US takes aim at Zuckerberg’s social media kingdom

By AFP
April 9, 2025


Mark Zuckerberg (C), seen here attending the inauguration of US President Donald Trump, is expected to take the stand as Meta goes to trial over antitrust claims - Copyright POOL/AFP Shawn THEW

Alex PIGMAN

Barring any eleventh-hour intervention, social media juggernaut Meta will stand trial next week facing serious US government allegations that it abused its market power to acquire Instagram and WhatsApp before they could become competitors.

By moving forward, the trial in a Washington federal court dashes any hopes from Meta boss Mark Zuckerberg that the return of Donald Trump to the White House would see the government let up on the enforcement of antitrust law against Big Tech.

The Meta case is being made by the Federal Trade Commission, the powerful US consumer protection agency, and could see the owner of Facebook forced to divest Instagram and WhatsApp, which have grown into global powerhouses since their buyout.

The case was originally made in December 2020, during the first Trump administration, and all eyes were on whether Trump would soften his stance against Big Tech during his second stint in the White House.

Zuckerberg, the world’s third-richest person, has made repeated visits to the White House as he tries to persuade the US leader to choose settlement instead of fighting the trial, a decision that would be extraordinary at this late stage.

FTC Chair Andrew Ferguson downplayed such possibilities, telling The Verge: “I think that the President recognizes that we’ve got to enforce the laws, so I’d be very surprised if anything like that ever happened.”

Zuckerberg’s lobbying efforts have included Trump inauguration fund contributions and overhauled content moderation policies favoring Republicans.

Even so, “I’m not sure Trump is persuaded that Zuckerberg is worthy of redemption,” said George Hay, an antitrust law professor at Cornell Law School.

While a White House intervention remains technically possible, it would require both presidential and FTC agreement that the case lacks merit, he added.

The Meta lawsuit represents just one of five major tech antitrust actions initiated by the US government recently. Google was found guilty of search market dominance abuse last August, while Apple and Amazon also face cases.

Zuckerberg, his former lieutenant Sheryl Sandberg, and a long line of executives from rival companies will be taking the stand over a trial that will last at least eight weeks and kicks off on Monday.



– ‘Really scary’ –



Central to the case is Facebook’s 2012 billion-dollar purchase of Instagram — then a small but promising photo-sharing startup designed for mobile phones that now boasts two billion active users.

An email from Zuckerberg cited by the FTC reveals the concerns: “The potential impact of Instagram is really scary and why we might want to consider paying a lot of money for this.”

The FTC argues Meta’s $19-billion WhatsApp acquisition in 2014 followed the same pattern, with Zuckerberg fearing the messaging app could either transform into a social network or be purchased by a competitor.

Meta’s defense will argue that substantial investments transformed these acquisitions into the blockbusters they are today, bearing little resemblance to their original versions.

They’ll also highlight that the FTC initially approved both transactions and shouldn’t be permitted a redo.

Recent court setbacks for the FTC — including failed challenges to Meta’s Within acquisition and Microsoft’s Activision Blizzard merger — may strengthen Big Tech’s position.

Judge James Boasberg, who will decide and preside over the case, has already cautioned that the FTC “faces hard questions about whether its claims can hold up in the crucible of trial.”

Author of explosive Meta memoir to star at US Senate hearing


By AFP
  April 9, 2025


Meta co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has cozied up to US President Donald Trump since the Republican was elected 

- Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP Samuel Corum

The former Facebook employee behind a scathing book about parent company Meta will testify Wednesday before US senators keen to establish whether the social networking giant ever collaborated with the Chinese government.

Former global policy director Sarah Wynn-Williams has alleged the company explored the possibility of breaking into the lucrative Chinese market by appeasing Beijing’s government censors.

Meta communications director Andy Stone told AFP the company “ultimately decided not to go through with the ideas we’d explored.”

The company’s family of apps is currently blocked in China.

Wynn-Williams’s testimony at a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing will focus on Meta’s foreign relations moves and on what its executives have previously told Congress.

Of particular interest at Wednesday’s hearing, headed by Republican Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, is whether Wynn-Williams contradicts what Meta co-founder and chief executive Mark Zuckerberg has stated under oath during past congressional hearings.

Wynn-Williams’s book, “Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism,” was released on March 11 and became a hot seller despite Meta winning an arbitration court order barring the author from promoting the work or making derogatory statements about the company.

Her book recounts working at the tech titan from 2011 to 2017 and includes claims of sexual harassment by longtime company executive Joel Kaplan, a prominent Republican and ally of President Donald Trump who took over as head of Meta’s global affairs team this year.

