id
stringlengths 9
9
| categories
list | date
stringlengths 10
10
| title
stringlengths 5
171
| abstract
stringlengths 132
7.13k
| keyword
stringlengths 9
170
|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
jp0001615
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/29
|
Bill requiring 'war crime' label on goods made by Japan firms put on hold in South Korean province
|
SEOUL - The introduction of a bill to a South Korean provincial assembly to require the labeling of certain school goods as “made by war crime companies” will be put on hold, one of the sponsors of the proposal said Thursday. In the wake of a statement issued by Hwang Dae-ho, a Gyeonggi-do assembly member belonging to the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, a committee in charge canceled deliberations on the bill that were set to start Friday. Hwang, however, said the sponsors will start preparations to submit the draft to the committee after gaining a social consensus. The education authority of the province, near Seoul, has opposed the proposal, saying the sticker is inappropriate and may cause confusion. South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha has urged the assembly to consider the proposal carefully, in an unusual interference by a state minister in the affairs of a regional assembly.
|
wwii;education;south korea;wartime labor;south korea-japan relations
|
jp0001616
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Apple infringed three Qualcomm patents, jury finds
|
SAN FRANCISCO/WASHINGTON - Mobile phone chip supplier Qualcomm on Friday won a legal victory against iPhone maker Apple, with a jury in federal court in San Diego finding that Apple owes Qualcomm about $31 million for infringing three of its patents. Qualcomm last year sued Apple alleging it had violated patents related to helping mobile phones get better battery life. During an eight-day trial, Qualcomm asked the jury to award it unpaid patent royalties of up to $1.41 per iPhone that violated the patents. The $31 million penalty is small change for Apple, the second most valuable U.S. company after Microsoft Corp. with a market value of $866 billion and annual revenue totaling hundreds of billions of dollars. But the setting of a per-phone royalty rate for Qualcomm’s technology gives the chip supplier a fresh line of attack in its two-year old legal battle with Apple. The biggest case, filed by Apple in early 2017, begins in April. Apple has sought to dismantle what it calls Qualcomm’s illegal business model of both licensing patents and selling chips to phone makers. Qualcomm has accused Apple of using its technology without paying. “The technologies invented by Qualcomm and others are what made it possible for Apple to enter the market and become so successful so quickly,” Don Rosenberg, Qualcomm’s general counsel, said in a statement. “We are gratified that courts all over the world are rejecting Apple’s strategy of refusing to pay for the use of our IP.” In a statement, Apple said it was disappointed with the outcome. “Qualcomm’s ongoing campaign of patent infringement claims is nothing more than an attempt to distract from the larger issues they face with investigations into their business practices in U.S. federal court, and around the world,” Apple said. It declined to comment on whether it would appeal. In other cases against Apple, Qualcomm has won sales bans on iPhones in Germany and China, though the Chinese ban has not been enforced and Apple has taken moves it believes allow it to resume sales in Germany. Qualcomm also suffered a setback with U.S. trade regulators who found that some iPhones infringed one of the San Diego-based company’s patents but declined to bar their importation into the United States, citing the damage such a move would inflict on rival Intel Corp. The verdict on Friday could come into play in the trial in April because it puts a per-phone dollar figure on some of Qualcomm’s intellectual property. Qualcomm’s patent licensing model relies on charging phone makers a cut of the selling price of the phone, a practice Apple has alleged is unfair and illegal. During an earlier trial between Qualcomm and the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, Apple executives outlined their company’s extensive negotiations to reduce those license fees to $7.50 per phone for Qualcomm’s patents. The San Diego jury valued just three of Qualcomm’s patents in the company’s portfolio at $1.41, a figure that the chip supplier believes bolsters its contention that its licensing practices are fair. “The three patents found to be infringed in this case represent just a small fraction of Qualcomm’s valuable portfolio of tens of thousands of patents,” Rosenberg said in a statement. Gaston Kroub, a patent lawyer in New York not involved in the case, said the verdict was clearly a win for Qualcomm. But it does not say much about the value of Qualcomm’s entire patent portfolio and was unlikely to spark settlements discussions, he said. “Apple is very skilled at handling appeals and taking a longer-term view. This isn’t something that will bring Apple to the table with any sense of urgency,” Kroub said.
|
apple;patents;qualcomm
|
jp0001617
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Trump's auto tariff threat 'makes me sad,' Toyota chief Akio Toyoda says
|
WASHINGTON - Toyota Motor Corp. President Akio Toyoda on Friday lamented U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to impose hefty tariffs on automobile imports, including those from Japan. Underscoring Toyota’s contribution to the U.S. economy and employment, Toyoda said he is saddened by calls in the United States for managed trade on Japanese automobile imports amid concern about their effects on national security. “I don’t know why they call it a national security threat. That really makes me sad,” he said in a speech at the Economic Club of Washington. “I hope that this kind of conversation can go away,” Toyoda said, speaking through an interpreter. Toyoda was in the U.S. capital to introduce the 2020 GR Supra, a sports car that goes on sale this summer. In the latest show of Toyota’s commitment to the United States, the automaker said Thursday it will expand investment in the world’s largest economy by 30 percent to reach $13 billion by 2021. Toyoda pledged to increase the carmaker’s investment in the United States as he stressed its close ties with local dealers, suppliers and communities. “What I can promise you is that Toyota would like to stay in this country” regardless of the ultimate decision Trump’s administration makes on imported cars, he said.
|
akio toyoda;tariffs;donald trump;toyota motor corp .
|
jp0001618
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Japanese companies remain wary in wake of Brexit delay vote
|
Japanese companies remain vigilant after the U.K. Parliament on Thursday voted to extend the March 29 deadline for the country’s exit from the European Union amid lingering uncertainty on the issue. It is not clear how long Brexit will be put off or whether the EU will approve an extension. The automobile industry would likely suffer a major impact from a no-deal Brexit because of its extensive supply chains. Last month, Nissan Motor Co. said it would cancel a production plan for a model at a plant in Britain. Toyota Motor Corp. is examining options, including a review of its investments in Britain that may involve termination of production in the country. Japanese firms are expected to implement measures devised in preparation for Brexit this month as planned. Honda Motor Co. plans a six-day production halt in April as it braces for disruptions to its procurement of parts. “We cannot change parts procurement plans or personnel deployment easily,” a Honda official said. Sony Corp. will stick to its plan to relocate its registered European headquarters from Britain to the Netherlands by the end of this month. Some companies are undecided about what to do in this uncertain situation, including Sharp Corp. and Panasonic Corp. Hitachi Ltd., which makes train cars in Britain, procures 30 percent of the parts from outside the country. It is closely watching the situation and assessing the long-term impact of a possible no-deal Brexit. On Friday, the Japanese government held a meeting on Brexit that brought together officials from related agencies at the Prime Minister’s Office. Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasutoshi Nishimura, chair of the meeting, instructed the officials to collect further information. Meanwhile, the government said its framework with the EU for smooth mutual transfers of personal information between businesses, which entered into effect in January, will remain effective after Brexit, including data exchanges between Japanese and British companies.
|
toyota;honda;nissan;japanese companies;brexit
|
jp0001619
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Co-pilot with All Nippon Airways unit found to be over alcohol limit, delaying another flight
|
All Nippon Airways Co. said Friday an international flight run by a group company was delayed the same day after a breath test showed the co-pilot had a higher than permissible alcohol level. The co-pilot from Air Japan Co. had drunk more than 10 330-ml cans of beer and two glasses of white wine at his home and at a bar on Wednesday night, plus a bottle of red wine on Thursday morning, before his Friday flight at 12:55 a.m. ANA and Air Japan are subsidiaries of ANA Holdings Inc. The co-pilot, in his 40s, was replaced by another pilot, causing the flight from Tokyo’s Haneda airport to Hong Kong to be delayed by 9 minutes, ANA said. The incident comes after the Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry warned Air Japan to improve alcohol checks after another pilot for the airline was found over the limit last month. In the February incident, a co-pilot in his 40s had planned to fly without telling his company about his alcohol consumption the night before, ANA said. He had consumed between two and three times the company’s limit, which is equivalent to two midsize bottles of beer, or about a liter. ANA also prohibits drinking 12 hours prior to flying. The Japanese airline industry has been hit by a series of incidents involving drinking by flight crews, prompting the ministry to urge carriers to review their rules and introduce mandatory alcohol tests for pilots. “We were not able to prevent a similar incident from occurring and we take it very seriously,” ANA said. ANA and its rival, Japan Airlines, have pledged to administer more stringent alcohol tests to pilots and use new testing equipment in response to the recent incidents.
|
airlines;ana;jal;aviation;drinking;pilots;all nippon airways co .
|
jp0001620
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Trump's trade war cost U.S. economy $7.8 billion in 2018, study says
|
WASHINGTON - President Donald Trump’s trade battles cost the U.S. economy $7.8 billion in lost gross domestic product in 2018, according to a study by a team of economists at leading American universities. The authors of the new paper said they had analyzed the short-run impact of Trump’s actions and found that imports from targeted countries declined 31.5 percent, while targeted U.S. exports fell by 11 percent. They also found that annual consumer and producer losses from higher costs of imports totaled $68.8 billion. “After accounting for higher tariff revenue and gains to domestic producers from higher prices, the aggregate welfare loss was $7.8 billion,” or 0.04 percent of GDP, the researchers said. The study was authored by a team of economists at the University of California, Berkeley, Columbia University, Yale University and the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and was published by the National Bureau of Economic research. Having dubbed himself the “tariff man,” Trump pledged on both the campaign trail and as president to reduce the trade deficit by shutting out unfairly traded imports and renegotiating free trade agreements. Trump has pursued a protectionist trade agenda to shield U.S. manufacturing. Washington and Beijing have been locked in a tit-for-tat tariff battle, and Trump has imposed tariffs that have roiled other major trading partners. As China and the U.S. work to end the trade war, China’s parliament on Friday approved a law aiming to create a transparent environment for foreign firms. The authors said that although U.S. tariffs favored sectors located in “politically competitive” counties, the retaliatory tariffs imposed on U.S. goods have offset the benefits to these areas. “We find that tradeable-sector workers in heavily Republican counties were the most negatively affected by the trade war,” the researchers said.
|
trade;gdp;tariffs;donald trump
|
jp0001622
|
[
"world",
"science-health-world"
] |
2019/03/16
|
New data suggest eggs increase risk of heart attacks and strokes
|
WASHINGTON - The debate over whether eggs are good for you has lasted for decades: Although a good source of protein, they also contain potentially harmful cholesterol. Now, after analyzing 30,000 Americans from six separate studies, researchers have concluded that eating an extra half an egg a day increased the risk of cardiovascular disease by 6 percent and premature death by 6 percent. That is relatively little, especially given that a half an egg is double what the average American eats daily. The study, published Friday by the Journal of the American Medical Association, also found that an additional 300 milligrams of dietary cholesterol per day increases the risk of heart disease by 17 percent and premature death by 18 percent. But, again, 300 mg is twice the average daily amount eaten by Americans. A large egg contains about 186 mg of cholesterol. The new data suggest that eating eggs increases the risk of heart attack or stroke, although the study does not establish a causal link. Still, it offers enough data to “make a strong statement that eggs and overall dietary cholesterol intake remain important in affecting the risk of (cardiovascular disease) and more so the risk of all-cause mortality,” physician Robert Eckel, of the University of Colorado, wrote in an editorial in JAMA. But as Tom Sanders, a professor of dietetics at King’s College London, points out, these results differ from a large U.S. study published in 1999 that found no effect. A 2013 analysis of 3 million adults published in the British medical journal BMJ also found no effect. A recent Chinese study even concluded cholesterol decreased the risk of cardiovascular disease. Sanders thinks the new results are only relevant for the United States, where the average person eats more eggs and meat than in Europe. “Eggs in moderation — around three to four per week — is fine, and that is what current U.K. dietary guidelines say,” Sanders said. In France, national nutrition guidelines refute the idea that you should not eat more than two eggs a week: “You can eat them regularly.” And dietitian Victoria Taylor, of the British Heart Foundation, insists that the way you eat the egg and with what is so important. “Eating healthily is all about balance. If you’re eating too much of one thing it leaves less room in the diet for other foods that may have more health benefit. “Eggs are a nutritious food and, while this study focuses on the amount we’re eating, it’s just as important to pay attention to how the eggs are cooked and to the trimmings that come with them. For example, poached eggs on whole-grain toast is a much healthier meal than a traditional fry-up.”
|
food;health;heart disease;diet;eggs
|
jp0001623
|
[
"world",
"science-health-world"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Hundreds of thousands of youth activists join world climate demonstration
|
MONTREAL - Hundreds of thousands of young people skipped school across the globe on Friday to march through the streets for an international day of student protests aimed at pushing world leaders into action on climate change. Classrooms in metropolises from Bangkok to Berlin and Lagos to London emptied as organizers of the student strike led demonstrations in more than 100 countries. Students flooded into the streets across Europe, North and South America, and Asia carrying placards reading: “There is no planet B,” “You’re destroying our future” and “If you don’t act like adults, we will.” Despite three decades of warnings, carbon dioxide emissions hit record levels in 2017 and again last year. Loading the atmosphere with greenhouse gases at current rates will eventually lead to an uninhabitable planet, scientists say. In Stockholm, Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg — who inspired the protests — warned that time was running out. “We are living through an existential crisis that has been ignored for decades and if we do not act now it may be too late,” the 16-year-old, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee, told Swedish public television station SVT. Across the world, their placards formed a mosaic: “Like the ocean, we will rise” (Sydney) “Our future in your hands” (Berlin) “System change, not climate change” (Vienna) “Don’t be a Trump” (Hong Kong) “The Titanic would have NO problem in 2019” (Elmshorn, Germany) And everywhere, “There is no planet B.” Montreal drew some of the largest crowds, estimated by organizers at nearly 150,000. In the United States, protests were more low-key, with events held in New York, Washington, Chicago and St. Paul, Minnesota, where one sign read: “So bad even introverts are here!” Further south in Latin America, placards with messages such as “climate change is not ‘fake news'” were seen in Buenos Aires — while young people also took to the streets in the Chilean capital Santiago and Colombia’s Medellin. In Delhi, one of the world’s most polluted cities, 200 students took part in a colorful protest, waving ribbons, juggling and performing stunts with hoops. “We have to make a choice whether we want to sit and be indifferent or do something for our planet,” said 16-year-old student Srijani Datta. In Sydney, 18-year-old Charles Rickwood warned that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef could be destroyed. “If current trends in the environment continue, we’ll see the one, two degrees increase in our ocean then it will simply become unsustainable and we could lose the entire Great Barrier Reef,” he told AFP. European students were also out en masse. Several thousand youngsters thronged the streets of central London in a raucous demonstration with banners and placards. Packing into Parliament Square, they cheered and chanted “Change … now!” before marching past Downing Street and massing outside Buckingham Palace. “They’re not going to stop me trying to save the planet,” said 15-year-old Joe Crabtree from southwest London, who had missed two exams to join the rally. More than 1 million marched overall, according to estimates by organizing groups such as the Youth For Climate movement and AFP reporters. The Friday for Future movement said more than 300,000 young people demonstrated in Germany alone. As youngsters hit the streets, nations meeting at the U.N. environment assembly in Kenya announced they had agreed to “significantly reduce” single-use plastics over the next decade. But experts said the pledge — which only referred to man-made global warming and made no mention of the fossil fuels driving it — fell far short of the steps needed to tackle Earth’s burgeoning pollution crisis. The global action drew a mixed reaction from politicians. Germany’s Economy Minister Peter Altmaier said the demonstrators should be in class while Australian Education Minister Dan Tehan said striking was “not something that we should encourage.” But New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern hailed the action, saying: “We hear you and we’re getting on with setting a path for carbon neutrality.” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres offered his strongest support yet for the strikes, writing in The Guardian newspaper: “Without ambitious action, the Paris agreement is meaningless.” Guterres also called for world leaders to come to the Climate Action Summit in New York in September “with concrete, realistic plans” to further reduce their emissions by 2020, in order to reach a target of 45 percent lower emissions over the next decade, and to net zero by 2050. In the Indian Ocean island nation of Mauritius, students circulated a petition to be submitted to the government demanding concrete measures. The Paris treaty calls for capping global warming at “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) but the planet is currently on track to heat up by double that figure. The U.N.’s climate science panel warned in October that only a wholesale transformation of the global economy and consumer habits could forestall a catastrophe. “My eyes hurt from pollution. My shirt gets dirty from dust,” 13-year-old protester Shagun Kumari said in Delhi. “I want fresh air that won’t harm my lungs and clean water to drink so that I don’t keep falling sick.”
|
children;australia;canada;new zealand;climate change;environment;montreal
|
jp0001624
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Trump issues first veto over measure to end his emergency declaration on border wall
|
WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump issued the first veto of his presidency on Friday to block a measure passed by Democrats and Republicans in Congress that would terminate his emergency declaration for a wall on the border with Mexico. The veto, made necessary after a strong and unusual rebuke from members of Trump’s Republican Party, capped a week that left Trump politically wounded — at least temporarily. Congress is unlikely to muster the votes to override the veto, a fact that left White House officials confident despite disappointment that it had passed the Republican-controlled Senate at all. The bipartisan vote on Thursday was a slap at Trump for his decision to circumvent Congress and take money already designated for other programs to pay for a barrier on the southern border. Twelve Republicans joined Democrats to pass the measure, concerned that the president had overstepped his authority. Trump repeated his view that a crisis existed at the border, called the resolution reckless and said he was proud to veto the measure. The emergency declaration is being challenged in court as an unconstitutional usurpation of Congress’ power of the purse. Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said her chamber would vote on March 26 to override the veto. The Senate would have to vote to override the veto as well, requiring more Republicans than the original 12 to sign on, which is unlikely to happen. Trump was flanked by border officials and people whose relatives were killed by someone who was in the United States illegally. They praised him for standing firm on the issue, which resonates strongly with his political base.
|
congress;immigration;donald trump
|
jp0001625
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/16
|
After New Zealand massacre, Trump downplays white nationalism threat
|
NEW YORK - U.S. President Donald Trump played down any threat posed by racist white nationalism on Friday after the gunman accused of the New Zealand mosque massacre called him “a symbol of renewed white identity.” Trump, whose previous responses to the movement have drawn scrutiny, expressed sympathy for the victims who died at “places of worship turned into scenes of evil killing.” But he declined to join expressions of concern about white nationalism. Asked whether he thought it is a rising threat around the world, he said, “I don’t, really.” “I think it’s a small group of people that have very, very serious problems, I guess,” Trump said. “If you look at what happened in New Zealand, perhaps that’s the case. I don’t know enough about it yet. But it’s certainly a terrible thing.” Trump was asked about white nationalism and the shooting deaths of 49 people at mosques in Christchurch after he vetoed Congress’ resolution to block his declaration of a national emergency at the Mexico border. His veto, aimed at freeing money to build more of a border wall, is expected to survive any congressional effort to overturn it. Questioned about the accused gunman’s reference to him, Trump professed ignorance. “I didn’t see it. I didn’t see it,” he said. “But I think it’s a horrible event … a horrible, disgraceful thing and a horrible act.” The man accused of the shootings, Brenton Tarrant, left behind a lengthy document that outlined his motivations. He stated that he was a 28-year-old Australian white nationalist who hates immigrants and was set off by attacks in Europe that were perpetrated by Muslims. In a single reference, he mentioned the U.S. president. “Were/are you a supporter of Donald Trump?” was one of the questions he posed to himself. His answer: “As a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose? Sure. As a policy maker and leader? Dear god no.” The White House denounced the connection. But the mention from the suspect, who embraced Nazi imagery and voiced support for fascism, nonetheless cast an uncomfortable light on the way that the president has been embraced by some on the far right. Trump, who as a candidate proposed a ban on all Muslims entering the United States, has drawn criticism as being slow to condemn white supremacy and related violence. After a 2017 clash between white nationalists and anti-racist protesters in Charlottesville, Virginia, left one demonstrator dead, Trump said there were “very fine people on both sides” of the confrontation. He also did not immediately reject the support of David Duke, a former Ku Klux Klan grand wizard, during his presidential campaign. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, a Connecticut Democrat, tied Trump’s inflammatory language to the violence half a world away. “Words have consequences — like saying we have an invasion on our border and talking about people as though they were different in some fatal way,” Blumenthal said on CNN. “I think that the public discourse from the president on down is a factor in some of these actions.” Former Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke, who declared his Democratic candidacy for president this week, said, “We must call out this hatred, this Islamophobia, this intolerance, and the violence that predictably follows from the rhetoric that we use.” Trump’s hard-line immigration rhetoric and calls to return America to its traditional past have been embraced by many on the conservative fringes, including some who troll online with racist imagery, as well as white supremacists who have looked to engage in violence. In Florida, Cesar Sayoc, who had decorated his van with Trump propaganda, was accused of mailing explosives last fall to Democratic Party officials and media members, many of whom had been criticized by the president. The president said Sayoc had been “insane” long before he became a Trump fan. Last month, a former Coast Guard official was accused of stockpiling weapons in a plot to kill media members and liberal politicians as part of a plan to transform the U.S. into a white ethno-state. It took more than a week for Trump to respond to the plot, which he deemed “a shame.” Many experts who track violent extremists have identified white nationalism as a growing threat in the U.S. and abroad. In January, for example, the New York-based Anti-Defamation League said that domestic extremists killed at least 50 people in the U.S. in 2018, up from 37 in 2017, and said, “White supremacists were responsible for the great majority of the killings, which is typically the case.” Some critics have accused U.S. authorities of not dedicating adequate resources to stem a threat of domestic terrorism. However, The Washington Post reported last week that internal FBI data showed more domestic terrorism suspects were arrested last year than those allegedly inspired by international terrorist groups.
|
guns;immigration;christchurch;ethnicity;discrimination;mass shootings;donald trump
|
jp0001626
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Profile of mosque shooter: A white nationalist seeking revenge
|
SYDNEY - The gunman behind at least one of the mosque shootings in New Zealand on Friday tried to make a few things clear in the manifesto he left behind: He is a 28-year-old Australian white nationalist who hates immigrants. He was angry about attacks in Europe that were perpetrated by Muslims. He wanted revenge, and he wanted to create fear. Though he claimed not to covet fame, the gunman — whom authorities identified as Brenton Tarrant — left behind a 74-page document posted on social media under his name in which he said he hoped to survive the attack to better spread his views in the media. While his manifesto and video were an obvious play for infamy, they contain clues for a public trying to understand why anyone would target dozens of innocent people who were simply spending an afternoon engaged in prayer. There could be no more perplexing a setting for a mass slaughter than New Zealand, a nation so isolated from the mass shootings that plague the United States that police officers rarely carry guns. Yet the gunman highlighted New Zealand’s remoteness as a reason he chose it. He wrote that an attack in New Zealand would show that no place is safe and that even a country as far away as New Zealand is subject to mass immigration. He said he grew up in a working-class Australian family, had a typical childhood and was a poor student. Tarrant has spent little time in Australia in the past four years and only had minor traffic infractions on his record. A woman who said she was a colleague of his when he worked as a personal trainer in Grafton said she was shocked by the allegations against him. “I can’t … believe that somebody I’ve probably had daily dealings with and had shared conversations and interacted with would be able of something to this extreme,” Tracey Gray told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. The rambling manifesto is filled with confusing and seemingly contradictory assertions about his beliefs. Beyond his white nationalistic views, he claimed to be an environmentalist and said he is a fascist who believes China is the nation that most aligns with his political and social values. He said he has contempt for the wealthiest 1 percent. And he singled out American conservative commentator Candace Owens as the person who had influenced him the most, while saying “the extreme actions she calls for are too much, even for my tastes.” Throughout the manifesto, the theme he returns to most often is conflict between people of European descent and Muslims, often framing it in terms of the Crusades. Among his hate-filled statements is a claim that he was motivated toward violence by an episode that occurred in 2017 while he was touring through Western Europe. That was when an Uzbek man drove a truck into a crowd of people in Stockholm, killing five. He said his desire for violence grew when he arrived in France, where he was offended by the sight of immigrants in the cities and towns he visited. Three months ago, he said, he started planning to target Christchurch. He said he has donated to many nationalist groups but claimed not to be a direct member of any organization. However, he admitted contacts with an anti-immigration group called the reborn Knights Templar and said he got the approval of Anders Breivik for the attack. The lawyer for Breivik, a right-wing Norwegian extremist who killed 77 people in Oslo and a nearby island in 2011, told Norway’s VG newspaper that his client — who is in prison — has “very limited contacts with the surrounding world, so it seems very unlikely that he has had contact” with the New Zealand gunman. The gunman rambled on about the supposed aims for the attack, which included reducing immigration by intimidating immigrants and driving a wedge between NATO and the Turkish people. He also said he hoped to further polarize and destabilize the West, and spark a civil war in the United States that would ultimately result in a separation of races. The attack has had the opposite impact, with condemnation of the bloodshed pouring in from all quarters of the globe, and calls for unity against hatred and violence. The gunman used various hate symbols associated with the Nazis and white supremacy. For instance, the number 14 is seen on his rifle, a possible reference to the “14 Words,” a white supremacist slogan attributed in part to Adolf Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. He also used the symbol of the Schwarze Sonne, or black sun, which “has become synonymous with myriad far-right groups who traffic in neo-Nazi,” according to the center. His victims, he wrote, were chosen because he saw them as invaders who would replace the white race. He predicted he would feel no remorse for their deaths. And in the video he livestreamed of his shooting, no remorse can be seen or heard as he sprays terrified worshippers with bullets again and again, sometimes firing at people he has already cut down. The gunman — a licensed gun owner who bought the five guns used in the shootings legally — left a scene of carnage that shocked the nation, and the world. It was, in the words of New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern “one of New Zealand’s darkest days.”
|
guns;immigration;australia;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings;brenton tarrant
|
jp0001627
|
[
"asia-pacific",
"science-health-asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Student-led climate rally envelops the globe
|
WELLINGTON - A global day of student protests aimed at spurring world leaders into action on climate change to protect the planet for future generations kicked off in Australia and New Zealand on Friday. Thousands of young people marched in Wellington carrying placards reading “Time’s Melting Away” and “Act Now or Swim” as part of an ambitious plan to stage 1,000 demonstrations in more than 100 countries during a worldwide day of action. Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA Thousands more gathered in Sydney, demanding the conservative government to do more to curb the use of fossil fuels. The international student strike was set to see classrooms empty in cities across the globe, from Boston to Bogota, Dhaka to Durban and Lagos to London. Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA “This is young people taking the reins and realizing that they do have people power, that’s really awesome,” Abigail O’Regan, 20, said in the New Zealand capital. The protests were inspired by Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg, who camped out in front of Parliament in Stockholm last year to demand action from world leaders on global warming. Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA “We are only seeing the beginning,” tweeted Thunberg, who has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for her activism. “I think that change is on the horizon and the people will stand up for their future.” Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA Some teachers and political leaders have tried to cajole or threaten students against skipping school, to little avail. In Australia, Education Minister Dan Tehan questioned whether the protests truly represented a grassroots movement. “Students leaving school during school hours to protest is not something that we should encourage,” he told public radio. “Especially when they are being encouraged to do so by green political activists.” Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA His comments came as a report showed Australia’s annual carbon emissions had reached record levels, raising questions it will meet targets agreed under the 2015 Paris climate agreement. But the budding activists have received encouragement from New Zealand Prime Minster Jacinda Ardern, who said it was important for the young generation to send a message, even at a time when she was trying to console the nation after mass shootings at two mosques left at least 49 people dead. Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA “We hear you and we’re getting on with setting a path for carbon neutrality,” the 38-year-old leader said in a statement. “Please keep bringing as many people as you can with you because we simply won’t achieve our goals alone.” Wellington university student Josie Mason, 20, said she was “excited by the fact that youth are being heard.” “They call our generation the ‘slacktivists’ because it’s really easy to say you’re going to an event on a Facebook page or like something but not really do anything,” she said. Participants in a rally calling for action on climate change — part of a worldwide ‘global strike’ campaign — hold up signs on Friday in Tokyo’s Shibuya Ward. About 80 people took part in the Tokyo event. | YOSHIAKI MIURA Despite 30 years of warnings about dire impacts, carbon dioxide emissions hit record levels in 2017 and again last year. Loading the atmosphere with greenhouse gases at current rates, scientists agree, will eventually lead to an unlivable planet. “On climate change, we have to acknowledge that we have failed,” Thunberg told the global ruling class in Davos in January. The U.N.’s climate science panel warned in October that only a wholesale transformation of the global economy and consumer habits could forestall a climate catastrophe. Children take part in the global Climate Strike rally in Brisbane, Australia, on Friday. | REUTERS
|
children;australia;new zealand;climate change;environment
|
jp0001628
|
[
"asia-pacific",
"politics-diplomacy-asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Group seeking to overthrow Kim was behind raid on North Korean Embassy in Spain, Washington Post reports
|
WASHINGTON - A dissident organization committed to overthrowing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un was behind a raid on the North Korean embassy in Spain last month, The Washington Post reported on Friday, quoting people familiar with the planning and execution of the mission. The newspaper, which did not further identify its sources, identified the group as Cheollima Civil Defense, which also goes by the name Free Joseon. It said the group came to prominence in 2017 after evacuating a nephew of Kim from Macau when potential threats to his life surfaced. The Post’s sources said the group did not act in coordination with any governments and U.S. intelligence agencies would have been especially reluctant to be involved given the sensitive timing of the mission ahead of a second summit between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump in Hanoi on Feb. 27 and 28. According to Spanish media accounts, broadly confirmed by a Spanish Foreign Ministry source, a group of unidentified men entered North Korea’s embassy in Madrid on Feb. 22, bound and gagged staff, and drove off four hours later with computers. There has been no claim of responsibility. The dissident group identified by the Washington Post could not be reached for comment and its purported website has made no mention of any involvement in the raid. On Feb. 25 the website posted a statement saying the group had “received a request for help from comrades in a certain Western country” and that “it was a highly dangerous situation but (we) responded.” The group said an important announcement would be coming that week, but no details of any operation have been released. The Madrid embassy is where North Korea’s chief working-level negotiator in talks with the United States, Kim Hyok Chol, was ambassador until 2017. Intelligence experts said computers and phones reportedly seized in the raid would be eagerly sought by foreign intelligence agencies given the information they might contain on Kim Hyok Chol and others. Asked about the Washington Post report, the U.S. State Department referred queries to the Spanish authorities. The CIA declined to comment.
|
north korea;kim jong un
|
jp0001629
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
'Our gun laws will change': New Zealand's leader vows action after racist mosque massacre
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - New Zealand’s prime minister vowed to toughen the country’s gun laws after revealing Saturday that the man accused of murdering 49 people in two mosques legally purchased the arsenal of firearms used in the massacre. Jacinda Ardern said the gunman, 28-year-old Australian Brenton Tarrant, obtained a “Category A” gun license in November 2017 and the following month began purchasing the five weapons used in Friday’s attacks in the southern city of Christchurch. The firearms included two semi-automatic rifles, two shotguns and a lever-action weapon, she said, speaking to reporters in Wellington before heading to Christchurch. “The mere fact … that this individual had acquired a gun license and acquired weapons of that range, then obviously I think people will be seeking change, and I’m committing to that,” she said. “While work is being done as to the chain of events that led to both the holding of this gun license and the possession of these weapons, I can tell you one thing right now — our gun laws will change.” She confirmed that the gunman and two suspected associates who were also arrested had not been on the radar of any intelligence agencies, even though he had published a manifesto online indicating plans for attacks on Muslims. “They were not on any watch lists either here or in Australia,” she said. “The individual charged with murder had not come to the attention of the intelligence community, nor the police, for extremism. “I have asked our agencies this morning to work swiftly on assessing whether there was any activity, on social media or otherwise, that should have triggered a response. That work is already underway.” Tarrant appeared in Christchurch District Court on Saturday and was remanded without a plea until his next scheduled appearance in the South Island city’s High Court on April 5. Handcuffed and wearing a white prison suit, Tarrant did not speak. His court-appointed lawyer made no application for bail or name suppression. He was likely to face further charges, police said. There was a heavy police presence at a hospital where families of the more than 40 wounded had gathered. Eleven people remained in intensive care, hospital authorities said. Funerals were planned on Saturday for some of the victims, several of whom were born overseas. Dozens of people laid flowers at cordons near both mosques in Christchurch, which is still rebuilding after a devastating earthquake killed almost 200 people in 2011. New Zealand tightened its gun laws to restrict access to semi-automatic rifles in 1992, two years after a mentally ill man shot dead 13 people in the southern town of Aramoana. But firearms laws are lax compared to neighboring Australia, which enacted a strict gun control regime in the wake of a similar massacre in 1996, and most other developed nations outside of the United States. Anyone over 16 can apply for a New Zealand firearms license, valid for 10 years after completing a safety course and a police background check. Most guns do not require registration under New Zealand’s Arms Act and police do not know “how many legally or illegally owned firearms there are in New Zealand,” according to a police statement last year. In 2014, police estimated there were up to 1.2 million legal firearms in civilian ownership, or around 1 for every 4 members of the public — twice the per capita number of guns in Australia. Separate “endorsements” are required to own semi-automatic weapons like those used in Friday’s attack, as well as pistols and other restricted weapons. However, police and firearms experts have pointed to several loopholes allowing owners to bypass registration of semi-automatics. Ardern noted the failure of several earlier attempts to reform gun laws and said a ban on semi-automatic weapons would now be considered. A 1997 police review of gun laws called for such a ban, but attempts to update the Arms Act since 1992 have stalled in Parliament.
