RIYADMEDIA

Azerbaijan and Armenia are in an arms race that threatens to undermine U.S.-backed peace talks between the two Caucasus countries. Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul.
…

los angeles — A prosecutor says five people have been charged in connection with Matthew Perry’s death from a ketamine overdose last year, including the actor’s assistant and two doctors.

U.S. Attorney Martin Estrada announced the charges Thursday, saying the doctors supplied Perry with a large amount of ketamine and even wondered in a text message how much the former “Friends” star would be willing to pay.

“These defendants took advantage of Mr. Perry’s addiction issues to enrich themselves. They knew what they were doing was wrong,” Estrada said.

Perry died in October due to a ketamine overdose and received several injections of the drug on the day he died from his live-in personal assistant. The assistant, Kenneth Iwamasa, is the one who found Perry dead later that day.

The actor went to the two charged doctors in desperation after his regular doctors refused to give him ketamine in the amounts he wanted. DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said in one instance the actor paid $2,000 for a vial of ketamine that cost one of the physicians about $12.

Two of the people, including one of the doctors charged, were arrested Thursday, Estrada said. Two of the defendants, including Iwamasa, have pleaded guilty to charges already, and a third person has agreed to plead guilty.

Multiple messages left seeking comment from lawyers or offices for all the defendants have not yet been returned.

Among those arrested Thursday are Dr. Salvador Plasencia, who is charged with seven counts of distribution of ketamine and also two charges related to allegations he falsified records after Perry’s death.

The other person arrested Thursday is Jasveen Sangha, who prosecutors described as a drug dealer known as the “ketamine queen.”

Ketamine supplied by Sangha caused Perry’s death, authorities said.

Sangha and Plasencia could make their first court appearances later Thursday.

Records show Plascencia’s medical license has been in good standing with no records of complaints, though it is set to expire in October.

A San Diego physician, Dr. Mark Chavez, has agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy to distribute ketamine. Prosecutors allege Chavez funneled ketamine to Plasencia, securing some of the drug from a wholesale distributor through a fraudulent prescription.

The prosecutor said the defendants exchanged messages soon after Perry’s death referencing ketamine as the cause of death. Estrada said they tried to cover up their involvement in supplying Perry ketamine, a powerful anesthetic that is sometimes used to treat chronic pain and depression.

Los Angeles police said in May that they were working with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service with a probe into why the 54-year-old had so much of the surgical anesthetic in his system.

Iwamasa found the actor face down in his hot tub on Oct. 28, and paramedics who were called immediately declared him dead.

The assistant received the ketamine from Eric Fleming, who has pleaded guilty to obtaining the drug from Sangha and delivering it to Iwamasa. In all, he delivered 50 vials of ketamine for Perry’s use, including 25 handed over four days before the actor’s death.

Perry’s autopsy, released in December, found that the amount of ketamine in his blood was in the range used for general anesthesia during surgery.

Ketamine has seen a huge surge in use in recent years as a treatment for depression, anxiety and pain. People close to Perry told coroner’s investigators that he was undergoing ketamine infusion therapy.

But the medical examiner said Perry’s last treatment 1½ weeks earlier wouldn’t explain the levels of ketamine in his blood. The drug is typically metabolized in a matter of hours. At least two doctors were treating Perry, a psychiatrist and an anesthesiologist who served as his primary care physician, the medical examiner’s report said. No illicit drugs or paraphernalia were found at his house.

Ketamine was listed as the primary cause of death, which was ruled an accident with no foul play suspected, the report said. Drowning and other medical issues were contributing factors, the coroner said.

Drug-related celebrity deaths have in other cases led authorities to prosecute the people who supplied them.

After rapper Mac Miller died from an overdose of cocaine, alcohol and counterfeit oxycodone that contained fentanyl, two of the men who provided him the fentanyl were convicted of distributing the drug. One was sentenced to more than 17 years in federal prison, the other to 10 years.

And after Michael Jackson died in 2009 from a lethal dose of propofol, a drug intended for use only during surgery and other medical procedures and not for the insomnia the singer sought it for, his doctor, Conrad Murray, was convicted of involuntary manslaughter in 2011. Murray has maintained his innocence.
…

Prague — When the opposition activist Ilya Yashin spoke after being freed from a Russian prison as part of the historic prisoner swap between Washington and Moscow, he said he had been warned never to return.

Speaking in Bonn, Germany, Yashin said that a Federal Security Service agent told him that if he came back from exile, his “days will end like Navalny’s” — a reference to opposition figure Alexey Navalny, who died in an Arctic penal colony in February.

But as the experiences of Russian journalists and critics already in exile show, distance from Moscow is no assurance of safety.

Alesya Marokhovskaya fled Moscow for Prague shortly after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, thinking she would be safe in the Czech capital. Then the threats started.

Several menacing messages directed at her and a colleague came via the feedback form on the website of IStories, the Prague-based Russian outlet where they work.

Sent over the course of several months last year, the messages included detailed information about where they lived, their travel plans, and even that Marokhovskaya’s dog had breathing problems.

 

“I was thinking I was safe here, and it was a big mistake for me because it’s not true,” Marokhovskaya told VOA. “It’s hard not to be paranoid.”

Even when Marokhovskaya moved to a new apartment, the assailants took notice.

“Rest assured, you can’t hide from us anywhere,” an August 2023 message, originally in Russian, said. “We’ll find her wherever she walks her wheezing dog. None of you can hide anywhere now.”

The threats underscore a troubling pattern of transnational repression in which Moscow reaches across borders to target exiled journalists and activists around the world.

