Indian worker’s employer arrested for murder in Italy

Indian worker’s employer arrested for murder in Italy
Italian police Tuesday arrested the employer of an Indian farm labourer who was left on the road to die after a work accident that severed his arm and crushed his legs. (Reuters/File)
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Updated 02 July 2024
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Indian worker’s employer arrested for murder in Italy

Indian worker’s employer arrested for murder in Italy
  • Antonello Lovato was arrested for second degree murder over the death of Satnam Singh
  • “If the Indian, who died due to copious blood loss, had been promptly helped, he would in all likelihood have been saved,” the Latina prosecutors’ office said

ROME: Italian police Tuesday arrested the employer of an Indian farm laborer who was left on the road to die after a work accident that severed his arm and crushed his legs.
Antonello Lovato was arrested for second degree murder over the death of Satnam Singh, who was injured while working on a farm in Latina, a rural area south of Rome where tens of thousands of Indian farmhands work.
“If the Indian, who died due to copious blood loss, had been promptly helped, he would in all likelihood have been saved,” the Latina prosecutors’ office said, citing a medical examiner.
Singh, who was 31 and working without legal papers, had his arm sliced off by a machine which also crushed his legs.
Lovato then dumped Singh and his wife on the roadside, along with the severed limb in a box, according to trade unions who are supporting Singh’s widow.
“The worker’s condition after the accident was so serious as to make the need for prompt assistance clear,” the prosecutors’ office said.
Prosecutors said an ongoing investigation would continue into working conditions on the farm.
Undocumented workers in the region where the farm is located are paid an average of 20 euros ($21) a day for up to 14 hours labor, according to the Osservatorio Placido Rizzotto, which analyzes conditions in the agriculture industry.
Italy’s financial police identified nearly 60,000 undocumented workers from January 2023 to June 2024.
But Italy’s largest trade union CGIL estimates that as many as 230,000 people — over a quarter of the country’s seasonal agricultural workers — do not have a contract.


India’s Modi will meet with Putin on 2-day visit to Russia starting Monday, Kremlin says

India’s Modi will meet with Putin on 2-day visit to Russia starting Monday, Kremlin says
Updated 4 sec ago
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India’s Modi will meet with Putin on 2-day visit to Russia starting Monday, Kremlin says

India’s Modi will meet with Putin on 2-day visit to Russia starting Monday, Kremlin says
  • New Delhi’s importance as a key trading partner for Moscow has grown since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022
  • But Modi on Thursday skipped the summit of a security grouping created by Moscow and Beijing to counter Western alliances

MOSCOW: The Kremlin on Thursday said Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Russia next Monday and Tuesday and hold talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The visit was first announced by Russian officials last month, but the dates have not been previously disclosed.
Russia has had strong ties with India since the Cold War, and New Delhi’s importance as a key trading partner for Moscow has grown since the Kremlin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022. China and India have become key buyers of Russian oil following sanctions imposed by the US and its allies that shut most Western markets for Russian exports.
Under Modi’s leadership, India has avoided condemning Russia’s action in Ukraine while emphasizing the need for a peaceful settlement.
The partnership between Moscow and New Delhi has become fraught, however, since Russia started developing closer ties with India’s main rival, China, because of the hostilities in Ukraine.
Modi on Thursday skipped the summit of a security grouping created by Moscow and Beijing to counter Western alliances.
Modi sent his foreign minister to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization at its annual meeting in Kazakhstan’s capital of Astana. The meeting is being attended by Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Indian media reports speculated that the recently reelected Modi was busy with the Parliament session last week.
Modi last visited Russia in 2019 for an economic forum in the far eastern port of Vladivostok. He last traveled to Moscow in 2015. Putin last met with Modi in September 2022 at a summit of the SCO in Uzbekistan. In 2021, Putin also traveled to New Delhi and held talks with the Indian leader.
Tensions between Beijing and New Delhi have continued since a confrontation in June 2020 along the disputed China-India border in which rival troops fought with rocks, clubs and fists. At least 20 Indian troops and four Chinese soldiers were killed.
After his reelection to a third straight term. Modi attended the G7 meeting in Italy’s Apulia region last month and addressed artificial intelligence, energy, and regional issues in Africa and the Mediterranean.
In the early 1990s, the Soviet Union was the source of about 70 percent of Indian army weapons, 80 percent of its air force systems and 85 percent of its navy platforms.
India bought its first aircraft carrier, INS Vikramaditya, from Russia in 2004. It had served in the former Soviet Union and later in the Russian navy.
With the Russian supply line hit by the fighting in Ukraine, India has been reducing its dependency on Russian arms and diversifying its defense procurements, buying more from the US, Israel, France and Italy.
 


UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat

UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat
Updated 22 min 35 sec ago
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UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat

UK left-wing maverick Galloway loses his parliamentary seat

LONDON: Veteran left-wing political maverick George Galloway lost his parliamentary seat in Britain’s election on Friday, defeated by the Labour candidate in the northern English town of Rochdale.
Galloway had served for just four months after winning a by-election triggered by the death of the town’s previous lawmaker.
Back in March, Galloway’s pro-Palestinian campaign helped him win votes from the town’s Muslim community and he secured what was his seventh stint as a lawmaker, representing his left-wing Workers Party of Britain.
That win came after Labour withdrew support from its candidate over a recording espousing conspiracy theories about Israel.
Both the Conservatives and the Labour Party have said they want the fighting in Gaza to stop, but they have also backed Israel’s right to defend itself, angering some among the 3.9 million Muslims who make up 6.5 percent of Britain’s population.
Galloway criticized Labour for supporting Israel in its war against Hamas during his winning by-election campaign in March.
But this time he lost to Labour candidate Paul Waugh, a former political journalist who has previously worked for Britain’s Independent and Evening Standard newspapers, and who grew up in the town.
Galloway, 69, was himself a former Labour parliamentarian before being expelled from the party in 2003 for criticizing then-prime minister Tony Blair over the Iraq war.
By that time, he already had a reputation for controversy.
In 1994, he drew criticism for meeting Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein and telling him: “Sir, I salute your courage, your strength, your indefatigability.”


Japan, Philippines defense pact negotiations nearing conclusion, ambassador says

Japan, Philippines defense pact negotiations nearing conclusion, ambassador says
Updated 57 min 4 sec ago
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Japan, Philippines defense pact negotiations nearing conclusion, ambassador says

Japan, Philippines defense pact negotiations nearing conclusion, ambassador says

MANILA: Negotiations between Japan and the Philippines for a Reciprocal Access Agreement on defense and security are close to conclusion, Tokyo’s ambassador to Manila said on Thursday.
The role of the Philippines in maintaining regional stability and security was undoubtedly important, ambassador Kazuya Endo said in a speech.
A significant development can be expected on defense equipment transfer, he said.

Japanese and Philippine foreign and defense ministers will meet in Manila on July 8 for talks that could include a breakthrough defense pact that would allow their military forces to visit each other’s soil.
The Philippines has been ramping up its ties with neighbors and other countries to counter what it describes as China’s growing aggression in the South China Sea.
Maintaining peace and stability in the Taiwan Strait is critical for the Indo Pacific region, Endo said.


With breakthrough in UK election, far right leader Farage says establishment ‘revolt’ is underway

With breakthrough in UK election, far right leader Farage says establishment ‘revolt’ is underway
Updated 05 July 2024
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With breakthrough in UK election, far right leader Farage says establishment ‘revolt’ is underway

With breakthrough in UK election, far right leader Farage says establishment ‘revolt’ is underway
  • Reform UK, a re-brand of the Brexit Party that Farage founded in 2018, were predicted to secure 13 seats
  • Farage is a one-time Conservative who quit the party in the early 1990s to co-found the euroskeptic UK Independence Party (UKIP)

LONDON: Brexit figurehead Nigel Farage has claimed to have kickstarted a “revolt against the establishment,” after exit polls indicated his hard-right party had secured an unprecedented electoral breakthrough.
Reform UK, a re-brand of the Brexit Party that Farage founded in 2018, were predicted to secure 13 seats — the first time a party on Britain’s far-right fringes has won more than a single seat.
“This, folks, is huge,” Farage said in a social media video posted early Friday.
“The revolt against the establishment is underway,” he added on X.
Reform appeared to have far exceed expectations in the election, after it was forecast in the latter stages of the campaign to win just a handful of seats in the House of Commons.
Farage, who launched an eighth bid to become one of the country’s 650 MPs mid-way through the six-week campaign, was set to succeed finally in Clacton, eastern England, according to the exit poll for UK broadcasters.
This would put the attention-grabbing populist figurehead in a prime position to attempt his long-term aim of staging a “takeover” of the Conservatives.
Millions of their voters appeared to have already switched their support to Reform, leaving the Tories — in power since 2010 — facing their worst result in nearly two centuries, the exit polls said.
Reform’s surge comes as hard-right parties or politicians increase their appeal across Europe and in the United States.

Seen as one of Britain’s most effective communicators and campaigners, Farage — a privately educated son of a stockbroker — is a long-time ally of US President Donald Trump.
“This is the beginning of a big movement,” David Bull, Reform’s deputy leader told Sky News, as the UK awaited the official tallies late Thursday.
“This is a political revolt. It’s also a five-year plan. If we can go from nothing four years ago to winning 13 seats, imagine what we can do in five years’ time.”

