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WikiLeaks’ Assange in UK Court Fighting Extradition to USA

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange made a brief court appearance Monday in his bid to prevent extradition to the United States to face serious espionage charges.He and his lawyers complained they weren’t being given enough time to meet to plan their battle against U.S. prosecutors seeking to put him on trial for WikiLeaks’ publication of hundreds of thousands of confidential documents.The 48-year-old was brought to court from Bealmarsh Prison on the outskirts of London. He saluted the public gallery, which was packed with ardent supporters including the musician MIA, when he entered the courtroom. He later raised his right fist in defiance when he was taken to holding cells to meet with lawyer Gareth Peirce.Peirce said officials at Belmarsh Prison are making it extremely difficult for her to meet with Assange.“We have pushed Belmarsh in every way – it is a breach of a defendant’s rights,” she said.Assange refrained from making political statements. He confirmed his name and date of birth, and at one point said he didn’t understand all of the proceedings against him during the brief hearing at Westminster Magistrates’ Court.He faces 18 charges in the U.S., including conspiring to hack into a Pentagon computer. He has denied wrongdoing, claiming he was acting as a journalist entitled to First Amendment protection.Many advocacy groups have supported Assange’s claim that the charges would have a chilling effect on freedom of the press.A five-day extradition hearing is scheduled for late February. Assange’s legal team has tried to delay the hearing so there is more time to prepare, but these requests have been denied.Assange has already served a 50-week prison sentence in Britain for jumping bail. A rape investigation launched against him in Sweden has been dropped, so he would likely be freed from prison if extradition is denied. 
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William, Harry Issue Statement Amid UK Royal Family Rift

Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II is set to hold face-to-face talks Monday with Prince Harry for the first time since he and his wife, Meghan, unveiled their controversial plan to walk away from royal roles, holding  a dramatic family summit meant to chart a future course for the couple.
    
The meeting reflects the queen’s desire to contain the fallout from Harry and Meghan’s decision to “step back” as senior royals, work to become financially independent and split their time between Britain and North America. The couple, also known as the Duke and Duchess of Sussex, made the announcement Wednesday without telling the queen or other senior royals first.
    
Before the extraordinary session, Princes William and Harry took the equally unusual step of issuing a statement challenging the accuracy of a newspaper report that there was a severe strain on the relationship between the two brothers.
    
“For brothers who care so deeply about the issues surrounding mental health, the use of inflammatory language in this way is offensive and potentially harmful,” the statement said.
    
The meeting at the monarch’s private Sandringham estate in eastern England will also include Harry’s father Prince Charles and his brother Prince William. It comes after days of intense news coverage, in which supporters of the royal family’s feuding factions used the British media to paint conflicting pictures of who was to blame for the rift.
    
William is expected to travel to Sandringham from London and Harry from his home in Windsor, west of the British capital. Charles has flown  back from the Gulf nation of Oman, where he attended a condolence ceremony Sunday following the death of Sultan Qaboos bin Said.
    
Meghan, who is in Canada with the couple’s baby son Archie, is likely to join the meeting by phone.
    
Buckingham Palace said “a range of possibilities” would be discussed, but the queen was determined to resolve the situation within “days, not weeks.” The goal was to agree on next steps at Monday’s gathering, which follows days of talks among royal courtiers and officials from the U.K. and Canada. Buckingham Palace stressed, however, that “any decision will take time to be implemented.”
    
One of the more fraught questions that needs to be worked out is precisely what it means for a royal to be financially independent and what activities can be undertaken to make money. Other royals who have ventured into the world of commerce have found it complicated.
    
Prince Andrew, for example, has faced heated questions about his relationship with the late convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein. Andrew, the queen’s second son, has relinquished royal duties and patronages after being accused by a woman who says she was an Epstein trafficking victim who slept with the prince.
    
The Duke and Duchess of Sussex also face questions on paying for taxpayer-funded security. Home Secretary Priti Patel refused to comment, but said safety was a priority.
    
“I’m not going to provide any detailed information on the security arrangements for either them or any members of the royal family or for any protected individuals, that’s thoroughly inappropriate for me to do so” she told the BBC. “At this moment in time, right now, the royal family themselves need some time and space for them to work through the current issues that they’re dealing with.”
    
The meeting comes amid days of days of discussions about the future of the monarchy following the surprise announcement. Senior royals were said to be hurt, Harry and Meghan’s friends have told Britain’s media that the couple were being pushed aside because of the desire of the Windsors to concentrate on the core of the royal family and focus on those in the line of succession – Prince Charles, William and William’s son George.
    
