India's billionaires Ambani and Adani got richer while coronavirus pushed millions into poverty

By Diksha Madhok, CNN Business 

India has been hobbled by an economic slump and a brutal wave of coronavirus that new research shows pushed millions of people into poverty.

© Chris Jackson/Sanjeev Verma/Hindustan Times/Getty Images

But as these Indians struggle to live on a few dollars a day, the country's ultra-wealthy have gotten even richer and more influential, as their combined fortunes have soared by tens of billions of dollars in the last year.


Mukesh Ambani — chairman of the sprawling conglomerate Reliance Industries — is now worth more than $80 billion, some $15 billion more than a year ago, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Not far behind him is Adani Group founder Gautam Adani, whose wealth skyrocketed from less than $13 billion this time last year to $55 billion today.

The two men, who are now the first and fourth richest men in Asia, respectively, are worth more than the GDP of some nations. Their diverging fortunes with fellow Indians are symbolic of a rising wealth gap that has hammered many across the world, and which has become particularly pronounced in Asia's third largest economy, which accounted for more than half of the global increase in poverty in 2020.

Leading other Asian billionaires

Ambani spent much of the pandemic as Asia's wealthiest person, ahead of many Chinese tycoons.

He's retained his comfortable perch through most of this year, and is the world's 12th richest man — worth more than the likes of Mexican mogul Carlos Slim and Dell founder Michael Dell. His company had a terrific 2020, raising billions of dollars from Silicon Valley giants such as Google and Facebook, who are betting on his vision to dominate the internet in one of the world's biggest markets.

And it is not too lonely at the top for Ambani. Until recently, the continent's second richest man was also an Indian: Adani. The founder of Adani Group controls companies ranging from ports and aerospace to thermal energy and coal. Like Reliance, Adani Group has performed exceptionally well on the Indian stock market — shares of Adani Enterprises, for example, have jumped over 800% on the National Stock Exchange in Mumbai since June 2020, a sign that investors are optimistic about Adani's ability to bet on sectors key to Prime Minister Narendra Modi's economic development goals.

Both the Indian billionaires have roots in Gujarat, which is Modi's home state.

Shares in Adani's companies tumbled last month after The Economic Times newspaper said that foreign funds that hold stakes worth billions of dollars were frozen by the country's National Securities Depository.

Even though the conglomerate said the report was "blatantly erroneous," its founder lost nearly $20 billion dollars in net worth in less than a month. Despite this steep fall, Adani remains among Asia's richest men behind Chinese bottle water tycoon Zhong Shanshan and Tencent CEO Pony Ma, according to Bloomberg.

Other Chinese billionaires, including Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, have taken a hit as Beijing cracks down on tech entrepreneurs.

The utter dominance of Ambani and Adani isn't surprising, according to Saurabh Mukherjea, founder of Marcellus Investment Managers. He added that almost every major sector in India is now ruled by one or two incredibly powerful corporate houses.

"The country has now reached a stage where the top 15 business houses account for 90% of the country's profits," Mukherjea told CNN Business.

"The playbook is the same as other countries," he said, referencing some of America's famous tycoons throughout history, including John D. Rockefeller and Andrew Carnegie.

The other 99% in India

While Adani can easily brush aside a single-day loss of $6 billion, most of the country has been dealing with life-changing economic turmoil during the pandemic.

As India imposed severe restrictions on travel and business activity to control the spread of Covid-19, the share of wealth held by nation's top 1% rose to 40.5% by the end of 2020, a 7 percentage point increase from 2000, according to a Credit Suisse report on global wealth released in June.

The report noted that the Gini coefficient — a popular measure of inequality — increased from 74.7 in 2000 to 82.3 last year. The higher the number, the greater the disparity in income. A rating of 0 means that income is equally distributed throughout a society, while a rating of 100 means that one person takes home all of the income.

India slipped into a rare recession last year, after a lockdown that lasted for almost four months. While the economy recovered this year, unemployment numbers approached record levels this May after a massive surge in Covid cases this spring.

According to an analysis by Pew Research Center, India's middle class shrank by 32 million people last year as a consequence of the economic slowdown, compared to what it was expected to be without the pandemic.

"Meanwhile, the number of people who are poor in India (with incomes of $2 or less a day) is estimated to have increased by 75 million because of the Covid-19 recession," senior Pew researcher Rakesh Kochhar wrote in a post in March, adding that it accounted for nearly 60% of the global increase in poverty. That increase didn't account for the second wave.

By comparison, the change in living standards in China has been "more modest," Kochhar added.

Many households coped with the loss of income last year by cutting back on food intake, selling assets, and borrowing informally from friends, relatives, and money lenders, according to researchers at Azim Premji University in the Indian state of Karnataka. The researchers estimate that some 230 million Indians fell into poverty — which they defined as income of less than $5 a day — because of the pandemic.

"An alarming 90 per cent of respondents ... reported that households had suffered a reduction in food intake as a result of the lockdown," the researchers wrote in a May report examining the impact of one year of Covid in India. "Even more worryingly, 20 per cent reported that food intake had not improved even six months after the lockdown."

The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab has been studying the impact of the pandemic on workers from some of India's poorest states. In a report on young migrant workers from the states of Bihar and Jharkhand, the researchers found that Covid-19 pushed men out of salaried work, and women out of the workforce entirely.

"They [women] had this one chance of working. Now they are back home with their families and being pushed to get married," Clément Imbert, associate professor of economics at the University of Warwick and one of the researchers, told CNN Business.

Now, as India braces for a potential third wave of Covid-19, researchers hope the government can introduce some bold measures to cushion the impact on the world's weakest.

© Sanjeev Verma/Hindustan Times/Getty Images Chairman and founder of the Adani Group Gautam Adani seen during the News18 Rising India Summit on February 25, 2019 in New Delhi, India.© Narinder Nanu/AFP/Getty Images Migrant workers and their families line up to board a bus on the outskirts of Amritsar on May 21, 2020.

RUNAWAY

Afghanistan: Hasty air base handover sums up America's hurried exit from its longest war

By Anna Coren, Sandi Sidhu and Tim Lister, CNN 

© Rahmat Gul/AP An Afghan army soldier walks past Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAP) that were left after the American military left Bagram air base, in Parwan province north of Kabul, Afghanistan, Monday, July 5.


Located an hur north of Kabul, Bagram was for nearly 20 years the hub of America's war in Afghanistan. Now it is eerily quiet. The last US combat troops have left and the Afghan government is trying to work out how to use the sprawling complex -- and how to secure it.

Afghan officials accompanying CNN on a tour of Bagram on Monday confessed that they were only now getting access to much of the base, and working out what had been left behind. One senior officer said he was notified last Thursday that his forces had less than 24 hours to secure the perimeter of the base.

The last US troops left the base on Friday. Some Afghan soldiers told CNN they only found out the Americans were leaving that very day.

There is a deep sense of abandonment among the Afghans now in possession of Bagram. One Afghan officer said to CNN that it felt like an old friend had left without saying goodbye.

The huge mustard-colored aircraft hangars remain locked. Among the equipment left behind are some 700 vehicles: Humvees, pickup trucks and 4 x 4s, some still littered with half-eaten American snacks like Oreos and partially consumed soda bottles. Beyond the hardware, there are other signs that this was not so long ago a little piece of America in the Hindu Kush mountains. Bagram had its own Burger King and Popeye's franchises, a radio station and mini shopping mall. Once upon a time, there was even a Harley Davidson store here

.

© Rahmat Gul/AP Blast wallls and a few buildings can be seen at the Bagram air base after the American military left.

Now some 3,000 Afghan security forces are settling into Bagram. On Monday, a delegation from Afghanistan's National Security Council were visiting the base, working out how it might be used in the battle against a resurgent Taliban.

Not long ago, the airfield saw dozens of arrivals and departures every day. It was the beating heart of a vast military airlift operation that supplied US and NATO troops in Afghanistan. From Bagram, surveillance aircraft would patrol the skies around the clock watching for the Taliban's movements.

The twin runways, some two miles long, stretch towards the horizon. But the only noise is that of the wind sweeping across the plains.

