| Alexei Navalny: Mike Pompeo admits 'substantial chance' that Russia ordered poison attack Posted: 09 Sep 2020 05:27 PM PDT  The US Secretary of State said on Wednesday there was a strong chance Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny's poisoning was ordered by senior officials in Moscow. Navalny, the most visible critic of Vladimir Putin within Russia, fell violently ill last month as he took a flight in Siberia. He was flown for treatment to Germany, where doctors said he was poisoned. "I think people all around the world see this kind of activity for what it is," Mike Pompeo said in a radio interview. "And when they see the effort to poison a dissident, and they recognise that there is a substantial chance that this actually came from senior Russian officials, I think this is not good for the Russian people," he told conservative host Ben Shapiro. Mr Pompeo reiterated that the United States and its European allies all wanted Russia to "hold those responsible for this accountable" and said Washington would also try to identify the perpetrators.
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| George Bizos: Anti-apartheid lawyer who defended Mandela dies aged 92 Posted: 09 Sep 2020 05:14 PM PDT  South Africa mourns the loss of human rights lawyer George Bizos after he dies of "natural causes".
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| Congress questions sale of US residence in Israel to Adelson Posted: 09 Sep 2020 04:43 PM PDT |
| Coronavirus: What do we know about the artemisia plant? Posted: 09 Sep 2020 04:16 PM PDT  Artemisia plant extracts have anti-malarial properties, but there's no evidence they can combat Covid-19.
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| Trade talks: Why chicken, cheese, and cod are a tricky menu Posted: 09 Sep 2020 04:02 PM PDT  The UK this week pursues simultaneous talks with Japan, the US and EU to secure its post-Brexit future.
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| Whistleblower: W.House stifled reporting on Russian election interference Posted: 09 Sep 2020 04:01 PM PDT  A senior US intelligence official said the White House ordered him to stop reporting on Russian election interference and highlight Chinese and Iran meddling instead, according to a whistleblower complaint revealed Wednesday.
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| UK denies going rogue with new law despite EU fury Posted: 09 Sep 2020 03:01 PM PDT  British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was accused Wednesday of presiding over a "rogue state" as his government introduced legislation that intentionally breaches its EU withdrawal treaty in the messy countdown to a full Brexit divorce.
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| Whistleblower says DHS tried to stifle intel on Russian meddling Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:43 PM PDT  Brian Murphy said he was reassigned from his position at DHS after objecting to drafts of an intel report making Russia's actions appear to be on par with those of Iran and China.
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| Trump loyalists interfered to downplay Russia election threat – whistleblower Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:31 PM PDT  Brian Murphy claims he was demoted for refusing to accept fabrication of intelligence to match Donald Trump's rhetoricTrump loyalists running the Department of Homeland Security manipulated intelligence reports to play down the threat of Russian election interference and white supremacists and exaggerate the threat of Antifa and anarchist groups, according to the department's former top intelligence official.The official, Brian Murphy, said he was demoted in August from his position running the department's office of intelligence and analysis, because of his refusal to go along with the fabrication of intelligence to match Donald Trump's rhetoric, and for making formal complaints about the political pressure. He filed a whistleblower reprisal complaint on Tuesday.Murphy was transferred to a DHS management position after his team was found to have collected information on reporters and protesters in Portland, Oregon. In his complaint, he claimed the office "never knowingly or deliberately collected information on journalists, at least as far as Mr Murphy is aware or ever authorized", and he described the reporting as "significantly flawed".He insisted the real reason for his transfer was his refusal to manipulate vital intelligence on national security.In the whistleblower complaint, Murphy alleges that the efforts to falsify DHS intelligence dated back to 2018, when the then homeland security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen asked his office to inflate the numbers of known or suspected terrorists crossing the border with Mexico, in support of Trump's demand for a border wall.Murphy said the intelligence identified three such terrorist cases. In December 2018, Nielsen told the House judiciary committee there were 3,755.According to Murphy's testimony, Nielsen and her successor, Chad Wolf, continued to exaggerate the terrorist threat at the border in 2019, while being aware of the real figures.Murphy's most serious allegations concern the effort to downplay Russian meddling in the election, while it was actually under way in the course of the campaign. In May this year, Murphy said Wolf told him "to cease providing intelligence assessments on the threat of Russian interference in the United States, and instead start reporting on interference activities by China and Iran".Wolf told Murphy the orders came from the national security adviser, Robert O'Brien."Mr Murphy informed Mr Wolf he would not comply with these instructions, as doing so would put the country in substantial and specific danger," the whistleblower complaint says.On 7 July, Murphy was told to stop circulating any information about Russian disinformation efforts until he met Wolf. The next day, according to the complaint, the acting homeland security secretary told Murphy the assessment of the Russian role "should be "held" because it "made the president look bad".When Murphy objected, he was excluded from meetings on the subject, and an alternative assessment was leaked to the press which put Russian interference on a par with China and Iran – an equivalence which Murphy, and most intelligence experts, say is not supported by the facts."This is a huge deal," the former National Security Agency lawyer Susan Hennessey wrote on Twitter. "Is [national security adviser] O'Brien directing the [intelligence community] and others to lie about or distort the China election threat to hurt Biden and help Trump?"Top administration officials including the director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe, the secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, and the attorney general, William Barr, have claimed that China is as big a threat, if not a much greater danger, to the integrity of the US elections than Russia, with the implication that China favours Trump's Democratic challenger, Joe Biden. No substantial evidence has been presented to support that claim, which is contradicted by a vast amount of material, including reports by the special counsel Robert Mueller, and the Republican-led Senate intelligence committee, detailing Russian interference.According to the whistleblower complaint, a homeland threat assessment (HTA) drawn up by Murphy's intelligence analysts in March this year was also blocked by Wolf and other DHS political appointees because of its sections on Russian interference and the white supremacist threat.Murphy was told by his superiors he "needed to specifically modify the section on white supremacy in a manner that made the threat appear less severe, as well as include information on the prominence of violent 'leftwing' groups". When he refused, the HTA was taken out of his hands."It is Mr Murphy's assessment that the final version of the HTA will more closely resemble a policy document with references to antifa and "anarchist" groups than an intelligence document," his complaint said.Hennessey, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the executive editor of the Lawfare blog, urged some scepticism over Murphy's claims in view of his office's involvement in the monitoring of journalists in Portland."Murphy's account is especially weak on key allegation that he was reassigned as retaliation for whistleblowing, as opposed to astonishingly bad judgment. It could be that, in an effort to tell a self-serving story, he is also revealing very serious (and real) wrongdoing at DHS," she wrote.