Tom Bradby, a TV journalist who is close to Harry and Meghan, warned in the Sunday Times that the royal family badly needed a peace deal to prevent “a protracted war” that could damage the monarchy.
    
With much at stake, the talks could be a step toward a changed monarchy.
   
“This is a seismic moment in royal history and British society,” Kate Williams, a historian at the University of Reading, wrote in the Observer. “It tells historians of the future much about our society, its self-perceptions, prejudices and fears. And most of all, it should mark our realization as we didn’t learn after (Princess) Diana that those who marry into the royal family are not our dolls to attack and throw around as we please.”
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British Ambassador Detained Briefly While Attending Tehran Vigil for Jet-Crash Victims

Britain’s ambassador to Tehran has said he was detained briefly by Iranian authorities as he attended a vigil for the victims of last week’s crash of a Ukrainian passenger jet.Iran’s Mehr news agency said Rob Macaire was arrested on Saturday for his alleged “involvement in provoking suspicious acts” at the gathering in front of Tehran’s Amir Kabir University.People gather for a candlelight vigil to remember the victims of the Ukraine plane crash, at the gate of Amri Kabir University that some of the victims of the crash were former students of, in Tehran, Jan. 11, 2020.Students held a gathering at the school after Iran said the Ukrainian airliner was downed by mistake by Iranian antiaircraft missiles.In a post to Twitter Sunday, Macaire said he attended the event to pay respects to the victims, and was not attending any demonstration.Thanks for the many goodwill messages. Can confirm I wasn’t taking part in any demonstrations! Went to an event advertised as a vigil for victims of #PS752 tragedy. Normal to want to pay respects- some of victims were British. I left after 5 mins, when some started chanting.— Rob Macaire (@HMATehran) January 12, 2020The British Foreign Ministry called Macaire’s detention “a flagrant violation of international law.””The Iranian government is at a crossroads moment. It can continue its march towards pariah status with all the political and economic isolation that entails or take steps to deescalate tensions and engage in a diplomatic path forwards,” the ministry said.Iranian officials did not immediately make any statement about the incident.More protests were expected later on Sunday, amid building outrage among some Iranians about the downing of the Ukrainian jet.
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Iranians Protest Military’s Role in Downing Ukrainian Airliner

Hundreds of people protested in several cities around Iran on Saturday after the military admitted to mistakenly shooting down a civilian Ukrainian plane, killing all 176 on board. VOA’s Julie Taboh has more.
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Bolsonaro Targets Commission on Political Disappearances

President Jair Bolsonaro on Thursday removed several members of a commission investigating disappearances and murders during Brazil’s dictatorship, acting days after they confronted him on the role played by the state in the killing of a leftist activist.

A decree co-signed by Bolsonaro’s human rights minister and published in official records announced the replacement of four of the commission’s seven members, including its president, Eugenia Augusta Gonzaga.

Bolsonaro has faced intense criticism, including from allies, this week after he questioned the circumstances in which Fernando Santa Cruz, a leftist activist during the 1964-1985 military regime and father of the current president of the Brazilian Bar Association, was slain.

On July 24, the commission published an official obituary for Santa Cruz. It stipulates that his death in 1974 was “violent, caused by the Brazilian State, in the context of the systematic and generalized persecution” of political activists during the dictatorship.

A few days later, without providing evidence, Bolsonaro said while getting a haircut that Santa Cruz had been killed by a “terrorist group,” Acao Popular. Bolsonaro told journalists that if the president of the Brazilian Bar Association wanted to know how his father died: “I’ll tell him.”

Bolsonaro, a far-right former army captain, has often praised the military regime and minimized abuses committed by that regime.

In 2016, when voting to impeach President Dilma Rousseff, who was a victim of torture by the military regime, Bolsonaro dedicated his vote to a colonel who led a torture unit. “In memory of Col. Carlos Alberto Brilhante Ustra, the terror of Dilma Rousseff, I vote yes,” said the then-lawmaker.

After being elected president last Oct. 28, Bolsonaro named several ex-generals to his Cabinet. He also called for the commemoration of the anniversary of Brazil’s 1964 military coup, leading federal prosecutors to condemn an “apology for the practice of atrocities.”

In 2014, Brazil’s national truth commission concluded that at least 434 people were killed or disappeared during the dictatorship. It is estimated that between 30,000 and 50,000 people were illegally arrested and tortured. Bolsonaro called the report “unfounded.”

Changing times

To justify the changes made Thursday at the commission, Bolsonaro said times are changing in Brazil.