|
guns;immigration;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings;jacinda ardern
|
jp0001630
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Massacre in New Zealand shows how violent videos can evade tech giants' radar
|
SAN, FRANCISCO/BANGALORE INDIA - The Friday massacre at two New Zealand mosques, live-streamed to the world, was not the first internet broadcast of a violent crime, but it showed that stopping gory footage from spreading online persists as a major challenge for tech companies despite years of investment. The massacre in Christchurch was live-streamed by an attacker through his Facebook profile for 17 minutes, according to a copy seen by Reuters. Facebook said it removed the stream after being alerted to it by New Zealand police. But a few hours later, footage from the stream remained on Facebook, Twitter and Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube, as well as Facebook-owned Instagram and WhatsApp. It also remained available on file-sharing websites such as New Zealand-based Mega.nz . People who wanted to spread the material had raced to action, rapidly repackaging and distributing the video across many apps and websites within minutes. Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Mega on Friday said they were taking action to remove the copies. Other violent crimes that have been live-streamed include a father in Thailand in 2017 who broadcast himself killing his daughter on Facebook. After more than a day, and 370,000 views, Facebook removed the video. In the United States, the assault in Chicago of an 18-year-old man with special needs, accompanied by anti-white racial taunts, in 2017, and the fatal shooting of a man in Cleveland, Ohio, that same year, were also live-streamed. Facebook, the world’s largest social media network with about 2.3 billion monthly users around the world, tripled the size of its safety and security team to 30,000 people over the last three years to respond more quickly to reports of offensive content. It has also focused on developing artificial intelligence systems to catch material without the need for users to report it first. But the viral reach of yet another obscene video caused politicians around the globe on Friday to voice the same conclusion: Tech companies are failing. As the massacre video continued to spread, former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark in televised remarks said companies had been slow to remove hate speech. “What’s going on here?” she said, referring to the shooter’s ability to livestream for 17 minutes. “I think this will add to all the calls around the world for more effective regulation of social media platforms.” At least some expect Facebook to suffer consequences. Facebook “helped provide a platform for today’s horrific attack and will undoubtedly be called into question for facilitating the spread of this,” said Clement Thibault, analyst at financial data website Investing.com . The company’s profit margins fell last year as it spent to address the challenge, and stock analysts are bracing for further short-term hits to its profitability, whether or not regulations materialize and despite relatively few alternatives for advertisers. Shares of Facebook closed down 2.5 percent on Friday. After Facebook stopped the Christchurch livestream, it told moderators to delete any copies or complimentary comments on the attack. “All content praising, supporting and representing the attack and the perpetrator(s) should be removed from our platform,” Facebook instructed content moderators in India, according to an email seen by Reuters. Users intent on sharing the violent video took several approaches. Reviewed copies showed that some users had recorded the video playing on their own phones or computers to create a new version with a digital fingerprint different from the original to evade companies’ detection systems. Others shared shorter sections or screenshots from the gunman’s livestream. The shooting begins about six minutes into a 17-minute video reviewed by Reuters. It starts with the attacker driving to a mosque. On internet discussion forum Reddit, users strategized to avoid the actions of moderators, directing each other to video apps that had yet to take action and sending footage through messaging apps. Besides acting on user complaints about copies, YouTube said on Friday that it was trying to identify copies with an automated tool that finds videos likely to be violent in nature based on a combination of the title and description of the video, the characteristics of the user uploading it and objects in the footage. Exact matches of removed material cannot be uploaded again at YouTube and Facebook. Facebook said it, too, was relying on user complaints and an artificial intelligence system to identify violent footage and send it to moderators. It also was using audio technology to detect Christchurch broadcast footage, in which gunshots as well as music from the attacker’s car could be heard. Researchers and entrepreneurs specializing in detection systems said they were surprised that users in the initial hours after the attack were able to circumvent Facebook’s tools. Joshua Buxbaum, chief executive of the moderation technology company WebPurify, said Facebook and other services could employ image recognition or other types of AI to identify copies in additional ways. “I would certainly think given the budgets they have that they would have the ability to root out these videos,” Buxbaum said. Experts said the companies could set their detection tools and removal processes to be more aggressive, but YouTube and Facebook have said they want to be careful not to remove sensitive videos that either come from news organizations or have news value. Politicians in multiple countries said social media companies need to be more vigilant. “This is a case where you’re giving a platform for hate,” Democratic U.S. Sen. Cory Booker, who is running for president, said at a campaign event in New Hampshire. “That’s unacceptable, it should have never happened, and it should have been taken down a lot more swiftly.” Britain’s interior minister, Sajid Javid, said on Twitter, “Enough is enough.”
|
guns;immigration;australia;new zealand;social media;christchurch;facebook;mass shootings;brenton tarrant
|
jp0001631
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
New Zealand massacre puts focus on semi-automatic weapons
|
WASHINGTON - The horrific death toll in the New Zealand mosque massacre has put the spotlight on the lethality of the semi-automatic weapons used by the Christchurch gunman and in numerous attacks in the United States. At least 49 people were killed and dozens wounded when the gunman, identified as a 28-year-old Australian right-wing extremist, opened fire on worshippers in two mosques. A video livestreamed by the assailant on Facebook showed him rapidly firing what appeared to be hundreds of bullets at his defenseless victims, using various weapons. The New Zealand police have not yet identified the exact makes and models of the various guns used by the assailant. At least one was a shotgun, but others appeared to be similar to the semi-automatic rifles that have been used in a number of American mass shootings and are equipped with large-capacity magazines. Such weapons were used in the mass shooting at a movie theater in Colorado that left 12 people dead in 2012 and in the massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, the same year, which left 26 people dead including 20 children. The jihadi who attacked the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida, in 2016, killing 49 clubgoers, also used a semi-automatic weapon. The deadliest mass shooting in recent U.S. history was carried out in Las Vegas in 2017 by a man armed with 10 AR-15 semi-automatic rifles, some with 100-round magazines, and other guns. Fifty-eight people died in that attack. The troubled teenager behind the mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Florida, in 2017, which left 17 people dead and led to a grassroots gun control movement, was also armed with an AR-15. According to the Violence Policy Center, semi-automatic weapons differ from military versions in that the trigger of a semi-automatic must be pulled individually for each round fired. Machine guns, which are banned in the United States, will fire continuously for as long as the trigger is depressed or until the magazine is exhausted. “The unique design features of semi-automatic assault weapons allow the shooter to efficiently kill as many people as possible in the shortest amount of time available,” the Violence Policy Center said. “Increased lethality is the exact purpose for which these weapons were designed.” The United States last year banned “bump stocks” — devices that allow semi-automatic weapons to fire like machine guns. Stephen Paddock, the Las Vegas shooter, had equipped a number of his semi-automatic rifles with bump stocks. Bump stocks allowed him to fire at a rate of nine bullets a second before he turned his weapons on himself, according to U.S. authorities. The United States banned semi-automatic assault weapons in 1994 but the ban expired in 2004 and was not renewed. Democratic lawmakers in Congress have sought several times since then to renew the ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines but have not been successful.
|
guns;murder;christchurch;mass shootings
|
jp0001632
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
When gunman advanced on New Zealand mosque, one man ran at him
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - When the gunman advanced toward the mosque, killing those in his path, Abdul Aziz didn’t hide. Instead, he picked up the first thing he could find, a credit card machine, and ran outside screaming “Come here!” Aziz, 48, is being hailed as a hero for preventing more deaths during Friday prayers at the Linwood mosque in Christchurch after leading the gunman in a cat-and-mouse chase before scaring him into speeding away in his car. But Aziz, whose four sons and dozens of others remained in the mosque while he faced off with the gunman, said he thinks it’s what anyone would have done. The gunman killed 49 people after attacking two mosques in the deadliest mass shooting in New Zealand’s modern history. The gunman is believed to have killed 41 people at the Al Noor mosque before driving about 5 kilometers (3 miles) across town and attacking the Linwood mosque, where he killed seven more people. One person died later in a hospital. White supremacist Brenton Tarrant, 28, has been charged with one count of murder in the slayings and a judge said Saturday that it was reasonable to assume more charges would follow. Latef Alabi, the Linwood mosque’s acting imam, said the death toll would have been far higher at the Linwood mosque if it wasn’t for Aziz. Alabi said he heard a voice outside the mosque at about 1:55 p.m. and stopped the prayer he was leading and peeked out the window. He saw a man in black military-style gear and a helmet holding a large gun, and assumed it was a police officer. Then he saw two bodies and heard the gunman yelling obscenities. “I realized this is something else. This is a killer,” he said. He yelled at the congregation of more than 80 to get down. They hesitated. A shot rang out, a window shattered and a body fell, and people began to realize it was for real. “Then this brother came over. He went after him, and he managed to overpower him, and that’s how we were saved,” Alabi said, referring to Aziz. “Otherwise, if he managed to come into the mosque, then we would all probably be gone.” Aziz said as he ran outside screaming, he was hoping to distract the attacker. He said the gunman ran back to his car to get another gun, and Aziz hurled the credit card machine at him. He said he could hear his two youngest sons, aged 11 and 5, urging him to come back inside. The gunman returned, firing. Aziz said he ran, weaving through cars parked in the driveway, which prevented the gunman from getting a clean shot. Then Aziz spotted a gun the gunman had abandoned and picked it up, pointed it and squeezed the trigger. It was empty. He said the gunman ran back to the car for a second time, likely to grab yet another weapon. “He gets into his car and I just got the gun and threw it on his window like an arrow and blasted his window,” he said. The windshield shattered: “That’s why he got scared.” He said the gunman was cursing at him, yelling that he was going to kill them all. But he drove away and Aziz said he chased the car down the street to a red light, before it made a U-turn and sped away. Online videos indicate police officers managed to force the car from the road and drag out the suspect soon after. Originally from Kabul, Afghanistan, Aziz said he left as a refugee when he was a boy and lived for more than 25 years in Australia before moving to New Zealand a couple of years ago. “I’ve been to a lot of countries and this is one of the beautiful ones,” he said. And, he always thought, a peaceful one as well. Aziz said he didn’t feel fear or much of anything when facing the gunman. It was like he was on autopilot. And he believes that God, that Allah, didn’t think it was his time to die.
|
guns;violence;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings
|
jp0001633
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Many victims of New Zealand mosque massacre hailed from Mideast, South Asia
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - Several of those killed or wounded in the shooting rampage at two New Zealand mosques on Friday were from the Middle East or South Asia, according to initial reports from several governments. The live-streamed attack by an immigrant-hating white nationalist killed at least 49 people as they gathered for weekly prayers in Christchurch. Another 48 people suffered gunshot wounds in the attacks. Bangladesh’s honorary consul in Auckland, Shafiqur Rahman Bhuiyan, said that “so far” three Bangladeshis were among those killed and four or five others were wounded, including two left in critical condition. “One leg of an injured needed to be amputated while another suffered bullet injuries in his chest,” Rahman Bhuiyan said. He declined to identify the dead or wounded. Two Jordanians were among those killed, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement carried by the state-run Petra news service. Foreign Ministry spokesman Sufian Qudah had earlier said that a Jordanian man was killed and eight others were wounded. Christchurch Hospital chief Greg Robertson said Saturday that seven of the 48 gunshot victims admitted after the shootings had been discharged. Robertson said a 4-year-old girl who had been transferred to an Auckland hospital was in critical condition and 11 patients who remained in Christchurch were also critically wounded. “We have had patients with injuries to most parts of the body that range from relatively superficial soft tissue injuries to more complex injuries involving the chest, the abdomen, the pelvis, the long bones and the head,” he said. Many patients will require multiple operations to deal with their complex series of injuries, Robertson said. He said a 2-year-old boy was in stable condition, as was a 13-year-old boy. Mohammed Elyan, a Jordanian in his 60s who co-founded one of the mosques in 1993, was among those wounded, as was his son, Atta, who is in his 30s. That’s according to Muath Elyan, Mohammed’s brother, who said he spoke to Mohammed’s wife after the shooting. Muath said his brother helped establish the mosque a year after arriving in New Zealand, where he teaches engineering at a university and runs a consultancy. He said his brother last visited Jordan two years ago. “He used to tell us life was good in New Zealand and its people are good and welcoming. He enjoyed freedom there and never complained about anything,” Muath. “I’m sure this bloody crime doesn’t represent the New Zealanders.” Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said four Pakistanis were wounded, and Ministry spokesman Mohammad Faisal tweeted that five other Pakistani citizens are missing after Friday’s attacks. Malaysia said two of its citizens were hospitalized, and the Saudi Embassy in Wellington said two Saudis were wounded. India’s high commissioner to New Zealand, Sanjiv Kohli, tweeted Saturday that nine Indians were missing and called the attack a “huge crime against humanity.” Indian officials have not said whether the nine were believed to be living in Christchurch. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at least three Turkish citizens were wounded in the attacks in New Zealand and that he had spoken to one of them. Afghanistan’s ambassador to Australia and New Zealand said two Afghans are missing and a third person of Afghan origin was treated and released from the hospital. Two Indonesians, a father and son, were also among those shot and wounded, Foreign Ministry spokesman Arrmanatha Nasir said. Nasir said the father is being treated at an intensive care unit and his son is in another ward at the same hospital. He declined to identify them. The man’s wife, Alta Marie, posted on Facebook that her husband and their son are both alive, but wounded. Marie said that both were shot in the attack Friday at Christchurch’s Linwood Islamic center. “My husband was shot in multiple places and has a drain in his lung,” she wrote on Facebook. She said she was with her son, who is “traumatized” after being shot in his back and leg. List of mass shooting incidents in New Zealand, where violent crime is rare and few police carry guns New Zealand suffered its worst peacetime shooting as at least one gunman, a suspected white supremacist, killed 49 people during Friday prayers at two mosques in Christchurch, the largest city on South Island. Violent crime is rare in New Zealand and police do not usually carry guns, though mass shootings have occurred previously. Here is a list of some previous incidents. 1997 : A lone shooter killed six people, including his father, and wounded four others in the ski-lodge hamlet of Raurimu. He was tried and found not guilty by reason of insanity. 1994 : Seven members of the Bain family were shot dead in Dunedin, South Island’s second-largest city. A surviving son was convicted of their murders in 1995, but later acquitted at a retrial in 2009 and awarded a payout of almost $1 million New Zealand dollars ($680,000). 1992 : At a farm outside Auckland, Brian Schlaepfer shot and stabbed six members of his own family before killing himself with a shotgun. 1990 : A gun-mad loner killed 13 men, women and children in a 24-hour rampage in the tiny seaside village of Aramoana. He was killed by police. It prompted a modest tightening of gun laws. 1943 : Forty-eight prisoners-of-war and a guard died when officers opened fire on rioting inmates at a camp holding Japanese soldiers captured during the Guadalcanal Campaign. A court-martial determined prisoners were responsible, but no charges were pressed.
|
guns;immigration;australia;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings
|
jp0001634
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Suspect in Christchurch shootings charged with murder in first court appearance
|
CHRISTCHURCH/WELLINGTON, NEW ZEALAND - The main suspect in mass shootings at two New Zealand mosques was charged with one count of murder a day after an attack that killed 49 people and wounded dozens, prompting the prime minister to vow reform of the country’s gun laws. Brenton Tarrant, a 28-year-old Australian citizen, appeared in a Christchurch District Court on Saturday and was remanded without a plea until his next scheduled appearance in the South Island city’s High Court on April 5. Handcuffed and wearing a white prison suit, Tarrant did not speak. His court-appointed lawyer made no application for bail or name suppression. He was likely to face further charges, police said. The attack, which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern labelled an act of terrorism, was the worst-ever peacetime mass killing in New Zealand and the country raised its security threat level to the highest. Tarrant has been identified as a suspected white supremacist, based on his social media activity. Footage of the attack on one of the mosques was broadcast live on Facebook, and a “manifesto” denouncing immigrants as “invaders” was also posted online via links to related social media accounts. The video footage showed a man driving to the mosque, entering it and shooting randomly at people inside. Worshippers, possibly dead or wounded, lay on the floor, the video showed. Reuters was unable to confirm the footage’s authenticity and police urged people not to view or share it. Police said the alleged shooter was arrested in a car, which was carrying improvised explosive devices, 36 minutes after they were first called. It was still unclear whether any other shooters were involved in the attacks. Two other people were in custody and police said they were working to understand their involvement. Armed police were deployed at several locations in all cities, unusual in a country that has had low levels of gun violence. Ardern said the main suspect was a licensed gun owner who used five weapons during his rampage, including two semi-automatic weapons and two shotguns. Authorities were working to find out how he had obtained the weapons and a license, and how he was able to enter the country to carry out the attack, she said. “I can tell you one thing right now, our gun laws will change,” Ardern told reporters, saying a ban on semi-automatic weapons would be considered. None of those arrested had a criminal history or was on any watch list in New Zealand or Australia. There was a heavy police presence at the hospital where families of the more than 40 wounded had gathered. Eleven people remained in intensive care, hospital authorities said. Funerals were planned on Saturday for some of the victims, several of whom were born overseas. Dozens of people laid flowers at cordons near both mosques in Christchurch, which is still rebuilding after a devastating earthquake in 2011 that killed almost 200 people. Leaders around the world expressed sorrow and disgust at the attacks, with some deploring the demonization of Muslims. U.S. President Donald Trump, who condemned the attack as a “horrible massacre,” was praised by the accused gunman in a manifesto posted online as “a symbol of renewed white identity and common purpose.” Asked by a reporter in Washington if he thought white nationalism is a rising threat around the world, Trump said: “I don’t really. I think it’s a small group of people that have very, very serious problems. I guess if you look at what happened in New Zealand perhaps that’s a case, I don’t know enough about it yet.” Ardern, who flew to Christchurch on Saturday, said she had spoken to Trump, who had asked how he could help. “My message was sympathy and love for all Muslim communities,” she said she told him. Political and Islamic leaders across Asia and the Middle East voiced concern over the targeting of Muslims. “I blame these increasing terror attacks on the current Islamophobia post-9/11,” Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan posted on social media. “1.3 billion Muslims have collectively been blamed for any act of terror.” One man who said he was at the Al Noor mosque told media the gunman burst into the mosque as worshippers were kneeling for prayers. “He had a big gun. … He came and started shooting everyone in the mosque, everywhere,” said the man, Ahmad Al-Mahmoud. He said he and others escaped by breaking through a glass door. Facebook said, that having been alerted by police, it had deleted the gunman’s accounts “shortly after the livestream commenced.” Facebook, Twitter and YouTube all said they had taken steps to remove copies of the videos. Ardern said she had asked authorities to look into whether there was any activity on social media or elsewhere that could have alerted them ahead of the attack. Forty-one people were killed at the Al Noor mosque, seven at a mosque in the Linwood neighborhood and one died in hospital, police said. Hospital officials said some of the wounded were in a critical condition. The visiting Bangladesh cricket team was arriving for prayers at one of the mosques when the shooting started but all members were safe, a team coach said. Muslims account for just over 1 percent of New Zealand’s population, a 2013 census showed, most of whom were born overseas. A website set up for victims had raised more than $1 million New Zealand dollars ($684,000) in less than a day, and social media was flooded with messages of shock, sympathy and solidarity. One image shared widely was of a cartoon kiwi, the country’s national bird, weeping. Another showed a pair of figures, one in a headscarf, embracing. “This is your home and you should have been safe here” the caption read.
|
guns;immigration;australia;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings;brenton tarrant
|
jp0001635
|
[
"national",
"politics-diplomacy"
] |
2019/03/16
|
In Osaka, leaders' bid to swap seats could spell trouble as region faces global spotlight
|
OSAKA - When Osaka Gov. Ichiro Matsui and his sidekick, Osaka Mayor Hirofumi Yoshimura, announced they would resign their positions to run for each other’s seats next month, local reactions ranged from disbelief to exasperation. Osaka politics has always been, to put it politely, different from more predictable local varieties elsewhere. Still, the decision by Matsui and Yoshimura to cut their terms short — originally, elections were set to take place in November — and try to switch chairs as a way to gauge voter support for their municipal merger efforts is a strange move. Matsui justifies it by saying another election would be required in November under the law if he and Yoshimura just resigned and ran again for the same posts. This way, if they run for, and win, each other’s positions, Osaka, Kansai and the rest of the country can enjoy four more years of the “Matsui and Yoshimura Variety Show.” Given talk among some LDP heavyweights of keeping Prime Minister Shinzo Abe around until 2024, why shouldn’t Matsui and Yoshimura also try to extend their time in office? In Osaka, the LDP has been the major “opposition” party, because Komeito, until it broke with Matsui and Yoshimura’s Osaka Ishin no Kai (One Osaka) over the merger plan, cooperated with them to form majorities in the municipal and prefectural assemblies. Yet, except for also being against the merger proposal, Osaka Ishin and the LDP are practically soul mates. At the news conference announcing his candidacy for governor, LDP-backed Tadakazu Konishi, failed to clearly articulate how his policies would be different from Osaka Ishin, other than his opposition to the merger. On a personal level, however, his views are said to clash not only with Osaka Ishin but also the LDP on certain issues of local importance. For example, Konishi is reportedly not that keen on integrated casino resorts. As governor, he might try to slow down the rush to open one before or around the time of the 2025 World Expo, though it’s expected he’d go along with one if push comes to shove. For the national LDP, Osaka presents a bit of a conundrum. Abe and Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga are close to Matsui, but if the national LDP decides not to back Konishi against Yoshimura, or back an LDP mayoral candidate against Matsui, that could create problems with the Osaka chapter of the party. Such a rift would be especially problematic when it comes time for the central LDP to rally support for Osaka-area LDP candidates in the July Upper House election. If that wasn’t confusing enough, it appears the Japanese Communist Party will support, officially or not, Konishi in an “all anti-Osaka Ishin” effort. Keep an eye out for television footage and social media posts of the nearly unprecedented sight of senior LDP and JCP leaders in Osaka clasping their hands in a show of support for Konishi’s bid. Yoshimura, on the other hand, must convince voters he knows the prefecture, not just the city. Though not a top priority, voters will be looking for him to display a high level of statesmanship during the campaign. As mayor, Yoshimura angrily canceled Osaka’s 60-year-old sister city relationship with San Francisco to protest its “comfort women” statues, but mostly showed little interest in international affairs. But if he becomes governor, Yoshimura would be the area’s top local official and would have to smile, make conversation and shake hands with world leaders, the United Nations secretary-general, and international VIPs, including members of various royal families, when they arrive for the G20 summit in Osaka in June. After that, he would take the international stage as Osaka’s ambassador for the expo. What could possibly go wrong? View from Osaka is a monthly column that examines the latest news from a Kansai perspective.
|
osaka;elections;ichiro matsui;osaka ishin no kai;hirofumi yoshimura
|
jp0001636
|
[
"national",
"politics-diplomacy"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Thousands rally in Okinawa to urge Tokyo and Washington to scrap base relocation plan
|
NAHA, OKINAWA PREF. - A rally attended by thousands of Okinawa residents on Saturday urged the Japanese and U.S. governments to scrap a plan to relocate a controversial U.S. air base within the prefecture. In the wake of last months local referendum that showed a majority of the island prefecture’s residents oppose the transfer plan, some 10,000 people gathered at a park in the prefectural capital of Naha, according to the organizer of the rally. The protesters adopted a resolution demanding the two governments abolish the plan to relocate U.S. Marine Corps Air Station Futenma from a crowded residential area of Ginowan to the less densely populated coastal area of Henoko in Nago. Many local residents have long been frustrated with noise pollution, accidents and crimes resulting from the heavy concentration of U.S. military bases in Okinawa and want the Futenma base to be moved outside of the prefecture. In the prefectural referendum on Feb. 24, some 72 percent of the total voters rejected the relocation plan. But as it was nonbinding, the Japanese government has continued to push ahead with work to build a replacement facility for the air base in the prefecture. The resolution blasted the stance of the central government, saying, “Forcing through (the relocation work) by ignoring public opinion is utterly intolerable and shameful in a democratic country.” Many participants in the rally also criticized the Abe administration for ignoring the referendum result. “Despite the will of people shown in the vote, the construction work is continuing,” said Masato Taira, 51, a local government worker from the city of Okinawa. “We’ll never give up and will continue to show our opposition.” “The state never listens to our voices,” said Yukie Uehara, a 41-year-old self-employed worker from the city of Itoman, who condemned the central government for disrespecting democracy. “In order to prevent the base work from progressing further, we want people in other parts of the country to consider the base issue as their own problem,” said Uehara, who participated in the rally together with her two daughters. On Saturday, a crowd of over 1,000 people also rallied in front of the Prime Minister’s Office in Tokyo to oppose the relocation plan. “It is an issue not just for Okinawa but for Japan as a whole,” said Jinshiro Motoyama, a civic group leader. The central government has said the relocation plan is the “only solution” for eliminating the dangers posed by the Futenma base without undermining the deterrence provided by the Japan-U.S. security alliance.
|
okinawa;futenma;henoko;u.s. military bases
|
jp0001637
|
[
"national",
"politics-diplomacy"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Japan expanding GSDF's presence on southwestern islands with new bases and missile batteries
|
The government is pushing ahead with plans to build new Ground Self-Defense Force bases on remote islands in the southwest in response to military threats from China. On March 26, GSDF bases are due to be opened in the city of Amami and the town of Setouchi, both on Amami Oshima island in Kagoshima Prefecture. About 560 troops will be stationed at the bases. Surface-to-air missile systems will be deployed at the Amami base, while land-to-sea missiles and an ammunition depot will be placed at the Setouchi base. Another GSDF base will be opened on the same day on Miyako Island in Okinawa Prefecture. That base will initially host 380 soldiers, but will eventually expand to host some 700 to 800 troops once surface-to-air and land-to-sea missiles are deployed in fiscal 2019. In the meantime, work to lay the groundwork for yet another GSDF base has started on Ishigaki Island in Okinawa. The city of Ishigaki includes the Senkaku Islands, which are administered by Japan but also claimed by China, which calls them Diaoyu, and Taiwan, which calls them Tiaoyutai. The government plans to situate the base in the Hiraeomata area, around the center of Ishigaki Island, and man it with 500 to 600 troops plus a missile unit. The Ishigaki base project has raised environmental worries among residents, including those concerning the island’s water supply. A civil group that started a petition drive for a referendum on the project collected signatures from about 40 percent of the voters. Last month, however, the Ishigaki Municipal Assembly voted down a bill to hold the referendum. The Defense Ministry then started the foundation work this month. The ministry estimates that the cost of developing the four new bases will reach about ¥170 billion. A chain of islands from Amami Oshima to the main island of Okinawa and the Sakishima Islands, including Miyako, Ishigaki and the Senkakus, almost overlaps the so-called first island chain that is strategically important to China. The Chinese military is increasingly active around the island chain. In January 2018, what appeared to be a Chinese submarine was spotted in waters near Miyako. In 2016, the Defense Ministry opened a GSDF base on the country’s westernmost island, Yonaguni. In the event of an emergency in the region, an amphibious unit whose main mission will be to recapture remote islands is expected to be sent from its base in Nagasaki Prefecture, along with reinforcements from elsewhere. To prepare for such a scenario, the GSDF is proceeding with the reorganization of brigades and divisions across the country to improve maneuverability. Under the initiative, mobile regiments with 800 troops each have been formed at the GSDF’s Kitakumamoto base in Kumamoto Prefecture and the Zentsuji base in Kagawa Prefecture. These regiments are equipped with mobile combat vehicles that have firepower equal to conventional tanks and travel at speeds up to 100 kph. Similar regiments are set to be formed at the Takikawa base in Hokkaido and the Tagajo base in Miyagi Prefecture this month, according to the ministry. The GSDF is also thinking of regularly deploying amphibious troops aboard a transport vessel around remote southwestern islands in the East China Sea, ministry sources said. “We aim to increase deterrence by showing the existence of troops specialized in the defense of islands,” a senior ministry official said.
|
china;kagoshima prefecture;gsdf;amami oshima
|
jp0001638
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Nagasaki student to deliver flame from the atomic bombings to Pope Francis during meeting at the Vatican
|
KYOTO - A Nagasaki 13-year-old who is the granddaughter of an atomic bomb survivor will present a flame kept alight from the World War II bombing of Hiroshima to Pope Francis during a general audience on Wednesday. The “flame of peace,” as it is called, is maintained at a monument in the city of Yame, Fukuoka Prefecture. The fire is said to have been brought from Hiroshima in September 1945 after the city was flattened by the U.S. atomic bombing a month earlier on Aug. 6 in the closing days of the war. The student, Yusa Okada, in her first year of junior high school, is part a group organized by Earth Caravan, a Kyoto-based nonprofit. The participants on the trip will pray for world peace during the papal audience. She will be joined by Chiyumi Shinkai, 55, whose parent was a hibakusha, and Setsuko Thurlow, 87, who survived the Hiroshima bombing and campaigns for the elimination of nuclear arms in cooperation with the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN). Others in the group include an aboriginal Canadian girl, a Palestinian girl and two others. Three days after the tragedy of Hiroshima, the city of Nagasaki was also devastated by a U.S. atomic bomb. The general audience with the pope, held every Wednesday at St. Peter’s Square, is attended by people from around the world. The Vatican has promised that at least one of the participants from Japan will be allowed to get a front-row seat at the event so that the person can have a chance to meet face-to-face with Pope Francis. The participants aim to show the flame of peace to the pope and explain its history to him. “I hope for a world without war. I’m planning to convey my wish for the elimination of nuclear weapons to Pope Francis and tell him that I want to start by doing what I can,” Okada said. “I expect that by showing the flame to Pope Francis, we can convey the wishes of those who died praying for peace to the world,” Shinkai said. Ryokyu Endo, who heads Earth Caravan, asked the archbishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Nagasaki and others to help get a front-row seat for a Japanese participant after learning that Pope Francis has ordered a picture of a boy standing by a crematorium in Nagasaki after the Aug. 9, 1945, atomic bombing of the city to be made into cards for distribution. Endo, the chief priest of a Buddhist temple, said he hopes that the flame of peace will be delivered to Pope Francis as a symbol of the efforts to make sure that the devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki will never be repeated. The pope often advocates for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The participants will ask the pope to blow the flame out in a symbolic gesture representing the eradication of weapons of mass destruction, Endo said, according to the daily Mainichi Shimbun. “It’s a fire that should never have been in this world and I was hoping (Pope Francis) will blow it out as a symbol to do away with nuclear arms,” Endo was quoted as saying in the daily. Satoshi Suzuki, a 48-year-old corporate employee who plans to record video of the Japanese party’s participation in the general audience, said, “I want people around the world to watch a 13-year-old girl visit Vatican City and to take action for peace.” Pope Francis plans to make his first trip to Japan in November. He is expected to visit Nagasaki and Hiroshima during his stay.
|
nagasaki;hiroshima;nuclear weapons;pope francis;atomic bombings
|
jp0001640
|
[
"national",
"media-national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Alarming results in literacy survey stir debate on social media in Japan
|
A Feb. 16 report on the country’s literacy has been causing a stir on social media, prompting a number of users to warn of impending intellectual doom. The report on Bunshun Online discussed a 2013 study compiled by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) that showed that around 50 percent of adults from developed countries were unable to read or comprehend simple sentences. The survey was conducted in an attempt to investigate the causes behind increasing unemployment rates in Europe. The survey , conducted by the Program for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), measured respondents’ proficiency in information-processing skills such as literacy, numeracy and problem solving in technology-rich environments on around 157,000 adults between the ages of 16 and 65 in 24 OECD countries. Japan generally scored better than most nations worldwide, with approximately one-third of respondents showing an inability to comprehend basic Japanese. Moreover, a third of the respondents in Japan appeared to have a numeracy level that would correspond to that possessed by a third- or fourth-grader and less than 10 percent were capable of completing basic tasks using a computer. The survey also showed that 1 in 3 respondents of working age didn’t know how to use a computer. Cue the alarm bells. Bunshun Online discussed the 2017 findings of Noriko Arai , a mathematician and the author of “ AI vs. Children who can’t Read Textbooks .” Arai conducted a Reading Skill Test on 24,600 middle and high school students to measure their level of basic reading comprehension. The results shocked the public, with 1 in 5 third-year middle school students and 1 in 13 third-year high school students being unable to identify either the subject or object of a sentence. The poor scores were initially believed to be a reflection of the declining standards in domestic education but, comparing these scores to the findings of the PIAAC survey, it could indicate wider social issues. The surprises, however, didn’t end there. Other OECD nations scored worse than Japanese respondents on most measures. On average, 48.8 percent of adults in developed countries lack basic comprehension skills, 52 percent have a numeracy level that is less than third or fourth grade and 5.8 percent know how to complete basic tasks using a computer. The table of scores by country also showed that Japanese high school graduates have literacy skills comparable to those of Italian and Spanish college graduates. When it comes to younger adults between the ages of 16 and 24, South Korea ranks fourth in literacy, fifth in numeracy and first in problem solving. Japan, on the other hand, drops to third place in numeracy (falling behind the Netherlands and Finland) and 14th place (significantly lower than the OECD average) in problem solving in technology-rich environments. The reaction to Bunshun Online’s coverage of this issue was harsh. “When I used to work in HR for a company, I did come across situations where I thought, ‘Seriously, you can’t read that? You’re a college graduate!’” Twitter user @toshi0104 wrote. “So these results might actually be true.” Twitter user @yuki_20211 added that “there are even fewer people who can actually write.” Tweeting under the handle @takapon_jp , entrepreneur Takafumi Horie also took pot shots at users of the social media platform, saying that “this is exactly why people get blamed on Twitter.” In response, @ms_7670b3 said: “I honestly think Japanese is a difficult language. In addition to their lack of comprehension skills, I think there are plenty of people who have a hard time expressing themselves through writing.” On the other hand, some expressed skepticism with the results. “That a third of Japanese people cannot read Japanese is rather hard to believe,” Twitter user @pycl posted. “The literacy rate should be pretty high. The problem is perhaps whether one can read or write, and whether they have the skills to communicate through them.” User @cristinmilites said, “I was surprised when I read this article but if this survey is trustworthy, then maybe it isn’t so weird to come across people who have no idea of what you’re trying to say.” Others, however, refused to dwell on the negative aspects of the report. “The article has a lot of surprising numbers,” Twitter user @sasakitoshinao wrote. “However, we can see that Japanese people still have potential despite the results.” User @aozukinsan agreed. “The increase in the number of people who don’t know how to use computers probably has something to do with the growing number of smartphones on the market, but to find out that less than 10 percent of people know how to complete a basic task on a computer is surprising. That said, apparently we’re in a better situation compared to other developed countries.” If the results sound absurd to you, it may be because you’re probably working with highly skilled people on a daily basis. If that’s the case, you may have actually been the exception all this time. As technology continues to evolve, demand for highly skilled people will also grow in the job market — a serious concern for those who could potentially be left behind.