Whether the Afghan security forces have the time and resources to exploit Bagram is the big unanswered question.

One unnamed senior Afghan defense official told CNN the base would have what it needed to operate.

"You should understand that we have been provided with adequate equipment to run this whole base," said the official, speaking anonymously because they were not authorized to comment.

"Afghans have the potential to safeguard its land, take maximal benefit of this base and ensure sovereignty," he added.

The Pentagon has stressed the US withdrawal will not necessarily mean the end of NATO's Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan, despite NATO's decision in April to start and complete its own troop drawdown within a few months.

Across the country, however, Afghan forces are stretched as the Taliban attack on multiple fronts.

Since May, the Taliban claim to have taken control of some 150 districts across Afghanistan, in their southern heartlands of Kandahar and Helmand provinces -- but also in the north.

Over the last few days, they have claimed advances in Badakhshan province, bordering China and Tajikistan, and neighboring Takhar. The United Nations reported last week that a total of 56,546 people have been displaced in Kunduz, Takhar, Badakhshan and Baghlan provinces.

Afghanistan's first vice president, Amrullah Saleh, has said that "tens of thousands of families" have fled the Taliban onslaught to seek shelter in major cities.

Saleh tweeted Monday that "some have found refuge in homes of relatives thanks to our traditions & others are in makeshift tents or street corners awaiting a 'hand' of help."

"We are doing what we can & with what we have," he added.

The Afghans now have Bagram, but the challenge is they do not have enough planes to make full use of it. And combat aircraft -- as both senior Afghan officials and former US commander Gen. David Petraeus have pointed out -- will be critical in stemming the Taliban's surge.

Along with the coalition troops, thousands of military contractors have also left Afghanistan. Many of them were based at Bagram. "They are the ones that keep the fixed- and rotary-wing assets of the Afghan Air Force flying," Petraeus said last week. "These are US systems that we have provided to them."

Now, Bagram feels almost like a place without a purpose. For years and probably decades to come, it will be the most obvious reminder in Afghanistan of Operation Enduring Freedom, the clarion call that followed the events of 9/11.

Australia's Vital Metals starts production at Canadian rare earth project

(Reuters) - Australian rare earth miner Vital Metals said on Tuesday it had started production at its Nechalacho project in Canada's Northwestern Territories last month.

The miner said it has begun crushing ore and expects to hit full production rates in July.

Rare earth elements are of strategic significance. Most automakers also use rare-earth-based magnets in electronic vehicle motors.

China dominates the global production of the raw materials, which are expensive. Australia's Lynas, a much larger rival of Vital, is the biggest non-China supplier of the product.

(Reporing by Riya Sharma in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)

NO LAUGHING MATTER
Nitrous oxide, a powerful greenhouse gas, is on the rise from ocean dead zones

Brett Jameson, PhD Candidate in Biological Oceanography , University of Victoria 1


In October 2019, I set sail with a team of scientists aboard the Canadian Coast Guard Vessel John P. Tully in the northeast Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Vancouver Island. Battling rough seas and lack of sleep, we spent the better part of a week working shoulder-to-shoulder in a small stand-up refrigerator, analyzing seafloor sediments to learn more about the effects of low-oxygen conditions on deep-sea environments.

© (Shutterstock) Seabed sediments in Bermuda mangroves consumed nitrous oxide from the seawater. Restoring coastal ecosystems might help curb climate change.

When organisms die, they sink through the water column, consuming oxygen in the sub-surface ocean as they decompose. This leads to bands of oxygen-depleted water called oxygen minimum zones, or “dead zones.”

These harsh environments are uninhabitable for most organisms. Although they occur naturally in some areas, dead zones often appear after fertilizer and sewage wash downstream into coastal areas, sparking algal blooms, which then die off and decompose.

One of our studies from that expedition suggested that the sediments below oxygen-depleted waters are a significant source of nitrous oxide (N2O). This gas is released into the atmosphere when deep water rises to the surface in a process known as upwelling.

Nitrous oxide, more commonly known as “laughing gas,” is a potent greenhouse gas, 300 times more powerful than carbon dioxide. Global emissions of N2O are increasing as a result of human activities that stimulate its production.
N2O hotspots

The oceans currently account for around 25 per cent of global N2O emissions, and scientists are working to improve estimates of marine contributions. Most research has focused on oxygen minimum zones, which are known as hotspots of N2O emissions.

Warming of the ocean due to climate change is driving the expansion of marine oxygen minimum zones globally. This has led to speculation that N2O emissions from the oceans will continue to increase and further accelerate climate change. Our results indicate that even more N2O production may be expected where these low-oxygen waters are in contact with the seafloor.

This story is part of Oceans 21

Our series on the global ocean opened with five in-depth profiles. Look out for new articles on the state of our oceans in the lead up to the UN’s next climate conference, COP26. The series is brought to you by The Conversation’s international network.

Nitrogen is an essential component to life on Earth and exists in the environment in many different forms. Specialized groups of single-celled microbes use nitrogen-containing compounds, such as ammonium and nitrate, for energy to drive cellular functions. These metabolic reactions mediate the transformation of nitrogen between its various states in the environment, during which N2O can leak out into the environment as a byproduct.

Aside from its effects as a greenhouse gas, N2O is also the predominant ozone-depleting substance emitted to the atmosphere.
Mangroves as N2O banks

Our team travelled to Bermuda in the fall of 2020 to measure N2O emissions in a pristine mangrove forest in collaboration with the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences. These sediments were shallower and accessible to snorkelers, which allowed us to thoroughly investigate their role in N2O cycling under different environmental conditions.

We found the seabed sediments in the Bermuda mangroves were actually consuming N2O from the overlying seawater. Similar N2O “sinks” have been described previously in other pristine systems, including estuaries, mangroves and even terrestrial soils.

© (Brett Jameson) UVic PhD candidate Brett Jameson returns with samples collected from Bermudian mangroves.

The ability of these areas to draw N2O from the atmosphere is tied to the concentrations of nitrogen-containing nutrients in the environment. Nitrous oxide production is inhibited when these nitrogen-containing nutrients are in short supply. When nutrient levels are sufficiently low, marine habitats can act as net consumers of N2O.

Sediments that act as N2O sinks can also act as net sources of N2O to the atmosphere when subjected to increased nitrogen loading from agricultural runoff and urban waste water. Indeed, mangroves and other near-shore ecosystems that experience sustained inputs of dissolved nitrogen tend to be large N2O emitters.

Read more: New mangrove forest mapping tool puts conservation in reach of coastal communities

The extent to which pristine environments can serve as buffers against increases in atmospheric N2O concentrations is still uncertain. Most studies to date have focused on densely populated and highly disturbed regions of Europe and Asia, which act as sources of N2O. This leaves much to be learned about the role of pristine marine habitats as N2O sinks and their overall influence on global N2O budgets.
Targeting fertilizer

Although reducing future marine N2O emissions hinges on the more complex problem of slowing the growth and spread of marine oxygen minimum zones, actions to conserve and restore pristine coastal environments are tractable interventions that can be implemented in the short term.

At present, human agricultural practices account for over two-thirds of global N2O emissions. As a result, much attention has been directed at reducing the amount of excess nitrogen added to agricultural soils via fertilizer. Since nutrients that are not taken up by plants often end up in watersheds that drain into the ocean, policies that address overuse of fertilizers will also benefit adjacent aquatic ecosystems.

However, further reducing marine emissions will require a multifaceted approach that also addresses coastal development and waste-water disposal practices in heavily impacted areas.

The United Nations has declared 2021 as the start of a Decade of Ocean Science for Sustainable Development. Detailing the vital link between oceans and climate change has never been more timely than now.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Brett Jameson receives funding from the University of Victoria, the Canadian Healthy Oceans Network (CHONe), the National Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), and the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences.

Algoma Steel in Sault Ste. Marie to get $420M in federal funding to transition to cleaner technology
CBC/Radio-Canada 

© Yvon Theriault/Radio Canada Prime Minister Justin Trudeau discusses the steelmaking process with officials at Algoma Steel Inc in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., on Monday, for a federal funding announcement on greener technology.

