India not xenophobic, FM says after Biden remark

HINDUTVA ARE ISLAMOPHOBIC

India on Saturday decried remarks by US President Joe Biden earlier this week describing it as an “xenophobic” country that does not welcome immigrants.

The New Arab Staff & Agencies
04 May, 2024

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar addresses a press conference at the BJP headquarters in New Delhi on April 01, 2024 [Getty]


India is not xenophobic, the country's foreign minister has insisted, after comments by US President Joe Biden suggesting the South Asian nation and fellow ally Japan were struggling economically because they rejected immigrants.

Biden, who is seeking reelection against Republican rival Donald Trump in November, made the remarks at a campaign fundraising event in Washington this week.

Foreign minister S. Jaishankar told a media roundtable Friday that Biden's comments did not match India's reality.

"First of all, our economy is not faltering," he said, according to a report of the discussion published Saturday by the Economic Times newspaper.

"India has been a very unique country," he added. "I would say actually, in the history of the world, that it's been a society which has been very open... different people of different societies come to India."


India is one of the world's fastest-growing economies with annualised GDP growth of 8.4 percent in the December quarter, according to official data in February.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Hindu-nationalist government has been accused by critics of discriminating against Muslims, including through recently enacted reforms to India's citizenship law.

The amended law sparked huge protests when it was first passed by parliament in 2019 and finally enacted in March, with Amnesty International warning that it still risked being used as a tool, alongside a mooted National Register of Citizens, to deprive some Muslims of citizenship.

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"There are people who publicly said on record that... a million Muslims will lose their citizenship in this country," Jaishankar said.

"Why are they not being held to account? Because nobody has lost citizenship."

'Unfortunate'

Biden had clubbed allies India and Japan in with rivals China and Russia in remarks intended as a defence of US immigration policy.

"Why is China stalling so badly economically? Why is Japan in trouble? Why is Russia in trouble? And India? Because they're xenophobic. They don't want immigrants," Biden had said at the Wednesday fundraiser.

Tokyo responded Saturday by saying it was "unfortunate that comments not based on an accurate understanding of Japan's policy were made".

Since taking office in 2021, Biden has strengthened ties with US allies in Asia, in particular India and Japan.


He has hosted state dinners at the White House for both Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida.

The White House has since had to downplay Biden's remarks.

The president was merely trying to send a broader message that "the United States is a nation of immigrants," National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters.

Biden clarifies xenophobia comments

May 05, 2024

Tasha Kheiriddin

United States President Joe Biden arrives prior to making a statement on Campus unrest from in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, DC on Thursday, May 2, 2024. 

 IMAGO/MediaPunch via Reuters Connect

On Friday and Saturday, India and Japan responded to President Joe Biden’s gaffe at a campaign fundraiser last week in which he called the two nations “xenophobic.”

The US governmentlater clarified that Biden’s comments meant to explain "that the US is a nation of immigrants and that immigrants make the US stronger” and did not have "the intent of undermining" the US-Japan relationship.

Still,Tokyo was not amused. Japan’s embassy in Washington said “the comments were not based on an accurate understanding of Japan's policies.”

New Delhi wasn’t impressed either. India’s Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar said India was open to people “who have a claim to come to India” and highlighted its strong economy.

Having described the US-Japan alliance as "unbreakable" and noted India’s “democratic character” and “diversity” during a state visit last year, Biden’s latest comments contradict previous efforts to sweet-talk these key Indo-Pacific allies. But considering their common geopolitical interests, especially when it comes to China, Tokyo and New Delhi are unlikely to let the gaffe sour their relationship with Washington.

Tunisia's journalism students force university to cut ties with pro-Israel partner

IPSI's administration supported their students' demands and officially cancelled the agreement with KAS on Thursday, 2 May.


Basma El Atti
Rabat
03 May, 2024

From Africa to Australia, more universities around the world are protesting against the war in Gaza. [Getty]


Tunisian students have compelled a journalism institute to sever ties with a pro-Israel partner amidst rising pro-Palestine protests on campuses worldwide.

Last weekend, dozens of journalism students camped at Manouba's Institute of Press and Information Sciences (IPSI) to protest the establishment's partnership with the German Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS).

They named their camp after Sherine Abu Akleh — a journalist killed while on duty by the Israeli army in 2022 — vowing not to leave the university premises until all agreements with the 'pro-Zionist' KAS were revoked.



In October, the Stiftung office in Tel Aviv shared a message stating, "KAS stands with Israel. Germany stands with Israel," following the start of Israel's war on Gaza.

IPSI's administration supported their students' demands and officially cancelled the agreement with KAS on Thursday, 2 May.

"We, the staff and professors, share the same position. Since the beginning of this year, partnerships with organisations openly supporting Israel have been terminated," Hamida El Bour, director of IPSI, told a local radio station on Thursday.

Regarding the exams boycotted by students during the protests, El Bour promised to reschedule the exams, and new dates will be announced soon.

