05 November 2015
Week In Brief: INTERNATIONAL
AFGHANISTAN: In the aftermath of last week’s 7.5 magnitude earthquake which killed at least 370 people and injured more than 2000, the Taliban are taking over Darqand in Takhar province.
An ex-inmate of Guantanamo Bay, Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, is the new leader of Isis in Afghanistan.
A young woman was stoned to death for fleeing from her arranged marriage and eloping with her lover.
ANTARCTICA: A Nasa study indicates that Antarctica is expanding. Ice gain from snowfall in East Antarctica and the interior of West Antarctica is greater than ice loss in other parts of Antarctica.
AUSTRALIA: Prime minister Malcolm Turnbull is abolishing the titles of Dame and Knight.
AUSTRIA: Austria is planning to build an anti-immigration fence along its border with Slovenia.
BANGLADESH: A publisher of secular books was murdered by Islamists in Dhaka, and three writers were attacked. Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent has claimed responsibility. The recent murder of an Italian aid worker and a Japanese farmer, and a bomb attack on a Shia shrine which killed two people, have been claimed by Isis. At least 4 secular bloggers have been murdered this year.
BURMA: A report by Yale University says that the government persecution of Rohingya Muslims amounts to genocide.
Voting takes place next Sunday in the first general election since the junta over-ruled election results 20 years ago. Only 75% of seats are up for election – the other 25% reserved for army officers. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi is barred from presidency as her sons have foreign citizenship, but her party National League for Democracy is likely to win.
CHINA: Married couples may now apply for permission to have a second child. China has enforced a ‘one child’ policy for over thirty years.
EGYPT: A Russian passenger jet crashed in the Sinai peninsula, 23 minutes after leaving Sharm el-Sheikh airport. 224 people were killed. Most of the passengers were Russians returning to St Petersburg after a holiday on the Red Sea. The plane broke up in the air – investigators are examining the wreckage to determine whether this was caused by mechanical failure, a bomb on board or a missile strike.
GUATEMALA: Jimmy Morales, a comic actor, won last week’s presidential elections with 67% of the vote in the second-round run-off.
INDIA: Groups of the country’s leading historians and film-makers have joined writers in protesting against the intolerance of Narendra Modi’s hard-line nationalist Hindu government.
Prime minister Modi announced an African investment plan of $10 billion to a conference of 40 African leaders in Delhi.
IRAN: The supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei explained that the traditional, popular and authorised chant “Death to America” should not be taken literally.
LEBANON: A Saudi prince and nine other people were charged with drug trafficking. They were arrested at Beirut airport as nearly two tonnes of illegal drugs were about to be loaded onto a private jet destined for Riyadh.
MALDIVES: The vice-president Ahmed Adeeb has been arrested on suspicion of ‘high treason’, following the failed attempt on the life of President Adulla Yameen when his boat was blown up earlier this year. The previous vice-president is also charged with treason.
NORTH KOREA: A UN report claims that the Pyongyang government makes up to $2.3 billion from North Koreans sent abroad to work more or less as forced labour in China and Russia.
ROMANIA: A blaze caused by a firework killed at least 26 people and injured more than 150 during a free rock concert in a nightclub in Bucharest.
SAUDI ARABIA: It was announced that Karl Andree, the Briton who has served fifteen months of a twelve month sentence for alcohol offences and was also sentenced to a flogging, will be released unflogged.
Raif Badawi, the blogger sentenced to 10 years in prison and 1000 lashes, has been awarded the EU’s prestigious human rights award, the Sakharov Prize.
SYRIA: Talks about the future of the country continued in Vienna. Russia, Iran, the USA, Saudi Arabia and 15 other countries are involved. There are no representatives from Syria itself.
Russian planes attacked Raqqa, the city which Isis regards as its capital.
President Obama authorised the use of US troops – ‘a few dozen’ special operations troops to advise groups fighting against Isis – for the first time in Syria.
In the town of Douma, rebel forces are using cages of prisoners loyal to Assad as human shields to deter Russian and Syrian bombardments and air-attacks.
TANZANIA: The ruling party won the elections. It has enjoyed fifty years in power. The results in Zanzibar were nullified.
TURKEY: In the return to the polls in the re-run of last June’s inconclusive election, there was an outright victory for the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP) of President Erdogan. The AKP won 316 seats out of 550, ie. 49.4% – up 8.5%. The pro-Kurdish HDP was down to just over 10%. Leading up to the election, more than 1800 Kurdish activists and politicians were detained, including HDP mayors and parliamentary candidates. A few days before the election, an opposition TV station was shut down and journalist were arrested, amid scenes of police using tear gas, water canons and batons.
Two members of ‘Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently’, the anti-Isis activist group reporting secretly from Isis-held territory, were found murdered in the city of Sanliurfa. ‘Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently’ won the 2015 International Press Freedom Award last month.
USA: General Mark Miley, the new army chief, is proposing a big increase in the number of US troops and weapons stationed in Europe.
In the latest Republican candidates’ TV debate, Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz did well, while Jeb Bush and Donald Trump underwhelmed. Rubio has won the backing of party’s biggest donor, Paul Singer.
YEMEN: Saudi-led coalition has employed hundreds of Colombian mercenaries (recruited by US security firm Blackwater) to fight against Houthi rebels.
Chapala, a category 4 tropical cyclone, is due to hit Yemen with 7 years worth of rainfall and winds of up to 105mph and a 7 metre tidal surge.
