| Iraqis step up protests as deadline for new PM looms Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:38 PM PST  Thousands took to the streets in Iraq's capital and across the south Sunday to protest against Iran's kingmaking influence, as the latest deadline for choosing a new prime minister loomed. Anti-government rallies have rocked Baghdad and the Shiite-majority south since October 1, with demonstrators calling for a complete overhaul of a regime they deem corrupt, inefficient and overly beholden to Tehran. "The revolution continues!" shouted one demonstrator at a protest encampment in central Diwaniyah.
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| Evangelical tussling over anti-Trump editorial escalates Posted: 22 Dec 2019 02:43 PM PST  As the political clamor caused by a top Christian magazine's call to remove President Donald Trump from office continues to reverberate, more than 100 conservative evangelicals closed ranks further around Trump on Sunday. In a letter to the president of Christianity Today magazine, the group of evangelicals chided Editor-in-Chief Mark Galli for penning an anti-Trump editorial, published Thursday, that they portrayed as a dig at their characters as well as the president's. "Your editorial offensively questioned the spiritual integrity and Christian witness of tens-of-millions of believers who take seriously their civic and moral obligations," the evangelicals wrote to the magazine's president, Timothy Dalrymple.
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| Death toll from New Zealand volcano eruption rises to 19 Posted: 22 Dec 2019 02:36 PM PST  The death toll from a volcanic eruption in New Zealand earlier this month has risen to 19 after police said Monday another person died at an Auckland hospital overnight. There were 47 people visiting the tourist destination of White Island when the volcano erupted Dec. 9, killing 13 people initially and leaving more than two dozen others hospitalized with severe burns. The latest victim is the sixth person to die in hospitals in New Zealand and Australia in the two weeks since the eruption.
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| Warren, back in Oklahoma, sees tribal leaders in private Posted: 22 Dec 2019 01:44 PM PST  Returning to the state where she was born, Democratic presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren met privately with Native American tribal leaders Sunday and offered no new apology for the DNA test she took to counter President Donald Trump's taunts about her claim to American Indian heritage, according to a meeting participant. Trump had long mocked the Massachusetts senator for her ancestral claims and repeatedly referred to her as "Pocahontas," a racial slur he still employs. The Cherokee Nation complained that Warren was "undermining tribal interests with her continued claims of tribal heritage," and in August, Warren offered a public apology at a forum on Native American issues, directly addressing an issue that had proved to be a political liability.
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| Syrian state media says Israel is firing missiles into Syria Posted: 22 Dec 2019 01:30 PM PST ![Syrian state media says Israel is firing missiles into Syria]( "Syrian state media says Israel is firing missiles into Syria") Syrian air defenses opened fire Sunday night on missiles fired from inside Israel, state media reported. Syrian state TV gave no further details but residents of Damascus said explosions could be heard near the capital. State TV said one of the Israeli missiles was shot down near the Damascus suburb of Aqraba.
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| Israel to grant holiday travel permits to Gaza Christians Posted: 22 Dec 2019 01:19 PM PST  Israel announced on Sunday that it will allow Christians in the Gaza Strip to travel to Jerusalem and the West Bank for Christmas. Until its notice just two days before the holiday, it was unclear whether Israel would grant permits to members of Gaza's tiny Christian community to leave the Hamas-ruled coastal territory.
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| Syria violence uproots displaced families again Posted: 22 Dec 2019 12:40 PM PST  Maaret al-Numan (Syria) (AFP) - Thin mattresses, children's toys, a gas heater: Abu Ismail packed a pick-up truck with scant belongings before fleeing a northwest Syria town nearly emptied of residents by recent regime attacks. Tens of thousands of people like Abu Ismail have fled the Maaret al-Numan region, located in jihadist-held Idlib province, since December 16, following a rise in air strikes, according to the United Nations. Thousands more are still trying to leave violence-plagued southern Idlib towards safer areas further north, but steady bombing has made the exit both dangerous and difficult, the UN says.
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| Thousands protest against new PM, close roads in Lebanon Posted: 22 Dec 2019 11:17 AM PST  Thousands of protesters demonstrated in central Beirut and elsewhere in Lebanon on Sunday against the country's new prime minister, saying he should abandon the post because he is a member of the ruling elite. After sunset, protesters closed several roads and highways in Beirut and other parts of the country to rally against the nomination of Hassan Diab, who was backed by the militant Hezbollah group and its allies and failed to win the backing of the main Sunni Muslim groups.
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| Egypt frees ex-general arrested after challenging president Posted: 22 Dec 2019 10:53 AM PST ![Egypt frees ex-general arrested after challenging president]( "Egypt frees ex-general arrested after challenging president") The Egyptian military on Sunday released one of the country's former chiefs-of-staff, nearly two years after his arrest following an announcement that he would challenge President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in the 2018 presidential vote, military officials and his lawyer said. A military court had sentenced Sami Annan earlier this year to nine years' imprisonment.
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| Inside impeachment: How an 'urgent' tip became 'high crimes' Posted: 22 Dec 2019 09:58 AM PST  The night before the whistleblower complaint that launched President Donald Trump's impeachment was made public, Democrats and Republicans on the House Intelligence Committee crammed into the same room to get a first look at the document. The House's drive toward impeachment ended last week with a party-line vote. A series of text message s from Kurt Volker, Trump's special envoy to Ukraine, stirred anxieties in both parties about work being done by Rudy Giuliani, Trump's personal lawyer, in the Eastern European country.