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"This demonstration is legitimate because it supports the Palestinian cause," added the head of IPSI.

In recent weeks, hundreds of students have demonstrated in Tunisian universities in solidarity with the Palestinian people and against Israel's war on Gaza, responding to a call from the country's two main student unions, the General Union of Tunisian Students (UGET) and the Tunisian General Union of Students (UGTE).

From Africa to Australia, more universities around the world are protesting against the war in Gaza, following the lead of US students who have organised several rallies to pressure their institutions to sever ties with Israel.

In seven months of the war, Israel killed at least 34,596 people in the Gaza Strip.

UK's Labour Party's Gaza war stance leads to local election losses

Labour saw losses where former Labour councillors stood as independents following a series of resignations in wake of the Israel-Gaza war.

The New Arab Staff
04 May, 2024


Israel's war on Gaza has been a controversial issue for Labour party leader Sir Keir Starmer [GETTY]


The Labour Party's stance on the Gaza war has cost it seats at local council elections in England and Wales this week, following anger among supporters over the party leader's soft response to Israel's brutal offensive.

The left-wing opposition party lost seats in traditional Labour strongholds after several councillors defected earlier this year, dissatisfied with Sir Keir Starmer's support for Israel's "right to self-defence" in its war on Gaza, which has seen at least 34,622 Palestinians killed over seven months.

Votes were held across England and Wales on Thursday to elect local councillors and mayors, with results trickling in throughout Friday and Saturday.

Although Labour picked up 173 councillors and gained eight councils, it also saw losses where former Labour councillors stood as independents following a series of resignations in wake of Israel's military assault on Gaza.

Labour lost its majority in Oldham Council, which it had held since 2011, as independent candidates supportive of Palestine won five seats, leaving the council without a clear majority.

The party's majority had already been weakened after two defections there in April, as party supporters have felt dismayed by the leadership's inability to condemn Israel's offensive, which has triggered a major humanitarian crisis in the tiny enclave.

Senior Labour politician and shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper admitted that Gaza had become an issue for voters in the UK.

Speaking to Channel 4 news on Friday following the results, she said: "No doubt Gaza has been a factor in some council areas, and obviously in some council areas there have been other factors as well.

"In some areas we’ve had particular candidates campaign very strongly on that issue," she said.

"This is an issue where tens of thousands of people have died, including the majority of them women and children. So, rightly, people feel very strongly about this," Cooper said, in reference to Gaza.



"I think it's clear we need an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, it is devastating what’s happening we’re deeply worried about the risks that Israel may pursue a Rafah offensive which would be catastrophic in humanitarian terms that’s why an immediate ceasefire is so important," she added.

One painful episode for Labour occurred in Pendle Council, where the party lost all its seats after four councillors stood as independents. A similar scenario unfolded in Blackburn.

Labour politician Clive Betts said on Friday that his party had lost votes over its stance on Gaza.

“A lot of that was mistaken, on the belief that we hadn’t changed our position on Gaza from a few months ago, but once people take a view that we have got it wrong, it is very difficult to change their minds," the Sheffield Southeast MP said.

Many Labour supporters have been angered by Starmer's defence of Israel's war and failure to call for an outright ceasefire from the beginning.

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In a controversial interview with LBC radio in October, Starmer said that Israel had a right to cut off power and water supplies into Gaza.

"I’m very clear, Israel must have that right to defend herself," Starmer said.

When the presenter challenged him on whether that included cutting off power or water, the former lawyer said that he thought Israel did have the right to do that "within international law".

His comments received widespread backlash and prompted a spell of defections among councillors, who are responsible for governing local authorities.

In November, nine councillors in Blackburn announced resignations from the Labour Party in response to the Labour leadership’s stance over the war.

While Starmer did row back on his remarks, it came ten days later, which was regarded as too late for many supporters.


Over the course of the war, there has been a flurry of support for independent or alternative candidates, who are emphasising the war as a key campaign issue to attract disillusioned Labour voters.

Maverick political veteran and former Labour MP George Galloway won a by-election in a traditional Labour seat in northern England earlier this year in a campaign based on calling for a Gaza ceasefire.

There has also been concern that the party has lost support of Muslim communities over the topic.

Political pollster John Curtice told the BBC that Labour support is down eight points since last year in areas where more than 10 percent of the population are Muslim.

The local elections are largely seen as a forecast of what could play out in a general election expected in autumn this year.

Although the right-wing Conservatives are expected to lose power and a potentially record amount of seats after 13 years in office, Labour insiders are said to be concerned that Starmer's approach to the war could curtail Labour's gains.

Black people globally are demanding reparations. It's time politicians listen

The global fight for reparations is gaining steam, with Black communities uniting behind the cause, writes Richard Sudan.

Opinion
Voices
Richard Sudan
24 Apr, 2024

Only when the West confronts its legacy of slavery with reparations can Black communities around the world be truly free, writes Richard Sudan

 [photo credit: Getty Images]

The demand for reparations to atone for slavery and tackle the modern legacy of structural racism left in its wake is by no means a new campaign.

