1.4 million girls banned from Afghan schools since Taliban return: UNESCO
There are now nearly 2.5 million girls deprived of their right to education, representing 80 percent of Afghan school-age girls
Updated 15 August 2024
AFP
There are now nearly 2.5 million girls deprived of their right to education, representing 80 percent of Afghan school-age girls
PARIS: At least 1.4 million girls in Afghanistan have been denied access to secondary education since the Taliban returned to power in 2021, with the future of an entire generation now “in jeopardy,” the United Nations’ cultural agency said Thursday.
Access to primary education has also fallen sharply, with 1.1 million fewer girls and boys attending school, UNESCO said in a statement as the Taliban authorities marked three years since retaking Afghanistan on August 15, 2021.
“UNESCO is alarmed by the harmful consequences of this increasingly massive drop-out rate, which could lead to a rise in child labor and early marriage,” the agency said.
“In just three years, the de facto authorities have almost wiped out two decades of steady progress for education in Afghanistan, and the future of an entire generation is now in jeopardy.”
There are now nearly 2.5 million girls deprived of their right to education, representing 80 percent of Afghan school-age girls, the UN agency said.
The Taliban administration, which is not recognized by any other country, has imposed restrictions on women that the UN has described as “gender apartheid.”
Afghanistan is the only country in the world to stop girls and women attending secondary schools and universities.
“As a result of bans imposed by the de facto authorities, at least 1.4 million girls have been deliberately denied access to secondary education since 2021,” UNESCO said.
This represents an increase of 300,000 since the previous count carried out by the UN agency in April 2023.
UNESCO Director General Audrey Azoulay urged the international community to remain mobilized “to obtain the unconditional reopening of schools and universities to Afghan girls and women.”
The number of primary pupils has also fallen. Afghanistan had only 5.7 million girls and boys in primary school in 2022, compared with 6.8 million in 2019, UNESCO said.
The UN agency blamed the drop on the authorities’ decision to ban female teachers from teaching boys as well as the lack of incentive for parents to send children to school.
Enrolment in higher education in equally concerning, the statement said, adding that the number of university students had decreased by 53 percent since 2021.
“As a result, the country will rapidly face a shortage of graduates trained for the most highly-skilled jobs, which will only exacerbate development problems,” UNESCO said.
Blinken set to arrive in Ukraine in show of support for Kyiv
Updated 4 sec ago
WASHINGTON: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken is set to arrive in Ukraine on Wednesday, where he will meet with senior government officials at what he said was a critical moment for supporting the country in its fight against Russia’s invasion. The top US diplomat, who is traveling to Ukraine alongside Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Lammy, said he will use his visit to hear directly from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and others what Kyiv’s current goals in the war are and what Washington can do to help it achieve them. “I think it’s a critical moment for Ukraine in the midst of what is an intense fall fighting season with Russia continuing to escalate its aggression,” Blinken said in London at a news conference with Lammy. Zelensky has been pleading for Western countries to supply longer-range missiles and to lift restrictions on using them to hit targets such as military airfields inside Russia. On the battlefield more than 2-1/2 years since the invasion, Ukrainian forces are being stretched by a better armed and more numerous foe, as they try to fend off creeping Russian gains in the east where Moscow is focusing its attacks. In a bid to seize back some of the initiative and divert Russian forces, Kyiv sent troops into Russia on an audacious large-scale cross-border incursion last month, but Moscow’s troops have continued to inch forward in the east. The visit also comes a day after Blinken in London said Russia has received ballistic missiles from Iran and will likely use them in Ukraine within weeks, warning that cooperation between Moscow and Tehran threatens wider European security. The deepening military cooperation between Iran and Russia is a threat for all of Europe, Blinken said, and added that Washington had privately warned Iran that providing ballistic missiles to Russia would be “a dramatic escalation.” The US issued sanctions on Iran later on Tuesday over the transfer. Blinken declined to say whether Washington will allow Ukraine to use long-range weapons deep inside Russia but said multiple factors went into the consideration of this decision rather than just looking at it as a weapons system. “It’s not just the system itself that counts. You have to ask: Can the Ukrainians effectively use it, and sometimes that requires significant training, which we’ve done. Do they have the ability to maintain it?,” Blinken said. Zelensky has long pushed back against allies who have supplied long-range weapons but told Kyiv they cannot use them deep inside Russia for fear of instigating a direct conflict between the West and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. Thousands of civilians have died in the war, which Russia started with a full-scale invasion on Ukraine in February 2022. Millions of Ukrainians have also been displaced, while their cities and villages have become piles of rubble. Russia has escalated its drone and missile attacks on Ukraine in recent weeks, while Ukraine has also sent hundreds of long-range attack drones deep into Russian territory. Later this month, Zelensky travels to the United States and will present a plan to President Joe Biden and his two potential successors in Novembers election that he hopes will bring the end of the war closer.