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| Justice Dept. push into Trump case could prompt dismissal Posted: 09 Sep 2020 02:12 PM PDT  Attorney General William Barr on Wednesday defended the Justice Department's move to intervene in a defamation lawsuit against President Donald Trump, even as experts were deeply skeptical of the federal government's effort to protect the president in a seemingly private dispute. The department's move is likely to have an ancillary benefit for Trump in delaying the case, but administration lawyers have a tough task at hand trying to argue that the president was acting in his official capacity when he denied Carroll's allegations last year, experts say.
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| EU considers legal action as UK unpicks Brexit deal Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:51 PM PDT  The European Union is considering legal action against the UK after Boris Johnson pressed ahead with plans to override parts of the Withdrawal Agreement. The bloc believes it may be able to mount a challenge before the Government manages to pass legislation which changes part of the deal struck last year relating to Northern Ireland, which ministers admit does breach international law in a "very specific and limited way." According to Bloomberg, a draft working paper prepared by Brussels and circulated to member states warns that the UK Internal Market Bill represents a "clear breach" of the agreement which would "open the way to legal remedies". It adds that once the transition period ends, the EU could also trigger the dispute settlement mechanism contained in the deal, which could ultimately result in the UK being hit with financial sanctions. It came as the EU called for emergency talks to salvage the Brexit negotiations. The talks will take place on Thursday.
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| Teacher deaths raise alarms as new school year begins Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:43 PM PDT  O'FALLON, Mo. (AP) — Teachers in at least three states have died after bouts with the coronavirus since the dawn of the new school year, and a teachers' union leader worries that the return to in-person classes will have a deadly impact across the U.S. if proper precautions aren't taken. AshLee DeMarinis was just 34 when she died Sunday after three weeks in the hospital. A third-grade teacher died Monday in South Carolina, and two other educators died recently in Mississippi.
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| Think 2020's disasters are wild? Experts see worse in future Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:37 PM PDT  A record amount of California is burning, spurred by a nearly 20-year mega-drought. Meanwhile, the Atlantic's 16th and 17th named tropical storms are swirling, a record number for this time of year. Phoenix keeps setting triple-digit heat records, while Colorado went through a weather whiplash of 90-degree heat to snow this week.
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| Whistleblower: DHS Hyped ‘Antifa,’ Soft-Pedaled White Supremacist Threat Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:26 PM PDT  Downplay the white supremacist threat. Hype up rhetoric about anti-fascists and other "left-wing" groups stoking violence. That's what the Department of Homeland Security's leadership ordered one of its top intelligence officials to do, according to a complaint from that staffer, Brian Murphy, released Tuesday. In a filing with the Department's Inspector General, Murphy, until recently a top official in the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis, alleges he was recently demoted for his repeated refusals to cook the books on DHS intelligence, particularly that which did not favor the Trump administration. Murphy, who alleges unfair retaliation, claims he was pressured to downplay threats posed by white supremacists and Russian election interference, and instead told to inflate fears around immigrants, anarchists, anti-fascists, China, and Iran.In October 2018, for example, then-DHS Deputy Chief of Staff Miles Taylor and DHS Counselor Kristen Marquadt allegedly pressured Murphy into distorting information on immigrants, so that it "supported the policy argument that large numbers of [known or suspected terrorists] were entering the United States through the southwest border."Trump Advisers: He Was 'Triggered' by Talk of White SupremacyMurphy says he declined to manipulate the data, and that he and a supervisor agreed that doing so would constitute a felony. Nevertheless, he claims, immigration data was distorted on multiple occasions, including oral testimony then-DHS head Kirstjen Nielsen gave to Congress, in which she claimed 3,755 known or suspected terrorists had crossed the southern border.In a meeting with Nielsen and then-DHS Chief of Staff Chad Wolf, Murphy offered documentation showing that no more than three people of that description had crossed the border. Even those descriptions might have been inappropriate, Murphy added, since they simply shared the "name or phone number of a person who was known to be in contact with a terrorist. At that point, Mr. Murphy was removed from the meeting by Mr. Wolf."(In a brief interview with The Daily Beast, Taylor said,"the allegation is false. The real reason the Department of Homeland Security issued a fact cheat clarifying the number of terrorists crossing the southern border was because senior DHS leadership was worried that the White House was misstating the numbers of terrorists crossing the southern border, so we wanted to clarify the numbers and provide more accurate information to the public.")In May 2020, Murphy claims, Wolf—by then the acting DHS Secretary—ordered him to stop giving reports on the threat of Russian interference in the U.S., and instead focus on potential interference by China and Iran."Mr. Wolf stated that these instructions specifically originated from White House National Security Adviser Robert O'Brien," Murphy alleges. (The Daily Beast previously reported that O'Brien told his staff not to engage with Congress and other outsiders on the election security issue. In a statement provided after the publication of this story, White House spokesperson Sarah Matthews said, "Ambassador O'Brien has never sought to dictate the Intelligence Community's focus on threats to the integrity of our elections or on any other topic; any contrary suggestion by a disgruntled former employee, who he has never met or heard of, is false and defamatory. Rather, Ambassador O'Brien has consistently and publicly advocated for a holistic focus on all threats to our elections–whether from Russia, Iran, China, or any other malign actor.") Murphy alleges that Wolf ordered him again in July to stop investigating Russian interference. "Mr. Wolf stated to Mr. Murphy the intelligence notification should be 'held' because it 'made the President look bad,'" the whistleblower report reads. When Murphy again declined, Wolf allegedly made moves to exclude him from future meetings on the subject.Concurrently, the DHS was compiling a Homeland Threat Assessment [HTA], which listed Russian interference and white supremacy as two chief concerns. Murphy claims acting DHS Secretary Ken Cuccinelli told him to downplay those two sections and specifically to "modify the section on White Supremacy in a manner that made the threat appear less severe, as well as include information on the prominence of violent 'left-wing' groups."