Trump ‘attacking US universities’: ex-Harvard president


By AFP

September 3, 2025


Claudine Gay accused the Trump administration of attacking higher education institutions - Copyright GETTY IMAGES NORTH AMERICA/AFP Kevin Dietsch

The Trump administration is attacking higher education institutions in the United States as authoritarian governments seek to quash independent thought, the former president of Harvard University said Wednesday.

The prestigious university is at loggerheads with Trump, who believes Ivy League schools are unaccountable bastions of liberal, anti-conservative bias and anti-Semitism, particularly around the protests against Israel’s campaign in Gaza.

Trump has sought to cut more than $2.6 billion of funding to Harvard, and has moved to block entry of international students — a quarter of its student body.

“The truth here is that our government, the American government, is attacking higher ed and universities,” Claudine Gay told the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities and Social Sciences in Amsterdam.

“The agenda here is about destroying knowledge institutions because they are centres of independent thought and information,” she added.

“That is the story. Nothing justifies that. Nothing explains that. Other than authoritarians don’t like independent centres of thought and information,” said Gay in rare public comments.

– ‘Distressing’ compliance policy –

Gay, the first black woman to lead Harvard in its 368-year history, stepped down in January 2024 amid a row over alleged anti-Semitism on campus following protests about the Gaza war.

Her resignation followed a heated appearance at a Capitol Hill hearing.

Republican lawmaker Elise Stefanik likened student calls for a new intifada — an Arabic word for uprising that harks back to the first Palestinian revolt against Israel in 1987 — to inciting “genocide against the Jewish people in Israel and globally.”

When Stefanik asked Gay whether such calls would violate Harvard’s code of conduct, Gay replied: “We embrace a commitment to free expression even of views that are objectionable, offensive, hateful.

“When speech crosses into conduct that violates our policies, including policies against bullying, harassment or intimidation, we take action,” she said during the hearing.

The blowback to the Congress hearing was rapid and intense.

Former Harvard student and multi-million-dollar donor Bill Ackman claimed that the high-profile row had led to “billions of dollars of cancelled, paused, and withdrawn donations to the university”.

Gay apologised but eventually resigned in January 2024 after allegations that she improperly cited scholarly sources in her academic work added to the pressure.

In her comments in the Netherlands, she said Harvard appeared to be moving towards a policy of “compliance” with Trump’s demands.

“This is distressing… Not only for those of us who are on campus and face the consequences directly, but also for all of those in higher ed who look to Harvard for leadership and guidance.”

White House quietly drops WTO, ILO from foreign aid cut list


By AFP
September 4, 2025


The WTO headquarters is next to Lake Geneva - Copyright AFP Chris J Ratcliffe

The World Trade Organization and the International Labour Organization told AFP on Thursday that they no longer figured among entities targeted in the White House’s latest round of foreign aid cuts.

US President Donald Trump’s Republican administration announced last Friday that it was cancelling $4.9 billion of congressionally-approved foreign aid, sparking outrage among Democrats.

In a memo detailing the cuts, the administration said it was “committed to getting America’s fiscal house in order by cutting government spending that is woke, weaponised, and wasteful”.

Trump, who has already effectively dismantled USAID — the world’s largest humanitarian aid agency — since taking office again in January, listed a number of international organisations among the targeted entities.

The list originally included $107 million in cuts to ILO funding and another $29 million in slashed funding to the WTO.

But by Wednesday, the WTO had disappeared from the list, and on Thursday the ILO had also vanished.

“We are aware of the removal of the International Labour Organization from a US administration memo released on 29 August,” the agency told AFP.

“We are seeking more information on what this latest development means for the ILO.”

The WTO also confirmed to AFP that it was “not on the funding cut list any more.”

There was no immediate explanation for why the two Geneva-based organisations had been quietly removed from the official White House document.

The UN labour agency told AFP earlier this week that after Trump’s earlier executive orders slashing foreign funding, “the majority of ILO projects funded by the USA were given closure orders”.

Of the 229 ILO staff who had been working on projects funded by Washington, 190 initially received a pink slip, but in the end more than half of them were reassigned to other projects, a spokeswoman said.

The United States remains the largest contributor to the WTO’s budget, pitching in 23 million Swiss francs ($28.5 million) this year, or 11.4 percent of the total.