Algoma Steel Inc., in Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., is getting up to $420 million in federal funding to help it phase out coal-fired steel-making processes.

During a news conference on Monday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced the funding for the manufacturer to retrofit its operations to cleaner technology.

This will allow Algoma Steel to purchase equipment to support its transition to electric-arc furnace production. It's expected to cut greenhouse gas emissions by more than three million metric tonnes a year by 2030, Trudeau said, the equivalent of removing 900,000 passenger vehicles off the road.

"There's no doubt that climate change is the test of our generation," Trudeau said, adding that the funding will also create 500 jobs during the project's construction phase and through subcontracting.

"Fighting climate change and growing the economy must go hand in hand."

Michael McQuade, chief executive officer for Algoma Steel, said the 70 per cent carbon reduction from the new technology represents one of the lowest cost-per-tonne opportunities to achieve large-scale sustainable greenhouse gas reductions in the country.

"The world can't get to net zero without steel," he said.

"We are most grateful for the government of Canada's leadership on this front and their commitment in support of Algoma Steel's sustainability transformation."

Sault Ste. Marie Mayor Christian Provenzano applauded the investment, saying Algoma Steel "has been the economic lifeblood" of the community for more than a century. Provenzano said his own family "would not be here but for Algoma Steel."

But Provenzano said a lot has changed over the last hundred years — and Algoma Steel "must change too."

"In every way with this investment and this project, Algoma Steel will become a stronger, healthier, and more sustainable steel producer and community partner."

According to Ottawa, the steel industry accounts for seven per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions from the energy industries — equal to global aviation, shipping, and chemicals emissions combined.

CANADA

'Steer the market': Study finds $23B in federal, provincial pipeline support


Taxpayer dollars are heavily distorting Canada's financial marketplace in favour of fossil fuel pipelines, new research suggests.

The International Institute for Sustainable Development says spending by provincial and federal governments combined with the value of loan guarantees and other fiscal instruments intended to help get the lines built is worth a total of $23 billion.

The great majority of that money isn't in direct subsidies to the now-defunct Keystone XL or ongoing Trans Mountain and Coastal GasLink projects, said report author Vanessa Corkal. But backstopping loans and reducing other kinds of risks for pipelines encourages companies to make choices they wouldn't otherwise make, she said.

"Direct spending is only one form of the ways government can steer the market."

The institute spent two years combing through public documents on government support for the three pipelines.

That includes $11.3 billion in loans from the federal government to finance the purchase of the Trans Mountain Pipeline and $6 billion Alberta offered to guarantee loans for Keystone XL, which was ultimately cancelled by U.S. President Joe Biden. It also includes a $500 million loan for the construction of Coastal GasLink.

But the institute also says governments are involved in other ways to minimize risk for industry.

Trans Mountain Corporation, the government-owned entity that purchased the Trans Mountain project, has spent $34 million covering its operating losses and pension expenses. Ottawa has also promised to stand behind a $2 billion "emergency fund" promised by Alberta in case the project encounters "unforeseen circumstances."

Any of its environmental liabilities would be covered by another $2-billion federal pledge. Another $46 million will help with its financing costs.

"Understanding the money that is currently tied up in pipelines is crucial so that Canadians can understand what's at stake and what is the opportunity we have to redirect some of this funding to industries that will help us move forward," Corkal said.

 "There's a limit to how much money can go toward stimulus."

Corkal said her calculations only include present incentives and don't make projections of future costs. She added that lack of government transparency means her estimates are incomplete — especially for the now publicly owned Trans Mountain line.

"What did the government value the pipeline at?" Corkal asked.

"Did they overpay? What are the projections for what it will make in the future? What are the terms of the loan? We filed many requests, but the results that we got did not actually contain the details that we needed."

Many of the advantages that government support gives are hard to quantify but still valuable, she said. For example, Canada has promised to protect any future owner of Trans Mountain from any other government trying to block its construction or delay granting permits.

"The $23 billion that we identify is really just what we are able to quantify," Corkal said.

Federal and Alberta government spokespeople were not immediately available to comment on the study.

Corkal acknowledges that the resources offered to the Keystone project are no longer on the table now the project is dead. But she said they're included in the report to show how heavily government is still willing to back the industry.

While the report says Alberta invested $1.5 billion in Keystone XL, government figures say the province's losses after the project died were $1.3 billion.

Corkal added that once governments are involved in a project, it's hard for them to back out.

"Now that governments have assumed these risks, they're going to double down on them."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 6, 2021.

— Follow Bob Weber on Twitter at @row1960

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

The Olympics are 'on the wrong side of history' when it comes to free speech


This article was originally published on The Conversation, an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts. Disclosure information is available on the original site.
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Author: Bruce Kidd, Professor Emeritus of Kinesiology and Physical Education, University of Toronto

An important debate is brewing about free speech at the Olympics. After years of the International Olympic Committee restricting the free expression of athletes at the Games, some prominent athletes are calling for the unlimited right to speak freely — including the right to protest.

The advocates include Canadian decathlete Damien Warner, an Olympic bronze medallist in 2016, who has said: “If there’s something on their mind, then athletes should be allowed to speak.” The IOC, he said, is “on the wrong side of history.” The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Olympic Advisory Committee takes a similar view.

In response, the IOC has relaxed its Rule 50 on “advertising, demonstrations and propaganda” to allow free speech in interviews and meetings, but has stood firm on the prohibitions against “political” statements on the field of play and during ceremonies. The committee threatens to punish any athlete who disobeys.

Understanding Rule 50

The IOC Athletes’ Commission supports Rule 50, saying it believes “the focus at the Olympic Games must remain on athletes’ performances, sport and the international unity and harmony that the Olympic Movement seeks to advance.”

But another of the recommendations from the Athletes’ Commission, following a survey and consultation process, was to “increase opportunities for athletes’ expression during the Games.”

“The feedback was that they didn’t want it to interfere with the competition itself, so ensuring that the competition itself was protected,” explained Rosie MacLennan, a double gold medallist in the trampoline and chair of Canadian Olympic Committee Athletes Commission.

In worldwide polling, Rule 50 has won the support of the majority of athletes for this position. The Canadian Olympic Committee Athletes Commission has reported that 80 per cent of surveyed athletes supported the rule.

Growing athlete activism

The push for free speech is an artefact of growing athlete activism in recent years in response to racism in European soccer, the unrelenting police violence against Black people and other minorities in countries like the United States and Chinese human rights violations in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong.

At the 2019 Pan American Games in Peru, two American athletes, fencer Race Imboden and hammer thrower Gwen Berry, conducted silent protests against “racism, gun control, mistreatment of immigrants, and a president who spreads hate” back home.

For many years, Rule 50 completely prohibited critical athletes’ statements or demonstrations at games — and sporting bodies compelled their athletes to comply and athletes went along with it.

The style was epitomized by basketball superstar Michael Jordan, who famously avoided political statements “because Republicans buy shoes too.”

When the Canadian skier Laurie Graham likened herself to a cruise missile flying down the hill to a World Cup victory, I asked her not to use a metaphor of death and destruction for a peaceful activity like sport. She quickly agreed, which thrilled me. But then she said that she didn’t want to get in trouble with her sponsors, who told her to avoid controversy.

The need to speak out

As a competitor in the 1964 Tokyo Olympics who wrote a widely syndicated student newspaper column from the Olympic Village, I fully support the right to free speech. I have always believed that athletes should take responsibility for the circumstances and sports in which they are involved and they cannot do that without the right to speak out.

Athletes should be able to wear personal signifiers, such as Indigenous sashes or rainbow fingernail polish, both of which have been allowed or banned from competitions and ceremonies at different times.

Free speech is an internationally established human right. It’s not something that should be conferred or denied by a vote. The majority should never be able to silence the minority.

I still subscribe to John Stuart Mills’ admonition that “if all mankind minus one were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”

The intercultural education cherished by the Olympic Movement would be enhanced by completely free speech. We can’t be hectoring others about what we believe, but we do need to be honest about who we are.