“The motive [is that the] president has changed, now it is Jair Bolsonaro, of the right,” he told reporters. “When they put terrorists there, nobody said anything.”

Bolsonaro and human rights minister Damares Alves appointed Marco Vinicius de Carvalho, one of Alves’ top advisers, as the commission’s new leader. The decree gave seats on the body to a member of the Ministry of Defense, which already had a seat on the commission, and a former army colonel.

At a news conference in Sao Paulo following her dismissal as the body’s president, Gonzaga described Bolsonaro’s mocking of official documents around the death of Santa Cruz “cruel.”

She said members of the commission had been expecting to be replaced since the election for their “prominent role in defending” victims of the dictatorship.

“For us, this destitution was a response to our manifestations, defending the rights of the Santa Cruz family and others,” Gonzaga said.

‘Nonpartisan’ commission

She also insisted that the commission, which began in 1995, is not a government body, like ministries, which change with each new government.

“The commission has always been nonpartisan, always including people who have some connections with this theme, and they are not paid,” she told a crowd of journalists and families of victims of the dictatorship.

Felipe Santa Cruz, son of Fernando Santa Cruz, filed a complaint Wednesday to Brazil’s top court about the president’s comment on the case. Santa Cruz, who was 2 when his father went missing, wrote that Bolsonaro’s comments showed “cruelty and a lack of empathy.”

According to the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo, supreme court Justice Luis Roberto Barroso gave Bolsonaro 15 days to clarify his statements about Santa Cruz. The supreme court was not immediately available to confirm.

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IS Stepping Up Attacks in Iraq’s North

Islamic State (IS) militants killed four security officials late Wednesday near the northern city of Kirkuk, local officials said.

The attack, which was carried out on a checkpoint manned by local Kurdish security forces, also left at least eight people wounded, local sources said.

“At least 15 IS militants, including a couple snipers, were involved in the overnight raid,” a senior Iraqi security official told VOA.

The Iraqi official, who refused to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to reporters, added that the militants used mortars in the Wednesday attack.

In the nearby province of Saladin, at least five Iraqi soldiers and government-backed militia members were killed in an IS attack on their positions, Iraqi police reported Thursday.

IS has not yet claimed responsibility for either attack.

In response to Wednesday’s attacks, Iraqi warplanes carried out an airstrike on an IS position, killing at least three militants, an Iraqi security official said.

Increased attacks

IS has increased its attacks in recent weeks against Iraqi and Kurdish forces in parts of northern Iraq that were held by the terror group before they were freed with the help of the U.S.-led coalition.

A VOA reporter in Iraq said one of the targeted areas has largely been safe until recently, with IS increasingly carrying out surprise attacks against civilians and security forces in places like Kirkuk, Diyala and Mosul.

Mosul was considered the de facto capital of IS in Iraq. Supported by U.S. airpower, Iraqi troops liberated the country’s second-largest city from IS in July 2017. The terror group was officially declared defeated in Iraq in December 2017.

Since then, however, remnants of IS have frequently targeted vital parts of the region.

During the harvest season this year, IS also set fire to thousands of acres of wheat fields across northern and western Iraq, inflicting substantial damage on the local economy, reports said.

IS militants have also attempted attacks on oilfields in northern Iraq. Last week, Iraqi forces foiled two major attacks claimed by IS on the strategic Olas and Ajil oilfields in Saladin province, the Iraqi military said.

Cells across northern Iraq

The extremist group has active cells across areas in northern Iraq considered disputed between the central Iraqi government and Kurdistan regional government, according to Iraqi officials.

IS “was territorially defeated, but the context for their [re-emergence] in disputed territories is permissive. Terror is [a] continuous threat,” Hemin Hawrami, deputy speaker of Iraqi Kurdistan’s regional parliament, said in a tweet Thursday.

U.S. officials also have warned that IS’s ongoing activities pose a threat to Iraq’s stability.

“After the defeat of ISIS in Mosul, Iraq didn’t have an ISIS terrain-holding threat,” James Jeffrey, special envoy for the Global Coalition to Defeat IS, told reporters at the State Department on Thursday, using another acronym for IS.

“But what we have seen is a persistent, resilient, rural, terrorist level of violence generated by these underground cells of ISIS, particularly in areas from south of Mosul and the Kurdish areas down to Baghdad,” he said.

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Saudi Women Now May Travel Without Male Consent

Saudi Arabia has issued new laws that grant women greater freedoms by allowing any citizen to apply for a passport and travel freely, ending a long-standing and controversial guardianship policy that had required male consent for a woman to travel or carry a passport.