US backing had meanwhile covered 22 percent of the ILO’s regular budget.

But Washington has so far not paid its contributions for 2024 or 2025 to either organisation, with such delays quite common among member countries.

Singapore to order Meta clamp down on govt impersonator scams


By AFP
September 3, 2025


Four years ago, Donald Trump was kicked off Facebook -- this time around, Meta's policies are more likely to please conservatives - Copyright AFP Drew ANGERER

Singapore will order Meta to crack down on scammers pretending to be government officials, a type of fraud that has boomed in the city-state and cost victims tens of millions of dollars, authorities said Wednesday.

Meta’s Facebook is the top platform fraudsters use to carry out the scams, said Minister of State for Home Affairs Goh Pei Ming, who warned of fines of up to Sg$1 million ($776,000) if the tech giant fails to act.

During the first half of this year, so-called government official impersonation scams rose by 200 percent from the year before to more than 1,760 cases, Goh said in a speech to an anti-scam conference.

In a notorious example, scammers used deepfakes or images of Prime Minister Lawrence Wong this year to sell fraudulent cryptocurrency investment schemes.

Losses to impersonation scammers rose by about 90 percent to Sg$126 million in the first half of 2025.

Facebook is the “top platform used by scammers for such impersonation scams”, Goh said.

Singapore has seen a rise in scammers impersonating government officials and is ordering Facebook to help crack down – Copyright AFP Roslan RAHMAN

Police “will require Meta to put in place measures to address scam advertisements, accounts, profiles and business pages impersonating key Government officials on Facebook,” he said.

This will be the first time police will order an online platform to tackle the rising scam problem in the city-state, Goh said.

Meta said it was against the tech giant’s policies to impersonate or run ads that deceptively use public figures to try to scam people, adding “we remove these when detected.”

“Scammers use every platform available to them and constantly adapt to evade enforcement,” the firm told AFP.

“That’s why Meta has specialized systems to detect impersonating accounts and celeb-bait ads, including facial recognition technology,” Meta added, saying legal action was taken against offenders.

Goh noted Singapore is a “very attractive scam target” because the median wealth of adults in the city-state is above the global benchmark and the country is well-connected to the internet.

Scammers also like to impersonate government officials because of Singaporeans’ high trust in their government, he said.

Goh added TikTok has also been classified as a “designated online service” with effect from September 1 this year.

This means that by February 28 next year, the social media platform must comply with a code that requires it to implement efforts to counter scams and cybercrime.

Meanwhile, Singapore’s neighbour Malaysia has summoned TikTok’s top management after delays by the company in cooperating with police to curb the spread of fake news on the platform, local media reported.

The meeting is expected to take place at Malaysian police headquarters in Kuala Lumpur on Thursday.

England moves to ban sale of energy drinks to children


By AFP
September 3, 2025


Up to a third of 13- to 16-year-olds in England are believed to consume energy drinks, some of which contain more caffeine than two cups of coffee, the government says - Copyright JIJI Press/AFP STR

High-caffeine energy drinks such as Red Bull will be banned for sale to youths under 16 in England under plans announced by the government on Wednesday.

“By preventing shops from selling these drinks to kids, we’re helping build the foundations for healthier and happier generations to come,” health minister Wes Streeting said in a statement.

Up to a third of 13- to 16-year-olds in England are believed to consume energy drinks — some of which contain more caffeine than two cups of coffee — despite most supermarkets having introduced a voluntary ban, according to the government.

“How can we expect children to do well at school if they have the equivalent of a double espresso in their system on a daily basis?” Streeting said.

“We’re acting on the concerns of parents and teachers and tackling the root causes of poor health and educational attainment head on,” he added.

A 12-week consultation will now gather evidence from experts, the public, and retailers and manufacturers.

Under current rules, any drink with over 150mg of caffeine per litre requires a warning label saying it is not recommended for children.

“Energy drinks might seem harmless, but the sleep, concentration and wellbeing of today’s kids are all being impacted, while high sugar versions damage their teeth and contribute to obesity,” Streeting said.