|
social media;literacy;japan pulse
|
jp0001641
|
[
"national",
"media-national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Does NHK drama credit instant noodles to the right inventor?
|
Each morning at 8 o’clock, millions of homemakers across the country tune into a 15-minute-long segment of a serialized morning drama on NHK. The current story, titled “Manpuku,” relates the saga of the man who invented instant noodles and his devoted wife, played by Hiroki Hasegawa and Sakura Ando, respectively. The program is meant to dramatize the life story of Taiwan-born Momofuku Ando (1910-2007) and his wife, Masako. Ando, founder of Nissin Ramen, is credited, in 1958, with launching Chikin Ramen, the forerunner of the instant noodles we know today, of which tens of billions of servings are consumed annually throughout the world. NHK’s series, reports Flash (March 19), has been enjoying healthy viewer ratings of more than 20 percent. But hold on just a second: Does Ando genuinely deserve credit for inventing instant ramen noodles? “Ando had lived in Taiwan up to around age 20,” journalist Tsuyoshi Nojima tells the magazine, “and from before the Pacific War, there was a culture of consuming deep-fried noodles in southern Taiwan.” According to Nojima, a Taiwanese company called Qingji Bingguo Dian had developed thin deep-fried noodles in chicken broth known phonetically as gui-shi-mi (chicken-thread noodles). Ando would almost certainly have been familiar with such a food from his formative years in Taiwan. What’s more, says Nojima, “These noodles were imported to Japan to alleviate food shortages in the immediate postwar period, as I’ve been told by numerous overseas Chinese residents here. It’s not coincidental that the noodles were sold by Taiwanese.” Enter Zhang Guowen, who first came to Japan to study to become a dental technician. Zhang, like Ando, worked in Osaka where he started a business producing a type of instant noodle named Choju-men (“longevity noodles”), which he began selling in the spring of 1958 — preceding the launch of Nissin’s Chikin Ramen by several months. Choju-men may be all but forgotten today, but they were a staple on the third expedition of Japanese explorers to Antarctica. As proof, Flash ran the reproduction of an advertisement for the noodles in the autumn 1959 edition of Asahi Graph magazine. In December 1958, Zhang applied to the Japanese Patent Agency to register his noodle-making process — one month before Ando did the same. The Flash article runs the image of a document, dated Aug. 16, 1961, by which Zhang signed over his patent rights to Ando for ¥23 million, a figure equivalent to around ¥300 million today. “To suggest that Ando invented instant noodles is a fantasy,” complained the late Zhang’s son, Nobuharu Kiyokawa. “As the saying goes, ‘Winner takes all.’ Or, if you prefer, ‘History is written by the victors.’ However, the Chinese expatriates in Osaka all say to us, ‘You were the first.'” “I suppose my father got the hint to make the noodles from the ones he ate in Taiwan,” says Kiyokawa. “It saddens me to think that the NHK drama has convinced people that Ando was the one who invented instant noodles.” A spokesperson for NHK told Flash’s reporter that it wasn’t just the names in “Manpuku” that had been changed. The drama, the spokesperson says, is not so much about who deserves credit for the noodles as it is a “boldly reconstructed work of fiction” intended to portray “an emotionally moving era” and “love between a husband and wife.” Some other topics have been stirring the pot on the food front. According to the 456-member Japan Frozen Food Association, combined consumption of domestic and imported frozen foods in 2017 set an all-time record, exceeding ¥1 trillion in value. An online survey in the Asahi Shimbun’s Be Between column of March 9 found that 85 percent of respondents say they regularly consume frozen foods, with the largest segment, 29 percent, saying they do so two or three times a week. The most popular items cited by respondents included gyōza (pot-stickers), frozen vegetables, fried rice or pilaf dishes, udon and other types of noodles, and fried food such as croquettes and fish. Meanwhile, reflecting the growth in popularity of Mediterranean-style cuisine from the 1990s, demand for olive oil in Japan has been realizing exponential growth. From Italy alone, Japan imported 60,000 tons of Italian olive oil products in 2017, up from 33,000 in 2007. Total demand is said to have grown threefold. The Nikkei Marketing Journal (Feb. 25) reported plans by the Association of Japanese Olive Oil Processors, working in collaboration with the Agriculture Ministry, to seek the same certification adopted by the Spain-based International Olive Council Standards. Worldwide olive oil production is projected to fall by around 6 percent in 2018-19 due to poor harvests in Tunisia and Italy. The price of extra virgin oil has climbed to €600 per 100 kilograms — a rise of around 30 percent. Domestic olive growers are no doubt hoping to exploit the shortfall. And if their products meet the same standards as the Europeans, they may eventually find their way to overseas markets.
|
nhk;instant noodles;momofuku ando;manpuku
|
jp0001642
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Japanese government task force to encourage cities with populations of 200,000 or more to establish child counseling centers
|
The government plans to set up a task force with the aim of encouraging cities with populations of 200,000 or more to establish child counseling centers at a time when the number of consultations related to child abuse is increasing. The planned task force will also include representatives from such cities and prefectural governments, sources said. Prefectures, along with ordinance-designated major cities with populations of 500,000 or more, are already required to have child consultation centers. Among the 54 cities with populations of 200,000 or more, only two — Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, and Kanazawa, the capital of Ishikawa Prefecture — have set up such centers. The city of Akashi in Hyogo Prefecture and the city of Nara are slated to open child consultation centers next month and in fiscal 2021, respectively. Cities hoping to open child consultation centers need to foster counselors — for example, through on-site training at existing centers — in cooperation with their prefectural governments. Issues related to such training and other matters will likely be discussed by the envisioned task force, according to the sources. Details will be worked out at a later. During work to draft a bill to revise the child welfare law, some lawmakers of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party had called for obliging cities with populations of 200,000 or more to set up child consultation centers, but the proposal was not adopted. The government instead opted to create the task force to encourage such cities to establish the centers. The legal amendment is expected to be adopted by the Cabinet as early as Tuesday.
|
welfare;child abuse
|
jp0001644
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Most young people in Japan say coming-of-age ceremonies should continue to be held for 20-year-olds
|
Over 70 percent of people aged between 16 and 22 in Japan believe official coming-of-age ceremonies should continue to be held for those aged 20, a Cabinet Office survey has shown, as the government prepares to lower the age of adulthood to 18 in April 2022. While no legal rules exist establishing an age for coming-of-age ceremonies hosted by local governments, they are traditionally held for 20-year-olds. The survey, released Friday, showed that 71.9 percent of the respondents said such ceremonies should be held for those aged 20, while 18.9 percent answered age 18 and 7.5 percent chose 19. The interview-based survey covered 3,500 people aged between 16 and 22 and 1,500 aged between 40 and 59. It was conducted between Nov. 29 and Dec. 24 last year and drew valid responses from 51.5 percent of the younger group and 63.9 percent of the older cohort. The older respondents also have a strong belief that such ceremonies should be for those aged 20, with 55.0 percent supporting that age, followed by 34.4 percent backing 18 and 6.3 percent favoring 19. Coming-of-age ceremonies for 18-year-olds could have fewer participants because many college entrance examinations are held around the time of such ceremonies in January. Coming of Age Day falls on the second Monday of that month. Asked about when such ceremonies should be held, 63.4 percent of the younger respondents cited January, 24.1 percent answered March — during spring vacation — and 7.2 percent chose April and May, which includes the Golden Week holiday period. Concerns have been expressed about people aged 18 and 19 becoming victims of consumer crime after the age of adulthood is lowered, as the move will allow young people to sign contracts and make transactions once they turn 18, rather than 20. Asked if they are worried about such a possibility, 64.3 percent of the younger respondents said “yes.” On reasons for their concern, with multiple answers allowed, 59.4 percent said they do not know what kind of damage they might face when concluding contracts or making transactions. Meanwhile, 58.9 percent cited a lack of legal and related knowledge regarding contracts and transactions, while 45.3 percent said they do not know what to do if they become a victim of such a crime. “We will work intensively on consumer education in the next three years,” a Consumer Affairs Agency official said.
|
coming-of-age day;adulthood
|
jp0001645
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/16
|
Meteorological Agency starts development of AI-based system to predict windy events in Japan
|
The Meteorological Agency’s research arm recently began developing an artificial intelligence-based system to predict high-wind events severe enough to impact the safety of land and air transportation, officials said. The system, which the Meteorological Research Institute aims to develop over a period of four years, is also expected to help self-driving cars avoid accidents caused by strong wind, including tornados and downbursts. Major wind systems develop quickly and their random nature has made it difficult to forecast their potential severity or location. East Japan Railway Co. (JR East) has been operating its own system to detect possible gusts following a derailment caused by strong winds in 2005, but its application has been limited. By monitoring air current data obtained from weather radar, the Meteorological Research Institute’s prototype system has been able to detect the formation of high wind events with 90 percent accuracy, the officials said. The institute needs to collect more data on how winds are generated in warmer periods of the year, they said. Cumulonimbus clouds — tall, dense, vertical clouds observed mainly in summer — cause unpredictable air currents, making wind prediction more complicated, according to the agency.
|
weather;meteorological agency;artificial intelligence
|
jp0001646
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
China's Huawei sees little impact on sales from U.S. broadside
|
SHENZHEN, CHINA/HONG KONG - The U.S. campaign against China’s Huawei is having little impact on the company’s sales and it is unlikely many countries will follow the United States in banning Huawei from building next-generation mobile networks, its rotating chairman, Eric Xu, said. “Recently we are seeing a large number of countries making their own decisions,” Xu said during an interview at Huawei Technologies’ headquarters in Shenzhen. While Australia has banned Huawei from 5G networks over security concerns, European Union countries such as Germany and France have indicated they are likely to ignore the U.S. call to shut out the telecom giant. “Maybe it’s only Australia,” Xu told Reuters reporters after a tour of the campus. Xu affirmed that Huawei’s revenue jumped 36 percent over the first two months of 2019 and was set for a 15 percent annual spike to $125 billion, underlining strength in its smartphone business and sales of computing and communications networks. Huawei has been facing mounting scrutiny, led by the United States, amid worries its equipment could be used by Beijing for spying. The company, however, says the concerns are unfounded. Xu said he does not expect the United States to intensify its attack on the company by barring sales of U.S. components to Huawei, a move that almost put its compatriot ZTE Corp. out of business last year before U.S. President Donald Trump lifted the ban. Huawei is the world’s third-largest buyer of computer chips, many of which come from U.S. companies, and a sales ban would be disruptive to the global tech industry, Xu said. Xu’s comments come at a time when Huawei has sued the U.S. government over a law that restricts its market access. In Canada, lawyers for Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, the daughter of founder Ren Zhengfei, have sued the government over her Dec. 1 arrest at the behest of the United States. She was charged with bank and wire fraud to violate U.S. sanctions against Iran. Huawei, a privately held firm that offers few details about its internal operations, has in recent months offered media interviews and invited journalists to tour its facilities as part of a counter-attack against the allegations of spying. Reuters reporters were invited on Monday to peruse files in Huawei’s “share registry room” where it keeps records on tens of thousands of employee shareholders. Huawei said the records show that the firm is owned by its employees and that its 74-year-old founder Ren owns just over 1 percent of the company. Reuters could not independently verify the ownership structure. Much of the global scrutiny of Huawei stems from Ren’s background with China’s People’s Liberation Army, where he was a civilian engineer for nearly a decade until his departure in 1983 after helping to build its communications network. Reuters also toured Huawei’s new campus in Dongguan, near Shenzhen, that features buildings modeled on European cities, including Paris and Heidelberg, connected by a special train imported from Switzerland. However, there was little activity on the campus, which is designed to house 18,000 workers, save a couple of black swans flitting about a lake. In contrast, another Huawei facility nearby bustled with workers assembling smartphones on automated production lines. Huawei’s growth is mainly being driven by its booming smartphone business and sales of computing and communications networks to government and business customers. Future growth will also come “primarily” from these, Xu said, with sales of equipment to telecom carriers growing at single digit rates. Huawei is the world’s top producer of telecom equipment and third-biggest maker of smartphones. On Huawei’s semiconductor operations, HiSilicon, Xu said the unit produced more than $7.5 billion worth of chips last year. That compares with an estimated $21 billon of chips that Huawei acquired from outside vendors. HiSilicon produces chip designs for Huawei’s equipment mainly, with the manufacturing handled by “foundry” companies such as Taiwan’s TSMC. It does sell chips to others for use in video cameras, television set-top boxes and some low-cost internet-connected devices, Xu said. Huawei will report its 2018 financial results at a press briefing on Friday, which over a hundred journalists are expected to attend, far more than in past years. “The United States should take quite a lot of the credit for making advertisements for Huawei,” Xu quipped.
|
china;u.s .;australia;smartphones;eu;espionage;huawei;5g;meng wanzhou
|
jp0001647
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Tokyo hotel to serve giant ¥100,000 wagyu burgers in honor of new emperor
|
A restaurant in a high-class Tokyo hotel has unveiled giant wagyu burgers with golden-dusted buns costing ¥100,000 ($908), in honor of the upcoming ascension of Crown Prince Naruhito. Available at the Oak Door steakhouse in the Grand Hyatt Tokyo, located in the posh Roppongi district, the 3-kilogram burgers will celebrate the succession and new Imperial era using an array of expensive ingredients, including foie gras and shaved black truffles. It is recommended that six to eight people share the Golden Giant Burger, which is approximately 25 cm wide and 15 cm high and is accompanied by a bottle of wine. It will be available from April 1 through the end of June, according to the restaurant. The government will unveil the name of the new era on April 1 and the country’s 248th Imperial era will start on May 1, when the Crown Prince ascends to the throne following his father Emperor Akihito’s abdication the previous day. The 85-year-old Emperor expressed his wish to retire in a rare video message in 2016, citing his concern that he might not be able to fulfill his official duties due to his advanced age. He will become the first living monarch to step down in about 200 years.
|
beef;wagyu
|
jp0001648
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Culture meets convenience as Japan's konbini stores bet that books go down well with a bento
|
With increased competition from online stores and digital alternatives, bookstores in Japan are belatedly following their overseas brethren out of business, so convenience store chains are stepping in to cater to readers who like to peruse a page or two before they buy. Of the three biggest convenience store chains, Lawson Inc. already has books on sale at thousands of locations, Seven-Eleven Japan Co. is offering advanced sales of a popular children’s book, and FamilyMart Co. has integrated a bookstore with one of its outlets. The convenience store chains are aiming to cash in on customers who are willing to pick up a book with their bento. Lawson introduced books to its stores in June 2014 and has witnessed a gradual increase in sales. This has seen books also replacing magazines, which have seen a drop-off in sales in recent years. About 4,000 Lawson outlets have dedicated bookshelf space, and there is a plan to expand the trend to another 1,000 locations over the next year. The bookshelves contain around 100 titles and feature several new publications each week, including all the popular reads of the moment. The headquarters of the companies even provide weekly guidance on how the books should be displayed. Men and women in their 40s and 50s make up almost half of all book buyers, meaning their tastes are catered to. Paperbacks by famous authors, titles linked to movies and television shows, as well as practical guides on a wide selection of themes such as cooking and health are sold. Only new novels and thick volumes have proved to be duds, with customers preferring to buy the former at bookstores and the latter at times when they are easier to carry. Four special editions of books by famous Japanese authors in publisher Kodansha Ltd.’s historical novel anthology were sold exclusively at Lawson outlets in late February. Prices for the coverless, paperback-sized books were purposely kept down as well. According to estimates by Nippon Ryutsu Academy, run by major publishing agent Nippon Shuppan Hanbai Inc., sales of magazines at convenience stores dropped around 60 percent from 2007 through 2017. Installing bookshelves has helped offset that loss. “People who don’t intend to buy a book tend to do so, and this has helped compensate for the recent slump in magazine sales,” said an official from Lawson’s entertainment group. Advanced sales of a book adaptation of a movie based on the popular children’s book “Oshiri Tantei” (“The Butt Detective”), from Poplar Publishing Co., is one of Seven-Eleven’s hottest titles at one outlet in Tokyo. The book about a walking, talking, butt detective who solves crimes and farts in the faces of criminals, gets a prominent place near the magazine section. The books, targeting elderly customers with grandchildren and parents with kids in tow, are selling briskly. In fact, Seven-Eleven effectively won exclusive rights to sell “Oshiri Tantei” because it will not be available at bookstores until April. In the meantime, FamilyMart opened a two-story integrated convenience and book store in Abiko, Chiba Prefecture, at the end of February. Customers can add a book to their basket and buy it at the same cash register. Formerly owned and operated as a subsidiary of Nippon Shuppan, the bookstore’s dwindling sales led to the change of tack. In the meantime, FamilyMart was looking to cash in on the store’s premium location in front of the train station. “It is really tough to solely manage a bookstore, but there are strong calls to have bookstores survive, so we intend to spread (integrated stores),” said a Nippon Shuppan spokesperson. A FamilyMart official cited the synergies created by the integration as a way to strengthen sales. “Until now, the selections for book titles at convenience stores have been unsatisfactory, at best. This is why we want to utilize the expertise offered by bookstore workers.”
|
books;retailers;convenience stores;shopping;magazines;bookstores
|
jp0001649
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Nissan CEO Hiroto Saikawa signed off on Carlos Ghosn's retirement deal, panel says
|
Nissan Motor Co. Chief Executive Officer Hiroto Saikawa signed off on Carlos Ghosn’s retirement package, an outside corporate-governance panel said, which could intensify scrutiny of his role in alleged financial improprieties by the former chairman of Nissan and Renault SA. Tokyo prosecutors have accused Nissan, Ghosn and his deputy, Greg Kelly, of misleading investors and the government about how much the company was paying its top executive. Although they have been charged with under-reporting Ghosn’s compensation, it wasn’t clear how much of that was deferred for retirement. As part of a set of recommendations for a more independent board at Nissan released Wednesday, a special governance committee included a cryptic line about Ghosn’s retirement package: “Regarding the post retirement treatment of Mr. Ghosn, Mr. Ghosn, through Mr. Kelly as the person responsible for Global Human Resources and Legal, obtained documents signed by the current CEO.” The panel didn’t elaborate on the contents of the retirement package. When asked whether there were problems with the documents, a spokesman for Nissan declined comment. The committee for improving the company’s governance was formed late last year. The indictments against Nissan and the former executives not only raised questions about Nissan’s corporate governance, it cast attention on the leadership of Saikawa, Ghosn’s protege and a longtime board member, people familiar with the situation inside the company have said. Saikawa, who replaced Ghosn and publicly accused him of financial misconduct, said he has no intention of resigning anytime soon, despite signaling in January he would step down shortly, according to people familiar with the matter. Nissan has considered providing Ghosn with post-retirement benefits including homes in Rio, Beirut and Paris as chairman emeritus and senior adviser, people familiar with the matter said. According to one document entitled ‘Employment agreement’ seen by Bloomberg, one of the post-retirement schemes proposed a non-compete agreement for Ghosn. Saikawa and Ghosn’s former aide at Nissan, Greg Kelly, were the officials who typically signed those type of agreements, one of the people said, without confirming details of any signed agreement. According to the document seen by Bloomberg, Ghosn was to receive a $40 million lump sum and an annual salary of $4.4 million with the title of advisor and chairman emeritus. He would also receive title to the three Nissan-owned homes, and a stake in Lebanese supplier Rymco, as well as use of offices including at Nissan’s Yokohama headquarters. The Financial Times earlier reported that Saikawa approved an employment contract for Ghosn as chairman emeritus, citing a 2012 document that it said may not have been a final agreement. Ghosn’s lawyers have said that the accusations against the executive are flawed because he never signed written agreements that he was to receive any deferred payments after retirement.
|
scandals;nissan;carlos ghosn;corporate governance;hiroto saikawa
|
jp0001650
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Facebook moves to curb white nationalism and separatism, and steer searches to anti-hate sites
|
LOS ANGELES - Facebook announced Wednesday it will ban praise or support for white nationalism and white separatism as part of a stepped-up crackdown on hate speech. The ban will be enforced starting next week at the leading online social network and its image-centric messaging service Instagram. “It’s clear that these concepts are deeply linked to organized hate groups and have no place on our services,” the social network said in a statement. Facebook policies already banned posts endorsing white supremacy as part of its prohibition against spewing hate at people based on characteristics such as race, ethnicity or religion. The ban had not applied to some postings because it was reasoned they were expressions of broader concepts of nationalism or political independence, according to the social network. Facebook said that conversations with academics and “members of civil society” in recent months led it to view white nationalism and separatism as linked to organized hate groups. “Going forward, while people will still be able to demonstrate pride in their ethnic heritage, we will not tolerate praise or support for white nationalism and separatism,” Facebook said. People who enter search terms associated with white supremacy will get results referring them to resources such as Life After Hate, which focus on helping people turn their backs on such groups, according to the social network. Amid pressure from governments around the world, Facebook in the past few years has ramped up machine learning and artificial intelligence tools for finding and removing hateful content while remaining open to free expression. “Unfortunately, there will always be people who try to game our systems to spread hate,” Facebook said. “Our challenge is to stay ahead by continuing to improve our technologies, evolve our policies and work with experts who can bolster our own efforts.” Facebook said the new ban would not apply to topics such as American pride and Basque separatism, which “are an important part of people’s identity,” according to the statement.
|
facebook;hate speech;instagram;white nationalism
|
jp0001651
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Japan's internet giants team up as mobile payments race intensifies
|
Line Corp. and Mercari Inc. are joining forces on mobile payments as the nation’s internet companies race to dominate cashless transactions in the world’s No. 3 economy. The operator of Japan’s most popular messaging platform and the used-goods online marketplace app will let users shop and pay for purchases at stores that accept each other’s systems, they told reporters in Tokyo on Wednesday. They also launched an alliance to welcome other mobile payment providers. After years of inactivity, mobile payments competition is heating up in Japan. Line and Mercari are teaming up to take on powerful rivals: E-commerce giant Rakuten Inc. runs its own bank, has a credit card with more than 15 million customers and is building a mobile-phone network, while PayPay — backed by SoftBank Group Corp., Yahoo Japan Corp. and India’s Paytm — sparked a shopping frenzy in December by giving users ¥10 billion ($90 million) in rebates on purchases. “Competition has heated up, with SoftBank, Rakuten, and Mercari aggressively promoting their own payment services,” Amir Anvarzadeh, a market strategist at Asymmetric Advisors Pte, said in a note to clients prior to the announcement. While Rakuten and Line had a head start in payments, Mercari is a latecomer, and none of their rivals have managed to secure an insurmountable lead. Two of the country’s biggest convenience store chains — Lawson and Family Mart — already accept most competing payment methods, on top of an assortment of e-money and transit cards. The same is true for fast-food operator Matsuya Foods, electronics store Bic Camera and pharmacy chain Tomod’s. They have also turned to discounts and giveaways to lure users. PayPay is running its second rebate campaign, while Rakuten customers can earn 40 times the points typically awarded on purchases. All three leading players offer users a chance to get back as much 20 percent from purchase values. Line has bet that partnerships with financial institutions will help it get ahead of the competition. The company plans to introduce Line Securities equities trading with the country’s biggest brokerage, Nomura Holdings Inc., this year, provided it receives the necessary permits. And a banking offering in partnership with Mizuho Financial Group Inc. could become available as early as fall 2020. In November, Line announced an alliance with China’s Tencent Holdings Ltd. and its WeChat Pay, aimed at Chinese visitors to Japan.
|
softbank;line;rakuten;mercari;cashless;paypay
|
jp0001652
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Apple's new services may draw innovative giant into tech turf wars
|
NEW YORK - Apple’s ambitious leap into streaming video illustrates an escalating trend: Tech’s biggest companies, faced with limits to their growth, are starting to encroach on each other’s turf. Apple is taking on Netflix by launching a subscription TV service with its own original shows. Facebook is edging into Amazon’s e-commerce sphere by enabling users to make purchases within Instagram. Google, which has already challenged Amazon and Microsoft in cloud computing, is launching an online game service that could undercut the lucrative game-console businesses of Microsoft and Sony. Apple, which is also launching a gaming service and introducing its own credit card, may be veering the most outside its comfort zone, technology industry analyst Rob Enderle said. “This is an awful lot of breadth really quickly for a company that hasn’t been known for being great at breadth,” Enderle said. “This is much more diversity than Apple’s ever had.” Before, when the company’s product suite grew too varied, “what Steve Jobs did with Apple was, he made the company focus,” Enderle said. These are different times, however, and Apple may have decided that it doesn’t have much choice amid declining sales of its premier product — the iPhone. “They have kind of bled the device market dry,” said Sally Edgar, of U.K.-based technology consultancy Waterstons. “Companies will increasingly be about subscription services. I think they have to do it to survive.” Apple’s financial report for the last three months of 2018 — the crucial holiday season — revealed the magnitude of the iPhone slump: a 15 percent drop in revenue from the previous year. Tech companies have, of course, explored new markets and fought turf battles over them for years. Facebook and Google have long scrapped over digital ads, though both face the prospect of hitting a wall and have angled for alternatives. A memo this month from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg signaled a shift away from an advertising-dependent business to something more focused on private messaging and other services. Meanwhile, Google and Amazon are battling it out over voice assistants in the home. Google and Microsoft have competing search engines. And Apple and Google have waged an epic smartphone battle for roughly a decade. But longtime tech industry analyst Tim Bajarin sees new urgency in the latest push into streaming services and other businesses that bring in continuous flows of money — not just when consumers make big investments in new phones or other hardware. “It’s just becoming clearer today that the only way a company is going to grow is by adding a recurring revenue model,” Bajarin said. “Apple is becoming an aggregator of content. They now have multiple services that will help them grow their bottom line.” Enderle said Apple is still in the “honeymoon phase” after a Monday announcement at its Cupertino, California, headquarters. Apple presented new A-list entertainment partners such as Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg and video game partners such as the creators of “SimCity” and the “Final Fantasy” series. What happens next may be harder for the company to manage. “It always looks great on the front end and then you have to execute,” he said.
|
google;tech;apple;gaming;netflix;amazon.com;live streaming
|
jp0001653
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Honda and Hino to buy into Monet, SoftBank and Toyota's 'united Japan' mobility tech venture
|
Automakers Honda and Hino are joining a partnership between SoftBank and Toyota to drive innovation in mobility services such as self-driving cars. SoftBank Corp. and Toyota Motor Corp., the nation’s top automaker, announced late last year a joint venture for mobility services, in what they called a “united Japan” effort to face global competition. Honda Motor Co., Toyota’s rival, and Hino Motors, Toyota’s truck division, said Thursday that each company will acquire a 9.9 percent stake in the ¥2 billion Toyota-SoftBank venture, Monet Technologies Corp. Each company will invest ¥250 million, according to the companies. “This partnership will allow us to coordinate the vehicle data on passenger and object mobility that Hino collects from its trucks and buses and the data Honda obtains from its mobility services,” said Junichi Miyakawa, president and CEO of Monet, in a statement. Toyota and SoftBank also announced Thursday a new consortium named after the tie-up, which includes partnerships with 88 other companies such as Coca-Cola Bottlers Japan and East Japan Railway Co. to enhance mobility services. Philips Japan, a health technology company, developer Mitsubishi Estate and Yahoo Japan Corp. are among other big names that will also join the new Monet Consortium. Technology experts say advances in artificial intelligence and sensors are opening up potential for autonomous driving and other mobility services, although safety concerns remain a major hurdle. Honda President Takahiro Hachigo said collaborating with Monet will include efforts to implement regulatory changes. “Honda wants to contribute to the revitalization of the mobility service industry in Japan and solve traffic-related problems facing Japanese society,” he said. Hino Motors President Yoshio Shimo said the move was part of the truck-maker’s ongoing efforts to transport goods and people. “Through this partnership, we will strive to achieve our vision of creating a world where people and goods move freely, safely and efficiently,” said Shimo. Under the new arrangement, SoftBank will own 40.2 percent in Monet Technologies while Toyota will own 39.8 percent. In announcing the partnership in October, Toyota President Akio Toyoda said the move reflected the company’s desire to change and keep up with global competition in autonomous vehicles and other technology. Toyota is widely seen as a traditional Japan Inc. company, while SoftBank, led by Masayoshi Son, has a reputation for aggressively investing in less traditional brands — such as car-sharing companies Uber, Didi Chuxing and Grab, as well as Arm, a leader in the “internet of things.”
|
tech;toyota;softbank;honda;carmakers;investments;hino;self-driving;monet technologies
|
jp0001654
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Boeing rolls out software fix to defend 737 Max franchise as it awaits U.S. regulator's approval
|
SEATTLE/WASHINGTON - Boeing Co. on Wednesday took its most aggressive moves yet to defend its core 737 airliner franchise, saying it had developed software fixes to prevent failures of an automated flight control system that is being scrutinized after two deadly crashes in the past five months. In the midst of one of its worst crises in years, Boeing is under pressure from crash victims’ families, airlines, lawmakers in Washington and regulators around the world to prove that the automated flight control systems aboard its 737 Max aircraft are safe, and that pilots have the training required to override the system in an emergency. A Boeing official in Seattle said Wednesday that the timing of the software upgrade was “100 percent independent of the timing of the Ethiopian accident,” and that the company was taking steps to make the anti-stall system “more robust.” There was no need to overhaul Boeing’s regulatory relationship with the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) now, the company said. “We are going to do everything that we can do to ensure that accidents like these never happen again,” Mike Sinnett, vice president for product strategy and future airplane development told reporters. A spokesman for the FAA said the agency had not reviewed or certified the software upgrade yet. U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao and some lawmakers on Wednesday questioned why Boeing did not require safety features on its top-selling plane that might have prevented the crashes. “It is very questionable if these were safety-oriented additions, why they were not part of the required template of measures that should go into an airplane,” she said, adding that she was not ready to require that all safety options be retrofitted on existing planes. Executives with U.S. airlines welcomed Boeing’s moves, but want U.S. regulators to sign off on the upgrade. Southwest Airlines Co., which on Wednesday became the first major airline to formally cut its financial outlook for the year after being forced to pull its Max fleet of 34 jets out of service, supported Boeing’s decision. “Boeing’s software update appears to add yet another layer of safety to the operation of the Max aircraft,” said Southwest’s Certificate Chief Pilot, Bob Waltz. Allied Pilots Association, which represents American Airlines Group Inc. pilots, said it was pleased with Boeing’s progress but warned that the certification process should not be rushed. The fix should be fully vetted and take into account any further information from an investigation into an Ethiopian Airlines crash on March 10, the association said in a statement. United Airlines Vice President Michael Quiello said the airline was optimistic about the software update, but was counting on the FAA to certify the change. Airline stocks turned positive after Boeing unveiled the software fix. CFRA analyst Jim Corridore, who has a “buy” rating on Boeing, said news from the company and the Washington hearing were positive steps toward getting the Max jets airborne again. The world’s largest plane-maker said the anti-stall system, which is believed to have repeatedly forced the nose lower in at least one of the accidents, in Indonesia last October, would now only do so one time after sensing a problem, giving pilots more control. It will also be disabled if two airflow sensors that measure the “angle of attack,” or angle of the wing to the airflow, a fundamental parameter of flight, offer widely different readings, Boeing said. Reuters reported those details earlier this week. The anti-stall system — known as MCAS, or Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System — has been pinpointed by investigators as a possible cause in a fatal Lion Air crash in Indonesia and the crash in Ethiopia. Existing 737 pilots will also have extra computer-based training following criticism that MCAS was not described in the aircraft manual. Boeing had previously said that existing cockpit procedures would cover any example of runaway controls caused by MCAS. The changes were drawn up in response to the Lion Air crash but are seen as crucial to regaining the trust of pilots, passengers and regulators after the Ethiopia crash prompted a worldwide grounding of Boeing 737 Max planes. Ethiopian officials and some analysts have said the Ethiopian Airlines jet behaved in a similar pattern before crashing shortly after takeoff from Addis Ababa, but that investigation is still at an early stage. Boeing’s Sinnett said the software had been through extensive testing, including flights with the FAA. However, he said he could provide no time frame for when the 737 Max jets would return to service. Boeing said it would change the design of the system so that it no longer relied on a single sensor. The changes also would make standard visual warnings to pilots if the system stopped working. Previously, those warning messages and displays had been optional. Reuters reported in November after the Lion Air disaster that some aviation experts believed the optional alert could have drawn engineers’ attention to mechanical faults, leading to an industry debate over whether the system should be mandatory. Current 737 Max pilots have criticized Boeing for not disclosing more details about MCAS initially. Sinnett said the company has added details on MCAS to its flight crew operations manual. All pilots will need to complete this training before returning to the skies, he said. John Hamilton, chief engineer for 737 Max flight displays, said in a statement that “all primary flight information required to safely and efficiently operate the 737 Max” was already included without the features that would now be offered.
