Tag: InternationalNews

{Publisher Simon & Schuster had defended Milo Yiannopoulos but steps back after comments about sexual consent.}

The publisher behind far-right commentator Milo Yiannopoulos has cancelled his planned book, Dangerous.

Simon & Schuster’s announcement on Monday came hours after the Breitbart editor was disinvited to this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference because of past comments about relationships between boys and men.

In audio from a podcast, Yiannopoulos, 33, can be heard describing sexual consent as “arbitrary and oppressive”.

“In the homosexual world particularly, some of those relationships between younger boys and older men, the sort of coming-of-age relationships, relationships in which those older men have helped those young boys to discover who they are and give them security and safety and provide them with love and a reliable – and sort of a rock, where they can’t speak to their parents,” Yiannopoulos is heard saying on the Drunken Peasants podcast.

Documented on a new video from the podcast makers, he is also heard jokingly defending “priest molestation”.

Simon & Schuster and its Threshold Editions imprint said that “after careful consideration” they had pulled the book, which was the subject of intense controversy.

Until Monday, Simon & Schuster had defended the book.

In December, the publisher asked readers to “withhold judgment until they have had a chance to read the actual contents of the book”.

Yiannopoulos, who was reportedly paid a six-figure advance for the memoir to the tune of around $250,000, was permanently banned by Twitter in July 2016 for racist abuse targeting the Ghostbusters actor Leslie Jones.

Taking to his Facebook page, Yiannopoulos wrote: “They canceled my book.” In a later post, he said: “I’ve gone through worse. This will not defeat me.”

“Dangerous” was originally scheduled to come out in March, but Yiannopoulos had pushed back the release to June so he could write about the uprisings during his recent campus tour.

‘They were fine with his racism’

More than 100 Simon & Schuster authors had objected to his book deal.

Author Roxane Gay withdrew a planned book with the publisher.

On Monday, she said she would continue her protest and not return to Simon & Schuster.

“In cancelling Milo’s book contract, Simon & Schuster made a business decision the same way they made a business decision when they decided to publish that man in the first place,” she said.

“When his comments about pedophilia/pederasty came to light, Simon & Schuster realised it would cost them more money to do business with Milo than he could earn for them.

“They did not finally ‘do the right thing’ and now we know where their threshold, pun intended, lies. They were fine with his racist and xenophobic and sexist ideologies. They were fine with his transphobia, anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.”

Source:Al Jazeera

{Rumours still abound about bizarre attack on North Korean leader’s half brother at Malaysia airport.}

A week since news broke that the half-brother of North Korean leader Kim Jong-un had been assassinated, a clearer picture is emerging of the Cold War-style killing in Kuala Lumpur’s international airport.

But rumours still abound about the bizarre attack, and Malaysian police are keeping their cards close to their chest when it comes to their ongoing investigation.

Here is what we know – and what we still don’t know – about the death of Kim Jong-nam.

{{What happened?}}

Last Monday morning, Kim Jong-nam was at the budget terminal of Kuala Lumpur’s main airport preparing to fly to Macau.

He was approached by two women, one of whom grabbed him from behind and sprayed his face with an apparently poisonous liquid, according to police and leaked CCTV footage.

Jong-nam then approached airport staff, gesturing to his face in a bid to explain what happened, footage showed.

The staff later led him to the airport clinic, where a picture released in Malaysian media shows him slumped in a chair.

Kim suffered a seizure and was rushed to hospital but died before he arrived.

{{The first suspects}}

In the days following the attack, police announced they had arrested a 28-year-old Vietnamese woman called Doan Thi Huong, as well as 25-year-old Indonesian Siti Aishah and her Malaysian boyfriend.

Huong – who is shown in CCTV from the airport wearing a t-shirt emblazoned with the word “LOL” – worked at an “entertainment outlet” and Aishah was a masseuse at a spa, police said.

Aishah had been duped into believing she was taking part in a TV prank show, the head of police in Indonesia said, citing information from Malaysia.