Indonesian islanders take on Swiss cement group in climate case


By AFP
September 3, 2025


Pari island residents Edi (L) and Asmania pose next to the factory of Swiss cement giant Holcim in Eclepens, western Switzerland - Copyright AFP/File STAN HONDA

Nathalie OLOF-ORS

A Swiss court on Wednesday weighed whether to hear a landmark climate case pitting residents of a tiny Indonesian island being swallowed by rising sea levels against cement giant Holcim.

The case is part of a wider international movement seeking to assign to major companies responsibility for the climate damage hurting the livelihoods of millions of people, especially in developing countries.

Oil companies have typically been the biggest targets, but climate activists are hoping the suit against Holcim will highlight the role of a lesser-known but highly-polluting industry, which is responsible for around eight percent of carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted into the atmosphere each year.

In the case, four residents of Pari have filed a suit against the world’s largest cement firm, demanding that it provide compensation for the damage wrought by climate change and help fund protection measures on the island like planting mangroves.

Two of the plaintiffs travelled to Switzerland to take part in Wednesday’s hearing at the court in Zug, where Holcim is headquartered, to determine whether or not it will consider the complaint.

The hearing ended after three hours but it remained unclear how quickly the court would render its decision.



– ‘Climate justice’ –



“I’m confident for this step of today’s proceedings,” said Nina Burri, a lawyer for the Swiss Church Aid (HEKS) NGO helping the islanders.

“At core, this case is about climate justice,” she told AFP outside the courthouse.

“It is about the plaintiffs and whether they have to bear the costs that they haven’t caused, or whether the big polluters have to be responsible and liable for the emissions and the damages they cause.”

Before the hearing, Holcim maintained that “the question of who is allowed to emit how much CO2” should be “a matter for the legislature and not a question for a civil court”.

But it said after Wednesday’s hearing that “we await the court’s decision”, insisting that it was “fully committed to reaching net zero by 2050 with sustainability at the core of our strategy”.

Environmentalists allege that Holcim figures among the world’s 100 largest corporate CO2 emitters, and thus bears significant responsibility for climate-related loss and damage.

The case illustrates the new face of the climate fight, as activists increasingly turn to the courts amid frustration over the slowness and even retreat of states in the fight against global warming.

If accepted, it could be a milestone for plaintiffs from developing countries who take on industrial giants.



– ‘Inspirational’ –



“I hope the case will become inspirational… for climate victims” around the world, plaintiff Asmania told reporters in Switzerland last week.

Environmentalists have said 11 percent of the 42-hectare (104-acre) island of Pari has already disappeared in recent years, and it could be completely under water by 2050 due to rising sea levels.

The islanders say saltwater floods have surged in scale and frequency, battering homes and damaging livelihoods.

Asmania, a 42-year-old mother-of-three, who like many Indonesians goes by one name, has already lost her seaweed farm due to flooding, which has also blighted her fish farm, sweeping in dirt and oil that kill off the newborns.

This year, she began with 500 small fry, “and there are only nine left”, she said, adding that income “is zero”.

The case is the first filed by Indonesians against a foreign company for climate-related damage, and the first instance of a Swiss firm being sued for its alleged role in such damage.

The four plaintiffs in the case are seeking 3,600 Swiss francs ($4,500) each from Holcim for damages and for protection measures such as planting mangroves and constructing breakwater barriers.

HEKS stressed that the amount was only equivalent to 0.42 percent of the actual costs — in line with estimates that Holcim is responsible for 0.42 percent of global industrial CO2 emissions since 1750.

In addition, the plaintiffs are demanding a 43 percent reduction in Holcim’s greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and a 69 percent reduction by 2040.

Treat carbon storage like ‘scarce resource’: scientists


By AFP
September 3, 2025


The latest research says the global capacity for safely storing carbon underground is much lower than previously assume - Copyright AFP Jonathan KLEIN
Nick Perry

The amount of carbon dioxide that can be stored underground is vastly overestimated, new research said Wednesday, challenging assumptions about the “limitless” potential this approach holds to reducing global warming.

Carbon capture and storage (CCS) is complex and costly, and critics say it cannot meet the urgent need to slash planet-heating emissions and meet the world’s climate targets.

One approach works by avoiding emissions at a polluting source — such as a factory smokestack. Another, known as direct air capture, pulls CO2 from the atmosphere.

But both require the CO2 captured to be injected into rock and locked away underground for centuries or millennia in deep geologic formations.