(Another former DHS official recently told The Daily Beast that she was "advised by senior officials in the White House" not to even use the terms "domestic terrorism or white supremacy," which were considered to be "trigger words" for Trump.)Trump DHS Official: Of Course There Are Racists in the Administration'Homeland Security' Ignores White Terror, DHS Veterans SayMurphy's supervisor allegedly told him Wolf and Cuccinelli wanted to withhold publication of the HTA because they worried how it "would reflect upon President Trump."The pressure to identify leftist groups as a threat appears to have mounted as racial justice protests swept the country and President Donald Trump increasingly demonized the left in public and in campaign literature."Mr. Murphy was instructed by Mr. Wolf and/or Mr. Cuccinelli to modify intelligence assessments to ensure they matched up with the public comments by President Trump on the subject of ANTIFA and 'anarchist' groups," Murphy's complaint reads.Murphy claims he was specifically asked to alter the report to include incidents in Portland, Oregon, which have attracted Trump and Wolf's particular interest over left-wing protests.The DHS and Department of Justice have taken special interest in identifying anarchists and anti-fascists as threats, even if the actual criminal cases stemming from this year's protests show a minimal footprint from people with those political affiliations. Nevertheless, the DHS in July issued a list of supposed anarchist violence in Portland, much of which amounted to graffiti incidents. Wolf has recently appeared on Fox News suggesting the U.S. treat anti-fascists and Black Lives Matter protesters like terrorists, possibly using racketeering or conspiracy law against them (legal experts say the move would constitute a massive legal stretch).Trump himself has tweeted repeatedly about anarchists and anti-fascists, threatening to designate the latter as a terrorist organization. (Such a designation would also strain legal feasibility, although a recently leaked DHS memo suggested the groundwork for falsely designating the broad anti-fascist movement as a foreign terror organization, based on a handful of anti-fascists who fought ISIS in the Kurdish separatist area of Rojava.)Although Murphy claims to have been demoted for his refusal, his complaint alleges ongoing tampering with intelligence in his old department.Trump's 'ANTIFA' Threat Is Total Bullshit—And Totally Dangerous'Antifa' Is Literally Never Mentioned in the First Prosecutions of Protest Violence"On September 3, 2020, Mr. Murphy learned the new draft was provided to Mr. Wolf, who had ordered the HTA to be redesigned with the policy office completing the revisions," his complaint reads. "It is Mr. Murphy's assessment that the final version of the HTA will more closely resemble a policy document with references to ANTIFA and 'anarchist' groups than an intelligence document as originally formulated by DHS I&A."Murphy served as principal deputy under secretary in the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis from March 2018 until July 31, 2020, when he claims he was "retaliatorily demoted to the role of Assistant to the Deputy Under Secretary for the DHS Management Division."The demotion came the day after acting DHS head Chad Wolf allegedly told Murphy that "the removal and reassignment of Mr. Murphy would be politically good for Mr. Wolf, who wanted to be officially nominated as the DHS Secretary," according to Murphy's complaint. Wolf has not been formally nominated for the role, and Congress's independent Government Accountability Office recently found that he is ineligible to act in his current capacity.Read more at The Daily Beast.Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast hereGet our top stories in your inbox every day. Sign up now!Daily Beast Membership: Beast Inside goes deeper on the stories that matter to you. Learn more.
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| Boy's shooting raises questions about police crisis training Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:23 PM PDT  A police shooting that wounded a 13-year-old autistic boy in Salt Lake City is revealing shortfalls in the way officers respond to a mental health crisis, an advocacy group said Wednesday, a part of policing that's facing renewed scrutiny during nationwide protests over brutality by law enforcement. Similar questions are being raised in Rochester, New York, following the death of a Black man whose brother called police about his unusual behavior shortly after a mental health evaluation. It comes as demonstrators have urged cities to "defund the police" and shift money to social services instead.
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| U.S. House Speaker warns Britain that breaking Brexit treaty could imperil trade pact Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:19 PM PDT |
| Trump’s ‘Ending’ the Iraq War Is a Gift to Iran Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:14 PM PDT |
| U.S. House speaker says violating Good Friday accord would kill any U.S.-UK trade deal Posted: 09 Sep 2020 01:09 PM PDT |
| Trump raises $210 million, robust but well short of Biden Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:47 PM PDT  President Donald Trump and his Republican Party jointly raised $210 million in August, a robust sum but one dwarfed by the record $364.5 million raised by Democrats and their nominee, Joe Biden. Trump's campaign released its figure Wednesday, several days later than usual and nearly a week after the Biden campaign unveiled its total, the highest for any one month during a presidential campaign. The president's reelection team said it brought in more money during its party's convention than the Democrats did in theirs, and officials insisted they "will have all the resources we need" ahead of November.
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| All the most explosive revelations from Bob Woodward's interviews with Donald Trump Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:46 PM PDT  Donald Trump sat down for 18 interviews with Bob Woodward, a veteran US political journalist best known for his reporting of the Watergate scandal, for his upcoming book on the US president and his administration. The interviews took place over the course of several months - both in person and over the phone - with Mr Trump reportedly calling Woodward late at night from the White House residency. The ensuing book, Rage, explores Mr Trump's handling of the pandemic, his views on America's race relations, diplomacy with North Korea and a range of other national security issues. The book also includes brutal assessments of Mr Trump from members of his inner circle, including his former defense secretary General Jim Mattis, the former director of national intelligence Dan Coats and others. The book, which hits bookshops next Tuesday, has already caused a stir in Washington and comes just weeks before the US presidential election. Here are all the most explosive revelations.
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| UN: COVID-19 could fuel more conflict, poverty, starvation Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:28 PM PDT  Top U.N. officials warned Wednesday that the COVID-19 pandemic has aggravated discrimination and other human rights violations that can fuel conflict, and its indirect consequences are dwarfing the impact of the virus itself in the world's most fragile countries. U.N. political chief Rosemary DiCarlo and U.N. humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock painted a grim picture to the U.N. Security Council of the global impact of the pandemic that has blanketed the world, with over 26 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 and more than 860,000 deaths.