Following the murder of George Floyd, global Black Lives Matter protests have become more amplified and have energised the calls for justice.

But these rallying cries have been met with dismissal and inaction from a political class who are, quite simply, disconnected from reality.

"Slavery is not our history – it interrupted our history. Nor is it a politically partisan issue. It’s a feature of European development with a continual price paid by black people"

Our so-called leaders and countries have no difficulty in sending colossal sums of money to support war, apartheid, and genocide, yet sideline reparations for the descendants of captive Africans.

Western nations built by slavery are represented by governments who deliberately seek to delay the issue of reparations for perpetuity.

In the United States, for example, the HR40 bill which suggests studying reparations will likely never become law and has been stalled for decades.

The United Kingdom, the world's leading slave trading nation, is so far from acknowledging its true role in slavery that classrooms actually teach that Britain was the first country to end slavery in 1807. In fact, it was Ayiti (Haiti) in 1804.

Indeed, Britain’s industrial and scientific revolutions and development were only possible because of slavery and the underdevelopment of Africa.

Britain’s so-called greatness and empire were predicated on the subjugation of human beings with darker skin. Slavery was not merely a chapter in the UK’s development but the very fuel that underpinned it.

Despite the deliberate ignorance and lack of political will in countries like the US and the UK, nations bearing the scars of slavery are banding together to fight for justice

Earlier this month, a plan for an international tribunal — modelled on the Nuremberg Trials after World War Two — was discussed at the third session of the Permanent Forum on People of African Descent (PFPAD) in Geneva.

The proposed reparations tribunal, aiming to establish a legal framework and build UN consensus, has garnered strong support from both CARICOM and AU nations.

"Black communties in every country enriched by slavery are still impacted by the shadow of the past"

Transatlantic slavery was the greatest crime in modern history. The black holocaust saw tens of millions of Africans uprooted from their homelands, and forced to build nations in which they’ve yet to be treated as equal citizens.

Reparations can help to tackle the entrenched economic disparities and can at least attempt to heal the ongoing intergenerational trauma created by slavery.

There are certainly challenges. But the agreement for an international tribunal is indicative of a growing conversation which will not go away so long as structural inequalities persist.


Caribbean nations, in particular, remain neo-colonially shackled by financial institutions like the World Bank and the IMF.

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But to be clear, black communties in every country enriched by slavery are still impacted by the shadow of the past.

We know all too well that racialised policing in the United States has its roots in slave patrols and that the US prison system is dubbed the new form of slavery for very good reason. Black people make up disproportionately high numbers in American jails and are often exploited for cheap labour, benefiting companies profiting from the private prison industry.

We can see, too, how black people are treated as less than human in Brazil, which accounts for the greatest number of enslaved Africans. There are many more examples we could highlight.

But our own families tell a tale too reminding us that slavery was not long ago, but yesterday in human terms. In fact, in my family, slavery was four people ago.

My Caribbean roots are Afro-Guyanese. My dad’s grandfather’s grandmother was born in 1832 before the end of emancipation in 1833. She was likely born as somebody’s property.

I have a picture of her, a black woman, with a Scottish surname, Chesney. James Chesney was a leading slave owner in Guyana. I may never know what my families’ African name was or where they came from. But I do know that Europeans captured and owned them. Their lives meant something.


"Africans, and black people of African descent, are saying no more and are demanding reparations. It’s not a handout but a debt that must be paid if European countries are to ever move forward in any meaningful way"

There has never been a moral counterargument to the notion of reparations. But both the left and the right have opposed it becoming a reality for different reasons.

Liberal hypocrites have supported justice for other communities including Jewish communties, Japanese Americans and Native Americans, but have offered near silence when it comes to black people. At best, they’ve offered ineffective anti-racism measures and might have argued for police reform in the form of holding a placard at a demonstration.

Right-wingers have openly and consistently expressed contempt for black people and have in some cases argued that slavery benefited black and African people culturally.


Slavery is not our history – it interrupted our history. Nor is it a politically partisan issue. It’s a feature of European development with a continual price paid by black people.



Africans, and black people of African descent, are saying no more and are demanding reparations. It’s not a handout but a debt that must be paid if European countries are to ever move forward in any meaningful way.

African and Caribbean nations moving toward a tribunal model of reparations to be taken to the UN is a good idea. This is what Malcolm X thought before he was killed.

It's also not a coincidence that African nations are kicking out the remaining European forces from their countries.

States within the United States considering reparations independently, rather than relying on the federal government, serves as another sign of shifting perspectives and expectations.

The Brattle Report from last year, which assessed that nations that benefited from slavery should pay reparations amounting to trillions of pounds – and laying out why – was another important step.

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Communities demanding reparations are organising like never before. There is work to be done, but I believe reparations will become a reality. Black people are putting it firmly on the agenda, and there is increasing unity on this issue.

Even the Church has pledged £100 million pounds to begin righting the wrongs of the past.