|
u.s .;boeing;faa;ethiopian airlines;aircraft accidents;737 max;lion air;mcas
|
jp0001655
|
[
"business",
"financial-markets"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Tokyo stocks sink deeper on heightened global slowdown worries
|
Stocks suffered a broad sell-off on the Tokyo Stock Exchange on Thursday, as market sentiment was battered by heightened fears about a worldwide economic slowdown. The 225-issue Nikkei average gave up 344.97 points, or 1.61 percent, to end at 21,033.76, after losing over 400 points to fall below 21,000 again this week. The key market gauge sagged 49.66 points Wednesday. The Topix index of all first-section issues finished down 26.64 points, or 1.66 percent, at 1,582.85. It fell 8.45 points the previous day. Selling far outpaced buying from the outset of Thursday’s trading, after Wall Street took a downturn Wednesday with investor sentiment chilled by a sharp drop in U.S. long-term interest rates. Concerns over a global slowdown grew further after European Central Bank President Mario Draghi indicated the possibility of the ECB pushing back a rate hike further, brokers said. A major German chipmaker’s profit warning dealt another blow to the market by prompting selling of semiconductor-related issues. In the afternoon, however, the market showed some resilience, thanks to purchases of bargains, brokers also said. Thursday’s tumble, the second one this week, seemed to be led by futures-linked selling by foreign investors, said Ryuta Otsuka, strategist at the investment information department of Toyo Securities Co. Pointing out that trading for fiscal 2019 effectively started Wednesday, an official at a major securities firm offered the view that institutional investors moved to sell shares to secure initial profits for the new fiscal year from Monday. Meanwhile, Otsuka said speculation about the Bank of Japan’s purchases of exchange-traded funds helped stocks pare part of their earlier losses in afternoon trading. Investors refrained from active trading in the afternoon to see the outcome of the resumed round of U.S.-China trade negotiations in Beijing and developments related to the U.K.’s planned exit from the European Union, brokers said. Falling issues far outnumbered rising ones 1,878 to 229 in the TSE’s first section, while 31 issues were unchanged. Volume decreased to 1.224 billion shares from Wednesday’s 1.311 billion shares. In the battered chip industry sector, Shin-Etsu Chemical Co. lost 1.72 percent, Tokyo Electron 1.69 percent, and Sumco Corp. 1.04 percent. Gunma Bank plunged 8.15 percent amid growing earnings concerns. Other major losers included factory automation equipment-maker Keyence Corp. and clothing store chain Fast Retailing Co. By contrast, supermarket chain Kobe Bussan Co. jumped 6.12 percent after announcing strong sales for February. Also on the positive side were airlines Japan Airlines Co. and ANA Holdings Inc., and game-maker Nintendo Co. In index futures trading on the Osaka Exchange, the key June contract on the Nikkei average dropped 320 points to end at 21,060.
|
stocks;tse;nikkei 225
|
jp0001656
|
[
"business",
"financial-markets"
] |
2019/03/28
|
JPX and Tokyo Commodity Exchange to merge in October
|
Japan Exchange Group Inc. (JPX) and Tokyo Commodity Exchange Inc. said Thursday the two institutions have agreed to merge in October to enhance their competitiveness against overseas rivals. The merger is aimed at creating the country’s first all-in-one exchange that can handle both stocks and commodity futures including metals and grain, as Japan has lagged behind a global trend of integrated bourses. Japan Exchange Group, owner of the Tokyo and Osaka stock exchanges, will turn Tokyo Commodity Exchange into a wholly owned subsidiary after signing a final agreement in late June. Japan Exchange Group said the merger “will be the best for the two companies.” A spokesperson for the Japan Exchange Group said the merger “will be the best for the two companies.” Some commodities handled at the Tokyo Commodity Exchange, such as gold, soybeans and rubber, will be traded at the Osaka Exchange, while energy-related commodities including crude oil will stay at the Tokyo Commodity Exchange for the time being. Japan Exchange Group and the Tokyo Commodity Exchange signed a nondisclosure agreement in October last year and have been discussing terms of the merger since then.
|
stocks;japan exchange group;tokyo commodity exchange
|
jp0001657
|
[
"business",
"financial-markets"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Dollar falls below ¥110.10 in Tokyo trading
|
The dollar edged down below ¥110.10 in Tokyo trading Thursday, pressured by a fall in U.S. long-term interest rates and a Japanese stock sell-off. At 5 p.m., the dollar stood at ¥110.07-07, down from ¥110.67-67 at the same time Wednesday. The euro was at $1.1238-1239, down from $1.1251-1252, and at ¥123.71-71, down from ¥124.51-52. After moving between ¥110.40 and ¥110.50, the dollar fell below ¥110.20 in midmorning trading, as the Nikkei stock average’s tumble fueled safe-haven buying of the yen vis-a-vis the U.S. currency, a currency broker said. A slide in the key 10-year interest rate in the United States in off-hours trading also put a damper on the dollar, another broker said. But the dollar was supported by “buying on a dip” when it came close to the ¥110 threshold, an official at a major securities firm said.
|
exchange rates;forex;currencies
|
jp0001658
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Lloyd's of London vows action after 18 women say they experienced sexual harassment at the firm
|
LONDON - Lloyd’s of London has promised strong action over sexual harassment, a week after a news report cited damaging allegations by female staff against the centuries-old insurance market. New chief executive John Neal on Wednesday said Lloyd’s was “determined to … tackle all forms of inappropriate behavior with robust actions to create a more inclusive working environment. Neal’s comments, contained in a statement showing that Lloyd’s halved pre-tax losses last year, came one day after it unveiled “a robust plan of action to address reports of sexual harassment in the Lloyd’s market and create a safe and inclusive working environment. Bloomberg Businessweek last week reported on “a deep-seated culture of sexual misconduct” at Lloyd’s after hearing the experiences of 18 women alleging sexual harassment — and as the #MeToo movement against such misconduct continues to reverberate across the world. In response, Lloyd’s has promised a series of measures, including the “provision of an independently managed, confidential and market-wide access point for reporting inappropriate behaviour.” It would also offer “training focused on prevention, as well as reporting and supporting those who have been subjected to inappropriate behaviour.” Neal on Tuesday said it had been distressing to hear about the experiences of women in the Lloyd’s market. “No one should be subjected to this sort of behaviour, and if it does happen, everyone has the right to be heard and for those responsible to be held to account,” he added. Neal’s predecessor, Inga Beale, Lloyd’s first and only female CEO, had “met resistance at every step” in her attempts to turn around the “deeply backward-looking” culture during her five years at the helm, according to Bloomberg. Also Wednesday, Lloyd’s reported a pre-tax loss of £1 billion ($1.3 billion, €1.2 billion) for 2018 as the 333-year-old company paid out heavily on a series of natural disasters. The group had posted a loss before tax of £2 billion in 2017 following a series of devastating hurricanes. In 2018, “several large natural catastrophes, including Hurricanes Florence and Michael, Typhoon Jebi in Japan, as well as the Californian wildfires” cost the Lloyd’s market £2.9 billion, it said in a statement. Lloyd’s latest annual loss comes as the company prepares for life after Brexit, with the opening of a Brussels subsidiary. “Lloyd’s is … ready for Brexit through its new Brussels subsidiary, which is fully operational and writing risks,” it said Wednesday. “This provides certainty for our customers in the European Economic Area (EEA) that they can continue to access Lloyd’s insurance products, services and expertise.”
|
women;sexual harassment;disasters;me too;lloyd 's of london
|
jp0001659
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Nissan-funded panel recommends abolishing chairman post to prevent single leader from holding excessive power
|
YOKOHAMA - To prevent a sole executive from wielding excessive power, Nissan Motor Co. should abolish its chairman position and strengthen an independent monitoring governance system, a panel of experts commissioned by the carmaker said Wednesday. Governance issues surfaced at the firm following the arrest of former Chairman Carlos Ghosn for alleged financial misconduct last November. Ghosn is alleged to have underreported billions of yen in income over the course of several years and shifted personal investment losses to the company. The root cause of the alleged misconduct was the “concentration of all authority” in Ghosn, including areas like human resources and compensation, the panel’s report said. The group had been tasked with discussing how the Yokohama-based firm should enhance its corporate governance. According to the report, Ghosn exercised authority in a way that appeared to be for his person gain. The delegation of power to a few individuals — including Greg Kelly, the former Nissan representative director who was also arrested for alleged financial wrongdoing — made it difficult for other administrative sections to detect Ghosn’s activities, the report said. The panel did not interview Ghosn and Kelly, who have both denied wrongdoing. The report concluded that Nissan should eliminate the chairman post and that an independent, outside director should chair meetings by the firm’s board of directors. The proposal also said Nissan’s representative executive officer should not double as an executive officer or director at alliance partners Renault SA and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. “It’s not just Nissan, but Japanese companies often have a chairman who is the leader of the business execution body and is also the leader of the board of directors, which is a supervisory body,” said Sadayuki Sakakibara, a member of the panel and former chairman of Keidanren, the nation’s biggest business lobby. “The same person was the top of business execution and supervision. … This was a major root cause of the misconduct (at Nissan), so it needs to change. … This is quite a bold proposal,” as there aren’t many examples of such structures in Japan, Sakakibara added. The panel, which interviewed seven Nissan executives, suggested that Nissan change its company framework to set up committees tasked with nominations to the board, compensation and auditing by the end of June. The majority of the members of the nomination committee should be independent, outside directors, while all the members of the compensation committee should be such individuals, the proposal said. The panel also said that a majority of the Nissan board should be independent, outside directors. A spokesperson for Ghosn issued a statement Thursday saying that “those found in this so-called independent ‘report’ will be revealed for what they are: Part of an unsubstantiated smear campaign against Carlos Ghosn to prevent the integration of the alliance and conceal Nissan’s deteriorating performance.” “Mr. Ghosn acted at all times with the full authority of the board and its shareholders, and his paramount goal was achieving value for Nissan’s shareholders.” In a further twist, the corporate governance panel also reported the same day that Nissan Chief Executive Officer Hiroto Saikawa signed off on Ghosn’s retirement package, which could intensify scrutiny of the CEO’s role in alleged financial improprieties by the former chairman of Nissan and Renault SA. The committee included a cryptic line about Ghosn’s retirement package: “Regarding the post retirement treatment of Mr. Ghosn, Mr. Ghosn, through Mr. Kelly as the person responsible for Global Human Resources and Legal, obtained documents signed by the current CEO.” The panel did not elaborate on the contents of the retirement package. When asked whether there were problems with the documents, a spokesman for Nissan declined comment. Nissan also did not comment on when Saikawa signed the document. The committee for improving the company’s governance was formed late last year.
|
nissan;carmakers;carlos ghosn
|
jp0001660
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Sony chairman, who keyed firm's turnaround with bet on PlayStation and image sensors, to retire
|
Sony Corp. Chairman Kazuo Hirai, the architect of a turnaround at the once-dominant electronics giant, will retire in June after spending more than three decades at the company. The 58-year-old, who ceded the role of chief executive officer to Kenichiro Yoshida in April 2018, will continue to advise the company after his retirement, Sony said in a statement. Shuzo Sumi of Tokio Marine Holdings Inc. was nominated to become chairman of the board. Hirai, who took over as CEO from Howard Stringer in 2012, turned the company’s fortunes around by paring back and refocusing its operations. With Yoshida’s support, Hirai sold off the Vaio personal computer business, reshaped the television set unit and pulled the mobile business back from a destructive fight for market share. He also invested heavily in the PlayStation games business and image sensors used in smartphones, now major drivers of the firm. Profits hit a record last year as he ceded the CEO role. “He’ll be remembered as the guy who turned it around and got Sony back in the black,” said Yasunori Tateishi, the author of two dozen books about Japan’s electronics industry, including several critical of Sony. “And then he left at the very top.” Shares rebounded during his tenure as the company’s finances improved. The stock tripled during his years as CEO, about double the return of the benchmark Topix index. “Since passing the baton of CEO to Yoshida-san last April, as chairman of Sony, I have had the opportunity to both ensure a smooth transition and provide support to Sony’s management,” Hirai said in Thursday’s statement. “As such, I have decided to depart from Sony, which has been a part of my life for the past 35 years.” Hirai began his career in Sony’s music division in the 1980s, where he performed legal work and then promoted Japanese musicians in the U.S. “I thought (being) in the record business was a nice combination of what I wanted to accomplish, to be in the creative industry but not part of the creative process,” he told the Financial Times in 2016. He introduced the kando slogan, which in Japanese means to trigger emotion. He used the phrase throughout his tenure, for everything from his overhaul of the company’s Hollywood business to its development of a virtual reality headset. Hirai became CEO at the end of a fiscal year with ¥437.1 billion in losses, as Sony struggled against rivals such as Samsung Electronics Co. and Apple Inc. The television business epitomized the trouble: Once an industry leader with its Trinitron technology, Sony had lost ¥714 billion on TVs in the previous eight years. The next year, activist investor Daniel Loeb pressed Hirai to step up the pace of change. Loeb’s Third Point hedge fund proposed Sony sell part of its entertainment business in an initial public offering to impose more discipline. Hirai resisted. Then in 2014, hackers broke into the computer systems of Sony’s entertainment division, revealing embarrassing internal correspondence and health details of employees and their children. The U.S. authorities ultimately said North Korea was responsible for the attack, perhaps in retaliation for the Seth Rogen comedy “The Interview.” Still, Hirai fought through the troubles. He elevated Yoshida to chief financial officer in 2014 and together they methodically worked through Sony’s many issues. By cutting back in smartphones and TVs and steadily investing in promising new ventures, the company’s finances began to improve. Sony made a small profit in the 2014 fiscal year and has boosted net income steadily since. One important wager Hirai made was heavy investment in image sensors, critical components for the cameras used in increasing numbers in smartphones. His bet on the PlayStation business paid off. He also tried to rekindle Sony’s entrepreneurial strength, introducing an internal accelerator program in 2014 that let employees pitch new ideas. Results on that front have been mixed. Still, when Hirai handed over the CEO post in April of last year, Sony posted a fiscal year operating profit of ¥734.9 billion. “Hirai established a good foundation for the business,” said Yoshiharu Izumi, an analyst with SBI Securities Co Ltd. “He should be appreciated.” Nevertheless, Hirai leaves as Sony is in need of another revival. With fewer games in store for the aging PlayStation 4 and its Xperia phone business bleeding money, CEO Yoshida will have to prove that the turnaround can continue. The mobile division had an operating loss of ¥15.5 billion during the December quarter, the fourth straight unprofitable period. Yoshida has so far rebuffed pressure to sell off the unit. The PS4, headed for its sixth year, is one of the best-selling consoles in history. But this year’s software lineup is smaller than the record-setting 2018, mostly focused on a pair of zombie titles. Even the camera chips business is seeing an impact from slowing global demand for smartphones. Operating profit in chips fell 23 percent to ¥46.5 billion in the most recent quarter. “He stepped off at the very best time,” said author Tateishi. “If you ask if what he left is sustainable, that’s questionable.”
|
sony;electronics
|
jp0001661
|
[
"world",
"social-issues-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Migrants rescued off Libya by tanker apparently hijack the ship, force it to head toward Europe
|
VALLETTA - Migrants hijacked a cargo ship in Libyan waters Wednesday and forced the crew to redirect the vessel north to Europe, according to Italian and Maltese authorities. As the vessel headed in a direction leading to the island nation of Malta and Italy’s shores, both countries vowed to keep the hijacked ship out of their territorial waters. Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini identified the ship as the Turkish oil tanker El Hiblu 1 and said the crew had earlier rescued migrants in the Mediterranean Sea. He put the number of migrants on board at around 120 and described what was happening as “the first act of piracy on the high seas with migrants that hijacked” a cargo ship. “Poor castaways, who hijack a merchant ship that saved them because they want to decide the route of the cruise,” Italian news agency ANSA quoted Salvini saying with sarcasm. A Maltese special operations team seized the tanker Thursday and returned control to the captain. The migrants would be turned over to police for investigation, armed forces said. Italian media reports said the ship was heading to Libya to drop off the group that was rescued when migrants seized control near the Libyan coast. A private group that operates a rescue ship and monitors how governments treat migrants, Mediterranea Saving Humans, urged compassion for the group on the hijacked vessel and said it hoped European countries would act “in the name of fundamental rights, remembering that we are dealing with human beings fleeing hell.” The Armed Forces of Malta said military personnel were standing by and the tanker still was in Libyan territorial waters as of early Wednesday night. A Maltese military official told Maltese media the ship was carrying 108 migrants. The official was not authorized to speak to reporters and requested anonymity. The official also said Malta would not allow the ship to enter the country’s waters. Salvini said weather conditions were not good and it was too early to tell if the ship was being directed toward Malta or Italy’s Lampedusa island. But he had a message for the pirates: “Forget about Italy.” Mass migration to Europe has dropped sharply since 2015, when the continent received 1 million refugees and migrants from countries in the Middle East, Asia and African. The surge created a humanitarian crisis in which desperate travelers frequently drowned and leading arrival spots such as Italy and Greece struggled to house large numbers of asylum-seekers. Along with the dangerous sea journey itself, those who attempt to cross the Mediterranean risk being stopped by Libya’s coast guard and held in Libyan detention centers that human rights groups have described as bleak places where migrants allegedly suffer routine abuse. European Union member countries, responding to domestic opposition to welcoming immigrants, have decided to significantly downscale an EU operation in the Mediterranean, withdrawing their ships and continuing the mission with air surveillance only. EU officials on Wednesday lamented the move, while Amnesty International reiterated its view that Europe’s collaboration with Libya to stem migration was a human rights outrage. EU members “alert the Libyan coast guard when refugees and migrants are spotted at sea so they can be taken back to Libya, despite knowing that people there are arbitrarily detained and exposed to widespread torture, rape, killings and exploitation,” Matteo de Bellis, an international migration researcher for Amnesty. “This shameful decision has nothing to do with the needs of people who risk their lives at sea, but everything to do with the inability of European governments to agree on a way to share responsibility for them.”
|
italy;eu;libya;migrants;malta;hijack;matteo salvini
|
jp0001662
|
[
"world",
"social-issues-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Despair and anger as Venezuelans endure paralyzing blackout, food rots and water disappears
|
CARACAS - Venezuelans wavered between despair and rage Wednesday as they endured a third day of a near-nationwide blackout that has paralyzed their country — the second such outage this month. “Food stocks are starting to rot. There’s no water. The transport virtually doesn’t work. There’s no means of communication,” said Nestor Carreno, who was forced to shutter his pizzeria in a formerly upscale district of Caracas. “I don’t know how my family is doing. Insecurity is growing.” A cacophony of saucepans being banged out of windows and car horns in the street has been heard in the capital since the start of the vast outage. Memories of the first, which started on March 7 and lasted a week — forcing citizens to seek water from rivers and sewage outflows as pumps came to a halt — fed the anguish. Many residents stocked up on food and water. The government of President Nicolas Maduro, which blamed the blackouts on U.S. “cybernetic” attacks and opposition “sabotage” and “terrorism,” decreed the closure of public offices and schools until Wednesday night. Communications Minister Jorge Rodriguez said a new power cut Wednesday had plunged some parts of Caracas and other regions into the darkness once again, shortly after electricity had been restored. He said work was continuing to fix “equipment damaged by the terrorism.” The outage was affecting 21 of Venezuela’s 23 states, according to users on social media. The government has given no official information on its scale. Juan Guaido, the opposition leader whom the U.S. and many of its allies recognize as the country’s interim president over Maduro, called for a national protest on Saturday over “the lack of public services.” “The light has gone, we can’t remain passive actors,” Guaido told supporters. He has rejected the government allegations that the opposition was behind the latest blackout as “lies.” Caracas resident Mildred Tejeras, 48, explained the daily hardships. “You don’t know if you’ll be able to get back home if you’ve gone out to look for something to eat or, now, power or water. We are living through the worst that you can live through in Venezuela,” she said. Power cuts have become frequent in Venezuela over the past few years, underlining the long slide into crisis that the country, once South America’s wealthiest, has experienced. But this month’s blackouts were unprecedented in scale. Experts calculate they cost Venezuela’s economy $200 million per day. In both cases, the government said they were caused by disruptions at the country’s main power plant, the Guri hydroelectric dam on the Orinoco river in the south that supplies 80 percent of Venezuelans. Outside of the anxiety and political exchanges over the blackout, the presence of Russian troops in Venezuela has made the climate more febrile. “It seems (Maduro’s government) doesn’t trust its own troops, because it is importing others … once again violating the constitution,” Guaido said in the opposition-run congress on Tuesday. Under Venezuela’s constitution, any foreign military mission in the country needs to be approved by the congress. Russia, Maduro’s main ally and one of its biggest creditors along with China, on the weekend sent 100 troops and 35 tons of military equipment aboard two flights to Caracas. Moscow said it was done in “full respect for (Venezuela’s) legal norms” and to head off what it described as a U.S.-organized “coup.” But U.S. President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly warned that “all options” were available to deal with Venezuela, said Wednesday: “Russia has to get out.” He made the declaration at the White House with Guaido’s wife, Fabiana Rosales, at his side. Trump said Maduro and his government “have no money, they have no oil, they have no nothing. They’ve got plenty of pressure right now. They have no electricity.” He added: “Other than military you can’t get any more pressure than they have. … All options are open.”
|
russia;venezuela;poverty;water;nicolas maduro;donald trump;juan guaido
|
jp0001663
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Terror stalks Mali massacre village amid fears attackers will return
|
OGOSSAGOU, MALI - Eleven-year-old Amy raises her left arm to show where a bullet grazed her side, and from deep within her, a boundless distress comes out in great sobs. The girl’s life was plunged into hell on Saturday when gun- and machete-toting men entered her village in central Mali, set to kill everyone from her community, the Fulani. “Our fear here is that they will come back and kill all those who didn’t die. We are really afraid,” the child says. Amy says she lost several members of her family in the massacre at Ogossagou, a village in the Bankass district near the border with Burkina Faso. The bloodletting has been blamed on a militia from the Dogon ethnic group — a farming and hunting community that has long been at loggerheads with the cattle-grazing Fulani over access to the land. It is the latest spiral of violence in the ethnic mosaic of central Mali, where ancient tensions have boiled over — stoked, say experts, by the arrival of violent jihadi groups. Homes in the village have been put to the torch, and rotting animal carcasses litter the ground. The stench fills the air. Near a well stands a mound of sand that witnesses described as a mass grave holding about 40 of the estimated 160 people who were murdered. “We hauled four bodies out of this well, including that of a child aged just seven years old,” a health worker said. On the ground were pieces of the Real Madrid football jersey that the child had worn. “We heard gunfire” at around 5 a.m., said cattle farmer Boubar Toure. “The attackers went directly to the home of the village chief,” added Hamadou Belco Barry. Barry said they murdered the village chief in front of his mother, whom they then killed. They then attacked other members of his family, he said. “They threw grenades in — there were men, women and children in them, one of whom was aged less than three,” a tearful witness said, pointing to a mud-walled home. One of the assailants took up a position outside the house and chopped down any who tried to flee with his machete, he said. In another part of the village, traces of black smoke scar the walls of several huts. This was where the village’s marabout, or traditional medicine man, Bara Sekou Issa, was slain along with his family. One of his relatives, who says he survived the bloodbath, stands alongside children in rags, all of them walled in by silence. One of them, wearing an ochre-coloured turban, lost his mother and father, the villagers say. “These children that you see are deeply traumatized,” a local official told AFP, seeking to remain anonymous. “We don’t have any means to look after them.” He points to a 12-year-old boy who, according to local people, has not uttered a word since Saturday. In addition to killing and maiming the inhabitants, the militiamen also torched the village’s slender stores of food, the witnesses said. A woman named Awa, who said she had lost her daughter and husband, reached out for food and bags of water handed out by NGOs. In the aftermath of the attack, Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita came to the village and vowed to bring security and enforce justice. A short while later, the authorities said they had arrested a “wounded assailant.” “Everyone knows the attackers, but no one wants to tell the truth,” a spokesman for the villagers, Ahmadou Barry, said. A Dogon hunters’ association, Dan Nan Ambassagou, has been accused of the atrocity by the villagers — a charge it denies — and was dissolved by the authorities on Sunday. The UN is sending a 13-member team to investigate, including crime-scene experts, while the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Fatou Bensouda, has vowed to do her utmost to bring the perpetrators to justice.
|
mali;terrorism;islam;mass murder;ibrahim boubacar keita;dogon
|
jp0001664
|
[
"world",
"science-health-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
U.S. jury says Bayer must pay $80 million to man in Roundup cancer trial
|
SAN FRANCISCO/NEW YORK - A U.S. jury on Wednesday awarded $80 million to a man who claimed his use of Bayer AG’s glyphosate-based weed killer Roundup caused his cancer, in the latest legal setback for the company facing thousands of similar lawsuits. The jury in San Francisco federal court said the company was liable for plaintiff Edwin Hardeman’s non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. It awarded $5 million in compensatory damages and $75 million in punitive damages to Hardeman after finding that Roundup was defectively designed, that Monsanto failed to warn of the herbicide’s cancer risk and that the company acted negligently. Bayer bought Roundup maker Monsanto last year for $63 billion. The company in a statement on Wednesday said it was disappointed with the jury’s decision and that it would appeal the verdict. “This verdict does not change the weight of over four decades of extensive science and the conclusions of regulators worldwide that support the safety of our glyphosate-based herbicides and that they are not carcinogenic,” Bayer said. The trial is only the second of more than 11,200 Roundup lawsuits set to go to trial in the United States. Previous litigation setbacks and a prior jury verdict against the company have sent Bayer shares plunging. The verdict comes after the same jury on March 19 found Roundup to have been a “substantial factor” in causing Hardeman’s cancer, allowing the trial to proceed to a second phase to determine liability and damages. Bayer shares fell more than 12 percent after last week’s jury finding. In the trial’s second phase, Hardeman’s lawyers were able to present previously excluded internal documents allegedly showing the company’s efforts to influence scientists and regulators about the widely-used product’s safety. Lawyers for Hardeman were seen by a Reuters reporter cheering in the elevator outside the courtroom after the verdict was announced. “As demonstrated throughout trial, since Roundup’s inception over 40 years ago, Monsanto refuses to act responsibly,” Hardeman’s lawyers said in a statement, adding that the company instead focused on “manipulating public opinion and undermining anyone who raises genuine and legitimate concerns about Roundup.” After the verdict, Hardeman told reporters he was “overwhelmed.” “It hasn’t sunk in yet,” he said. Hardeman’s case was considered a bellwether trial to help determine the range of damages and define settlement options for the more than 760 other federal cases pending in the same court before U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria. In the first trial phase of Hardeman’s case, the jury deliberated for more than four days before finding Roundup responsible for the man’s cancer. Bayer on Wednesday said that was an indication that jurors were “very likely divided over the scientific evidence.” The company said its appeal would focus on legal rulings by Chhabria, who allowed some of Hardeman’s scientific experts to testify despite calling plaintiffs’ expert opinions “shaky” in a 2018 ruling. But legal experts have noted that the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which oversees the San Francisco federal court, has generally been permissive in allowing expert testimony. Monsanto’s Roundup was the first to contain glyphosate, the world’s most widely used weed killer. But it is no longer patent-protected and many other versions are available. Bayer does not provide sales figures for the product. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the European Chemicals Agency and other regulators have found that glyphosate is not likely carcinogenic to humans. The World Health Organization’s cancer arm in 2015 reached a different conclusion, classifying glyphosate as “probably carcinogenic to humans.” In the first U.S. Roundup trial, another California man was awarded $289 million in August after a state court jury found Roundup caused his cancer. That award was later reduced to $78 million and is on appeal. Hardeman’s case featured a significant difference from that trial after Chhabria decided to split cases before him into two phases: one to decide causation on purely scientific grounds, the other to determine Bayer’s potential liability and damages only if the jury first ruled that the weed killer was a substantial factor in causing cancer. That decision had been seen as beneficial to Bayer. Legal experts said the jury’s verdict in the first phase of the Hardeman case was a significant setback, narrowing the company’s legal options going forward. Chhabria has scheduled another bellwether trial for May and a third trial is likely to also take place this year. All three will be split into causation and liability phases. Bayer is also scheduled to face another Roundup trial in California state court beginning on March 28 and at least two trials in Missouri state court in the fall.
|
courts;cancer;monsanto;herbicides;roundup;bayer
|
jp0001665
|
[
"world",
"crime-legal-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Republicans, for third time in a week, block effort seeking Robert Mueller report release
|
WASHINGTON - For the third time in a week, U.S. Senate Republicans on Wednesday blocked a measure calling for special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on Russian election interference to be publicly released. Amid the squabble over the timing and scope of the release, a senior Republican senator assured that Attorney General Bill Barr will release the special counsel’s findings in a matter of “weeks, not months.” The Republican-led upper chamber has faced mounting pressure to align with a measure from the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives that seeks swift release of the full report to Congress and the American people. Senate Democrat Diane Feinstein took to the Senate floor asking for unanimous consent to pass the non-binding resolution, which cleared the House in mid-March by 420 to 0. “The fact is that a four-page summary can not possibly illuminate what this thorough of an investigation uncovered,” said Feinstein, referring to Barr’s summary description of the report. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell objected, stressing the need for Mueller and Barr to review the report and determine what can be publicly released and what must be redacted. “I think we should be consistent in letting the special counsel actually finish his work, and not just when we think it may be politically advantageous to one side of the other for him to do so,” he said. Mueller and his team spent 22 months investigating Russia’s meddling in the 2016 U.S. election, and possible connections between team Trump and Moscow. While he found there was conclusive evidence that Russia influenced the vote, Barr in his summary cleared Trump and his team of any collusion with Russia regarding election interference. Two previous efforts by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to advance the House measure were also blocked, actions the top Democrat denounced on the Senate floor Wednesday. “When we read reports that Barr only wants to release a summary, and Leader McConnell is unsupportive of transparency, something doesn’t smell right,” Schumer said. Senate Judiciary Committee chairman Lindsey Graham meanwhile said he met with Barr Monday and the attorney general laid out a path for reviewing the report with Mueller and releasing it. “He’s going to do all that in weeks, not months, he’s going to turn it over to the committee, then I think he’ll come to the Senate, hopefully some time in April” to testify, Graham told Fox News.
|
republicans;robert mueller;democrats;mitch mcconnell;donald trump;diane feinstein;russia probe
|
jp0001666
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Israeli spelunkers say salt cave running through Mount Sodom into Dead Sea is world's longest
|
MOUNT SODOM, ISRAEL - Israeli cave explorers said Thursday that a salt cave with striking stalactites near the Dead Sea is the world’s longest, beating the record-holder in Iran. The cave, named Malham, stretching over 10 kilometers (6.25 miles), runs through Mount Sodom, Israel’s largest mountain, and spills out to the southwest corner of the adjacent Dead Sea. Pale salt stalactites hang from the ceilings, and some of the walls sparkle with salt crystals. Drops of salty water are visible at the tips of some of the stalactites. Malham became known to researchers through the work of Amos Frumkin, founder and director of Hebrew University’s Cave Research Center, who in the 1980s mapped around 5 kilometers (3 miles) of it. But in 2006, researchers mapped over 6 kilometers of the N3 cave in southern Iran’s Qeshm Island, granting it the widely recognized status of the world’s longest salt cave. Two years ago, Israeli spelunker Yoav Negev decided to complete Frumkin’s work, reaching out to Bulgarian cave explorers for reinforcements with the promise of a warm winter adventure. Negev, the founder of the Israel Cave Explorers Club, joined forces with Boaz Landford, a researcher at the university’s research center, to organize a delegation of eight European spelunkers and another 20 locals. They spent some 10 days mapping the cave in 2018. A second 10-day expedition in 2019 with 80 local and international spelunkers completed the measuring and mapping of the cave with lasers, determining its length at over 10 kilometers. Mount Sodom is essentially a huge salt block covered by a thin but resilient layer of cap rock. The rare desert rains that find their way through cracks in the cap rock dissolve the salt to form small caves that flow down toward the Dead Sea. Even in the short period of time since Frumkin’s mapping, the cave’s structure has changed, and will continue to do so. Much of the cave’s interior is covered by a fine dust that blows in from the desert. Massive slabs of salt, some amber-colored from dust and minerals, jut out to form dramatic installations. A thin slab appearing to have been sliced out is nicknamed “The Guillotine,” while twin slabs in a different hall earned the title of “The Ten Commandments.” Reporters touring the site clambered and crawled through the narrow passages before reaching the “Wedding Hall,” where hundreds of white stalactites of various shapes and lengths create a festive backdrop. To Negev, Malham is in “a category of its own.” “There’s nothing like it in Israel,” he said, claiming that no other cave comes close to the 10-kilometer mark. Negev pointed to its vast network of “caverns, passageways, piers, plateaus — one over another.” He called it “the most impressive and complex in Israel . . . and one of the most beautiful and fascinating ones I’ve been in.” Negev downplayed the significance of retaking the title from Iran — Israel’s main enemy — saying he has “excellent ties” with Iranian spelunkers through social media and professional conferences. “The political rivalry creates a desire to connect and mutual curiosity,” he said. “They’re really excellent spelunkers.” “I wish I could visit there,” he said of Iran and its caves.