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| Official claims pressure to alter Homeland Security intel Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:20 PM PDT  A Department of Homeland Security official said in a whistleblower complaint released Wednesday that he was pressured by more senior officials to suppress facts in intelligence reports that President Donald Trump might find objectionable, including information about Russian interference in the election and the rising threat posed by white supremacists. The official, Brian Murphy, alleged that senior DHS officials also pressed him to alter reports so they would reflect administration policy goals and that he was demoted for refusing to go along with the changes and for filing confidential internal complaints about the conduct.
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| Editorial Roundup: US Posted: 09 Sep 2020 12:18 PM PDT |
| Trapped by Pandemic, Ships' Crews Fight Exhaustion and Despair Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:48 AM PDT  BANGKOK -- Ralph Santillan, a merchant seaman from the Philippines, hasn't had shore leave in half a year. It has been 18 months since he reported for duty on his ship, which hauls corn, barley and other commodities around the world. It has been even longer since he saw his wife and son."There's nothing I can do," Santillan said late last month from his ship, a 965-foot bulk carrier off South Korea. "I have to leave to God whatever might happen here."His time on the ship, where he spends long days chipping rust off the deck or cleaning out cargo holds, was supposed to have ended in February, after an 11-month stint -- the maximum length for a seafarer's contract.But the COVID-19 pandemic led countries to start closing borders and refusing to let sailors come ashore. For cargo ships around the world, the process known as crew change, in which seamen like Santillan are replaced by new ones as their contracts expire, ground nearly to a halt.In June, the United Nations called the situation a "growing humanitarian and safety crisis." And there is still no solution in sight.Last month, the International Transport Workers' Federation, a seafarers' union, estimated that 300,000 of the 1.2 million crew members at sea were essentially stranded on their ships, working past the expiration of their original contracts and fighting isolation, uncertainty and fatigue."This floating population, many of which have been at sea for over a year, are reaching the end of their tether," Guy Platten, secretary-general of the International Chamber of Shipping, which represents shipowners, said Friday. "If governments do not act quickly and decisively to facilitate the transfer of crews and ease restrictions around air travel, we face the very real situation of a slowdown in global trade."Some crew members have begun refusing to work, forcing ships to stay in port. And many in the shipping industry fear that the stress and exhaustion will lead to accidents, perhaps disastrous ones."Owners made their contract so short for a reason," said Joost Mes, director of Avior Marine, a maritime recruitment agency in Manila, Philippines. "The consequences are coming closer, and the margins of safety are getting less."Seafarers have to stay vigilant. Standing in the wrong spot on deck, or missing a step on a long, narrow ladder, could mean injury or death. A distracted watch officer could miss an approaching vessel until it is too late."I can see the fatigue and stress in their faces," Santillan said in July from his ship, referring to the five men who worked with him on the deck. "I'm sure they can see it on my face." He said they sometimes worked 23-hour days to meet their schedules.Three of the 20 crew members on a bulk carrier that ran aground off Mauritius in late July, spilling 1,000 tons of oil into the pristine waters, were on extended contracts, according to Lloyd's List, a maritime intelligence company. The cause of the accident has not been determined, but the seafarers' union said it pointed to the potential consequences of having an overworked crew. Two of the ships' officers have been charged with unsafe navigation.In a June survey by the seafarers' union, many crew members on extended contracts said exhaustion was affecting their ability to focus. Some compared themselves to prisoners or slaves, according to the survey, and some said they had considered suicide.Members of one crew had to shave their heads after running out of shampoo because no one could go ashore for provisions, according to the survey. Another ship's captain had to pull the tooth of a seafarer who could not go ashore to see a dentist, a shipping company executive said."If someone is hurt, there is no hospital," said Burcu Akceken, chief officer of a chemical tanker that was anchored off Dakar, Senegal, who is from Turkey.Many stranded crew members said governments should do more to accommodate crew changes."Ports and countries want the cargo, but when it comes to the crew who are bringing the cargo to them, they are not helping us," said Nilesh Mukherjee, chief officer on a tanker carrying liquid petroleum gas, who is from India.Even in normal times, replacing a crew member involves complex logistics, said Frederick Kenney, director of legal and external affairs at the International Maritime Organization, a U.N. agency that oversees global shipping.Leaving a ship, and getting home, requires more than just disembarking. It usually involves multiple border crossings, flights with at least one connection, and a slew of certificates, specialized visas and immigration stamps. A crew member's replacement has to go through the same steps.Every step in that procedure is "broken" because of the pandemic, with flights limited, border controls tightened and many consulates closed, according to Kenney. While some countries have found ways around the problem, "the rate of progress is not keeping up with the growing backlog of seafarers," he said last week.Some ports have exempted crew members from border restrictions, then backtracked after seafarers, arriving from their home countries to report for duty on a ship, were found to have COVID-19.Hong Kong exempted sea as well as airline crews from a 14-day quarantine requirement, but it changed those rules in July, after the exemptions were blamed for a surge in case numbers. In Singapore, too, protocols were tightened after seafarers tested positive for the virus on arrival.Platten, of the International Chamber of Shipping, said that if the crisis continued, vessels would inevitably stop sailing."It's not going to be suddenly, tomorrow, that they're all going to stop," he said. "It'll be a gradual creeping up on this, and that's a real worry for the global supply chain."Some ships have already been idled, at least temporarily, because seafarers refused to keep working. Under international maritime law, an undermanned ship cannot sail.The departure of the Ben Rinnes, chartered to haul soy for Cargill from Geelong, Australia, was delayed last month after five seafarers demanded to be sent home. At least one had been working for 17 months. Cargill said that as a charterer, it did not manage crew changes, but that it had been involved in discussions that led to the crew members' departure. In a statement, it said it joined the union's call for "immediate government action to ensure seafarers can be repatriated."Another ship was idled in the Australian port of Fremantle because seafarers stopped working, and there were at least two similar cases in which crew members were allowed to disembark in Panama.While some seafarers have extended their contracts out of a sense of duty, or because they feared being blacklisted if they didn't, others have accused captains or employers of intimidation. Australian maritime authorities detained the cargo ship Unison Jasper last month over accusations that its Myanmarese crew had been abused and forced to sign contract extensions.Santillan, who boarded his ship in March 2019, was near the end of his contract when the pandemic hit. After a monthlong voyage