Meta took the matter to arbitration, contending the book violates a non-disparagement contract signed by Wynn-Williams when she worked with the company’s global affairs team.

Stone said Wynn-Williams was “fired for poor performance and toxic behavior,” having made a series of allegations that the company investigated and found to be unfounded.

“Careless People” ranks second on a New York Times bestseller list of nonfiction books, with another title highly critical of Meta close behind.

“The Anxious Generation,” which paints a dark picture of social media’s effect on children, is currently fourth on the Times bestseller list, a year after its release.

Japan to sell more rice reserves as prices soar

By AFP
April 9, 2025

The shortages have been driven by factors including poor harvests caused by hot weather and panic-buying prompted by a "megaquake" warning last year 

- Copyright AFP Kazuhiro NOGI

Japan will sell more rice from its emergency stockpile through July in an attempt to stabilise soaring prices, the agricultural minister said Wednesday.

After rice prices nearly doubled year-on-year, the government began auctioning its stockpile last month — the first time since it was started in 1995.

“In order to stabilise rice prices that have soared, the government will sell off its reserve rice every month until this summer” when newly harvested rice enters the market, agricultural minister Taku Eto said.

The shortages have been driven by factors including poor harvests due to hot weather in 2023 and panic-buying prompted by a “megaquake” warning last year.

Record numbers of tourists have also been blamed for a rise in consumption.

And some businesses are thought to be keeping their inventories and waiting for the most opportune time to sell.

The government has so far released around 210,000 tonnes of rice.

The next auction of 100,000 tons will take place in the week of April 21.

The retail price for five kilograms of rice in the last week of March was 4,206 yen ($29), up 104.5 percent year-on-year.

Japan is aiming to boost its rice exports almost eightfold to 350,000 tonnes by 2030, the government said last month.

Rice consumption in Japan has more than halved over the past 60 years as diets have changed to include more bread, noodles and other energy sources.

The new target is part of a long-term national policy to boost overseas rice shipments and make farming it more efficient as the country’s ageing population shrinks.

Rice also appears to have been a factor in US President Donald Trump’s hefty tariffs of 24 percent on Japanese imports into the United States.

The White House has accused Japan of imposing a 700-percent tariff on US rice imports, a claim that Eto was quoted as calling “incomprehensible”.

Thailand revokes visa of US academic charged with royal insult


By AFP
April 9, 2025


A sign is displayed outside the Criminal Court during a protest against article 112, Thailand's lese majeste royal defamation law

 - Copyright AFP Pedro UGARTE

Thailand’s immigration authorities revoked the visa Wednesday of a prominent American scholar detained a day earlier on royal defamation charges, his lawyer said.

Paul Chambers, who has spent over a decade teaching Southeast Asia politics at a Thai university, had his bail request rejected Tuesday by a court in Phitsanulok province after reporting to police to answer a charge of lese-majeste.

His case is a rare instance of a foreigner falling foul of strict laws which shield King Maha Vajiralongkorn and his close family from any criticism and can lead to decades-long prison sentences.

“The immigration police just came into the detention centre earlier this afternoon,” said Wannaphat Jenroumjit, who is with the Thai Lawyers for Human Rights (TLHR) and representing Chambers.

The Thai military filed a complaint against Chambers earlier this year over an article linked to a think-tank website which focuses on Southeast Asia politics.

“Urgent! Lawyers have been informed that immigration police have revoked the visa of Paul Chambers,” TLHR posted on X.

The organisation said it will appeal the visa revocation decision within 48 hours and continue efforts to secure Chambers’ release.

Wannaphat told AFP she had submitted a second bail request on Tuesday and was awaiting the court’s decision.

She said Chambers was “not confident but remains hopeful” in the Thai justice system.

Chambers told AFP last week he felt “intimidated” by the situation, but was being supported by the US embassy and colleagues at his university.

The US State Department said Tuesday it was “alarmed” by the arrest.

Chanatip Tatiyakaroonwong, a researcher at Amnesty International who campaigns for the release of political prisoners, said the visa revocation was meant to “intimidate” Chambers.

“They found his work threatening, so revoking his visa means he can no longer remain in Thailand and continue his work,” he told AFP.

“The visa revocation is meant to send a message to foreign journalists and academics working in Thailand, that speaking about the monarchy could lead to consequences.”

He added that the chances of Chambers being granted bail looked grim, given a “pattern” in which people charged under lese-majeste laws are rarely granted bail.

International watchdogs have expressed concern over the use of the laws — known as Article 112 — against academics, activists and even students.

One man in northern Thailand was jailed for at least 50 years for lese-majeste last year, while a woman got 43 years in 2021.