|
israel;records;geology;dead sea;caves
|
jp0001667
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Determined to deliver Brexit, May puts her job on the line if Parliament OKs her deal
|
LONDON - Faced with losing all control over the Brexit process, British Prime Minister Theresa May has made one final, desperate move: hinting she will step down if MPs approve her Brexit deal. The Conservative leader has faced growing calls to resign over the political crisis that has gripped Britain for months, and which forced her to ask the EU last week to delay Brexit by a fortnight. With many MPs now pressing for a longer extension or even to reverse the whole process, May has made one last attempt to secure support for the divorce deal she has struck with Brussels. She told MPs in her party on Wednesday evening that she would not “stand in the way” of new leadership for the “second phase of Brexit negotiations” — without spelling out when exactly this would be. May has in the past won praise for her determination and ability to survive an extraordinary period of political turmoil since the Brexit vote. But her approach to the endgame — refusing to accept that MPs did not like her deal and delaying Brexit to keep trying to push it through — has prompted frustration and anger on all sides. She has all but lost control of her government, with ministers from both the pro- and anti-Brexit camps joining scores of Conservative MPs in defying the government in parliamentary votes. This weekend, after another humiliating Brussels summit, British newspapers were full of reports of moves by her colleagues to oust her. The Conservative-supporting Spectator magazine suggested May was the “worst prime minister in our history,” condemning her “lack of imagination, inability to lead a team or solve complex problems. Her former director of communications, Katie Perrior, wrote in The Times newspaper that May was “a passenger at the time when the country needed a rally driver. Top selling tabloid The Sun praised May’s “remarkable resilience in the face of repeated humiliations,” but said it was “time to move on.” Despite having campaigned to stay in the EU, May embraced the cause once she took office with the mantra “Brexit means Brexit. Her promise to leave the EU’s institutions and end free movement of workers delighted euroskeptic MPs, but caused dismay among many pro-Europeans. The splits in her Conservative party became a serious problem after a disastrous snap election in June 2017, when May lost her parliamentary majority. She was forced to strike a deal with Northern Ireland’s pro-Brexit Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), and since then has struggled to keep her party and its allies together. Naturally reserved and reliant on her husband, Philip, and a few close aides, May says she is just quietly “getting on with the job. But in the last election, she struggled to engage with voters and was dubbed the “Maybot” after churning out the same answers and speeches over and over again. May’s legacy from her previous role as interior minister has also been called into question in recent months, with growing criticism of her crackdown on irregular migration. The question now is whether May’s gamble succeeds — and who might succeed her. May has faced repeated challenges since taking office, with figures such as former foreign minister Boris Johnson constantly challenging her authority. But she won a leadership challenge within her own party in December, even if she had to promise to quit before the next scheduled election in 2022. May’s critics are hampered by their own divisions, and have so far failed to unite behind a rival candidate.
|
eu;u.k. parliament;brexit;theresa may
|
jp0001668
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Theresa May offers to quit and MPs vote on eight other Brexit options, but still no end to stalemate
|
LONDON - British Prime Minister Theresa May failed to sway hard-line opponents of her European Union divorce deal on Wednesday with an offer to quit, and Parliament’s bid to agree on an alternative fell short, leaving the Brexit process as deadlocked as ever. May told her Conservative lawmakers she would step down if her Brexit deal was finally passed by Parliament at the third attempt, in a last-ditch bid to win over many of her party’s euroskeptic rebels. But some were unmoved, and the Northern Irish party crucial to getting the agreement through said it would reject the deal again. Britain was supposed to leave the bloc on Friday, but Brussels agreed last week to put back the divorce date until April 12 to give London a chance to resolve the three-year crisis, which has split the country down the middle. However, it still remains uncertain how, when or even whether the United Kingdom, the world’s fifth-biggest economy, will leave the EU. The possibilities that it will leave with no deal to soften the shock to its economy, or delay the departure date to hold a general election, have increased as other options fade. While May’s deal continued to stumble, an attempt by Parliament to take control of the process by holding a series of indicative votes on other options produced no immediate way through the impasse. None of the proposals, many of which involved closer alignment with the EU than May envisages, won the support of a majority of lawmakers. “In a spectacular display of indecision, the House of Commons has voted against remaining in the EU and every version of leaving the EU,” tweeted James Cleverly, the Conservative Party’s deputy chairman. Some proposals fared better than May’s deal did two weeks ago. Parliament is to hold more indicative votes on Monday after refining the options most likely to secure a majority. Many Conservative euroskeptics had made clear they would only consider supporting May’s deal if she gave a firm commitment to resign, hoping a new leader would be more sympathetic to their views when negotiating the terms of Britain’s future relationship with the EU. “I have heard very clearly the mood of the parliamentary party,” May told a meeting of Tory lawmakers. “I know there is a desire for a new approach — and new leadership — in the second phase of the Brexit negotiations — and I won’t stand in the way of that.”But within hours of May’s offer, the Democratic Unionist Party, which props up her minority government, said it would vote against the deal if May brought it back a third time. “We’re in a situation where we cannot sign up to the Withdrawal Agreement,” DUP leader Arlene Foster said. The government gave itself the option of bringing May’s deal back to Parliament on Friday, although Speaker John Bercow repeated his warning that he would not allow a third vote unless the motion had changed substantially since its last defeat. May, who voted to remain in the EU in the 2016 referendum, had already promised to step down before the next election, due in 2022. Her deal, defeated in Parliament by 149 votes on March 12 and by 230 votes on Jan. 15, means Britain would leave the EU single market and customs union as well as EU political bodies. But it requires some EU rules to apply unless ways can be found in the future to ensure that no border posts need to be rebuilt between British-ruled Northern Ireland and EU member Ireland. Many Conservative rebels and the DUP object to this “Irish backstop,” saying it risks binding Britain to the EU for years. To succeed, May needs at least 75 lawmakers to come over to her side. After the ERG met, a spokesman said: “There is no way enough votes are coming out of that room to put the (Withdrawal Agreement) through.” While May was addressing her lawmakers, MPs in the main chamber debated eight other Brexit options, ranging from leaving abruptly with no deal to revoking the divorce altogether. Though there was no majority support for any, the option calling for a referendum on any departure deal, and another suggesting a U.K.-wide customs union with the EU, won more votes than May’s deal two weeks ago. If May’s deal were to pass, her office said there would be a contest to replace her after May 22, when Britain would leave the EU. Most voters think the Brexit negotiations have been handled badly, and recent polls suggest there may now be a slight majority for staying in the EU. Many Conservative MPs say May herself has caused the chaos by not negotiating harder with the EU.
|
eu;u.k .;brexit;theresa may
|
jp0001669
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Who might be the prime minister to inherit the Brexit mess if Theresa May quits?
|
LONDON - British Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday offered to quit if her twice-defeated EU divorce deal passes, in a last-ditch attempt to persuade euroskeptics to back it. Here are some of those who could be in the frame to replace her: Michael Gove, 51 : One of the highest-profile Brexit campaigners during the 2016 referendum, Gove has had to rebuild his Cabinet career after falling early to May in the contest to replace David Cameron, who resigned the day after losing the referendum. Seen as one of the most effective members of the Cabinet in bringing forward new policies, the high-energy environment minister has become a surprise ally to May and has so far backed her Brexit strategy. Gove teamed up with Boris Johnson during the 2016 Brexit campaign only to pull his support for Johnson’s subsequent leadership bid at the last moment and run himself. Betting odds indicate he is the leading candidate to replace May and has a 22 percent chance of being the next prime minister. Boris Johnson, 54 : A former foreign minister, Johnson is May’s most outspoken critic over Brexit. He resigned from the Cabinet in July in protest at her handling of the exit negotiations. Johnson, regarded by many euroskeptics as the face of the 2016 Brexit campaign, set out his pitch to the membership in a bombastic speech at the party’s annual conference last October — some members queued for hours to get a seat. He called on the party to return to its traditional values of low tax and strong policing, and not to try to ape the policies of the left-wing Labour Party. David Lidington, 62 : May’s de-facto deputy prime minister, he supported “remain” in the 2016 referendum and played a key role in David Cameron’s failed renegotiation effort prior to the Brexit vote. Lidington has been touted as a possible interim leader. At the weekend, he said he did not think he had any wish to take May’s job. “One thing that working closely with the prime minister does is cure you completely of any lingering shred of ambition to want to do that task,” he said. Jeremy Hunt, 52 : Hunt replaced Johnson as foreign minister in July and has urged the Conservative membership to set aside their differences over Brexit and unite against a common foe: the EU. Hunt voted to remain in the EU in the referendum. He served six years as Britain’s health minister — a role which has made him unpopular with many voters who work in or rely on the state-run, financially stretched National Health Service. Jacob Rees-Mogg, 49 : A flamboyant millionaire who cultivates the image of an English gentleman from days gone by, Rees-Mogg has developed a cult following among those who want a more radical departure from the EU than May is proposing. Rees-Mogg, the head of the influential ERG euroskeptic group of lawmakers, announced he had submitted a letter of no confidence in the Prime Minister the day after she unveiled her draft Brexit deal. But does he want the top job? Asked immediately after saying he had submitted his letter to depose May, Rees-Mogg said he would not be putting himself forward for the job. Dominic Raab, 44 : Britain’s former Brexit minister quit May’s government last year in protest at her draft exit agreement, saying it did not match the promises the Conservative Party made in the 2017 election. Raab served only five months as head of the Brexit department, having been appointed in July. He was seen as a relative newcomer to the top table of government, but had served in junior ministerial roles since being elected in 2010. Raab campaigned for Brexit ahead of the referendum. Asked earlier this month if he would like to be prime minister he said: “Never say never.” Sajid Javid, 49 : Javid, a former banker and champion of free markets, has served in a number of Cabinet roles and scores consistently well in polls of party members. A second-generation immigrant of Pakistani heritage, he has a portrait of former Conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher on his office wall. Javid voted “remain” in the 2016 vote but was previously considered to be euroskeptic. David Davis, 69 : Davis, a leading euroskeptic, was appointed to lead Britain’s negotiations with the EU in July 2016, but he resigned two years later in protest at May’s plans for a long-term relationship with the bloc. Last month, he told a magazine he would probably be the Conservative Party leader if the role was like an application for a job as chief executive. “But it isn’t. And that isn’t the way the decision is done,” he said. Penny Mordaunt, 46 : Mordaunt is one of the last remaining pro-Brexit members of May’s Cabinet, where she serves as international development minister. Many had expected her to join the wave of resignations that followed the publication of May’s draft withdrawal deal. Andrea Leadsom, 55 : Another pro-Brexit campaigner who still serves in May’s Cabinet, Leadsom made it to the last two in the 2016 contest to replace Cameron. But rather than force a run-off vote against Theresa May, she withdrew from the contest. She currently runs parliamentary business for the government. Amber Rudd, 55 : Rudd resigned as interior minister last year after facing an outpouring of indignation over her department’s treatment of some long-term Caribbean residents who were wrongly labelled illegal immigrants. She could win support from pro-EU lawmakers in the Conservative Party. But she struggled to retain her seat at the 2017 election and has one of the smallest majorities in Parliament.
|
eu;u.k .;boris johnson;brexit;theresa may;michael gove
|
jp0001670
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Trump tells Russia to get troops out of Venezuela, warning 'all options' are on table
|
WASHINGTON - U.S. President Donald Trump on Wednesday called on Russia to pull its troops from Venezuela and warned that “all options” were open to make that happen. The arrival of two Russian air force planes carrying nearly 100 Russian troops outside Caracas on Saturday has escalated the political crisis in Venezuela. Russia and China have backed President Nicolas Maduro, while the United States and most Western countries support opposition leader Juan Guaido. In January, he invoked the constitution to assume the country’s interim presidency, arguing Maduro’s 2018 re-election was illegitimate. “Russia has to get out,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office, where he met with Guaido’s wife, Fabiana Rosales. The U.S. government believes the Russian troops include special forces and cybersecurity personnel. Asked how he would make Russian forces leave, Trump said: “We’ll see. All options are open.” Russia has bilateral relations and agreements with Venezuela that it plans to honor, Russian Deputy U.N. Ambassador Dmitry Polyanskiy said, in response to Trump’s comments. “It’s not up to US to decide actions and fate of other countries. It’s only up to the people of Venezuela and its only legitimate president Nicolas Maduro,” Polyanskiy said on Twitter. Maduro, who retains control of state functions and the country’s military, has said Guaido is a puppet of the United States. Rosales, a 26-year-old journalist and opposition activist, told Trump that Guaido was attacked on Tuesday, though she did not provide details. “I fear for my husband’s life,” she said. She was accompanied by the wife and sister of Roberto Marrero, Guaido’s chief of staff, who was arrested and detained last week. Earlier at the White House, Rosales met Vice President Mike Pence, and told him that power outages and food shortages were hurting children in her country. “They are trying to break our morale. They want to submerge us in eternal darkness. But let me tell you that there is light, and the light is here,” Rosales told Pence. She is slated to meet U.S. first lady Melania Trump in Palm Beach on Thursday on a swing through South Florida, home to the largest community of Venezuelan exiles in the United States. Rosales is also slated to meet with lawmakers on Capitol Hill and members of the Venezuelan diaspora at a prominent Washington think tank. Pence praised Rosales for being “courageous.” “Our message very simply is: We’re with you,” Pence said.
|
russia;venezuela;nicolas maduro;donald trump;juan guaido;fabiana rosales
|
jp0001671
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Hero French pilot in Entebbe hijacking dies aged 95
|
NICE, FRANCE - A French pilot hailed for bravery during a hijacking drama targeting Jews on an Air France flight in 1976 has died aged 95, his son told AFP on Wednesday. Michel Bacos was flying from Tel Aviv to Paris when Palestinian and German radicals hijacked the aircraft, which was eventually flown to Entebbe in Uganda. The former French Resistance fighter earned France’s highest award, the Legion d’Honneur, for refusing to leave the plane and ordering his crew to remain with Jewish passengers who were separated from non-Jews. He died in the south of France where he had been living with his wife for the last 30 years, their son, Eric Bacos, told AFP. The hostages were eventually freed after six days by Israeli commandos, who launched a raid that has since been re-told in multiple documentaries and films as one of the most famous special-forces operations in history. The commandos freed all but four of 105 hostages, with the loss of one Israeli soldier, Yonatan Netanyahu, the brother of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
|
france;benjamin netanyahu;uganda;jews;hijacks;michel bacos;entebbe
|
jp0001672
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Trump administration approved secret nuclear power tech sales to Saudi Arabia, document shows
|
WASHINGTON - U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry has approved six secret authorizations by companies to sell nuclear power technology and assistance to Saudi Arabia, according to a copy of a document seen by Reuters on Wednesday. The Trump administration has quietly pursued a wider deal on sharing U.S. nuclear power technology with Saudi Arabia, which aims to build at least two nuclear power plants. Several countries including the United States, South Korea and Russia are in competition for that deal, and the winners are expected to be announced later this year by Saudi Arabia. Perry’s approvals, known as Part 810 authorizations, allow companies to do preliminary work on nuclear power ahead of the deal, but not ship equipment that would go into a plant, a source with knowledge of the agreements said on condition of anonymity. The approvals were first reported by the Daily Beast. The Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) said in the document that the companies had requested that the Trump administration keep the approvals secret. “In this case, each of the companies which received a specific authorization for (Saudi Arabia) have provided us written request that their authorization be withheld from public release,” the NNSA said in the document. The NNSA and the Department of Energy did not immediately respond to requests for comments. Many U.S. lawmakers are concerned that sharing nuclear technology with Saudi Arabia could eventually lead to a nuclear arms race in the Middle East. Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman told CBS last year that the kingdom would develop nuclear weapons if its rival Iran did. In addition, the kingdom has occasionally pushed back against agreeing to U.S. standards that would block two paths to potentially making fissile material for nuclear weapons clandestinely: enriching uranium and reprocessing spent fuel. Concern in Congress about sharing nuclear technology and knowledge with Saudi Arabia rose after Oct. 2, 2018, when U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. The Part 810 authorizations were made after November 2017, but it was not clear from the document whether any of them were made after Khashoggi’s killing. Rep. Brad Sherman, a Democrat, called on Secretary of State Mike Pompeo during a congressional hearing on Wednesday to release the names of the companies that got the approvals by the middle of April, and Pompeo said he would look into it. Sherman also said the Trump administration has attempted to evade Congress on sharing nuclear power with the kingdom. Pompeo said the administration was working to ensure any shared technology nuclear power would not present proliferation risks. Last month, Democratic House members alleged in a report that top White House aides ignored warnings they could be breaking the law as they worked with former U.S. officials in a group called IP3 International to advance a multibillion-dollar plan to build nuclear reactors in the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia. IP3 did not immediately respond to a request for comment about whether it was one of the companies that got a Part 810 authorization. Separately, the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, has accepted a request by Sens. Marco Rubio, a Republican and Bob Menendez, a Democrat, to probe the administration’s talks on a nuclear deal with Saudi, a GAO official who spoke on condition of anonymity, said on Wednesday.
|
u.s .;saudi arabia;nuclear power;rick perry;donald trump;mike pompeo;mohammed bin salman
|
jp0001673
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
U.S. transport chief asks why some Boeing safety features are not required on ill-fated Max models
|
WASHINGTON - U.S. Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao said on Wednesday it was “very questionable” why some safety features were not required on the Boeing Co. 737 Max, ahead of a much-anticipated Senate hearing where leaders in her department will be questioned about two recent 737 Max crashes. Chao stopped short of saying the government would require retrofitting all aircraft with new safety features. “I don’t think we are there yet, but it is very questionable if these were safety-oriented additions, why they were not part of the required template of measures that should go into an airplane.” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, said she was considering introducing a bill that would require “key safety equipment” be included in “basic plane sale costs. … I feel very strongly that key safety equipment should be included in the basic sale price of a plane.” Chao said “it’s troubling that if indeed it was a safety feature that it was not included.” Reuters reported last week that Boeing plans to mandate a previously optional cockpit warning light as part of a software update to the 737 Max fleet that was grounded. That feature might have warned earlier of problems that possibly played a role in the crashes of Ethiopian and Indonesian planes that killed almost 350 people. Boeing is expected to disclose details of its anti-stall software upgrade on Wednesday and confirm plans to make the alert mandatory. At a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing on the Transportation Department’s budget, Chao said the issue will be reviewed by an outside committee and the department’s inspector general. Sen. Joe Manchin, a Democrat and pilot, questioned Chao on why it took the Federal Aviation Administration so long to ground the 737 Max while regulators around the world moved faster to halt the planes. He also questioned why safety features were not mandated by Boeing or the FAA. “It looks like we are following,” Manchin said, adding it was “just wrong” not to require the alert. Chao defended the FAA’s decision-making as a “fact-based” review and decided to ground the planes after it received new satellite data and evidence at the scene. The FAA has said it will review the software upgrade and plans to mandate it by April but has emphasized that it will not agree to unground the planes until it has more details about what led to the March 10 Ethiopian Airlines crash. Sen. Ted Cruz, who will chair the hearing later on Wednesday, said on CNBC, “Another major area of inquiry is the process of certification of the 737 Max to begin with. “Why didn’t this process catch this problem if this was the cause of the accident?” Chao said 1,461 Boeing employees are involved in certification. She defended the FAA’s decision to allow Boeing to perform much of the certification work for the government. U.S. Transportation Department Inspector General Calvin Scovel will testify that the FAA will significantly change its oversight approach to air safety by July 2019. At the same hearing, the FAA’s acting administrator, Dan Elwell, will tell a Senate Commerce Committee panel the agency’s oversight approach must “evolve.” Scovel’s testimony for the hearing first reported by Reuters says that in response to a 2015 inspector general report, the FAA agreed to improve oversight of organizations performing certifications on its behalf.
|
u.s .;congress;faa;ethiopian airlines;elaine chao;737 max;lion air;air accidents
|
jp0001674
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Brazil to privatize some of its most famous national parks starting this year
|
BRASILIA - Brazil aims to begin privatizing the management of its national parks this year, including some of its most famous natural tourist sites, the country’s Environment Minister Ricardo Salles said on Wednesday. The government aims to privatize as many as possible, he said. Salles listed Foz do Iguacu, one of the world’s largest waterfalls that straddles the border with Paraguay and Argentina, as one of many famous national parks around the country that could be brought under private management. Activists and environmentalists have said they fear right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro, who assumed office Jan. 1, and Salles will roll back environmental oversight in the country in favor of economic development. On the campaign trail, Bolsonaro criticized fines for environmental infractions, considered pulling out of the Paris Agreement on climate and at one point proposed that the agriculture and environment ministries be merged. A system to carry out the privatization will be in place “definitely this year,” Salles told reporters following a hearing in Brazil’s Senate. “We’ll see how many we’re able to do. The effort is being made to do the maximum possible without disturbing a process that relies both on an economic model but also on well executed sustainability.” The move would involve privatizing oversight for territories demarcated as “conservation units” that are generally managed by government agency Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation (ICMBio). The institute is named for Mendes, the defender of the Amazon rainforest who was murdered for his work. Salles called Mendes “irrelevant” in a television interview earlier this year. Salles listed Fernando de Noronha island — an exclusive getaway for underwater divers — as well as Pau Brasil, Chapada dos Veadeiros and Itatiaia national parks as also being potential targets for private management. Salles said the Environment Ministry was seeking to create a new body for resolving environmental fines. The structure that Salles called the “nucleus of conciliation of fines” would have the power to authorize, modify or cancel fines as well as reach accords with environmental offenders who confess infractions. Brazilian newspaper Folha de S.Paulo first reported the initiative was under consideration last month. Fines are a key tool employed by environmental agency Ibama to enforce its regulations. The current model, in which it is extremely rare that fines are actually collected, cannot continue, Salles said.
|
brazil;forests;environment;parks;conservation;jair bolsonaro
|
jp0001675
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Global warming blamed as wildfires blaze across unseasonably hot, dry Portugal
|
GONDOMIL, PORTUGAL - Hundreds of Portuguese firefighters struggled on Wednesday to contain wildfires which erupted far earlier in the season than usual because of unexpectedly hot and windy weather. Ten fires were burning across the country, most in the north, several months before the late spring season when fire crews are normally in place. Meteorologists said global warming had made it difficult to predict where blazes would erupt. “We are having significant fire outbreaks in areas where we didn’t know the risk was high,” Miguel Miranda, president of the Portuguese Institute of Meteorology (IPMA), told Portuguese radio station TSF. “We are in unexplored territory, we have never been through this.” Helicopters dropped water on flaming woodlands near the tiny village of Gondomil on Portugal’s northern edge near the Spanish frontier. A firefighter there told Reuters the force was waiting at a wooded area until the weather conditions made it possible to fight the blaze. There were no immediate reports of casualties or figures for property damage. Portugal’s government issued a wildfire alert on Tuesday evening, with no rain in sight and temperatures at the start of the week that soared as high as 28 degrees Celsius (82 Fahrenheit), far above seasonal norms. The weather conditions resemble those that caused a devastating wildfire in the central town of Pedrogao Grande in June 2017, killing 64 people and injuring more than 250, the worst disaster in modern Portuguese history. The government warning prohibits farmers from using slash-and-burn methods and requires employers to authorize absences for workers who serve as volunteer firefighters. Temperatures are expected to remain unseasonably hot, according to IPMA, with the temperature in the northern river city of Porto expected to reach 24 degrees on Wednesday, compared with a March average of 12C. “This meteorological scenario means an increase in the fire risk index from Monday until Wednesday with favorable conditions for the rapid spread of fires throughout the mainland, with high to very high levels,” the Civil Protection agency said on its website. The most aggressive wildfire raged in the municipality of Oliveira de Azemeis since the early hours of Tuesday morning, with 450 firefighters on the ground who managed to bring it under control on Tuesday. In the district of Esposende, also in northern Portugal, a wildfire on Tuesday forced authorities to evacuate two schools due to high levels of smoke. It has since been put out.
|
fires;climate change;portugal
|
jp0001676
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Pentagon warns nations not to 'make it a mess' in space as U.S. studies India anti-satellite weapon test
|
MIAMI - Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan has warned any nations contemplating anti-satellite weapons tests like the one India carried out Wednesday that they risk making a “mess” in space because of debris fields they can leave behind. Speaking to reporters in Florida during a visit to the U.S. military’s Southern Command, Shanahan said the United States was still studying the outcome of a missile India said it launched at one of its own satellites. “My message would be: We all live in space, let’s not make it a mess. Space should be a place where we can conduct business. Space is a place where people should have the freedom to operate,” Shanahan said. Experts say that anti-satellite weapons that shatter their targets pose a space hazard by creating a cloud of fragments that can collide with other objects, potentially setting off a chain reaction of projectiles in Earth’s orbit. India’s foreign ministry played down any risk of debris from its missile test, saying the impact occurred in low-Earth orbit and that the remnants would “decay and fall back on to the Earth within weeks.” The U.S. military’s Strategic Command was tracking more than 250 pieces of debris from India’s missile test and would issue “close-approach notifications as required until the debris enters the Earth’s atmosphere,” Pentagon spokesman Lt. Col. Dave Eastburn said. New Delhi and Washington, which generally have close relations, have been in talks regarding the event, and India publicly issued an aircraft safety advisory before the launch, Eastburn added. Lt. Gen. David Thompson, vice commander of U.S. Air Force Space Command, added the International Space Station was not at risk at this point. NASA chief Jim Bridenstine said in testimony before the House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday that the consequences of anti-satellite weapons tests could be long-lasting. “If we wreck space, we’re not getting it back,” he said, without mentioning India by name. In Islamabad, Pakistan issued a call against military threats in outer space. “Space is the common heritage of mankind, and every nation has the responsibility to avoid actions which can lead to the militarization of this arena,” the foreign ministry said in a statement Wednesday. “We hope that countries which have in the past strongly condemned demonstration of similar capabilities by others will be prepared to work towards developing international instruments to prevent military threats relating to outer space.” India would only be the fourth country to have used such an anti-satellite weapon, after the United States, Russia and China. The United States ran the first anti-satellite test in 1959, when satellites themselves were rare and new. Shanahan noted that given the increasing global reliance on space, it was important to create rules of the road for space. “I think not having rules of engagement is worrisome. So, how people test and develop technologies is important,” he said, adding, “I would expect anyone who tests does not put at risk anyone else’s assets.”
|
india;u.s .;space;military;narendra modi;patrick shanahan
|
jp0001677
|
[
"asia-pacific",
"science-health-asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Chinese rocket startup fails to put satellite into orbit
|
BEIJING - A rocket developed by OneSpace has failed to reach orbit after lifting off from a state launch facility in northwestern China, state media reported Thursday, the second failed orbital launch by a privately funded Chinese firm in five months. An anomaly occurred within “tens of seconds” after OneSpace’s OS-M1 rocket blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Wednesday, the official Technology Daily reported, declaring that the launch had failed. OneSpace’s rocket was carrying the Lingque-1B Earth-observing satellite, developed by Beijing-based ZeroG Lab. The satellite maker, partly funded by Shenzhen-listed Huaxun Fangzhou Co. has plans to build a network of remote sensing satellites. Footage apparently from the launch site that was widely shared on Chinese social media showed the rocket lost control within a minute of takeoff. Tens of private Chinese space companies have joined a race in recent years to develop rockets capable of delivering low-cost micro-satellites with commercial applications, backed by mostly Chinese venture capital. In May 2018, OneSpace became the first private firm to send an independently developed rocket into space. That was followed by successful suborbital launches by another company, iSpace, four months later. The next step was to send a payload into orbit. Beijing-based Landspace attempted to deliver a satellite into orbit in October but failed. The push by private Chinese firms to send a payload into orbit is partly inspired by the recent technological success of U.S. firms, such as SpaceX and Blue Origin. It is also encouraged by the Chinese government. The State Council, or Cabinet, said in a white paper in December 2016 the space industry is an important part of China’s overall development strategy. Beijing encouraged private investors to participate in its push in a bid to commercialize some aspects of the space industry, setting up funds and opening up government launch sites for their use. One of China’s near-term tasks is to develop major satellite systems of remote sensing, communications and broadcasting, and navigation and positioning. President Xi Jinping has made becoming a space flight superpower a priority for the government since coming to office in 2012. The government aims to send a permanent manned space station into orbit by around 2022.
|
china;space;onespace
|
jp0001678
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Anti-satellite weapons are rare, high-tech and risky to test
|
LONDON/NEW, DELHI/ATLANTA - India tested an anti-satellite weapon on Wednesday, saying the indigenously produced interceptor was used to destroy an object in orbit. Such a weapon allows for attacks on enemy satellites — blinding them or disrupting communications — as well as providing a technology base for intercepting ballistic missiles. India, whose space program has developed launchers, satellites and probes to the moon and Mars, created the interceptor used in Wednesday’s test domestically, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in a broadcast on television. Previous tests The United States performed the first anti-satellite tests in 1959, when satellites themselves were rare and new. Bold Orion, designed as a nuclear-tipped ballistic missile re-purposed to attack satellites, was launched from a bomber and passed close enough to the Explorer 6 satellite for it to have been destroyed if the missile had been armed. The Soviet Union performed similar tests around the same time. In the 1960s and early 1970s, it tested a weapon that could be launched in orbit, approach enemy satellites and destroy them with an explosive charge, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit research and advocacy organization. In 1985, the United States tested the ASM-135, launched from an F-15 fighter jet, destroying an American satellite called Solwind P78-1. There were no tests for more than 20 years. Then, in 2007, China entered the anti-satellite arena by destroying an old weather satellite in a high, polar orbit. The test created the largest orbital debris cloud in history, with more than 3,000 objects, according to the Secure World Foundation, a group that advocates sustainable and peaceful uses of outer space. The next year, the United States carried out Operation Burnt Frost, using a ship-launched SM-3 missile to destroy a defunct spy satellite. Debris Debris from anti-satellite tests can create problems for other satellites and spacecraft in orbit, as tiny bits of junk whiz through space many times faster than a rifle bullet. The International Space Station, for example, regularly tweaks its orbit to avoid debris of all kinds. China’s 2007 test is considered the most destructive. Because the impact took place at an altitude of more than 800 km (500 miles), many of the resulting scraps stayed in orbit. The U.S. test in 2008 did not create as much orbital debris, and because it was at a lower altitude, atmospheric drag caused much of it to fall toward Earth and burn up. India’s Foreign Ministry said in a statement that its test was done in the lower atmosphere to ensure there was no debris in space and that whatever was left would “decay and fall back onto the Earth within weeks.” The U.S. Strategic Command, which tracks objects in orbit for the U.S. military, had no immediate comment about Wednesday’s test. Military use Destroying an enemy’s satellites, which can provide crucial intelligence and communications in war, is considered an advanced capability. With Wednesday’s successful test, India theoretically puts other countries’ satellites at risk. Neighboring Pakistan, with which India traded airstrikes last month, has several satellites in orbit, launched using Chinese and Russian rockets. But China, which put dozens of satellites in orbit in 2018 alone, according to state media, could see India’s fledgling capability as more of a threat. India needs to build anti-satellite weapons “because adversary China has already done it in 2007,” said Ajay Lele, senior fellow at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses. “More than anything I would say through this India is sending a message to the subcontinent,” he added. “India is saying that we have mechanisms for space warfare.”
|
india;space;military;weapons;narendra modi
|
jp0001679
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Shadowy group accused of North Korean Embassy intrusion in Spain suspends operations
|
SEOUL - A dissident group accused of breaking into North Korea’s embassy in Madrid said on Thursday it was temporarily suspending operations, after a Spanish judge issued international arrest warrants for two suspected intruders now believed to be in the United States. A shadowy group called Cheollima Civil Defense, also known as Free Joseon, acknowledged on its website late on Tuesday that it was behind the incident but said it was not an attack and that the group had been invited into the embassy. In a statement on its website on Thursday, Cheollima Civil Defense said that while it has “bigger tasks ahead,” it had temporarily suspended work because of “speculative” media reports. “We ask the media to restrain itself in its interest in our organization and its members,” the statement said, noting that the group’s membership includes North Korean refugees, but that it had not recently contacted defectors living in South Korea. A judicial source said on Wednesday that warrants were issued for the group’s alleged leader and another suspect after an investigation by a Spanish court found that they broke into the embassy, tried to persuade an official to defect and then stole computer equipment. The suspected leader has been identified by the court in an official document as Adrian Hong Chang, a Mexican citizen who is a U.S. resident. The other suspect sought in the arrest warrant is Sam Ryu, who is a U.S. citizen of Korean descent. According to the court’s official document, which was made public on Tuesday, Hong Chang is believed to have traveled to the United States a day after the raid and contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation to pass on information about it. It was unclear how the court knew that the man had contacted the FBI, which said on Tuesday it is “our standard practice to neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation.” An authoritative U.S. government source said on Wednesday that the FBI received the names of the alleged embassy intruders from Spanish investigators and was looking into the matter at the request of Spanish authorities. Other Spanish judicial sources told Reuters the two arrest warrants are likely to be the first of several as there were believed to have been ten intruders. The other suspects include South Korean citizens. Lee Wolosky, an American attorney who represents Cheollima Civil Defense, said in a statement on Wednesday that the Spanish court “purported to reach conclusions without any input from representatives” of the group. He said it was irresponsible of the court “to disclose publicly the names of people who are working in opposition to a brutal regime that routinely and summarily executes its enemies.” The U.S. State Department has said the U.S. government was not involved in the raid and did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the Spanish arrest warrants. Three of the intruders took an embassy official into the basement and tried to convince him to defect. They identified themselves as members of a group who campaigned for the “liberation of North Korea,” the Spanish court document said. The document gave a detailed account of the intruders’ movements before as well as during the intrusion, including their stay in a hotel and purchases of knives, balaclava masks and fake guns. The embassy raid occurred shortly before the Feb. 27-28 summit between North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump in Hanoi. The group kept embassy staff tied up for several hours and then searched the premises for arms before leaving, at which point they separated into four groups and headed to Portugal, the document alleged. Hong Chang then flew from Lisbon to New York. His current whereabouts was unknown, the document said. In Spain the High Court has the power to investigate criminal offenses, after which formal accusations are launched.