Pope Francis heads to Singapore on final stop of Asia tour
Updated 2 min 33 sec ago
SINGAPORE: Pope Francis left East Timor for Singapore on Wednesday for the last leg of a gruelling 12-day Asia-Pacific tour, flying from one of the world’s poorest regions to one of its richest. The marathon four-nation tour has already taken in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea but the 87-year-old pontiff has appeared in good spirits throughout despite fears over his health. A formal leaving ceremony was held at the airport in capital Dili, where the pope’s plane took off for the Southeast Asian city-state shortly after 12:25 p.m. local time (0325 GMT). The main event of this leg was an open-air mass to what the Vatican said was an estimated 600,000 people on Tuesday in stifling tropical heat, rallying nearly half of the Catholic-majority country. “I am so very happy, this is the first time he is here. But we are sad because he was only here for three days — we wanted him to be here for one week,” said 28-year-old banker Namaseo Xavier. “The message that Papa Francisco gives us, that’s peace for my country.” On Wednesday he spoke to young people before driving through the seaside city where thousands of people lined the streets, screaming as he drove by. In Singapore he is set to meet the city-state’s leaders, deliver a state address and hold a mass at its national stadium. His visit was only the second papal trip to East Timor, where around 98 percent of the population is Catholic, after John Paul II in 1989. He will stay in Singapore until Friday when he heads back to Europe after wrapping up the longest and farthest tour of his 11-year papacy. The country, independent since 1965, is one of the most developed in Asia but has been criticized by rights groups over the severity of its justice system, which still applies the death penalty. It is home to a Chinese majority and significant Malay and Indian minorities. Christians make up about 19 percent of the population, but majority religion is Buddhism.
Harris goes on offense against Trump in combative debate
Updated 11 September 2024
Reuters
PHILADELPHIA: Republican Donald Trump and Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris clashed over abortion, the economy, immigration and Trump’s legal woes at their combative first presidential debate on Tuesday night, each seeking a campaign-altering moment in their closely fought election.
A former prosecutor, Harris, 59, appeared to get under the former president’s skin with a series of sharp attacks, prompting a visibly angry Trump to deliver a stream of falsehood-filled retorts.
At one point, she brought up Trump’s campaign rallies, goading him by saying that people often leave early “out of exhaustion and boredom.”
Trump, who has been frustrated by the size of Harris’ own crowds, said, “My rallies, we have the biggest rallies, the most incredible rallies in the history of politics.” He then pivoted to an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory claiming that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are “eating the pets” of residents.
“Talk about extreme,” Harris said, laughing. With eight weeks to go before the Nov. 5 election, and days until early voting starts in some states, the debate — the only one scheduled — presented both opportunities and risks for each candidate in front of a televised audience of tens of millions of voters.
Harris also criticized Trump over his criminal conviction for covering up hush money payments to a porn star as well as his other indictments and a civil judgment finding him liable for sexual assault. Trump has denied wrongdoing and again accused Harris and the Democrats of orchestrating all of the cases without evidence.
The candidates opened the debate by focusing on the economy, an issue that polls show favors Trump.
Harris attacked Trump’s intention to impose high tariffs on foreign goods — a proposal she has likened to a sales tax on the middle class — while touting her plan to offer tax benefits to families and small businesses.
“Donald Trump left us the worst unemployment since the Great Depression,” Harris said, referring to his years as president from 2017-2021. Unemployment peaked at 14.8 percent in April 2020 and at 6.4 percent when he left office. It was far higher in the Great Depression.
Trump, 78, criticized Harris for the persistent inflation during the Biden administration’s term, though he overstated the level of price increases. He also pivoted quickly to his top issue, immigration, claiming again without evidence that immigrants from “insane asylums” are crossing the US southern border with Mexico.
Inflation, he said, “has been a disaster for people, for the middle class, for every class.”
