The former owner of a Mexico City private school who was convicted of manslaughter last month in the deaths of 26 people during a 7.1-magnitude earthquake was sentenced to 31 years in prison.During Wednesday’s sentencing, the court ruled Mónica García Villegas, former owner and director of the Enrique Rébsamen School, acted carelessly by building an apartment for herself on the roof of the school building.The court deemed the extra weight was a factor in the building’s collapse during the September 19, 2017, earthquake that killed 19 children and seven adults.In addition to the prison sentence, Villegas was ordered to pay nearly $19,000 to each victim’s family and fined $5,800 for criminal negligence.The Mexico News Daily reports Villegas was arrested in May of last year in Mexico City on a tip from her brother who received a reward of just over $234,000 for leading authorities to her.
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Category Archives: News
Worldwide news. News is information about current events. This may be provided through many different media: word of mouth, printing, postal systems, broadcasting, electronic communication, or through the testimony of observers and witnesses to events. News is sometimes called “hard news” to differentiate it from soft media
COVID-19 Apps Roll Out Nationwide as States Try to Reopen
Around the world, governments are turning to technology to trace people who have been exposed to the coronavirus. There are two main approaches. Michelle Quinn has a look at how they aim to work.
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Man Who Attacked Paris Police Officer Sentenced to 28 Years
A Paris court on Wednesday handed down a 28-year jail term to the Algerian man who attacked a police officer with a hammer in 2017 as officers guarded Notre Dame Cathedral. Farid Ikken, now 43, was convicted of attempted terrorist murder. Beginning with the 2015 terror attack in Paris on Charlie Hebdo magazine staff, in which 17 people were killed, France has been the site of several such incidents. Many of the attacks have targeted French security forces. In 2017, Ikken a former doctoral student, yelled, “This is for Syria,” before he charged officers outside the well-known tourist site. One officer was struck in the head with the hammer. Ikken was shot and wounded by other officers. Prosecutors said that during a search of Ikken’s home, police found a declaration of allegiance to Islamic State in a self-filmed video on his computer. They say he appeared to have acted alone. The trial began Monday. On Tuesday, Ikken testified that he had no regrets for his role in the incident, adding he still felt a “satisfaction of duty accomplished” after the attack.
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Report Tracks How Governments Fighting COVID Are Increasing Surveillance
Governments around the world have used the COVID-19 pandemic as their reason for expanding digital surveillance and collecting more data from their citizens, according to a report published Wednesday.The annual FILE – People wearing face masks to protect against the coronavirus use their smartphones to enter their personal data before being allowed to enter a pedestrian shopping street in Beijing, May 16, 2020.The report again singled out China for specific criticism as the world’s worst abuser of internet freedom, but Beijing also found new methods of digital surveillance in the pandemic.The report noted that Chinese authorities combined low- and high-tech tools not only to manage the outbreak of the coronavirus, but also to deter internet users from sharing information from independent sources and challenging the official narrative.The report concluded “the pandemic is normalizing the sort of digital authoritarianism that the Chinese Communist Party has long sought to mainstream.”“China’s government already was sitting on the most sophisticated and multilayered censorship and internet control apparatus around the world,” said Sarah Cook, a senior researcher at Freedom House.Technology spreadsShe added that what is unusual this year with COVID-19 is these tactics were being used regarding public health. Surveillance technology developed in the Xinjiang region — such as handheld devices for pulling data from citizens’ phones — is now proliferating in other parts of the country.There also are certain upgrades in these surveillance technologies, such as refining facial recognition technology to be able to identify people who are wearing masks or forcing people to use various color-coded health apps in China to track citizens’ infections.“These really don’t protect privacy and there are research initiatives that indicated that they even had a backdoor to the police,” Cook continued.FILE – A man holding a smartphone walks past the headquarters of Chinese state newspaper People’s Daily in Beijing, Oct. 6, 2018.In addition, Freedom House researchers say individuals around China also have reported pandemic-related intrusions, like being told to put webcams inside their houses and outside their doors for alleged quarantine enforcement.Apart from the heavy surveillance, Cook said the spread of COVID-19 is directly related to Chinese Communist Party speech controls on the internet.WeChat users
“The very thing we flagged last year as a problem in terms of monitoring of WeChat users and reprisals against WeChat users is exactly what happened to doctors like Li Wenliang, who initially tried to share information about this emerging SARS-like virus,” she said.“So, I think there’s really this very intimate connection between the outbreak overall and the fact that China is the worst abuser of internet freedom around the world.”Elsewhere in the world, Iceland is said to have the greatest internet freedom, followed by Estonia and Canada. The report listed U.S. in seventh place, with internet freedom worsening for the fourth year running.
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China Is Biggest Long-Term Threat to Britain, Says UK Spy Chief
The head of Britain’s domestic spy agency outlined Wednesday a cauldron of threats the country is facing, including from Islamist militancy to rising right-wing extremism, but he emphasized the biggest long-term challenge is presented by China.
Russia currently poses the biggest state-based threat to Britain, but China will become more dangerous in the future, Ken McCallum told reporters in London in his first public remarks as the new head of MI5. He said Russia was delivering “bursts of bad weather,” while Beijing is “changing the climate.”
The 45-year-old Glasgow-born spy chief said he’s planning to expand his agency’s operations to counter clandestine Chinese activities. He warned that Beijing has been seeking to steal the intellectual property of British businesses, including pharmaceutical companies, and universities.
“The UK wants to cooperate with China on the big global issues like climate change, while at the same time being robust in confronting covert hostile activity when we come across it,” he said. Ken McCallum, head of MI5, Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, is photographed in London, Oct. 14, 2020. (UK Government/Handout via Reuters)McCallum accused hostile states like China and Russia, of no longer just being focused on the traditional espionage activity of stealing government secrets, but also of targeting Britain’s economy and infrastructure, and seeking to undermine its democracy.