Residents of the rice farming village in Vietnam where Huong grew up said she was very fashionable, often changing her hair colour and returning each lunar new year with a different foreign boyfriend.

{{The Pyongyang trail}}

Later police arrested a 46-year-old North Korean called Ri Jong-chol, who they said lived in Kuala Lumpur and worked in information technology.

They are currently seeking four more North Korean men, who entered the country on different dates in the fortnight running up to the assassination, and all left on the day it was carried out.

The men returned to Pyongyang on a convoluted route via Indonesia, Dubai and Vladivostok, immigration officials and sources said.

Seoul cited these developments as proof that the North Korean regime was behind the attack. But Pyongyang hit back, accusing the Malaysian investigation of being politically motivated.

{{The motive}}

If Pyongyang were behind the killing, a number of reasons have been put forward as to why the regime might have wanted Jong-nam out of the way.

One theory said he was a marked man since he criticised the country’s system of hereditary succession to a journalist in 2011, when he said North Korea would need to reform and liberalise like China.

Another said Kim Jong-un was paranoid about the slim chance his older sibling posed a threat to his leadership, providing a liberal alternative within the Kim family.

Other analysts said the assassination could have been ordered over reports Kim Jong-nam was preparing to defect.

One suggestion that does not assume the regime’s involvement is that a hit was ordered in connection with alleged shady business dealings in the region.

{{What happens next?}}

Malaysian authorities insisted a family member must come forward to provide a DNA sample before it can be released – something they said has yet to happen.

If no next of kin comes forward within a fortnight, police have said they would consider other options for the body.

A heavy, armed police presence accompanied the arrival of an unmarked convoy at the hospital holding the body in the early hours of Tuesday, amid unconfirmed reports that Kim Jong-nam’s son, Kim Han-sol, had flown to Kuala Lumpur to claim the remains of his father.

A toxicology report should be released between one and two weeks after the post-mortem, the health minister has said on different occasions, which means there could be more detail about the kind of poison used as early as Wednesday.

But whatever the outcome of the investigation, the fallout from the killing has already damaged ties between North Korea and Malaysia and may isolate the Stalinist state yet further on the world stage.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Raid is part of an investigation into allegations that far-right leader used EU funds to pay staff of her FN party.}

French police have searched the Paris-based headquarters of far-right leader Marine Le Pen’s National Front (FN) party in relation to a probe into alleged misuse of EU funds, according to a party statement.

The European Parliament (EP) says Le Pen, a member of the European institution since 2004, had paid FN party staff with EP funds.

According to EU rules, parliamentary money should be used only to pay assistants working with the institution.

The parliament says the breach happened during the 2011-12 legislature, after Le Pen assumed her role as FN leader in January 2011.

The EP says 20 assistants presented as parliamentary aides back then continued to work for the FN elsewhere.

Al Jazeera’s Natacha Butler, reporting from Paris, said Le Pen, currently in a visit to Lebanon, has not yet commented on the police search, but in the past, she has always denied misusing European funds.

“She basically says this is a political smear by her opponents because she is running very much on an anti-EU platform,” Butler said.

Second raid

The raid is the second in a year by investigators trying to determine whether the FN misused EP funds.

“For the second time, a raid took place at the same offices, over the same allegations, which confirms that the first raid amounted to nothing,” the party said in a statement.

The group accused investigators acting for the Paris prosecutor’s office of a “media operation” designed to disrupt Le Pen’s campaign before a presidential vote in April.

The search at the FN headquarters came only days after corruption accusations against conservative candidate Francois Fillon.

Fillon, a former prime minister, has been hit by allegations that his wife was paid for years as his assistant in the French parliament but never actually worked there.

“The parallels are rather striking with Fillon who is also accused of using parliamentary money, this time in France, to pay his relatives for fake jobs,” Butler said.

Butler added: “He has always presented himself as an honest politician and those allegations have been very damaging.