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| Young Climate Activists Press U.S. Court to Force Trump’s Hand Posted: 22 Dec 2019 09:52 AM PST ![Young Climate Activists Press U.S. Court to Force Trump's Hand]( "Young Climate Activists Press U.S. Court to Force Trump's Hand") (Bloomberg) -- Young climate activists who sued the U.S. in 2015 to force changes in government policy said the Trump administration's actions increase the urgency for the case to go to trial."Another six months have passed without decision," the youths said in a filing in the San Francisco federal appeals court this weekend, "while defendants continue to act in ways that further endanger plaintiffs' lives, liberties, and property, as supported by additional, new evidence."The administrations of both Barack Obama and Donald Trump have repeatedly sought to kill the case, arguing the courts lack the authority to direct the executive branch to develop a comprehensive plan to cut greenhouse gas-emissions across the U.S. economy. A trial might take as long as four months, which would help keep attention on climate change through the 2020 elections.The court put the case on a fast-track schedule in January and a three-judge panel signaled at a hearing in June that it agrees the government hasn't done enough to address climate change. But the judges voiced uncertainty about whether courts can force broad action.Read More: Kids' Climate Claims 'Compelling' But Court Queries Own RoleThe plaintiffs, who include University of Oregon student Kelsey Juliana, argue that the U.S. has violated a constitutional right to a livable climate over the last five decades.In the latest filing, they submitted government documents that they say show a record expansion in recent years of oil and gas exploration and production on federal lands, as well as a marked increase in coal extraction.Climate activism got a boost this year from Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg, who inspired millions of students to speak out on the issue, scolded world leaders at the United Nations General Assembly and mocked taunts by Trump and Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.The Justice Department didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.The case is Juliana v. United States, 18-36082, U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals (San Francisco). The lower-court case is Juliana v. U.S.A., 15-cv-01517, U.S. District Court, District of Oregon (Eugene).To contact the reporter on this story: Peter Blumberg in San Francisco at pblumberg1@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: David Glovin at dglovin@bloomberg.net, Tony Czuczka, James LuddenFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Police: 63-vehicle pileup in Virginia results in injuries Posted: 22 Dec 2019 09:47 AM PST  A pileup involving more than 60 cars on a major interstate in Virginia on Sunday morning injured dozens of people, some critically, according to state police. The accident happened just before 8 a.m. Sunday on Interstate 64 in York County and for a time shut down traffic in both directions, Virginia State Police Sgt. Michelle Anaya said in a statement. Eastbound lanes eventually reopened, but westbound lanes remained closed hours after the crash, according to the Virginia Department of Transportation.
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| Syrian troops push toward Turkish observation post in Idlib Posted: 22 Dec 2019 08:53 AM PST  Syrian government forces pushed deeper in their offensive on the last remaining rebel stronghold in the country's northwest on Sunday, getting very close to a Turkish observation post in the area, opposition activists said. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the opposition's Syrian Civil Defense, also known as White Helmets, reported shelling and airstrikes on rebel-held villages in Idlib on Sunday, saying that at least one civilian was killed. The province of Idlib has been at the center of a Syrian forces' push under the cover of airstrikes in recent weeks, with more than a dozen villages captured.
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| White House predicts Pelosi to `yield' on impeachment delay Posted: 22 Dec 2019 08:50 AM PST  The White House argued Sunday that Speaker Nancy Pelosi has put herself in an untenable position by stalling House-passed articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump in hopes of shaping the upcoming Senate trial. The House voted Wednesday to impeach Trump, who became only the third president in U.S. history to be formally charged with "high crimes and misdemeanors." Pelosi has declined to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate until Republicans provide details on witnesses and testimony, forestalling a trial that is likely to result in Trump's acquittal on charges of obstruction of Congress and abuse of power. Meanwhile, an influential senator and key Trump ally predicted that the drive for new testimony by Pelosi, D-Calif. and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., would be for naught.
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| New Missile Test Looms as Trump Fails to Sway Kim Posted: 22 Dec 2019 08:36 AM PST  WASHINGTON -- U.S. military and intelligence officials tracking North Korea's actions by the hour said they are bracing for an imminent test of an intercontinental ballistic missile capable of reaching U.S. shores but appear resigned to the fact that President Donald Trump has no good options to stop it.If the North goes ahead with the test in the coming days -- Pyongyang promised a "Christmas gift" if no progress had been made on lifting sanctions -- it would be a glaring setback for Trump's boldest foreign policy initiative, even as he faces an impeachment trial at home.U.S. officials are playing down the missile threat, though similar tests two years ago prompted Trump to suggest that "fire and fury," and perhaps a war, could result.Trump often cites the suspension of long-range missile and underground nuclear tests for the past two years as evidence that his leader-to-leader diplomacy with the North was working -- and that such negotiating skills would persuade the North's leader, Kim Jong Un, to give up his arsenal.The administration's argument has now changed. Should Kim resume tests, U.S. officials said, it will be a sign that he truly feels jammed and has concluded Washington will not lift crushing sanctions on his impoverished nation anytime soon.Left unaddressed, however, is the challenge that a new missile test would represent and what that would mean for the sanctions strategy. Over the past week, Stephen Biegun, the North Korea envoy who was confirmed by the Senate on Thursday as the next deputy secretary of state, has traveled across East Asia to also try to stem new efforts by Russia and China to weaken those sanctions.Military officials said there are no plans to try to destroy a missile on the launchpad or intercept it in the atmosphere -- steps both Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama considered and rejected. It is unclear if the military's Cyber Command is still trying to sabotage the launches from afar, as it did under the Obama administration, with mixed results.Instead, officials said, if the North resumes its missile tests, the Trump administration will turn to allies and again lobby the United Nations Security Council for tightened sanctions -- a strategy that has been tried for two decades.Beneath the recent threats is the onset of a cold reality: In the 18 months after Trump and Kim first met in Singapore, with declarations of warmth not seen since the suspension of the Korean War in 1953, the North has bolstered its arsenal of