Catholic nuns lift veil on abuse in convents





A nun walks in the San Damaso Courtyard at the Vatican

Salvatore Cernuzio poses for a photograph at the Vatican

Mon, November 29, 2021
By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - When young nuns at a convent in Eastern Europe told their Mother Superior that a priest had tried to molest them, she retorted that it was probably their fault for "provoking him".

When African nuns in Minnesota asked why it was always they who had to shovel snow they were told it was because they were young and strong, even though white sisters of the same age lived there too.

As the Roman Catholic Church pays more attention to the closed world of convents, where women spend much of their time in prayer and household work, more episodes of psychological, emotional and physical abuse are coming to light.

A new book, "Veil of Silence" by Salvatore Cernuzio, a journalist for the Vatican's online outlet, Vatican News, is the latest expose to come from within and approved by authorities.

Cernuzio recounts experiences of 11 women and their struggles with an age-old system where the Mother Superior and older nuns demand total obedience, in some cases resulting in acts of cruelty and humiliation.

Marcela, a South American woman who joined an order of cloistered nuns in Italy 20 years ago when she was 19, recounts how the indoctrination was so strict that younger sisters needed permission to go to the bathroom and ask for sanitary products during their menstrual periods.

"You are always complaining! Do you want to be a saint or not?" Marcela, who later left the convent, quotes the Mother Superior as shouting when she suggested changes in the daily routine.

Therese, a French woman, was told "you have to suffer for Jesus" when she asked to be spared physically demanding chores because of a back condition.

"I understood that we were all like dogs," recounted Elizabeth, an Australian. "They tell us to sit and we sit, to get up and we get up, to roll over and we roll over."

BURNOUT SYNDROME

Last year, Father Giovanni Cucci wrote a landmark article about abuse in convents in the Jesuit journal Civilta Cattolica, whose texts are approved by the Vatican.

He found that most of it was abuse of power, including episodes of racism such as in the Minnesota convent. Cucci said the problem needed more attention because it had been overshadowed by the sexual abuse of children by priests.

In 2018, the Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano exposed the plight of foreign nuns sent by their orders to work as housekeepers for cardinals and bishops in Rome with little or no remuneration.

It later chronicled a "burnout" syndrome, where younger women with good educations were held back by older superiors reluctant to relinquish a boot camp-style tradition of assigning them menial tasks, ostensibly to instil discipline and obedience.

"Whatever may have worked in a pyramidal, authoritarian context of relationships before is no longer desirable or liveable," wrote Sister Nathalie Becquart, a French member of the Xaviere Missionary Sisters and one of the highest-ranking women in the Vatican.

Becquart wrote in the book's preface of the "cries and sufferings" of women who entered convents because they felt a calling from God but later left because their complaints too often fell on deaf ears.

Some were stigmatized as "traitors" by their orders and had great difficultly getting jobs in the outside world.

Last year, Cardinal Joao Braz de Aviz, who heads the Vatican department that oversees religious congregations, revealed that Pope Francis had opened a home in Rome for former nuns abandoned by their orders.

The cardinal, who has launched investigations into a number of convents, told the Vatican newspaper he was shocked to discover that there were a few cases where former nuns had to resort to prostitution to live.

(Reporting by Philip Pullella; Editing by Alex Richardson)

French honor for Josephine Baker stirs conflict over racism







 Entertainer and American ex-patriate Josephine Baker gestures as she discusses the American Black Power movement, 1970, in Roquebrune, south of France. this is the summary: France is inducting Missouri-born cabaret dancer Josephine Baker, who was also a French World War II spy and civil rights activist – into its Pantheon. She is the first Black woman honored in the final resting place of France’s most revered luminaries. On the surface, it’s a powerful message against racism, but by choosing a U.S.-born figure -- entertainer Josephine Baker – critics say France is continuing a long tradition of decrying racism abroad while obscuring it at home. (AP Photo, File)More

ARNO PEDRAM
Mon, November 29, 2021

PARIS (AP) — On the surface, it’s a powerful message against racism: a Black woman will, for the first time, join other luminaries interred in France’s Pantheon. But by choosing a U.S.-born figure -- entertainer Josephine Baker – critics say France is continuing a long tradition of decrying racism abroad while obscuring it at home.

While Baker is widely appreciated in France, the decision has highlighted the divide between the country's official doctrine of colorblind universalism and some increasingly vocal opponents, who argue that it has masked generations of systemic racism.

Baker’s entry into the Pantheon on Tuesday is the result of years of efforts from politicians, organizations and public figures. Most recently, a petition by Laurent Kupferman, an essayist on the French Republic, gained traction, and in July, French President Emmanuel Macron announced Baker would be “pantheonized.”


“The times are probably more conducive to having Josephine Baker’s fights resonate: the fight against racism, antisemitism, her part in the French Resistance,” Kupferman told The Associated Press. “The Pantheon is where you enter not because you’re famous but because of what you bring to the civic mind of the nation.”

Her nomination has been lauded as uncontroversial and seen as a way to reconcile French society after the difficulties of the pandemic and last year’s protests against French police violence, as George Floyd’s killing in the U.S. echoed incidents in France involving Black men who died in police custody.

Baker represented France’s “universalist” approach, which sees its people as simply citizens and does not count or identify them by race or ethnicity. The first article of the constitution says the French Republic and its values are considered universal, ensuring that all citizens have the same rights, regardless of their origin, race or religion.

In 1938, Baker joined what is today called LICRA, a prominent antiracist league and longtime advocate for her entry in the Pantheon.

“She loved universalism passionately and this France that does not care about skin color,” LICRA President Mario Stasi told The Associated Press. “When she arrived from the United States, she understood she came from a ‘communautaurist’ country where she was reminded of her origin and ethnicity, and in France, she felt total acceptance."

Universalists pejoratively call opposing anti-racism activists “communautarists,” implying that they put community identity before universal French citizenry. Radical anti-racist groups, meanwhile, say that France first needs a reckoning with systemic racism — a term that is contested here — and the specific oppression experienced by different communities of color.

The term “communautarist” is also used to describe American society, which counts race in official censuses, academic studies and public discourse, which is taboo in France and seen as reducing people to a skin color.

For Rokhaya Diallo, a French commentator on issues related to race, “universalism is a utopia and myth that the republic tells about itself that does not correspond to any past or present reality,” she told The AP. “For Black and non-white people, the Republic has always been a space of inequality, of othering through the processes triggered by colonization.”

Lawyers, activists and academics have chronicled discrimination in police violence, in housing and in employment in France, notably against people with African or Arab origins. Universalists say this isn't a structural part of French society, however, identifying racism as a moral matter and not inscribed within the state.

Kévi Donat, a Black French guide who gives tours of Black Paris, said Baker is the “most controversial” figure he highlights in his tours, in part because she initially earned fame in France for dancing in a banana belt that “played into stereotypes around Black and African people.”

“Sometimes Josephine Baker is used to say ‘in the U.S. there was racism, (but) all these Black Americans were welcomed in France,' meaning we’re ahead, that we don’t have that problem here,” Donat said.