In 2023, a man was jailed for two years for selling satirical calendars featuring rubber ducks that a court said defamed the king.

Greek general strike hits transport and commerce


By AFP
April 9, 2025


Greek unions called for a 24-hour strike against the high cost of living 

- Copyright AFP Pedro PARDO

More than 15,000 people took to the streets in Greece on Wednesday in the second 24-hour general strike this year, calling for higher wages to match the rising cost of living.

Transport ground to a halt as air traffic controllers joined the action, while rail and public transport as well as island ferry services were hit.

Schools, courts, banks and public offices were also shut as part of the demonstrations.

The action came as the new sweeping tariffs imposed by US President Donald Trump come into effect. They include a 20-percent levy on the European Union, of which Greece is a member.

In Athens, police said more than 10,000 people gathered near parliament as part of public- and private-sector union action against the conservative government of Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.

Protesters shouted “salary increases”, “injustice is suffocating us” and “down with New Democracy” — Mitsotakis’s party.

Public sector union ADEDY blamed the “exorbitant prices” on “the cartels that operate freely in the energy sector but also in various products and services”.

Increasing housing costs were the result of “anarchic tourist development”, it added, pointing the finger at the government.



– ’10 years of stagnation’ –



In Greece’s second-largest city Thessaloniki, some 5,000 people turned out to protest.

“We can’t live decently with these salaries that we receive,” shopworker Eleni Iaonnidou, 27, told AFP.

“When we spend nearly 50 percent of our salary on rent, how can we live?”

“My pension is not even enough for 20 days a month,” said Kostas Papaioannou, 69. “We’re asking for something very simple: to be able to meet the basic needs of our life.”

ADEDY said there had been “10 years of stagnation” and that salaries had only increased by four percent this year and one percent last year.

Private sector union GSEE wants the reinstatement of collective agreements cancelled during the financial difficulties of the last decade and “real increases to counter the high cost of living”.

Although Greece saw high economic growth of 2.2 percent last year, salaries remain low despite rising taxes and inflation that hit 3.5 percent in the middle of last year.

Faced with mounting public anger, the government pushed up the minimum wage from to 880 euros ($972) a month from April 1, a 6.4-percent jump from 830 euros.

In February, huge protests marking the second anniversary of Greece’s worst rail tragedy turned violent, as masked youths threw petrol bombs and rocks at police, who responded with tear gas and stun grenades.

Argentina braces for 24-hour strike as it awaits news on IMF loan


By AFP

April 9, 2025


Argentina's President Javier Milei faces another general strike in response to austerity measures - Copyright AFP DANIEL DUARTE

Philippe BERNES-LASSERRE

Argentina is bracing for fresh austerity protests Wednesday, with a 24-hour general strike slated to start at midnight against President Javier Milei, who remains focused on Washington and a new IMF loan.

Thursday’s labor action will be the third general strike in budget-slashing Milei’s 16-month-old presidency, and was called by unions to protest his brand of “chainsaw” austerity.

Milei had famously wielded a live chainsaw during his presidential campaign to symbolize the cuts he would make to the bureaucracy and social spending.

In office, he has slashed subsidies for transport, fuel and energy, fired tens of thousands of public servants and shuttered entire government departments.

The measures have reduced inflation and resulted in Argentina’s first budget surplus in over a decade, but also tipped the country into recession and millions more people into poverty in the first months of Milei’s government — though official data shows the numbers improving.

“The cost (of austerity) for vulnerable sectors is infinitely higher than is suggested by the monthly inflation index,” Hector Daer, secretary general of the CGT labor movement, said ahead of the strike.

The action is set to paralyze trains and planes, and shutter schools and banks.

Argentina has one of the world’s highest annual inflation rates, but Milei’s measures are credited with bringing it down from 211 percent in 2023 to 66 percent.

Unions say the positive macroeconomic figures bely the average Argentine’s loss of purchasing power.

Ahead of Thursday’s work stoppage, Buenos Aires is set to play host Wednesday to a weekly protest by pensioners — one of the groups hardest hit by Milei’s cuts — backed by labor unions and other social movements.

On March 12, 45 people were injured when a similar demonstration — joined by football fans — turned violent.

Argentina has sought a $20 billion loan from the International Monetary Fund, adding to an existing $44 billion it already owes.

Milei says the money will allow his government to pay off its debts to the central bank and help “exterminate” inflation — a key goal as the mid-term legislative campaign approaches, with his party seeking to increase its representation in Congress.

The IMF on Tuesday announced it had reached a preliminary loan agreement with Argentina, which must now be approved by its executive board.