missiles and its stockpile of bomb-ready nuclear material.New estimates from a leading authority suggest that Kim has expanded his arsenal substantially since Trump announced on Twitter after Singapore that "there is No Longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea."Siegfried Hecker, the former head of the Los Alamos National Laboratory and one of the few Westerners who has seen the North's uranium production facilities, said he believes the country has fuel for about 38 warheads -- double an earlier estimate that he and other scientists and intelligence analysts had issued.In recent weeks, the North has conducted ground tests of what appear to be new missile engines that Pyongyang said would bolster its "nuclear deterrent," suggesting that it has little intention of giving up its ability."I think part of this may be bluff on their part," John Bolton, the former national security adviser, said to NPR on Thursday. "They think the president's desperate for a deal, and if they put an artificial time constraint on it, they may think they're going to get a better deal. We'll just have to wait and see."But," he noted, "this is all part of the North Korean playbook."A new element of the playbook could be that Kim is calculating that impeachment has weakened Trump, making him more desperate for a policy victory.Senior foreign policy officials and military commanders are bracing for perhaps the most serious cycle of crisis yet."What I would expect is some kind of long-range ballistic missile would be the 'gift,'" Gen. Charles Brown Jr., commander of Pacific Air Forces, said Tuesday. "Does it come on Christmas Eve? Does it come on Christmas Day? Does it come after the new year? One of my responsibilities is to pay attention to that."With no diplomatic progress between Washington and Pyongyang since the implosion of the last summit in February between Trump and Kim in Hanoi, Vietnam, administration officials are loath to see Trump leap into another face-to-face negotiation. While Trump's initial diplomatic outreach to Kim raised hopes and generated positive headlines, the president accepted vague language calling for the "denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula" as an ironclad commitment by the North to rid itself of its own weapons.The expected North Korean escalation will leave Trump with an unpalatable choice. He could reprise his alarming threats of military action from late 2017, infusing the 2020 election year with a sense of crisis, which could cost him votes -- and risk real conflict.Or he could endure the new provocation and double down, betting that greater sanctions could somehow force the North to abandon its decadeslong course toward a nuclear-tipped missile capable of striking the continental United States.Hopes for a Disarmament, DashedWhen Trump emerged from his daylong Singapore summit with Kim, the first time the leaders had ever met, he sounded certain that progress would be swift."I think he will do these things," Trump said. "I may be wrong. I may stand before you in six months and say, 'Hey, I was wrong.'"Roadblocks appeared almost immediately. The North refused to turn over an inventory of its weapons and delivery systems. However, there were signs Kim wanted to open up his nation's economy, analysts said.After exchanging warm letters, the leaders met again in Hanoi, with Trump offering a grand bargain -- an end to all sanctions for full disarmament. The president even offered to help build hotels along North Korea's east coast.Kim said he would agree to dismantle the main nuclear site at Yongbyon, the heart of the North's nuclear program, in return for relief from the most onerous sanctions, which Obama began in 2016 and Trump accelerated. Trump was tempted to accept, former aides said, but Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Bolton stopped him, arguing that important uranium enrichment sites of the North's were outside the walls of the facility. The talks ended in failure.In the months that followed, the administration debated whether it should soften its demand that the North dismantle all of its nuclear infrastructure before receiving substantial benefits. There was talk of negotiating an interim "nuclear freeze"; while that would keep the problem from worsening, it ran the risk of enshrining a nuclear arsenal already one-third the size of Pakistan's and India's.It took until October for a new North Korean team to assemble and meet with Biegun. He thought the meeting went well until, at the end of the day, the North's delegation returned to read a clearly prewritten statement denouncing the United States.The teams have not met since.Kim Plays His HandThe recent threats from Kim come as he is preparing for two important political events: a year-end plenary session of the Workers' Party of Korea and a New Year's speech. Kim had declared at the start of 2019 that North Korea would not give up a single weapon until the United States lifts sanctions. He then gave Trump a year-end deadline.Now Kim finds himself empty-handed, unable to stride into the party plenum in triumph or deliver a pronouncement of victory Jan. 1. Backed into a corner, he is trying once again to use his main leverage -- the threat of weapons tests or military action -- to coerce Trump into sanctions relief, analysts said."Things have not worked out the way he has anticipated," said Jean Lee, a Korea expert at the Wilson Center. "I suspect that he will keep provoking President Trump to compel him to get back to negotiations, but try to avoid overtly confronting him because he wants to leave open an opportunity."On Sunday, North Korea said Kim presided over a meeting of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party, where it said important issues had been discussed "for the sustained and accelerated development of the military capability for self-defense."The official Korean Central News Agency said the meeting was called to decide "important organizational and political measures and military steps to bolster" the armed forces "as required by the fast-changing situation." But it gave no details about the discussions.Kim could choose to launch a satellite rather than an intercontinental ballistic missile on the bet that might push Trump to loosen sanctions without inciting a violent reaction.Kim could also coax China and Russia into further easing sanctions at the U.N. Both nations are eager to reassert a leadership role on the North Korea issue.On Thursday, Luo Zhaohui, China's vice minister of foreign affairs, said at a news conference in Beijing that easing sanctions, as China and Russia had proposed Wednesday at the U.N., was the "best solution" to "break the deadlock on the peninsula."Analysts said China does not appear to be forcing all North Korean workers to leave its borders as it is required by a U.N. resolution. China said it complies with the sanctions resolutions. U.S. officials said Beijing also must stop ship-to-ship transfers carried out by North Korea of energy products.The U.S.' efforts to maintain a common front against the North may be further complicated next week when President Xi Jinping of China hosts a summit with Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan and President Moon Jae-in of South Korea. Trump's efforts to get the South to cover the full cost of U.S. troops based there has strained relations between the allies.Containment or WarTrump contemplated attacking North Korea early in his administration, when officials floated the idea of a "bloody nose" strategy intended to signal that Washington would never allow the North to reach the point when it could hold U.S. cities hostage with nuclear weapons. "Military solutions are now fully in place, locked