“The spotlight has been very much on Fillon until now but of course with the French police now being involved it seems that perhaps Le Pen will be far more in the headlines after this search.”

An election poll by Opinionway, the French research company, had Le Pen easily beating her four main rivals and winning the first round with a score of 27 percent to move through to the two-way runoff against either Fillon or Emmanuel Macron, the left-wing independent candidate.

According to the poll, Le Pen is predicted to lose in the second round to either of the candidates.

Source:Al Jazeera

{On January 31st 2017, a peace event of making hand printing flag for peace took place at Asawittaya school in Thai, Bangkok. With 1,300 participants of the students, parents, teachers and the citizens of the communities, the peace event was held to boost civic awareness for peace and encourage participation in peace activities of the local communities in Thai. }

The event was held by Heavenly Culture, World Peace, Restoration of Light (HWPL) and its supporting group, the International Women’s Peace Group (IWPG). The purpose of this event is to spread a culture of peace. The program was started by watching videos introducing the two organizations and the 2nd Commemoration of the WARP Summit. After that, the students performed a dance show with the theme of longing for peace and made a hand printing Thai flag. The event enabled participants to think about being a Thai and the value of motherland for them.

Ms. Aphinita Chaichana who is the President of Namobuddhaya Club and IWPG Peace Ambassador said “This is a great beginning in Thailand. I have been very happy to cooperate with IWPG, IPYG and HWPL. After this event, I am sure that many people in Thailand will know and be interested in the culture of peaceful life. And I will try to make peaceful Thailand and peaceful world step by step.”

Founded in 2012, Heavenly Culture, World Peace, Restoration of Light (HWPL) is a non-governmental organization with the goal of achieving world peace and the cessation of war. With over 70 branches in Korea and another 100 branches around the world, HWPL, in conjunction with the International Women’s Peace Group (IWPG) and the International Peace Youth Group (IPYG), is actively working to bring all wars to an end.

To pursue this goal in a practical way, HWPL is taking steps to establish an enforceable law based on the Declaration of Peace and Cessation of War (DPCW) proclaimed on 14 March, 2016. In addition, HWPL is operating 194 World Alliance of Religions’ Peace (WARP) Offices in 104 countries to resolve religious conflicts which takes 80% of all ongoing wars.

Stemming from the malay muslim conflicts caused by historical background and religious differences in the southern part of Thailand is still ongoing up until today. It is expected to see how HWPL that planted the seed of peace in Bangkok will yield results on the settlement of the dispute in that area.

{CCTV footage purportedly showing the deadly assault on Kim Jong-un’s brother by a woman in Malaysia is also released.}

Malaysia has summoned the North Korean ambassador over his accusation that it was conspiring with “hostile forces” as it investigates the murder of leader Kim Jong-un’s half-brother.

Malaysia also recalled its envoy to Pyongyang after a spat erupted when North Korean demands to hand over the body of Kim Jong-nam were rejected.

“The ministry emphasised that as the death occurred on Malaysian soil under mysterious circumstances, it is the responsibility of the Malaysian government to conduct an investigation to identify the cause of death,” a foreign ministry statement said after a meeting with the North Korean ambassador.

Ambassador Kang Chol last week accused Malaysia of colluding with “hostile forces” to damage the North, after rival South Korea said Pyongyang had orchestrated the airport attack.

Malaysia views the complaint as “baseless”, the foreign ministry statement said.

“The Malaysian government takes very seriously any unfounded attempt to tarnish its reputation,” it said. “The Malaysian ambassador in Pyongyang has been recalled to Kuala Lumpur for consultations.”

CCTV footage purportedly showing the deadly assault in Malaysia on Kim Jong-nam by a woman – who is believed to have wiped a fast-acting poison on his face – was released on Monday.

Kim Jong-nam died last Monday a short time after the attack in the departure hall of Kuala Lumpur International Airport, where he had been preparing to take a flight to Macau.