At present, carbon capture plays a vanishingly small part in addressing the climate crisis. But scientists and policymakers consider it a necessary tool to help bring future warming down to safer levels.

However, in a new paper published in the prestigious journal Nature, a team of international scientists has sharply revised down the global capacity for safely and practically storing carbon underground.

They estimated a global storage limit of around 1,460 billion tonnes of CO2 — nearly 10 times below scientific and industry assumptions.

This “reality check” should better inform decision-makers considering carbon capture in their long-term climate policies, the study’s senior author, Joeri Rogelj, told AFP.

“This is a study that helps us understand — and actually really corrects — the working assumption of how much carbon, or CCS capacity, would be available if one takes a practical and a prudent approach,” said Rogelj, an expert in carbon capture from Imperial College London.



– ‘Scarce resource’ –



To reach this revised figure, the team — led by the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis — took existing assumptions about carbon storage and ruled out locations deemed risky or economically unviable.

This included, for example, injecting CO2 below major civilian centres, into zones of known seismic activity, or many hundreds of metres beneath the oceans.

The findings underscored that carbon storage should be treated as “a scarce resource that needs to be deployed strategically to maximise climate benefits rather than… a limitless commodity”, the study said.

This storage limit could be breached by 2200, the authors said, noting they could not account for possible advances in carbon capture, or other technologies, in future.

Fully exhausting this capacity could lower global temperatures by 0.7C — but that should be reserved for future generations who may need it most, the authors said.

The IPCC, the UN’s expert scientific panel on climate change, says carbon capture is one option for reducing emissions, including in heavy polluting sectors like cement and steel.

But it remains infinitesimal: Rogelj said the amount of carbon captured every year at present amounted to approximately one-thousandth of global annual CO2 emissions.

88 postal operators suspend services to US over tariffs: UN


By AFP
September 6, 2025


The postal service in France is among those that stopped taking US-bound parcels following Trump's decision to impose new tariffs on them - Copyright AFP Jung Yeon-je

Robin MILLARD

Postal traffic to the United States plunged more than 80 percent following Washington’s imposition of new tariffs, with 88 operators worldwide fully or partially suspending services, the Universal Postal Union said Saturday.

The UPU, the United Nations’ postal cooperation agency, is working on “the rapid development of a new technical solution that will help get mail moving to the United States again”, its director general Masahiko Metoki said in a statement.

US President Donald Trump’s administration announced in late July that it was abolishing a tax exemption on small packages entering the United States from August 29.

The move sparked a flurry of announcements from postal services, including in Australia, Britain, France, Germany, India, Italy and Japan, that most US-bound packages would no longer be accepted.

The UPU said data exchanged between postal operators via its systems showed that traffic to the United States was down 81 percent on August 29, compared to a week earlier.

“Furthermore, 88 postal operators informed the UPU they have suspended some or all postal services to the US until a solution is implemented,” it said.

These included operators in 78 UN member states — including two in Bosnia and Herzegovina — and in nine other territories including Macau and the Cook Islands.

– New system upcoming –

The US changes places the burden of customs duty collection and remittance on transport carriers or “qualified parties” approved by the US Customs and Border Protection agency.

“Carriers, such as airlines, signalled they were unwilling or unable to bear this responsibility,” while postal operators had not yet established links to those approved parties, “causing major operational disruptions”, said the UPU.

The UN agency said it was working on a “Delivered Duty Paid” solution which will soon be integrated into its customs declaration platform.

It enables post operators “to calculate and collect the required duties from customers at origin”, the agency said.

In the meantime, the UPU said that, as of Friday, postal operators could access a calculator via a software interface that can be plugged into their retail and counter systems.

– Letter sent –

Metoki has written to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio to convey member countries’ concerns surrounding the upheaval.

UPU figures show that over the past 12 months, inbound traffic to the United States, from all categories of mail, comprised 15 percent of global postal traffic.

Of that, 44 percent came from Europe, 30 percent from Asia, and 26 percent from the rest of the world.

The majority was likely to be small packages — the international mail product most often used for e-commerce goods, said the UPU.

Based in the Swiss capital Bern, the UPU was established in 1874 and counts 192 member states. It sets the rules for international mail exchanges and makes recommendations to improve services.