and loaded, should North Korea act unwisely," Trump tweeted in August 2017.More recently, Trump has shown a keen interest in winding down conflicts rather than starting new ones. Trump has also forced out hawkish senior advisers, including Bolton, who once argued for a preemptive strike on North Korea.But Trump's current approach -- gradual diplomacy backed by the "boa constrictor" of sanctions, perhaps toward an interim freeze -- is unfolding in the shadow of similar efforts by four presidents who failed to stop the North.In signing a major defense bill Friday evening, Trump put into place new sanctions on North Korea, including the possibility of financial penalties on Russia and China in 120 days if they trade with the North."We will be keeping a very close eye on that," Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., who wrote the provisions, said in an interview. "It would be a huge mistake for the president to waive these sanctions unless he can certify progress on major issues."Trump has essentially shrugged off the 13 short-range missile or rocket tests that North Korea has conducted since May. An intercontinental missile launch would be more difficult to ignore, though, and it is unclear how he might respond, especially if such a test intensifies criticism that Kim has manipulated him.Thus far, Trump is showing little appetite for a return to the "fire and fury" tensions of two years ago."I have a very good relationship with Kim Jong Un," Trump told reporters at the White House this month before adding, in what could prove to be wishful thinking, "I think we both want to keep it that way."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2019 The New York Times Company
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| GOP governors grapple with whether to accept refugees or not Posted: 22 Dec 2019 08:07 AM PST  An executive order by President Donald Trump giving states the right to refuse to take refugees is putting Republican governors in an uncomfortable position. Others say refugees are vital to fill jobs and keep rural communities afloat. More than 30 governors have agreed to accept refugees, but about a dozen Republican governors have stayed silent as they face a decision that must be made by Jan. 21 so resettlement agencies can secure federal funding in time to plan where to place refugees.
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| Cyprus police bring in boat with 34 Syrian migrants aboard Posted: 22 Dec 2019 07:49 AM PST ![Cyprus police bring in boat with 34 Syrian migrants aboard]( "Cyprus police bring in boat with 34 Syrian migrants aboard") Cyprus police officers rescued 34 Syrian migrants Sunday after spotting their boat off the Mediterranean island nation's northwestern coast. The migrants were all male and included a 17-year-old. All 34 were taken to a migrant reception center outside the Cypriot capital of Nicosia.
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| Clashes erupt at Hong Kong rally to support China's Uighurs Posted: 22 Dec 2019 07:46 AM PST  Clashes broke out Sunday between Hong Kong police and protesters at a rally in support of China's Uighur minority. Police arrested two protesters who were attempting to burn a Chinese flag at the rally, which was attended by several hundred people. Some were holding signs emblazoned with the blue and white flag of the independence movement in the northwestern Chinese territory of Xinjiang.
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| Scientists struggle to save seagrass from coastal pollution Posted: 22 Dec 2019 07:29 AM PST  Peering over the side of his skiff anchored in the middle of New Hampshire's Great Bay, Fred Short liked what he saw. Just below the surface, the 69-year-old marine ecologist noticed beds of bright green seagrass swaying in the waist-deep water. It was the latest sign that these plants with ribbon-like strands, which had declined up to 80% since the 1990s, were starting to bounce back with improved water quality.
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| Sudan opens Darfur crimes probe against Bashir regime figures Posted: 22 Dec 2019 06:42 AM PST  Sudan has opened an investigation into crimes committed in the Darfur region by members of the regime of ousted former president Omar al-Bashir, the state prosecutor said Sunday. The conflict between pro-government forces and ethnic minority rebels left around 300,000 people dead and 2.5 million displaced, according to the United Nations. "We have launched an investigation into the crimes committed in Darfur from 2003," prosecutor Tagelsir al-Heber said on his arrival in Khartoum after a trip to the United Arab Emirates.
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| Iran Poll Shows Majority Backs Right to Protest After Crackdown Posted: 22 Dec 2019 06:06 AM PST ![Iran Poll Shows Majority Backs Right to Protest After Crackdown]( "Iran Poll Shows Majority Backs Right to Protest After Crackdown") (Bloomberg) -- About three-quarters of Iranians surveyed in a government-backed poll said they supported the rights of protesters to take to the streets in last month's countrywide demonstrations, a reformist newspaper reported.The Iranian Students' Polling Agency, which surveyed 2,027 people in the province of Tehran, also found that 62% of respondents saw "dialogue with protesters" as the government's best means of addressing popular discontent, the daily Etemad newspaper said.The expression of support, especially in a survey conducted by a state-backed polling organization, suggests that grievances still run deep in Iran. Triggered by a steep rise in gasoline prices, November's protests met with a violent crackdown, becoming the bloodiest in Iran since the 1979 revolution.The government so far hasn't provided an official death toll for the unrest, but the London-based rights group Amnesty International estimates that some 304 people were killed by security forces.The demonstrations spread to scores of cities and towns throughout the country and several of Tehran's districts and its outskirts were swept up in the unrest.Officials have consistently claimed that the majority of those who took part in demonstrations and clashed with police were "rioters" and "terrorists" acting on behalf of foreign governments. Hundreds of people remain in prison.The most deadly violence took place in the oil-rich, Arab-speaking province of Khuzestan, which the ISPA survey doesn't cover.According to the survey, 71% of people said impartiality at Iran's state broadcaster, which holds a monopoly over the country's entire broadcasting services, was "low" or "very low" when it came to covering the protests. Some 90% of respondents said they used alternative news sources such as social media and satellite TV.To contact the reporter on this story: Arsalan Shahla in Tehran at ashahla@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Lin Noueihed at lnoueihed@bloomberg.net, Paul Abelsky, Alaa ShahineFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Egypt court sentences 3 teens to 15 years for grisly murder Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:55 AM PST ![Egypt court sentences 3 teens to 15 years for grisly murder]( "Egypt court sentences 3 teens to 15 years for grisly murder") A court in Egypt convicted three teenage boys of fatally stabbing a boy who was defending a girl from sexual harassment, sentencing them on Sunday each to 15 years in prison. The juvenile court in the Nile Delta region found that the three suspects had repeatedly stabbed 17-year-old Mahmoud el-Banna in October. El-Banna's killing stunned Egypt, where there has been a large outcry against the harassment of women, with local media extensively covering the case.