Farage, 60, is a one-time Conservative who quit the party in the early 1990s to co-found the euroskeptic UK Independence Party (UKIP).
He pulled off an unprecedented win in the 2014 European Parliament elections, serving as an MEP for the fringe party for around two decades and helping to make Euroskepticism more mainstream.
But UKIP never managed to win more than one seat in a general election. Farage himself failed to become an MP on seven separate occasions.
But his national prominence continued to grow after he became a driving force behind the 2016 Brexit vote, before forging a career as a presenter on the brash right-wing TV channel GB News.
Entering the 2024 general election after initially ruling himself out, Farage said he was bidding to emulate efforts in Canada in the 1990s by right-wing fringes to take over its Conservative Party.
His candidacy dramatically re-energised Reform UK, while spooking the Tories as polls immediately registered an uptick in support for the hard-right anti-immigrant outfit.
Conservatives and centrists now fear Farage could have the perfect platform in parliament to further legitimize his staunchly anti-establishment populist messaging.
“If this exit poll is right, this feels like Nigel Farage’s dream scenario — he’ll be rubbing his hands with glee,” said Chris Hopkins, political research director at pollster Savanta.
“He’s got enough MPs to make a racket in Westminster, and the party he shares the closest political space with could be reduced to a long period of soul-searching.”


‘Black sheep’ embarrass French far right before vote

‘Black sheep’ embarrass French far right before vote
Updated 05 July 2024
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‘Black sheep’ embarrass French far right before vote

‘Black sheep’ embarrass French far right before vote

PARIS: Efforts by France’s far right to cultivate an image of respectability before legislative elections have been hurt by a number of racist and other extremist incidents involving its candidates.
National Rally (RN) heavyweights Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella rushed to take a stance against what they both called “black sheep” in the party to limit the damage.
The RN is projected to emerge as the biggest party in the National Assembly, with Bardella tipped as France’s next prime minister if it wins an absolute majority, or gets close enough.
But some RN candidates in Sunday’s second round of voting have fueled suspicions that xenophobic, racist and anti-Semitic attitudes in the party are perhaps not just a thing of the past.
On Wednesday, Bardella was confronted on live television with a sound recording of RN deputy Daniel Grenon saying that anybody of French-North African double nationality “has no place in high office.”
Bardella quickly condemned the remark, calling it “abject,” and announced the creation of a “conflict committee” within the party to deal with such cases.
“Anybody who says things that are not in line with my convictions will be excluded,” he said.
Earlier Laurent Gnaedig, a parliamentary candidate for the RN, caused uproar by saying that remarks by discredited party founder Jean-Marie Le Pen, who called Nazi gas chambers “a detail of history,” were not actually anti-Semitic.
Gnaedig later presented his “sincere apologies” and said he had never meant to question the reality of “the horror of the Holocaust.” He would accept any decision by the party’s conflict commission, he added.
In November, Bardella himself got into hot water on the same topic when he said he did “not believe that Jean-Marie Le Pen was an anti-Semite.” He later walked back the remark, saying Le Pen “obviously withdrew into a kind of anti-Semitism.”

Another candidate, Ludivine Daoudi, dropped out of the race for France’s parliament on Tuesday after a photo of her allegedly wearing a cap from Nazi Germany’s air force, the Luftwaffe, sparked furor online.
And Brittany region candidate Francoise Billaud deleted her Facebook account after she was found to have shared a picture of the grave of French Vichy collaborationist leader Philippe Petain with the caption “Marshal of France.”
RN deputy Roger Chudeau meanwhile got into trouble with the party leadership for saying that the 2014 appointment of Moroccan-born Najat Vallaud-Belkacem as the Socialist government’s education minister had been “an error.”
Marine Le Pen has over the past years moved to make the party a mainstream force and distance it from the legacy of Jean Marie Le Pen, her father and its co-founder, in a process widely dubbed “dediabolization” (un-demonization).
“What really matters is how a political party reacts,” she has said, adding that the party commission’s would be “harsh” in dealing with such cases of extremism.
She added there was a distinction to be made between “inadmissible” statements for which sanctions were “highly likely,” and cases of mere “clumsiness.”
The latter category, she said, included an attempt by candidate Paule Veyre de Soras to defend her party against racism charges by saying that “I have a Jewish ophthalmologist and a Muslim dentist.”
Le Pen said most candidates “are decent people who are in the running because the National Assembly needs to reflect France and not reflect Sciences Po or ENA,” two elite universities.
The RN has acknowledged that President Emmanuel Macron’s decision to call a snap election left little time to select candidates in the numbers needed to fill the seats it expects to win.
The far right has also noted that other parties have similar problems, citing the case of hard-left National Assembly candidate Raphael Arnault, who was found to be on a French police anti-extremist watchlist.
Arnault was suspected of terrorist sympathies and questioned after tweeting on October 7 that “the Palestinian resistance has launched an unprecedented attack on the colonialist state of Israel.”
A recent poll by Harris Interactive projected the RN and its allies would win 190 to 220 seats in the National Assembly, the leftist coalition NFP 159 to 183 seats and Macron’s Ensemble (Together) alliance 110 to 135.