KROPOTKIN CONSIDERED UPU AS A MODEL FOR AN AUTONOMOUS CONFEDRAL ORGANIZATION

Turkey opposition calls extraordinary congress for Sept 21


By AFP
September 6, 2025


A court annuled the outcome of the CHP Istanbul provincial congress in October 2023, throwing out its leader Ozgur Celik - Copyright AFP Jung Yeon-je

Fulya OZERKAN

Turkey’s main opposition party has announced it will hold an extraordinary congress on September 21 after a court ousted its Istanbul leadership on graft allegations, party officials said on Saturday.

The decision comes amid growing political pressure on the Republican People’s Party (CHP) after a court this week annulled the outcome of its Istanbul provincial congress in October 2023, throwing out its leader Ozgur Celik and 195 others.

More than 900 CHP delegates on Friday submitted a petition to a local election board in the capital Ankara to authorise the congress, a party source told AFP.

The congress is expected to shape the party’s strategy as it faces legal uncertainty.

CHP leader Ozgur Ozel described the move as “entirely a technical and legal manouevre” in case a court delivers a similar verdict to oust the overall party leadership in a hearing on September 15.

“Because, as you know, anything is within the realm of possibility,” he said.

The CHP, the largest opposition force in the Turkish parliament, won a huge victory over President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s AKP in the 2024 local elections.

Since then, the party has become a target of a wave of arrests and legal cases that culminated in March with the jailing of Istanbul’s popular and powerful mayor Ekrem Imamoglu on corruption allegations that he denies.

The arrest and jailing of Imamoglu, seen as a key rival to Erdogan, sparked street protests unprecedented in a decade.

Authorities have clamped down on demonstrations detaining nearly 2,000 people including students and journalists — most of whom were later released.

On Tuesday, the court ousted the CHP Istanbul leader and scores of party delegates and named a five-man team to replace them in a move that saw the stock market plunge 5.5 percent.

The CHP has filed an appeal against the ruling.

Political analyst Berk Esen told AFP the move was a “rehearsal” for the bigger case against the party’s national leadership seeking to hobble it as an opposition force.



-‘CHP stands tall’-



An almost identical lawsuit is hanging over its national leadership in a closely-watched case that will resume in Ankara on September 15.

A petition of over 900 party delegates demanding an extraordinary congress raised within just a day and a half comes against the possibility of a similar court ruling, observers say.

CHP leader Ozel said should an Ankara court deliver a ruling that affects the party’s leadership, and appoint a trustee to replace him, “that trustee, I must point out with all due respect, would last no more than six days.”

Because, he added, six days later, the party “naturally and inevitably, reinstates its elected leader” at the congress.

Gul Ciftci, a CHP deputy leader responsible for election and legal affairs, said the extraordinary congress “will not only determine the future of our party but will also reaffirm faith in pluralism, diversity, and democratic politics in Turkey,” in a comment on X on Friday.

She hailed the decision for the congress, made with the delegates’ will, as “the strongest proof that the CHP stands tall against all attempts at intervention by the government”.

The party source told AFP that to boost the chances of the request for an extraordinary congress being accepted, signatures were not collected from the 196 Istanbul delegates who were suspended by the court order.

Vatican receives first LGBTQ pilgrimage


By AFP
September 6, 2025


Pope Leo XIV has not yet set out the direction he wants to take on same-sex couples in the Catholic Church - Copyright AFP Jung Yeon-je

Clément MELKI

In a first for the Vatican, more than a thousand LGBTQ Catholics and their supporters are this weekend holding a pilgrimage, in what they are promoting as an important sign of diversity in the Church.

The gathering, of some 1,400 people from around 20 countries, was part of the Catholic Church’s Jubilee holy year. It was organised by La Tenda di Gionata (The Tent of Jonathon), an Italian association lobbying for greater inclusivity among the faithful.

Those taking part were not to have a private audience with Pope Leo XIV.

Even though LGBTQ groups have gone to the Vatican before, this is the first time such a pilgrimage has featured on the official Jubilee programme.

Yveline Behets, a 68-year-old transgender woman from Brussels, walked 130 kilometres (80 miles) with another 30 LGBTQ people along part of the ancient Via Francigena pilgrimage route to get to Rome.