I’ve spoken in China about athletes’ rights. While few agreed with me, no one was shocked. They listened. So did I. The IOC should embrace and support such interactions and tell authoritarian hosts that this is what the Olympics are about.

What will the punishment be?

If some athletes still decide to protest in Tokyo or at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing and are punished, that punishment will become the issue. I would be horrified by a repeat of 1968, when the IOC expelled U.S. sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos from the Mexico Olympics for protesting against poverty and racism from the victory podium — in effect banning them for upholding the Olympic aspirations.

With all the challenges facing Tokyo and Beijing, it’s unlikely that Rule 50 will be reconsidered before both Games take place. But the issue won’t go away, and I would like to think the final restrictions will be abolished by the Paris Olympics in 2024.

In the meantime, athletes like MacLennan, who regularly consults Canadian athletes, should take advantage of the opening provided by the IOC consultation to push for ongoing athlete engagement and athlete-centered reforms on an international basis — including much more significant athlete voice and vote on decision-making bodies.

Once in-person meetings resume, athletes should revive the former practice of open meetings in the Olympic Village where they can introduce and discuss the issues most on their minds — including the geo-political issues that buffet the Games.

If there was genuine opportunity for athletes to become involved in sport governance and public policy, there would be far less reason for them to demonstrate.

Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Olympic Games, always saw the Olympics as a pedagogical project and athletes as the self-actualizing subjects of their activity and learning. If athletes are to learn, they need to learn to deal with political and intercultural issues and when and how to speak out.

The IOC should embrace free speech as a contribution to its highest goals.

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I am an honorary member of the Canadian Olympic Committee.

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This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Disclosure information is available on the original site. Read the original article:

https://theconversation.com/the-olympics-are-on-the-wrong-side-of-history-when-it-comes-to-free-speech-132954

Bruce Kidd, Professor Emeritus of Kinesiology and Physical Education, University of Toronto, The Conversation

Colby Cosh: Charge churches property tax? It's a lot better than burning them
Colby Cosh 12 hrs ago

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© Provided by National Post A firefighter douses the remains of St. Jean Baptiste Parish church in Morinville, Alta., which burned to the ground on June 30, 2021.


Late last month, the mayor of Iqaluit, Nunavut’s capital city, had a bright idea. Kenny Bell had been appalled by the discoveries — or rediscoveries — of hundreds of unmarked graves at former residential schools in the Canadian West. He wondered what he could do, as the non-Indigenous mayor of an Indigenous community, to “help where I can and stand with Indigenous people.” Curiously, he didn’t decide, as a few others seem to have, that arson was the obvious answer to his question.

Instead, he announced that he intends to introduce a motion at city council to remove the property tax exemption enjoyed by churches in Iqaluit, as they are almost everywhere else in Canada. Bell was quoted by the Nunatsqiaq News as saying that “We’re not retaliating against [churches]; they killed literally thousands of children.”

One can’t help feeling that this semicolon may conceal a desire to, in fact, retaliate against churches. But the loss of the property tax exemption would strike at some churches that were never powerful enough to co-ordinate with the Canadian state in a program of racial assimilation — the city has Baptist and Pentecostal missions, as well as a mosque — and Mayor Bell says he doesn’t intend to discriminate among the tax-exempt buildings. The next council meeting takes place on July 13.

Now, the mayor’s idea may have been a little impulsive. CBC News did not have trouble finding Iqaluit church volunteers who abhor the thought that churches facing new tax bills would lose the ability to provide counselling and addiction services. (Maybe the city could pay for some more of those if there weren’t so many tax-exempt buildings around?) Bell brushed off the CBC but mentioned that “many Inuit are happy” with the idea behind his motion; another interviewee, however, said she had spoken to some elders and their reaction was more or less “Welp, the white folks are at it again.” Bell admitted in an earlier interview that he had not canvassed fellow councillors to get a sense of how the vote might go.

This doesn’t sound, on an overview of the news coverage, like the ideal way to go about what is intended to be a gesture of reconciliation. But, then again, it’s not arson. Since Mayor Bell launched his trial balloon, the country has experienced an apparent pogrom against Catholic churches, with two Anglican ones in B.C. joining the party on Canada Day. Most Indigenous spokesmen have denounced the rash of church fires, but it’s not hard to find white progressives celebrating them on social media. If you try posting something like “Hey, arson is bad, you guys,” you’ll probably flush some out in a few seconds.

So why is it that we’re having a progressive-led bien-pensant conversation about whether church arsons are good and not a progressive-led bien-pensant conversation about statutory tax exemptions for churches? Is the answer that destructive measures against the crushing dead hand of the church are to be actively preferred to ordinary politics? Is it that taking away the exemptions would be an exercise in democracy, and thereby provides no fuel for the imaginations of pyromaniac cosplay revolutionaries? Is it that changing provincial and municipal statutes might take a great deal of advocacy work, work which might lead to little or nothing, and that it’s much easier just to commit a loathsome, possibly murderous crime in the dead of night?

The radical left has mostly not thought ahead that far, and the non-radical left in this country is pretty churchy. It is only atheists per se, whatever their political stripe, who have ever made much noise about the various tax exemptions churches enjoy because of our deep legal tradition. From the militant atheist’s point of view, it is readily apparent that the old common-law status of churches as beneficial in themselves, whatever their metaphysical bona fides, is exactly the same attitude that allowed for the creation of state-licensed and church-run residential schools themselves. (These schools sometimes put students to work on lucrative farming operations — a commercial aspect that was politely overlooked for the same reasons.)

Removing the property tax exemption from churches would actually create revenue that could be devoted explicitly to reconciliation-flavoured government programs. The idea probably wouldn’t be popular enough to succeed anywhere, any more than it is likely to in Iqaluit. But it ought to be more popular than a wave of arson that the combined efforts of our political class (and police) have failed to stop, and left-wing enthusiasts of reconciliation might be asked why they aren’t getting behind Mayor Bell’s idea.

Do they still believe that religion is a force for social good in itself? If this is to remain an operating principle of our civilization, in spite of all those unmarked cemeteries, the time to say so would be at a moment when sincere Catholic and Anglican believers are waiting in terror to see whether their church is the next to be added to the great bonfire. As an atheist, I believe churches should be answerable to the law, not excluded from it and subjected to random destruction.

Four-day workweek trial an "overwhelming success" in Iceland

Tre'Vaughn Howard 

Trials of a four-day workweek in Iceland were called an "overwhelming success" by researchers on Sunday. The Association for Sustainable Democracy (Alda) in Iceland, along with the UK-based thinktank Autonomy, published their findings of two large-scale trials of the program undertake from 2015 to 2019 of a reduced working week with no cut in pay.

The study included 2,500 workers, which is roughly 1% of Iceland's working-age population. "It shows that the public sector is ripe for being a pioneer of shorter working weeks, and lessons can be learned for other governments," said Will Stronge, director of research at Autonomy.

Workers who participated in the trials worked 35-36 hour per week. According to Alda, "worker wellbeing dramatically increased across a range of indicators, from perceived stress and burnout, to health and work-life balance." At the same time, "productivity and service provision remained the same or improved across the majority of trial workplaces."

The two trials, which took place in a variety of workplaces, including traditional offices and hospitals, were initiated by the Reykjavík City Council and the Icelandic national government as a response to campaigns by trade unions and civil society organizations.

The report describes the study as a "blueprint" for future trials in other countries, and also noted that 86% of Iceland's working population are now either working fewer hours or "gaining the right to shorten their hours."

"The Icelandic shorter working week journey tells us that not only is it possible to work less in modern times, but that progressive change is possible too," said Alda researcher Gudmundur D. Haraldsson.

Iceland trialed giving thousands of workers a 4-day workweek and saw improvements in well-being and productivity

sjones@insider.com (Stephen Jones) 

© NurPhoto / Contributor Getty Images Reykjavik, Iceland. NurPhoto / Contributor Getty Images

Iceland experimented with giving some of its workers a four-day workweek.
One percent of Iceland's workforce participated in two trials.
There was generally no reduction in productivity, and well-being improved, according to analysis.