He highlighted in his briefing to reporters worrying foreign intelligence activity around Britain’s research and development of vaccines for the coronavirus, saying his agency was trying to block efforts to steal or sabotage vaccine research data. “Clearly, the global prize of having a first useable vaccine against this deadly virus is a large one,’ he said.
“I guess there are two bits we are on the lookout for: attempts either to steal unique intellectual property that’s been generated in that research or potentially to fiddle with the data,” he said. “And then the second risk we’ve got to be alive to is the possibility that the research is still high integrity and sound, but that somebody tries to sow doubt about its integrity,” he added.
Three months ago, Britain’s National Cyber Security Center said Russian-sponsored hackers had been trying to steal vaccine research from universities and pharmaceutical firms.
“In the 2020s, one of the toughest challenges facing MI5 and indeed government is that the differing national security challenges presented by Russian, Chinese, Iranian and other actors are growing in severity and in complexity — while terrorist threats persist at scale,” he said.
“We also do see interference in politics: the influencing of conversations around the European Union for example. We not long ago disrupted a piece of Chinese espionage activity that looked as if it was aimed against the European Union,” he added.FILE – A scientist works on a vaccine against the coronavirus at a facility in Oxford, Britain, June 24, 2020. British intelligence officials are putting such facilities high on the list of potential Chinese targets.McCallum, who was an undercover agent for 24 years for the agency before taking the top job at MI5, is calling for a register to be set up of foreign agents that would require lobbyists, trade advisers, lawyers and others paid by foreign powers to list their activities. Such registers currently exist in the U.S. and Australia. That would help to fight underhand “interference and influence, which is distinct from the espionage risk,” he said.
In a report published last July, the cross-party intelligence and security committee of the British parliament report warned “Russian influence in the UK is the new normal.” The committee criticized British “enablers and fixers,” including members of Britain’s House of Lords, who have facilitated the flow of Russian money into Britain over the past decade and enriched themselves while turning London into a “laundromat” for Russian cash.
“The arrival of Russian money resulted in a growth industry of enablers – individuals and organizations who manage and lobby for the Russian elite in the UK. Lawyers, accountants, estate agents and PR professionals have played a role, wittingly or unwittingly, in the extension of Russian influence which is often linked to promoting the nefarious interests of the Russian State,” the committee members said in their report.
The British government is currently drafting a new National Security and Investment Bill that would allow business deals and takeovers involving defense and critical infrastructure businesses to be blocked by authorities, if they fear there’s a risk to key British assets.
Turning to terrorism, McCallum said there was a growing threat from right-wing extremism. Since 2017, MI5 had disrupted 27 planned terrorist attacks, eight of them being organized by far-right extremists. “This threat is not, today, on the same scale as Islamist extremist terrorism. But it is growing,” he warned.FILE – Cars and buses are seen stationary on London Bridge in London, Britain, Dec. 1, 2019, as police forensic work is completed following a terror attack involving a man, wearing a fake suicide vest, going on a knife rampage.He said the coronavirus pandemic had made it more difficult to maintain physical surveillance on suspected terrorists, noting that with fewer pedestrians on the streets, “watchers” were easier to spot by the people they are tailing. But one benefit of the pandemic, he added, is there are fewer events and fewer crowded places for assailants to target.
McCallum, the youngest ever MI5 director general, took over in April. He said he gets deeply concerned when he gets a late-night phone call, fearing it could be to tell him of a terrorist attack.
“When attacks do take place, the human realities are awful. I often say to new joiners at MI5 that the hardest thing about working here is that no matter how much hard work and ingenuity we bring, it isn’t possible for us to stop every attack. Terrorist attacks are always, without exception, sickening. Whenever my phone rings late in the evening, my stomach lurches in case it is one of those awful moments.”
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British PM Resists Lockdown Idea, But Rules Out Nothing
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson Wednesday resisted a call from his political opposition for a nationwide, temporary “circuit breaker” lockdown to halt the spread of COVID-19, but said he rules out nothing. On Tuesday, Keir Starmer, leader of the opposition Labor Party, called for a three-week lockdown, based on advice from Britain’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE). The organization said failing to do so would lead to “catastrophic consequences.” Starmer said it was clear that Johnson’s regional approach to restrictions was not working. Johnson told the members of Parliament that he would stick to his local and regional approach that was announced Monday, which uses a three-tier system that rates the level of COVID-19 cases in specific areas. Cities and towns with medium, high or very high alert ratings must implement restrictive measures accordingly.Liverpool became the first area in the highest category, which requires bars, gyms and other businesses to close, perhaps for months.In a heated exchange with Starmer, Johnson pointed out that the opposition leader supported the government’s approach as recently as Monday. Starmer replied that he had supported the government in all its measures to this point but thinks the circuit breaker lockdown is in the national interest.British Finance Minister Rishi Sunak told Parliament he believes a second national lockdown would carry heavy economic and social costs that could permanently damage the British economy.Meanwhile, Northern Ireland, which is outside the tier system, announced the toughest COVID-19 measures since the pre-summer peak, closing restaurants and suspending schools. Northern Ireland has the highest infection rates in Britain.
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In Belarus, a Cultural Uprising is Also Under Way
The protests against the disputed electoral victory of longtime Belarus leader Alexander Lukashenko have roused a sense of Belarusian nationalism, and with it, the desire to learn and use the Belarusian language, which had largely disappeared. In this story narrated by Jonathan Spier, Ricardo Marquina in Minsk reports on how the language – whose use is highly restricted by authorities in favor of Russian – is seeing a rebirth.Producer: Rod James
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Apple Unveils New iPhones for Faster 5G Wireless Networks
Apple unveiled four new iPhones equipped with technology for use with faster new 5G wireless networks, hoping that demand for higher data speeds will spark demand for new phones.
That might not happen as quickly as Apple would like.
In a virtual presentation Tuesday, the company announced four 5G-enabled versions of the new iPhone 12 ranging in price from almost $700 to roughly $1,100. Apple also announced a new, less expensive version of its HomePod smart speaker.