Well-documented tactics to silence critics include online harassment, legal threats, surveillance and suspected poisonings, press freedom experts say.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry declined to answer specific questions about threats and harassment facing journalists. A spokesperson instead said “protecting the rights of journalists” is the ministry’s “constant focus of attention.”

The emailed response shared a list of instances in which foreign governments fined, banned or suspended Kremlin-run media. Russia’s Prague embassy, meanwhile, did not reply to VOA’s email requesting comment.

At first, Marokhovskaya thought the threats didn’t impact her. But she later noticed changes in her lifestyle. She didn’t leave her home as often, she said, and she worried about surveillance.

“Physically, I’ve never faced any aggression. It’s just words for now, but it makes my life really messy,” she said. “But only in a psychological way.”

It’s a sentiment shared by her colleagues at IStories and other exiled Russian journalists who spoke with VOA in Prague.

“Any journalist, whether he’s working at IStories, or The Insider, or any other media outlet in exile, is, in a way, risking his or her life. You can’t be 100% safe,” IStories founder Roman Anin told VOA.

Restricted by Russian laws that effectively banned independent coverage of the war in Ukraine, hundreds of journalists — and their newsrooms — fled. Most resettled across Europe in cities like Amsterdam, Berlin, Riga, Vilnius, Tbilisi and Prague.

The legal aid group Setevye Svobody, or Net Freedoms Project, estimates that at least 1,000 journalists have left since the war broke out. Rights group OVD-Info estimates roughly the same number of political prisoners are held in Russian custody. Among that number, say watchdogs, are several journalists.

Had she stayed on Russian soil, Rita Loginova thinks she would have been among them. Originally from the Siberian city Novosibirsk, the journalist faced police harassment before fleeing in March 2023 on the encouragement of her editors.

“I didn’t want to become a prisoner, because a mother near her children is better than a mother in prison. That’s why I’m here,” Loginova told VOA one evening at her favorite pizza place in Prague.

Between puffs on her vape and sips of beer, she spoke about leaving home “because we had a lot of risk for our life and our liberty,” and how she misses her mom, her dog and the view from her old apartment.

Although she likes Prague, Loginova, who works at the independent outlet Verstka, says she is beset by financial hardship, a challenge experienced by many exiled Russians.

More broadly, reporting on Russia from abroad is a challenge, especially for outlets like IStories that have been branded “undesirable” organizations by the Kremlin — a designation that exposes staffers and sources to criminal charges and jail time.

As a result, says IStories founder Anin, finding sources in Russia willing to speak can be hard. And yet the exiled journalists know they are luckier than the political prisoners in Russia, let alone Ukrainians grappling with Russia’s invasion firsthand.

“We have not an easy job, but simultaneously, we shouldn’t complain,” Anin said.

In June, Russia issued an arrest warrant for Anin on charges of spreading “false information” about the military, a charge the Kremlin often uses to retaliate against independent journalists or critics who speak out against the war.

“I was a little bit surprised why it took them so long to take this legal step,” says Anin, who left Russia in 2021 for vacation but never returned after learning of his likely arrest.

Beyond legal threats and harassment, hacking is another problem.

Anna Ryzhkova, a journalist at Verstka, says that in December 2023, she received an email from someone posing as a journalist at another exiled Russian outlet, accusing her of plagiarism and asking her to click a link to the article in question.

Ryzhkova realized it was likely a scam designed to hack her accounts. She then learned several colleagues had received similar emails. Two months later, she discovered there had been a sophisticated attempt to hack her Gmail account.

“I was really frightened,” Ryzhkova said, adding that she believes the Russian government was behind both incidents.

Sitting outside a stylish cafe playing Charli XCX music, Ryzhkova admits these incidents make her consider quitting journalism entirely.

“But then you take half a day off. You breathe,” she said. “And you start again. You choose some dangerous topics again.”

These cases show that nothing is out of bounds for Russia, according to Gulnoza Said of the U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists.

“Russia can do anything to silence government critics,” she told VOA. “The challenges they face make it very difficult for them to stay mentally healthy and continue working as journalists.”

There’s a strange irony in being an exiled Russian journalist who fled your home to continue reporting on it. Moscow may be more than 1,000 miles from Prague, but it doesn’t feel that far.

“Physically you’re here, but mentally you’re still in Russia, because you keep writing about Russia,” Ryzhkova said, adding that sacrifice is a unifying factor for all who do it.

“We all miss our home,” she said. “Most of us had to sacrifice something important to be here.”

But for many, the often-personal costs are worth it.

“It’s important to do this work. It’s important,” Alexey Levchenko, a journalist at The Insider, said at Prague’s Cafe Slavia, a venue on the banks of the Vltava that has a history as a hub for writers.

“What can we do to stop the war? We don’t have many possibilities,” he said. “Journalism is one of the most effective possibilities.”

Anin agreed. He views their work as integral to thwarting Moscow’s effort to distort the truth about the war.

“We work 24/7,” he said. “Even if you can’t change the reality with your stories, we’re saving the history for future generations.”

Prague has a long history of literary dissidents, and these exiled Russian journalists are just the latest chapter.

Asked if she is happy, Ryzhkova is briefly caught off-guard. “I am,” she says, before breaking into laughter.

Why the laughter? She tucks her blonde hair behind her ears before answering.