The success of two four-day working-week trials in Iceland could act as an example for other governments, analysts say.

More than 2,500 people across 100 workplaces took part in two government-backed trials, representing roughly 1% of the country's working-age population.

Many saw their workweek reduced to 35 hours from 40 without a reduction in pay and saw no real loss in productivity, according to joint analysis of the trials by the UK future-of-work think tank Autonomy and the Icelandic Association of Sustainability and Democracy.

The results add credence to the concept of a four-day working week without a significant cut in pay, which has been increasingly pushed as a remedy for improving work-life balance, boosting employee performance, and helping the environment.

The trials were initiated by the Reykjavik City Council and the national government following lobbying by civil-society groups and trade unions, which claimed the nation lagged behind most of its Nordic neighbors in terms of work-life balance.

The first trial took place in the capital, Reykjavik, from 2014 to 2019 and initially saw childcare and service-center workers cut their hours to 35 a week from 40. It then expanded to encompass staff members in the mayor's office and care homes.

The second, conducted from 2017 to 2021, saw 440 civil servants from several national government agencies reduce their hours. Their roles covered both traditional nine-to-five hours and irregular shift patterns.

Contrary to claims that working reduced hours could be counterproductive, and actually lead staff members to work longer, the analysis suggests that overall there was no overall loss of productivity or quality of service provided.

In fact, teams were encouraged to work more efficiently by reducing meeting time, reorganizing their schedules, and improving communication between departments.

There was also generally an improvement in worker well-being. Perceived levels of stress and burnout fell in many cases, with many employees saying they felt more positive and happy at work as a result of the new regime.

Participants say reduced hours meant they could spend more time exercising and socializing, which in some cases had an impact on their work performance. In workplaces where there was no noticeable improvement in well-being, there was also no marked decrease.

More governments could introduce 4-day-week trials

The researchers described Iceland's trial as a "crucial blueprint" for how similar trials might be organized around the world, highlighting that in the years since trade unions had been able to negotiate the right to shorter hours for 86% of the Icelandic workforce.

"It shows that the public sector is ripe for being a pioneer of shorter working weeks - and lessons can be learned for other governments," said Will Stronge, the director of research at Autonomy, in a statement issued alongside the analysis.

Iceland is not the only national government to test the concept of a four-day week.

In May 2021 the Spanish government approved plans for a three-year pilot and pledged 50 million euros to support businesses implementing the plans, according to The Guardian.

Jacinda Ardern, New Zealand's prime minister, has also highlighted the concept as a means of helping the economy bounce back from the coronavirus pandemic.

In 2020 Iceland ranked 10th for the shortest working hours, according to latest figures by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, with Icelandic workers averaging 1,435 a year.

People in Germany worked the least hours in 2020, averaging 1,332 annually.

The 27 European Union countries collectively ranked 13th, with 1,513 hours worked annually on average.

In the 35th-placed US, workers notch an average of 1,767 hours annually.
Read the original article on Business Insider

Italian watchdog takes aim at delivery firm's gig-worker algorithms

MILAN (Reuters) - Italy's data protection authority on Monday ordered the delivery firm Foodinho, owned by the Spanish start-up Glovo, to change the computer algorithms used to manage staff to avoid any discrimination, after finding breaches of privacy and labour laws.

© Reuters/STEFANO RELLANDINI FILE PHOTO: A delivery driver for Glovo cycles in downtown Milan

The move comes as a debate on how to regulate workers' rights in the digitised "gig economy" is unfolding around the world. The European Commission has opened a public consultation on potential EU-wide rules.

Trade unions say management algorithms on international platforms are eroding gig workers' wages and rights, just as lockdowns to contain the COVID-19 pandemic have increased demand for casual workers such as delivery drivers.

The watchdog, Garante, said it had ordered Foodinho to pay a 2.6 million euro ($3.1 million) fine after an investigation of its management of its 19,000 riders in Italy, as well as other online delivery platforms.

It said the company had not explained its automatic order management system properly to its workers, and had failed to ensure that the results of automatic processes to evaluate the workers' performance were correct.

Foodinho also failed to provide workers with ways to challenge decisions made using the algorithm, including the exclusion of some riders from taking orders, the authority said.

The watchdog gave Foodinho 150 days to make the required changes, and said Spain's data authority would look into Glovo's international digital platform.

Glovo, which is based in Barcelona and operates its services in Italy through Foodinho, had no immediate comment.

The firm delivers everything from food to household supplies to some 10 million users across 20 countries.

A court in Spain ruled last year that Glovo workers were employees and not freelancers, while the Spanish government is proposing legislation to give unions access to the algorithms that tech companies use to manage their workforces.

And in February, Britain's Supreme Court found that a group of Uber drivers were entitled to worker rights such as the minimum wage. ($1 = 0.8434 euros)

(Reporting by Elvira Pollina; Editing by Kevin Liffey)

Wages are finally going up and that's going to have to continue to get people back to work

Jeff Cox 

CNBC

JUL 5, 2021

Economists have been wringing their hands over the continued difficulty in getting people back to work.

One commonly cited factor keeping some workers idled is generous unemployment benefits combined with wages that are too low.

Average hourly earnings rose 3.6% in June, above the trend before the pandemic.

Surveys indicate that pay increases and other benefits are essenital tools to lure workers back in.

© Provided by CNBC Bar tender Kim DePland, 38, attends a job fair for restaurant and hotel workers, after coronavirus disease (COVID-19) restrictions were lifted, in Torrance, near Los Angeles, California, June 23, 2021.

American workers collectively saw a nice bump in their paychecks for June that may have to keep coming if conditions ever are going to get back to where they were before the pandemic hit.


If there was one dark cloud over the month's otherwise robust round of hiring, it was the tick higher in the unemployment rate and the stagnation of the U.S. labor force.

Even as nonfarm payroll hires swelled by 850,000, the unemployment rate edged up to 5.9%. That was largely because the labor force participation rate, a key factor in devising the headline unemployment number, was unchanged at 61.6%. The overall labor force, a measure of those working or looking for work, increased by just 151,000 and the total employment level contracted by 18,000.

It all added up to more than 7.1 million fewer people holding jobs in June than in February 2020, the last month before the Covid-19 pandemic declaration.

At the same time, average hourly earnings rose 0.3% month over month and 3.6% year over year, both about in line with Wall Street expectations.

Economists have been wringing their hands over the continued difficulty in getting people back to work. The most commonly cited reasons are continued fears of the virus, child care issues, skills mismatches, and the allure of enhanced unemployment benefits compared to the salaries companies are offering.

It's the salary and benefits issue, though, that has been the most bewildering, as companies wonder what it will take to entice workers off the sidelines.

"They've got to walk the walk. I think it's pay," said Fred Goff, founder and CEO of Jobcase, a social platform that advocates for workers. "If people don't walk the walk, I do think the labor market will continue to be tight."

© Provided by CNBC

Jobcase conducted a survey of 515 unemployed workers in May and found that almost all said they weren't making more money out of work than when they had jobs, though 34% said they are still uncomfortable going back to work.

Their biggest concerns were health worries surrounding the virus, followed by pay rates being too low. In addition to pay, Goff cites "superfluous" requirements for jobs, such as college degrees that don't apply or training that isn't needed.

And he faults corporate CEOs who place more importance on returning money to shareholders than paying workers.

"All we're saying is what was acknowledged before the crisis, that we have too much emphasis on shareholder value and not enough on worker value," Goff said.
Less urgency in getting back to work

The pay issue, at least, jibes with what executives at job search site Indeed are finding with their clients, who cite health as the biggest reason for their hesitancy to go back, according to Nick Bunker, the site's economic research director. The financial cushion accumulated during the pandemic also was a factor for some.

"There were, of course, people who were saying unemployment insurance payments were making their job search less urgent, but it wasn't in their top-tier responses," Bunker said. "You have seen signs that wage growth is picking up. The question is for some occupations and jobs, especially during the pandemic, do we need to see continued pickup in those wages to really get hiring going."