Baker was among several prominent Black Americans, especially artists and writers, who found refuge from American racism in France after the two World Wars, including the famed writer and intellectual James Baldwin.

But Françoise Vergès, a political scientist on questions of culture, race and colonization, said “symbolic gestures” like putting Baker in the Pantheon aren’t enough to extinguish racial discrimination in France.

“In 2021, even if it’s morally condemned, racism still exists and still has power over people’s lives,” she said.

In addition to her stage fame, Baker also spied for the French Resistance, marched alongside Martin Luther King Jr. in Washington, and raised what she called her “rainbow tribe” of children adopted from around the world.

For Stasi, the LICRA president, her “fight is universalist, so nationality in some way is irrelevant. ... She perfectly inscribes herself in the (French) fight for ‘Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.’”

“Of course there was racism in France, but it wasn’t institutionalized like it was in America during segregation,” Kupferman said.

For Vergès, this obscures France’s own history of racism and colonialism, which includes a brutal war with Algeria, a former French colony, when it fought for independence from 1954 to 1962.

“It’s always easier to celebrate people who aren’t from your country,” she said. “It avoids questioning your own situation at home.”

Verges explained that moving abroad for anyone may offer some protection from racism, simply because you are seen by locals as different anyway, more American or French or Nigerian than Black.

“A country’s racism is in relationship with its own history,” Vergès said. “You also have French Black people in the U.S. who find it less racist than France, because being French protects them from being treated like Black Americans.”

Baldwin, the American writer, noted the same thought in a 1983 interview with the French news magazine Le Nouvel Observateur.

“In France, I am a Black American, posing no conceivable threat to French identity: in effect, I do not exist in France. I might have a very different tale to tell were I from Senegal — and a very bitter song to sing were I from Algeria," he said.

The devastation of the Gatlinburg wildfires offered hope, in a way, for scientists


Vincent Gabrielle, Knoxville News Sentinel
Sun, November 28, 2021

The 2016 Gatlinburg wildfire was deadliest in the eastern half of the U.S. since the Great Fires of 1947 in Maine and the worst in the history of Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

Fourteen people died. 190 were injured. More than 15 square miles burned over the course of 30 days.

But the fire's aftermath is helping reveal how the forests in the storied national park have evolved to burn. And, maybe, even thrive because of fire.

Five years on, Table Mountain pine seedlings are shooting up as saplings for the first time in decades. Short, bushy oaks sprout from roots that survived the heat. Reclusive fungi pop up from the ashen soil. Huckleberry bushes creep in, attracting bears and birds.

Dead trees from the 2016 fire stand over resurgent growth along the Gatlinburg Bypass. Some of the new growth seen here is from roots that survived the fire and sprouted again.

Nature persists. It's up to us to learn from it.

Returning forests

After the burn, scientists found something rare and unexpected: a species of nearly extinct tree regrowing in the mountains on the Tennessee-North Carolina border.

"I had no idea there was so much American chestnut up there," said Jennifer Franklin, a professor of forestry at the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture. Before the chestnut blight killed most of the American chestnuts in the early 1900s, they dominated eastern forests. Only a few remnant chestnuts survived. "It was amazing because everything else burned off around them."

Franklin studies prescribed burns and forestry. In the years after the fire, she has been trekking into the park to observe which plants survived and returned. She told Knox News she was surprised how quickly the forest began to regenerate even in the hottest burn spots.

The fires of 2016 did not burn equally. In some forested pockets, you could barely tell anything had happened. In the hottest places, all of the leaf litter burned away, leaving bare soil. But scientists learned the fire didn't reach the deepest roots.

"Those root systems that survived, those trees, they just came back really strongly," Franklin said. Chestnuts, oaks, shortleaf pine and Table Mountain pine all returned very quickly. "Some of them we counted over 100 sprouts from a single root system."

Tips from an insider: Best ways to spend time in Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge: Tips from an insider

More: America's newest national park features a human-made marvel in West Virginia

Franklin has a keen eye for the effects of fire. She teaches up-and-coming foresters prescribed fire management.

National park personnel have been intentionally burning sections of the park since the 1990s, for conservation purposes and to thin out debris. But for a prescribed fire to work as intended it needs to mimic the effects of a natural fire.

"I thought it was interesting that the prescribed fires done in earlier years by the park staff had similar effects to wildfire," Franklin wrote in an email to Knox News. She explained that it was difficult to mimic the effects of more intense wildfire with safe, controlled fires set during the wet season. The 2016 fire revealed that it is possible to get some of the effects of a wildfire without a fire going wild.
Bears sheltered in place

Bears, largely pulled through the fire unscathed. Joseph Clark is an adjunct professor at UT who studies bears that live near humans. He happened to be following a dozen bears wearing radio collars when the fires started. Clark said he was surprised to see that, by and large, the bears didn’t flee the fire. They sheltered in place.

"The fire just seemed to roar over them," Clark said. He explained that only two bears were documented to have died from the fire, one of which was euthanized by the park service. "I think they mostly found enough cubby holes that they could just hunker down and wait for the fire to pass through."

After the fires were contained, the bears ventured into the burned areas possibly seeking carcasses to scavenge.

These behaviors were also seen among bears during and after the 1988 Yellowstone Fires, which means that North American bears may have fire survival instincts in common.

Secretive fungi appear

Perhaps the most unexpected thing the fires revealed was how they affect fungi. In the areas that burned the most intensely, rare, fire-loving fungi were among the first living things to recolonize.

Karen Hughes, a UT professor of mycology, explained that plants rely on symbiotic fungi to grow and thrive.

"Fires of that intensity are supposed to destroy microorganisms in the top eight inches of soil," Hughes said. If the soil was sterile after a fire, pine seedlings shouldn't have been able to grow. "And yet here are these little pine trees coming up."

Hughes and other researchers discovered that the roots of the young pine sprouts were covered in symbiotic fungi. .

"Fungi help modify soil in a way that helps a healthy forest to return," Hughes said.

Mycology experts aren’t sure how these fungi survive the flames. Some fungi might have been carried on the wind, others may have escaped the flames deep in the soil.

Hughes and her collaborators found some of these fire fungi live symbiotically, inside of mosses and trees. Fire rarely burns all parts of a plant evenly and some unburnt plant matter flies off in the fire’s updraft. These unburnt portions may spread the fungi over a burned area, where they later grow into visible mushrooms.

The fire completely remapped where scientists understand many fire-dependent fungi species to live. Some were even unknown in the park before the fire.

"The fact that fire has been suppressed means that we just haven't seen these fungi," said Hughes. She explained that the fire let her see the fungi that had been hiding in the soil, trees and moss. "There were so many of them that they colored the forest floor."
Evolving to burn

Great Smoky Mountains and the greater Southern Appalachians are not strangers to fire. While large blazes like those of 2016 are rare, the park's forests evolved in tandem with smaller, frequent fires. The biodiversity of the park is dependent on different types of forests that burn at different frequencies.

"Table Mountain pine is only found in the central and southern Appalachians and it has cones that have to be heated to fully open and release seeds," said Donald Hagan, an associate professor of forest ecology at Clemson University. "That says something about how long fire has been on this landscape."