A final decision could come “in the coming days,” according to the lender.

Argentine Congress backs inquiry into Milei crypto scandal

By AFP
April 8, 2025


Argentine President Javier Milei's involvement in the cryptocurrency $LIBRA will face a congressional inquiry - Copyright AFP/File Luis ROBAYO

Argentina’s Congress on Tuesday backed the creation of a commission of inquiry into a cryptocurrency promoted by President Javier Milei that soared then crashed, losing investors hundreds of millions of dollars.

The libertarian president hailed the $LIBRA meme coin as a “private project” aimed at “stimulating the growth of the Argentine economy, by financing small businesses and Argentine entrepreneurs.”

“The world wants to invest in Argentina. $LIBRA,” he wrote on the social network X on February 14, in a post he deleted hours later after the currency crashed.

Industry experts have called the operation a “rug pull” — a scam where developers unveil a crypto token, attract investors, then quickly cash out.

$LIBRA went from boom to bust all in the space of a day.

After Milei’s apparent thumbs-up, it soared in value but then plummeted 90 percent within two hours.

Milei later claimed he “did not know the details of the project.”

On Tuesday, the lower house voted by 128 members in favor to 93 against and seven abstentions to launch an inquiry into the currency, which moved more than $4.5 billion and caused investors to lose approximately $250 million.

MPs also approved a resolution to summon Economy Minister Luis Caputo and Justice Minister Mariano Cuneo Libarona, among other senior officials, to testify over the affair.

A judge has been tasked with investigating Milei’s connection to $LIBRA amid allegations that he was complicit in fraud, consorted with criminals or was in breach of his duties.

Race to save Sweden’s 17th century warship in preservation project


By AFP
April 9, 2025


Workers install a new metallic support structure around the 17th-century warship Vasa at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm - Copyright AFP Jonathan NACKSTRAND

A Swedish museum has launched a massive four-year project to preserve the sagging hull of the Vasa, a majestic warship that sank nearly 400 years ago and is now one of Sweden’s most popular tourist attractions.

Experts have begun putting in place a complex metal structure to support the hull, which more than 60 years after its salvage has begun to sag in the Stockholm museum custom-built for it.

“Today we put in a part of the new support structure, one cradle, and it’s needed because the ship needs better support, because the old one from 1961 doesn’t cut it anymore,” said project leader Peter Rydebjork, showing off the new structure around the 17th century warship.

Due for completion in 2028, in time to mark the 400th anniversary of the shipwreck, the cost of the project is estimated at up to 17.7 million euros ($19.5 million).

Originally intended to sail to the southern Baltic, the three-masted Vasa — a symbol of a rising Swedish kingdom — sank only a few hundred metres into its maiden voyage in 1628.

After just fifteen minutes at sea, it capsized and sank in Stockholm’s harbour due to a design flaw. The incident claimed the lives of several dozen crewmembers.

Well-preserved in the cold mud and low-salinity waters of the Baltic for more than three centuries, the Vasa was brought to the surface in 1961 after a delicate salvage operation.

Since then, the ship, which is largely intact, has been exhibited at the popular Vasa Museum.

But preserving the wreck is complex: the wood has shrunk over the years and the hull is sagging due to gravity.

It is also listing to one side.

Rydebjork said the old support structure “doesn’t really do the work that it should be doing, because the Vasa needs to be supported in the right places.”

“The new support structure will actually support the ship where it’s strongest on the inside,” he added.

The first phase of the project involves stabilising the exterior of the wreck, while a second phase will stabilise the interior.

A third and final phase will right the ship so it no longer lists.

PRIMITIVE ACCUMULATION OF CAPITAL

From Freddy Kruegers to Peaky Blinders: a look at Ecuador’s drug gangs

THE BIGGEST CRIMINAL GANG IS THE STATE

By AFP
April 9, 2025


Ecuadorean Army soldiers stand guard outside of the Carondelet presidential palace in Quito on April 8, 2025. - Copyright AFP Abdul BASIT

Ecuadorans go to the polls on Sunday under the shadow of surging drug violence and a troubling explosion in the number of local gangs and mafias.

A flood of cocaine from Colombia and Peru through Ecuadoran ports has drawn a who’s who of mafias from Albania to Italy to Mexico to this once-safe Andean nation.

But it has also created a plethora of homegrown groups with striking names and ferocious reputations.

“Los Freddy Kruegers” cause nightmares in the streets, “The Ugly Women’s Headquarters” run jails and “The Peaky Blinders” try to rule the waves of a key coastal zone.

Together they and numerous other groups terrorise citizens through campaigns of extortion, kidnap and murder.