from Brazil to Singapore, which was supposed to be his last stop, he was told that his flight home to the Philippines had been canceled.It wasn't clear to him who was responsible -- the airline, his employer or the Philippine government, which, because of the pandemic, was letting only a few of its many overseas workers back into the country each day.But border restrictions meant that Santillan wasn't allowed onshore. And with no one to replace him, the ship would be unable to sail if he stopped working.Fearing he'd be blacklisted if he did so, Santillan signed a new contract. Since then, he said, his captain has told him at least three times that he would be allowed to leave, but it hasn't happened.He and the rest of the crew try to keep one another's spirits up, but their list of diversions is grimly short: Go to the gym, belt out some songs on the karaoke machine, or buy internet credits and scroll through Facebook, looking for something to laugh at. Santillan has watched "Pirates of the Caribbean" so many times that he has memorized it -- a point of exasperation, not pride.He still has chocolates that he bought in Brazil for his wife and their young son, but they have passed their expiration date. His son, who was a week old when Santillan left the Philippines, is now walking and talking.Santillan said he had to resist thinking about his family while working."Missing someone is not allowed," he said. "For you to focus on work, you can't think about them. Your body is heavier when you miss someone."This article originally appeared in The New York Times.(C) 2020 The New York Times Company
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| Former U.S. official told to halt Russia intelligence assessments - whistleblower complaint Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:44 AM PDT |
| Palestinian FM urges Arab states to dismiss Israel-UAE deal Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:43 AM PDT  The Palestinian foreign minister Wednesday called on Arab states to dismiss a deal between the United Arab Emirates and Israel to normalize relations, describing the agreement scheduled to be finalized next week as "an earthquake." The UAE and Israel announced the deal to establish full diplomatic relations on Aug. 13. It reflected a changing Middle East in which shared concerns about archenemy Iran have largely overtaken traditional Arab support for the Palestinians.
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| Trump's former spy chief has 'deep suspicions' that Putin has blackmail on Trump, according to Bob Woodward's new book Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:34 AM PDT  Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats had "deep suspicions" about Trump's relationship with Putin and "could not shake them," Woodward wrote.
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| Trump told Bob Woodward the U.S. has an 'incredible' new secret nuclear weapons system Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:27 AM PDT  President Trump's admission that he downplayed the coronavirus threat earlier this year despite understanding the pathogen's dangers is one of the more staggering revelations in Bob Woodward's forthcoming book about the president. But not to be lost among the fallout is the fact that Trump apparently disclosed a secret new nuclear weapons system to Woodward, The Washington Post reports."I have built a nuclear — a weapons system that nobody's ever had in this country before," Trump told Woodward, while reportedly discussing how close the U.S. and North Korea had come to war in 2017. "We have stuff that you haven't seen or heard about. We have stuff that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin and [Chinese President] Xi [Jinping] have never heard about before. There's nobody — what we have is incredible."Trump is known for the occasional, exaggerated boast, but this is apparently the real deal. Woodward reports that anonymous sources confirmed the U.S. military does have a new secret weapons system, but they did not provide any details about it. They were also reportedly taken aback by Trump's willingness to disclose the information. Read more at The Washington Post.More stories from theweek.com Carl Bernstein says Bob Woodward's revelations about Trump are 'graver than in Watergate' Why Trump may have overplayed his hand by including 'super famous conservatives' on Supreme Court nominee list The true Election Day nightmare scenario
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| Iran pressured to spare life of wrestler who faces execution Posted: 09 Sep 2020 11:04 AM PDT  Iran aired a statement by a wrestler who faces the death penalty and whose case recently drew a critical tweet from President Trump.
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| Global Cloud Based Office Productivity Software Industry Posted: 09 Sep 2020 10:58 AM PDT |
| Global Bus Rapid Transit Systems Industry Posted: 09 Sep 2020 10:38 AM PDT |
| Bridging America's divides requires a willingness to work together without becoming friends first Posted: 09 Sep 2020 10:32 AM PDT  Amid two crises – the pandemic and the national reckoning sparked by the killing of George Floyd – there have been anguished calls for Americans to come together across lines of race and partisanship. Change would come, a USA Today contributor wrote, only "when we become sensitized to the distress of our neighbors." Empathy born of intimacy was the prepandemic solution to the nation's fractured political landscape. If Americans could simply get to know one another, to share stories and appreciate each other's struggles, civic leaders argued, we would develop a sense of understanding and empathy that would extend beyond the single encounter. But after studying how Americans cooperate, both in moments of political upheaval and in ordinary times, I am convinced that tackling America's political divide demands more than intimacy – and less than it. Ordinary people, talkingScience bears out the idea that intimacy can make people more understanding of others.A venerable tradition of social psychological research shows that people who interact with members of a stigmatized group may change their opinion of the whole group. The original research by Gordon Allport suggested that contact between members of different groups worked by giving people knowledge of the other group. But later studies found instead that it increased their empathy and willingness to take the other's perspective.That's why a growing industry of professional facilitators champion carefully structured conversations as key to solving workplace conflicts, community development disputes, Americans' political disengagement and racial division. As partisan political divides became vitriolic, civic leaders brought ordinary people together to talk. You could join people from the left and right at a Make America Dinner Again event or a Better Angels workshop, where "you can actually become friends and colleagues with people you don't agree with." Joan Blades, who created the online political advocacy group MoveOn.Org in 1997, seemed to have her finger on the pulse again when she launched Living Room Conversations in 2011. Small groups would host conversations across partisan lines. "By the time you get to the topic you've chosen to discuss, you're thinking, 'I like this person or these people,'" Blades promised. By the end of the 2010s, these were the terms for building unity: personal conversations in intimate settings that would produce friendship across gulfs of difference. Commonalities and differencesThe pandemic made the idea of living room conversations with anyone outside one's household sadly unrealistic. But it may not have been the solution people were looking for in the first place. Initiatives that bring together members of different groups, researchers have shown, are less effective in reducing prejudice when the groups participating are unequal in power and status – say, Black Americans and white ones. Dominant group members tend to insist on talking about their commonalities with