Dead trees from the 2016 fire that swept through the Gatlinburg area can still be seen from the Park Vista hotel in Gatlinburg on Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2021.

Scientists track fire histories using preserved burn scars in old-growth trees and by carbon-dating fossil charcoal. These physical records show that fire used to burn more frequently through the Appalachians than it does nowadays.

Many fires were probably set intentionally. For thousands of years, indigenous people would set blazes for hunting, crop land and trail clearance, and to maintain space for important plants like giant river cane. Cades Cove, in the centuries before European settlement, was routinely burned by the Cherokee to maintain open fields.

In upland areas that regularly burned, oak and pine trees grew over open, grassy forest floors. The trees grew tall to avoid low flames. In the spring, riots of wildflowers emerged.

Each fire's effects rippled through time, felt differently by every plant, tree and animal. For example, a Smokies study found that a fire can affect which birds live where for approximately 25 years after a burn.

For most of the park’s history, both natural and human-caused fire have been suppressed by the Forest Service and the Park Service. Setting fires was discouraged and wildfires were put out.

Over the decades, the parts of the park dominated by fire-adapted species like oak and pine were colonized by moisture-loving species like maples and hemlock. These new species closed off the understory, making the forest thick, shady and moist.

Oak and pine saplings cannot compete under these conditions. Their seedlings are out-competed or never germinate. As the decades wear on they are slowly being replaced.

Many species that depend on these woodlands, like the red-cockaded woodpecker and the purple fringed orchid, are dwindling as the forests change.

"It's a feedback loop, here species encroach and it becomes harder for fire to happen," Hagan said. "That doesn't mean it can't happen but it's only going to happen under a more severe drought."
The fire cycle continues

The other consequence of thick forests is the potential for more damaging fires. During droughts, dry, decomposing leaves become fuel.

Hagan they don't have to be catastrophic fires like the worst seen in Gatlinburg to cause real damage to trees.

"Slow-burning fires feed off of decomposing leaves on the forest floor and cook the upper root systems of many trees. After several years those trees die, leaving behind standing dead trunks.

"That means they are fuel for future fires," Hagan said. "Certain parts of the landscape might be more flammable than they were in 2016."

In the future, the mountains could experience similar conditions to what was recorded in 2016. Scientists project that the Southern Appalachians will experience more intense rainstorms with long periods of drought between them as climate change worsens.

Patches of dead trees marking the fire path from the 2016 fire that swept through the Gatlinburg area can still be seen around the Park Vista hotel from the Gatlinburg Bypass on Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2021.

"We are seeing increased climate volatility," Hagan said. "There will certainly be situations where you have extreme droughts that create extreme fire events."

Hagan and other forest ecology experts think that the best way to prepare for this is to promote the natural biodiversity. By creating lots of different sections of forest at different stages of growth, park managers can conserve species and prevent sweeping fires at the same time.

And, of course, prescribed burns are one of the tools, too.

"We know the future is going to be different from the past," Hagan said. "Effectively what we are doing is hedging our bets against an uncertain future."

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: Gatlinburg wildfires exposed lessons in forest life after a blaze

The oldest trees on Earth

CBSNews
Sun, November 28, 2021

High atop the remote, rocky slopes of California's White Mountains, the harsh conditions make it difficult for life to take root. But for a certain type of tree – and for those who have traveled here to study it – this place is paradise.

These gnarled bristlecone pines are the oldest individual trees in the world. Researchers like Andy Bunn have come to learn from the ancients.

Correspondent Conor Knighton asked Bunn, "Looking at this tree, would you have any idea how old this is?"

"I've been doing this long enough to not try and play the guessing game too much," he replied. "It'd be easy for this tree to be a thousand years old; it would be easier for it to be two thousand years old. Older than that would be unusual, but not impossible."

/ Credit: CBS News

There are bristlecones in this grove that are more than twice as old.

"It's remarkable to sit there and have your hand on one of those trees and know that it was growing when the Pyramids were built," said Bunn.

By taking core samples from the trunks – a process that researchers say doesn't harm the trees -- it's possible to extract their hidden history. "Dendrochronology" is the science of dating tree rings.

Matt Salzer, a dendrochronologist at the University of Arizona's Laboratory of Tree Ring Research, said, "Each annual tree ring is like a time capsule of the environment for that year from which it was formed. And it contains many different types of information – chemical information, the information on growth, climate information."

Examining a tree ring core sample. / Credit: CBS News

"If you're trying to look at people in the past through time, tree rings give you a way to do it in a way that makes sense in a human life scale," said University of Arizona professor Charlotte Pearson. She first became fascinated with the bristlecones after reading about an ancient volcanic eruption on the Greek island of Santorini. "It blew my mind that trees on the other side of the world could possibly be used to date this thing to within a single year," she said.

Massive eruptions eject so much ash that they cool the entire planet. Since bristlecones put on narrow rings during especially cold years, scientists have used those rings to help establish an eruption date of 1560 BC.

Showing Knighton a tree ring sample, Pearson said, "We're moving backwards through time here. Here we change between A.D. and B.C., and we're into the B.C. period now, going backwards through time right to the very end, where we come to 1700 B.C."

By matching up core samples from live trees with wood from dead trees, it's possible to create a record that stretches back even further.

The oldest known living bristlecone is estimated to be over 4,800 years old. Named "Methuselah," the tree's precise location inside Inyo National Forest isn't publicized, and we won't be revealing it here – scientists are worried extra attention might attract vandals. Plus, in all likelihood it's not actually the oldest.

A bristlecone pine named Methuselah is more than 4,800 years old. / Credit: CBS News

Knighton asked, Do you believe that there are older trees out there?"

"Almost certainly," Bunn replied. "It would be naïve to think that we just happened to get the oldest tree when we looked."

Age on the inside isn't always apparent on the outside. Up a long, winding dirt road from the Methuselah Grove stands the Patriarch Tree. Though it is the largest bristlecone pine known, it's a comparative youngster, at around 1,500 years old.

Bunn said, "It really does feel like you are in the presence of something magnificent. There's not a lot of places in the world where you can get the feeling of being around trees like this."

The Patriarch tree. / Credit: CBS News

What makes this place challenging for most species might be the secret to the bristlecone pine's success. Bunn said, "They live in this sort of moonscape where they have figured out a life history strategy where they can eke out a living in this incredibly difficult environment, and they don't really have to compete with other organisms."

For Bunn, the climate record written in the rings offers guidance for how we might think about what's happening in the present as we plan for the future. "What we're seeing increasingly is that a lot of the climate events that we are experiencing and living through right now have no precedent in the paleoclimate record," he said. "So, we really are moving into uncharted territory."

Like us, bristlecones mark time in years. Their lives are so long, these twisting sentinels see a far bigger picture.

Knighton asked, "Does it give you some perspective on your own lifespan?"

"Yeah, definitely," Bunn replied. "It gives me not only perspective of my own lifespan, but also on sort of human civilization. And to look back and to see everything that humanity's accomplished and to go back and read the rings of these trees and to think about what humanity was like at different periods while those trees were growing, is incredibly humbling."

For more info:

Laboratory of Tree Ring Research, University of Arizona, Tucson

Story produced by Anthony Laudato. Editor: James Taylor.