Our governments need to read the room and support these calls. To not do so will come at a high political and social price, sooner rather than later.



Richard Sudan is a journalist and writer specialising in anti-racism and has reported on various human rights issues from around the world. His writing has been published by The Guardian, Independent, The Voice and many others.
Follow him on Twitter: @richardsudan

Google fired me for standing against tech complicity in Gaza genocide. But justice cannot be stopped

Google has fired employees for protesting ties to Israel beginning with Project Nimbus. One such employee, Mohammad Khatami, argues Google cannot stop justice

Mohammad Khatami
29 Apr, 2024

Protestors, including Google workers, gathered in front of Google's San Francisco offices demanding an end to its work with the Israeli government. [Getty]

The software engineering job offer I received from Google came at the perfect time.

I was in my senior year of college, lacking confidence and riddled with anxiety.

The email from Google in my inbox validated all the years I spent studying. The hard work I had put into sharpening my coding skills had paid off, and I felt elated.

When I started working at Google in August 2022, I remember sending my parents photos of the office and cherishing their amazement. I remember bringing friends in to try the food and to experience an office that was famous for feeling like a college campus. I loved seeing their smiles looking at the New York City Financial District skyline from the 14th-floor terrace.

Google is famous for being a 'worker-friendly' workplace combining forward-thinking engineering with free food, massages, and even nap pods. How wrong that all turned out to be.

A few months after I joined the company, my excitement about this job was shattered when I learned about Project Nimbus, Google’s and Amazon’s $1.2 billion cloud computing contract with the Israeli government. The details of the agreement were deeply unsettling: massive cloud server clusters of vague purpose would be built within the borders of Israel, where indigenous Palestinians are subject to military occupation and apartheid rule, routinely persecuted, dehumanized, displaced, and killed in an ongoing, state-sponsored process of ethnic cleansing aided by high tech infrastructure.

Security and management of the clusters would be handed over to Palestine's occupier, potentially allowing the Israeli military free reign to use Google's technology however they wanted despite Google's repeated denials that are disputed even by Israel's military.

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October 7 and the Gaza genocide

Worker dissent and public opinion objections to the deal were to be contractually ignored under the deal with Israel, despite clear evidence that the project would serve the goals of the Israeli military. To avoid criticism, Google would continuously deny the military nature of the contract for years even as Israel itself has said otherwise.

When Israel began its medieval siege against Gaza over 200 days ago, my fears about working for Google intensified. It quickly became clear that Israel intended to commit a genocide and was leveraging artificial intelligence to enable it.

To commit a massacre of this scale, data is as important as ammunition. The Israeli occupation boasts about the sophistication of its targeting systems, which are developed by training machine learning models on extensive data collected through invasive surveillance of Palestinians.

Israel prefers striking targets while individuals are in their family homes, tracking Palestinians using automated systems with depraved names like “Where’s Daddy.” Merely returning home exposes Palestinians and their families to risk. When questioned about their preference for using conventional bombs over precision-guided weapons that could minimize civilian casualties, the Israeli military stated that they do not see the value in expending expensive munitions on “unimportant people.”

In response to Israel’s crimes of genocide and collective punishment, Google has doubled down on their relationship with the Israeli military.

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From search engine to the military industrial complex

As recently as a month ago, a Google contract proved direct services to the Israeli military, confirming that company leadership had been misleading workers for years regarding the military applications of Project Nimbus.

In other words, Google workers are expected to develop technology that can be evidently used to streamline Israel’s genocide, and we are expected to remain silent about it.

Once upon a time, Google’s slogan was “Don’t be evil.” They abandoned this motto in the last decade to transition into a glorified military contractor.

What appeared to be an incredible job from the outside now resembles a dystopian adult daycare centre to me. The reality of working at Google is that it is a place where a chipper attitude, a false veneer of liberalism, and a collection of inconsequential, constantly shifting projects, are fervently promoted by Google’s propaganda to obscure the company’s business model that seem to include profiting from no-questions-asked militarisation that can enable genocide.

With just a few public statements about how black lives matter, Google could pretend that it hadn’t - allegedly - made billions off of the destitution of black people in the Congo. With a tweet celebrating Indigenous People’s month, Google could unironically evade criticism for operating an office in Tel Aviv, a city built on the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in Jaffa. Google mastered the song and dance of wokeness for the public, and internally, it keeps an iron grip on dissent.

For years, I and other Googlers with the No Tech for Apartheid campaign opposed Project Nimbus within the company. We shared petitions, sent internal memos, and submitted ethics reviews. In response, we were doxxed, harassed, silenced, ignored then ultimately fired in order to ensure that Google's profits in occupied Palestine and the global military industry remained unchallenged.

Many workers witnessed this repression, but company culture promotes fear and apathy over integrity. Google is two-faced. The colorful office, scooters, music rooms, and desserts all serve to distract from the backdrop of aggressive retaliation and a culture of fear. Google can only sustain profits from violence if it is able to ensure the complicity of its workers. And it is disheartening how some of the world’s brightest minds can be placated by comfort and used to increase wealth at the expense of human life.