“If you had asked me the same question three years ago, when I lived in Moscow in my house, with my husband, with my dog, and if you had described to me everything that would happen to me over the next three years, I would say there is no way to stay happy in such circumstances,” she says. “But somehow I am.”
…

…

With the 2024 Summer Olympics wrapped up, Paris is now getting ready to host the Paralympics later this month. More than 4,000 athletes with disabilities along with tens of thousands of spectators will attend the events that run from August 28 to September 8. Olympic authorities praise the city for the steps it has taken to make them accessible to all. But disability advocates say much more needs to be done — across France — to change infrastructure and mindsets. Lisa Bryant reports from Paris.
…

Latvia’s government has been moving to phase out teaching in the Russian language in the country’s schools. It’s part of a bid to reduce Moscow’s influence in the wake of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. But as Henry Wilkins reports from the Latvian capital’s largely Russian-speaking Daugavgriva neighborhood, some educators and security experts say the move could be playing into the hands of the Kremlin’s propagandists.
…

COLUMBIA, South Carolina — Minnesota Governor Tim Walz and Ohio Senator JD Vance have agreed to debate each other on October 1, setting up a matchup of potential vice presidents as early voting in some states gets underway for the general election.

CBS News on Wednesday posted on its X feed that the network had invited Vance and Walz to debate in New York City, presenting four dates — September 17, September 24, October 1 and October 8 — as options.

Walz reposted that message from his own campaign account, “See you on October 1, JD.” The Harris-Walz campaign followed up with a message of its own, saying Walz “looks forward to debating JD Vance — if he shows up.”

Vance posted on X that he would accept the October 1 invitation. He also challenged Walz to meet on September 18.

Whether Walz and Vance would debate before the November 5 general election had been in question. In just the past several weeks, President Joe Biden left the campaign, and Democrats selected Vice President Kamala Harris to lead their ticket.

Vance has largely kept his focus trained on Harris, whom he would have been set to debate before Biden’s departure from the race. Vance has lobbed critiques against Walz, including questioning the retired Army National Guardsman’s service record.

Trump has said he wanted Vance to debate Walz on CBS, which had been discussing potential dates for that meeting.

The debate is expected weeks after the September 10 top-of-the-ticket debate recently solidified between Trump and Harris on ABC News.

Trump has said he negotiated several other debate dates, on three different networks. Fox News has also proposed a debate between Harris and Trump to take place on September 4, and NBC News is angling to air one on September 25.

During an appearance in Michigan, Harris said she was “happy to have that conversation” about an additional debate.
…

As thousands of migrants continue to make their way to the United States, and stricter immigration policies make legal entry increasingly difficult, a Mexican border center south of Arizona has become a crucial source of humanitarian aid to migrants. Veronica Villafañe narrates the story reported by Paula Díaz.
…

Washington  — Landlocked between Russia and China, analysts say Mongolia is finding ways to balance its outreach to Western democratic nations without alarming it neighbors to the north or south.

Although Mongolia regards China and Russia as its top foreign and economic priorities, with most of its trade transiting the two, it has also committed to deepening and developing relations with the United States, Japan, the European Union and other democracies, calling these countries its “third neighbors.”

Sean King, senior vice president of Park Strategies, a New York-based political consultancy, tells VOA, “They’re smart to involve us as much as possible as a counterweight to Moscow and Beijing.”

United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken concluded his latest trip to Asia earlier this month in Mongolia, where he emphasized the country is the United States’ “core partner” in the Indo-Pacific and that such partners are “reaching new levels every day.”

Blinken’s visit came after the two sides held their first comprehensive strategic dialogue in Washington.

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida was scheduled to visit Mongolia this week, but the trip was canceled as Japan braces for a rare major earthquake predicted for the coming week. Instead, the two sides spoke by phone on August 13.

Leaders of democracies who visited Mongolia the past few months include German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, British Foreign Secretary David Cameron, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell and Philippine Foreign Secretary Enrique Manalo. French President Emmanuel Macron visited Mongolia for the first time last year.

The State Department said that including Mongolia as one of two countries in Campbell’s diplomatic debut “underscores the United States’ strong commitment to freedom and prosperity in the Indo-Pacific and beyond.”

Charles Krusekopf, founder and executive director of the American Center of Mongolian Studies, told VOA, “Being able to have some regional presence by having a close relationship with Mongolia, having a friend in the region, I think, is important to the United States.” 

The June 2019 edition of the U.S. Defense Department’s “Indo-Pacific Strategy Report” includes Mongolia, along with New Zealand, Taiwan and Singapore, in the camp of Indo-Pacific democracies, positioning them as “reliable, competent and natural partners.”

Despite its geographical location, which limits its diplomatic space to maneuver, Mongolia has managed to maintain close relations with all parties, from the U.S., China, and Russia to North and South Korea, making it an exception in complex geopolitics.

At last month’s Mongolia Forum, government officials and strategic experts from eight countries, including Britain, China, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States, gathered in Ulaanbaatar to discuss the most pressing strategic issues in Asia today, including tensions on the Korean Peninsula.

“It’s one of the rare places in which people from all countries of the region can come together to meet, and it’s considered kind of a neutral ground,” Krusekopf tells VOA.

Mongolia abstained from U.N. resolutions in 2022 and 2023 that condemned Moscow’s annexation of Ukrainian territory and demanded that Russian troops leave the country.

Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khurelsukh and Prime Minister Oyun-Erdene Luvsannamsrai also met with Chinese leaders Xi Jinping and Premier Li Qiang, respectively, last year.

Oyun-Erdene visited China just a month before his state visit to the U.S., where the two countries issued the U.S.-Mongolia Joint Statement on the Strategic Third Neighbor Partnership.

Shortly before Blinken’s visit this month, Mongolia held its annual military exercise called Khan Exploration, which, although it was a peacekeeping exercise, was attended not only by troops from the U.S. and Japan but also China.

Krusekopf says with most of Mongolia’s foreign trade being mining exports through China, Beijing doesn’t feel a threat from Western security interests there.