members of the disadvantaged group. That's frustrating for the latter, who more often want to talk about their differences and, indeed, their inequalities. Taking the perspective of someone different, moreover, works to diminish the prejudices of members of dominant groups but not those of members of disadvantaged groups. Research also shows that when people are asked to take the perspective of a person who fits a stereotype, they negatively stereotype that person even more than if they had not been asked to do so. Asking a Democrat to put herself in the shoes of a MAGA hat-wearing Republican, in other words, may backfire. Nor does empathy always overcome political beliefs. A recent study from the University of Houston found that people who are naturally empathetic are more likely to feel anger toward those in the opposite party and feel pleasure when they suffer. Empathy tends to be biased toward one's own group, so it may fuel political polarization rather than counter it. Naturally empathetic people are also more likely to suppress their feelings of compassion when those feelings conflict with their ideological views, becoming less compassionate as a result. In one study, subjects who had individualistic beliefs opposed government welfare programs even after reading a story about a man in financial need, but individualists who were naturally empathetic opposed welfare even more strongly after reading the story. Friendship isn't necessarySince dialogue initiatives are voluntary, they probably attract people who are already predisposed to wanting to find connection across difference. And no one has figured out how a friendly meeting between Democratic and Republican voters, or even a hundred such meetings, can have a discernible effect on political polarization that is national in scope. Certainly, participants who change their minds may share their new opinions with others in their circle, creating a ripple effect of goodwill. But dialogue initiatives may also crowd out ways of tackling political divisions that are likely to have wider impact.Americans committed to living in a functioning democracy could demand that national political representatives, not ordinary citizens, sit down together to find common ground across difference. Or they could work to bring back some version of the Fairness Doctrine, a federal policy once endorsed both by both the conservative National Rifle Association and the liberal American Civil Liberties Union, that required television channels to air diverse points of view. Or people could rally to demand that Congress pass legislation like gun control that overwhelming majorities of Americans across the political spectrum want – working across party lines to win policy, not become friends. Treating friendship as a prerequisite to cooperation also misses the fact that people have long worked together for the common good on the basis of relationships that do not resemble the intimacy of friends. The protests after George Floyd's death, for example, introduced many white Americans to the idea of allyship. Allies – whether white anti-racists and/or straight people or men – commit to listening more than talking and to taking direction from people without the privilege they enjoy. Allies don't require intimate connection as the price for their involvement. They recognize that intimacy has often served to keep relationships unequal, and that is exactly what they want to change. It is not just movement activists who expose the limits of intimacy for building unity. Black participants in the interracial dialogues political scientist Katherine Cramer studied were frustrated when they described what it was like to be discriminated against and white participants responded with their own stories about how they had never treated their Black friends any differently than their white ones. But when participants ignored their facilitator's plea to "dialogue, not debate," and challenged each other on the evidence for their claims, the white participants, in particular, were stopped from sliding by with bromides about how "under the skin, we're all the same." It was the confrontational exchanges that led participants to recognize their real differences while still building a relationship. [Deep knowledge, daily. Sign up for The Conversation's newsletter.]In the post-9/11 public forum about rebuilding Lower Manhattan that I studied, organizers instructed participants only to share experiences and values, not bargain over options for rebuilding. But participants described themselves as "like a mini-United Nations," and used that metaphor to effectively hash out compromises despite their very different starting points. Intimacy is great, but democracy requires something more demanding: a willingness to tolerate, and even cooperate with, people with whom we share a purpose, but not much else.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * Understanding the US political divide, one word cloud at a time * How to bridge the political divide at the holiday dinner tableFrancesca Polletta does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| AP Exclusive: Pence to attend event hosted by QAnon backers Posted: 09 Sep 2020 10:11 AM PDT  Vice President Mike Pence and top officials from President Donald Trump's campaign are slated to attend a Montana fundraiser next week hosted by a couple who have expressed support for the QAnon conspiracy theory, according to an event invitation obtained by The Associated Press and a review of social media postings. The baseless conspiracy theory posits that Trump is fighting entrenched enemies in the government and also involves satanism and child sex trafficking. Beyond Pence, the Sept. 14 fundraiser in Bozeman, Montana, is expected to draw influential figures in the president's orbit including Kimberly Guilfoyle, a top Trump fundraising official who is dating Donald Trump Jr., GOP chairwoman Ronna McDaniel, Republican National Committee finance chairman Todd Ricketts and RNC co-chairman Tommy Hicks Jr., the event invitation shows.
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| Book: Trump said of virus, 'I wanted to always play it down' Posted: 09 Sep 2020 10:08 AM PDT  President Donald Trump talked in private about the "deadly" coronavirus last February, even as he was declaring to America it was no worse than the flu and insisting it was under control, according to a new book by journalist Bob Woodward. Trump said Wednesday he was just being a "cheerleader" for the nation and trying to keep everyone calm. "I wanted to always play it down," the president said.
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| Amnesty probe reveals global business ties to Myanmar military units accused of human rights abuses Posted: 09 Sep 2020 08:38 AM PDT  A new investigation by Amnesty International has revealed how a secretive Myanmar conglomerate, linked to multiple foreign businesses, has funded the Southeast Asian country's powerful military, including units accused of human rights abuses and crimes under international law. Leaked official documents analysed by the human rights organisation have disclosed how Myanmar's military receives huge revenues from shares in Myanma Economic Holdings Limited (MEHL), a conglomerate involved in mining, beer, tobacco, garment manufacturing and banking sectors. MEHL has partnerships with a range of eight local and foreign businesses across Asia, partnering with Japanese beer multinational Kirin, and South Korean companies including steel giant POSCO, the INNO Group and Pan-Pacific, a garment manufacturer. The Myanmar army has been accused of multiple human rights abuses against the country's ethnic minorities, in particular the Rohingya Muslim community which was subjected to what the United Nations has called a genocidal campaign of arson, rape and murder in Rakhine State in 2017. MEHL shareholder records show that military units, including combat divisions, own about one third of the conglomerate's shares. Records also detail links between MEHL and the Western Command, which oversees operations in Rakhine State.