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| Us vs. them: Trump aiming to use impeachment to rev up base Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:45 AM PST  Using stark "us vs. them" language, President Donald Trump and his reelection campaign have begun framing his impeachment not as a judgment on his conduct but as a referendum on how Democrats regard him and his supporters. Mere days from the start of an election year, the White House and its allies are painting Trump's impeachment on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress as an effort to undo his 2016 victory and discount the will of the people. All but certain to be acquitted in next year's trial by the Republican-controlled Senate, Trump has considered a barnstorming tour after the yet-to-be-scheduled trial ends, hoping to use a backward-looking message to propel him forward in 2020.
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| Iran rejects conditional release for Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:45 AM PST  Iran's prosecutor general has denied conditional release for a jailed British-Iranian woman and a prominent human rights activist, a lawyer for the two said, according to state media. "We had requested conditional parole and furlough for both Nazanin Zaghari and Narges Mohammadi, and the prosecutor general has disagreed with both," Mahmoud Behzadirad said, quoted late Saturday by state news agency IRNA. "Conditional parole is my clients' legal right," the lawyer added. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe was arrested in 2016 as she was leaving Iran after taking her then 22-month-old daughter to visit her family. She had been working for Thomson Reuters Foundation - the media organisation's philanthropic arm - and was sentenced to five years in jail for sedition. Ms Mohammadi, 47, was the spokeswoman for the Centre of Human Rights Defenders in Iran and had campaigned against the death penalty. Richard Ratcliffe and daughter Gabriella singing carols with the British Rights Abroad Group Families outside Downing Street Credit: Jonathan Brady/PA Wire Initially arrested in 2015, the mother-of-two was sentenced to a total of 10 years in prison for "forming and managing an illegal group" among other charges. The human rights activist reportedly suffers from a neurological disease that causes muscular paralysis. She "must be examined... at least every six months but has not been for several months now," the lawyer said, noting that even the intelligence ministry, as the security body handling the case, had agreed to the leave. "Zaghari has been examined by a psychiatrist several times and is in a situation similar to Narges Mohammadi," Mr Behzadirad added. The British-Iranian's daughter, Gabriella, returned to Britain in October, having stayed with relatives in Iran since her mother's detention, visiting her every week. The two women launched a three-day hunger strike in January and ended it after being allowed to resume medical treatment outside the prison, according to Mrs Zaghari-Ratcliffe's husband.
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| Iran rejects 'conditional release' for Iranian-British woman Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:29 AM PST  The lawyer of an Iranian-British woman convicted on spying charges in Iran has asked that she be released after serving half of her sentence, a request that was immediately rejected by the Tehran prosecutors'office, the state IRNA news agency reported Sunday. Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, who works for the Thomson Reuters Foundation, was sentenced to five years for allegedly planning the "soft toppling" of Iran's government while traveling with her young daughter in Iran at the time.
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| Iraqis protest as deadline to name new PM looms Posted: 22 Dec 2019 04:21 AM PST  The demonstrations came ahead of a looming midnight deadline for naming an interim prime minister, but without a solution being reached. The protesters closed roads in southern provinces including oil-rich Basra saying they won't accept the nomination of the outgoing higher education minister, Qusay al-Suhail. Iraq's leaderless uprising has roiled the country since Oct. 1, and at least 400 people have been killed since.
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| Libya's east-based forces seize ship with Turkish crew Posted: 22 Dec 2019 02:38 AM PST  Libya's forces based in the country's east say they have seized a ship with Turkish crew members amid tensions in the eastern Mediterranean over a contentious maritime border deal involving Tripoli and Ankara. The development comes as Turkey recently increased its backing for Libya's U.N.-supported government, based in the country's west, in the capital of Tripoli. In Libya's protracted conflict, that administration is a bitter rival to the east-based one.
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| Trump slams 'unfair' Pelosi delay, rallies conservatives Posted: 22 Dec 2019 12:21 AM PST  President Donald Trump complained Saturday about House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's delayed transmission of the articles of impeachment to the Senate, which may delay a trial in the GOP-controlled chamber. "It's so unfair," Trump said, days after he was impeached by the House, as he spoke at a conservative student conference organized by the group Turning Point USA. Pelosi has refused so far to send the articles of impeachment to the Senate, in part to provide more leverage to Democrats in that chamber as they seek to negotiate the rules for the trial proceedings.
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| India's leader defends new law as protests against it go on Posted: 21 Dec 2019 11:54 PM PST  Twenty-three people have been killed nationwide since the law was passed in Parliament earlier this month in protests that represent the first major roadblock for Modi's Hindu nationalist agenda since his party's landslide re-election last spring. Most of the deaths have occurred in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, where 20% of the state's 200 million people are Muslim. Police, who deny any wrongdoing, said that among the 15 people killed in the state was an 8-year-old boy who died in a stampede in the city of Varanasi, the heart of Modi's parliamentary constituency.