“Mongolia is friends with everyone in the region. It’s never been a threat to other countries, and they’re seen as a middle country. And it’s a broker in that region,” he said.
…

…

WASHINGTON — The federal government is expected to announce water cuts soon that would affect some of the 40 million people reliant on the Colorado River, the powerhouse of the U.S. West. The Interior Department announces water availability for the coming year months in advance so Western cities, farmers and others can plan.

Behind the scenes, however, more elusive plans are being hashed out: how the basin will share water from the diminishing 2,334-kilometer river after 2026, when many current guidelines that govern it expire.

The Colorado River supplies water to seven Western states, more than two dozen Native American tribes, and two states in Mexico. It also irrigates millions of acres of farmland in the American West and generates hydropower used across the region. Years of overuse combined with rising temperatures and drought have meant less water flows in the Colorado today than in decades past.

That’s made the fraught politics of water in the West particularly deadlocked at times. Here’s what you need to know about the negotiations surrounding the river.

What are states discussing?

Plans for how to distribute the Colorado River’s water after 2026. A series of overlapping agreements, court decisions and contracts determine how the river is shared, some of which expire at the end of 2025.

In 2007, following years of drought, the seven U.S. states in the basin — Arizona, Nevada, California, Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming — and the federal government adopted rules to better respond to lower water levels at Lake Mead and Lake Powell. Those are the river’s two main reservoirs that transfer and store Colorado River water, produce hydropower and serve as barometers of its health.

The 2007 rules determine when some states face water cuts based on levels at Lake Mead. That’s why states, Native American tribes, and others are drafting new plans, which anticipate even deeper water cuts after 2026 based on projections of the river’s flow and climate modeling of future warming in the West.

“The ultimate problem is that watershed runoff is decreasing due to an ever-warming climate,” said Jack Schmidt, professor of watershed sciences at Utah State University, and director of the Center for Colorado River studies. “The proximate problem is we’ve got to decrease our use.”

How are these talks different from expected cuts this month?

Sometime this month, the federal government will announce water cuts for 2025 based on levels at Lake Mead. The cuts may simply maintain the restrictions already in place. Reclamation considers factors like precipitation, runoff, and water use to model what levels at the two reservoirs will look like over the following two years. If Lake Mead drops below a certain level, Arizona, California, Nevada and Mexico are subject to cuts, though California has so far been spared because of its senior water rights.

In recent years, Arizona has faced the bulk of these cuts, while Mexico and Nevada also saw reductions. But these are short-term plans, and the guidelines surrounding them are being renegotiated for the future.

What are states already doing to conserve water?

Arizona, Nevada and Mexico faced federal water cuts from the river in 2022. Those deepened in 2023 and returned to 2022 levels this year. As the crisis on the river worsened, Arizona, California and Nevada last year agreed to conserve an additional 3 million acre-feet of water until 2026, with the U.S. government paying water districts and other users for much of that conservation.

Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming — the state’s so-called Upper Basin — don’t use their full 7.5 million acre-foot allocation from the river, and get a percentage of the water that’s available each year.

An acre-foot is enough water to serve roughly two to three U.S. households in a year.

Have these efforts worked?

Yes, for now. A wet 2023 plus conservation efforts by Lower Basin states improved the short-term outlook for both reservoirs. Lake Powell is at roughly 39% capacity while Mead is at about 33%.

Climate scientists and hydrologists say that higher temperatures driven by climate change will continue to reduce runoff to the Colorado River in coming years, and cause more water to be lost to evaporation, so future plans should prepare for less water in the system. Brad Udall, a senior water and climate scientist at Colorado State University, said predicting precipitation levels is harder to do.

The short-term recovery in the Colorado River basin should be viewed in the context of a more challenging future, he added.

“I would push back heartily against any idea that our rebound over the last couple of years here is some permanent shift,” Udall said.

What can’t states agree on?

What to do after 2026. In March, Upper and Lower Basin states, tribes and environmental groups released plans for how the river and its reservoirs should be managed in the future.

Arizona, California and Nevada asked the federal government to take a more expansive view of the river management and factor water levels in seven reservoirs instead of just Lake Powell and Lake Mead to determine the extent of water cuts. If the whole system drops below 38% capacity, their plan said, deeper cuts should be shared evenly with the Upper Basin and Mexico.

“We are trying to find the right, equitable outcome in which the Upper Basin doesn’t have to take all of the pain from the long-term reduction of the river, but we also can’t be the only ones protecting Lake Powell,” said Tom Buschatzke, director of Arizona’s Department of Water Resources and the state’s lead negotiator in the talks.

Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming called for addressing shortages based on the combined capacity of Lake Powell and Lake Mead, as opposed to just Lake Mead. It proposed more aggressive cuts that would affect California, Arizona and Nevada sooner when the major reservoir levels fall. Their plan doesn’t call for reductions in how much water is delivered to Upper Basin states.

Becky Mitchell, the lead negotiator for the state of Colorado, said the Upper Basin’s plan focuses more on making policy with an eye on the river’s supply, rather than the demands for its water.

“It’s important we start acknowledging that there’s not as much water available as folks would like,” Mitchell said.

Where does it go from here?

The federal government is expected to issue draft regulations by December that factor in the different plans and propose a way forward. Until then, states, tribes and other negotiators will continue talking and trying to reach agreement.
…

TOA BAJA, Puerto Rico — Hurricane Ernesto dropped torrential rain on Puerto Rico and knocked out power for nearly half of all customers in the U.S. territory Wednesday as it threatened to grow into a major hurricane en route to Bermuda.