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| The global market for Laminate Flooring is projected to reach US$21.3 billion by 2025 Posted: 09 Sep 2020 08:18 AM PDT |
| Husband of detained UK-Iranian urges govt help after new charges Posted: 09 Sep 2020 08:08 AM PDT  The husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian woman detained in Tehran for sedition, on Wednesday called on the UK government to do "everything to protect her" after Iran announced she faces fresh charges.
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| EU fumes over British defiance, but will press on with Brexit talks Posted: 09 Sep 2020 08:04 AM PDT |
| Zimbabwe bans coal mining in Hwange and other game parks Posted: 09 Sep 2020 07:29 AM PDT  A decision to give Chinese firms rights to explore for coal in the famous Hwange park is overturned.
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| Hezbollah allies sanctioned by US denounce Washington's move Posted: 09 Sep 2020 07:13 AM PDT  A powerful political group allied with militant Hezbollah denounced Wednesday the U.S. sanctions against one of its senior members, saying they infringe on Lebanon's sovereignty and will not succeed in extracting any concessions. The statement by the Shiite Amal group headed by Lebanon's longtime Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri came a day after the U.S. Treasury sanctioned two former Cabinet ministers who are allied with Hezbollah. The new sanctions — a rare move by Washington targeting politicians close to the Iran-backed Hezbollah — sent a strong political message to local allies of the group, including President Michel Aoun who maintains a political alliance with Hezbollah.
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| Norwegian citizen arrested in 1982 Paris attack Posted: 09 Sep 2020 07:12 AM PDT |
| Genesis 2 Project LLC® (G2P) announces the first scientifically-authenticated documentation of unidentified aerial phenomenon (UAP) Posted: 09 Sep 2020 07:07 AM PDT  On 5 June, 2020, G2P Principals led by Dr. JC van Velkinburgh briefed Bill Richardson, former US Ambassador to the United Nations and Governor of New Mexico, on the scientific and societal implications of a public release of its information. Also discussed were the facts that G2P principals and associates embody expertise in science, security, and technology, and all have carried secret clearances with DOD and/or DOE. All have signed non-disclosure agreements, to preserve the confidentiality of the participants and maintain focus on the integrity of the information.
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| Latin America’s Teachers Are Pandemic’s Unsung Heroes Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:30 AM PDT |
| Johnson’s Road to Brexit Ruin Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:25 AM PDT  (Bloomberg Opinion) -- Britain's reckless mismanagement of its exit from the European Union took a remarkable turn this week, when a cabinet minister casually told the House of Commons that the government was proposing to break international law. In the midst of an effort to forge a trade agreement with the EU that the U.K. presumably hopes will be binding on both sides, this is a strange way to proceed.Apparently Prime Minister Boris Johnson is no longer pleased with the withdrawal agreement that secured Brexit, a treaty he negotiated and previously boasted about. The government now says there are loose ends, ambiguities and unintended consequences, mainly concerning Northern Ireland and EU rules on state subsidies. It proposes new domestic legislation to remedy these defects. Northern Ireland Secretary Brandon Lewis told parliament these changes would override aspects of the withdrawal agreement and hence break international law — but only in a "very specific and limited way."This is something the U.K.'s partners might want to keep in mind. In the future, when Britain signs a treaty, it expects to keep its word, so long as it's convenient.It tells you something that the most generous interpretation of this shambles is that Johnson's government is only posturing, in the hope that brinkmanship will force the EU to come to terms on future trading arrangements. Or perhaps the goal is the opposite: to collapse the whole process and move forward with no agreement in place. The truth is, nobody seems to understand what Johnson's government is trying to achieve, least of all Johnson.Adding to the frustration is that the fundamental conflict in Britain's Brexit ambition has been plain from the outset: The U.K. cannot hope to have an independent trade policy, frictionless exchange between Northern Ireland and the rest of the U.K., and seamless trade across Northern Ireland's border with the EU. Given goodwill on both sides, an ambitious post-Brexit free-trade agreement could've worked around these difficulties. Yet hopes of such a deal are fast receding — and the no-deal alternative that Johnson has flirted with since becoming prime minister cannot resolve those tensions.Johnson is much to blame for the impasse. Insisting that a no-deal Brexit would suit the U.K. perfectly well is both absurd on the merits and tactically dumb because nobody in the EU actually believes it. Some smaller fault, though, does rest with Europe's negotiators, because they've tried to drive a needlessly hard bargain. On the questions that gave rise to this most recent dispute, for instance, they have aimed to make Britain accept restrictions on domestic economic policy not required of Europe's other partners in free-trade agreements, and submit to EU law on matters better handled by joint dispute-settlement procedures. Protecting Europe's interests does not require these infringements on U.K. sovereignty.Before it's too late, restoring friendly U.K.-EU relations should be the highest priority for both sides. This could've been a negotiation between friends, with all minds concentrated on limiting the damage from Brexit and finding potential for mutual advantage. But Britain chose to embark on this dangerous path, and Johnson now leads the way in wrecking any hope of an amicable approach. If he persists in this vein, his claims about the joys of a no-deal Brexit will be put to the test — and the country is unlikely to care for the results. Editorials are written by the Bloomberg Opinion editorial board.For more articles like this, please visit us at bloomberg.com/opinionSubscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.©2020 Bloomberg L.P.
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| Brexit deal contains ambiguities after being written at pace, says UK PM's spokesman Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:18 AM PDT |
| Global Cloud Computing Services Industry Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:18 AM PDT |
| EU will not seek to suspend Brexit talks over new British bill - sources Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:15 AM PDT |
| 'It's going horribly': College towns fret about census count Posted: 09 Sep 2020 06:11 AM PDT  Betsy Landin was listed by her parents on the 2020 census as living at her family's home in Phoenix when she really should have been counted in the college town of Tempe, where she studies finance at Arizona State University. Also missing from Tempe's tally was Arizona State political science major Betzabel Ayala, whose mother counted her on the family's census form in Phoenix because she was living at home after coronavirus lockdowns led to a nationwide exodus from college towns last spring. In yet another example of the widespread disruption caused by the global outbreak, hundreds of thousands of U.S. college students who normally live off campus in non-university housing are being counted for the 2020 census at their parents' homes or other locations when they were supposed to be counted where they go to school.