|
u.s .;north korea;history;espionage;spain;north korea nuclear crisis
|
jp0001680
|
[
"asia-pacific",
"crime-legal-asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Mystery deepens over raid at North Korean Embassy in Madrid allegedly led by 'Oswaldo Trump'
|
MADRID - The mystery over a commando-style assault on North Korea’s embassy in Madrid, allegedly led by man who had an Uber account in the name of “Oswaldo Trump,” deepened Wednesday after a shadowy group committed to overthrowing North Korean leader Kim Jong Un claimed responsibility. A dissident organization known as the Cheollima Civil Defense (CCD) said it had orchestrated the raid carried out on Feb. 22 to end illicit activities rampant in North Korea’s foreign missions. It denied using any violence, saying in a statement on its website that its members were invited into the embassy “and contrary to reports, no one was gagged or beaten.” But the statement contradicts a Spanish National Court report published a day earlier that said a group of people had roughed up employees of the embassy and robbed computers before fleeing. The alleged leader of the group, Adrian Hong Chang, a 35-year-old Mexican who had an Uber account in the name of Oswaldo Trump, contacted “the FBI in New York five days after the assault” with information related to the incident in the embassy, the court added. The embassy raid came just days before a high-stakes nuclear summit in Hanoi between Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump that ultimately failed to reach an accord. The timing has fueled speculation that the assailants were trying to get information on North Korea’s former ambassador to Spain, Kim Hyok Chol, who became North Korea’s top nuclear negotiator after he was expelled from Spain in 2017. CCD said the raid had no links to the Hanoi summit — which ended abruptly with no agreement — and that no other governments were involved until after the event. But it added it had “shared certain information of enormous potential value with the FBI in the United States, under mutually agreed terms of confidentiality.” Hong Chang, who lives in the United States, first visited the North Korean Embassy in Madrid on Feb. 7, presenting himself as Matthew Chao, a “managing partner” at a firm he called Baron Stone Capital, according to the court’s report. He said he was interested in investing in North Korea and asked to meet with embassy’s charge d’affaires. Hong Chang later visited a shop where he would buy the knives and fake guns that were later used during the raid on the embassy before leaving Spain on Feb. 9. He returned to Spain on Feb. 19 via Prague. Three days later a group of 10 men led by Hong Chang broke into the embassy and tied up its occupants and covered their heads with plastic bags. Two members of the group took the charge d’affaires to the embassy’s basement and tried to convince him to defect, which he refused. One embassy employee managed to escape by jumping from a first floor balcony, seriously injuring herself, and managed to call police. When officers arrived at the embassy, Hong Chang — who wore a pin badge depicting North Korea’s leader — opened the door and claiming to be a high embassy representative convinced them that there was no problem. The gang then fled, most of them in embassy vehicles. The following day Hong Chang flew from Lisbon to New York. A police source told AFP that the court had issued international arrest warrants for members of the gang but could not say how many nor if they involved Hong Chang. CCD — which offers to assist people attempting to defect from North Korea — emerged in 2017 when it posted an online video of the son of the North Korean leader’s assassinated brother, saying it had guaranteed his safety. Last month the group declared itself a government-in-exile for the North called “Free Joseon,” using an old name for Korea.
|
u.s .;north korea;kim jong un;spain;fbi;madrid;donald trump;cheollima civil defense;oswaldo trump
|
jp0001681
|
[
"national",
"social-issues"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Government bill on power harassment takes aim at Japan's workplace woes
|
A supervisor berates employees as slackers and incompetents. A president taunts, punches and forces a worker to write a letter of resignation — leading the employee to commit suicide. A whistle-blower exposes an illegal cartel, only to be banished and given mundane tasks to perform for over 20 years. These are real-life examples of workplace harassment — known in Japan as pawahara (power harassment) — that have come to light in Japanese courtrooms over the years. Earlier this month, the Abe administration adopted a draft bill requiring companies to set up protocols for preventing and dealing with abuses of power. If it becomes law, the legislation will take force within a year for big companies and within three years for midsize and small businesses. Bureaucrats say the move shows the government understands power harassment is a serious social problem. Critics say it doesn’t go far enough. How serious is the problem? Power harassment started becoming a major issue over 10 years ago. Complaints to labor bureaus skyrocketed from 22,153 in 2006 to 70,917 in 2016 — up more than threefold. In a 2016 government survey, roughly 33 percent of respondents said they had experienced power harassment in the past three years. How is power harassment defined? In broad terms, it refers to workplace harassment. But in government speak, as defined in the bill, pawahara is the act of causing physical or emotional pain, or demoralizing the workforce by exploiting one’s position. To meet the criteria, behavior has to be considered out of line in day-to-day business. In 2012 the labor ministry listed six examples of power harassment: physical attacks, verbal abuse, deliberate isolation from other employees, making excessive demands, making too few demands, and infringing on the privacy of others. What does the legislation propose? The bill revises a law designed to improve the working environment for women. Among other pending details, the government would obligate employers to properly handle harassment claims, such as by installing counseling and training programs for both workers and managers. Those seeking counseling or involved in a pending case would be protected by law from punishment or dismissal. In addition, employers need to insert clauses on workplace harassment in the company rules and inform all staff of the new policy, said Keiichiro Ueda, deputy director of the Equal Employment Opportunity Division at the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry. But the specific guidelines — including the legal definition of power harassment itself, apparently — will be decided after the Diet passes the bill. “The guidelines would define what constitutes ‘power harassment,'” Ueda said. “The objective is to demonstrate the thresholds and delineate what companies have to do.” Ueda hopes the guidelines to be hammered out will help companies determine whether a complaint should be considered a case of power harassment. Is the draft bill significant? This is the first time the government has weighed in on workplace harassment by proposing legislation, Ueda said. The bill essentially signals the government is committed to dealing not only with workplace harassment, but all types of unwanted conduct, including sexual harassment. “Power harassment is representative of broader social issues,” he said. “This legislation is a starting point for the government to take further action in dealing with harassment.” Megumi Nakatsuji, a labor and social security attorney based in Tokyo, applauded the move. Although several companies have introduced similar plans on their own, she said some remain ill-equipped to process harassment claims. “I think the move was good since the plan covers all companies,” Nakatsuji said. Does the bill penalize firms that refuse to comply? No, the bill does not include any punitive measures, Ueda said. However, the labor ministry official said the government can issue administrative guidance to pressure a company to comply. If that fails to rectify the situation, the government can shame it by releasing its name to the public, he said. But some experts say the name-and-shame approach doesn’t solve everything. Megumi Imamura, another Tokyo-based attorney who has dealt with workplace harassment cases, thinks the legislation is a step forward, though any administrative guidance may not go far enough in prompting companies to modify their working environments. “Most of my clients work in small businesses,” Imamura said. “So there are cases where the top executive is the harasser, so I’m not so sure if an internal counseling office would solve the matter.” Nakatsuji, though, said imposing stiff penalties may not be a solution either. Harassers and companies alike have been found liable in criminal and civil cases. What prompted the government to draw up the bill now? One factor is the government’s overall push for labor reform. Last year, it enacted the work-style reform law to limit overtime to 100 hours per month to promote productivity and prevent overwork. The law takes effect on Monday. This discourse generated momentum for taking up the workplace harassment issue, Ueda said. Another factor is the fact that power harassment has been growing. Nakatsuji said complaints soared as both workplace harassment and public awareness of it grew. Today’s work culture — typified by overwork combined with little support from supervisors and colleagues — may be creating a toxic environment that induces power harassment, she said. Cultural influences may be playing a role as well. Ueda, the labor ministry official, said Japanese companies have been run based on sustained, long-term relationships between employees and management. In an environment like that, employees may feel that it is imperative to obey their bosses no matter how unreasonable their workloads become. Another looming factor that could be cause for friction is diversification, he said. “The workforce in Japan is growing diverse, and with lifetime employment crumbling, not everyone is sharing the same values in the office,” he said. “So there will inevitably be more friction (in such an environment).” What’s next? Ueda said the government’s highest priority right now is to focus on laying the legal groundwork for dealing with power harassment cases. It is also considering initiatives to set up a counseling hotline that would be available at night and on weekends. “The key thing is for people to know what power harassment actually is,” Nakatsuji said. “In a single sentence, it impairs the dignity of people and is nothing but risk and hampers productivity for companies.”
|
labor laws;harassment;jobs;power harassment;mhlw
|
jp0001682
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Bureau head Shoko Sasaki to lead upgraded Immigration Agency when it launches April 1
|
Shoko Sasaki, 57, director-general of the Justice Ministry’s Immigration Bureau, will become the first commissioner of the Immigration Services Agency when it launches Monday, the government said Wednesday. The agency, to be established as an affiliate of the Justice Ministry, will be upgraded from the bureau as the government introduces new types of visas to allow more foreign workers to live and work in the country. The agency will comprise two departments. One of them will deal with immigration control, such as immigration clearance and deportations, while the other will take charge of managing and supporting foreign nationals residing in Japan and preparing an environment for them to live and work in the country. A total of 5,432 personnel will be deployed to the agency, including an increased number of immigration officers. Sasaki joined the Justice Ministry in 1985. She took her current post in January after serving as director of the Entry and Status Division and as assistant vice justice minister. Norimitsu Takashima, 57, director-general of the ministry’s Human Rights Bureau, will assume the role of deputy commissioner of the new agency. Takashima will be replaced at the Human Rights Bureau by Hiroshi Kikuchi, a 55-year-old prosecutor at the Supreme Public Prosecutor’s Office.
|
immigration;justice ministry;shoko sasaki;immigration agency
|
jp0001683
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Kyoto University sits at top of Japanese college rankings for second year running
|
Kyoto University was crowned the best among about 330 Japanese universities in rankings released Wednesday by Times Higher Education, moving into sole possession of first after sharing the top spot in 2018 with the University of Tokyo, which finished second this year. The top nine spots were dominated by national universities, with Tohoku University ranking third, followed by Kyushu University. Hokkaido University and Nagoya University jointly held fifth place. The third annual Japan University Rankings were produced in cooperation with Benesse Corp., an education services company. Unlike the annual global rankings, which focus on quality of research, the Japanese version places importance on universities’ strength in developing student abilities. Japanese universities were judged on four areas — resources, engagement, outcomes and environment. These were quantified by 16 “individual performance indicators” such as resources spent on students, faculty-to-student ratio, scholarly output, research grants and academic reputation. Akita International University, a public university, came in 10th. Known for encouraging study abroad, it was also ranked first for fostering an international environment. Private universities ranked lower. International Christian University was in 11th place, Waseda University was 13th and Keio University was 14th.
|
kyoto university;education;universities;rankings;times higher education
|
jp0001684
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
As Tokyo Olympics loom, Japan needs to fill Takeda's empty seat ASAP, says IOC's Bach
|
LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND - The International Olympic Committee is looking to appoint a new member for Japan soon following the departure of Japanese Olympic Committee chief Tsunekazu Takeda from the global ruling body, IOC President Thomas Bach said on Wednesday. Takeda, who is under investigation in France for suspected corruption and will step down from his JOC role in June, ceased to be an IOC member on Tuesday after a decision by the IOC executive board. He had initially planned to leave that post in June as well. Bach said the IOC board did not want any uncertainty regarding Takeda’s future with Tokyo hosting the Olympics next year. “I think he also wanted to clear the way in the interest of Japan and also of the IOC,” Bach told a news conference, adding that the IOC would like to identify a successor as soon as possible. “Japan not only being the host and a very strong member of the Olympic movement, we are interested in having as soon as possible a member in Japan.” International Gymnastics Federation President Morinari Watanabe is an IOC member from Japan, though his membership is not individual but linked to the presidency of the federation. Takeda’s IOC departure means he also no longer heads the organization’s marketing commission, a key body in securing deals with major sponsors. The 71-year-old joined the IOC in 2012. French prosecutors have questioned Takeda in Paris and placed him under formal investigation in December for suspected corruption in Tokyo’s successful bid to host the 2020 Summer Games. Takeda, who was president of the 2020 bid committee, has been head of the JOC since 2001 and his resignation leaves a cloud hanging over both the national committee and organizers of the Tokyo Games. French investigators have led a yearslong probe into corruption in athletics and in early 2016 extended their inquiry into the bidding and voting processes for the hosting of the 2016 Rio de Janeiro and 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. Multimillion dollar payments made by the Tokyo bid committee to a Singapore consulting company are being examined. Takeda has said there was nothing improper about the contracts made between the committee and the consultancy and that they were for legitimate work.
|
ioc;tsunekazu takeda;thomas bach;2020 tokyo olympics
|
jp0001685
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Japan marked first fall in asylum-seekers in eight years in 2018 amid tougher screening
|
Japan marked a fall in applicants seeking refugee status in 2018 for the first time in eight years amid stricter rules, government data showed Wednesday. The number of applicants fell approximately 47 percent from the previous year to 10,493, with 42 people granted asylum — up from 20 — the Justice Ministry said. Japan saw a sharp rise in the number of asylum-seekers following a reform in 2010 that granted work permits to applicants awaiting government screenings for longer than six months. The ministry, however, introduced a stricter process in January last year, saying the work permit system was “misused” by people who believed they could work in Japan as long as they had applied for refugee status. Asylum-seekers came from 74 countries last year, the ministry said. People from Nepal formed the biggest group, followed by those from Sri Lanka, Cambodia, the Philippines and Pakistan. Applicants from the five nations were down 41 percent from 2017 but still accounted for around 55 percent of the total. The 42 people granted asylum included 13 from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, five from Yemen and five from Ethiopia, the ministry said. One of those granted asylum had been threatened after their father was killed by a militant group in their war-torn country, and another was detained by a militia group while taking part in humanitarian aid activities, according to the ministry. Separately, residence permits were issued for 40 people from countries including Pakistan and Syria, although they were not granted refugee status, the ministry said. The ministry also said a total of 16,269 people were deported from Japan last year, up 19 percent from the previous year, for overstaying visas, engaging in activities other than permitted and other violations of the immigration law. More than 60 percent of the deportees were confirmed to be working illegally, the ministry said. By nationality, the largest group was from Vietnam with 4,395 people, followed by China with 4,185, Thailand with 2,101 and the Philippines with 1,692, the ministry said.
|
immigration;refugees
|
jp0001686
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Hokkaido court convicts ex-gangster, saying drug charge 'provable' without illegal warrantless GPS data
|
ASAHIKAWA, HOKKAIDO - A Hokkaido court convicted a man Thursday of possessing stimulant drugs, but ruled some of the evidence gathered by police using GPS data without a warrant was inadmissible. The Asahikawa District Court sentenced Masayuki Tanikawa, 46, a former gangster, to six years in prison and fined him ¥1.5 million ($13,600) for possessing 61 grams of stimulant drugs. Tanikawa was arrested in the parking lot of a hospital in Asahikawa on May 2017 and police deemed the drugs were for commercial purposes and not personal use. Presiding Judge Hidehiko Sato said the crime was “sufficiently provable” through the evidence obtained through interrogation. Tanikawa’s defense claimed during the trial that data from a GPS device that the police had attached intermittently to the defendant’s car since 2013 and footage from a surveillance camera set up by the police to monitor the garage could not stand as evidence because it had been obtained illegally. Prosecutors argued that Tanikawa was charged based on evidence that the police collected through other means and was not closely linked to the GPS data. They had sought a seven-year prison term and a fine of ¥1.5 million. As for the surveillance camera, the prosecutors asserted its legitimacy, saying that police were monitoring a parking lot adjacent to a public road and were not invading a private area. On the matter, the court sided with the prosecution team. In March 2017, the Supreme Court ruled against warrantless GPS data collection in investigations, saying it violates privacy, and said even investigations making use of GPS devices with a warrant were questionable. In Tanikawa’s trial, prosecutors also said that the investigators had used the GPS device before the top court’s ruling, and they had thought that they were able to conduct such an investigation without a warrant at that time. Following the ruling by the Supreme Court, the National Police Agency ordered all prefectural police to refrain from using GPS devices in investigations.
|
drugs;courts;yakuza;organized crime;hokkaido;gps;asahikawa
|
jp0001687
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Chile agrees to let French investigators question suspect about Japanese student's disappearance
|
BESANCON, FRANCE - French investigators will travel to Chile next month to question a man suspected of killing his Japanese ex-girlfriend, who vanished from her university residence in France in 2016, a prosecutor said Wednesday. Nicolas Zepeda is the sole suspect in the disappearance of Narumi Kurosaki, 21, who vanished in the eastern French city of Besancon on the night of Dec. 4, 2016, after having dinner with Zepeda, her 28-year-old ex. Her body has not yet been found, despite extensive searches of a nearby forested area. Authorities in France believe she was suffocated by Zepeda in a jealous rage. He has denied any involvement in her disappearance. Besancon’s public prosecutor, Etienne Manteaux, said that Chilean authorities had agreed to allow a French team of investigators to travel to Chile to question the teaching assistant, who left France shortly after Kurosaki’s disappearance. Manteaux said the team would travel to Chile “during the second half of April.” Kurosaki and Zepeda met in Japan and started a relationship but later split. She was last seen dining with him in a restaurant a short drive from Besancon, a town in the foothills of the Alps. He has admitted to going to her university residence afterward and claims the pair had consensual sex. Fellow students said they heard terrified cries and banging noises in the residence on that night but no traces of blood were found in her room. Chilean authorities have so far declined to serve an international warrant issued by France for his arrest. Manteaux said they had, however, agreed to let French investigators be present when Zepeda is questioned by a Chilean prosecutor, and that they will also be allowed to ask questions. Manteaux added that he was hoping to convince the Chileans that the evidence against Zepeda was strong enough to bring charges against him, paving the way for France to file a request for his extradition. Manteaux told a news conference in November that Zepeda had bought five liters of flammable liquid and matches at a supermarket days before Kurosaki disappeared and that his rental car was returned covered in mud.
|
france;murder;chile;narumi kurosaki;nicolas zepeda
|
jp0001688
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Record 3,578 involved in cannabis cases in 2018, with rate among Japan's teens up fivefold since 2014
|
Police took action against a record 3,578 people in cannabis cases in 2018, up 570 from the previous year, data released by the National Police Agency showed Thursday. The NPA data showed the figure per 100,000 people doubled from 1.7 in 2014 to 3.5 in 2018, with a sharp growth seen among teens and those in their 20s. An NPA official said, “We are worried that more youths may use the drug without recognizing the hazards.” By age group, the number per 100,000 people came to 6.0 among those aged 14 to 19, a more than fivefold jump from 1.1 in 2014. The figure more than doubled from 5.0 to 12.2 among people in their 20s while it increased from 4.1 to 7.3 among those in their 30s. Of the 3,578 people, 2,928 were implicated in possession of cannabis, followed by 201 in dealing, 152 in cultivation, 138 in receiving and 63 in smuggling. Police said 13,862 people were involved in overall drug cases, with stimulant drug cases topping the list at 9,868 despite a slight decline from the previous year. Cannabis cases came second, accounting for 25.8 percent of the total. The number of people involved in cocaine cases more than tripled from 61 in 2014 to a record 197 in 2018, up 20 from a year earlier. The amount of stimulant drugs seized by police nationwide in 2018 totaled 1,138.6 kilograms, topping 1 ton for the third straight year. That of cocaine jumped to 42.0 kg from 9.6 kg in 2017, while 12,303 pills, including synthetic drugs such as MDMA, were confiscated. The street value of stimulants was ¥60,000 per gram, while that of cannabis was ¥5,000. Cocaine and heroin came in at ¥20,000 and ¥30,000, respectively, according to the NPA. Meanwhile, in a separate report, the NPA said Thursday the number of people recognized as gangsters by police dropped to a record-low 30,500 in 2018 amid an intensified crackdown on organized crime. The total, including yakuza members and those loosely associated with crime syndicates, fell about 4,000 from the year before, marking the 14th consecutive year of decline, according to the agency tally. By group, Yamaguchi-gumi was the largest at 9,500 members, while Sumiyoshi-kai had 4,900 and Inagawa-kai had 3,700, the agency report said. The number of crime syndicate members and associates investigated in crime cases by police reached 16,881 in 2018, down 856 from the previous year. Of that figure, those suspected of violating the Stimulants Control Law accounted for 4,569, while those who allegedly committed bodily harm stood at 2,042. A total of 1,749 cases of fraud were recorded. “It is becoming harder to live as a crime syndicate member amid crackdowns and escalating social exclusion of members,” said an NPA official. But the agency also said it had found yakuza were playing a key role in so-called special fraud cases, including defrauding old people by impersonating their children or their grandchildren and asking for urgent money transfers over the phone. Of the 2,747 people police investigated last year over special fraud cases, 630 people, or 22.9 percent, were members of crime syndicates. The agency said 24 of the 53 people who were recognized as the main culprits in special fraud cases were crime syndicate members, and 58 of the 121 coordinators in those cases were also gangsters. Altogether, police confirmed more than 16,000 special fraud cases in 2018 and the amount swindled exceeded ¥35 billion.
|
drugs;yakuza;marijuana;teens;npa;police
|
jp0001689
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Police took action on record 9,088 domestic violence cases across Japan in 2018
|
Japan continues to see a rise in reported instances of domestic violence, with police taking action on a record 9,088 cases in 2018, the National Police Agency said Thursday, marking the 15th consecutive annual increase since the agency began collecting such data in 2003. The NPA said increased social awareness of the issue is believed to have resulted in a rise in the number of people seeking police consultations, leading to arrests and other actions. The 2018 figure was up 666 from a year before. The NPA said there were 77,482 cases of people contacting local police about domestic violence problems, an increase of 5,027. The police suspect two cases of domestic violence led to murder. In February last year, a woman was killed in a house fire in Himeji, Hyogo Prefecture. Police arrested a man who was living with her on suspicion he poured a flammable liquid over the woman and set her on fire. In August, a woman in Misawa, Aomori Prefecture, was allegedly stabbed to death by her former husband. They worked in the same meat processing plant and the woman had complained to the police about defamatory postings by the man on an internet bulletin board. There were 109 domestic violence cases involving attempted murder, according to the agency data. While about 80 percent of domestic violence victims were women, the number of male victims nearly tripled from 2014 to 2018 to reach 15,964, the agency said. By age, victims in their 30s accounted for the highest proportion at 28.2 percent, followed by those in their 40s at 24.1 percent and victims in their 20s at 23.4 percent. Spouses or former spouses were perpetrators in 76.1 percent of the cases. Stalking cases declined by 161 from the previous year to 2,464 in 2018, while consultations with police about stalking also declined, by 1,523 to 21,556. Police said a tightening of the anti-stalking law is likely to have served as a deterrent. One stalking case resulted in a murder. In November, a Filipino woman was allegedly stabbed to death by her ex-boyfriend in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka Prefecture. The suspect had been warned by police to stay away from her. Nearly 90 percent of stalking victims, or 18,949, were women. Current or former boyfriends or girlfriends accounted for the highest proportion of stalkers at 43.3 percent, while 7.5 percent were strangers. The number of consultations with police regarding so-called revenge pornography came to 1,347 cases in 2018, up 104, according to the agency. Police recognized 253 of them as violations of related laws. Revenge pornography involves a victim that has compromising images of a sexual nature retained, distributed or used as a form of leverage by another person. Women were victims in 93.3 percent of the revenge pornography cases.
|
violence;women;stalking;domestic violence;npa;revenge porn
|
jp0001690
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/28
|
After 34 years and a 13-year jail term, 85-year-old finally exonerated in Kumamoto murder retrial
|
KUMAMOTO - In a retrial held decades after his conviction, a court on Thursday acquitted an 85-year-old man of a 1985 murder in Kumamoto Prefecture. The Kumamoto District Court found Koki Miyata not guilty in the murder of his shogi partner Matao Okamura in Matsubase, Kumamoto Prefecture, more than 34 years ago. “There is no evidence that shows the defendant was the culprit and the court cannot accept he committed the murder,” said presiding Judge Yoshihisa Mizokuni in handing down the ruling. “Years have passed since the (initial) ruling was finalized, and it is appropriate to hand down this ruling as quickly as possible.” Miyata was initially sentenced to 13 years in prison in 1986 over the murder and was only released on parole in 1999. He now lives in a nursing facility in Kumamoto as he suffers from dementia and is bedridden. He did not appear at the court Thursday and was told of his acquittal while at the facility. “We are full of emotions as our efforts over more than 30 years bore fruit,” Makoto Saito, a lawyer representing Miyata’s defense team, said at a news conference. One of Miyata’s sons, Makoto, 60, who was in the courtroom for the ruling, said prosecutors “refused until the end” to accept the contradiction between the evidence and Miyata’s forced confession. “It is regrettable it ended without them offering any apologies,” he said at the news conference. The defense team for Miyata requested that prosecutors abandon their right to appeal the ruling. To open the door for a rare retrial, the team in 1993 approached forensic doctor Yokichi Ono and asked him to reanalyze the victim’s wounds and the knife that was deemed to be the murder weapon. The legal process to seek a retrial commenced in 2012, with lawyers for Miyata submitting a new analysis by Ono to the Kumamoto court that claimed the knife believed to have been used in the attack was incompatible with the wounds the victim suffered. The district court decided in June 2016 to reopen the case, saying doubts had been raised about the credibility of Miyata’s confession, a decision that was upheld by the Fukuoka High Court in November 2017 and finalized by the Supreme Court in October last year. “We were able to have a retrial because lawyers, forensic doctors and everyone else involved thoroughly analyzed mistakes,” Ono said before the ruling.During the first and last hearings of the retrial held in February, prosecutors did not ask for Miyata to be convicted of murder, referring to the top court decision. However, in a separate matter, they did seek a two-year prison sentence for violations of the firearm and sword law, and the gunpowder law. The court sentenced Miyata to one year in prison for those two charges, although Miyata will not have to serve the sentence. Okamura, 59, was found dead at his home in Matsubase — now a part of the city of Uki — on Jan. 8, 1985, and Miyata was arrested later in the month after he initially confessed to the murder. He later denied being involved during his trial at the district court but was convicted of murder and other charges based on his initial confession. Japan has seen a slew of retrials held in recent years, stirring concerns about false convictions. In 2016, a court acquitted Keiko Aoki and her former boyfriend, Tatsuhiro Boku, who spent about 20 years in prison over the murder of Aoki’s 11-year-old daughter in Osaka in 1995. In another case, Toshikazu Sugaya, who spent over 17 years in prison over the murder of a 4-year-old girl in 1990 in Ashikaga, Tochigi Prefecture, was acquitted of the crime in 2010.
|
violence;murder;courts;shogi;kumamoto;stabbings;koki miyata
|
jp0001691
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
Japanese broadcasters call for end to mandatory AM radio due to cost and lack of listeners
|
Japanese commercial broadcasters on Wednesday proposed a revision to the broadcast law that would allow them to ditch AM radio broadcasting due to issues over cost amid a decline in listenership. The Japan Commercial Broadcasters Association asked the communications ministry to implement a system revision by 2028 in order to allow radio broadcasters to focus on FM broadcasting. Under the law, broadcasters are obliged to broadcast on both AM and FM. The request, made at a meeting of a panel of experts at the ministry, reflects the heavy burden placed on broadcasters stemming from updates to facilities and other forms of investment at a time when radio stations’ advertising revenues are diminishing as the number of listeners falls. “It’s extremely difficult for us to renew our facilities while continuing AM broadcasting,” said TBS Radio Inc. Chairman Kiyohiko Irie, who participated in the panel meeting as a representative of commercial broadcasters. He asked for a measure to allow radio broadcasters to convert their AM broadcasting to FM or to maintain both types of broadcasting, according to their own business judgments. Specifically, the broadcasters’ association proposed a test that would halt AM broadcasting in limited areas, possibly in 2023. If no problems arise during the trial, the association would seek the end of mandatory AM broadcasting. Some members of the panel, which is tasked with discussing ways to strengthen commercial broadcasters’ operating foundations, agreed with the idea of ending AM broadcasting, while others were cautious, citing concerns that FM radio waves have difficulty reaching mountainous areas. While AM radio waves reach farther than FM waves, they are more prone to being blocked by tall buildings and tend to have poor reception in urban areas. In addition, AM radio base stations are often built in coastal areas and require investments to protect facilities in the event of tsunami. As a result, 43 of the 47 radio stations making AM broadcasts also have simultaneous FM broadcasts for their AM radio programs.
|
radio;japan commercial broadcasters association
|
jp0001692
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/28
|
A rare breed: Akita dog to be honored for coming to the rescue of elderly woman
|
AKITA - Mame, an Akita breed of dog, will be honored for distinguished service after coming to the rescue of an elderly woman in Senboku, Akita Prefecture, on March 23, police said Wednesday. The 12-year-old dog alerted its owner of trouble in the distance while they were out for a walk around 1 a.m. The dog had discovered a woman slumped on the side of the road, according to police. The woman in her 90s was wearing pajamas and unable to give the dog’s owner her name or address. The owner notified staff at a nearby convenience store of the problem and they called emergency personnel, who brought her to a hospital. The Akita dog and its owner will be given a certificate of appreciation for their efforts on Monday. Noting that such an honor is rarely given to a dog, police commended Mame for dealing with the situation in an appropriate manner and assisting the elderly lady. The area around a statue of Hachiko, an Akita dog that lived in the 1920s famed for loyally waiting for his deceased master for years near Shibuya Station in Tokyo, is now a popular meeting spot in the bustling district. Hachiko’s story and the Akita breed gained further global recognition following the release of the U.S. film “Hachi: A Dog’s Tale” starring Richard Gere. Last year, during a ceremony in Moscow attended by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Russian Olympic figure skating champion Alina Zagitova received an Akita puppy from a group preserving the breed. U.S. author and political activist Helen Keller (1880-1968) treasured the companionship of dogs throughout her life, including two Akita dogs that in the 1930s became the first of their kind known to have been brought to the United States. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also received a dog as a gift from the Akita Prefecture governor.
|
animals;elderly;akita;akita dogs
|
jp0001693
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Era change brings Y2K-like computer dilemma to Japan
|
Companies in Japan have a little more than six weeks to revamp their computer software to respond to the country’s first era change in the digital age when a new Emperor is enthroned on May 1. The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, or METI, is calling on companies to check where they use the Japanese calendar in their computer systems, modify necessary programs and carry out tests to detect potential problems. Eras are how Japan defines its history, so drivers’ licenses, newspapers and a host of official documents use it to mark the years, with 2019 currently referred to as the “31st year of Heisei.” The government will announce on April 1 the name of the new era, which will begin on May 1 in line with Crown Prince Naruhito’s accession to the throne. According to the Information-Technology Promotion Agency, an independent administrative agency, systems using the current Heisei and other era names require program modifications. Software and computer systems incompatible with the era change are expected to cause problems in placing or receiving orders online. Excel and other spreadsheet software may become unable to recognize the Japanese calendar. METI expects companies to conduct not only in-house tests but also trials with their business partners, as unsupported external systems connected online could cause trouble. On Thursday, the ministry said that 20 percent of companies surveyed have yet to check the use of the era-based Japanese calendar in their information systems. In a joint seminar with Microsoft Japan Co. in Tokyo in February, the ministry urged companies to be well prepared for the era change. “You have to be careful as information systems have greatly developed, increased in scale and become complicated, compared with the previous era name change in 1989,” a ministry official told some 200 participants in the seminar. Microsoft Japan has started offering a program to update its Windows operating system and set up a special website to draw users’ attention to the era change and explain necessary procedures. The company is scheduled to provide programs compatible with the new era name in April. “We want users to update programs anyway,” a Microsoft Japan official said. The name of the new era is a closely guarded secret and will be formally announced April 1, kicking off the country’s first Imperial succession in more than three decades. By a coincidence of timing and tradition, a character from the prime minister’s surname is being discussed as a contender to describe the new era. “Peace” has been an enduring theme of era names over the centuries, with the current epoch dubbed Heisei, which can be translated as “achieving peace” and the prior one called Showa, or “enlightened harmony.” The first kanji character of Abe’s surname — an — connotes peace and stability. Still, using the character in the era name could be politically awkward for Abe in tradition-conscious Japan, where the Emperor is viewed as above politics. Any appearance that Abe was capitalizing on the process to burnish his own legacy could raise questions about whether he was overstepping his bounds as he prepares to become Japan’s longest-serving prime minister in November. The name is based on a concept proposed by the top spokesman for Abe’s government, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga, and then reviewed by a panel of experts and the speakers of both houses of the Diet, which Abe’s party controls. The Cabinet gives final approval.