The storm was over open water about 1,110 kilometers south-southwest of Bermuda late Wednesday, with maximum sustained winds of 130 kph and moving northwest at 26 kph.

A hurricane watch was issued for Bermuda, while tropical storm warnings were discontinued for Puerto Rico and its outlying islands of Vieques and Culebra and for the U.S. and British Virgin Islands.

“I know it was a long night listening to that wind howl,” U.S. Virgin Islands Gov. Albert Bryan Jr. said at a news conference.

An islandwide blackout was reported on St. Croix, and at least six cellphone towers were offline across the U.S. territory, said Daryl Jaschen, emergency management director.

Schools and government agencies were closed in the U.S. and British Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico, where heavy flooding was reported in several areas, forcing officials to block roads, some of which were strewn with trees. More than 140 flights were canceled to and from Puerto Rico.

“A lot of rain, a lot of rain,” Culebra Mayor Edilberto Romero said in a phone interview. “We have trees that have fallen on public roads. There are some roofs that are blown off.”

Flash flood warnings remained up because of continuing rain.

In the north coastal town of Toa Baja, which is prone to flooding, dozens of residents moved their cars to higher areas.

“Everyone is worried,” Víctor Báez said as he sipped beer with friends and watched the rain fall. He only briefly celebrated that he had power. “It’s going to go out again,” he predicted.

Ernesto, a Category 1 hurricane, was forecast to gain power in the coming days and possibly reach the strength of a major Category 3 hurricane by Friday, and its center was expected to pass near Bermuda on Saturday.

“Residents need to prepare now before conditions worsen,” Bermuda’s National Security Minister Michael Weeks said. “Now is not the time for complacency.”

Forecasters also warned of heavy swells along the U.S. East Coast.

“That means that anybody who goes to the beach, even if the weather is beautiful and nice, it could be dangerous … with those rip currents,” said Robbie Berg, warning coordination meteorologist with the National Hurricane Center.

Between 10 and 15 centimeters of rain had been forecast for the U.S. and British Virgin Islands and 15 to 20 centimeters in Puerto Rico, with up to 25 centimeters in isolated areas.

More than 640,000 customers lost power in Puerto Rico, and 23 hospitals were operating on generators, Gov. Pedro Pierluisi said Wednesday. He added that crews were assessing damage and it was too early to tell when electricity would be restored.

“We are trying to get the system up and running as soon as we can,” said Juan Saca, president of Luma Energy, the company that operates transmission and distribution of power in Puerto Rico.

Luma Energy said earlier Wednesday that its priority was to restore power to hospitals, the island’s water and sewer company and other essential services. More than 300,000 customers were without water as a result of power outages, Pierluisi said.

Puerto Rico’s power grid was razed by Hurricane Maria in 2017 as a Category 4 storm, and it remains frail as crews continue to rebuild the system.

“It’s just frustrating that this many years later, we continue to see something like a storm cause such widespread outages in Puerto Rico, particularly given the risk that these outages can cause for vulnerable households in Puerto Rico,” said Charlotte Gossett Navarro, the Hispanic Federation’s chief director for Puerto Rico.

Not everyone can afford generators on the island of 3.2 million people with a more than 40% poverty rate.

“People already prepared themselves with candles,” said Lucía Rodríguez, a 31-year-old street vendor.

Rooftop solar systems are scarce but keep growing in Puerto Rico, where fossil fuels generate 94% of the island’s electricity. At the time María hit, there were 8,000 rooftop installations, compared with more than 117,000 currently, according to the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis.

Ernesto is the fifth named storm and the third hurricane of this year’s Atlantic hurricane season. Since 1966, only four other years have had three or more hurricanes in the Atlantic by mid-August, according to Philip Klotzbach, Colorado State University hurricane researcher.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has predicted an above-average Atlantic hurricane season this year because of record warm ocean temperatures. It forecast 17 to 25 named storms, with four to seven major hurricanes.
…

PARIS — French prosecutors opened an investigation into an online harassment complaint made by Olympic boxing champion Imane Khelif after a torrent of criticism and false claims about her sex during the Summer Games, the Paris prosecutor’s office said Wednesday.

The athlete’s lawyer Nabil Boudi filed a legal complaint Friday with a special unit in the Paris prosecutor’s office that combats online hate speech.

Boudi said the boxer was targeted by a “misogynist, racist and sexist campaign” as she won gold in the women’s welterweight division, becoming a hero in her native Algeria and bringing global attention to women’s boxing.

The prosecutor’s office said it had received the complaint and its Office for the Fight against Crimes against Humanity and Hate Crime had opened an investigation on charges of “cyber harassment based on gender, public insults based on gender, public incitement to discrimination and public insults on the basis of origin.”

Khelif was thrust into a worldwide clash over gender identity and regulation in sports after her first fight in Paris, when Italian opponent Angela Carini pulled out just seconds into the match, citing pain from opening punches.

Claims that Khelif was transgender or a man erupted online. The International Olympic Committee defended her and denounced those peddling misinformation. Khelif said that the spread of misconceptions about her “harms human dignity.”

Among those who referred to Khelif as a man in critical online posts were Donald Trump and J. K. Rowling. Tech billionaire Elon Musk reposted a comment calling Khelif a man.

Khelif’s legal complaint was filed against “X,” instead of a specific perpetrator, a common formulation under French law that leaves it up to investigators to determine which person or organization may have been at fault.

The Paris prosecutor’s office didn’t name specific suspects.

The development came after Khelif returned to Algeria, where she met with President Abdelmadjid Tebboune on Wednesday and will be welcomed by family later this week in her hometown of Ain Mesbah.