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| Afghan president appears to win new term in initial results Posted: 21 Dec 2019 11:27 PM PST  Afghan President Ashraf Ghani appears to have narrowly won a second term, according to preliminary results from September's balloting that were announced Sunday, although his main challenger rejected the outcome as illegitimate. If the outcome stands despite the complaints of ballot fraud, it could give Ghani the authority he has sought to demand a leading role in peace talks with the Taliban in the country devastated by decades of war. In a nationally televised address from the presidential palace later in the day, Ghani claimed victory over his main rival, Abdullah Abdullah, who serves as Afghanistan's chief executive in a fragile national unity government..
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| Fighting Shipping Pollution Is Bad For the Planet Posted: 21 Dec 2019 11:00 PM PST  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- The shipping industry is getting serious about cutting sulfur dioxide emissions. People who live along busy shipping lanes will see health benefits from reduced particulate emissions and a reduction in acid rain when new regulations come into force on Jan. 1. But the sulfur particles help offset some of the warming caused by powering the ships, so the rules may also increase the likelihood that rising sea levels caused by global warming leave those same populations without a home.The new regulations from the International Maritime Organization, a United Nations agency responsible for ensuring safe and efficient shipping on clean oceans, allow for two ways of tackling the problem. Either ships must burn fuel with a sulfur content of no more than 0.5%, down from the 3.5% that is currently permitted outside of designated special emission-control areas. Or they must install scrubbers to remove sulfur from their exhaust.The change targets the public-health impact of shipping, which is estimated to contribute 13% of total sulfur oxide emissions annually. It will slash the amount of sulfur dioxide from ships by 75%. Doing so will dramatically reduce premature deaths resulting from sulfate emissions from ships, according to a paper published in Nature Communications in 2018 by a team of researchers from U.S. institutions and the Finnish Meteorological Institute.Most of the health benefits will be felt by communities in coastal regions of densely populated countries with busy ports or those on major sea-trade routes, especially in India and China. People living near coastlines in the U.S. or Europe won't see a difference since ships operating in those areas already face far stricter limits that restrict them to burning fuel with a maximum sulfur level of 0.1%.But these health benefits may come at a cost of actually worsening shipping's climate impact. That's because the sulfates from ships' exhaust emissions contribute a cooling effect that will be lost with their removal.Sulfur aerosols from ship exhaust reflect energy back into space. But they also help make clouds brighter, so they reflect more sunlight away from the Earth as well. Mikhail Sofiev, one of the authors of the Nature Communications paper, explained it like this:Clouds with many small droplets are "whiter" — more reflective — than the clouds with few large droplets. Anthropogenic particles are small and numerous. They attract water and prompt formation of many small cloud droplets – and we get white-top cloud. Fewer sulfate particles reaching the cloud tops will reduce their albedo [ability to reflect] because the cloud droplets will become less numerous, bigger and therefore less reflective.Most of the cooling effect from ship exhaust comes from this secondary impact on clouds, accounting for about 92% of the total. The new regulations will reduce that cooling impact from the world's shipping fleet by 81%, according to the study. The net effect of the IMO 2020 rule on the climate impact is to increase the warming effect of all human activities by 3.8%.Removing the sulfur from ship emissions exposes the climate effects of shipping. As James Corbett, another of the report's authors, points out, "sulfate aerosols mask climate forcing, they don't change it."The sulfur puzzle is just one piece of IMO's efforts to clean up an industry that's crucial to keeping global trade flowing, with more than 80% of global trade carried by sea. The Third IMO GHG Study, published in 2014, estimated that in 2012 international shipping accounted for about 2.2% of all anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions, and that such emissions could grow by between 50% and 250% by 2050.In 2018, the London-based group adopted a strategy to reduce greenhouse gas pollution. The goal is to cut the carbon intensity of international shipping "by at least 40% by 2030, pursuing efforts towards 70% by 2050, compared to 2008," according to the document. It also aims to bring about a peak in total greenhouse gas emissions "as soon as possible" and reduce them by at least 50% by 2050 compared with 2008 levels. The overall emissions target is lower than the carbon intensity goal because the volume of shipping is forecast to increase over the next 30 years.One proposal to help achieve all of this is to lower fuel consumption by introducing speed limits. Others include technical approaches such as mandatory power limits.Where sulfur dioxide emissions are concerned, some of the negative climate impact may be offset by a parallel reduction in organic carbon and black carbon particles from ship exhaust, which have strongly warming properties. Low-sulfur fuels contain fewer black carbon particles and scrubbers remove them alongside the sulfur. They also have another important component: They are extremely expensive. The higher cost of IMO 2020-compliant ship fuel and the fact there is no single worldwide specification for compliant fuel may in and of itself increase the incentive for ship operators and charterers to cut consumption, Corbett argues, thereby reducing CO2 emissions.Until an industry-wide greenhouse gas strategy is adopted and implemented that may be the best hope we have. To contact the author of this story: Julian Lee at jlee1627@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Melissa Pozsgay at mpozsgay@bloomberg.netThis column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.Julian Lee is an oil strategist for Bloomberg. Previously he worked as a senior analyst at the Centre for Global Energy Studies.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinion©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Croatia's presidential contest heads to Jan. 5 runoff vote Posted: 21 Dec 2019 10:27 PM PST  Croatia's conservative president will face a liberal former prime minister in a runoff election early next month after no candidate won an outright majority in a first round of voting Sunday, near-complete results showed. The vote was held just days before Croatia takes over the European Union's presidency for the first time. Left-wing former Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic led the field with nearly 30% of the votes in preliminary returns.