|
internet;imperial family;abdication;reiwa
|
jp0001694
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Forget consumption tax hike and give structural reform another try, ex-economy chief Heizo Takenaka says
|
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe should again abandon his oft-delayed plan to hike the consumption tax this year because it risks pushing Japan’s economy into recession and hampering efforts to generate stable inflation, according to former economy minister Heizo Takenaka. “Of course a sales tax hike would increase the possibility of a recession,” said Takenaka, now a professor at Toyo University. “That’s why managing the economy this year is extremely difficult.” Takenaka added that the focus on raising revenues through the higher tax also misses the point that social security reform must come first. Takenaka’s comments come amid growing concern the economy may be highly vulnerable if the sales tax is hiked to 10 percent from 8 percent in October. In August 2012, the Diet passed legislation to double the consumption tax to 10 percent from 5 percent in two stages. While the government has planned more steps to soften the blow from the tax increase than on previous occasions, the economy has a track record of shrinking after hikes. Economists are already warning that the economy may be contracting in the first quarter as China’s slowdown, trade tensions, and the cooling of global tech demand squeeze growth. Takenaka warned that the Bank of Japan doesn’t have much firepower of its own left to stimulate the economy further should it fall into recession. The higher tax rate would only raise a limited amount of funds for Japan’s ballooning social security payments, given the exemptions for essential goods such as food, and use of the revenue to fund free education and promote cashless payment systems, he said. “The largest problem Japan’s fiscal debt faces is its social security conundrum,” said Takenaka, who served in the administration of former Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi. “Unless you cut out the irrational parts of that and conduct reform, nothing will change, barring a sales tax hike up to something like 30 percent.” Given clear side effects from the BOJ’s easing policy, the government must get on with deregulation that can drive economic growth while it has the opportunity, instead of going ahead with a potentially deflationary tax hike, he added. “Japan shouldn’t be raising its sales tax when the 2 percent inflation goal hasn’t been reached, and Japan hasn’t completely escaped from deflation,” said Takenaka. “I don’t think the prime minister wants to do it either.”
|
taxes;economy;consumption tax;heizo takenaka
|
jp0001696
|
[
"business",
"corporate-business"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Nissan governance improvement panel to release proposals on March 27
|
A Nissan Motor Co. committee tasked with improving the automaker’s governance said Sunday it will release a set of proposals on March 27. The committee, formed after former Nissan Chairman Carlos Ghosn’s arrest in November over alleged financial misdeeds, said it will hold a news conference on that day. The proposals will likely include increasing the number of outside directors on Nissan’s board, according to people familiar with the panel’s discussions. Based on the proposals, Nissan will speed up its process of forming a new management structure. The news conference is expected to be attended by the co-chairs of the panel, Sadayuki Sakakibara, a former chairman of the Japan Business Federation, and Seiichiro Nishioka, a lawyer. Nissan is considering naming Sakakibara as the chief of the board, sources familiar with the company’s reform said earlier. On Sunday, the committee held its fourth meeting in Tokyo since its establishment in December.
|
nissan;carlos ghosn
|
jp0001697
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Black editor of paper that urged revival of Ku Klux Klan resigns in Alabama
|
LINDEN, ALABAMA - A black woman who took over the helm of a small-town Alabama newspaper that recently called for the Ku Klux Klan to “ride again” has stepped down after a few weeks, citing interference from the newspaper’s owner. Elecia R. Dexter told The New York Times on Friday that she stepped down because of continuing interference from the newspaper’s owner who had published the KKK editorial. Dexter said she wanted to maintain her “integrity and well-being.” “I would have liked it to turn out a different way, but it didn’t,” Dexter, 46, told the newspaper. “This is a hard one because it’s sad — so much good could have come out of this.” Dexter last month replaced Goodloe Sutton as editor and publisher of the Democrat-Reporter of Linden. Dexter took over after a firestorm erupted when Sutton wrote and published an editorial that began: “Time for the Ku Klux Klan to night ride again.” The editorial said Democrats and “Democrats in the Republican Party” are plotting to raise taxes, so the Klan should raid their communities. It was one of many incendiary and racially insensitive editorials published by the paper. Dexter’s appointment was heralded as a positive in the small Alabama town. She said she hoped her appointment would let the community know “this is everybody’s paper.” But Dexter told the Times that Sutton, who had retained ownership of the paper, had continually interfered in operations. Sutton did not respond to the Times’ requests for comment Friday. The paper dates to 1879 and its editorials are consistently conservative and often critical of Democrats. The use of “Democrat” in its name reflects back to the period when nearly all white conservatives in the South were Democrats.
|
media;ethnicity;discrimination
|
jp0001698
|
[
"world",
"science-health-world"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Apple Watch may spot heart problem, but more research needed
|
WASHINGTON - A huge study suggests the Apple Watch can detect a worrisome irregular heartbeat at least sometimes — but experts say more work is needed to tell if using wearable technology to screen for heart problems really helps. More than 419,000 Apple Watch users signed up for the unusual study, making it the largest ever to explore screening seemingly healthy people for atrial fibrillation, a condition that if untreated eventually can trigger strokes. Stanford University researchers reported Saturday that the watch didn’t panic flocks of people, warning just half a percent of participants — about 2,100 — that they might have a problem. But even among those flagged, “it’s not perfect,” cautioned Dr. Richard Kovacs of the American College of Cardiology, who wasn’t involved with the study. People who received an alert were supposed to consult a study doctor via telemedicine and then wear an EKG patch measuring cardiac activity for the next week to determine the watch’s accuracy. Some skipped the virtual check-up to consult their own doctors; overall, about 57 percent sought medical attention. Among those who got EKG monitoring through the study, a third had atrial fibrillation, according to preliminary results being presented at an American College of Cardiology conference in New Orleans. A-fib tends to come and go, and a week of monitoring might have missed some cases, said Stanford lead researcher Dr. Mintu Turakhia. But if the watch detected another irregular heartbeat while someone was wearing the EKG patch, 84 percent of the time it really was a-fib, he said. “This study we believe provides very encouraging evidence that a device, the Apple Watch, can be used to detect a-fib and to point out to people when additional monitoring or testing may be needed,” said Dr. Lloyd Minor, Stanford’s dean of medicine. Other cardiac experts said the study, which was funded by Apple, suggests screening with wearable technology might be technically feasible eventually, but needs lots more research.
|
heart disease;apple;smart watches
|
jp0001699
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Slovakian government critic to face ruling party's candidate in presidential run-off
|
BRATISLAVA - Vocal government critic Zuzana Caputova clinched pole position in round one of Slovakia’s weekend presidential election, according to near complete results of the first ballot since an investigative journalist’s murder dealt a blow to the political establishment. The environmental lawyer secured 40.55 percent of the ballot after 99.88 percent of votes were counted, while runner-up European Commission Vice President Maros Sefcovic — the ruling Smer-SD party’s candidate — garnered 18.66 percent, the Slovak Statistics Office said early Sunday. Caputova is on course to become Slovakia’s first female president, as a new opinion poll by the Focus pollster said she would win the run-off vote against 52-year-old career diplomat Sefcovic by a landslide on March 30. The 45-year-old liberal thanked her supporters in the race for the largely ceremonial post, saying “Thank you” in Slovak as well as in the languages of the country’s largest minority groups. Running on a slogan of “Stand up to evil,” Caputova had appealed to voters tired of the country’s main political players and vowed to restore public trust in the state. She was among tens of thousands of protesters who took to the streets after last year’s killing of journalist Jan Kuciak, which shocked the nation and raised fears about media freedom and political corruption. They were the largest anti-government protests since communist times in the central European country of 5.4 million people, which spent decades behind the Iron Curtain before joining the European Union, the eurozone and NATO. “It turns out that we want our country to be decent and fair. Zuzana Caputova is exactly the person who can pull Slovakia out of the crisis,” outgoing President Andrej Kiska said in a Facebook video message after the results rolled in. “Slovakia is on the right track,” added the millionaire who backed Caputova. The president ratifies international treaties, appoints top judges, is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and can also veto laws passed by parliament. Turnout was just under 50 percent. The voting did not go completely without a hitch, as a man ran out with the ballot box at the polling station in the eastern village of Medzany and threw it to the ground, scattering its contents on the street. Caputova, a deputy head of the non-parliamentary Progressive Slovakia party, cast her ballot in her southern city of Pezinok. “Slovakia is at a crossroads in terms of regaining the public’s trust,” she said, flanked by her daughters and partner. • ‘Symbol of change’- Journalist Kuciak and his fiancee were gunned down in February 2018 just as he was about to publish a story on alleged ties between Slovak politicians and the Italian mafia. The double murder and Kuciak’s last explosive report, published posthumously, plunged the country into crisis. Then prime minister Robert Fico was forced to resign but remains the leader of the populist-left Smer-SD and is a close ally of current premier Peter Pellegrini. Four people were charged with the killings. On Thursday, prosecutors said they had also charged multimillionaire businessman Marian Kocner with ordering the murder of Kuciak, who had been investigating his business activities at the time. Kocner is believed to have ties to Smer-SD. “With this announcement, the authorities may have wanted to show just how effectively the state functions so it could help Sefcovic gain some points,” Bratislava-based analyst Grigorij Meseznikov told AFP. “On the other hand, this could also be a vindication for Caputova, as she is the symbol of change.” On the streets of Bratislava, several voters said they were impressed by Caputova’s fresh approach. Project manager Nora Bajnokova, 33, said she backed Caputova because “she is a woman, a mother, a lawyer and not involved in active politics,” while 31-year-old voter Ivan Jankovic called her “courageous and open-minded.” But for 41-year-old security guard Oto, who did not give his last name, only Sefcovic was “serious” enough to be presidential material. “Sefcovic is an experienced multilingual diplomat who can immediately represent Slovakia abroad,” said another voter, Milan Perunko, 54. A sports enthusiast and European Commission vice president since 2014, Sefcovic campaigned on the slogan “Always for Slovakia.” Official results will be announced at noon on Sunday.
|
elections;slovakia;zuzana caputova;maros sefcovic
|
jp0001700
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Yellow vest protest violence flares as demonstrations enter fourth month
|
PARIS - Rioters set fire to a bank and ransacked stores on Paris’s Champs Elysees avenue on Saturday in a new flare-up of violence as France’s yellow vest protests against President Emmanuel Macron and his pro-business reforms entered a fourth month. Police fired tear gas and water cannon as the protests turned violent after weeks of relative calm, during which marches had attracted declining numbers of participants. A Banque Tarneaud branch spewed flames before firefighters arrived and rescued a woman and her infant from the building, with 11 suffering minor injuries, the fire department said. Rioters also set fire to an upmarket handbag store and two newsstands on the Champs Elysees, while scattered bonfires burned on the thoroughfare. Protesters hurled cobblestones at riot police through clouds of tear gas in front of the Arc de Triomphe monument, which was ransacked at the peak of the protests in December. Police arrested nearly 240 protesters as rioters looted stores around the Champs Elysees and wrecked the high-end Fouquet’s restaurant. The canvas awning was later set on fire of the swanky brasserie, known in France as the place where conservative Nicolas Sarkozy celebrated his presidential election victory in 2007. Macron cut short a weekend ski trip in the Pyrenees to return to the capital on Saturday night for a crisis meeting with ministers. “We are attached to constitutional rights, but we’ve got people who through all means quite simply want to make a wreck of the republic, to break things and destroy, running the risk of getting people killed,” Macron said. “I want us to very precisely analyze things and as quickly as possible take strong, complementary decisions so this doesn’t happen again,” he told ministers. Police said 42 protesters, 17 of their own officers and one firefighter were injured. The interior ministry estimated 10,000 people had participated in the protest in Paris, compared with 3,000 on the previous Saturday. Nationwide, protesters were estimated at 32,300, compared with 28,600 last week. Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said that although the protest was relatively small, there had been more than 1,500 “ultra-violent” people out looking for trouble. “They decided, perhaps as a swan song, to come attack — and I use their words — Paris,” Castaner said, adding that more than 1,400 police officers were mobilized. A separate, peaceful march against climate change through central Paris drew as many 36,000 people, police estimated. Some 145,000 people marched nationwide. Yellow vest protesters had promised to draw bigger numbers to mark the fourth month since the movement erupted in mid November over since-scrapped fuel tax hikes and the cost of living. Named after the high-visibility vests French drivers have to keep in their cars and worn by protesters, the revolt swelled into a broader movement against Macron, his reforms and elitism. However, the weekly demonstrations, held every Saturday in Paris and other cities, have been generally getting smaller since December, when Paris saw some of the worst vandalism and looting in decades. After the spike in violence, Macron offered a package of concessions worth more than €10 billion ($11 billion) aimed at boosting the incomes of the poorest workers and pensioners. His government ordered police to crack down on the protests in January, leading to complaints of police brutality. The 41-year-old former investment banker also launched a series of national debates aimed at determining what policies people want the government to focus on. Saturday’s protests coincided with the end of the debates.
|
france;taxes;protests;paris;emmanuel macron;yellow vest
|
jp0001701
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/17
|
New Zealand PM received gunman's 'manifesto' minutes before attack
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said Sunday her office had received a “manifesto” from the gunman suspected of killing 50 people in two Christchurch mosques minutes before Friday’s attack. “I was one of more than 30 recipients of the manifesto that was mailed out nine minutes before the attack took place,” Ardern told reporters. “It did not include a location, it did not include specific details,” she said, adding that it was sent to security services within two minutes of receipt. Ardern said she had read “elements” of the lengthy, meandering and conspiracy-filled far-right “manifesto.” “The fact that there was an ideological manifesto with extreme views attached to this attack, of course, that is deeply disturbing,” she said. She also said Facebook’s chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg, had sent condolences over the shootings, some of which were live-streamed over the social media platform. “Certainly, I have had contact from Sheryl Sandberg. I haven’t spoken to her directly but she has reached out, an acknowledgment of what has occurred here in New Zealand,” Ardern said a media conference when asked if Facebook should stop livestreaming. “This is an issue that I will look to be discussing directly with Facebook,” Ardern said. Facebook said it had removed 1.5 million videos globally of the attack in the first 24 hours after it happened. “In the first 24 hours we removed 1.5 million videos of the attack globally, of which over 1.2 million were blocked at upload,” Facebook said in a tweet late Saturday. The company said it is also removing all edited versions of the video that do not show graphic content out of respect for the people affected by the mosque shooting and the concerns of local authorities. The gunman live-streamed the attacks using an app designed for extreme sports enthusiasts, with copies still being shared on social media hours later. Ardern was joined by Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison in expressing doubts that current rules go far enough. Morrison said that social media companies had “co-operated” since the attack. “But I sadly have to say that the capacity to actually assist fully is very limited on the technology side.” He said “assurances were given” that once such content was pulled down, a regime would make sure it did not go back up. “Clearly it hasn’t (happened). So I think there are some very real discussions that have to be had about how these facilities and capabilities as they exist on social media, can continue to be offered.” The death toll rose to 50 on Sunday when police found another body, and the bodies of some of the victims were to be released to loved ones for burial. It is customary in Islam to bury the dead within 24 hours, but police did not release the bodies immediately because they were investigating. Thirty-five people were in hospitals, with 12 in intensive care. Police did not believe that three other people arrested on Friday were involved in the attack. Two men faced charges unrelated or “tangential” to the attack, while a woman had been released. One person at the second mosque targeted was being hailed for distracting and confronting the shooter, preventing further deaths. Abdul Aziz, 48, told media he heard shooting and ran outside the mosque, shouting at the gunman and drawing him away from the building. Aziz, originally from Afghanistan, picked up one of the gunman’s discarded weapons and threatened the man, who drove off.
|
guns;immigration;new zealand;social media;christchurch;facebook;mass shootings;jacinda ardern
|
jp0001702
|
[
"asia-pacific",
"politics-diplomacy-asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Former Chinese energy chief accused of corruption
|
BEIJING - China has expelled one of its most senior ethnic Uighur officials from the Communist Party, the country’s anti-corruption watchdog said Saturday, accusing the former energy chief of abusing his position to live a “lavish life.” Nur Bekri, who was placed under investigation last September and removed from his post a month later, engaged in “family-style corruption,” illegally accepting property directly or through his relatives, the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said in a statement. China’s anti-graft agency said investigations revealed Bekri — described as “greedy and corrupt” by the watchdog — had demanded luxury cars for his relatives, participated in opulent banquets, accepted expensive gifts from those seeking favors and lived a “lavish life” in violation of Communist party principles. He was also accused of trading power for sex. He has been expelled from the party and his case will be transferred to prosecutors for further investigation, the statement added. Bekri worked his way up in his native Xinjiang, eventually rising to deputy party secretary and government chairman in the far-western region, before being appointed the head of China’s energy administration in 2014. He was also deputy head of China’s state planner prior to his fall from grace, making him one of the highest-ranking Uighur officials in the country. The mostly Muslim Uighur minority populates the restive Xinjiang region, where it faces a draconian crackdown in the name of combating terrorism and separatism. Up to a million minorities are believed to be held in extrajudicial re-education camps in Xinjiang, rights groups say. President Xi Jinping has presided over a much-publicized anti-corruption campaign since coming to power in 2012, which some have compared to a political purge. The energy industry has been a particular target, with several top officials at China’s state-owned oil companies coming under investigation in recent years.
|
china;corruption;xinjiang;nur bekri
|
jp0001703
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Christchurch Muslims struggle with shock and fear
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND - A few months ago, Christchurch’s Linwood Mosque proudly laid down new carpets in its halls. On Friday, the light brown carpets were stained red after an gunman stormed the building, spraying bullets at worshippers. “There was blood everywhere. Everything was out of control,” Ibrahim AbdelHalim, imam of Linwood Mosque, told AFP. Like the wider Muslim community in Christchurch, Egypt-born AbdelHalim is struggling to come to terms with the violence wrought upon worshippers this week as he waits to bury the dead. Working together with the local Islamic community, AbdelHalim had sought to refresh the mosque after a trust bought it over in early 2018. Some of the seven worshippers who died at Linwood were among the most enthusiastic contributors, donating their personal time to help in fundraising efforts. One woman, a local Kiwi, fell down beside his wife when she was shot dead, AbdelHalim said. His wife, Falwa El-Shazly, was shot in the arm but survived the attack. Another man, a Fijian-Indian New Zealander who would regularly bring boxes of food from his restaurant during mosque donation drives, was also killed. “They are dear to me, these are people who offer to us work for free,” AbdelHalim said. “It was a very bad day, not just all of us, all of New Zealand.” At Hedley College, the main meeting centre for the survivors and victims’ families, local Muslims from various ethnic and cultural backgrounds shared wordless hugs and fought back tears as they exchanged news about their loved ones. With Muslims making up just 1 percent of New Zealand’s population, some members of the close-knit community raced to the mosques when they heard about the shootings. “I did not go to the prayer yesterday due to work … but received a call from my friends and rushed to the spot,” Mohammad Kamruzzaman, originally from Bangladesh, told AFP. “Five of (our Bangladeshi friends) are still missing, only Allah knows where they are. We have lost … a guardian lady for our community, who taught children the Quran for free. It feels like we have lost a parent.” Fiji-born Azan Ali, 43, who was in the Linwood Mosque with his Auckland-based father when the attack occurred, trembled when he thought back to crack of the gun shots on Friday. “Will I see my parents, my kids, my loved ones again or not? All the people you pray with, you see beside you…” he added, his voice trailing off. “My kids are scared, you know. You just have to work through it as a community.” His father, Sheik Aeshad, who saw a worshipper shot in the neck, said he could not understand how such violence could take part in New Zealand, a small nation better known for its rolling, green hills and snow-capped mountains. “We never thought in New Zealand, this could happen. New Zealand’s so friendly a place, you can leave your door open and go. But not now,” he added. “I’m thinking what’s going to happen the next time… it could be more people targeting somewhere else.” It was a sentiment shared by Sahra Ahmed, a New Zealander of Somali origin and a nurse active in her local community. Sahra said the attacks showed the South Pacific island nation could not escape the global wave of right-wing extremism. “This is a global movement, for better or worst, it’s happened in all parts of the world. And some people like to import ideas from everyone else. So we’re not immune from what’s happening,” she told AFP. “It doesn’t matter where you go, the world is very small.”
|
religion;guns;immigration;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings
|
jp0001704
|
[
"asia-pacific"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Families of Christchurch mosque shooting victims wait to bury their dead; toll rises to 50
|
CHRISTCHURCH, NEW ZEALAND/WELLINGTON - The death toll in the New Zealand mosque shootings rose to 50 on Sunday when police found another body at one of the mosques as families waited for authorities to formally identify victims and release their bodies for burial. Australian Brenton Tarrant, 28, a suspected white supremacist, was charged with murder on Saturday. Tarrant was remanded without a plea and is due back in court on April 5, where police said he was likely to face more charges. Friday’s attack, which Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern labeled terrorism, was the worst peacetime mass killing in New Zealand. and the country had raised its security threat level to the highest. Footage of the attack on one of the mosques was broadcast live on Facebook, and a “manifesto” denouncing immigrants as “invaders” was also posted online via links to related social media accounts. The bodies of the victims had not been released to families because investigations were going on, Police Commissioner Mike Bush said at a media conference in Wellington. It is customary in Islam to bury the dead within 24 hours. “We have to be absolutely clear on cause of death and confirm their identity before that can happen. But we are so aware of the cultural and religious needs, so we are doing that as quickly and sensitively as possible,” Bush said. Bush said the body of the 50th victim was found at the Al Noor mosque, where more than 40 people died after a gunman entered and shot at people with a semi-automatic rifle with high-capacity magazines, before traveling to a second mosque. One man at the second mosque in the suburb of Linwood was being hailed for distracting and confronting the shooter, preventing further deaths. Abdul Aziz, 48, told media he heard shooting and ran outside the mosque, shouting at the gunman and drawing him away from the building, the Newshub website reported. Aziz, originally from Afghanistan, said he picked up one of the gunman’s discarded weapons and threatened the man, who drove off. Police then rammed the gunman’s vehicle and arrested him. “Those two police officers acted with absolute courage,” Bush said. “They have prevented further deaths and risked their own lives to do so.” Church services for victims of the attack were held around the country, including at Christchurch’s “Cardboard Cathedral,” a temporary structure built after much of the central city was destroyed in a 2011 earthquake. Thirty-four people were in Christchurch Hospital, with 12 in intensive care, and one child moved to dedicated children’s hospital in Auckland. Greg Robertson, head of surgery at Christchurch Hospital said staff were used to seeing gunshot wounds and severe injuries, but the scale and nature of the attacks was different. “The magnitude of this is the thing that is the most significant issue for people. It’s just comprehending what is the incomprehensible.” At Hagley College, a school across the park from the Al Noor mosque, a support centre was set up with a stream of victims’ friends and relatives arriving. One woman carried sandwiches and falafel. A student, who asked not to be identified, said a friend had been killed. “He was studying to be a pilot and we saw him for morning classes. Then he went to the mosque as usual. And we are not hearing from him,” he said. “I got a call last night from a friend, around midnight, to say he has passed away.” The majority of victims were migrants or refugees from countries such as Pakistan, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Turkey, Somalia and Afghanistan. Pakistan’s high commissioner said six citizens had been killed and three were missing. Bush said police did not believe that three other people arrested on Friday were involved in the attack. Two men faced charges unrelated or “tangential” to the attack, while a woman had been released, he said. Tarrant did not have a criminal history and was not on any watch lists in New Zealand or Australia. In a manifesto circulating online, Tarrant described himself as “Just a ordinary White man, 28 years old” who used the spoils of cryptocurrency trading to finance extensive travels through Europe from 2016 to 2018. Ardern said Tarrant was a licensed gun owner who allegedly used five weapons, including two semi-automatic weapons and two shotguns, which had been modified. “I can tell you one thing right now, our gun laws will change,” Ardern told reporters on Saturday, saying a ban on semi-automatic weapons would be considered. New Zealand has in the past tried to tighten firearm laws, but a strong gun lobby and culture of hunting has stymied such efforts. There are an estimated 1.5 million firearms in New Zealand, which has a population of only 5 million, but it has had low levels of gun violence.
|
guns;immigration;australia;new zealand;christchurch;mass shootings;brenton tarrant
|
jp0001706
|
[
"national",
"science-health"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Safety-minded Tokyo bracing for Olympic contingencies of all kinds
|
Cyberattacks, terrorism, earthquakes and heat waves: Tokyo’s Olympic organizers are hoping for the best but bracing for the worst as they make contingency plans for potential catastrophes during the games. Clean and orderly Tokyo has been spared from the terror attacks seen in many Western cities in recent years and is considered a relatively safe bet for the games: It is often ranked as low-risk by insurance and risk-management firms. But that security goes out of the window when it comes to hosting the Greatest Show on Earth, says Shiro Kawamoto, a counterterrorism expert and professor of risk management at Nihon University. “Tokyo’s safeness in normal times cannot be taken for granted during the Olympics when the world’s attention is on it,” Kawamoto said. So Tokyo is pulling out all the technological stops to bolster safety. In an Olympic first, for example, it is introducing a facial recognition system for games volunteers. Organizers are also bracing for a cyberattack similar to the one that blighted the opening ceremony of the 2018 Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, where internet and Wi-Fi access were brought down. “We are preparing on the assumption there will be a cyberattack,” said senior government official Kenji Endo, one the people in charge of Tokyo 2020 preparations. The government has set up an elite unit of police and Defense Ministry experts to counter possible threats. As far as terror attacks go, Tokyo has not experienced a major event since the Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult released sarin on the Tokyo subway system in 1995, killing 13 people and injuring thousands. But an attack on New Year’s Eve — where a Japanese man deliberately drove a minicar down one of Tokyo’s best-known streets and ran over nine people — jolted Tokyo out of its complacency. Counterterrorism drills are being conducted regularly and officials are urging the public to be vigilant. With petty crime much lower than in other major capitals, people generally pay little attention to abandoned baggage, for example. “To prevent a suspicious object in a train from suddenly exploding, someone has to spot it and call the police or station staff,” Kawamoto said. The ever-present threat of natural disasters is also keeping officials up at night, with Tokyo being one of the world’s most seismically active capitals and memories of last year’s deadly typhoons, flooding and heat waves still fresh. “As for natural disasters, we think the biggest challenge is to prepare for a big quake that is impossible to predict,” said Akio Sato, a senior official in the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. Rigid building codes mean even strong tremors often do little damage, but the government estimates up to 23,000 could die if a magnitude 7 quake hit Tokyo directly. Panic and a lack of preparation could cause more unnecessary damage, experts warn. Mindful that hundreds of thousands will be coming from overseas, the Japan Tourism Agency has upgraded its “safety tips” app with information on disasters, evacuation shelters and medical organizations. The 2020 Games will take place “during the most dangerous period — in the middle of typhoon season,” said Nobuyuki Tsuchiya, head of a Tokyo environmental organization. Typhoon Jebi pummeled Japan last year, lashing the country with ferocious winds and driving rain that killed 11 people. If a similar typhoon generates high tides that hit Tokyo, the water “will not be gone for about two weeks,” said Tsuchiya. Tokyo’s eastern lowlands, where roughly 2.5 million people live, will host the Olympic volleyball and swimming venues. Any floodwater could drain into the city’s massive subway system and inundate not only transport, but also underground malls in other parts of the city, Tsuchiya warned. In response, Tokyo Metro, the capital’s largest subway, has been scrambling to set up watertight doors at some 400 entrances to the system in case of flooding. Organizers have had to take expensive measures to combat the heat during the games, which will take place at the height of Tokyo’s sweltering summer. The start time for the marathon was moved to early morning and organizers plan to install heat-busting measures such as water-sprinklers along the route, swelling the event’s budget. Authorities should also study “contingency plans including a decision to suspend the event,” said Toshitaka Katada, a disaster prevention professor at the University of Tokyo. “That kind of decision-making tends to be delayed” if not discussed in advance, especially regarding who decides the cancellation and in which circumstances, he said. Any such decision would be taken by the IOC, while “the Japanese government will give necessary advice over important security issues,” said government official Endo. Tokyo 2020 official Kaho Akiyama said organizers were prepared to deal with a crisis if it arises. “To help deal with any emergencies, we are preparing evacuation plans for each venue, and are considering the offer of multilingual support to facilitate prompt and smooth evacuations,” she said.
|
security;2020 tokyo olympics;cybesecurity
|
jp0001707
|
[
"national",
"politics-diplomacy"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Abe doubles down on constitutional reform and pledges defense buildup in speech before National Defense Academy graduates
|
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe renewed his commitment Sunday to amending Japan’s U.S.-drafted pacifist Constitution, one of his key policy goals and a decades-old pledge of his ruling party. Abe has maintained his desire to amend the supreme law and clarify the status of the Self-Defense Forces to end the debate over their constitutionality, while his ruling Liberal Democratic Party has shied away from the topic due to its potential political impact on a series of local elections in April. “The SDF has now won the trust of 90 percent of the public,” Abe said at a graduation ceremony of the National Defense Academy in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture. “Now it’s our turn to make all-out efforts to prepare an environment where SDF members can fulfill their duties with strong pride,” he added. In contrast to his speech at a graduation ceremony last year, Abe did not refer to the threat posed by North Korea’s nuclear and missile programs. Sources familiar with Abe’s thinking say he is willing to personally meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in hopes of securing progress on the abduction issue, which involves Japanese kidnapped by agents of the North in the 1970s and 1980s. He said at the ceremony a year ago he would maintain his hard-line stance until Pyongyang gives up its nuclear and ballistic missile programs. In his speech to the graduating students, Abe reiterated his resolve to strengthen Japan’s defenses against new threats, such as cyberattacks. Referring to the new 10-year defense policy established late last year, Abe said his government will accelerate the buildup of defense capabilities to counter both cybersecurity threats and threats from countries utilizing outer space for military ends. “We’ll push forward with reforms at a speed fundamentally different from the past to build defense capabilities for the next era so that our country can maintain its advantage in the areas of cyberspace and outer space, and electromagnetic waves.” Abe hailed the SDF’s past activities, including search and rescue operations after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in the Tohoku region and other natural disasters that hit the country, and mine-sweeping operations in the Persian Gulf. The number of National Defense Academy graduates in fiscal 2018 totals 478, excluding those from abroad. Of them, women account for 48.
|
shinzo abe;constitution;self defense forces;kanagawa
|
jp0001708
|
[
"national",
"history"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Student-curated exhibit keeps Filipino 'comfort women' struggle alive
|
MANILA - A month-long art exhibit about Filipino “comfort women” opened Saturday at a university in Manila. The exhibit, titled “In the Spaces We Mend, Inheriting the Unfinished Narrative of the Filipino Comfort Women,” is being hosted by Celline Mercado, a final-year fine arts major at the prestigious Ateneo de Manila University. Mercado, 21, said that in putting on the mixed-media display in a library at the university, she hopes the experiences and struggles of Filipino women who claim to have been sexually abused by Japanese soldiers in the 1940s will remain alive, especially with the younger generation. “I went abroad, where I was exposed to a lot of museums. And they were transferring history lessons and memories about the war in a way that we don’t have yet,” Mercado told Kyodo News at the event. “So, I wanted to do, in my capacity, an exhibit that could sort of emulate that kind of transmission of memories,” she said, adding that it coincides nicely with the celebration of National Women’s Month. The exhibit includes illustrations by some of the comfort women themselves, including Maria Rosa Henson, who, in 1992, became the first Filipina to publicly come out with her wartime sexual slavery experience. Some of her personal memorabilia are also on display. The term comfort women is a euphemism used to refer to women who provided sex, including those who did so against their will, for Japanese troops before and during World War II. In the Philippines, an estimated 1,000 women across the country were said to have fallen victim to the system. Other artworks at Mercado’s exhibit include photographs taken by various artists of the women in their twilight years, a scale model of a house called “Bahay na Pula” (Red House) that served as a garrison of the Imperial Japanese Army where many women were allegedly raped, a video documentary and a video animation. The opening of the exhibit was attended by five former comfort women from Pampanga province, north of Manila. The women, now in their 80s, continue to demand a formal apology and just compensation from the Japanese government as well as historical inclusion of wartime sexual abuse. “(The exhibit) is very important so that those who don’t know our history and the kind of life that we lived will understand us. It is important for them to understand our experiences so they can help us in our demand for justice,” said Isabelita Vinuya, 81, who heads the group. “There are only 28 of us now remaining alive. We hope that our government will hear us out, help us, and support us,” she said. The group had around 90 members when they organized themselves as Malaya Lolas (Free Grandmothers) in 1997. Another organization of former comfort women is called Lila Pilipina (League for Filipino Grandmothers), which had 174 individuals in 1992, of whom only seven remain alive. The women refuse to consider as “official” the statements of apology issued by several Japanese officials in the past, while some of them rejected payments made through the Asian Women’s Fund in the mid-1990s, saying it came from private donors. Mercado said she is targeting high school students in her work on the comfort women issue, which also includes producing a booklet, because the matter is not taught in depth in schools.
|
wwii;history;comfort women;phillippines
|
jp0001709
|
[
"national",
"crime-legal"
] |
2019/03/17
|
Ghosn eager to speak publicly, but are the dangers of entrapping himself too great?