The changes approved by King Salman and his Cabinet allow any person 21 and older to travel abroad without prior consent and any citizen to apply for a Saudi passport on their own.

The decrees were published early Friday in the kingdom’s official weekly gazette.

Other changes issued in the decrees allow women to register a marriage, divorce or child’s birth and to be issued official family documents.

The changes were widely celebrated by Saudis on Twitter, but also drew criticism from some conservatives.
 

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Divers Remove Plastic Waste from Greek Waters — a ‘Gulf Full of Plastic Corals’

Divers and environmentalists found an unpleasant surprise in Aegean waters near Greece and are working to fix it.  What looked like colorful coral turned out to be a plastic wasteland, just one of many challenges delicate marine ecosystems face. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi dives in for a look.

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As Brexit Storm Gathers, Britain Looks to Trump for Hope

The prospect of Britain crashing out of the European Union with no deal at the end of October is creating a tumultuous first few weeks in office for Prime Minister Boris Johnson. The British pound sterling is plunging, and there are warnings of widespread disruption. As Henry Ridgwell reports from London, Johnson is looking for help across the Atlantic to a like-minded ally in the White House.
 

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Democratic Debates: Top Quotes by Each Candidate

The second night of the second round of Democratic presidential candidate debates took place in Detroit Wednesday. The candidates answered questions on a range of issues, including health care, immigration, crime and race.

Here are quotes from each candidate:

Michael Bennet, on the connection between education and the criminal justice system, saying: “Let’s fix our school system, and then maybe we can fix the prison pipeline.”

Joe Biden, in his closing statement, said: “Everybody knows who Donald Trump is, we have to let him know who we are. We choose science over fiction. We choose hope over fear. We choose unity over division. And we choose the idea that we can as Americans — when we act together — we can do anything.”

Cory Booker, during a heated argument about criminal justice with Biden, said: “Mr. Vice President has said that since the 1970s, every crime bill, major and minor, has had his name on it. And sir, those are your words, not mine, and this is one of those instances where the house was set on fire and you claimed responsibility for those laws. And you can’t just now come out with a plan to put out that fire.”

Bill de Blasio, in explaining why voters should vote for him, said: “If we’re going to beat Donald Trump, this has to be a party that stands for something. The party of labor unions. This has to be the party of universal health care. This has to be the party that’s not afraid to say out loud we’re going to tax the hell out of the wealthy. And when we do that, Donald Trump right on cue will call us socialists. Here’s what I’ll say to him: ‘Donald, you’re the real socialist.'”

Julian Castro, on security at the southern U.S. border with Mexico, said: “My immigration plan would also make sure that we put undocumented immigrants, who haven’t committed a serious crime, on a pathway to citizenship. That we do a 21st century Marshall Plan, with Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, so that we can get to the root of this challenge, so people can find safety and opportunity at home, instead of having to come to the United States.”

Tulsi Gabbard, in criticizing the U.S foreign policy establishment, said: “For too long, we had leaders who have been arbitrating foreign policy from ivory towers in Washington without any idea about the cost and the consequence, the toll it takes on our service members, on their families. We have to do the right thing. End the wasteful regime change wars and bring our troops home. … We were all lied to (about Iraq). The problem is that this current president is continuing to betray us.”

Kirsten Gillibrand, in saying the discussion about race shouldn’t fall on Booker or Senator Kamala Harris, said: “I don’t believe it’s the responsibility of Cory and Kamala to take this on. I think as a white woman running for president of the United States, it is my responsibility to lift up those voices that aren’t being listened to. … I can talk to those white women in the suburbs and explain to them what white privilege is. When their son is walking down a street with a bag of M&M’s in his pocket wearing a hoodie, his whiteness is what protects him from not being shot.”

Kamala Harris, in a discussion about equal pay for women, said: “Women are paid 80 cents on the dollar. Black women: $0.61. Native American women: $0.58. Latinas: $0.53. … Since 1963, when we passed the Equal Pay Act, we have been talking about the fact that women are not paid equally for equal work. … I’m done with the conversation. Under my plan, companies will be fined if they’re not paying men and women equally.”

Jay Inslee, who is running on a platform of addressing climate change, said: “Under Donald Trump, we face a looming catastrophe, but it is not too late, we have one last chance. The survival of humanity on this planet and civilization as we know it is in the hands of the next president.”

Andrew Yang, in saying robots have displaced more workers than immigrants, said: “If you go to a factory here in Michigan, you will not find wall-to-wall immigrants, you will find wall-to-wall robots and machines. Immigrants are being scapegoated for issues they have nothing to do with in our economy.” 

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