazy and taking over large parts of the data center," Ayar Labs CEO Charles Wuischpard told Reuters in an interview. "The data movement challenge and the energy consumption in that data movement is a big, big issue."

The challenge is that many large machine-learning algorithms can use hundreds or thousands of chips for computing, and there is a bottleneck on the speed of data transmission between chips or servers using current electrical methods.

Light has been used to transmit data through fiber-optic cables, including undersea cables, for decades, but bringing it to the chip level was hard as devices used for creating light or controlling it have not been as easy to shrink as transistors.

PitchBook’s senior emerging technology analyst Brendan Burke expects silicon photonics to become common hardware in data centers by 2025 and estimates the market will reach $3 billion by then, similar to the market size of the A.I. graphic chips market in 2020.

Beyond connecting transistor chips, startups using silicon photonics for building quantum computers, supercomputers, and chips for self-driving vehicles are also raising big funds.

PsiQuantum raised about $665 million so far, although the promise of quantum computers changing the world is still years out.

Lightmatter, which builds processors using light to speed up AI workloads in the datacenter, raised a total of $113 million and will release its chips later this year and test with customers soon after.

Luminous Computing, a startup building an AI supercomputer using silicon photonics backed by Bill Gates, raised a total of $115 million.

PHOTONIC FOUNDRIES

It is not just the startups pushing this technology forward. Semiconductor manufacturers are also gearing up to use their silicon chip-making technology for photonics.

GlobalFoundries Head of Computing and Wired Infrastructure Amir Faintuch said collaboration with PsiQuantum, Ayar, and Lightmatter has helped build up a silicon photonics manufacturing platform for others to use. The platform was launched in March.

Peter Barrett, founder of venture capital firm Playground Global, an investor in Ayar Labs and PsiQuantum, believes in the long-term prospects for silicon photonics for speeding up computing, but says it is a long road ahead.

"What the Ayar Labs guys do so well ... is they solved the data interconnect problem for traditional high-performance (computing)," he said. "But it's going to be a while before we have pure digital photonic compute for non-quantum systems."

(Reporting by Jane Lanhee Lee; Editing by Stephen Coates)

Indian capital engulfed in smoke after landfill catches fire












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Smoke rises from a fire at the Bhalswa landfill, in New Delhi, India, Wednesday, April 27, 2022. The landfill that covers an area bigger than 50 football fields, with a pile taller than a 17-story building caught fire on Tuesday evening, turning into a smoldering heap that blazed well into the night. India's capital, which like the rest of South Asia is in the midst of a record-shattering heat wave, was left enveloped in thick acrid smoke.

 (AP Photo/Manish Swarup)More

ANIRUDDHA GHOSAL
Wed, April 27, 2022

NEW DELHI (AP) — Acrid smoke hung over New Delhi for a second day on Wednesday after a massive landfill caught fire during a scorching heat wave, forcing informal waste workers to endure hazardous conditions.

The landfill in northern Delhi’s Bhalswa is taller than a 17-story building and covers an area bigger than 50 football fields. Waste workers who live in nearby homes had emptied onto the streets on Tuesday evening. But by Wednesday morning, the thousands of people who live and work at the landfill had begun the dangerous process of trying to salvage garbage from the fire.

“There’s a fire every year. It is not new. There is risk to life and livelihood, but what do we do?” asked Bhairo Raj, 31, an informal waste worker who lives next to the landfill. He said that his children studied there and he couldn't afford to leave.

The Indian capital, like the rest of South Asia, is in the midst of a record-shattering heat wave that experts said was a catalyst for the landfill fire. Three other landfills around the Indian capital have also caught fire in recent weeks.

The landfill in the latest fire was planned for closure more than a decade ago, but more than 2,300 tons of the city's garbage is still dumped there every day. The organic waste in the landfill decays, resulting in a build-up of highly combustible methane gas.

“With high temperatures, this spontaneous combustion will take place,” said Ravi Agarwal, the director of Toxics Link, a New Delhi-based advocacy group that focuses on waste management.

A  van drives past a raging fire at the Bhalswa landfill, in New Delhi, India, Wednesday, April 27, 2022. The landfill that covers an area bigger than 50 football fields, with a pile taller than a 17-story building caught fire on Tuesday evening, turning into a smoldering heap that blazed well into the night. India's capital, which like the rest of South Asia is in the midst of a record-shattering heat wave, was left enveloped in thick acrid smoke. 

(AP Photo/Manish Swarup)

Several fire engines rushed to the landfill on Tuesday to try and douse the fire. At night, the landfill resembled a burning mountain and it smoldered until early morning.

March was the hottest month in India in over a century and April has been similarly scorching. Temperatures crossed 43 degrees Celsius (109.4 F) in several cities Tuesday and are forecasted to continue rising.

“India's current heatwave has been made hotter by climate change,” said Dr. Friederike Otto, senior lecturer in climate science at the Grantham Institute in Imperial College London.

She said that unless the world stops adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, such heat waves will become even more common.

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AP journalist Rishi Lekhi contributed to this report.

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The Associated Press Health & Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.