Dec 08 2023
Late Night Music:Kinky- Mas
Dec 07 2023
Six In The Morning Thursday 7 December 2023
Russia luring migrants from Finnish border for war in Ukraine
By Oleg BoldyrevBBC Russian
Russia is trying to recruit foreign migrants, detained in a recent sweep at its border with Finland, for its war in Ukraine.
The BBC has seen evidence of several cases in which foreigners were rushed into a military camp on the border with Ukraine, days after they were picked up for breaching immigration laws.
The practice of coercing people in pre-deportation detention centres to sign contracts for army service in Ukraine is not new, but the numbers swelled as foreign migrants arrived at Russia’s 1,340-km (833-mile) border with Finland.
Reuters journalist Issam Abdallah ‘killed by Israeli tank shell’
Human rights groups call for war crimes investigation after Israeli tank fired at journalists in Lebanon
Israeli tank shells fired in quick succession killed a Reuters journalist and injured six others as they filmed in Lebanon on 13 October, investigations by their employers have found.
Human rights groups called for a war crimes investigation into the attacks, after conducting their own independent investigations and reaching the same conclusion.
Issam Abdallah, a 37-year-old video journalist, was killed instantly by a first shell, the reports published on Thursday found. It also seriously injured the AFP photographer Christina Assi, 28, who had a leg amputated and is still in hospital.
Denmark parliament adopts bill prohibiting Quran burnings
The Danish parliament on Thursday approved legislation that would effectively prohibit Quran burnings in the northern European country.
Lawbreakers could face up to two years in jail
The law criminalizes the “inappropriate treatment of writings with significant importance for a recognized religious community.”
The bill was passed with 94 votes in favor by the 179-member Danish parliament, also known as the Folketing. Seventy-seven votes were cast against the legislation.
Burning, tearing, or defiling religious texts in public could land people with a fine or up to two years behind bars. Destroying a holy text on video and disseminating the footage online could also put offenders in jail.
Situation in Gaza is ‘apocalyptic’, UN human rights chief tells FRANCE 24
Up to 600 N Korean defectors deported by China have vanished, says rights group
Up to 600 North Koreans have “vanished” after being forcibly deported by China in October, a Seoul-based human rights group said on Thursday, warning they may face imprisonment, torture, sexual violence and execution in the isolated state.
The report by the Transitional Justice Working Group (TJWG) came about two months after South Korea lodged a protest with China over the suspected repatriation of a large of number of North Koreans who were trying to flee to South Korea.
The TJWG said hundreds of defectors were transported in guarded buses and vans from Chinese detention centres across the border into the North on Oct. 9, calling the incident the largest such mass repatriation in years.
As Western unity on Ukraine falters, Putin eyes a slow-burn win
Dec 06 2023
Six In The Morning Wednesday 6 December 2023
‘Everything is shaking’: Heavy fighting rocks Gaza’s key southern city
Forced to flee twice, Gazan tells us he ‘won’t move again’
Alice Cuddy
Reporting from Jerusalem
Izzat Abdullah Al Jamal tells us he has been displaced twice since the war began and no longer trusts that there is any “safe place” in Gaza.
Izzat, 55, fled from his home in the northern Gaza city of Jabalia, seeking shelter in al-Shifa hospital before fleeing on foot to the southern city of Khan Younis.
“The people in Khan Younis are very kind and generous but the area is overcrowded with refugees and there is strong bombing,” he says.
Like others we’ve been speaking to there, Izzat says he “won’t move” again.
Iranian regime accused of raping and violating protesters as young as 12
Amnesty International report details ‘harrowing’ testimonies of survivors at hands of security forces following nationwide protests
Iranian security forces used rape and sexual violence to torture, punish and inflict lasting physical and psychological damage on protesters as young as 12 during the country’s nationwide protests last year, a report says.
The report by Amnesty International is based on the testimonies of 12 women, 26 men, one girl and six boys who survived rape or other forms of sexual violence. Six survivors of rape were subjected to gang rapes by up to 10 male state agents, according to Amnesty.