In Algeria, Khelif’s former coach Mustapha Bensaou said the boxer’s complaint in France was initiated by the Algerian authorities and should “serve as a lesson in defending the rights and honor (of athletes) in Algeria and around the world.”

“All those involved will be prosecuted for violating Imane’s dignity and honor,” Bensaou said in an interview with The Associated Press. He added: “The attacks on Imane were designed to break her and undermine her morale. Thank God, she triumphed.”

The investigation is one of several underway by France’s hate crimes unit that are connected to the Olympics.

It is also investigating alleged death threats and cyberbullying against Kirsty Burrows, an official in charge of the IOC’s unit for safeguarding and mental health, after she defended Khelif during a news conference in Paris. Under French law, the crimes, if proven, carry prison sentences that range from two to five years and fines ranging from 30,000 to 45,000 euros.

The unit is also examining complaints over death threats, harassment or other abuse targeting six people involved in the Games’ opening ceremony, including its director Thomas Jolly.
…

…

…

moscow — Marina and her family were used to hearing the distant boom of explosions from their village in Russia’s Kursk region, just a few kilometers from the Ukrainian border.

On the night of August 6, the explosions became so loud their beds began shaking.

“Nobody knew anything,” the 39-year-old hairdresser told Agence France-Presse at a humanitarian aid center run by the Orthodox Church in Moscow.

Ukrainian soldiers and armored vehicles began pouring into the region in the early hours of that morning, mounting the biggest cross-border attack on Russian soil since World War II.

The operation came almost 2½ years into Russia’s assault on Ukraine, which has seen Moscow capture large swaths of Ukrainian territory and strike Ukrainian cities.

But for many living in the border region, the attack came as a surprise.

“Drones started flying over the farms, over fields, over cars,” said Marina. “We couldn’t get through to anyone to find out how to leave, and where to go.”

‘Can’t get out’

When her village some 10 kilometers (6 miles) away from the border was cut off from electricity and water, Marina knew they had to leave.

“Some said maybe it’ll blow over, and so maybe they stayed till the last minute. Now, they can’t get out of there,” she said.

Despite the risks, Marina’s partner, Yevgeny, decided to take her and their two children to the region’s capital, Kursk, a place that was still safe “for a few days,” he thought.

They left their dog and cat behind.

As they saw the long line of cars on the road and deserted villages, they finally realized the scale of the attack under way.

The family reached Kursk in the early morning, where they found accommodation in a center for evacuees.

Their neighbors were not so lucky: They were injured by a drone as they fled.

“We hoped it would all be over soon,” Marina said.

But on Sunday, debris from a downed Ukrainian missile fell on a residential building in Kursk, injuring 15 people, according to the authorities.

At least 12 civilians have been killed and more than 100 injured since the incursion began, according to authorities.

‘There’s nothing left’

The family went to Moscow, where their friends were waiting for them — four of them already living in a tiny studio flat north of the capital.

Now living eight to a room, Marina and Yevgeny have been desperately trying to find out what’s happening in their home region.

Half an hour before meeting AFP at the Moscow aid center, Yevgeny managed to contact a neighbor, who confirmed the Ukrainian army was now occupying their village.

“They’ve moved into my father-in-law’s house, which he’d just renovated, right next to the shop that they’ve already emptied,” he said.

Ukraine has said it will open humanitarian corridors for civilians in the captured territory so they can evacuate toward Russia or Ukraine.

Russia says more than 120,000 people have fled fighting in the region, but Yevgeny said many of his neighbors were stuck.

“Honestly, it’s a tricky situation. Nobody’s going to kick them out in a day and a half,” Yevgeny told AFP of the Ukrainian army.

“The longer it goes on, the more time they have, the better their position is, and the harder it will be to drive them out.”

“In short, there’ll be nothing left to live in. There’s nothing left,” he said.

A neighbor managed to let Marina and Yevgeny’s cat and dog out of the house, where they had been locked for several days.

“Now, they’ll have to find their own food in the village,” he said sadly.
…

washington — The Biden administration is planning to speed up the processing of asylum-seekers at the U.S.-Canada border in response to a significant increase in migrant crossings.

A Department of Homeland Security spokesperson confirmed in an email to VOA that there would be two changes in the asylum process at the northern border. They also emphasized that the agency continues to enforce U.S. immigration laws and deliver tough consequences for noncitizens who do not have a lawful basis to remain in the United States.

“DHS carefully reviewed its implementation of the Safe Third Country Agreement with Canada and concluded that it could streamline that process at the border without impacting noncitizens’ ability to have access to a full and fair procedure for determining a claim to asylum or equivalent temporary protection,” the spokesperson said.

CBS News reported the plan before DHS confirmed the details with VOA. These policy changes were scheduled to take effect Wednesday.

The first change will require migrants to present their documents, testimony and other credible evidence when U.S. asylum officers screen them to determine if they are subject to the agreement.

Before, migrants could delay the screening while they gathered the information needed to prove they qualify for an exemption.

“Asylum officers will consider only the documentary evidence available at the time of the TSI [Threshold Screening Interview],” the DHS spokesperson wrote.

The second change reduces the time a migrant has to consult with a lawyer. Starting Wednesday, a migrant has a minimum of four hours to get legal assistance before the first asylum interview. The DHS made a similar change at the U.S.-Mexico border in June in a move aimed at limiting asylum claims there.

The Safe Third Country asylum agreement between the U.S. and Canada was signed in 2002 and expanded in 2023. It assigns responsibility for processing asylum claims to the country where the asylum-seeker first arrives.

Those affected by the Safe Third Country agreement must show that they first requested asylum in Canada when entering the U.S. from that country. If not, they may be sent back to Canada unless they qualify for an exemption. Unaccompanied children and migrants with relatives in the U.S. are exempt from the agreement.