In January and February, Ecuador recorded more than one death every hour, according to figures from the Interior Ministry.

The mafias “have been gaining space; it is complex to combat them,” admits Guayaquil’s police commander, Pablo Davila.

The situation has put security at the center of Sunday’s presidential runoff between incumbent Daniel Noboa and leftist candidate Luisa Gonzalez.

One merchant remembers the day a bomb exploded in her restaurant in Guayaquil, the economic and crime capital of the country.

“They said they were from the mafia. They demanded $15,000 not to kill us,” the woman, who asked not to be named for her safety, told AFP.

Many local gangs have teamed up with much larger cartels from Mexico and Colombia, as well as Albanian and Italian mafias.

But the local gangs have also fractured and proliferated as they look for their own ever-bigger piece of the pie.

“The war is over territory. There aren’t known leaders like before. Everyone wants their independence,” said the head of one gang on condition of anonymity.

The situation is causing serious headaches for Ecuadoran security services, who must now gather intelligence and act against an ever-changing panoply of actors.

Security expert Carla Alvarez compares the situation to the chaos of 1990s Colombia.

“We see an association of small, less rigid groups. This already happened in Colombia in the 1990s after the death of Pablo Escobar,” she said.

In Ecuador, hierarchies began to break in 2018 when one of the largest organizations split.

The death of “Choneros” leader Jorge Luis Zambrano in 2020 left a power vacuum.

The impact is now felt even in relatively safe Quito, once a haven from drug violence, but increasingly on the front lines.

There, restaurant employee Marianela receives threats and extortion via WhatsApp. “I block them,” she said.

But there is no ignoring the violence on the streets of her Martha Bucaram neighborhood.

Police and military regularly appear, hunting for weapons and drugs. “There were about two dead here on the corner,” she said, recalling a recent shootout.

Carolina Andrade, a municipal security secretary, admits that without the security presence of hard-hit Guayaquil, the capital is seen as “a safe space to come and hide.”

As new alliances and actors emerge, there may be worse to come.

Multiple smaller gangs are now trying to join “larger organizations to have greater presence, legitimacy, and territorial control,” Andrade said.

Pressure builds on Afghans fearing arrest in Pakistan


By AFP
April 9, 2025


Islamabad wants to deport 800,000 Afghans

 - Copyright AFP Abdul BASIT

Israr AHMED KHAN with Abdul BASIT in Chaman

Convoys of Afghans pressured to leave Pakistan are driving to the border, fearing the “humiliation” of arrest, as the government’s crackdown on migrants sees widespread public support.

Islamabad wants to deport 800,000 Afghans after cancelling their residence permits — the second phase of a deportation programme which has already pushed out around 800,000 undocumented Afghans since 2023.

According to the UN refugee agency, more than 24,665 Afghans have left Pakistan since April 1, 10,741 of whom were deported.

“People say the police will come and carry out raids. That is the fear. Everyone is worried about that,” Rahmat Ullah, an Afghan migrant in the megacity Karachi told AFP.

“For a man with a family, nothing is worse than seeing the police take his women from his home. Can anything be more humiliating than this? It would be better if they just killed us instead,” added Nizam Gull, as he backed his belongings and prepared to return to Afghanistan.

Abdul Shah Bukhari, a community leader in one of the largest informal Afghan settlements in the coastal city, has watched multiple buses leave daily for the Afghan border, about 700 kilometres away.

The maze of makeshift homes has grown over decades with the arrival of families fleeing successive wars in Afghanistan. But now, he said “people are leaving voluntarily”.

“What is the need to cause distress or harassment?” said Bukhari.



– ‘Harassed every day’ –



Ghulam Hazrat, a truck driver, said he reached the Chaman border crossing with Afghanistan after days of police harassment in Karachi.

“We had to leave behind our home. We were being harassed every day.”

In Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, on the Afghan border, police climb mosque minarets to order Afghans to leave: “The stay of Afghan nationals in Pakistan has expired. They are requested to return to Afghanistan voluntarily.”

Police warnings are not only aimed at Afghans, but also at Pakistani landlords.

“Two police officers came to my house on Sunday and told me that if there are any Afghan nationals living here they should be evicted,” Farhan Ahmad told AFP.

Human Rights Watch has slammed “abusive tactics” used to pressure Afghans to return to their country, “where they risk persecution by the Taliban and face dire economic conditions”.

In September 2023, hundreds of thousands of undocumented Afghans poured across the border into Afghanistan in the days leading up to a deadline to leave, after weeks of police raids and the demolition of homes.



– ‘That is their country’ –



After decades of hosting millions of Afghan refugees, there is widespread support among the Pakistani public for the deportations.