OUR FRIENDS THE FUNGI

World’s vast networks of underground fungi to be mapped for first time
Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent 4 hrs ago

Vast networks of underground fungi – the “circulatory system of the planet” – are to be mapped for the first time, in an attempt to protect them from damage and improve their ability to absorb and store carbon dioxide.© Provided by The Guardian Photograph: Biosphoto/Alamy

Fungi use carbon to build networks in the soil, which connect to plant roots and act as nutrient “highways”, exchanging carbon from plant roots for nutrients. For instance, some fungi are known to supply 80% of phosphorus to their host plants.

Underground fungal networks can extend for many miles but are rarely noticed, though trillions of miles of them are thought to exist around the world. These fungi are vital to the biodiversity of soils and soil fertility, but little is known about them.

Many hotspots of mycorrhizal fungi are thought to be under threat, from the expansion of agriculture, urbanisation, pollution, water scarcity and changes to the climate.

The new project, from the Society for the Protection of Underground Networks (SPUN), will involve the collection of 10,000 samples around the world, from hotspots that are being identified through artificial intelligence technology.

Jane Goodall, the conservationist, who is advising the project, said: “An understanding of underground fungal networks is essential to our efforts to protect the soil, on which life depends, before it is too late.”

The Society for the Protection of Underground Networks comprises scientists from the Netherlands, Canada, the US, France, Germany and the University of Manchester in the UK.

The first collections will take place next year in Patagonia, and continue for about 18 months, to create maps of potential underground mycorrhizal fungi that can be used for further research. Using the maps, the scientists hope to pinpoint the ecosystems facing the most urgent threats, and partner with local conservation organisations to try to create “conservation corridors” for the underground ecosystems.

This is believed to be the first major effort to map an underground ecosystem in this way. Climate science has focused on above-ground ecosystems, and although we know that fungi are essential for soil structure and fertility, and the global carbon cycle – as ecosystems with thriving mycorrhizal fungi networks have been shown to store eight times as much carbon as ecosystems without such networks – much of the role of fungi in the soil nutrient cycle remains mysterious.

Mark Tercek, former CEO of the Nature Conservancy, and a member of the governing body for SPUN, said: “Fungal networks underpin life on Earth. If trees are the ‘lungs’ of the planet, fungal networks are the ‘circulatory systems’. These networks are largely unexplored.”

Mycorrhizal fungi create tough organic compounds that provide structure to the soil, and store carbon in their necromass, the networks that are no longer active, but remain woven into the soil.

Modern industrial agriculture adds vast quantities of chemical fertiliser which interrupts the dynamics of exchange between plants and fungi, scientists warn. Without thriving fungal networks, crops require more chemical inputs and are more vulnerable to drought, soil erosion, pests and pathogens. Mechanical ploughing in modern agriculture also damages the physical integrity of fungal networks

.

© Photograph: Biosphoto/Alamy Hotspots of mycorrhizal fungi are thought to be under threat, from agriculture, urbanisation, pollution, water scarcity and changes to the climate.

There is also increasing evidence that some combinations of fungi can enhance productivity more than others, so guarding these is critical, according to soil scientists.

Ten hotspots have been identified by the scientists involved, including: Canadian tundra; the Mexican plateau; high altitudes in South America; Morocco; the western Sahara; Israel’s Negev desert; the steppes of Kazakhstan; the grasslands and high plains of Tibet; and the Russian taiga.

Jeremy Grantham, a billionaire financier and funder of climate research who is funding the project with $3.5m (£2.6m), said: “Just below our feet lies an invaluable ally in mitigating climate change: vast hidden fungal networks. Billions of tonnes of carbon dioxide flow annually from plants to fungal networks. Yet these carbon sinks are poorly understood. In working to map and harness this threatened but vital resource for life on earth, SPUN is pioneering a new chapter in global conservation.”

LEFT WING WIN

Former first lady set to become Honduras's first woman president

Barnaby CHESTERMAN
Mon, November 29, 2021

Former first lady set to become Honduras's first woman presidentLeftist opposition candidate Xiomara Castro took a commanding lead in preliminary results (AFP)

Former first lady Xiomara Castro appeared set to become Honduras's first woman president after taking a commanding lead over the ruling party candidate, partial election results showed Monday.

With just over half of votes counted, the leftist opposition leader had taken more than 53 percent with a lead of almost 20 percentage points over the ruling National Party's Nasry Asfura, according to a National Electoral Council (CNE) live count.

Castro, whose husband Manuel Zelaya was deposed from the presidency in a coup in 2009, claimed victory late Sunday, even as the CNE said no result will be announced until the last vote is counted.

"Good night, we've won," Castro told supporters, promising to lead "a reconciliation government" in a country wracked by violent crime, drug trafficking, rampant corruption and large-scale migration to the United States.

Her statement sparked scenes of celebration in the capital Tegucigalpa, with supporters setting off fireworks and honking car horns.

It was a far cry from the deadly protests that broke out four years ago when Juan Orlando Hernandez won a second successive term amid accusations of fraud.

More than 30 people died as authorities cracked down on the month-long protest.

Reports of intimidation and violence in the buildup to Sunday's election led to fears of fresh unrest.

Castro and Asfura both called for calm as they cast their ballots, but the National Party (PN) declared victory less than an hour after polls opened, earning a rebuke from the European Union observer mission.

CNE boss Kelvin Aguirre said "historic" numbers had voted, with a turnout of more than 60 percent of 5.2 million registered voters.

But he warned that "no candidate can claim victory until the last vote has been counted."

- Olive branch -

The opposition had expressed fears the poll could be rigged to keep the PN in power, which would almost inevitably prompt street protests.

The campaign was bitter, with the PN trying to discredit Castro as a communist and attacking her support for legalizing abortion and same-sex marriage, touchy subjects in deeply conservative Honduras.

Castro, in turn, branded Hernandez a "narco-dictator."

But she took a conciliatory tone on Sunday night.

"I hold out my hand to my opponents because I don't have enemies, I will call for dialogue... with all sectors," she said.

Castro's expected victory would break 12 years of PN rule and four decades of hegemony shared with the Liberal Party.

Honduras has been hit hard by gang violence, drug trafficking and hurricanes, with 59 percent of its 10 million people living in poverty.

Washington has been keeping a close eye on the election.

Honduras has been the starting point for a wave of migrant caravans trying to reach the United States.

Some 18,000 police and as many soldiers were on duty nationwide for Sunday's vote, which took place without incident in the capital.

"Regardless of who wins, we're brothers, we're all Hondurans and need to respect each other," said Leonel Pena, 57, a carpenter in a poor neighborhood.

After more than a decade of PN rule, many voters said it was time for change.

"We've tried this government for 12 years and things have gone from bad to worse," Luis Gomez, 26, told AFP in the gang-ridden Tegucigalpa neighborhood of La Sosa. "We hope for something new."

Unemployment jumped from 5.7 percent in 2019 to 10.9 percent in 2020, largely because of the coronavirus pandemic, according to a study by the Autonomous University.

The country was also ravaged by two hurricanes in 2020.