Similarly, those who cross into Canada from the U.S. and fall under the agreement can be returned to the U.S. by Canadian authorities.

The DHS spokesperson said these changes were expected to help U.S. immigration officials process and remove migrants faster along the 8,890-kilometer northern border, where migrant encounters have increased this year.

In fiscal 2024 through June, U.S. Border Patrol agents encountered 16,459 migrants who crossed the U.S.-Canada border illegally. That was up from 10,021 in fiscal 2023 and 2,238 in 2022.

The DHS spokesperson called these changes “only procedural” and did not provide any additional comments beyond the statement.
…

…

Gaborone, Botswana — U.S. and Botswanan military personnel took part in a workshop focusing on better integrating women into the African country’s army, addressing issues such as sexual harassment and the need for tailored equipment.

The three-day workshop was part of a larger program wrapping up Thursday intended to strengthen relations between the two countries and build local forces’ capacity.

Major Teisha Barnes, military operations officer of the U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa, which has an initiative to better address the role of women serving their countries, said women in the military face challenges that could limit their opportunities.

“One of the big challenges is not letting women broaden their horizons and putting them in a box,” Barnes said, adding that “not many women rise to the occasion.”

“We have made several changes in the U.S. over the last 10 to 15 years to accommodate women based on body type and changes to uniform just to help women feel more comfortable within the military,” she said.

Barnes elaborated on the U.S. Army’s challenges regarding uniforms and equipment, saying, “In the U.S. we also had issues with the proper fit in the wear of our vest when it came to shooting and injuring females instead of helping us. Another issue we had was the learning that women did not weigh enough to actually break in boots.

“By giving lessons to Botswana,” she said, “we hope they will learn from our mistakes to prevent injuries to women.”

Botswana Defense Forces Major P. Sergio acknowledged that women in the army still face challenges and voiced hope that interactions with the U.S. Army will prove helpful.

“In our culture, men believe that women cannot join the army because it is tough and we are soft, we are not masculine,” Sergio said. “People are not quick to change; it will take time for people to accept that women have joined the army and are doing well.”

U.S. Ambassador to Botswana Howard Van Vranken said it is essential to afford women equal opportunities in the military.

“It is [a] kind of approach to problem solving that incorporates everyone’s strength and enables us to bring everyone into the equation on an equal basis,” he said. “It’s absolutely essential that in order to tackle the problems that we face in the 21st century in security, we need everyone to contribute.”

The U.S. Army Southern European Task Force, Africa, or SETAF-AF, workshop coincides with a broader initiative known as Southern Accord 2024, which is aimed at strengthening bilateral military capabilities.

The SETAF-AF deputy commanding general, Brigadier General John LeBlanc, said this year’s Southern Accord exercise, which drew 700 military personnel, has been a success. The bilateral exercises end Thursday.
…

…

Helsinki, Finland  — Next week, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, TSMC, the world’s top advanced computer chipmaker, is expected to break ground on its first European factory in Dresden, Germany, as it seeks to diversify production from Taiwan and threats from China. 

TSMC is the biggest supplier of semiconductor chips used in everything from computers to cars and medical equipment. The company will run the nearly $11 billion plant, holding a 70% stake. The joint venture that includes minority investors Robert Bosch, Infineon Technologies and NXP Semiconductors, will be called European Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, or ESMC. 

Dresden’s mayor’s office confirmed to VOA that the ground-breaking ceremony will take place August 20 and that ESMC is the largest ever investment project in Germany’s Saxony region.  

Analysts say Beijing’s threats against Taiwan have spurred TSMC to diversify from the self-governing island, which Beijing considers a breakaway province that must one day reunite with China, by force if necessary.  

TSMC is already building a new factory in Arizona, with a total investment of $65 billion in the U.S., and constructing a nearly $9 billion plant in Japan. 

Anna Rita Ferrara, an Italian political and international law adviser for research organizations, told VOA, “TSMC’s investment in Germany and the U.S.A. is a strategic move that allows the microchip industry to stay ahead in case China invades Taiwan. Relocating production to two major Western cities [Dresden and Phoenix] would help protect the Western IT sector from a dangerous supply reduction and a possible technological debacle.” 

TSMC has a $3 billion Chinese mainland factory in Nanjing that has been producing less advanced chips since 2016. 

TSMC has a 61.7% market share in the global semiconductor market, while second-place Samsung has an 11% market share, according to Statista, a European statistics platform.

The Dresden plant is scheduled to go into operation in 2027, with a monthly output of 40,000 chips, including 12-nanometer automotive chips, which are more advanced than those made in Taiwan. 

The Taiwanese chip giant did not immediately respond to VOA’s requests for comment on the Dresden-based plant’s opening and importance to diversifying from Taiwan in the face of China’s threats.   

According to Reuters, TSMC’s chairman, C. C. Wei, told reporters in June that the company had discussed moving factories outside of Taiwan, but called it impossible because up to 90% of its production is based in Taiwan. “Instability across the Taiwan Straits is indeed a consideration for supply chain,” he was quoted as saying, “but I want to say that we certainly do not want wars to happen.”

As China has repeated its threats to force Taiwan’s reunification, Europe and the U.S. have been working to attract domestic chip production to reduce their dependence on imports from Taiwan. 

The U.S. passed the Chips Act in 2022 to invest $39 billion to support chip companies in building factories. The European Union’s Chips Act last year followed with its own plans to invest $47 billion to increase the share of European chip production to 20% of the world by 2030.  