“They eat here, live here, but are against us. Terrorism is coming from there (Afghanistan), and they should leave; that is their country. We did a lot for them,” Pervaiz Akhtar, a university teacher, told AFP at a market in the capital Islamabad.

“Come with a valid visa, and then come and do business with us,” said Muhammad Shafiq, a 55-year-old businessman.

His views echo the Pakistani government, which for months has blamed rising violence in the border regions on “Afghan-backed perpetrators” and argued that the country can no longer support such a large migrant population.

However, analysts have said the deportation drive is political.

Relations between Kabul and Islamabad have soured since the Taliban returned to power in 2021.

“The timing and manner of their deportation indicates it is part of Pakistan’s policy of mounting pressure on the Taliban,” Maleeha Lodhi, the former permanent representative of Pakistan to the UN told AFP.

“This should have been done in a humane, voluntary and gradual way.”

Kabul slams Pakistan’s ‘violence’ against Afghans pressured to leave


By AFP
April 8, 2025


Thousands of Afghans have crossed the border from Pakistan in recent days, the United Nations and Taliban officials said, as Islamabad ramped up pressure for them to leave - Copyright AFP Abdul BASIT

The Taliban government accused Pakistan on Tuesday of violently expelling Afghans after Islamabad cancelled hundreds of thousands of residence permits, pressuring families across the border.

Islamabad announced at the start of March that 800,000 Afghan Citizen Cards (ACC) would be cancelled — the second phase of a deportation programme which has already expelled around 800,000 undocumented Afghans.

“The mistreatment of them (Afghans) by neighbouring countries is unacceptable and intolerable,” the Taliban Ministry of Refugees and Repatriation said on X, calling for a joint agreement to facilitate repatriations.

An average of 4,000 Afghans crossed the border from Pakistan on Sunday and Monday, “far higher than the March daily average of just 77”, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) told AFP.

The new phase in Pakistan’s campaign to repatriate Afghans “could affect up to 1.6 million undocumented Afghan migrants and Afghan Citizen Card (ACC) holders during 2025”, the agency said.

The United Nations says nearly three million Afghans live in Pakistan: 800,000 had their Pakistani ACC residency cards cancelled in April and 1.3 million still have residence permits until June 30 because they are registered with the UN refugees agency UNHCR. Others have no papers.

“It is with great regret that Afghan refugees are being subjected to violence,” the Taliban refugees ministry said.

“All refugees should be allowed to take their wealth, belongings and household goods with them to their own country,” it added.

“No one should use refugees as tools for their political goals.”

Afghans who crossed the border in recent days told AFP that they left without being able to take all their belongings or money, while others were rounded up and taken directly to the border.

“My only crime is that I’m Afghan,” Shah Mahmood, who was born in northern Afghanistan, told AFP on Monday after crossing the Torkham border point.

“I had papers and they ripped them up.”

Human rights activists have for months been reporting harassment and extortion by Pakistani security forces against Afghans.

Moniza Kakar, a lawyer in Pakistan’s largest city Karachi, said that officials “are picking and arresting people randomly, from different places”.

“There is no proper mechanism to shift the whole family,” she told AFP.

Relations between Kabul and Islamabad have soured since the Taliban takeover, fuelled by a sharp rise in violence in Pakistan along the Afghan border.

Pakistan’s interior ministry said it had issued “strict instructions” for the facilitation of Afghans’ exits, including “that no one should be harassed in this process”.

In September 2023, hundreds of thousands of undocumented Afghans poured across the border into Afghanistan in the days leading up to a deadline to leave, after weeks of police raids.

France could recognise Palestinian state ‘in June’: Macron

By AFP
April 9, 2025


Palestinians walk past tents lining the streets in a largely destroyed part of Jabalia, in the northern Gaza Strip - Copyright AFP/File JOHN THYS

Valérie LEROUX

France plans to recognise a Palestinian state within months and could make the move at a UN conference in New York in June on settling the Israel-Palestinian conflict, President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview broadcast Wednesday.

“We must move towards recognition, and we will do so in the coming months,” Macron, who this week visited Egypt, told France 5 television.

“Our aim is to chair this conference with Saudi Arabia in June, where we could finalise this movement of mutual recognition by several parties,” he added.

“I will do it because I believe that at some point it will be right and because I also want to participate in a collective dynamic, which must also allow all those who defend Palestine to recognise Israel in turn, which many of them do not do,” he added.

Macron said the recognition should take place in the next months

– Copyright POOL/AFP Ian Vogler

Such recognition would allow France “to be clear in our fight against those who deny Israel’s right to exist — which is the case with Iran — and to commit ourselves to collective security in the region,” he added.