Employers have been responding to the demands for greater incentives.

Some 4.1% of companies posting on Indeed in June were offering hiring incentives, more than double the rate of a year ago. Driving-related occupations as well as personal care and home health were the leading industries in offering incentives, with cash bonuses ranging from $100 to $30,000. Food prep jobs offered bonuses of $100 to $2,500.

In the aggregate, wage growth has been difficult to measure during the pandemic because lower-earning workers were some of the last to return to their jobs. That skewed the total average hourly earnings numbers higher for much of 2020, with a peak of 8.2% year-over-year growth in April 2020 that was hardly indicative of the overall labor market.

However, leisure and hospitality provides an interesting snapshot for what is happening in terms of pay.

The sector currently has an unemployment rate of 10.9%, compared to 5.7% prior to the pandemic, so there's obviously still a lot of slack there. But hiring has picked up rapidly in recent months, and so have wages.© Provided by CNBC A Dunkin' restaurant displays a

Leisure and hospitality payrolls have increased by 1.6 million since the beginning of the year, and average hourly earnings are up 5.7%. Wages have risen more than 10% since the start of the pandemic.

While there's still plenty of ground to cover, the industry, which includes the hardest-hit businesses during the pandemic such as bars, restaurants and hotels, is coming back as pay is increasing.

Companies will be tasked with keeping the momentum going.

Projections from Indeed show that through June 18, there were about 9.8 million job openings in the U.S. Labor Department data released Friday shows that there are just shy of 9.5 million workers considered unemployed.

With the total jobs now outnumbering the eligible workers, that could signal a tipping point for the jobs market.

Separate data from Indeed shows that the amount of job postings on the site deemed "urgent" for hiring jumped to 2.3% in June from 1.6% in January, another sign that companies are getting desperate for hires.

At the industry level, demand is widespread but especially acute over the past four weeks in human resources, with postings up 12.4% during the period in another sign that companies are getting operations back to normal and need help managing the workforce.

"Right now, the job market is relatively tight, or a lot tighter than you would expect given the fact that we're still down about 10 million jobs from where the labor market would have been absent the pandemic," Bunker said. "That's a result of extraordinarily high demand now as employers want to seize on near-term opportunities. At the same time, a large chunk of the workforce is a little hesitant, a little more patient. They don't feel the same sense of urgency."

Met Opera reaches agreement with locked out stagehands


NEW YORK (AP) — The Metropolitan Opera reached an agreement on a labor contract with its locked out stagehands, the second of three major deals needed to resume performances in September following the pandemic.

The agreement was reached early Saturday, a person familiar with the negotiations told The Associated Press. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the deal is subject to ratification by the union, which could take place as early as Tuesday.

The deal was first reported by the website Operawire.

Met spokeswoman Lee Abrahamian did not respond to a message seeking comment and Jamie Horwitz, spokesman for Local One of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), declined comment Sunday.

The stagehands’ contract expired last July 31 and the union had been locked out since Dec. 8.

The Met reached an agreement in May with the American Guild of Musical Artists, which represents the orchestra. Its contract with Local 802 of the American Federation of Musicians, which represents the orchestra, expires July 31, and negotiations are ongoing.

The company has not performed since March 11, 2020, because of the pandemic, canceling 276 performances plus an international tour.

The Met announced plans to resume with a Verdi Requiem on Sept. 11 to mark the 20th anniversary of the terrorist attacks. The season is to start on Sept. 27 with the Met premiere of Terence Blanchard’s “Fire Shut Up in My Bones.”

Ronald Blum, The Associated Press

20 years after 9/11, lawsuit against Saudis hits key moment


Mon., July 5, 2021


WASHINGTON (AP) — As the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks approaches, victims' relatives are pressing the courts to answer what they see as lingering questions about the Saudi government's role in the attacks.

A lawsuit that accuses Saudi Arabia of being complicit took a major step forward this year with the questioning under oath of former Saudi officials, but those depositions remain under seal and the U.S. has withheld a trove of other documents as too sensitive for disclosure.

The information vacuum has exasperated families who for years have tried to make the case that the Saudi government facilitated the attacks. Past investigations have outlined ties between Saudi nationals and some of the airplane hijackers, but have not established the government was directly involved.

"The legal team and the FBI, investigative agencies, can know about the details of my dad’s death and thousands of other family members' deaths, but the people who it’s most relevant to can't know," said Brett Eagleson, whose father, Bruce, was among the World Trade Center victims. “It's adding salt to an open wound for all the 9/11 family members.”

Lawyers for the victims plan to ask a judge to lift a protective order so their clients can access secret government documents as well as testimony from key subjects interviewed over the last year. Though the plaintiffs’ lawyers are unable to discuss what they’ve learned from depositions, they insist the information they’ve gathered advances their premise of Saudi complicity.

“We’re in a situation where only now, through the documents we have gotten and what our investigators have discovered and the testimony we’ve taken, only now is this iceberg that’s been underwater” floating to the surface, said attorney James Kreindler.

The Saudi government has denied any connection to the attacks. But the question has long vexed investigators and is at the heart of a long-running lawsuit in Manhattan on behalf of thousands of victims. The issue gained traction not only because 15 of the 19 hijackers were Saudi — as was Osama bin Laden, the mastermind — but also because of suspicions they must have had help navigating Western society given their minimal experience in the U.S.

Public documents released in the last two decades, including by the 9/11 Commission, have detailed numerous Saudi entanglements but have not proven government complicity.

They show how the first hijackers to arrive in the U.S., Nawaf al-Hazmi and Khalid al-Mihdhar, were met and assisted by a Saudi national in 2000. That man, Omar al-Bayoumi, who helped them find and lease an apartment in San Diego, had ties to the Saudi government, investigators have said. Just before Bayoumi met the hijackers, he met with Fahad al-Thumairy, at the time an accredited diplomat at the Saudi consulate in Los Angeles who investigators say led an extremist faction at his mosque. Bayoumi and Thumairy left the U.S. weeks before the attacks.

The 9/11 Commission, which assembled the most prominent accounting of the run-up to the attacks, laid out those connections but found Bayoumi to be an “unlikely candidate for clandestine involvement” with Islamic extremists. It said that while it was logical to regard Thumairy as a possible contact for the hijackers, investigators didn't find evidence he actually assisted them. He has denied it.

More broadly, the commission in 2004 said it found no evidence the Saudi government or senior Saudi officials had funded al-Qaida, though it noted Saudi-linked charities could have diverted money to the group.

In 2016, the final chapter of a congressional report on the attacks was declassified. The document named people who knew the hijackers after they arrived in the U.S. and helped them get apartments, open bank accounts and connect with mosques. It said some hijackers had connections to, and received support from, people who may be connected to the Saudi government, and that information from FBI sources suggested at least two of them may have been intelligence officers.

But it didn't reach a conclusion on complicity, saying while it was possible the interactions could reveal proof of Saudi government support for terrorism, there were also possibly more innocuous explanations for the associations.

The FBI conducted its own investigation, Operation Encore, with some agents drawing a tighter link.

One former agent, Stephen Moore, stated in a 2017 declaration that al-Qaida wouldn't have sent Hazmi and Mihdhar to the U.S. “without a support structure in place.” The document said the FBI believed Bayoumi was a “clandestine agent” and that Thumairy knew the hijackers “were on a complex pre-planned mission." He said he had concluded that “diplomatic and intelligence personnel of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia knowingly provided material support to the two 9/11 hijackers.”

Families of the 9/11 victims are hoping to prove similar allegations. They believe the entire story has not been revealed because of the U.S. government's reluctance for a full accounting. Any new evidence they might surface could be politically explosive given Saudi Arabia's role as a Middle East partner.

A spokesperson for the Saudi Embassy in Washington did not return a message seeking comment. Lawyers for the Saudi government declined to comment.

Andrew Maloney, another of the plaintiffs' lawyers, said that besides getting compensation for families, they hope Saudi Arabia will accept responsibility and commit to root out terrorism.

“If they did all three of those things, that would be a huge victory,” he said.