Stefan Uhlig, deputy director and senior consultant of Silicon Saxony, the German region’s semiconductor industry association, told VOA, “TSMC is coming to the EU because of the EU Chips Act, which is in place to attract technologies to the EU which are not here.” 

Uhlig said one-third of European semiconductors come from Saxony. “The region is known as Silicon Saxony and recognized as such in Europe and around the globe. Many places around the globe are chip hot spots, some larger production-capacity-wise but none is larger in terms of different chip manufacturers in one place.” 

Enrico Cau, an associate researcher at the Taiwan Centre for International Strategic Studies, told VOA having a factory in Europe is certainly part of TSMC’s global plan to improve the resilience of the supply chain and logistics, and it will also help bring the entire supply chain closer to where chips are needed. 

“It is unclear how these new plants will affect Taiwan in the long term under certain conditions,” he said. “For example, in case of critical disruptions of supply chains due to war, natural disasters, or even energy shortages, (especially with the new AI industry developing as a second core sector on the island and requiring much more power), that force(s) TSMC to also relocate the cutting edge manufacturing out of the island, temporarily or for longer periods of time.”   

TSMC’s electricity consumption currently accounts for about 8% of all power in Taiwan. 

The company accounted for about 8% of Taiwan’s GDP in 2022, Bloomberg reported, while its market value was more than $800 billion, ranking ninth in the world and surpassing companies such as Tesla, JPMorgan Chase, and Walmart, and far exceeding semiconductor peers such as Intel and Samsung.   

Analysts say TSMC’s diversifying production could also boost Taiwan’s soft power on the world stage, where Beijing has sought to squeeze Taipei. 

Marcin Mateusz Jerzewski, director of the Taiwan office of the European Center for Values and Security Policy, told VOA that TSMC has undeniably enhanced Taiwan’s global standing. 

“As the world’s leading dedicated semiconductor foundry, TSMC embodies technological excellence and innovation, significantly bolstering Taiwan’s soft power on the international stage,” he said. “However, the burgeoning reliance on TSMC poses a nuanced dilemma for Taiwan’s international standing, as the country’s global perception increasingly hinges on the success of this singular entity. This overdependence necessitates a strategic reassessment to ensure sustainable economic and diplomatic engagement.” 

Jerzewski noted that while TSMC accounts for a large chunk of Taiwan’s economy, it mainly relies on small and medium-sized enterprises, which he said the government should help to invest in democratic countries to strengthen their ties and reduce the risk of over-reliance on a single corporate entity.

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this report.
…

…

…

NEW YORK — Donald Trump has lost his latest bid for a new judge in his New York hush money criminal case as it heads toward a key ruling and potential sentencing next month. 

In a decision posted Wednesday, Judge Juan M. Merchan declined to step aside and said Trump’s demand was a rehash “rife with inaccuracies and unsubstantiated claims” about the political ties of Mercan’s daughter and his ability to judge the historic case fairly and impartially. 

It is the third time that the judge has rejected such a request from lawyers for the former president and current Republican nominee. 

All three times, they argued that Merchan, a state court judge in Manhattan, has a conflict of interest because of his daughter’s work as a political consultant for prominent Democrats and campaigns. Among them was Vice President Kamala Harris when she ran for president in 2020. She is now her party’s 2024 White House nominee. 

A state court ethics panel said last year that Merchan could continue on the case, writing that a relative’s independent political activities are not “a reasonable basis to question the judge’s impartiality.” 

Merchan has repeatedly said he is certain he will continue to base his rulings “on the evidence and the law, without fear or favor, casting aside undue influence.” 

“With these fundamental principles in mind, this Court now reiterates for the third time, that which should already be clear — innuendo and mischaracterizations do not a conflict create,” Merchan wrote in his three-page ruling. “Recusal is therefore not necessary, much less required.” 

But with Harris now Trump’s Democratic opponent in this year’s White House election, Trump lawyer Todd Blanche wrote in a letter to the judge last month that the defense’s concerns have become “even more concrete.” 

Prosecutors called the claims “a vexatious and frivolous attempt to relitigate” the issue. 

Messages seeking comment on the ruling were left with Blanche. The Manhattan district attorney’s office, which prosecuted the case, declined to comment. 

Trump was convicted in May of falsifying his business records to conceal a 2016 deal to pay off porn actor Stormy Daniels to stay quiet about her alleged 2006 sexual encounter with him. Prosecutors cast the payout as part of a Trump-driven effort to keep voters from hearing salacious stories about him during his first campaign. 

Trump says all the stories were false, the business records were not and the case was a political maneuver meant to damage his current campaign. The prosecutor who brought the charges, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, is a Democrat. 

Trump has pledged to appeal. Legally, that cannot happen before a defendant is sentenced. 

In the meantime, his lawyers took other steps to try to derail the case. Besides the recusal request, they have asked Merchan to overturn the verdict and dismiss the case altogether because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s July ruling on presidential immunity. 

That decision reins in prosecutions of ex-presidents for official acts and restricts prosecutors in pointing to official acts as evidence that a president’s unofficial actions were illegal. Trump’s lawyers argue that in light of the ruling, jurors in the hush money case should not have heard such evidence as former White House staffers describing how the then-president reacted to news coverage of the Daniels deal. 

Earlier this month, Merchan set a September 16 date to rule on the immunity claim, and September 18 for “the imposition of sentence or other proceedings as appropriate.” 

The hush money case is one of four criminal prosecutions brought against Trump last year. 

One federal case, accusing Trump of illegally hoarding classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida, was dismissed last month. The Justice Department is appealing. 

The others — federal and Georgia state cases concerning Trump’s efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss — are not positioned to go to trial before the November election.
…