France has long championed a two-state solution to the Israel-Palestinian conflict, including after the October 7, 2023 attack by Palestinian militants Hamas on Israel.

But formal recognition by Paris of a Palestinian state would mark a major policy switch and risk antagonising Israel which insists such moves by foreign states are premature.

– ‘No one will invest a cent’ –

France’s recognition of Palestinian statehood “would be a step in the right direction in line with safeguarding the rights of the Palestinian people and the two state solution,” Palestinian minister of state for foreign affairs Varsen Aghabekian Shahin told AFP.

Nearly 150 countries recognise a Palestinian state. In May 2024, Ireland, Norway and Spain announced recognition, followed by Slovenia in June, in moves partly fuelled by condemnation of Israel’s bombing of Gaza that followed the October 7 attacks.

But France would be the most significant European power to recognise a Palestinian state, a move the United States has also long resisted.

In Egypt, Macron held summit talks with President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi and Jordan’s King Abdullah II and also made clear he was strongly opposed to any displacement or annexation in Gaza and the Israeli-occupied West Bank.

US President Donald Trump has suggested turning Gaza into the “Riviera of the Middle East” with the Palestinians moving elsewhere — a suggestion that has sparked bitter condemnation.

Macron responded that the Gaza Strip was “not a real estate project.”

“Simplistic thinking sometimes doesn’t help,” he added, and, in a message to Trump said: “Perhaps it would be wonderful if one day it developed in an extraordinary way, but our responsibility is to save lives, restore peace, and negotiate a political framework.”

“If all this doesn’t exist, no one will invest. Today, no one will invest a cent in Gaza,” he said.

Indonesia president says ready to temporarily shelter Gazans

By AFP
April 8, 2025


Indonesia President Prabowo Subianto says he is prepared to grant temporary shelter to Palestinians affected by the war in Gaza - Copyright AFP Yasuyoshi CHIBA

Indonesia President Prabowo Subianto on Wednesday said he was prepared to grant temporary shelter to Palestinians affected by the war in Gaza between the Israeli military and the territory’s rulers Hamas.

Nearly 400,000 Gaza residents have been displaced in the weeks since Israel resumed military operations in the territory last month, according to the United Nations.

“We are ready to receive wounded victims,” Prabowo said before leaving for a Middle East visit to the United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Egypt, Qatar and Jordan.

“We are ready to send planes to transport them. We estimate the numbers may be 1,000 for the first wave.”

Wounded Palestinians and “traumatised, orphaned children” would be prioritised, he said.

He said he had instructed his foreign minister to talk with Palestinian officials and “parties in the region” on how to evacuate wounded or orphaned Gazans.

The victims would only be in Indonesia until they recovered and it was safe for their return.

Indonesia, the world’s most populous Muslim nation, has consistently called for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

According to Turkish media, Prabowo will be afforded the rare opportunity to address the Turkish parliament.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is one of the main backers of the Palestinian cause and visited Indonesia in February, where the pair pledged closer ties.

UN chief says Gaza transformed into ‘killing field’


By AFP
April 8, 2025


Pointing to the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of people in war, he emphasized the obligation of the 'occupying power' to ensure the provision of food and medical supplies - Copyright AFP/File Bashar TALEB

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said Tuesday that Gaza had become “a killing field,” blaming Israel for blocking aid and failing in its “unequivocal obligations” to meet the needs of the Palestinian territory’s residents.

“More than an entire month has passed without a drop of aid into Gaza. No food. No fuel. No medicine. No commercial supplies. As aid has dried up, the floodgates of horror have re-opened,” Guterres said in remarks to journalists.

Pointing to the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of people in war, he emphasized the obligation of the “occupying power” to ensure the provision of food and medical supplies to the population.

“None of that is happening today. No humanitarian supplies can enter Gaza,” he said.

“The Israeli authorities newly proposed ‘authorization mechanisms’ for aid delivery risk further controlling and callously limiting aid down to the last calorie and grain of flour,” Guterres told reporters at UN headquarters in New York.

He was referencing recent Israeli proposals over controlling aid into Gaza, which a UN source told AFP included monitoring calories to prevent misuse by Hamas.

“Let me be clear — we will not participate in any arrangement that does not fully respect the humanitarian principles — humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality,” he said, demanding guarantees for the unhindered entry of aid to the coastal territory.

Guterres also raised the alarm about the situation in the West Bank.

“The current path is a dead end — totally intolerable in the eyes of international law and history,” he said.

“And the risk of the occupied West Bank transforming into another Gaza makes it even worse.