The debate got under way at 9 p.m. ET (0100 GMT on Wednesday) with a surprise handshake between the two opponents, who had never met before. Harris approached Trump at his lectern, introducing herself by name, in what was the first handshake at a presidential debate since 2016.
The encounter is particularly important for Harris, with opinion polls showing that more than a quarter of likely voters feel they do not know enough about her. Harris entered the race only seven weeks ago after President Joe Biden’s exit.
Harris delivered a lengthy attack on abortion limits, speaking passionately about women denied emergency care and victims of incest unable to terminate their pregnancies due to statewide bans that have proliferated since the US Supreme Court eliminated a nationwide right in 2022. Three Trump appointees were in the majority of that ruling.
She also claimed Trump would support a national ban, an assertion Trump called a lie.
Trump, who has sometimes struggled with messaging on abortion, claimed falsely that Harris and Democrats support infanticide, which — as moderator Linsey Davis noted — is illegal in every state.
“As I said, you’re going to hear a bunch of lies,” Harris said.
Harris also sought to tie Trump to Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint that proposes expanding executive power, eliminating environmental regulations and making it illegal to ship abortion pills across state lines, among other right-wing goals.
Trump retorted that he has “nothing to do” with Project 2025, though some of his advisers were involved in its creation.
FIRST MEETING
Trump, who has spent weeks launching personal attacks on Harris that have included racist and sexist insults, largely avoided insults during the debate’s early moments. But he called her a “Marxist” as he grew increasingly agitated.
Trump’s advisers and fellow Republicans had urged him to focus on the high levels of inflation and immigration during Biden’s presidency, though both have dropped dramatically this year.
Presidential debates do not necessarily change voters’ minds, but they can transform the dynamics of a race. Biden’s poor performance against Trump in June led him to abandon his campaign on July 21.
In a contest that could again come down to tens of thousands of votes in a handful of states, even a small shift in public opinion could alter the outcome. The two candidates are effectively tied in the seven battleground states likely to decide the election, according to polling averages compiled by the New York Times.
The 90-minute debate, hosted by ABC News, was taking place at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia. As agreed by the campaigns, there was no live audience and candidates’ microphones were muted when it was not their turn to speak.
Harris spent days preparing in Pittsburgh, holding mock sessions on a stage with lights to recreate the debate environment.
Trump instead relied on informal chats with advisers, campaign appearances and media interviews to prepare, with former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard — who had a memorably hostile exchange with Harris in a Democratic presidential debate in 2019 — offering advice.
On a call with reporters on Monday, Gabbard said Trump would treat Harris the same as any other opponent.
“President Trump respects women and doesn’t feel the need to be patronizing or to speak to women in any other way than he would speak to a man,” she said.
US government demands overhaul of Israeli conduct in West Bank after killing of US citizen
A surge in violent settler assaults on Palestinians in the West Bank has stirred anger among Western allies of Israel, including the United States, which has imposed sanctions on some Israelis involved in the hard-line settler movement
Updated 11 September 2024
Reuters
LONDON/JERUSALEM: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Tuesday demanded an overhaul of Israeli military conduct in the occupied West Bank as they decried the fatal shooting of an American protester against settlement expansion, which Israel said was accidental.
Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, 26, who is also a Turkish national, was shot dead last Friday at a protest march in Beita, a village near Nablus where Palestinians have been repeatedly attacked by far-right Jewish settlers.
Turkish-American woman Aysenur Ezgi Eygi, a graduate of the University of Washington, poses wearing her mortarboard and keffiyeh in a family photograph taken at the University of Washington's 2024 commencement ceremony, in Seattle, Washington, U.S, June 8, 2024. (REUTERS)
Israel’s military said on Tuesday that its initial inquiry found it was highly likely its troops had fired the shot that killed her but that her death was unintentional, and it voiced deep regret.
President Joe Biden later told reporters “it ricocheted off the ground” and a US official said that was the conclusion of the Israeli investigation, the results of which were presented to the United States on Tuesday.
HIGHLIGHTS
• Eygi's family demands independent US investigation
• Blinken and Austin call Eygi's killing unprovoked and unjustified
• Israeli military says gunfire aimed at another individual
Palestinian officials say that Eygi was struck in the head.
Eygi’s family called Israel’s preliminary inquiry “wholly inadequate” and demanded an independent US investigation.
Hamid Ali, Eygi’s partner, in response to Biden’s comments, said her death “was no accident and her killers must be held accountable.”