But make no mistake; Google is destined to fail. Workers are waking up to the reality of their exploitation, and our ability to stand against the unethical use of our labour is only growing stronger. Abuse and oppression are unsustainable in the long term.

Today, on Wall Street, Google’s ticker symbol sits next to an upward green arrow—business has been prosperous for the profiteers of genocide. But workers play a critical role in the growing movement for liberation, and we will not forget Google’s complicity.

Justice will prevail.

Mohammad Khatami a former Google software engineer and organizer with NoTechForApartheid movement.

Follow him on TikTok

SOME FOLKS CALL THEM CHEMTRAILS

More Data Needed to Understand Contrails, their Climate Effect and to Develop Mitigation

The report highlights the complexity of contrail science, noting gaps in the understanding of how contrails form, or when they could persist, and how they impact the climate

SME News Service

Published on: 

05 May 2024

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) called for urgent action to deepen the understanding on the formation and climate impact of aviation contrails to develop effective mitigation measures.

The newly released IATA report Aviation Contrails and their Climate Effect: Tackling Uncertainties and Enabling Solutions calls for a strengthening of collaboration between research and technological innovation, coupled with policy frameworks to address aviation’s non-CO2 emissions through more atmospheric data.

The report highlights the complexity of contrail science, noting gaps in the understanding of how contrails form, or when they could persist, and how they impact the climate. The lack of high-resolution, real-time data on atmospheric conditions (particularly humidity and temperature at cruising altitudes) hinders precise contrail forecasting.

Willie Walsh, IATA’s Director General said: "The industry and its stakeholders are working to address the impact of non-CO2 emissions on climate change, particularly contrails. To ensure that this effort is effective and without adverse effects, we must better understand how and where contrails form and shrink the uncertainties related to their climate impact.

"Action now, means more trials, collection of more data, improvement of climate models, and maturing technologies and operations. Formulating and implementing regulations based on insufficient data and limited scientific understanding is foolish and could lead to adverse impacts on the climate.

"That is why the most important conclusion from this report is to urge all stakeholders to work together to resolve current gaps in the science so that we can take effective actions."

Recommendations

With current levels of understanding, the report made the following recommendations:

• In the immediate term (2024-2030), the priority for mitigating aviation’s climate change impact should be on reducing CO2 emissions over the uncertain gains that could stem from contrail detection and their mitigation. Over this time, increasing airline participation in sensor programs, continuing scientific research, and improving humidity and climate models should be the focus of work on contrail mitigation.

• Mid-term actions (2030-2040) should involve establishing standards for data transmission, continuous validation of models, and encouraging aircraft manufacturers to include provisions for meteorological observations, as well as selected avoidance.

• Longer-term actions (2040-2050): Aircraft should be continuously providing data and the models and infrastructure should be there and be reliable. The community will have at this point a more complete understanding of the non-CO2 effects of alternative fuels, with extended mitigation measures. These action items collectively aim to mitigate the climate impact of aviation while advancing scientific understanding and technological capabilities.

Background on Aviation’s Non-CO2 Emissions

Aviation's impact on climate extends beyond CO2 emissions, with non-CO2 effects such as contrails and nitrogen oxides (NOx) also contributing to global warming. Persistent contrails, formed in ice-supersaturated regions, can transform into cirrus clouds which reflect incoming solar radiation (during the day) as well as trap outgoing heat.

On balance, it is understood that contrails have a warming effect on the climate, with diurnal, seasonal, and geographical variations. However, despite extensive studies, significant uncertainties exist with respect to the capacity to predict individual contrail formation and their specific climate impact.

Initiatives and Trials: Recent collaborations among meteorologists, climate researchers, airlines, and aircraft manufacturers have yielded new insights that underscore the need for enhanced data collection and analyses of the likely air traffic network complications regarding any solutions.

Trials with modified flight paths and alternative fuels have shown potential yet limited efficacy due to the variability of atmospheric conditions and the localized nature of where contrails occur.

Technological Advances and Future Directions: Advancements in developing humidity sensors to be placed on aircraft are critical for contrail prediction and avoidance strategies. Current sensor technology on commercial aircraft lacks the required sensitivity and response time, and there are only a handful of such sensors in operation at altitude.

Ongoing research aims to develop more accurate, robust, and scalable solutions, and the use of sensors on a limited population of aircraft would allow the necessary improvement and validation of numerical weather prediction models.

Calif. state Sen. Blakespear says coastal railroad is at a climate crossroads. 'The data is clear and the message more urgent.'

Phil Diehl, The San Diego Union-Tribune
on May 5, 2024

A coordinated, multiagency effort is essential to save Southern California's coastal rail corridor from sea-level rise and erosion, state Sen. Catherine Blakespear warned last week.