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| The largest contemporary Muslim pilgrimage isn't the hajj to Mecca, it's the Shiite pilgrimage to Karbala in Iraq Posted: 09 Sep 2020 05:17 AM PDT  Every year, Shiite Muslims mark the death of Prophet Muhammad's grandson Hussain with a mourning period that lasts a total of 50 days. Ashura, the tenth day of the Islamic month of Muharram, commemorates the day Hussain died. For millions of Shiites, this mourning period culminates in a pilgrimage to Karbala in Iraq. This pilgrimage has, in recent years, become the largest gathering of people in the world for a religious reason. This year Ashura was observed on Aug. 30 and the pilgrimage, 40 days later, will end on Oct. 9, 2020. My research focuses on Shiite shrines and Muharram mourning practices. The city of Karbala, which I visited twice in 2013, is located 60 miles southwest of Baghdad and 45 miles north of Najaf, the other important Shiite shrine city in Iraq. The pilgrimage and the city of Karbala have been through many changes over a more than 1000-year-old history. This year, the pilgrimage and the holy city are faced with a new challenge: COVID-19. The historic battle at KarbalaKarbala is the place where Prophet Muhammad's grandson Hussain was killed during what is known as the Battle of Karbala in A.D. 680. According to Shiites, Hussain and his men were martyred in this battle on the day of Ashura.Following the death of Prophet Muhammad in A.D. 632, there was a dispute over who would be his rightful heir. Sunnis, who make up the majority of Muslims, believe that Abu Bakr, Muhammad's friend and father-in-law, rightly succeeded Muhammad in A.D. 632. Shiites believe that Ali, Muhammad's cousin and son-in-law, should have been Muhammad's successor.After years of civil war, as well as wars of expansion, the Arab Umayyad dynasty established its rule over the region, from the Middle East to North Africa from A.D. 661 to 750. But there were those who decried Umayyad rule.Hussain had been invited by the inhabitants of Kufa, which was a garrison town near Najaf, to come and lead them in a revolt against the Umayyad caliph in Damascus. Umayyad forces first put down the unrest in Kufa and then met and killed Hussain and his men on the desert plains of Karbala. For Shiite Muslims, Hussain was their third imam, a worldly and spiritual leader whose direct relationship to Muhammad gave him special status and authority.After Hussain's death, a tomb was soon built which attracted devotees and benefactors. Najaf is where Hussain's father, Ali, lies buried. The pilgrimage throughout historyOver the years, Hussain's shrine was destroyed, rebuilt, remodeled and expanded. Muharram mourning rituals, whether in Karbala or elsewhere, have been used for political ends. Sometimes, Muharram practices were sponsored by rulers who sought to gain popular support. At other times, the rituals turned into anti-government protests. Fearing civil unrest, some rulers prohibited or limited pilgrimage to Karbala. For example, Mutawakkil, a caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, which ruled over a vast Islamic empire from the eighth to the 13th century, feared that the rituals inflamed anti-regime fervor. He destroyed the tomb in A.D. 850 and banned the pilgrimage to Karbala. Karbala and Najaf grew in importance in the 16th century with the founding of a Shiite state in Persia, today's Iran, under Shah Ismail I. From then on, the Iraqi shrine cities attracted increasing numbers of pilgrims.Many pilgrims brought bodies of deceased relatives because of a belief that being buried close to Ali or Hussain ensures that when the deceased stands in front of God on Judgment Day, Ali or Hussain will appeal to God's mercy to allow the person's soul to enter heaven. This has led to "Wadi al-Salam," Arabic for "Valley of Peace," in Najaf becoming one of the world's largest cemeteries, holding up to 5 million corpses. The transport and burial of corpses provided employment for a wide strata of the population in Najaf and Karbala. Higher fees were charged from those wanting to be closer to Ali or Hussain in the burial site. Blaming the corpse traffic as one of the reasons for several outbreaks of cholera in 19th-century Persia and Ottoman Iraq, the Ottoman government, which ruled over Iraq from the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century, sought to restrict and control the number of corpses that were brought in. Yet even under these restrictions, around 20,000 dead bodies were brought to Najaf each year at the start of the 20th century. Today, roughly 100,000 are brought for burial in Najaf annually. From decline to rebirthUnder the authoritarian Iraqi Baath regime, from the early 1970s to 2003, Shiite pilgrimage was closely monitored and limited.Like many previous rulers, Saddam Hussain feared that the rituals would be used in order to incite rebellion against his regime, that the pilgrimage would turn into a protest. But once Saddam was overthrown by U.S.-led forces in 2003, the pilgrimage flourished again.In 2004, more than 2 million pilgrims walked to Karbala, and the most common route was from Najaf to Karbala. Since then, the pilgrimage to Karbala has even eclipsed the hajj, which annually draws between 2 and 3 million. In 2014, 17 million people reportedly completed the walk to Karbala. By 2016, the number of pilgrims increased to 22 million. This year, fear of the spread of COVID-19 has greatly restricted many pilgrimages, including the hajj. Only a limited number of Muslims already inside Saudi Arabia was allowed to attend. As a precautionary measure, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, a top Iraqi Shiite leader, encouraged his followers to mourn at home, rather than visit Karbala. For Ashura this year, Shiites gathered in Najaf and Karbala, but on a much smaller scale. There was social distancing, but not everywhere. Not all pilgrims wore masks. In the absence of stringent measures, the number of infections in Iraq has already spiked. Whether the government will respond with stricter policies for the pilgrimage at the beginning of October remains to be seen.This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.Read more: * As coronavirus curtails travel, backyard pilgrimages become the way to a spiritual journey * Online Christian pilgrimage: How a virtual tour to Lourdes follows a tradition of innovationEdith Szanto does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
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| US withdrawing thousands of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan Posted: 09 Sep 2020 05:08 AM PDT  The United States will pull thousands of troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan by November, the top American commander for the Middle East said Wednesday, as President Donald Trump tries to make good on his campaign promise to get America out of "endless wars." During a visit to Iraq, Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, the commander of U.S. Central Command, said the reduction in Iraq — from about 5,200 troops to about 3,000 — reflects the Trump administration's confidence in the ability of U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces to handle the militant threat from the Islamic State group.
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