Smartphone sales have been slowing for years as their technology has matured. That has meant far fewer gotta-have-it innovations that can drive demand and, at least until recently, increasingly pricey phones. Add to that pandemic-related economic crisis, and consumers have tended to eke as much life as possible out of their existing phones.
Apple, however, is clearly betting that 5G speeds could push many users off the fence. At its event, the company boasted about 5G capabilities and brought in Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg to champion the carrier’s network.
5G is supposed to mean much faster speeds, making it quicker to download movies or games, for instance. But finding those speeds can be a challenge. While telecom operators have been rolling out 5G networks, significant boosts in speed are still uncommon in much of the world, including the U.S. So far, there are no popular new consumer applications that require 5G.
Updates in the new phones mostly amount to “incremental improvements” over predecessor iPhones, technology analyst Patrick Moorhead said, referring to 5G capabilities and camera upgrades on higher-end phones. But he suggested that if carriers build out their 5G networks fast enough, it could launch a “supercycle” in which large numbers of people switch to 5G phones.
That might be a big if. Mobile expert Carolina Milanesi of the firm Creative Strategies said economic pain caused by the global pandemic and accompanying job losses could easily restrain that buying impulse.
Apple’s new models include the iPhone 12, which features a 6.1-inch display and starts at almost $800, and the iPhone 12 Mini, with a 5.4-inch display at almost $700. A higher-end iPhone 12 Pro with more powerful cameras will begin at roughly $1,000; the 12 Pro Max, with a 6.7-inch display, will set buyers back at least $1,100. Apple said the phones should be more durable.iPhone 12 Pro and iPhone 12 Pro Max feature a new, elevated flat-edge stainless steel design and Ceramic Shield front cover for increased durability.In a move that may annoy some consumers, Apple will no longer include charging adapters with new phones. It says that will mean smaller, lighter boxes that are more environmentally friendly to ship. Apple, however, separately sells power adapters that cost about $20 and $50, depending on how fast they charge phones.
The iPhone models unveiled Tuesday will launch at different times. The iPhone 12 and 12 Pro will be available starting Oct. 23; the Mini and the Pro Max will follow on Nov. 13.
That compresses Apple’s window for building up excitement heading into the key holiday season.
Although other parts of Apple’s business are now growing more rapidly, the iPhone remains the biggest business of a technology juggernaut currently worth about $2 trillion, nearly double its value when stay-at-home orders imposed in the U.S in mid-March plunged the economy into a deep recession.
The pandemic temporarily paralyzed Apple’s overseas factories and key suppliers, leading to a delay of the latest iPhones from their usual late September rollout. The company also closed many of its U.S. stores for months because of the pandemic, depriving Apple of a prime showcase for its products.
Apple on Tuesday also said it was shrinking the size and price of its HomePod speaker to catch up to Amazon and Google in the market for internet-connected speakers, where it has barely made a dent. Both Amazon and Google are trying to position their speakers, the Echo and the Nest, as low-cost command centers for helping people manage their homes and lives. They cost as little as $50, while the HomePod costs almost $300.
The new HomePod Mini will cost almost $100. It will integrate Apple’s own music service, of course, with Pandora and Amazon’s music service in “coming months.” Apple didn’t mention music-streaming giant Spotify. It will be available for sale Nov. 6 and start shipping the week of Nov. 16.
The research firm eMarketer estimates about 58 million people in the U.S. use an Amazon Echo while 26.5 million use a Google Nest speaker. Roughtly 15 million use a HomePod or speakers sold by other manufactures, including Sonos and Harman Kardon.
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Russian-US Crew Launches on Fast Track to the Space Station
A trio of space travelers has launched successfully to the International Space Station, for the first time using a fast-track maneuver to reach the orbiting outpost in just three hours. NASA’s Kate Rubins along with Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov of the Russian space agency Roscosmos lifted off as scheduled Wednesday morning from the Russia-leased Baikonur space launch facility in Kazakhstan for a six-month stint on the station. For the first time, they are trying a two-orbit, three-hour approach to the orbiting space outpost. Previously it took twice as long for the crews to reach the station. They will join the station’s NASA commander, Chris Cassidy, and Roscosmos cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner, who have been aboard the complex since April and are scheduled to return to Earth in a week. Speaking during Tuesday’s pre-launch news conference at Baikonur, Rubins emphasized that the crew spent weeks in quarantine at the Star City training facility outside Moscow and then on Baikonur to avoid any threat from the coronavirus. “We spent two weeks at Star City and then 17 days at Baikonur in a very strict quarantine,” Rubins said. “During all communications with crew members, we were wearing masks. We made PCR tests twice and we also made three times antigen fast tests.” She said she was looking forward to scientific experiments planned for the mission. “We’re planning to try some really interesting things like bio-printing tissues and growing cells in space and, of course, continuing our work on sequencing DNA,” Rubins said. Ryzhikov, who will be the station’s skipper, said the crew will try to pinpoint the exact location of a leak at a station’s Russian section that has slowly leaked oxygen. The small leak hasn’t posed any immediate danger to the crew. “We will take with us additional equipment which will allow us to detect the place of this leak more precisely,” he told reporters. “We will also take with us additional improved hermetic material which will allow to fix the leak.” In November, Rubins, Ryzhikov and Kud-Sverchkov are set to greet NASA’s SpaceX first operational Crew Dragon mission, bringing NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi to the space station aboard the Crew Dragon vehicle. It follows a successful Demo-2 mission earlier this year. The Crew Dragon mission was pushed back from Oct. 31 into November, and no new date has been set yet. The delay is intended to give SpaceX more time to conduct tests and review data from an aborted Falcon 9 launch earlier this month.