“It is time to end the dehumanization, protect civilians, release the hostages, ensure lifesaving aid, and renew the ceasefire.”

Settlement champion Huckabee confirmed as US Israel envoy

CHRISTIAN ZIONIST WANTING THE RAPTURE

By AFP
April 9, 2025


Mike Huckabee has served as governor of Arkansas and ran for president in 2008 - Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP/File Kevin Dietsch

The US Senate on Wednesday confirmed Mike Huckabee, an evangelical Christian who has said Israel enjoys a divine right to the West Bank, as ambassador to Israel.

Huckabee will head to the US embassy in Jerusalem as Israel seizes large areas of Gaza, part of a renewed military campaign that has had President Donald Trump’s blessing.

The Senate voted largely on party lines to confirm Trump’s nominee, with one Democrat, John Fetterman, supporting him.

Huckabee, a Baptist minister who served as governor of Arkansas and ran for president in 2008, has long been an outspoken supporter of Israel, backing calls to annex the West Bank before such talk became increasingly mainstream.

On a 2017 visit to a settlement in the West Bank, which was seized by Israel in the 1967 war, Huckabee said there was “no such thing as an occupation.”

He later said that Israel “has title deed to Judea and Samaria,” using a biblical term for the West Bank.

Grilled about his remarks at his confirmation hearing by Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen, Huckabee denied that he was backing the expulsion of Palestinians.

“I’ve never, never indicated that that was a part of that. I simply referenced the biblical mandate that goes all the way back to the time of Abraham, 3,500 years ago,” Huckabee said.

Huckabee in his hearing repeatedly said that he would defer to Trump and not set policy based on his personal beliefs.

Trump before taking office backed a ceasefire in the Gaza war, which started with the unprecedented Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, but he also vowed full-fledged support to Israel including expediting arms shipments.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has expanded settlements in the West Bank, which are considered illegal under international law, but stopped short of a formal annexation backed by some of his far-right supporters.

Huckabee has also been a television talk-show host and plays guitar in a classic-rock cover band.

His daughter, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, served as Trump’s press secretary in his first term and now serves as governor of Arkansas.

Tata Steel to cut jobs at Dutch plant by 15%


By AFP
April 9, 2025


The cuts will fall on management and support roles at the plant, said Tata - Copyright AFP/File Brendan SMIALOWSKI
Jan HENNOP

Indian-owned steelmaking giant Tata Steel announced Wednesday it was slashing around 1,600 of the 9,200 jobs at its plant in the Netherlands, sparking a furious reaction from union leaders.

Tata blamed weak demand in Europe and global trade tensions, as US President Donald Trump’s punishing tariffs on dozens of countries — including European Union member states — took effect.

The tariffs are part of an intensifying trade war that has sparked fresh market panic.

“The challenging demand conditions in Europe driven by geo-political developments, trade and supply chain disruptions and escalating energy costs have affected the operating costs and financial performance,” said Tata, based in IJmuiden near Amsterdam.

The cuts would fall on management and support roles, Tata added.

“Tata Steel remains committed to ensuring that its Netherlands operation achieve their potential of being one of the most competitive, successful and efficient in Europe,” it said.

Dutch unions condemned the decision at the plant, which employs 9,200 workers. In all, Tata employs 11,500 people in The Netherlands.

“This was a bolt out of the blue,” said Hans Korver, a negotiator with De Unie, a union that represents mainly white-collar employees at the plant.

“We were particularly surprised by the scale of the cuts,” he told AFP.



– ‘Chaos’ –



The nation’s largest umbrella union federation FNV, said it “did not understand” Tata’s restructuring plan.

“Even now there are no detailed plans. They only thing created now is chaos,” it said in a statement.

Tata, in its statement, said “over the following weeks, an effective and comprehensive consultation process will be run on the proposed changes”.

But the FNV said it would be discussing the announcement with its members on Monday to decide on further steps, with strike action “not excluded”.

Tata Steel in November 2023 announced it was scrapping 800 jobs but in reality few jobs were slashed after the announcement.

The plant has been facing hefty fines because of harmful emissions in the area.

Dutch residents and the health authorities have accused it of being the main source of air, soil and water pollution in the area and of causing illnesses.

A pollution watchdog last week gave Tata a few more weeks to ensure that emissions complied to legal norms, or face fines running into millions of euros, Dutch media reports said.

Tata, in its statement Wednesday, said it was working towards more environmentally friendly and sustainable methods, such as changing from old blast furnaces to electric arc furnaces.

It planned to replace one blast furnace by the end of the decade, which it said would cut five million tonnes a year in carbon dioxide emissions.