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| Kim Jong-un meets with top military officials amid concerns of fresh tests Posted: 21 Dec 2019 09:53 PM PST  North Korean leader Kim Jong-un held a meeting of top military officials to discuss boosting the country's military capability, state news agency reported on Sunday amid heightened concern the North may be about to return to confrontation with Washington. Kim presided over an enlarged meeting of the ruling Workers' Party's Central Military Commission, KCNA news agency said, to discuss steps "to bolster up the overall armed forces of the country ... militarily and politically." "Also discussed were important issues for decisive improvement of the overall national defence and core matters for the sustained and accelerated development of military capability for self-defence," KCNA said. It did not give details on when the meeting was held nor what was decided. The commission is North Korea's top military decision-making body. Kim rules the country as its supreme military commander and is the chairman of the commission. North Korea has set a year-end deadline for the United States to change what it says is a policy of hostility amid a stalemate in efforts to make progress on their pledge to end the North's nuclear programme and establish lasting peace. Kim and U.S. President Donald Trump have met three times since June 2018, but there has been no substantive progress in dialogue while the North demanded crushing international sanctions be lifted first. On Saturday, the state media said the United States would "pay dearly" for taking issue with the North's human rights record and said Washington's "malicious words" would only aggravate tensions on the Korean Peninsula. North Korea has also repeatedly called for the United States to drop its "hostile policy" and warned about its "Christmas gift" as the end-year deadline it set for Washington to change its position looms. Some experts say the reclusive state may be preparing for an intercontinental ballistic missile test that could put it back on a path of confrontation with the United States. The U.S. envoy for North Korea, Stephen Biegun, has visited South Korea and China in the past week, issuing a public and direct call to North Korea to return to the negotiating table, but there has been no response.
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| The Year Socialism Became a Dirty Word—Again Posted: 21 Dec 2019 09:01 PM PST  (Bloomberg) -- It was a bad year to be any kind of socialist in Europe. The decline has been long and agonizing for a once-dominant force, but in 2019 falling popularity reached new depths and raised questions over whether reinvention can lead to a revival. A decade ago, the prime ministers of Britain, Spain, Greece and even Hungary were from the center-left. Many went on to swiftly lose power, but then socialist governments emerged in France and Italy. Now the political brand looks like an anachronism.Populism has tested the ability of mainstream parties to adapt and some on the center-right are regaining their footing. That cannot be said of the traditional left. It gravitated toward the middle ground in the 1990s, and then paid a price for selling out. But a pendulum swing to 1970s-style radical ideology has been shown to be just as out of sync with the times.This year ends with the humiliation of the Labour Party in the U.K.'s Dec. 12 election and Germany's Social Democrats more unpopular than at any time in living memory. In Italy and Spain, the center-left are in government only thanks to precarious alliances with the anti-establishment groups that grew from the 2008 financial crisis.For Jacob Funk Kirkegaard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics in Washington, the malaise runs deep, indeed as far back as the Cold War era of the early 1970s. "There has not been a charismatic and genuine left-wing leader who made a true difference in Europe since Willy Brandt," who won a Nobel prize for building bridges between east and west and paving the way for German reunification.This is what the parties are facing as we enter 2020:BritainBrexit-battered voters were turned off by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn's promises of a socialist revolution, which was to include everything from nationalizing industry to free broadband.The party lost Scotland years ago, but this month areas of England's post-industrial north abandoned Labour, some for the first time in their history. Harking back to the wilderness years in the 1980s, Corbyn is the most unpopular opposition leader in British history.Tony Blair returned Labour to power by dragging the party to the center, winning three back-to-back elections. But his catastrophic decision to follow the U.S. into war in Iraq wrecked his legacy and made him toxic at home. His warning this week was existential."The choice for Labour is to renew itself as the serious, progressive, non-Conservative competitor for power in British politics, or retreat from such an ambition, in which case over time it will be replaced," Blair told an audience.GermanyAt the heart of the identity crisis is a harsh reality: working class voters have been abandoning the very parties whose raison d'etre was to protect them. Blue collar workers are switching sides. Today there are not only fewer of them—as economies have evolved to more high-skilled labor—but those left are more socially conservative and opposed to immigration.Like its counterparts elsewhere in Europe, Germany's Social Democratic Party has struggled to find the antidote for a tidal wave of anti-immigration sentiment and to stop the Greens sopping young environmentally-conscious voters.The SPD is now pinning its hopes on a pair of unknowns to lead it out of an existential funk after governing with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives damaged the brand. Today, the SPD, the country's oldest party, polls in fourth place with less than 15%. The Greens could potentially displace the SPD in the coalition down the line.Proposals like a tax on the wealthy and an increase of the minimum wage were dismissed by one SPD critic as a "warmed-up box of socialist moth balls." "If they move further to the left, the SPD will stop being a people's party," warned Andrea Roemmele, professor of political communication at the Berlin-based Hertie School.France When it comes to a plunge in popularity, few leaders can better Francois Hollande, the country's most reviled president. His socialists are on life support and his former prime minister pronounced the party "dead and gone."For sure, the French socialists were always prone to infighting. In 2002, their failure to unite behind their candidate for president allowed far-right leader Jean-Marie Le Pen to make the run off against incumbent Jacques Chirac. But this time the way back seems much longer. President Emmanuel Macron was the beneficiary more recently, creating a centrist party that triumphed in 2017. He has since emerged as the strongest voice in the European Union.ItalyPolitical fluidity is another challenge, especially in parts of southern Europe without a two-party system or where the political landscape has fragmented beyond recognition. Gone are the days when you stuck to your tribe for life.Voters are willing to get experimental and there is no better political laboratory than Italy where parties surge and disappear in the blink of an eye. There, the strangest alliances are forged, such as that between rival populists.It explains how the center-left has