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Anti-Migrant Sentiment Fanned on Facebook in Malaysia
As coronavirus infections surged in Malaysia this year, a wave of hate speech and misinformation aimed at Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar began appearing on Facebook. Alarmed rights groups reported the material to Facebook. But six months later, many posts targeting the Rohingya in Malaysia remain on the platform, including pages such as “Anti Rohingya Club” and “Foreigners Mar Malaysia’s Image,” although those two pages were removed after Reuters flagged them to Facebook recently. Comments still online in one private group with nearly 100,000 members included “Hope they all die, this cursed pig ethnic group.” Facebook acknowledged in 2018 that its platform was used to incite violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar, and last year spent more than $3.7 billion on safety and security on its platform. But the surge of anti-Rohingya comment in Malaysia shows how xenophobic speech nonetheless persists. “Assertions that Facebook is uncommitted to addressing safety and security are inaccurate and do not reflect the significant investment we’ve made to address harmful content on our platform,” a company spokeswoman told Reuters. Reuters found more than three dozen pages and groups, including accounts run by former and serving Malaysian security officials, that featured discriminatory language about Rohingya refugees and undocumented migrants. Dozens of comments encouraged violence. Reuters found some of the strongest comments in closed private groups, which people have to ask to join. Such groups have been a hotbed for hate speech and misinformation in other parts of the world. Facebook removed 12 of the 36 pages and groups flagged by Reuters, and several posts. Five other pages with anti-migrant content seen by Reuters in the last month were removed before Reuters queries. “We do not allow people to post hate speech or threats of violence on Facebook and we will remove this content as soon as we become aware of it,” Facebook said. Some of the pages that remain online contain comments comparing Rohingya to dogs and parasites. Some disclosed where Rohingya had been spotted and encouraged authorities and the public to take action against them. Widespread hate speech “This kind of hate speech can lead to physical violence and persecution of a whole group. We saw this in Myanmar,” said John Quinley, senior human rights specialist at Fortify Rights, an independent group focused on Southeast Asia. “It would be irresponsible to not actively take down anti-refugee and anti-Rohingya Facebook groups and pages.” Muslim-majority Malaysia was long friendly to the Rohingya, a minority fleeing persecution in largely Buddhist Myanmar, and more than 100,000 Rohingya refugees live in Malaysia, even though it doesn’t officially recognize them as refugees. But sentiment turned in April, with the Rohingya being accused of spreading the coronavirus. Hate speech circulated widely, including on Facebook – a platform used by nearly 70% of Malaysia’s 32 million people. Rights groups and refugees said comments on Facebook helped escalate xenophobia in Malaysia. “Malaysians who have lived with Rohingya refugees for years have started calling the cops on us, some have lost jobs. We are in fear all the time,” said Abu, a Rohingya refugee who did not want to give his full name fearing repercussions. Another refugee who declined to be identified said he deactivated his Facebook account after his details were posted and Malaysians messaged him telling him to go back to Myanmar – from where he fled five years ago. “Facebook has failed, they don’t understand how dangerous such comments can be,” he said, referring to posts he had seen supporting action in Myanmar against Rohingya. ‘Absent’ Rights groups said the government of Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin had failed to do enough to curb xenophobia as it rounded up thousands of undocumented migrants and said it would no longer accept Rohingya refugees. “The Malaysian government was completely absent from any sort of effort to try to curtail this wave of hate speech,” said Human Rights Watch deputy Asia director Phil Robertson. Muhyiddin’s office did not respond to requests for comment. Reuters found four pages with links to security and enforcement agencies voicing anti-immigrant sentiment. “Let us not suffer the cancer of this ethnic (group),” administrators of a group called “Friends of Immigration” posted. The group says it is run by current and former immigration officials. That post from April was removed this month after Reuters queries to Facebook. The immigration department did not respond to Reuters queries. The communications and home ministries also did not respond to queries on hate speech in social media. Among the earliest posts to draw comments calling for Rohingya to be shot was one from the Malaysian Armed Forces Headquarters asking the public to be its “ears and eyes” and report undocumented migrants. A military spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the page. Another post that was shared more than 26,000 times was from a page calling itself the Military Royal Intelligence Corps that said undocumented migrants “will bring problems to all of us.” Reuters was unable to contact the administrator of the page. The military said it had nothing to do with the page and it was run by a former member of the intelligence unit. Facebook removed both posts after Reuters queries. The Intelligence Corps page was also taken down.