Protests spread across the country after the death in custody of a 22-year-old Kurdish woman, Mahsa Amini, in September 2022 following her detention for allegedly breaking the country’s strict dress code.
Freed Thai hostages: ‘Israelis had it worse’
Two of the 23 Thai hostages released late November spoke exclusively with DW. They talked about what they saw during their captivity in Hamas’ underground tunnels.
For seven weeks, Anucha Angkaew was a hostage of Hamas, which the EU as well as Germany, the US, UK and several other states designate as a terrorist organization. Cut off from the world, with no sunlight. Now, he’s back home in Ban Don Phila, his village in Thailand.
Marquees and music boxes have been set up, Neighbors are cooking vats of laab neua, a northern Thai specialty and favorite dish of the guest of honor. Tired and worn thin, he sits away from the bustle, on a wooden bench in front of his parents’ home, as if he were still getting used to living a life in freedom again.
“I lost 16 kilograms” (35.3 pounds), the slender man told DW.
Diaspora journalists increasingly targeted by home countries: report
Authoritarian states are increasingly targeting journalists working in exile as part of government reprisal campaigns against dissidents living outside their countries, US-based rights group Freedom House said in a new report Wednesday.
The uptick in so-called “transnational repression,” which can target all kinds of citizens living abroad, comes just a week after an Indian national was charged by US authorities with plotting to assassinate a Sikh separatist leader in New York, allegedly at the direction of an Indian government official.
“As attacks on free and independent media increase globally, more and more journalists are being forced to work from exile, and are increasingly facing the threat of transnational repression in their new homes abroad,” the Freedom House report said.
Tactics used include “physical harm, detention and rendition, online harassment… reprisals against family members” and smear campaigns, among other efforts “that degrade their morale and commitment to the profession.”
Osprey requested emergency landing, flew in wrong direction
By KAIGO NARISAWA/ Staff Writer
December 6, 2023 at 18:29 JST
A U.S. Air Force Osprey aircraft that crashed in Kagoshima Prefecture was flying away from an airport where the pilot had planned to make an emergency landing, according to Japanese government officials.
That finding indicates the U.S. crew lost control of the tilt-rotor aircraft before it fell into the sea, presumably killing all eight aboard.
The CV-22 Osprey disappeared from Japanese Self-Defense Forces’ radar at around 2:40 p.m. on Nov. 29, five minutes after its crew made a request for an emergency landing at Yakushima Airport.
‘No one will remember us’: India’s hero ‘rat hole miners’ who helped rescue 41 men from the Himalayan tunnel
Just a few pieces of debris stood between Munna Qureshi and dozens of laborers who his team had been tasked with rescuing from deep inside a Himalayan tunnel after all previous attempts to free them had failed.
“I could hear the laborers gasping on the other side with excitement,” the 29-year-old said. “My heart was racing as I removed the last rock between us.”
Dec 05 2023
Six In The Morning Tuesday 5 December 2023
Israel says troops in ‘heart of Khan Younis’ after bombarding southern city
Hospital says dozens killed in central Gaza
At least 45 people have been killed in central Gaza, the spokesperson for the al-Aqsa hospital in Deir al-Balah has told the BBC, after reports of an Israeli airstrike in the city.
This is the only information we have on this incident at the moment – we’ll bring you more when we have it.
Israel thinks key Hamas leaders are hiding in Khan Younis
Hugo Bachega
Middle East correspondent, in Jerusalem
The Israeli military is pushing ahead with its offensive in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, saying they are now “in the heart of the city”, after carrying out days of intense bombardment and ordering the evacuation of several areas.
Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of civilians who fled fighting in the north had moved to, is the key focus of the Israeli campaign in the south, as it is where the Israeli authorities believe members of the Hamas leadership are hiding. Hospitals are overwhelmed and a large number of children are among the casualties.
Nigerian army drone strike accident kills at least 85 civilians
Residents in north-west of the country say many victims of strike during Muslim festival were women and children
A Nigerian army drone strike accidentally killed at least 85 civilians observing a Muslim festival in the north-west on Sunday, the country’s armed forces have admitted.