The suit gained steam with a judge's 2018 ruling permitting plaintiffs' lawyers to do a limited fact-finding investigation.

Bayoumi and Thumairy were questioned in recent weeks, as was Musaed al Jarrah, a former Saudi embassy official whose name Yahoo News said was inadvertently revealed in an FBI filing last year that suggested he was suspected of having directed support for the hijackers.

The Justice Department, meanwhile, has given lawyers once-secret documents but under a protective order. Some information remains concealed entirely after the department invoked a “state secrets” privilege to block certain material seen as potentially jeopardizing national security.

“Sooner or later, this trial is going to become mainstream, and there's going to be a tremendous amount of public pressure, and they can’t keep things secret forever,” Eagleson said.

____

Follow Eric Tucker at http://www.twitter/com/etuckerAP

US left Afghan airfield at night, didn't tell new commander

Mon., July 5, 2021, 



BAGRAM, Afghanistan (AP) — The U.S. left Afghanistan's Bagram Airfield after nearly 20 years by shutting off the electricity and slipping away in the night without notifying the base's new Afghan commander, who discovered the Americans' departure more than two hours after they left, Afghan military officials said.

Afghanistan’s army showed off the sprawling air base Monday, providing a rare first glimpse of what had been the epicenter of America’s war to unseat the Taliban and hunt down the al-Qaida perpetrators of the 9/11 attacks on America.

The U.S. announced Friday it had completely vacated its biggest airfield in the country in advance of a final withdrawal the Pentagon says will be completed by the end of August.

“We (heard) some rumor that the Americans had left Bagram ... and finally by seven o'clock in the morning, we understood that it was confirmed that they had already left Bagram," Gen. Mir Asadullah Kohistani, Bagram's new commander said.

U.S. military spokesman Col. Sonny Leggett did not address the specific complaints of many Afghan soldiers who inherited the abandoned airfield, instead referring to a statement last week.

The statement said the handover had been in the process soon after President Joe Biden’s mid-April announcement that America was withdrawing the last of its forces. Leggett said in the statement that they had coordinated their departures with Afghanistan’s leaders.

Before the Afghan army could take control of the airfield about an hour’s drive from the Afghan capital Kabul, it was invaded by a small army of looters, who ransacked barrack after barrack and rummaged through giant storage tents before being evicted, according to Afghan military officials.

“At first we thought maybe they were Taliban,” said Abdul Raouf, a soldier of 10 years. He said the the U.S. called from the Kabul airport and said “we are here at the airport in Kabul.”

Kohistani insisted the Afghan National Security and Defense Force could hold on to the heavily fortified base despite a string of Taliban wins on the battlefield. The airfield also includes a prison with about 5,000 prisoners, many of them allegedly Taliban.

The Taliban's latest surge comes as the last U.S. and NATO forces pull out of the country. As of last week, most NATO soldiers had already quietly left. The last U.S. soldiers are likely to remain until an agreement to protect the Kabul Hamid Karzai International Airport, which is expected to be done by Turkey, is completed.

Meanwhile, in northern Afghanistan, district after district has fallen to the Taliban. In just the last two days hundreds of Afghan soldiers fled across the border into Tajikistan rather than fight the insurgents.

“In battle it is sometimes one step forward and some steps back,” said Kohistani.

Kohistani said the Afghan military is changing its strategy to focus on the strategic districts. He insisted they would retake them in the coming days without saying how that would be accomplished.

On display on Monday during was a massive facility, the size of a small city, that had been exclusively used by the U.S. and NATO. The sheer size is extraordinary, with roadways weaving through barracks and past hangar-like buildings. There are two runways and over 100 parking spots for fighter jets known as revetments because of the blast walls that protect each aircraft. One of the two runways is 12,000 feet (3,660 meters) long and was built in 2006. There's a passenger lounge, a 50-bed hospital and giant hangar size tents filled with supplies such as furniture.

Kohistani said the U.S. left behind 3.5 million items, all itemized by the departing U.S. military. They include tens of thousands of bottles of water, energy drinks and military ready made meals, known as MRE's.

“When you say 3.5 million items, it is every small items, like every phone, every door knob, every window in every barracks, every door in every barracks,” he said.

The big ticket items left behind include thousands of civilian vehicles, many of them without keys to start them, and hundreds of armored vehicles. Kohistani said the U.S. also left behind small weapons and the ammunition for them, but the departing troops took heavy weapons with them. Ammunition for weapons not being left behind for the Afghan military was blown up before they left.

Afghan soldiers who wandered Monday throughout the base that had once seen as many as 100,000 U.S. troops were deeply critical of how the U.S. left Bagram, leaving in the night without telling the Afghan soldiers tasked with patrolling the perimeter.

"In one night they lost all the good will of 20 years by leaving the way they did, in the night, without telling the Afghan soldiers who were outside patrolling the area,” said Afghan soldier Naematullah, who asked that only his one name be used.

Within 20 minutes of the U.S.'s silent departure on Friday, the electricity was shut down and the base was plunged into darkness, said Raouf, the soldier of 10 years who has also served in Taliban strongholds of Helmand and Kandahar provinces.

The sudden darkness was like a signal to the small army of looters, he said. They entered from the north smashing through the first barrier, ransacking buildings, loading anything that was not nailed down into trucks.

On Monday, three days after the U.S. departure, Afghan soldiers were still collecting piles of garbage that included empty water bottles, cans and empty energy drinks left behind by the looters.

Kohistani meanwhile said the nearly 20 years of U.S. and NATO involvement in Afghanistan was appreciated but now it was time for Afghans to step up.

“We have to solve our problem. We have to secure our country and once again build our country with our own hands,” he said.

_______

Associated Press Writer Tameem Akhgar contributed to this report

Kathy Gannon, The Associated Press

Echoes of 1989 as foreign forces withdraw from Afghanistan

Lyse Doucet - Chief international correspondent

BBC
Mon., July 5, 2021, 

A security personnel guards an entrance near the Australian embassy at the Green Zone in Kabul on May 25, 2021

The "final warning" on fine notepaper was delivered to me in the depth of a harsh Kabul winter at the peak of a Cold War conflict. "I must advise you that you should leave Afghanistan without delay while normal flights are still available," advised the British chargé d'affaires.

Eleven days later, on a snowy 30 January 1989, we watched the US chargé d'affaires solemnly lower the stars and stripes in a simple ceremony freighted with political meaning. The last Soviet troops were pulling out within weeks, ending their disastrous decade-long Afghan engagement. An exodus of Western missions was meant to rattle the beleaguered Moscow-backed government.

Britain also shut its gates on its magnificent white stucco compound once hailed as the "finest in Asia".

"UK ministers felt that they had no choice but to follow suit even though our embassy staff were keen to stay put and carry on with the job," recalls Stephen Evans, a former British ambassador to Afghanistan who was then the Afghanistan desk officer in the British foreign office.

Both Washington and London promised they'd soon be back, but their missions would stay shut until a US-led invasion in 2001 toppled the Taliban.

Now, as a nearly 20-year Nato military mission ends with the exit of foreign troops, the question of staying or going is back at the top of the envoys' agenda.

Letter

"We absolutely do not want to send a similar signal right now by closing our embassy, unless there is an overwhelming security reason to do so," emphasises Mr Evans in a sentiment widely echoed behind soaring blast walls and sharp coils of barbed wire now cocooning diplomatic and aid missions, as well as a multitude of other buildings in the capital.

But the faster than expected pace of the US-led pull out, the tumbling of districts to the Taliban at a surprising speed and scale, not to mention the dread of a highly infectious variant of Covid-19, has added a large lashing of unpredictability to this mix.

Evacuation plans are constantly updated, staff numbers have been steadily drawn down - driven by both Covid and security risks - and some bags are packed, just in case. There are days of calm, days of concern.

"All our capitals are interested in right now is security," laments one European diplomat. "For the last few months in Kabul we've all been discussing security because we're all so invested here and want to stay."

The last Belgian diplomats bid adieu this week and the Australians shut up shop in May. The French almost left and the British, like everyone else, constantly assess the situation.