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App Allowing Chinese Citizens Access to Global Internet Quickly Disappears
A mobile app launched last week in China that many there hoped would allow access to long banned Western social media sites abruptly disappeared from Chinese app stores a day after its unveiling.Tuber, an Andriod app backed by Chinese cyber security software giant Qihoo 360, first appeared to be officially available last Friday. It offered Chinese citizens limited access to websites such as YouTube, Facebook and Google, and it facilitated some 5 million downloads following its debut.Yet a day later, the Tuber app disappeared from mobile app stores, including one run by Huawei Technologies Co. A search for the app’s website yielded no results when VOA checked Monday. It’s unclear whether the government ordered the takedown of the app.Experts told VOA that such ventures are sometimes designed to create the illusion of choice to users eager to gain access to the global internet, but these circumvention tools are sometimes deleted if they are deemed by the Chinese government to be too popular with consumers.FILE PHOTO: The messenger app WeChat is seen next to its logo in this illustration picture taken Aug. 7, 2020.Short-lived frenzyChinese users hailed their newfound ability to visit long banned websites before the app was removed last Saturday.Several now banned articles introducing Tuber went viral Friday on China’s super app WeChat and seem to have contributed to Tuber’s overnight success.Sporting a logo similar to that of YouTube, Tuber’s main page offered a feed of YouTube videos, while another tab allowed users go to Western websites banned in China.A reporter at Chinese state media Global Times tweeted that the move is “good for China’s stability and it’s a great step for China’s opening up.”Exciting news!! #China launched a new web browser Tuber that can connect to FB, Twitter, Google, etc, without using VPN!! It’s still censoring fake news or propaganda like Epoch Times, but I think it’s good for China’s stability and it’s a great step for China’s opening up! pic.twitter.com/03fyJAo6U8— Rita Bai Yunyi (@RitaBai) October 9, 2020Users noticed, though, that the browser came with its own censorship already included. References to sensitive political issues, such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown and the more recent Hong Kong protests, were omitted, according to a Reuters check. YouTube queries for politically sensitive keywords such as “Tiananmen” and “Xi Jinping” returned no results on the app, according to TechCrunch.Some terms in the users’ agreement also raised concerns among observers. According to the app’s terms of service, the platform could suspend users’ accounts and share their data “with the relevant authorities” if they “actively browse or disseminate” content that breaches the constitution, endangers national security and sovereignty, spreads rumors, disrupts social orders or violates other local laws.Additionally, the terms of service stated the collection of personal information about users related to national security, public safety and public health does not require user authorization.Meanwhile, users of the app had to register through a Chinese phone number, which is tied to a person’s real identity, and allows GPS location tracking.Since its removal last Saturday, those who downloaded the app received a message that Tuber is “undergoing a system upgrade,” according to TechCrunch.Not the first attemptSarah Cook, a senior research analyst for China, Hong Kong and Taiwan at Freedom House, a watchdog organization, told VOA the brief availability of the new app might be a way for the Chinese government to create the “illusion of choice” to users who want to use the global internet, especially for communications that are not sensitive.“By facilitating and controlling the access, the Chinese Communist Party is able to ensure that their browsing indeed stays within approved limits,” she said.Cook added that by contrast, when a Chinese internet user jumps the Great Firewall with an independent VPN, then even if they were looking for entertainment content, they are likely to come across more politically sensitive information.Tuber is not the first browser in China that attempted to provide Chinese citizens with some access to the Western internet, although few have drawn as much attention.About a year ago, there was a similar effort made with a mobile browser called Kuniao that was approved by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. It purported to allow users to bypass internet censorship, though critics also suggested that it simply reduced the scope of censorship, rather than allowing people to fully circumvent controls.“But within two days of its launch, Kuniao’s website crashed from the high demand and it was soon blocked entirely. The official position on it seemed to sour quickly and online references to the browser were also deleted,” Cook said.A Chinese blogger who has been following China’s Great Fire Wall and who requested anonymity for fear of government retaliation told VOA the latest moves are telling. The blogger said the fate of both Tuber and Kuniao shows the government is increasingly unable to control sophisticated circumvention tools, including commercially available VPN (virtual private network) services and tools developed by tech-savvy amateurs.“The government has actually allowed a considerable number of these web browsers,” the blogger said. “It helps the government to achieve some level of monitoring over these Internet users compared to those who use VPN services.“These browsers are remarkably reliable when used within limited groups. But when they’ve become overly popular, the government will inevitably intervene,” the blogger said, adding it wouldn’t be surprising to see similar circumvention tools coming out soon.
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Saudis Lose Bid for Seat on UN Human Rights Council
Saudi Arabia failed in its bid to win a seat on the controversial U.N. Human Rights Council on Tuesday, but other nations with abysmal rights records, including China and Russia, made it on to the 47-nation body. “Today is a black day for human rights,” Hillel Neuer, executive director of U.N. Watch, a Geneva-based rights group, said ahead of the vote. The General Assembly elected by secret ballot Bolivia, Britain, China, Cuba, France, Gabon, Ivory Coast, Malawi, Mexico, Nepal, Pakistan, Russia, Senegal, Ukraine and Uzbekistan. They will serve three-year terms beginning Jan. 1, 2021. The outcome of the vote was mostly preordained, with candidates put forward by regional groups that set forth the same number of candidates as seats. The only contested group was Asia-Pacific, which saw Saudi Arabia lose to China, Pakistan, Nepal and Uzbekistan for the four available seats. Nations elected to the Geneva-based HRC are expected to “uphold the highest standards in the promotion and protection of human rights” both at home and abroad. Human rights groups have strongly criticized many of the new members for having shoddy or appalling rights records. “Serial rights abusers should not be rewarded with seats on the Human Rights Council,” said Louis Charbonneau, U.N. director for New York-based rights group Human Rights Watch. He pointed to China’s “massive” violation of human rights at home and efforts to undermine “the international human rights system they’re demanding to be a part of.” FILE – A man holds a sign during a rally to show support for Uighurs and their fight for human rights, Dec. 22, 2019, Hong Kong.China has detained as many as a million ethnic Uighur Muslims in “re-education camps” in its Xinjiang province and cracked down on freedoms in Hong Kong and Tibet. Russia, which has been accused of poisoning domestic dissidents, has also used its power in the U.N. Security Council 15 times to shield the Syrian regime of Bashar al-Assad. Most recently in July, Russia forced the council to cut aid deliveries to millions of Syrians by closing vital border crossing points during the coronavirus pandemic. Russia and Ukraine took the two available seats in their Eastern European group. In March 2014, Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula, sparking international outrage. A joint evaluation from three rights groups — U.N. Watch, Human Rights Foundation and the Raoul Wallenberg Center for Human Rights — said China, Cuba, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan were unqualified to run for a seat based on their rights’ records. The coalition also deemed Bolivia, Ivory Coast, Malawi, Mexico, Nepal, Senegal and Ukraine’s records as “questionable.” Under President Donald Trump, the United States withdrew from the HRC two years ago. Then-U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley called the council a “cesspool of political bias” that “makes a mockery of human rights,” primarily for its scrutiny of Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. “Prior to making this decision, and after our exit, the United States has urged U.N. member states to take immediate action to reform the Council before it became irreparable,” U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in a statement Tuesday. “Unfortunately, those calls went unheeded, and today the U.N. General Assembly once again elected countries with abhorrent human rights records, including China, Russia and Cuba.” FILE – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo delivers his speech during the “Advancing and Defending International Religious Freedom Through Diplomacy” symposium, in Rome, Sept. 30, 2020.Saudi Arabia, which wields financial power in the halls of the United Nations, failed by seven votes to win one of four available seats in the Asia-Pacific regional group. The kingdom has been involved in a lengthy war in neighboring Yemen that has created the world’s largest humanitarian crisis. The Saudi crown prince has also come under international scrutiny in the aftermath of the murder and dismemberment two years ago of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. “Saudi Arabia’s failure to win a seat on the Human Rights Council is a welcome reminder of the need for more competition in U.N. elections,” said HRW’s Charbonneau. “Had there been additional candidates, China, Cuba and Russia might have lost, too. But the addition of these undeserving countries won’t prevent the council from shining a light on abuses and speaking up for victims. In fact, by being on the council, these abusers will be directly in the spotlight.” The Human Rights Council has come under growing criticism in recent years for the number of rights violators among its rotating membership. Advocates warn that these countries use their status on the council as cover for their abuses.