Villagers in Tudun Biri in the state of Kaduna had gathered for the Maulud celebration when at about 9pm they heard what sounded like an aeroplane followed by a huge explosion.
“We couldn’t even run,” Danjuma Salisu, a survivor, said from his hospital bed, where he was being treated for hand and leg injuries.
EU faces ‘huge’ risk of terrorist attacks, says official
The war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza is heightening the terror risk in the EU, according to the bloc’s home affairs commissioner. The warning comes after a German tourist was killed in a knife attack in Paris.
European Union member states are facing a “huge risk of terrorist attacks” over the holiday season due to the ongoing war in the Gaza Strip, EU Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson said on Tuesday.
Speaking ahead of a meeting of EU interior ministers in Brussels, Johansson referred to a Saturday’s knife attack in Paris, where one German tourist was killed and two people were injured. The attacker reportedly pledged allegiance to the so-called “Islamic State” (IS) and expressed anguish about Muslims dying, notably in the Palestinian territories.
He had also been under close psychological surveillance for mental health issues.
French filmmakers warn that far-right cyber-raids are torpedoing their movies
French filmmaker Mehdi Fikri has accused far-right cyberactivists and TV pundits of scuppering the launch of his police violence drama “After the Fire”, reviving talk of the influence of online rating platforms and politicised commentators in shaping movies’ fortunes.
The slogan for entertainment website Allociné – dubbed the “French IMDb” due to its status as France’s go-to cinema platform – invites viewers to be “more than just spectators”.
It’s an invitation some viewers have embraced with malignant zeal, according to the French Filmmakers Society (SRF), which has warned of a concerted campaign by far-right activists to undermine films that do not align with their political agenda.
The warning follows the botched launch of Mehdi Fikri’s maiden feature, “Avant que les flammes ne s’éteignent” (After the Fire), which received a flurry of negative user ratings on Allociné even before its release in French cinemas on November 15.
Tokyo Olympics sullied by bid-rigging, bribery trials more than 2 years after the Games closed
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
December 5, 2023 at 17:00 JST
The bid-rigging trial around the Tokyo Olympics played out Tuesday in a Japanese courtroom — more than two years after the Games closed — with advertising giant Dentsu and five other companies facing criminal charges.
Seven individuals are also facing charges from Tokyo district prosecutors in the cases, including Koji Henmi, who oversaw the sports division at Dentsu at the time.
Executives or management-level officials at each of the accused companies, and Tokyo Olympic organizing committee official Yasuo Mori, have been charged with violating anti-monopoly laws.
‘Massacres await’: Palestinians in Nablus warn of deadly settler attacks
The Palestinian villages south of Nablus face severe settler violence and warn the assaults will only increase.
No matter how hard he tries, Abdulatheem Wadi is unable to hide the devastating pain written all over his face.
With his eyes fixed on the distance, the 50-year-old chokes up as he recalls how Israeli setters murdered his 63-year-old brother Ibrahim and his 24-year-old nephew Ahmad, on October 12, while they were attending a memorial service for a group of Palestinians also killed by settlers the previous night.
What was a funeral for four became a funeral for six.
“It was a massacre in a small village,” says Abdulatheem.
That village is Qusra, home to some 7,000 Palestinians living just south of Nablus in the northern occupied West Bank.
Dec 04 2023
Six In The Morning Monday 4 December 2023
Satellite image reveals tent build-up at UN site
New satellite imagery shows how displaced people in southern Gaza have been seeking shelter at a United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) site in Khan Younis.
The image, taken on Sunday, reveals tents and makeshift shelters spreading outwards from Khan Younis Training Centre.
Tents started appearing in its grounds on 18 October but the camp has expanded rapidly in recent days, including into open terrain to its west.
UNRWA says it is housing more than 30,000 people there and the site is “very overcrowded”.
Its latest report, published today, says 1.2 million displaced people are now sheltering in UNRWA sites across Gaza.
The IDF has been carrying out strikes in Khan Younis since fighting resumed on Friday.