- 'No narco-states, only narco-governments' -

The PN has been in power since Zelaya was ousted in a 2009 coup supported by the military, business elites and the political right.

Corruption and drug-trafficking scandals have engulfed Hernandez and many in his inner circle.

"Honduras is internationally known as a narco-state. But there are no narco-states, only narco-governments," said political analyst Raul Pineda, a former PN legislator.

Hernandez's brother Tony is serving a life sentence in a US prison for drug trafficking.

Drug barons whom the president helped extradite to the United States have accused him of involvement in the illicit trade.

Asfura was accused in 2020 of embezzling $700,000 of public money, and the so-called Pandora Papers linked him to influence-peddling in Costa Rica.

The third major candidate in the presidential race, the Liberal Party's Yani Rosenthal, spent three years in a US jail for money laundering.

He scored just nine percent in early results.

Hondurans also voted to elect the 28 members of the National Congress and 20 representatives of the Central American parliament.

bur/bc/mlr/to

Hondurans vote for new president as incumbent faces extradition

Grayson Quay, Contributing writer
Sun, November 28, 2021, 

nasry asfura poster Inti Ocon/Getty Images

Citizens of Honduras voted Sunday for a new president. The results of the election could remove the governing National Party from office for the first time since it took power in a 2009 military coup that ousted leftist President Mel Zelaya, who sought to align Honduras with Hugo Chavez's Venezuela.

Xiomara Castro, Zelaya's wife, currently leads in the polls, NPR reports. National Party candidate Nasry Asfura is in second place. His campaign has benefited from the National Party's entrenched political machine, which distributes cash payments and other gifts to voters, but has been marred by allegations that Asfura embezzled millions of dollars during his two terms as mayor of Tegucigalpa, the nation's capital city. The third-place candidate, Yani Rosenthal, returned to Honduras in 2020 after serving a prison sentence in the U.S. for money laundering.

Observers have expressed concerns that violence could erupt if a clear result does not emerge quickly. Twenty protestors were killed during demonstrations that followed the 2017 election. Political instability and gang activity in Honduras have already prompted some Hondurans to flee the country. Many of these refugees joined migrant caravans that traveled north through Mexico toward the U.S. border.

The incumbent president of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernández, has been accused by U.S. prosecutors of funding his campaigns with drug money and could be extradited to the U.S. if his party loses power, according to The Washington Post. His brother, former Honduran lawmaker Tony Hernández, is already serving a life sentence in a U.S. prison following a 2019 conviction for smuggling tons of cocaine into the United States.

Amazon workers in Alabama get a do-over in union election


FILE - In this March 30, 2021 file photo, a banner encouraging workers to vote in labor balloting is shown at an Amazon warehouse in Bessemer, Ala. A labor official is confirming a new union election for Amazon workers in Bessemer, based on objections to the first vote in a rare move. The decision was first announced on Monday, Nov. 29, 2021 by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which spearheaded the union organizing movement (AP Photo/Jay Reeves, File)

ANNE D'INNOCENZIO
Mon, November 29, 2021,

NEW YORK (AP) — A new union election for Amazon workers in Bessemer, Alabama will be held based on objections to the first vote that took place in April.

The move is a major blow to Amazon, which had spent about a year aggressively campaigning for warehouse workers in Bessemer to reject the union, which they ultimately did by a wide margin.

The rare call for a do-over was first announced Monday by the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, which spearheaded the union organizing movement. A National Labor Relations Board spokeswoman confirmed the decision but did not yet provide details.

The RWDSU charged Amazon with illegal misconduct during the first vote. In August, the hearing officer at NLRB who presided over the case determined that Amazon violated labor law and recommended that the regional director set aside the results and direct another election.

The main reason for the determination was a U.S. Postal Service mailbox Amazon installed in the parking lot ahead of the election, which could have left the false impression that the company was running the election. Security cameras in the parking lot could have scared off workers who thought Amazon may have been watching workers vote. About 53% of the nearly 6,000 workers cast ballots during the first election.

Kelly Nantel, an Amazon spokesperson, called the decision “disappointing.”

"Our employees have always had the choice of whether or not to join a union, and they overwhelmingly chose not to join the RWDSU earlier this year,” she said. “It’s disappointing that the NLRB has now decided that those votes shouldn’t count.”

Stuart Appelbaum, president of the RWDSU, sees the NLRB decision as a victory.

“Today’s decision confirms what we were saying all along – that Amazon’s intimidation and interference prevented workers from having a fair say in whether they wanted a union in their workplace – and as the Regional Director has indicated, that is both unacceptable and illegal, “ he said in a statement. “Amazon workers deserve to have a voice at work, which can only come from a union.”

But even with a second election, labor experts say a union victory is a long shot. Amazon will likely appeal and try to delay another vote. And even when an election is held, workers may chose to vote against joining a union again. Last time around, 1,798 workers rejected the union and 738 voted in favor of it.

A repeat of the election means another battle for Amazon with the RWDSU. The first election garnered nationwide attention and put a spotlight on how Amazon treats its workers. It was the biggest union push in Amazon’s history and only the second time that an organizing effort from within the company had come to a vote.

Pro-union employees at the Bessemer facility said they spent 10-hour shifts on their feet in the warehouse, where online orders are packed and shipped, and didn’t have enough time to take breaks. A union could force Amazon to offer more break time or higher pay, those workers said. Amazon, meanwhile, argued that it already offered more than twice the minimum wage in Alabama plus benefits without workers having to pay union dues.

This is the second unionizing attempt by Amazon workers in the past year.

A group of Amazon workers in Staten Island, New York withdrew its petition to hold a vote to unionize early in November. The workers, however, can refile a petition.

The organizing effort in New York City is working without the help of a national sponsor and is being spearheaded by a former Amazon employee, Christian Smalls. He said he was fired just hours after he organized a walkout last year to protest working conditions at the outset of the pandemic.

Canada's Capital Power and Enbridge to partner on carbon capture project


FILE PHOTO: The Enbridge Tower on Jasper Avenue in Edmonton

Mon, November 29, 2021, 7:14 AM·1 min read

(Reuters) - Capital Power Corp and Enbridge Inc agreed to partner on a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project, the companies said on Monday, that would aim to capture up to three million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions annually.

The proposed project would serve Capital Power's Genesee Generating Station near Warburg, Alberta, which currently provides over 1,200 megawatts of baseload electricity generation to Albertans.

Alberta, home to Canada's oil sands, is aiming to become a hub for carbon storage and hydrogen production as the world moves away from fossil fuel consumption and tries to cut climate-warming carbon emissions.

Enbridge would be the transportation and storage service provider, while Capital Power would be the carbon dioxide provider on the project, which could be in service as early as 2026.

The captured carbon dioxide emissions from the re-powered units would be transported and stored through Enbridge's open access carbon hub that could also serve several other local industrial companies.

Enbridge is applying to develop an open access carbon hub in the Wabamun area through the government of Alberta's request for full project proposals process, which is expected to start as early as December 2021.

Companies including TC Energy, Suncor Energy, Royal Dutch Shell also plan to build new CCS storage facilities.