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British Opposition Leader Calls for Three-week ‘Circuit Breaker’ Lockdown
Britain’s opposition Labor Party Leader Keir Starmer on Tuesday called on the government to implement a three-week temporary nationwide “circuit breaker” lockdown to stop the spread of COVID-19 throughout Britain.Starmer made the proposal in a speech in London, one day after Prime Minister Boris Johnson introduced his three-tiered regional alert plan designed to simplify and standardize the variety of COVID-related restrictions that have been imposed around the country.But Starmer said Britain is in a decisive moment in the fight against the virus and “there’s no longer time to give this prime minister the benefit of the doubt.””This was not inevitable, but it is now necessary,” he said, acknowledging that the restrictions are largely unpopular.Britain’s Prime Minister Boris Johnson speaks during a coronavirus briefing in Downing Street, London, Oct. 12, 2020.He also said the lockdown idea comes from recommendations made by Britain’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies (SAGE) which said “a package of stringent interventions is now urgently needed” to lower the rate of infection and take strain off hospitals and the National Health service.Quoting SAGE, the opposition leader said, “not acting now will result in a very large epidemic with catastrophic consequences.”Starmer proposed allowing only essential work and travel, restricting household mixing and that all pubs, bars and restaurants should be closed, but also be compensated. He said he understood the measures would require “significant sacrifices across the country.”The Labor Party leader added that schools would not have to close under his proposal, as the lockdown would be timed to coincide with an upcoming school holiday.Speaking directly to Prime Minister Johnson, Starmer said: “You know that the scientific evidence backs this approach … that the restrictions that you introduced won’t be enough.”Starmer’s words will only increase the pressure on the British leader, who has defended his decision not to re-introduce a full lockdown by saying he was trying to protect lives and livelihoods by balancing public health and the economy.
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Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict Shows Turkey Becoming Drone Power
Turkish drones are playing a big role in supporting Azerbaijan’s offensive in Nagorno Karabakh. With Turkey deploying them from Syria to Libya, they have become an integral part of Ankara’s efforts to project its power beyond its borders. But as Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul, the Turkish drone industry is facing international pushback.
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After 7-month Wait, Japanese Tourist Visits Machu Picchu
It didn’t go exactly as planned, but for one Japanese tourist, his dream of visiting the Incan ruins of Machu Picchu finally came true.
Jesse Takayama arrived in Peru nearly seven months ago with the sole purpose of visiting iconic Andean landmark. Because of the coronavirus lockdown, the 500-year-old site was closed, and he ended up trapped in a small, nearby town of Aguas Calientes. Originally, he’d only planned to stay in Peru a few days.
As the months passed, Takayama began to run out of money, and it looked as if his dream of visiting the UNESCO site would never happen.
“I go to run every morning and I could see Machu Picchu afar in distance,” Katayama told CNN. “I thought I would never make it to Machu Picchu as I was expecting it won’t open within this year, but I was OK with it because I had a great time here.”
But finally, thanks to an intervention by the Peruvian government, he was allowed to enter Machu Picchu, the first person to visit for nearly seven months.
“He had come to Peru with the dream of being able to enter,” said Peru’s Minister of Culture Alejandro Neyra in a virtual press conference. “The Japanese citizen has entered together with our head of the park so that he can do this before returning to his country.”
Takayama, was grateful for the long-delayed opportunity.
“I thought I never make it [to Machu Picchu], but everyone asked the government and the town, and they gave me super special permission,” the Osaka native wrote in an Instagram post. “Peruvians are soooo kind. Thank you soooo much!”
According to CNN, Takayama will head back to Japan on Oct. 16.
“I will definitely cry,” he says about his farewell to Aguas Calientes. “These seven months have been very special to me. I have discovered a new part of me.”
Neyra said Machu Picchu would re-open to tourists in November, but only at 30% of the normal capacity of 675 visitors per day.
Peru locked down early in the pandemic but has suffered one of the worst fatality rates in the world. It has 851,171 cases and more than 33,000 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University data.
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In France, Calls Grow for Paris to Back Armenia
As France helps spearhead diplomatic efforts to end the latest clashes over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh, the country’s Armenian diaspora along with leading French politicians are calling on Paris to abandon neutrality and side with Armenia. The uptick in violence is also increasing tensions between France and Turkey — as Lisa Bryant reports for VOA from Paris.