Cop28 president forced into defence of fossil fuel phase-out claims
Sultan Al Jaber, who is state oil CEO, had said phase-out of fossil fuels would take world ‘back into caves’
The president of Cop28 has been forced into a fierce defence of his views on climate science, after the Guardian revealed his comment that there was “no science out there, or no scenario out there, that says that the phase-out of fossil fuel is what’s going to achieve 1.5C”.
Sultan Al Jaber, who is also the chief executive of the United Arab Emirates’ state oil company, Adnoc, said at a hastily arranged press conference at the summit in Dubai: “I respect the science in everything I do. I have repeatedly said that it is the science that has guided the principles or strategy as Cop28 president. We have always built everything, every step of the way, on the science, on the facts.”
North Korea’s Kim Jong Un urges women to have more children
North Korea depends on physical labor to maintain its economy amid isolation from trade with the West. South Korea estimates that the North Korean population has steadily declined over the last decade.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has urged women in the country to have more children, state-run news agency KCNA reported on Monday.
“Stopping the decline in birth rates and providing good child care and education are all our family affairs that we should solve together with our mothers,” Kim said during an address to the attendees of the National Mothers Meeting.
Low birth rates could dampen economic outlook
South Korea has estimated that North Korea’s birth rates have been on the decline over the past decade. The United Nations Population Fund says that North Korea’s fertility rate stands at 1.8 births per woman as of 2023, which is below the 2.1 replacement rate benchmark in developed countries.
Paris knife attacker shows ‘failure’ of psychiatric care, France interior minister says
There was a clear failure in the psychiatric care of the radicalised Islamist suffering from mental troubles who stabbed a German tourist to death in central Paris at the weekend before being arrested, France’s interior minister said Monday.
The attack close to the Eiffel Tower has increased concerns in France over the risk of Islamist attacks, particularly with the French capital now barely half a year away from hosting the 2024 summer Olympic Games.
The attacker was a Frenchman in his mid-20s born to a non-religious Iranian family but who had already done prison time for planning an attack and was known to the authorities as an Islamist radical with mental troubles.
“There was clearly a failure, not from the point of view of his monitoring by the intelligence services, but a psychiatric failure,” Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told BFM TV, adding that the attacker had an “acute mental illness”.
“Doctors said on several occasions that he was doing better, was more normal and could be free,” he said.
Divers find wreckage, bodies from U.S. Osprey aircraft that crashed off Japan
By Mari Yamaguchi
U.S. and Japanese divers have discovered wreckage and remains of crew members from a U.S. Air Force Osprey aircraft that crashed last week off southwestern Japan, the Air Force announced Monday.
The CV-22 Osprey carrying eight American personnel crashed last Wednesday off Yakushima island during a training mission. The body of one victim was recovered and identified earlier, while seven others remained missing.
The Air Force Special Operations Command said the remains were being recovered and their identities have yet to be determined.
CNN took an 11-day cruise through some of the most-contested waters on Earth. Here’s what we learned
A nighttime transit through the Taiwan Strait is a test of nerves, seamanship and political awareness in an environment where a slight miscalculation could potentially lead to an international conflict.
It’s the first night in November. It’s dark – ink black before the moonrise – and Royal Canadian Navy Cmdr. Sam Patchell is taking that test.
His 4,800-ton warship, the frigate HMCS Ottawa, weaves and dodges between dozens of commercial fishing boats and merchant vessels at speeds of up to 24 mph, all the while tasked with staying outside boundaries dictated by international law, including the recognized territorial waters of China.
Dec 03 2023
Six In The Morning Sunday 3 December 2023
UN describes Gaza hospital as ‘warzone’ as Israeli strikes continue in south
Israel says it’s launched 10,000 air strikes during war
Israel says it has carried out “approximately 10,000 air strikes” in Gaza since the beginning of the war.
In a statement, the Israeli military says the cooperation between ground forces and the air force “is one of the most prominent elements in the IDF’s [Israel Defense Forces’] ground operation in the Gaza Strip”.
Situation is beyond catastrophic – British-Palestinian in southern Gaza
Hugo Bachega
Reporting from Jerusalem
Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, is one of the main targets of the renewed Israeli offensive against Hamas in territory. Israeli authorities believe members of the Hamas leadership are hiding in the city, where hundreds of thousands of people have been sheltering after fleeing fighting in the north in the early stages of the war.