(Reporting by Arunima Kumar in Bengaluru; Editing by Shailesh Kuber)

EXPLAINER-What is behind unrest in the Solomon Islands?


FILE PHOTO: Protests turn violent in Solomon Islands

Kirsty Needham
Mon, November 29, 2021

SYDNEY (Reuters) - Four people were killed during violent anti-government protests in the Solomon Islands that prompted Australia to send police and soldiers to help keep order.

In three days of unrest https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/calm-returns-clean-up-begins-solomon-islands-media-2021-11-28 last week, buildings were set ablaze and shops looted by protesters angered by problems such as high unemployment and crowded housing, witnesses said.

The unrest followed protests by residents of Malaita, the South Pacific island nation's most populous province, which opposed a decision by Prime Minister Sogavare's government in 2019 to formally recognise China instead of Taiwan.

That decision has not only contributed to strains in relations between Malaita and the Solomon Islands government, but also left the island nation of 650,000 at the centre of a geopolitical tussle involving big powers.

WHAT HAPPENED IN THE UNREST?

The violence began after protesters from a group calledMalaita for Democracy travelled to Honiara, the Solomon Islands' capital in Guadalcanal province, and gathered outside parliament. They called for Sogavare to address them on Nov. 24.

Witnesses said rioting erupted after Sogavare failed to meet them. Much of Honiara's Chinatown area was destroyed during the unrest that followed, involving young men from Honiara's outskirt settlements which have no running water.

Australian sent 100 police and soldiers, and 50 peacekeepers were dispatched by Papua New Guinea, in response to requests from the Solomon Islands government. They helped local police restore calm, and Fiji said it would send 50 troops.

Sogavare said unnamed foreign powers had intervened because they did not want the Solomon Islands to have diplomatic relations with China. Taiwan has denied any involvement in the unrest.

HOW HAVE TAIWAN-CHINA TENSIONS AFFECTED THE SOLOMON ISLANDS?

China and Taiwan have been rivals in the South Pacific for decades. Some island nations have switched allegiances and allegations have surfaced about rival offers of aid and infrastructure being made to sway influence.

Fifteen countries maintain formal diplomatic ties with Taiwan. The last two to ditch Taipei in favour of Beijing were the Solomon Islands and Kiribati in September 2019.

Malaita's premier, Daniel Suidani, has banned Chinese companies from the province and accepted development aidfrom the United States.

Suidani visited Taipei for medical treatment in May, sparking protests from Sogavare's government and the Chinese embassy in Honiara.

Suidani's doctors said they suspected a brain tumour and recommended overseas hospital treatment. Suidani returned to Malaita in October after a series of delays caused by the government's COVID-19 restrictions.

WHAT DO CHINA AND TAIWAN SAY?

Taiwan said it had nothing to do with the unrest. China's foreign ministry said it was concerned about developments in the Solomon Islands and that attempts to undermine these ties were "futile".

China's foreign ministry spokesman said: "Facts have proven that the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and the Solomon Islands is in line with the fundamental and long-term development of the Solomon Islands."

WHAT DO OTHER PACIFIC ISLAND NATIONS SAY?

The secretary general of the Pacific Island Forum, the main regional group, Henry Puna, issued a statement urging patience by "all parties" and adherence to the rule of law and the constitution.

WHAT ABOUT THE UNITED STATES?

The U.S. State Department has expressed concern about the violence in Honiara and supported the rapid restoration of peace and security. It said the United States has "enduring ties" with the Solomon Islands.

In 2020, the U.S. Agency for International Aid Development (U.S. Aid) granted $25 million for a development program to be based in Malaita, beginning with a sustainable forestry project, and re-establishing the Peace Corps.

The Solomon Islands government said in October 2020 the U.S. aid program would need to be approved by the national government first, cautioned Malaita province to respect the proper processes and urged people to stop "politicizing foreign aid".

The U.S. aid was made in response to a letter from the Solomon Islands national government requesting aid, before the 2019 switch to recognise China, a political adviser to Suidani said.

WHY DID AUSTRALIA SEND TROOPS?

Australia said it responded to Sogavare's request to send police to restore order in Honiara under a bilateral security treaty and that "our focus is to support stability, we do not take sides in these differences".

Malaita province said it was surprised https://www.reuters.com/world/china/solomon-islands-province-not-happy-australian-police-presence-political-aide-2021-11-29 by Australia's decision.

Australian police were previously deployed to the Solomon Islands in 2003 under a peacekeeping mission authorised by a Pacific Island Forum declaration, and stayed for a decade.

Severe internal unrest and armed conflict from 1998 to 2003 involved militant groups from Guadalcanal and Malaita.

Australia's diplomatic relationship with China is tense. Its defence minister has accused China of "alarming" actions which do not match its rhetoric about promoting regional peace and prosperity, prompting a rebuke from Beijing.

(Editing by Timothy Heritage)

CRIMINAL CAPITALI$M

China Cash Flowed Through Congo Bank to Former President’s Cronies





Sun, November 28, 2021

LONG READ

(Bloomberg) -- The Chinese businessman had walked out of a bank in Kinshasa with 13,624 hundred-dollar bills, 10,001 fifties and 43,000 smaller U.S. notes, despite explicit instructions to prevent it from happening.

“The account has finally been emptied,” Yvon Douhore, head of an in-house audit team in the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, wrote in an email that day, July 5, 2018, after noticing the withdrawal. “I’m at a loss for words,” a colleague replied the next day.

The previous month, Groupe BGFIBank’s compliance department in Congo had frozen accounts held by the businessman’s firm, Congo Construction Co., or CCC, because the client file was missing key documents, according to bank records. A history of transactions reviewed by Bloomberg News as part of the biggest leak of financial information from Africa showed an even bigger issue: its political connections.

Over a five-year period, tens of millions of dollars flowed through CCC’s accounts to people and companies closely associated with Congo’s then-president, Joseph Kabila, all at a bank partly owned by his sister and run by his brother, Selemani Francis Mtwale. But a series of scandals had forced the lender’s parent company in Gabon to reconsider its embrace of the presidential family. It removed Selemani as chief executive officer in May 2018 and then reclaimed a 40% stake held by Kabila’s sister, which it said she’d never paid for.

Douhore’s colleagues blocked the accounts while he conducted an autopsy of Selemani’s tenure. Yet someone at the bank was still authorizing transactions, right through to the final $2.5 million cash withdrawal in July 2018. The documents hint at why: Douhore was witnessing the closing act of CCC’s secret role as an intermediary between Chinese mining groups and the Kabila clan.

For more than six months, Bloomberg has analyzed a trove of 3.5 million bank documents from BGFI that offer an unprecedented glimpse into how several individuals and companies operated in what would turn out to be a takeover of much of the Congolese mining industry by Chinese companies during Kabila’s presidency. The information was obtained by Paris-based anti-corruption group Platform to Protect Whistleblowers in Africa and the French news organization Mediapart and shared with media outlets coordinated by the European Investigative Collaborations network and five non-governmental organizations.

The consortium’s investigations, dubbed “Congo Hold-up,” demonstrate the extent to which the country’s most powerful family used the bank to serve its private interests and how at least $138 million in state funds transited BGFI to Kabila’s relatives and associates. The new information also casts a light on some of the previously unseen ways in which Chinese companies came to dominate the mineral riches of one of the poorest nations in the world.