Kabul watches closely as events unfold

Watching even more nervously are Afghans who assist anxious envoys, the interpreters who translated language and culture for foreign troops, and the many vulnerable Afghans surviving in a city plagued by incessant power cuts and endless aggravations, who watch the embassies' every move as an omen of what's to come.

"If the country is told enough times that it is destined for failure then what hope is there for embattled Afghans to fulfil an alternative?" asks Muqaddesa Yourish, a former deputy minister of commerce who is now an executive at a leading communications firm in Kabul.


Who are the Taliban?


How can the West fight terror after leaving?


US troops must leave by deadline - Afghan Taliban

There was upset among Afghans when the Australian government announced in May it was closing its Kabul embassy although it expressed hope the move would be temporary. This time, in a sign of the times, it was a tweet, not a letter, from the British embassy which urged all British nationals in Afghanistan leave "as soon as possible".

"It's unfortunately an international echo chamber and the world seems to be projecting their guilt of withdrawal in predicting the worst for us - a civil war," Mr Yourish adds with regret. Afghans are also anxious about the threats of intensifying war.

Yet again, the British are watching the Americans; most foreign missions are. The US says it's planning to keep hundreds of its troops on the ground to secure its embassy, as it does in many other places.

Even that is fraught with risk. This week, a Taliban spokesman reiterated to the BBC that any residual presence of foreign forces would be regarded as "an occupation army". The Taliban insist it's a violation of the US-Taliban deal which paved the way for this pullout.

"During negotiations with the US, all these topics came up for discussion and, ultimately, the US side agreed to withdraw all troops, advisors, trainers etc from the country," emphasises Taliban spokesman Suhail Shaheen when I ask him about this issue.

A general view of Bagram airfield in Kabul, Afghanistan

The Taliban, keen to enhance their international legitimacy, are keeping an eye on embassies too. Last month, when the EU's new special envoy for Afghanistan Tomas Niklasson raised security concerns with Taliban leaders based in Doha, they released a statement within hours that diplomatic and aid missions in the Afghan capital would be protected.

But not everyone is convinced that what one western diplomat called "words from polished diplomats in Doha" would be respected by all Taliban field commanders. And while the Taliban want the world's envoys to stay in Kabul, they don't want them doing their job - supporting the government in power.

Some foreign missions now situated outside the outside the sprawling high security compound known as the Green Zone are planning to shift inside its gates within gates within gates. Norway has agreed to continue operating a vital field hospital used by diplomats and aid workers until next spring, by which time it's hoped a civilian hospital will have been established. Most crucial of all is the international airport - vital for Afghans too - which can serve, in the worst-case scenario no one wants to see, as an evacuation route.

Hamid Karzai International Airport is now guarded by Turkish and US troops under Nato's legal umbrella. It's hoped that Turkey will continue this task through a bilateral agreement with the Afghan government.

But, even at this eleventh hour, difficult discussions with Ankara are in a tangle of political, security and legal issues, not to mention the stubborn Taliban edict. Nato officials express confidence a deal can be done.

Will Afghan special force commandos be a match for Taliban fighters?

So most embassies are now trying to signal that they're staying put.

"The US embassy in Kabul is open and will remain open," underscored a post on their twitter account when media reports started surfacing of stepped-up evacuation planning.

"Embassies will remain in Kabul," emphasises a western diplomat. "But we are in a sensitive period and monitor the situation daily. The security of embassy staff is paramount."

"The embassy to watch is the UK," remarks another diplomat in Kabul. "It's not just Western missions. Even the Chinese ambassador is indicating he wants to increase dialogue on security issues."

The British compound, just inside the Green Zone, is larger than some missions, but is much closer in size to many others. So it's being seen as a bellwether.

And all eyes - Afghan and foreign - are on a fast-changing security situation across the country.

"A lot of the districts the Taliban have taken are irrelevant in strategic terms, but important for propaganda purposes," assesses Tamim Asey, a former Afghan deputy defence minister who now heads the Institute for War and Peace Studies in Kabul. "The next fighting season will be the battle for cities," he points out.

In a conflict where the narrative about what is happening on the ground can matter as much as the events, there's an effort now among envoys to try to stay calm, and carry on, as hard as that can be.

Indian activist Stan Swamy, jailed under terror law, dies

Mon., July 5, 2021



NEW DELHI (AP) — Father Stan Swamy, a jailed Jesuit priest and longtime Indian tribal rights activist, died Monday in the western Indian city of Mumbai. He was 84.

His lawyer and doctor told the Bombay High Court that Swamy, who suffered from Parkinson’s disease, died of cardiac arrest. The court was hearing a plea for bail on medical grounds after Swamy had been denied bail in March.

The activist had been moved to a private hospital from Tajola Central Prison in May after his health began rapidly deteriorating. He was admitted to the ICU, where he tested positive for COVID-19.

“Stan worked to light the world and do away with injustice. The government may have succeeded in snuffing his life out, but his spirit will continue to inspire,” Father Jerome Stanislaus D’souza, the president of Jesuits in India, said in a statement.

In October, Swamy was arrested in the eastern state of Jharkhand after being charged under India’s harsh anti-terror law, the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act. He was the oldest person to be accused of terrorism in India.

The government’s National Investigation Agency arrested him and 15 other activists and academics over a 2018 incident in which violence broke out between low-caste Dalits and right-wing groups.

Authorities alleged that those arrested had links to Maoist rebels, who are active in several states and are considered the country's biggest internal security threat.

Swamy maintained his innocence and rejected any links to the rebels, saying he was targeted over his work and writings on caste injustice and struggles faced by marginalized groups.

His arrest sparked widespread outrage in India, with many prominent opposition politicians and academics demanding his release.

The anti-terror law was amended in 2019 to allow the government to designate an individual as a terrorist. Police can detain people for up to six months without producing any evidence, and the accused can subsequently be imprisoned for up to seven years. Critics have called the law draconian, and accuse Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government of using it to mute dissent.

Swamy, who focused on empowering and uplifting India's indigenous tribes, was known for tirelessly advocating for the rights of those most marginalized.

Tributes poured in on social media on Monday.

“He deserved justice and humaneness,” tweeted Rahul Gandhi, leader of the main opposition Congress party.

“Father Stan Swamy spent a lifetime working for the dispossessed and the disadvantaged,” wrote prominent historian Ramachandra Guha, calling his death “a case of judicial murder.”

In January, to mark 100 days in jail, Swamy penned a letter thanking all those who had stood by him. He said he hadn't met the 15 other people accused with him, despite being in the same jail.

“But we still sing in chorus. A caged bird can still sing,” he wrote.

In his last bail hearing in May, he predicted his death if he remained in jail.

“I would rather die here very shortly if things go on as it is,” Swamy told the judges.

On Monday, his lawyer, Mihir Desai, told the court that Swamy isn't survived by any family members, the Live Law website reported.

“The Jesuits are his only family,” Desai said.

Krutika Pathi, The Associated Press

Toppled queen statues being assessed; federal Conservatives want them restored

Mon., July 5, 2021,


WINNIPEG — The fate of two toppled statues on the grounds of the Manitoba legislature remains unclear.

The statues of Queen Elizabeth and Queen Victoria were brought down with ropes on Canada Day by demonstrators who were protesting the deaths of Indigenous children at residential schools.

The head on the Queen Victoria statue was removed and dumped in a river before being recovered.

The Manitoba government says the statues have been taken away and are being assessed for damage.

Winnipeg police say they are investigating, but no charges have been laid.

Federal Conservative politicians in Manitoba have written to Premier Brian Pallister to urge the government to restore the statues quickly.

"Vandalism at the legislature and the burning of places of worship in provinces across Canada are criminal acts contrary to reconciliation," reads the letter signed by the eight Conservative members of Parliament in Manitoba, as well as by Eric Melillo, MP for Kenora in northwestern Ontario.

"We cannot allow a small number of individuals to subvert our democracy or erode our democratic institutions. Therefore, we respectfully request that the statues ... be repaired and restored to the legislative grounds as soon as possible."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published July 5, 2021.

The Canadian Press