This morning, the Israeli army issued evacuation orders for several districts of the city, urging people to leave immediately.
Mohammed Ghalayini, a British-Palestinian who has stayed in Gaza, said the situation in the city was “beyond catastrophic”.
Cop28 president says there is ‘no science’ behind demands for phase-out of fossil fuels
Exclusive: UAE’s Sultan Al Jaber says phase-out of coal, oil and gas would take world ‘back into caves’
The president of Cop28, Sultan Al Jaber, has claimed there is “no science” indicating that a phase-out of fossil fuels is needed to restrict global heating to 1.5C, the Guardian and the Centre for Climate Reporting can reveal.
Al Jaber also said a phase-out of fossil fuels would not allow sustainable development “unless you want to take the world back into caves”.
The comments were “incredibly concerning” and “verging on climate denial”, scientists said, and they were at odds with the position of the UN secretary general, António Guterres.
Philippines: Blast at Catholic Mass kills several
An explosion during a Catholic Mass in Marawi city killed four people and injured dozens more. Authorities believe it could be the work of militants affiliated with the “Islamic State” (IS) group.
An explosion at a Catholic Mass in a university gymnasium in Marawi city in the Philippines killed four people and injured dozens more on Sunday.
What do we know so far?
The explosion occurred at Mindanao State University in the Lanao del Sur province in the southern part of the country.
The blast happened during a regular service at Mindanao State University’s gymnasium in Marawi, the country’s largest Muslim city, regional police Chief Allan Nobleza said.
“We’re investigating if it’s an IED (improvised explosive device) or grenade throwing,” he said.
Fragments of a 16-mm mortar were recovered at the scene, senior police official Emmanuel Peralta told a news conference later.
Essequibo referendum: Is Venezuela about to seize part of Guyana?
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro is organising a referendum on Sunday to decide whether to create a new state in the Essequibo territory, an area currently under the control of neighbouring Guyana. Does Caracas have the means for its territorial ambitions, or is it just political grandstanding?
On December 3, Venezuelans vote for or against the creation of a new Venezuelan state in the Essequibo region. In the eyes of Venezuelan authorities, it is a “consultative” referendum designed to put an end to over 200 years of territorial conflict.
However, there is one big problem: the land Venezuela wants to potentially extend control over is recognised by the international community as a part of neighbouring Guyana – a sparsely populated country with some 800,000 inhabitants.
The issue has become an obsession for populist President Nicolas Maduro, who often repeats the phrase “El Essequibo es Nuestro” [The Essequibo is ours] in his speeches.
Among four other questions, the referendum asks citizens whether they favour “the creation of the Essequibo state and the development of an accelerated plan for comprehensive care for the current and future population of that territory”.
Piece of Osprey wreckage given to U.S. after crash off Japan
A piece of wreckage from a crashed Osprey military aircraft was handed over to U.S. military Sunday, a southwestern Japanese town said, as an around-the-clock search continued for seven crew missing in nearby waters.
The wreckage was collected by local fishermen, according to the town of Yakushima, after the tilt-rotor aircraft went down on Wednesday during a training exercise near the island town.
The only body recovered from the aircraft has been identified as Staff Sgt Jacob Galliher, a 24-year-old direct support operator assigned to the 43rd Intelligence Squadron, the U.S. Air Force Special Operations Command said.
Taken by the Mediterranean: A mother’s search for her lost son
A two-year search for refugees disappeared at sea trying to reach Spain is an endless mission, desperate relatives say.
At her home in the Syrian town of Daraa al-Balad, Rania Abu Aoun spends her days waiting anxiously for news about her son, Ramy.
It is agonising, she says.
Ramy’s phone has been off since January 3, 2022, when he left on a boat from Algeria heading towards Spain. He disappeared on that journey.
That day, the 30-year-old departed Algeria from the northwestern city of Oran, hoping to reach Europe and provide a better future for his three children, six-year-old Bayan, five-year-old Layan and two-year-old Hamza, who was born just three days after Ramy reached Turkey, the first stop on his long and arduous journey.
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