|
Since his conditional release from the Tokyo Detention House earlier this month, former Nissan Motor Co. Chairman Carlos Ghosn has remained tight-lipped about his case and unusual predicament, even ignoring the questions shouted out by the reporters who swarm him when he goes out for walks. His legal team, on the other hand, maintain he is actually willing to hold a news conference. They said one hasn’t been scheduled yet because his health — allegedly affected by more than 100 days in detention — needs more time to recover and their strategies must be hammered out first. Still, a news conference could take place sometime soon. And legal and communications experts not involved in the former Nissan CEO’s case warn he may be wading into treacherous waters, as his remarks pertaining to the allegations against him could be used by prosecutors when he goes to trial. “If (Ghosn) refers to specifics of the cases in a news conference, then it is full of risk and there’s nothing good about it,” said Yasuyuki Takai, an attorney and a former prosecutor at the Tokyo District Public Prosecutor’s Office. Junichiro Hironaka, one of Ghosn’s attorneys, told reporters last week that his client is asking for more time to contemplate what he wants to say at a news conference. Hironaka’s office did not return a request for comment from The Japan Times. Takai speculated the 65-year-old French former auto executive is determined to hold a news conference because he wants to tilt public opinion in his favor — a strategy Ghosn apparently thought was effective in helping secure his release on bail. “He is thinking that as he asserts his innocence on more occasions toward the audience both inside and outside Japan, the foreign media’s coverage will (pressure) the country, which would work to his advantage in a trial taking place in Japan,” Takai said. His legal team is well aware of the risks associated with having a news conference, so Hironaka may be reluctant to set one up, Takai said. If it happens, he added, Ghosn will be asked to refrain from talking about the accusations and focus on matters that won’t be challenged in the trial, such as Nissan’s future, the Japanese legal system’s use of prolonged detentions or whether executives at the Japanese carmaker plotted against him. It is rare for a defendant in a criminal case to hold a news conference before trial because of the danger of entrapping oneself, said Shigeru Nakajima, a lawyer based in Tokyo who practices transactional law. Ghosn was arrested Nov. 19 upon returning to Japan and was accused of deliberately underreporting his income in financial documents. Tokyo prosecutors served him two arrest warrants, including one for aggravated breach of trust resulting from the alleged transfer of private investment losses to Nissan during the 2008 global financial crisis. He was released on bail on March 6 after spending 108 days in confinement. While in detention, Ghosn, in an interview with the Nikkei newspaper, challenged the charges made against him and said he had “no doubt” his arrest and ousting were the result of a “plot and treason” by Nissan executives who were opposed to his strategy to integrate Nissan, Renault SA and Mitsubishi Motors Corp., even further. Shin Ushijima, a corporate lawyer, said the legal team’s presence at any conference would reduce the risks to some extent, but won’t necessarily ensure a positive outcome. At the moment, Ushijima pointed out that Ghosn’s legal team doesn’t have full access to all the evidence the prosecutors have. In addition to the legal risks that could result from potentially damaging remarks made by Ghosn, the ability of his legal team to quickly jump in, filter the questions and give proper advice is another concern, he said. The language barrier could also hamper communication, which could be problematic when discussing sensitive legal matters. “When a reporter asks questions in a question-and-answer session, it doesn’t necessarily mean Ghosn will stick to the script discussed in advance by his lawyers,” Ushijima said. In addition to these hazards, how the media will respond to the news conference is another unpredictable element, said Yu Taniguchi, editor-in-chief of monthly public relations magazine Senden Kaigi and an associate professor at the Graduate School of Information and Communication in Tokyo. Citing the media’s obsession with Ghosn’s attempt to leave in disguise when he was released on bail, Taniguchi said the domestic media has a tendency to digress from the main issues at hand. “Even if he holds a news conference, it is plausible under the current Japanese media environment that (domestic outlets) might focus on how he bowed or how he dressed,” she said.
|
nissan;renault;carlos ghosn
|
jp0001710
|
[
"national"
] |
2019/03/17
|
City's plan to farm sea urchins may make Japanese delicacy available in offseason
|
AOMORI - The city of Mutsu, Aomori Prefecture, has been working on a project to farm sea urchins, an expensive delicacy, by making use of cabbage thrown out by supermarkets. The project is aimed at securing a new source of income for local fisheries when they are not harvesting wild sea urchins, which grow by eating seaweed and come into season between April and July. Natural sea urchins do not grow well in winter as there is not much fresh seaweed. A fishery cooperative from the city’s Ohata area that usually halts sea urchin operations in winter is participating in the project. “We want to create a new business model that can give hope for fishery operators,” said Mutsu Mayor Soichiro Miyashita. The challenge started after officials learned about the idea of cultivating sea urchins with cabbage during a visit to the Kanagawa Prefecture Fisheries Technology Center in Miura last June. The edible interior lobe of the sea urchin, a small, creature with a round prickly shell usually found on the seabed, is among the most popular items for sushi. After carrying out an experiment between September and December, the city and the fishery cooperative learned that sea urchins raised using leafy vegetables were almost equivalent to those collected in high season — and they also tasted good. The farmed urchins contained amino acids such as glycine and methionine, which make up the seafood’s characteristic savory flavor. Officials are hopeful they can start putting cultivated sea urchins on the market during the offseason as soon as this year. The city received favorable feedback on the vegetable-fed urchins when it held a tasting party earlier this year. “In the future, we want to expand the scale of the farming and make it a tourist attraction,” said Kazuo Tachibana, head of the Mutsu Municipal Government’s Ohata Office.
|
aomori;kanagawa;sea urchin
|
jp0001711
|
[
"reference"
] |
2019/03/17
|
The week ahead for March 18 to March 24
|
Monday Finance Ministry to release preliminary customs-cleared trade statistics for February. Japan logged trade deficit of ¥1.42 trillion ($12.7 billion) in January, the widest margin of red ink in nearly five years amid steep fall in exports to China. Focus is on to what extent exports increase this time to gauge future economic growth. Tuesday Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism Ministry to release land prices across Japan. Japanese Olympic Committee to hold board meeting. Focus is on if JOC chief Tsunekazu Takeda will announce his retirement amid French bribery probe. Japan Tourism Agency to release number of foreign people that visited country in February. Wednesday Japan to mark 24th anniversary of sarin gas attack on Tokyo subway system by Aum Shinrikyo doomsday cult. Bank of Japan to release minutes for Jan. 22-23 policy meeting. Cabinet Office to release monthly economic report for March. Seattle Mariners and Oakland Athletics to open 2019 Major League Baseball season at Tokyo Dome. If veteran Mariners outfielder Ichiro Suzuki plays, it will be his first game in Japan since 2012 and his first major league game since last May. Figure skating world championships to be held at Saitama Super Arena through March 23. Two-time Olympic gold medalist Yuzuru Hanyu, who sustained a right ankle injury in November, to take part in men’s competition along with Shoma Uno, who claimed his third straight national championship in December. Women’s competition to feature Japanese teenager Rika Kihira, who has won six straight international tournaments this season, joined by compatriots Kaori Sakamoto and Satoko Miyahara. Thursday Spring Equinox Day national holiday. Second game of 2019 Major League season-opening series to be held between Seattle Mariners and Oakland Athletics at Tokyo Dome. Mariners rookie pitcher Yusei Kikuchi to make his Major League Baseball debut as starter. Official campaigning to start for nationwide gubernatorial elections in Hokkaido, Kanagawa, Fukui, Mie, Osaka, Nara, Tottori, Shimane, Tokushima, Fukuoka and Oita, which are seen as prelude to House of Councilors election this summer. In Osaka, Gov. Ichiro Matsui and Mayor Hirofumi Yoshimura, who have tendered their resignations, to seek election for each other’s posts. They both aim to reorganize Kansai’s largest city into metropolitan government system similar to Tokyo’s. Friday Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications to release national consumer price index for February. 100th anniversary of establishment of diplomatic relations between Japan and Poland. Japanese men’s soccer team to take on Colombia in friendly match at Yokohama’s Nissan Stadium. Saturday Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai to deliver keynote speech in Tokyo at W20 meeting, engagement group that proposes policy recommendations for Group of 20 major economies. National High School Baseball Championship to begin at Koshien Stadium. Sunday Spring Grand Sumo Tournament to end in Osaka after 15 days.
|
boj;ichiro suzuki;olympics;tsunekazu takeda;weekly events;the week ahead;schedule
|
jp0001712
|
[
"business"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Plea deal talks with Nissan executives over Ghosn charges began month prior to his arrest
|
Tokyo prosecutors and Nissan Motor Co. executives began negotiations on plea-bargaining deals in connection to charges against Carlos Ghosn, former chairman of the automaker, in October, informed sources said Saturday. Ghosn, 65, was arrested on Nov. 19, a few weeks after the Nissan executives agreed to provide prosecutors with information about his alleged financial misconduct. Part of the evidence that the prosecutors have disclosed to Ghosn’s defense team, in accordance with pretrial procedures, is believed to contain testimony by the executives, which the defense side is analyzing in preparation for the trial. Nissan opened a full-fledged internal investigation into Ghosn’s alleged misconduct in June after a whistleblower was purported to have come forward, sources familiar with the situation said. A non-Japanese Nissan executive close to Ghosn and a former chief of the automaker’s secretaries’ office, who is Japanese, started providing information about Ghosn’s alleged wrongdoing during the in-house investigation. During the internal probe, the executives hinted at their involvement in Ghosn’s alleged underreporting of his executive pay and fraudulent purchases of overseas real estate using company funds. The executives told in-house investigators that they would disclose further details to the prosecutors if they could secure a plea deal, the sources said. In plea negotiations, the prosecutors agreed not to indict the executives in exchange for their cooperation in the investigation. Ghosn was released on bail on Wednesday after 108 days in detention. He was indicted for the underreporting of his income. The sources said the plea deals also covered Ghosn’s allegedly fraudulent purchases of overseas real estate. But the prosecutors have yet to make a case against the matter due to a lack of evidence, they said. Meanwhile, Nissan, Renault SA and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. plan to form a new organization to lead their alliance in an effort to avoid concentrating power in the hands of one executive. It will take over the functions of the former alliance board. Informed sources said Sunday that the new body, which will be attended by top executives, such as Renault Chairman Jean-Dominique Senard, Nissan President and Chief Executive Officer Hiroto Saikawa and Mitsubishi Chairman and CEO Osamu Masuko, is expected to deal with a broad range of issues, from parts-purchasing and research and development to ways to strengthen the alliance.
|
scandals;nissan;carmakers;carlos ghosn
|
jp0001713
|
[
"business",
"tech"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Fujitsu's imaging technology to speed up restoration of quake-hit castles
|
Fujitsu Ltd. says it is developing an image-sensing technology system that will greatly speed up the restoration of stone walls on quake-hit castles and other cultural assets. With the technology, which the electronics company aims to put into practical use by the end of next March, the original locations of stone fragments that have fallen from walls can be determined by analyzing the shape and surface of the stones. The company also expects it may be used for restoration projects on historic structures outside Japan, such as the pyramids in Egypt. Fujitsu’s priority at the moment is to use the system to restore Kumamoto Castle, which is undergoing extensive repairs after two powerful earthquakes jolted central Kyushu in April 2016. Full restoration of the castle, built in 1607, is expected to take 20 years, with 30,000 stones needed to be restored back into the structure’s famous stone walls. Through conventional methods, a stonemason would only be able to specify the locations of several dislodged stones a day. But in a field test last year, it was determined the Fujitsu system could locate the proper placements of 101 to 123 stones per day. The technology may see strong demand in the country, which is plagued by earthquakes and other natural disasters. As castles are often important tourist attractions, residents in areas hit by natural disasters often call for the quick restoration of such sites. “There are many inquiries about this kind of system,” a Fujitsu official said. Stone walls at Komine Castle in Fukushima Prefecture also collapsed in the massive earthquake that hit northeastern Japan in March 2011. Last year’s torrential rain in western Japan also damaged the walls of another castle in Kagawa Prefecture.
|
fujitsu;earthquakes;kumamoto castle
|
jp0001714
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
In, out or limbo? Brexit endgame scenarios abound
|
LONDON - The tortuous Brexit saga is culminating in a crunch week that either sends Britain sailing nervously out of Europe — or sets the stage for it staying put. The House of Commons will hold up to three votes between Tuesday and Thursday as the country races toward the March 29 Brexit date. Their outcome will ultimately determine the future of a 46-year relationship that Britons voted to end in a 2016 referendum, surprising much of Europe. May’s deal The idea of Prime Minister Theresa May’s deal with Brussels making its way through parliament seemed fanciful when lawmakers voted against it by a historic margin last month. But Tuesday’s vote on essentially the same set of proposals should be a closer affair whose outcome hinges on last-gasp talks with the EU. EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier on Friday announced on Twitter a new package of concessions intended to resolve the contentious issue of the Irish border backstop, a policy intended to ensure there is never a need for a “hard” land border between the U.K. and Ireland. Barnier’s most striking idea was to allow the backstop to apply just to Northern Ireland, rather than the whole of the U.K. But May has long said this would be unacceptable, and negotiators had already rejected it Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the talks. The EU also offered to strengthen other provisions in the deal — on arbitration and good-faith clauses — but the U.K. side said it wasn’t enough. British politicians worry that the U.K. could be trapped against its will in the backstop and bound by EU trade rules potentially forever. U.K. Cabinet Minister Andrea Leadsom on Saturday rejected the European Union’s latest plan to break the deadlock but said Parliament will be given more chances to vote on the deal if the bloc improves its “disappointing” offer before it is too late. Two factors are suddenly playing in May’s favor. One is that Brexit backers are gradually realizing that May might be offering their best — and quite possibly last — chance to split from the bloc. And EU officials would like to see Britain’s status settled by the time the newly elected European Parliament throws open its doors in July. This might make EU bosses offer a last-minute concession that is just good enough to convince parliamentary holdouts to back May’s plan. London bank strategists surveyed by Bloomberg put the chances of the agreement being approved by the end of March at 37 percent. No deal May last month upturned her strategy that “no deal is better than a bad deal” by offering Parliament a chance to take the dreaded “no-deal” Brexit off the table. A vote on whether Britain should leave without the so-called Withdrawal Agreement will happen Wednesday if the deal itself is voted down the day before. May had long argued that fear of Britain simply crashing out should be used as motivation for getting everyone to rally around her plan. But the idea of trade routes clogging up and the U.K. pound crashing were too much for a growing faction of May’s team to bear. More and more have openly spoken of rebelling if Britain is headed for that outcome. The parliamentary vote would only be advisory — but carry plenty of political weight. Bloomberg’s bankers now put the odds of a “no-deal Brexit” at less than 1 in 10. Brexit delay The third vote on Thursday, if the first two have been rejected, would tell May to ask EU leaders to approve a delay of Britain’s departure date. May has spoken of a possible delay until the end of June but the Financial Times said some lawmakers are thinking much longer — nine to 21 months. The Guardian said the longer option was also backed by Brussels, although it leaves the prickly question of whether Britons would get to vote in European Parliament elections in May. EU leaders have the final say on whether there should be any delay — making their March 21-22 summit in Brussels particularly significant. The bankers put the odds of Brexit being postponed at 54 percent. Second referendum What such a delay might be used for is one of Brexit’s great unknowns. There are few reasons to think the different sides will suddenly stumble on a solution that had evaded them during two previous years of talks. But two forces are expected to spring into action: groups backing a much closer EU-U.K. union — and ones that simply want to call the whole thing off. Demands for a second referendum rang out the moment EU skeptics narrowly won the first. Polls show Britons still sharply divided about both Brexit and the democratic merits of holding another vote. A second poll would also take a long time to organize and require parliamentary support. May’s adamant refusal to back one means there would probably need to be a change in government and possibly early elections. And few London bankers dare to put any odds on what might happen then.
|
trade;eu;u.k .;brexit;theresa may
|
jp0001715
|
[
"world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
'Forbidden city' tells of secretive German history from kaiser to Hitler and Soviets
|
ZOSSEN, GERMANY - Werner Borchert grinds out a cigarette with his leather boot, zips up his down jacket and unlocks a rusty door with a sign reading “Do not enter.” He is entering anyway. Borchert is stepping into the heart of the forbidden city, a huge abandoned military complex hidden inside a fenced-off pine forest in eastern Germany. “The kaiser, Hitler, the Soviets — all of them were militarily active here, one after the other,” said Borchert, 67, a guide offering tours of the Haus der Offiziere officers’ complex in the Wuensdorf neighborhood of Zossen, some 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Berlin. He flicks a light switch in the darkness to turn on the cold, fluorescent lamps that light up seemingly endless hallways with numerous rooms branching off to the left and right. The complex, inaugurated in 1916, has housed the military of German Kaiser Wilhelm II, served as the Nazis’ military command center during World War II — and then headquartered the Soviets’ military high command for East Germany during the Cold War. “This was ‘Little Moscow’ on German ground,” Borchert, who grew up in the area, said during a recent tour. There was a theater, a museum, shopping facilities, a swimming pool and many barracks for the about 40,000 soldiers who were stationed here. “It was the cultural center for the Soviet Army in Germany,” he said. In 1994, several years after the fall of the Iron Curtain, the reunification of Germany and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the last Russian soldiers left the compound, a 6-square-kilometer (2.3-square-mile) area enclosed by a 17-kilometer-long (10.5-mile) concrete wall. The complex is now under the auspices of the state of Brandenburg, but no money has been invested and no new owner has been found. The ravages of time have taken its toll. The faded yellow plastering is flaking off the facade, windows are broken, a fuse box dangles off a wall, and wild animals such as martens have left trails of excrement on the dusty floors. The forbidden city got its name during Soviet times because German locals were rarely allowed in. Today it is mostly off-limits for the public, though tours can be booked with Borchert’s group. Some of the vacated rooms inside the three-story officers’ complex recall the glory years of the Soviet Union’s power in East Germany. One pale mural aggrandizes communism, showing a powerful hydroelectric power station and muscular workers operating tractors. Outside the main building entrance gate, there is still an oversize statue of the Russian communist revolutionary lader Vladimir Lenin. Some 20,000 visitors come to Wuensdorf every year to check out the town’s military history. Aside from the forbidden city, the area also still has traces of the Nazis’ Third Reich reign — including an elaborate and secretive system of bunkers. Known as Maybach I and Maybach II, the Nazis built fake country houses out of concrete. The houses were supposed to disguise underground bunkers that housed the military and army high commands, where much of the planning of WWII was developed. Most of the Maybach complex was destroyed after the end of the war by the Soviets, but the huge underground bunker known as Zeppelin, which served as a communication hub, is still accessible. It is also home to several above-ground air-raid bunkers known as Spitzbunker, which were rarely used but were a draw to the area for military buffs. “This was already secretive during the Nazi times. People who lived here of course knew that it was somehow related to the military, but they didn’t know the details,” said Sylvia Rademacher, another tour guide, referring to the Zeppelin bunker. “Under Russian times this was just as secretive or, one could say, exterritorial — the German territory ended at the walls,” she said, adding that the Soviets, too, used the bunker for communication purposes during the Cold War. Reflecting on what Wuensdorf’s military history means to her personally, Rademacher paused for a moment looking at the destroyed Maybach bunkers and said, “For me it’s a memorial, a warning that one has to teach young people that all of this shall not happen again.”
|
wwii;history;russia;military;germany;espionage;cold war;nazis
|
jp0001716
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders lead Iowa poll of 2020 Democratic field
|
CHICAGO - Former Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont lead the field of prospective and declared 2020 Democratic presidential candidates in an Iowa Poll of voters likely to participate in the first nominating contest 11 months from now. Biden, who is still trying to decide whether he wants to run for a third time, has the support of 27 percent of likely participants in the Iowa caucuses. He’s closely followed by Sanders, who unsuccessfully ran for the nomination against Hillary Clinton in 2016, at 25 percent. The early polling, sponsored by the Des Moines Register, CNN and Mediacom, is as much about name recognition as anything. Still, it shows that lesser-known candidates have considerable work to do if they want to compete with Biden and Sanders. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who like Sanders represents the most progressive wing of the party, drew the support of 9 percent. She’s followed by Sen. Kamala Harris of California at 7 percent. Beto O’Rourke, the former U.S. House member who gained a national following during his unsuccessful 2018 bid for the Senate in Texas, received support from 5 percent. He’s yet to join the race, but is believed to be close to doing so. Two other senators, Cory Booker of New Jersey and Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, each received support from 3 percent in the poll. The survey tested a total of 20 declared and prospective candidates and all others registered at 1 percent or less. The caucuses are scheduled to be held on Feb. 3, 2020. The quaint and quirky tradition will play out in school gymnasiums, fire stations, community centers, and other meeting places in nearly 1,700 precincts. The survey, conducted from March 3 to 6 by Selzer & Co. of West Des Moines, Iowa, included 401 likely Democratic caucus participants. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percentage points on the full sample, larger on subgroups.
|
u.s .;elections;joe biden;bernie sanders;donald trump;elizabeth warren beto o'rourke
|
jp0001717
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Canadian golden boy Trudeau tarnished by political scandal as elections loom
|
OTTAWA - Justin Trudeau rose to power in Canada as a champion of feminism and indigenous rights, quickly earning him golden boy status at home and abroad as a progressive leader. But a major political scandal that sparked the resignation of two of his ministers — both women, one indigenous — has tarnished his image just seven months before national elections. Pundits say the 47-year-old premier faces a tough battle just to stay in office, with the latest polls showing his Liberals trailing the Conservatives for the first time. For weeks, Trudeau’s government has been rocked by accusations of meddling in the criminal prosecution of engineering giant SNC-Lavalin, which was charged with corruption over alleged bribes paid to secure contracts in Libya. His attorney general, Jody Wilson-Raybould, who said she experienced “consistent and sustained” political pressure to shield the company from a trial, stepped down. Budget minister Jane Philpott followed suit, as did longtime Trudeau friend and top aide Gerry Butts. On Thursday, Trudeau addressed the allegations head-on, telling reporters in Ottawa that he had learned “lessons” from the crisis — but denying any wrongdoing. For the opposition, that wasn’t enough. On Friday, they renewed their calls for Trudeau to resign. “Trudeau is facing a serious crisis of confidence in his leadership,” said Stephanie Chouinard, a politics professor at the Royal Military College of Canada. “Seeing not one, but two members of his cabinet slamming the door like that, it’s unheard of for many years in Canada and it augurs very badly for him ahead of the October elections.” The Liberals built their brand around the handsome young Trudeau, a one-time bartender and snowboard instructor with Hollywood good looks and a father who was widely admired when he served as premier. Trudeau brought rock star energy to the job, and his brand of progressive politics — he made bold statements on climate action, legalized cannabis and helped refugees make a new life in Canada. The Liberals’ 2015 victory marked the return of the party, which had governed for most of the last century before being relegated to third-place status in a 2006 ballot. Trudeau was hailed. Now, his “virtue is being questioned,” Chouinard said. “He promised to do politics differently and introduce real change, but (in many eyes) has showed himself to be a politician like any other.” SNC-Lavalin was charged in 2015 with corruption for allegedly bribing officials in Libya between 2001 and 2011 to secure government contracts during the rule of former strongman Moamer Kadhafi. The Montreal-based firm openly lobbied the government for an out-of-court settlement that would result in a fine and agreeing to compliance measures, saying a conviction would lead to job cuts. But Wilson-Raybould, Canada’s first indigenous attorney general, refused to ask prosecutors to settle, and the trial is set to proceed. She later testified to lawmakers that she had received “veiled threats” over her stance — and Trudeau’s inner circle came under suspicion. Since the crisis erupted a month ago, Trudeau has seemed “disconnected” and “not in control” of his government, said Eric Montigny, a politics professor at Laval University in Quebec City. The resignations of two tough, successful women who embodied his values have prompted Canadians to re-examine his bona fides, especially his commitment to women and indigenous people, he said. Another female Liberal lawmaker, Celina Caesar-Chavannes, from the Toronto area, said in an interview with The Globe and Mail that Trudeau had turned his wrath on her after she said she would not seek re-election in October. “He was yelling. He was yelling that I didn’t appreciate him, that he’d given me so much,” said Caesar-Chavannes. While he later apologized, she said Trudeau was hostile on other occasions. Trudeau’s office denied the characterization, saying in a statement on Saturday: “The prime minister has deep respect for Celina Caesar-Chavannes. Discussions they had in February were direct but not hostile.” It was yet more bad press undermining Trudeau’s credentials as a progressive leader following the resignations of his attorney general and budget minister, both women, one indigenous. Caesar-Chavannes said Trudeau asked her to delay announcing her decision after Wilson-Raybould had just stepped down. In addition, apparent contradictions in Trudeau’spolicies, such as pushing for carbon emissions cuts while buying an oil pipeline in support of Canada’s energy sector, are getting more attention. “It strikes at the heart of the Trudeau brand,” Montigny said. “It also becomes more difficult for the prime minister to tell voters to trust him when two senior ministers say they have lost confidence in him.” For a hint of how things might play out, many will look to the March 19 federal budget vote. If Liberals, who hold a majority in parliament, break ranks, it could trigger snap elections. Marcel Chartrand, a communications professor at the University of Ottawa, is nevertheless optimistic that Trudeau’s party and Canadians in general will forgive his missteps. “He is young, he learns from his mistakes and I think Canadians will give him the benefit of the doubt,” he said.
|
women;canada;elections;justin trudeau
|
jp0001718
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Venezuela's Juan Guaido calls for massive protest as blackout drags on
|
CARACAS - Venezuelan opposition leader Juan Guaido on Saturday called on citizens nationwide to travel to the capital, Caracas, for a protest against socialist President Nicolas Maduro as the country’s worst blackout in decades dragged on for a third day. Addressing supporters in southwestern Caracas, Guaido — the leader of the opposition-run Congress who invoked the constitution to assume an interim presidency in January — said Maduro’s government “has no way to solve the electricity crisis that they themselves created.” “All of Venezuela, to Caracas!” Guaido yelled while standing atop a bridge, without saying when the planned protest would be held. “The days ahead will be difficult, thanks to the regime.” Activists had scuffled with police and troops ahead of the rally, meant to pressure Maduro amid the blackout, which the governing Socialist Party called an act of U.S.-sponsored sabotage but opposition critics derided as the result of two decades of mismanagement and corruption. Dozens of demonstrators attempted to walk along an avenue in Caracas but were moved onto the sidewalk by police in riot gear, leading them to shout at the officers and push on their riot shields. One woman was sprayed with pepper spray, according to a local broadcaster. The power flickered on and off in parts of Caracas on Saturday morning, including the presidential palace of Miraflores, according to Reuters witnesses. Six of the country’s 23 states still lacked power as of Saturday afternoon, Socialist Party Vice President Diosdado Cabello said on state television. “We’re all upset that we’ve got no power, no phone service, no water and they want to block us,” said Rossmary Nascimiento, 45, a nutritionist at the Caracas rally. “I want a normal country.” At a competing march organized by the Socialist Party to protest what it calls U.S. imperialism, Maduro blamed the outages on “electromagnetic and cyber attacks directed from abroad by the empire.” “The right wing, together with the empire, has stabbed the electricity system, and we are trying to cure it soon,” he said. Several hundred people gathered at the rally in central Caracas for a march to denounce the crippling U.S. oil sanctions aimed at cutting off the Maduro government’s funding sources. “We’re here, we’re mobilized, because we’re not going to let the gringos take over,” said Elbadina Gomez, 76, who works for an activist group linked to the Socialist Party. Julio Castro, a doctor and member of a nongovernmental organization called Doctors For Health, tweeted that a total of 17 people had died during the blackout, including nine deaths in emergency rooms. Reuters was unable to independently confirm the deaths or whether they could have resulted from the blackout. The Information Ministry did not respond to a request for comment. Clinics in the sweltering western state of Zulia, which suffers chronic regional blackouts, had scaled back operations after nearly 72 hours without power. “We’re not offering services and we don’t have any patients staying here because the generator is not working,” said Chiquinquira Caldera, head of administration at the San Lucas clinic in the city of Maracaibo, as she played a game of Chinese checkers with doctors who were waiting for power to return. Venezuela, already suffering from hyperinflation and shortages of basic goods, has been mired in a major political crisis since Guaido assumed the interim presidency in January, calling Maduro a usurper following the 2018 election, which Maduro won but was widely considered fraudulent. Maduro says Guaido is a puppet of Washington and dismisses his claim to the presidency as an effort by the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump to control Venezuela’s oil wealth. Former mayor and exiled opposition activist Antonio Ledezma on Saturday called on Guaido to seek United Nations intervention in Venezuela by invoking a principle known as “responsibility to protect.” The U.N. doctrine sometimes referred to as R2P was created to prevent mass killings such as those of Rwanda and Bosnia and places the onus on the international community to protect populations from crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing. “President @jguaido, (you should) formally request Humanitarian Intervention, applying the concept of R2P, to stop extermination, genocide and destruction of what’s left of our country,” Ledezma wrote via Twitter. At the opposition rally, Guaido said he would not invoke an article of the Venezuelan Constitution allowing Congress to authorize foreign military operations within Venezuela “until we have to.” “Article 187 when the time comes,” Guaido said. “We need to be in the streets, mobilized. It depends on us, not on anybody else.” Trump has said that a “military option” is on the table with regard to Venezuela, but Latin American neighbors have emphatically opposed U.S. intervention as a way of addressing the situation.
|
venezuela;protests;nicolas maduro;blackouts;juan guaido
|
jp0001719
|
[
"world",
"politics-diplomacy-world"
] |
2019/03/10
|
Trump signed Bibles. Heresy? Many religious leaders say no
|
PROVIDENCE, RHODE ISLAND - President Donald Trump was just doing what he could to raise spirits when he signed Bibles at an Alabama church for survivors of a tornado outbreak, many religious leaders say, though some are offended and others say he could have handled it differently. Hershael York, dean of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary School of Theology in Louisville, Kentucky, said he didn’t have a problem with Trump signing Bibles, like former presidents have, because he was asked and because it was important to the people who were asking. “Though we don’t have a national faith, there is faith in our nation, and so it’s not at all surprising that people would have politicians sign their Bibles,” he said. “Those Bibles are meaningful to them and apparently these politicians are, too.” But the Rev. Donnie Anderson, executive minister of the Rhode Island State Council of Churches, said she was offended by the way Trump scrawled his signature Friday as he autographed Bibles and other things, including hats, and posed for photos. She viewed it, she said, as a “calculated political move” by the Republican president to court his evangelical voting base. Presidents have a long history of signing Bibles, though earlier presidents typically signed them as gifts to send with a spiritual message. President Ronald Reagan signed a Bible that was sent secretly to Iranian officials in 1986. President Franklin Roosevelt signed the family Bible his attorney general used to take the oath of office in 1939. It would have been different, Anderson said, if Trump had signed a Bible out of the limelight for someone with whom he had a close connection. “For me, the Bible is a very important part of my faith, and I don’t think it should be used as a political ploy,” she said. “I saw it being used just as something out there to symbolize his support for the evangelical community, and it shouldn’t be used in that way. People should have more respect for Scripture.” York said that he, personally, would not ask a politician to sign a Bible, but that he has been asked to sign Bibles after he preaches. It feels awkward, he said, but he doesn’t refuse. “If it’s meaningful to them to have signatures in their Bible, I’m willing to do that,” he said. A request for comment was left the White House on Saturday, a day after Trump visited Alabama to survey the devastation and pay respects to tornado victims. The tornado carved a path of destruction nearly a mile wide, killing 23 people, including four children and a couple in their 80s, with 10 victims belonging to a single extended family. At the Providence Baptist Church in Smiths Station, Alabama, the Rev. Rusty Sowell said the president’s visit was uplifting and will help bring attention to a community that will need a long time to recover. Before leaving the church, Trump posed for a photograph with a fifth-grade volunteer and signed the child’s Bible, said Ada Ingram, a local volunteer. The president also signed her sister’s Bible, Ingram said. In photos from the visit, Trump is shown signing the cover of a Bible. Trump should have at least signed inside in a less ostentatious way, said the Rev. Dr. Kevin Cassiday-Maloney. “It just felt like hubris,” said Cassiday-Maloney, pastor at the First Congregational United Church of Christ in Fargo, North Dakota. “It almost felt like a desecration of the holy book to put his signature on the front writ large, literally.” He doesn’t think politicians should sign Bibles, he said, because it could be seen as a blurring of church and state and an endorsement of Christianity over other religions. It would have been out of line if Trump had brought Bibles and given them out, but that wasn’t the case, said James Coffin, executive director of the Interfaith Council of Central Florida. “Too much is being made out of something that doesn’t deserve that kind of attention,” he said. Bill Leonard, the founding dean and professor of divinity emeritus at the Wake Forest University School of Divinity in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, woke up to Facebook posts Saturday morning by former students who were upset about Trump signing the Bibles because they don’t view him as an appropriate example of spiritual guidance. But, Leonard said, it’s important to remember that signing Bibles is an old tradition, particularly in Southern churches. Leonard said he would have viewed it as more problematic if the signings were done at a political rally. He doesn’t see how Trump could have refused at the church. “It would’ve been worse if he had said no because it would’ve seemed unkind, and this was at least one way he could show his concern along with his visit,” he said. “In this setting, where tragedy has occurred and where he comes for this brief visit, we need to have some grace about that for these folks.”
|
religion;u.s .;donald trump
|
Subsets and Splits
No community queries yet
The top public SQL queries from the community will appear here once available.