She said she expected more “plurality” from the Church after experiencing difficulties with other Catholics, among whom, she said, she did “not always feel acknowledged”.

“One should not misuse the word ‘welcome’. We are not just some outsiders who are are welcomed sometimes, or more regularly — we are part of the same family,” she said, wearing a t-shirt with the rainbow of the LGBTQ community.

– Into the Vatican –

Just as millions of other pilgrims have done, those taking part in the LGBTQ pilgrimage were on Saturday to walk up the main road to the Vatican to step through the Holy Door into Saint Peter’s basilica.

Saturday morning, hundreds of them took part in a mass in the Church of the Gesu, in the centre of Rome. The evening before they had held a prayer vigil.

Hugo, a 35-year-old from Quebec in Canada who declined to give his last name, said he believed the LGBTQ pilgrimage was “a really important signal for us to feel more included”.

He said he hoped it would “let people who are on the fence to allow themselves to be more welcoming towards homosexuals in the Church”.

But, in a religious institution that for two millennia has viewed homosexual acts as going against its tenet of procreative sex and gay couples “intrinsically disordered”, the road to acceptance is still long.

“There are fears and a sort of misunderstanding when it comes to the life that homosexuals lead,” Hugo said. “If everybody got to know everyone else, I think a lot of barriers would come down.”

Currently, though, he said “a lot of obstacles remain”, especially for couples who wanted the Church’s blessing for same-sex marriages.

Pope Francis, who died in April, had sought to make the Catholic Church open to all, and he made many overtures to the LGBTQ community — without changing the doctrine.

His 2023 decision to allow priests to bless same-sex couples triggered fierce opposition from conservative branches of the Church, particularly in Africa.

– ‘Needs to change’ –

His successor Pope Leo has said that marriage is a union between a man and a women, but he will not change Francis’s decision.

Beatrice Sarti, an Italian accompanying her gay son on the weekend pilgrimage, said there “is still a long way to go”, starting with shifting mindsets among Catholics.

“Many of our children no longer go to church… because they are made to feel that they are wrong. That absolutely needs to change,” said the 60-year-old from Bologna, who is a member of La Tenda di Gionata.

“The first thing to do is train educators, the seminarians, the priests and the bishops, starting at grassroots,” she said, while admitting “it is a very long process”.

Eiffel Tower to honour 72 women scholars to ensure gender parity


By AFP
September 5, 2025


The Eiffel Tower is owned by the city of Paris - Copyright AFP/File Lionel BONAVENTURE

Gustave Eiffel, who designed France’s world-famous monument, had the names of 72 scholars inscribed on the base of the tower in golden letters. All of them men.

More than 130 years later, Paris authorities are seeking to right a historic wrong by adding the names of 72 illustrious women.

“The aim is to highlight the historical contribution of women to science and technology”, said an expert commission in charge of the project, which presented its conclusions to Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo on Friday.

The commission said such a tribute would remedy the so-called “Matilda effect”, the term coined by American historian Margaret Rossiter in 1993 to describe the systematic suppression of women’s contributions to scientific progress, after US rights activist Matilda Joslyn Gage.

The commission is chaired by astrophysicist Isabelle Vauglin, vice-president of the Femmes & Sciences association, and Jean-Francois Martins, the head of the tower’s operating company.

When France’s iconic monument was built in 1889, Eiffel had the names of 72 of France’s greatest scholars inscribed on the tower’s first floor in golden capital letters 60 centimetres high.

The scientists, who lived and worked between 1789 and 1889, include the artist and chemist Louis Daguerre, who invented the daguerreotype, the physicist Andre-Marie Ampere and the astronomer Francois Arago.

A list of women’s names will be proposed before the end of the year to Hidalgo, who will validate the final list.

The commission wants to limit the choice to “distinguished female experts who lived between 1789 and the present day” and who are now deceased and mainly of French nationality.

To ensure gender parity, members of the commission propose to place the women’s names above the existing frieze with the names of the men.

The Eiffel Tower is owned by the city of Paris.

One of the world’s most visited monuments, it attracts around seven million people every year, around three-quarters of them from abroad.

On Monday, Education Minister Elisabeth Borne said France should open a debate on the inscription above the Pantheon in Paris to better reflect the contributions of the women laid to rest there.