“The White House has not spoken with us. For four days, we have waited for President Biden to pick up the phone and do the right thing,” Ali said.
Blinken and Austin, in their strongest comments to date criticizing the security forces of Washington’s closest Middle East ally, described Eygi’s killing as “unprovoked and unjustified.” They separately said said Washington would insist to the Israeli government that it makes changes to how its forces operated in the West Bank.
“No one should be shot and killed for attending a protest. No one should have to put their life at risk just for freely expressing their views,” Blinken told reporters in London.
“In our judgment, Israeli security forces need to make some fundamental changes in the way that they operate in the West Bank, including changes to their rules of engagement.
“Now we have the second American citizen killed at the hands of Israeli security forces. It’s not acceptable,” Blinken said.
An Israeli government spokesperson declined to comment on Blinken’s remarks.
Austin spoke to Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, the Pentagon said late on Tuesday, adding he expressed “grave concern for the IDF’s responsibility for the unprovoked and unjustified death” of Eygi. He also urged Gallant “to reexamine the IDF’s rules of engagement while operating in the West Bank,” according to the Pentagon.
Opinion
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The Israeli military earlier said an investigation by the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division was under way and its findings would be submitted for higher-level review once completed.
“We’re going to be watching that very, very closely,” White House national security spokesperson John Kirby told reporters, saying a criminal probe was an unusual step by Israel’s military.
“We’re going to want to see where it goes now in terms of the criminal investigation and what they find, and if and how anyone is held accountable,” Kirby added.
PRELIMINARY INQUIRY
In a statement, the Israeli military said its commanders had conducted an initial investigation into the incident and found that the gunfire was not aimed at her but another individual it called “the key instigator of the riot.”
“The incident took place during a violent riot in which dozens of Palestinian suspects burned tires and hurled rocks toward security forces at the Beita Junction,” it said.
Israel has sent a request to Palestinian authorities to carry out an autopsy, it said.
“We are deeply offended by the suggestion that her killing by a trained sniper was in any way unintentional,” Eygi’s family said in a statement. A surge in violent settler assaults on Palestinians in the West Bank has stirred anger among Western allies of Israel, including the United States, which has imposed sanctions on some Israelis involved in the hard-line settler movement. Tensions have been heightened amid Israel’s war against Hamas militants in Gaza.
Palestinians have held weekly protests in Beita since 2020 over the expansion of nearby Evyatar, a settler outpost. Ultra-nationalist members of Israel’s ruling coalition have acted to legalize previously unauthorized outposts like Evyatar, a move Washington says threatens the stability of the West Bank and undercuts efforts toward a two-state solution to the conflict.
Since the 1967 Middle East war, Israel has occupied the West Bank of the Jordan River, an area Palestinians want as the core of a future independent state.
Israel has built a thickening array of settlements there that most countries deem illegal. Israel disputes that assertion, citing historical and biblical ties to the territory.
Muslim advocacy group files civil rights complaint against University of Georgia
Updated 11 September 2024
Reuters
WASHINGTON: The Council on American Islamic Relations advocacy group said on Tuesday it filed a civil rights complaint on behalf of some students at the University of Georgia alleging differential treatment of people of Palestinian, Arab and Muslim descent.
The complaint alleges the University of Georgia’s actions violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which bars federal funds recipients from allowing discrimination based on race, religion and national origin. It was filed with the US Education Department and urges a federal probe into the university.
The council said pro-Palestinian students have been the target of anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and Islamophobic harassment since Israel’s war in Gaza began, adding the university did not do enough to prevent the harassment or remedy its effects.
The university said it supports free speech and does not discriminate based on race or religion while also enforcing its rules and holding accountable those who violate policies.
There have been numerous protests in the United States, including on college campuses, against US support for Israel’s war in Gaza, with some turning violent.
There has also been antisemitic and Islamophobic rhetoric in some protests and counter protests. Human rights advocates have warned about rising antisemitism, Islamophobia and anti-Arab hate.
The latest bloodshed in the decades-old Israeli-Palestinian conflict was triggered last Oct. 7 when Palestinian Islamist group Hamas attacked Israel, killing 1,200 and taking about 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel’s subsequent assault on the Hamas-governed enclave has killed over 41,000 Palestinians, according to the local health ministry, while displacing nearly the entire population of 2.3 million, causing a hunger crisis and leading to genocide allegations at the World Court that Israel denies.