"The data is clear and the message more urgent than ever that our coastline near the rail line is at critical risk of failure," said Blakespear, D-Encinitas, at a hearing held by the Subcommittee on LOSSAN Rail Corridor Resiliency that she chairs in Sacramento
Seven different state and regional administrators updated the subcommittee Monday on the status of problem areas along the 351-mile-long Los Angeles-San Diego-San Luis Obispo rail corridor, focusing primarily on trouble spots in San Diego County and San Clemente in neighboring Orange County. The route is San Diego's only passenger and freight train connection to Los Angeles and the rest of the United States.
Sections of the railroad in Del Mar and San Clemente are especially vulnerable.

About 1.7 miles of the track in Del Mar follows the edge of a tall, fragile bluff 60 feet above the ocean. The San Diego Association of Governments, the regional planning agency, has been working for years on plans to reroute the tracks into a tunnel away from the bluff, but that won't happen until at least 2035.

In San Clemente, a seven-mile stretch of the track runs along the shrinking beach below crumbling bluffs.

"The rail is getting attacked from both sides," said San Clemente City Manager Andy Hall. Mother Nature has assaulted the tracks there from the west by scouring the sand from the beach, and from the east by weakening the steep bluff and unleashing landslides.

The Orange County Transportation Authority recently began considering long-term solutions for the seven miles of beachfront track there, including the possibility of a new inland route. However, the relocation there is uncertain and, if chosen, is decades in the future.

Any solution, even a quick one, is expensive. The Orange County Transporation Authority, working with Metrolink, spent $9.2 million on cleanup and construction of a catchment wall finished in March after a landslide at Mariposa Point in San Clemente.

In December 2023, the OCTA identified four new trouble spots that need protection from beach erosion and possible slope failures, said Darrell Johnson, the agency's chief executive officer.

"Potential solutions, in a perfect world ... would need to be in place ... or substantially underway, by the fall of 2024 ahead of the next storm season," Johnson said.

A rough estimate of the cost for the work needed immediately is $210 million to $310 million, he said. A more realistic time frame is that it would take up to four years to plan, engineer, obtain funding and build the projects.


Several presenters at the hearing emphasized the need for a multipronged approach to protect the tracks.

The three basic tactics are: replenishing sand on the beaches, adding and expanding rock revetments west of the tracks and installing barrier-like catchment walls east of the tracks where they are threatened by landslides.

Sand replenishment is widely considered the best answer.

Along with protecting the railroad, wider beaches preserve access to the coast and provide the recreational spaces loved by residents and visitors alike. Also, many people consider sand to be a more nature-based solution to the railroad's problems than building walls or dumping rocks that can contribute to beach erosion.

However, dredging sand from the ocean, harbors and lagoons to widen beaches is costly and time-consuming. Also, eventually the sand washes away again.

"It's probably not realistic to expect a nature-based solution would hold up all by itself," said California Coastal Commission Executive Director Kate Huckelbridge. "We understand the need for sort of a multicomponent, but it (sand) should be a major part of any project."

In Del Mar, the Coastal Commission approved new seawalls in 2022 as part of the ongoing efforts to protect the blufftop tracks until a new route is completed. However, the Coastal Commission also required the installation of stairways and trails as part of the project to preserve public access to the beach.

Overall rail ridership remains down from the pre-pandemic highs of 2019. However, passengers are slowly returning.

Amtrak ridership on a rider-per-mile basis in March of this year, when limited service was restored after the Mariposa Point slide, reached 101% of March 2019, said Los-Angeles-San Diego-San Luis Obispo (LOSSAN) Rail Corridor Agency Managing Director Jason Jewel.

By the end of this March, Amtrak restored service to its previous level of 10 round-trip daily trains between San Diego and Los Angeles. As a result, April ridership is forecast to increase by 8% to 10% over March, Jewel said.


Amtrak expects the upward trend to continue through the summer, when more people tend to choose the train for vacation travel and for special events such as the X-Games in Ventura, the horse races at Del Mar and Comic-Con in San Diego.

Tuesday's hearing was the subcommittee's fourth, the second this year. After its meeting in January, the subcommittee sent a letter to the California State Transportation Agency suggesting a formalized partnership among the agencies using the corridor.

The state agency has a "working group" that helps to identify and respond to issues along the corridor, but so far has taken no steps toward an official partnership.

_____


©2024 The San Diego Union-Tribune. Visit sandiegouniontribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Tories smashed at local elections leaving Rishi Sunak on political death row


ByRob Harris
May 6, 2024 — 

London: Rishi Sunak is on political death row after his party suffered crushing defeats in a series of mayoral contests at the weekend including London and its flagship West Midlands. His fate appears sealed whether his Conservative colleagues mount a challenge to him in the coming weeks or not.

No amount of positive spinning on the horror result can mask the fact that British voters are waiting with cricket bats for a 14-year-old government, with the Conservatives losing close to 500 council seats as well as the Blackpool South parliamentary by-election on a 26 per cent swing to Labour.

Putting on a brave face… British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.CREDIT:GETTY

Analysis of the votes across the country put the Tories a record low 25 per cent projected national vote share, with the party overtaken by Liberal Democrats in the number of council seats for the first time since 1996.