The Sentry, a Washington-based anti-corruption group, used the banking data to write a report about the Kabila family’s financial ties to Chinese mining companies. Bloomberg was given access to the organization’s documents and findings before the report’s release. Over the course of several months, Bloomberg independently obtained additional documents and spoke with dozens of people on five continents to confirm and complement the information.

In a statement posted on its website on Nov. 23, after the first consortium stories appeared, BGFI said that while it decried the leak and questioned the authenticity of the documents, it “strongly condemns acts contrary to law and ethics that may have been committed in the past within its BGFIBank RDC SA subsidiary and of which its employees could possibly have been perpetrators or complicit.” The bank added that it had restructured its ownership of the Congo unit in 2018, conducted an internal audit to identify methods that may have been used to circumvent controls, put in new management and filed a complaint with the prosecutor’s office to determine who was responsible for the alleged acts and sanction them.

This isn’t the first time BGFI has been at the center of corruption allegations in Congo. Five years ago, a former compliance officer shared thousands of bank documents with media outlets including Bloomberg that showed how Selemani had directed millions of dollars in public funds to the bank and a company owned by some of Kabila’s closest allies. The new leak of documents shows that was only part of the story.

After replacing his assassinated father in 2001 and negotiating an end to a brutal civil war, Kabila opened the country’s vast reserves of copper and cobalt to international investors. Western firms, initially enthusiastic about Kabila’s Congo, have since beat a steady retreat. BHP Group, Anglo American Plc’s De Beers and Freeport-McMoRan Inc. have all sold mines or abandoned projects. Those that stayed often formed high-risk partnerships that are now the subject of corruption probes, including one by the U.S. Department of Justice into Glencore Plc and two others by the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office into Glencore and Eurasian Natural Resources Corp. Glencore says it’s cooperating with the authorities. ENRC denies wrongdoing.

That’s increasingly left the field to companies from China eager to expand their control over the supply of two metals that are mined together in Congo and are at the heart of the nascent revolution in electric vehicles. In less than a decade, Chinese companies have gone from minor contributors to accounting for half of Congo’s cobalt output and about 70% of its copper production, according to Congo’s main business lobby.

The centerpiece of this transformation is a $6.2 billion minerals-for-infrastructure deal, the biggest investment in Congo’s history, spearheaded by China Railway Group Ltd. and Power Construction Corp. of China, known as Powerchina.

In 2008, the two countries agreed that the Chinese companies would finance $3 billion worth of infrastructure and build a $3.2 billion copper and cobalt project known as Sicomines, whose tax-free profits would repay both investments. Supporters hailed it as a proud symbol of China’s new “win-win” model of development financing, an alternative to the strict conditions attached to lending from the Western-dominated World Bank and International Monetary Fund.

Congo’s government also handed a no-bid contract to a subsidiary of China Railway to rebuild and maintain the road from the mining hub of Lubumbashi to the border with Zambia, with tolls charged to fund the work. The highway is the primary path to export for Congolese copper and cobalt, making it one of the most lucrative routes in Africa. Each year, tens of thousands of trucks laden with metal pay the concession fee, currently $300, to make the round trip. The toll road generated a total of $302 million between 2010 and 2020, according to an unpublished government audit seen by Bloomberg.

Kabila set up a government agency — the Bureau de Coordination et de Suivi du Programme Sino-Congolais — to oversee the Chinese relationship and appointed an ally, Moise Ekanga, to run it. Ekanga, it turns out, was also the chief operating officer of a private firm owned by the Kabila family, corporate documents and contracts reviewed by Bloomberg show. The company, Strategic Projects and Investments, or SPI, profited handsomely from China’s growing presence.

SPI held a 40% stake in the toll road business until 2015, and then took it over completely. The audit, by an anti-graft agency under the current government, claims that since China Railway’s exit six years ago, the toll company has misappropriated nearly $121 million. Bloomberg wasn’t able to independently verify the allegation.

Cong Maohuai, a Chinese businessman who owns the Kinshasa hotel in which CCC had an office, told the consortium that he acquired control of the toll company in November 2016. However, information available at Congo’s corporate registry still lists SPI as the sole shareholder. Cong declined to provide documentation proving the change of ownership, citing confidentiality requirements. He disputed the audit’s findings, saying, “I reaffirm that there was never any misappropriation” in the concession contract. Neither China Railway nor Kabila’s younger brother Zoe, SPI’s founding shareholder, responded to multiple requests for comment.

It’s not clear how much, if anything, SPI paid China Railway to take over the toll road firm in 2015. Minutes of a board meeting approving the share transfer don’t mention any compensation. But there are traces of what the company did with at least some of the money it made: It sent it to CCC.

From June 2013 to January 2016, BGFI records show, the toll venture made 41 transfers, worth $7.8 million, to CCC, almost all of which was taken out in cash.

CCC’s owner was an aspiring academic born in 1979 in Liaoning, China, named Du Wei. He began working in Africa in the early 2000s and in August 2016 wrote an article for Wuhan University’s Institute for International Studies bemoaning Chinese companies’ tendency to use “unscrupulous means” to win major projects, according to an article Du wrote that the Sentry cited in its report.

Du, who went by “David” in Congo, worked for Sicomines for three years until 2012, when he became a consultant for Kabila’s China agency, according to his LinkedIn profile. That’s also the year he incorporated CCC with Guy Loando, then a 29-year-old Congolese lawyer, and opened a company account at BGFI.

Between February and July 2013, CCC, which had no known construction projects, received $18 million from bank accounts in China and Hong Kong held by four offshore companies registered in the British Virgin Islands. The BGFI records list the justifications as “construction fee payment,” “other transfers” and “other.” The toll road business also wired $1 million to CCC that June. Du sent most of the $19 million on to Kabila’s China agency through a series of identical cash withdrawals and deposits, rather than direct transfers, the records show.

Ekanga, the agency’s head, then promptly paid off a $14 million loan his office had taken from BGFI for the benefit of companies that were or would be linked to Kabila. The agency had wired half of the borrowed funds to another BGFI account that advanced the same amount to a cattle business Kabila would shortly purchase. It also transferred $6 million to a building firm owned by two associates of the then-president, bank records show.

Neither Ekanga nor the agency’s spokesman responded to multiple emails, texts and phone calls from the consortium requesting comment. China Railway and Sicomines’ other Chinese shareholders didn’t respond to questions asking if they ultimately provided the funds to CCC or owned the BVI firms, which were created by the same Hong Kong-based corporate services provider that China Railway used to set up a subsidiary to hold shares in Congolese mines.

Sicomines later made three large payments to CCC, from June to September 2016, for a total of $25 million. Du distributed most of the money to companies and individuals linked to the president’s family, bank records show. This included $7.5 million for a firm whose shareholders were Kabila’s sister and Selemani’s wife, $1.6 million that went to the owner of a vessel that transported animals including zebras, giraffes and wildebeests to Kabila’s private nature reserve in 2017 and $1 million sent to a director of the shipping company. A lawyer representing the ship’s then-owner declined to respond to a request for comment.