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Fight Between Former Soviet Republics Puts Russia’s Regional Influence On the Line
Fighting between the former Soviet republics of Armenia and Azerbaijan is now in its third week — and has killed and injured hundreds in Europe’s south Caucasus region. But as Charles Maynes reports from Moscow, the conflict is also testing Russia’s traditional influence over the region.Producer: Ricardo Marquina
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US, UK Fight Foreign Bribery But Most Nations Do Very Little
An anti-corruption watchdog on Tuesday ranked the United States and United Kingdom as the largest exporters most active at enforcing rules meant to prohibit companies from paying bribes in foreign markets, but said many others are doing next to nothing. Berlin-based Transparency International said only four of 47 countries — the U.S., U.K., Switzerland and Israel, making up 16.5% of global exports — were actively enforcing legislation against foreign bribery in 2019. That’s down from seven countries, making up 27% of exports, that were conducting active enforcement in 2018. “Our research shows that many countries are barely investigating foreign bribery,” said Gillian Dell, the lead author of the Transparency report. “Unfortunately, it’s all too common for businesses in wealthy countries to export corruption to poorer countries, undermining institutions and development.” The 1997 Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development convention prohibits bribes to win contracts and licenses, or to dodge taxes and local laws. China, the world’s largest exporter and not a signatory to the convention, was found to conduct “little or no enforcement,” in a category that also includes India, and convention members Japan and Korea. Germany, the world’s third-largest exporter and also signatory to the convention, only conducts “moderate enforcement,” as do other major exporters like France, Italy and Spain. Germany and Italy both pursued fewer cases in 2019 than in the previous year, while France and Spain improved their performance. The Netherlands, Canada and Austria — all signatories to the convention — are the biggest exporters in the category of those showing only “limited enforcement.” “Too many governments choose to turn a blind eye when their companies use bribery to win business in foreign markets,” Transparency International head Delia Ferreira Rubio said. “G-20 countries and other major economies have a responsibility to enforce the rules.” Transparency’s recommendations include ending secrecy in ownership of companies, which makes investigating foreign bribery difficult, and exploring increased liability of parent companies for the actions of their foreign subsidiaries.
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Peru Coronavirus Infections Drop More Than 50% in Some Areas
Peru’s social insurance system announced the rate of weekly coronavirus infections nationwide dropped between 50 to 70 percent in several regions during a recent two week period. The EsSalud Heat Map report revealed coronavirus cases decreased more than 50 percent in 17 provinces. Four regions, including Puno, Madre de Dios, Amazonas, and Moquegua experienced the greatest decline, with cases dropping more than 70 percent. EsSalud’s Intelligence and Data Analysis Unit Chief Dante Cersso appealed to Peruvians to remain vigilant in their safety practices. The reduction in new cases in the capital, Lima fell as much as 36 percent. According to Cersso, the latest figures mirror the tally for cases recorded in late April. The reductions in new infections are noteworthy because Peru has been among the leaders in COVID-19 infections in Latin America. So far, Peru has reported more than 851,000 infections and 33,357 deaths.
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Media: Turkey Issues Detention Warrants for 167 Over Suspected Gulen Links
Turkish police detained dozens of people on Tuesday in a search for 167 suspects, many of them active duty soldiers, in a move against supporters of a Muslim preacher the government accuses of organizing a failed coup in 2016, state media reported. The detentions were the latest in a four-year-old crackdown targeting the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen. He denies involvement in the July 2016 putsch, in which some 250 people were killed. Authorities launched an operation from the coastal province of Izmir in search of 110 suspects, including 16 pilots, colonels, and lieutenant colonels, across 26 provinces, broadcaster TRT Haber said. It said 89 suspects had been detained. In a separate operation targeting Gulen’s followers, police sought 57 other suspects across 15 provinces, the state-owned Anadolu news agency said, adding that 32 people had been detained. Police spokesmen were not immediately available for comment. Since the abortive putsch, some 80,000 people have been held pending trial and about 150,000 civil servants, military personnel and others sacked or suspended. More than 20,000 people had been expelled from the Turkish military. Rights groups and Turkey’s Western allies have criticized the scale of the crackdown, saying the government was using it as a pretext to quash dissent. The government has denied the accusation, saying the measures are necessary for national security.
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Cuba Eases COVID-19 Restrictions in Hopes of Boosting Economy
Cuba is easing coronavirus restrictions in an effort to jumpstart the economy by reopening retail businesses, government offices and resuming airports operations across the island except in the capital, Havana, where an outbreak occurred in August. The popular beach resort town of Varadero will begin welcoming international visitors Thursday. All tourists arriving in Cuba are required to undergo mandatory testing and their hygiene practices will be monitored during their visit. Everyone in Cuba is required to wear face masks and maintain a safe distance from one another. The pandemic has reportedly choked the lifeblood of Cuba, the island’s $3 billion tourism industry, which has suffered since March when the first coronavirus cases were reported. The Associated Press reports the pandemic has mostly been controlled across Cuba, with President Miguel Díaz-Canel saying some communities have not logged any new cases in several months. The island nation has reported 6,000 COVID-19 cases and 123 deaths, according to Johns Hopkins University.
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Panama Resumes International Flights Nearly Seven Months After Imposing COVID-19 Restrictions
International flights are arriving and departing Panama’s Tocumen airport again after nearly seven months of restrictions due to the coronavirus pandemic. Monday’s restart of flight operations is part of a gradual nationwide reopening of businesses and industry which began in June. Initially, seven international airlines are expected to operate, with four others set to resume operations later this week. According to Raffoul Arab, Tocumen International Airport manager, the reactivation of commercial aviation will happen gradually as the different countries complete the opening of their borders. The frequency of flights will increase, especially when people recover their confidence in flying. International travelers must submit a negative COVID-19 test before boarding flights to the Central American country. Panama has confirmed more than 120,000 coronavirus cases of coronavirus and at least 2,491 deaths.