While it remains unclear whether Labour would be able to form a majority in its own right, the Conservatives now seem incapable of avoiding a hammering.

But after weeks of speculation of a move against him, it appears even Sunak’s colleagues have lost hope that changing the leader could do anything ahead of the general election, due by the end of the year.

Former Home Secretary Suella Braverman regrets backing Sunak, she says.CREDIT:GETTY

Speaking to the BBC, Suella Braverman - whom Sunak sacked as home secretary last year - said many of her colleagues are “privately demoralised and incredibly concerned about their prospects”.

“At this rate, we’ll be lucky to have any Conservative MPs at the next election, and we need to fight,” she said.

Asked if she wanted to see a change in leader, Braverman said: “I just don’t think that is a feasible prospect right now, we don’t have enough time and it is impossible for anyone new to come and change our fortunes to be honest.

“Rishi Sunak has been leading us for about 18 months, he has been making these decisions, these are consequences of those decisions. He needs to own this, and therefore he needs to fix it.”

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In the 18 months since he replaced his failed predecessor, Liz Truss, Sunak has lost seven parliamentary by-election elections, tens of MPs, and back-to-back local elections.

A one-time Goldman Sachs banker whose wife, Akshata Murthy, is the daughter of an Indian technology billionaire, Sunak has struggled to come across as a relatable figure.

He has been lampooned for his amateur and cringe-worthy social media attempts and his decisions to wear $900 Prada suede loafers to a construction site.

National polls show the Labour leading the Conservatives by more than 20 percentage points, a stubborn gap that the prime minister has been unable to close.

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In a message to voters ahead of the local elections, Sunak said they would have a choice between “a plan versus no plan, bold principled action versus U-turns and prevarication, a clear record of delivery versus political game playing.”

But asked if she regretted supporting Sunak’s bid for the Conservative leadership, Braverman said: “Honestly, yes I do”.

“The plan is not working and I despair at these terrible results,” she said. “I love my country, I care about my party and I want us to win, and I am urging the prime minister to change course, to, with humility, reflect on what the voters are telling us, and change the plan and the way that he is communicating and leading us.”

The defeat by Labour of Andy Street, the popular Tory mayor of West Midlands, by just 1508 votes has also caused psychological damage to the party, with one Conservative MP calling it “an inflection point”.

Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer speaks following Labour candidate for West Midlands Mayor Richard Parker’s victory in Birmingham

.CREDIT:GETTY

Street, former CEO of the John Lewis department store chain, had held the post for two terms and during the campaign did everything he could to dissociate himself from the Conservatives.

And despite speculation that the mayoral contest in London could be tight, Labour’s Sadiq Khan won a third term by taking a 43.8 per cent share of the vote, easily seeing off Conservative Susan Hall, who won 32.7 per cent.

There remain some questions for Labour and its leader Sir Keir Starmer, with it clear that the party was punished in parts of the country by Muslim voters, in a sign its stance on the Israel-Gaza war is affecting its support.

In 58 local council wards analysed by the BBC, where more than 1 in 5 residents identify as Muslim, Labour’s share of the vote was 21 per cent down on 2021, the last time most seats were contested.

George Galloway’s strongly pro-Palestinian Workers Party of Britain won four council seats - two in Rochdale, one in Calderdale and one in Manchester, where they ousted the Labour deputy leader of the council Luthfur Rahman.

But, for now, Labour can afford to put its problems aside for another day. It’s Sunak who has to decide if his premiership ends with a bang or a whimper.

Britain: Will Sunak Pay the Price for the Defeat?

Opinion

Jumah Boukleb

Sunday - 5 May 2024

The mayoral and council elections in England and Wales ended last Thursday, and the results aligned with pollsters’ projections that the ruling Conservative Party would suffer a significant defeat. Quickly and confidently, the opposition Labour Party climbed over the Conservatives’ shoulders and took in its victory. If the results are replicated in the upcoming parliamentary elections, Labour has cleared its path to 10 Downing Street. It is worth noting that every party but the Conservatives managed to increase their number of council seats. The Conservatives lost nearly half of their local council seats and suffered a humiliating parliamentary by-election defeat in Blackpool South to the Labour Party by a large margin.

According to commentators, the elections are significant because of the reactions they could stir in Conservative Party circles, especially their implications for the British Prime Minister and Conservative Party Leader Rishi Sunak.

A few days before the election date, I read a statement British Home Secretary James Cleverly had made to the media warning Conservative MPs against the repercussions of ousting and replacing Mr. Sunak after the election results came out. The statement shows that Cleverly had anticipated the striking magnitude of the Conservatives' defeat and that he knew it would concern many Conservative Party officials and MPs, encouraging them to hastily take a risky political gamble.

It's evident from the statement and its timing that Cleverly is well aware of what is happening behind closed doors. He has clearly been briefed on the reported plot by groups of (mostly far-right) Conservative MPs who support former Prime Minister Boris Johnson.