CCC also forwarded more than $1.7 million to Du’s personal accounts in Congo and Hong Kong, BGFI documents show.

Sicomines didn’t respond to questions from the consortium. The Chinese embassy in Kinshasa said its government “always asks Chinese companies working in the DRC to strictly respect local laws and regulations” and to “conduct cooperation projects in a win-win manner.” Chinese investors should “never interfere in Congolese political affairs,” an embassy spokesman said by email.

Du didn’t respond to questions. His WhatsApp and one of his email accounts were deleted after the consortium made numerous efforts to contact him.

While Sicomines entered production in 2015, it won’t be able to reach its full capacity of 250,000 metric tons of copper a year until it has a reliable supply of electricity. To ensure that, the company proposed building a dam near the village of Busanga. The $600 million project was originally supposed to be part of the minerals-for-infrastructure deal. But in July 2016, China Railway and Powerchina created a new company with Congo’s state-owned miner Gécamines, which owns 32% of Sicomines, to hold the 240-megawatt hydropower plant. This time, 15% of the state’s share went to a previously unknown entity called Congo Management Sarl, or Coman.

Efforts to contact Coman’s two shareholders were unsuccessful, but the company does have close ties to people in Kabila’s entourage. Coman is represented by the ex-president’s former personal lawyer and managed by someone who was an employee of Kabila’s China agency. In addition, financial transactions that appear to mirror each other occurred in the accounts of Coman and CCC. In November 2016, CCC’s Du withdrew $430,000 from the company’s account. A deposit of equal size appeared in Coman’s account at BGFI on the same day. After remaining untouched for a year, a similar amount was withdrawn by the chairman of a company co-owned by Kabila’s sister and sister-in-law, records show.

A man who would shortly become the manager of a Coman subsidiary also received $1 million from CCC in May 2017 — money that, banking records show, originated from Sicomines.

Neither Norbert Nkulu, Kabila’s former lawyer and Coman’s legal representative, nor Claudine Paony, the company’s manager, responded to questions sent by the consortium. In 2018, Kabila appointed Nkulu, who is also a former minister, to serve on Congo’s constitutional court.

Du began restructuring CCC in March 2017. First, the company took over a phosphate mining permit owned by Allamanda Trading Ltd., whose representative co-owns several companies with the person who managed Kabila’s farming company. Du then acquired the 20% stake in CCC owned by Loando, the Congolese lawyer, and transferred all the firm’s shares to a company registered in the British Virgin Islands called Harefield Overseas Ltd.

In January 2018, China Molybdenum Co. purchased CCC and its phosphate license for $40 million. China Moly had recently arrived in Congo by buying control of the giant Tenke Fungurume copper-cobalt mine in a deal worth more than $3 billion. Last year, the Chinese firm paid $550 million to take over another large copper-cobalt deposit in Congo.

None of the parties to the deal responded to questions about whether CCC paid Allamanda for the permit or if any member of the Kabila family was a beneficiary of the company. China Moly said Du learned of its interest in the phosphate deposit at an unspecified time in 2017 and that he was the only shareholder of the offshore vehicle that held CCC at the time of the transaction. The company said it will develop the project “at an appropriate time in the future.”

By late 2017, as reports of corruption accumulated, BGFI realized that it needed to act to avoid potentially crippling U.S. Treasury sanctions, bank documents show. First, it distanced the Congo unit from the presidential family.

Next, the bank instructed Douhore, the chief auditor in Kinshasa, to review Selemani’s leadership of the Congo unit. Douhore’s assessment, completed in July 2018, concluded that governance had been “unacceptable” and characterized by a “lack of integrity and transparency in the declaration of conflicts of interest.” Multimillion dollar payments into and out of CCC’s accounts, including those from Sicomines and the toll road company, were executed either without essential paperwork or with documents of questionable authenticity, according to the audit. Douhore didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Even after China Moly’s purchase of CCC, Du continued to control its accounts at BGFI, records show. In May 2018, CCC received $7.7 million from a company partly controlled by Kabila’s sister and sister-in-law. In the same month, a BGFI account belonging to Congo’s central bank wired nearly $1.9 million to CCC.

Du transferred $1.5 million to a company registered in the United Arab Emirates in May 2018, before he and another individual removed the rest of the funds in cash, including the final withdrawal of $2.5 million in July of that year. At least two of the transactions took place after BGFI’s compliance team had tried to block CCC’s accounts.

Douhore blamed the then-CEO — who had worked closely with Selemani — for overriding the freeze, according to the documents. The audit department notified BGFI headquarters that two companies owned by Kabila family members were draining their accounts at the same time as CCC. Together, the firms took more than $23 million out of the bank in cash over two months in mid-2018.

China Moly said it’s “not aware of the existence of CCC’s bank account” and doesn’t have any knowledge of the activities executed by Du through its subsidiary. BGFI’s CEO, who has since retired, said he had no relationship with Du and that he couldn’t have authorized a cash withdrawal on a frozen account without required justifications. Deogratias Mutombo, the governor of the central bank from 2013 until earlier this year, didn't respond to questions sent by the consortium.

In total, about $65 million flowed through CCC’s accounts between January 2013 and July 2018, of which $41 million was withdrawn in cash, making it impossible to track the beneficiaries of all the funds. Still, bank records show that at least $30 million was routed, via transfers or in cash, to people and entities directly linked to the Kabilas or companies owned by the presidential family.

Loando, Du’s former business partner, was elected in late 2018 to Congo’s senate as a member of Kabila’s coalition and has successfully navigated the deterioration of a pact between the former president and his successor, Felix Tshisekedi. In April, he became minister of regional planning. In response to questions about his role at CCC, Loando said he was simply a legal adviser and played no part in the daily management of the company. He said he wasn’t kept informed of the firm’s commercial activities and therefore had no knowledge of its transactions.

Kabila stepped down at the beginning of 2019, after 18 years in power, following delayed elections held under pressure from the U.S. and the African Union in which Tshisekedi was declared the winner.

What hasn’t changed is the control of Congo’s mines by Chinese companies. However, Tshisekedi has launched investigations into the minerals-for-infrastructure deal, including the Busanga hydropower plant, and whether China Moly is complying with its contractual obligations. It’s not clear when any conclusions from those probes will be announced.

Of the $3 billion in promised infrastructure financing from the Chinese companies, most of it still hasn’t arrived. Tshisekedi’s government said in September that projects worth only about $825 million have been built so far.

And the new president’s top anti-corruption official, Jules Alingete, has been examining alleged corruption scandals that have involved BGFI. Executives at the bank were “specialists in falsifying accounts,” he said in an interview with the consortium. “They fabricated, fabricated, fabricated, fabricated things.”

Douhore also criticized BGFI’s willingness to accept the explanations Du and an associate provided as they pulled nearly $10 million out of the bank in the middle of 2018. Those were just excuses “to allow unjustified withdrawals around suspicious [financial] movements," he wrote in an email to his bosses. To another colleague in the Kinshasa office he wrote, “We really are in another world.”

IMPERIALISM AND FINANCIAL CAPITAL