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Microsoft Attempts Takedown of Global Criminal Botnet
Microsoft announced legal action Monday seeking to disrupt a major cybercrime digital network that uses more than 1 million zombie computers to loot bank accounts and spread ransomware, which experts consider a major threat to the U.S. presidential election. The operation to knock offline command-and-control servers for a global botnet that uses an infrastructure known as Trickbot to infect computers with malware was initiated with an order that Microsoft obtained in Virginia federal court on Oct. 6. Microsoft argued that the crime network is abusing its trademark. “It is very hard to tell how effective it will be, but we are confident it will have a very long-lasting effect,” said Jean-Ian Boutin, head of threat research at ESET, one of several cybersecurity firms that partnered with Microsoft to map the command-and-control servers. “We’re sure that they are going to notice and it will be hard for them to get back to the state that the botnet was in.” Cybersecurity experts said that Microsoft’s use of a U.S. court order to persuade internet providers to take down the botnet servers is laudable. But they add that it’s not apt to be successful because too many won’t comply and because Trickbot’s operators have a decentralized fall-back system and employ encrypted routing. Paul Vixie of Farsight Security said via email “experience tells me it won’t scale — there are too many IP’s behind uncooperative national borders.” And the cybersecurity firm Intel 471 reported no significant hit on Trickbot operations Monday and predicted “little medium- to long-term impact” in a report shared with The Associated Press. But ransomware expert Brett Callow of the cybersecurity firm Emsisoft said that a temporary Trickbot disruption could, at least during the election, limit attacks and prevent the activation of ransomware on systems already infected. The announcement follows a Washington Post report Friday of a major — but ultimately unsuccessful — effort by the U.S. military’s Cyber Command to dismantle Trickbot beginning last month with direct attacks rather than asking providers to deny hosting to domains used by command-and-control servers. A U.S. policy called “persistent engagement” authorizes U.S. cyberwarriors to engage hostile hackers in cyberspace and disrupt their operations with code, something Cybercom did against Russian misinformation jockeys during U.S. midterm elections in 2018. Created in 2016 and used by a loose consortium of Russian-speaking cybercriminals, Trickbot is a digital superstructure for sowing malware in the computers of unwitting individuals and websites. In recent months, its operators have been increasingly renting it out to other criminals who have used it to sow ransomware, which encrypts data on target networks, crippling them until the victims pay up. One of the biggest reported victims of a ransomware variety sowed by Trickbot called Ryuk was the hospital chain Universal Health Services, which said all 250 of its U.S. facilities were hobbled in an attack last month that forced doctors and nurses to resort to paper and pencil. U.S. Department of Homeland Security officials list ransomware as a major threat to the Nov. 3 presidential election. They fear an attack could freeze up state or local voter registration systems, disrupting voting, or knock out result-reporting websites. While cybersecurity experts say the operators of Trickbot and affiliated digital crime syndicates are Russian speakers mostly based in eastern Europe, they caution that they are motivated by profit, not politics. They do, however, operate with impunity with no Kremlin interference as long as their targets are abroad. “In today’s world, Trickbot is a type of a plague,” said Alex Holden, founder of Milwaukee-based Hold Security, which tracks its activity closely on the dark web, “and a government that ignores a global plague is more than complacent.” Trickbot is “malware-as-a-service,” its modular architecture lets it be used as a delivery mechanism for a wide array of criminal activity. It began mostly as a so-called banking Trojan that attempts to steal credentials from online bank account so criminals can fraudulently transfer cash. But recently, researchers have noted a rise in Trickbot’s use in ransomware attacks targeting everything from municipal and state governments to school districts and hospitals. Ryuk and another type of ransomware called Conti — also distributed via Trickbot — dominated attacks on the U.S. public sector in September, said Callow of Emsisoft. Holden said the reported Cybercom disruption — involving efforts to confuse its configuration through code injections — succeeded in temporarily breaking down communications between command-and-control servers and most of the bots. “But that’s hardly a decisive victory,” he said, adding that the botnet rebounded with new victims and ransomware. The disruption — in two waves that began Sept. 22 — was first reported by cybersecurity journalist Brian Krebs. The AP could not immediately confirm the reported Cybercom involvement.
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Belarus Allows Police to Use Firearms Against Protesters
Belarus’ government says police will now be permitted to use firearms against protesters “if need be” as demonstrations demanding the resignation of President Alexander Lukashenko continued Monday.The Interior Ministry said in a statement Monday that the rallies “have become organized and extremely radical.””In this regard, the Interior Ministry’s employees and internal troops will not leave the streets and, if necessary, will use special equipment and military weapons,” it said.The ministry also announced Monday that more than 700 people were detained in demonstrations a day earlier. It said that of those detained Sunday, 570 of them were still in custody awaiting a court hearing.More than 2,000 mostly elderly people took part Monday in a “march of pensioners” against the government in the capital, Minsk. They chanted “go away” and some waved flags symbolizing the opposition.Videos from the demonstration showed police responding with flare guns and tear gas.Large protests have taken place each weekend since Lukashenko claimed victory in a disputed Aug. 9 election. Demonstrators have demanded his resignation as well as the release of political prisoners. Riot police clashed with protesting pensioners in central Minsk, Belarus, Oct. 12, 2020.Earlier Monday, European Union foreign ministers agreed to impose sanctions on Lukashenko as well as other senior officials.Speaking to reporters ahead of the meeting of EU foreign policy chiefs in Luxemburg, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said that renewed violence against protesters in Minsk could not be ignored.”The violence continues, perpetrated by the Lukashenko regime — there are still arrests of peaceful demonstrators, so we have to consider how to proceed,” Maas, whose country holds the EU’s rotating presidency, said.”I have suggested that we establish a new package of sanctions. And Lukashenko should be among the people who will then be sanctioned,” Maas said.The EU had previously imposed travel bans and asset freezes on 40 Lukashenko allies, but did not include Lukashenko in the list.On Saturday, Lukashenko held an unusual meeting with jailed opposition leaders.“The goal of the president was to hear everyone’s opinion,” his office said of the visit.Lukashenko’s main opposition candidate in the election, Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya, is now based in Lithuania after fleeing Belarus for her safety. Lukashenko maintains he won the poll in a landslide — garnering 80% of all ballots — despite widespread claims at home and abroad that the vote was heavily rigged to keep him in power. He has been in office for 26 years. Public anger has grown over the crackdown in the wake of the protests that have seen more than 7,500 arrests and police violence against demonstrators. Hundreds have emerged from police custody with bruises and tales of torture at the hands of Lukashenko’s security agents. Lukashenko has said the protests are encouraged and supported by the West and accused NATO of moving forces near Belarusian borders. The alliance has denied the accusations.
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