Losers have nothing to fear from another loss. This is true for life in general, and it is particularly true for politics. None of the Conservative MPs, who are threatened with losing their seats in the upcoming elections, would disagree. Accordingly, many Conservative MPs will not hesitate to seize any opportunity to throw the dice one last time, hoping for good luck and a win, or at least to minimize their electoral defeat. Of course, it will not be too difficult to find opportunists who are ready to lead the plot and volunteer to wield the dagger and stab Prime Minister Sunak in the back. Indeed, conventional wisdom tells us that if the loser has nothing to fear, gamblers have an opportunity to win, if not the parliamentary elections, then the party leadership. After that, all bets are off!

Despite its dazzling lights, the world of politics remains a dark and frightening place that the faint-hearted should avoid. In the hallways of British politics in general, and those of the Conservative Party in particular, this obscurity seems particularly pronounced. The bright lights conceal tense struggles between different parties that represent competing and conflicting interests. Each of them seeks to hold the levers of power and protect their interests, and to all of them, "the end justifies the means.”

If the price of maintaining the current status quo and avoiding electoral defeat demands nothing more than removing the Conservative leader and replacing him, then the problem would seem to have been solved. However, the Conservatives would not solve their problems by getting rid of Mr. Sunak. Their actual problem is that parliamentary elections are not far off. The noose around their neck is becoming tighter every day. They do not have the time to orchestrate and implement a plan to avert a painful electoral fate that could mirror that which they suffered at the hands of New Labour and Sir Tony Blair in 1997.

Rights groups call on Tajikistan to disclose whereabouts of “forcibly disappeared” opposition leader

Suhrob Zafar. / Guruhi24.com, HRW

By bne IntelliNews May 4, 2024

A call for Tajikistan to "immediately confirm the detention and whereabouts of and release" Suhrob Zafar, leader of the opposition Group 24 movement outlawed by Dushanbe, was on May 3 made by Human Rights Watch (HRW), the Norwegian Helsinki Committee and the International Partnership for Human Rights.

Zafar’s whereabouts have been unknown since early March, when he disappeared in Turkey in a suspected case of transnational repression. Group 24 is headquartered in Istanbul.

The human rights groups described Zafar as "forcibly disappeared”, despite his holding of official UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) asylum seeker status in Turkey.

In a statement, they cited unnamed sources as saying the Tajik State Committee for National Security is holding Zafar in its detention centre in Dushanbe, "periodically torturing him, and [denying] him medical assistance".

The Tajik government has not stated whether or not Zafar is in state custody or if it knows of his whereabouts.

"There are devastating reports that Suhrob Zafar may already have lost his ability to walk as a result of torture, so prompt action could be a matter of life and death," said Syinat Sultanalieva, Central Asia researcher at HRW.

"Tajik authorities should immediately verify Zafar’s detention status and whereabouts and urgently investigate allegations that he has been tortured."

Authorities should also ensure and confirm that Zafar's legal rights are respected, the rights groups added, saying he should be given contact with his family, access to a lawyer of his own choosing and necessary medical treatment.

The whereabouts of another Group 24 member, Nasimjon Sharifov, who went missing in late February while residing in Turkey, are also unknown.

In March 2015, the movement's founder, businessman Umarali Quvatov, was assassinated in Istanbul.

Group 24 is an opposition movement seeking political reforms in Tajikistan. It was banned and designated “terrorist” in October 2014, after it called on the Tajik population to publicly protest against the government.

In the last decade, according to HRW, Tajik authorities have cracked down brutally on the group and its members, imprisoning scores at home and driving large numbers into exile. Last month, a Freedom House report, Nations in Transit: A Region Reordered by Autocracy and Democracy, assessed that there is zero tolerance of opposition politics by Tajikistan’s Rahmon regime.

bne IntelliNews has reported on how there are fears that so heavy is the repression in Tajikistan that Tajiks who have lost hope of a better life are targeted by Islamist terrorist groups who radicalise the individuals and assign them to cells that commit terrorist attacks abroad.

Turkey is a member of Europe’s top human rights body Council of Europe and party to the European Convention on Human Rights, and any involvement of, or acquiescence by, Turkish state agents in the forcible disappearance of and potential extrajudicial transfer of Zafar and Sharifov to Tajikistan is a serious violation of the convention, HRW noted.

The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) has warned that “any extra-judicial transfer or extraordinary rendition, by its deliberate circumvention of due process, is an absolute negation of the rule of law and the values protected by the Convention. It therefore amounts to a violation of the most basic rights guaranteed by the Convention.”

“Türkiye should thoroughly investigate the unlawful actions on Turkish territory, which appear to have led to the forced rendition to Tajikistan of Zafar Sukhrob,” said Marius Fossum, regional representative in Central Asia at the Norwegian Helsinki Committee. “Zafar should be released pending a fair trial on any credible charges and provided with redress for the violation of his rights as a result of his forced removal to Tajikistan.”