changed its name countless times. Its latest incarnation as the Democratic Party is trying to rebuild its support base and is in government with the populist Five Star Movement. But together they poll about the same as Matteo Salvini's anti-immigration League, which is itching for an election and will eventually get one.Spain and PortugalWhen that time comes, the center-left strategy in Italy is to lure voters away from Five Star. In Spain, it's a gamble that Pedro Sanchez was banking on when he called two elections in the space of a year to try and shake off his dependence to far-left populists Podemos. It hasn't worked out.He too is trapped in a marriage of mutual, and temporary convenience. That leaves Portugal as a left-wing oasis in Europe, but one that increasingly feels like an exception.GreeceTribal politics was the norm in Greece until the country became the epicenter of Europe's debt crisis. Two parties traded power since the junta fell in 1974. But then as the socialist Pasok party became the biggest political casualty of the upheaval, a group further to the left filled the vacuum.Alexis Tsipras's Coalition of the Radical Left, or Syriza, shot to power in 2015 and effectively challenged Europe to a duel over austerity and Greece's euro membership. He blinked, turned into the Marxist fireband tamed into submission by Brussels and was ejected from office this year. He left with his international reputation enhanced, but at home the conservative New Democracy is back in power.MaltaOn the Mediterranean island of half a million people, the Labour Party was enjoying a long stint in government until the country's legacy of failing to tackle corruption caught up with it. Joseph Muscat, prime minister since 2013, was lauded for Malta's economic growth. Now he's the lightning rod for anger over a murder scandal.Two years after the brutal murder of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, the police investigation has reached Muscat's inner circle. He denies any involvement and resigned, saying he will step down next month. Protesters want him gone now.ScandinaviaIn Sweden, a far-right surge rocked a beacon of liberal democracy. The Social Democrats managed to cobble together a government, but for first time in decades they are no longer the most popular party in most opinion polls as the anti-immigration Sweden Democrats overtook.The Social Democrats in Denmark at least were able to return to power this year, though in part by adopting some policies of its anti-immigrant rival by tightening controls.Eastern EuropeIn eastern Europe, socialist parties have been on the slide for years as right-wing populist leaders like Hungary's Viktor Orban and Jaroslaw Kaczynski in Poland cemented their power by portraying some opponents as apologists for communism. Kaczynski's Law & Justice Party won a second term in October with an outright parliamentary majority, albeit against a main opponent that's from the center-right.But in Romania, the left-leaning Social Democratic Party was part of the government for more than a decade until its minority administration collapsed last month. For former party leader and national strongman Liviu Dragnea, it arguably couldn't get any worse. He was jailed in May for corruption.\--With assistance from Birgit Jennen, John Follain, Andrea Dudik, Rafaela Lindeberg and Raymond Colitt.To contact the author of this story: Flavia Krause-Jackson in London at fjackson@bloomberg.netTo contact the editor responsible for this story: Rodney Jefferson at r.jefferson@bloomberg.netFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| N Korean leader holds party meeting to bolster military Posted: 21 Dec 2019 07:16 PM PST  North Korea said Sunday leader Kim Jong Un has convened a key ruling party meeting to decide on steps to bolster the country's military capability. The meeting came amid speculation that the North could abandon diplomacy with the U.S. and launch either a long-range missile or a satellite-carrying rocket if Washington doesn't accept its demand for new incentives to salvage faltering nuclear negotiations by year's end. The Korean Central News Agency said Kim presided over a meeting of the Central Military Commission of the Workers' Party.
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| Slain Barnard College student mourned at private memorial Posted: 21 Dec 2019 05:53 PM PST  A Barnard College freshman who was fatally stabbed in a New York City park earlier this month was remembered by friends and classmates Saturday at a private memorial service at her high school alma mater in Virginia. Music figured prominently in the gathering, along with poetry readings and personal testimonies by those close to her. Majors had played in a rock band in New York and had told an editor from a newspaper internship in high school that she planned to take journalism classes in college.
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| Abe Reiterates Support for Trump’s North Korean Policy in a Call Posted: 21 Dec 2019 05:49 PM PST  (Bloomberg) -- Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe expressed "total support" for President Donald Trump's policy on North Korea in a phone conversation between the two leaders, while stressing on the importance of avoiding provocations.There should also be a reliance on peaceful dialogue to achieve complete denuclearization of the Korean peninsula, Abe told Trump in the call to discuss responses to the latest developments in North Korea, according to a statement from Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs.The conversation that stretched on for more than an hour was initiated by the Trump administration. Both agreed to the need for even deeper cooperation in tackling the problems of nuclear weapons and missiles in the region, as well as resolving the matter of kidnappings of Japanese citizens by North Korea.Abe plans to discuss the issues when he meets with Chinese President Xi Jinping during his visit to China this week.Abe's show of support comes amid signs of fraying consensus on North Korea among members of the United Nations Security Council, which had thus far remained united behind Trump's maximum pressure campaign on the reclusive nation. A new proposal by China and Russia to lessen the economic embargo on the hermit state is getting pushback in Washington.The proposal by North Korea's historic allies said the changes were warranted because Kim Jong Un's regime had complied with UN resolutions and needed "humanitarian and livelihood" relief.Trump Revives Threat of Force Against North Korea's 'Rocket Man'To contact the reporter on this story: Pavel Alpeyev in Tokyo at palpeyev@bloomberg.netTo contact the editors responsible for this story: Shamim Adam at sadam2@bloomberg.net, Niluksi KoswanageFor more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com©2019 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Australia's leader apologizes for vacation amid wildfires Posted: 21 Dec 2019 05:19 PM PST  Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison apologized Sunday for taking a family vacation in Hawaii as deadly bushfires raged across several states, destroying homes and claiming the lives of two volunteer firefighters. Morrison cut short a vacation with his wife and adult children amid public anger at his absence during a national crisis, and arrived home Saturday night. "If you had your time over again and you had the benefit of hindsight, we would have made different decisions," Morrison said.
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