Malaysian police have detained four suspects – a Vietnamese woman, an Indonesian woman, a Malaysian man, and North Korean man – and are on the hunt for four other North Koreans who fled the country on the day of the attack.

At least three of four North Korean men wanted in connection with the murder caught a flight from Jakarta, Indonesia to Dubai on the evening of the attack, Indonesian immigration office spokesman Agung Sampurno told Reuters news agency by text message. The details of the fourth suspect were unclear.

The grainy closed-circuit television footage showed from two different angles a woman wearing a white top grab a man’s face from behind with both hands and walk away.

A second woman was also seen walking swiftly away in another direction after the assault, though it was unclear if she had participated in the attack.

The portly, balding, middle-aged man was seen stumbling and wiping his face after the assault, and later clips showed him seeking help from people while gesturing to his face and then being escorted to a clinic.

More footage showed him inside the clinic seeking medical assistance.

The authenticity of the video could not independently be verified, and police officials were not immediately available for comment.

Half-brother of Kim Jong-un assassinated in Malaysia

In a press conference on Sunday, the police said the victim complained to the airport customer service personnel that two women had “wiped his face with a liquid”.

Autopsy results could be released as early as Wednesday, Malaysia’s health minister said on Monday.

“We are talking about the normal period of time to complete most post mortem and give results, so on this basis, yes,” Health Minister Subramaniam Sathasivam told reporters in response to a question about when results would be released.

North Korean officials have sought to prevent Malaysia from carrying out an autopsy and demanded the body be handed over directly.

South Korean Prime Minister Hwang Kyo-ahn told a meeting of South Korea’s National Security Council on Monday it was nearly certain that North Korea was behind the killing of Kim Jong-nam, the eldest son of the late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.

Kim Jong-nam, 46, who had been living in the Chinese territory of Macau under Beijing’s protection, had spoken out publicly against his family’s dynastic control of the isolated, nuclear-armed nation.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Zarif backs dialogue with ‘brothers in Islam’ but Saudi counterpart Jubeir urges ‘red lines’ to halt Iran’s actions.}

Saudi Arabia has demanded at the Munich security conference that Iran be punished, saying that the country was propping up the Syrian government, developing ballistic missiles and funding separatists in Yemen.

Adel al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister, on Sunday described Iran as the main sponsor of global “terrorism” and a destabilising force in the Middle East.

“Iran remains the single main sponsor of terrorism in the world,” he told delegates at the conference.

“It’s determined to upend the order in the Middle East … [and] until and unless Iran changes its behaviour, it would be very difficult to deal with a country like this.”

The international community needed to set clear “red lines” to halt Iran’s actions, Jubeir said, calling for banking, travel and trade restrictions aimed at changing Iran’s behaviour.

For his part, Avigdor Lieberman, the Israeli defence minister, said Iran’s ultimate objective was to undermine Saudi Arabia, and called for a dialogue between Israel and Arab countries to defeat “radical” elements in the region.

“The real division is not Jews, Muslims… but moderate people versus radical people,” he told the Munich conference delegates on Sunday.

Mevlut Cavusoglu, Turkey’s foreign minister, also criticised what he called Iran’s “sectarian policy” aimed at undermining Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

“Turkey is very much against any kind of division, religious or sectarian,” he said.

{{‘Brothers in Islam’}}

The comments followed an appeal from Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iranian foreign minister, for Arab Gulf states to work with his country to reduce violence across the region.

“We have enough problems in this region so we want to start a dialogue with countries we call brothers in Islam,” he said.

Zarif dismissed any suggestions his country would ever seek to develop nuclear weapons.

When asked about the new US administration’s tough rhetoric on Iran’s role in the region and calls to review the nuclear deal, he said Iran did not respond well to threats or sanctions.

US Senator Lindsey Graham, a South Carolina Republican, said he and other senators were preparing legislation to further sanction Iran for violating UN Security Council resolutions with its missile development programme and other actions.

“It is now time for the Congress to take Iran on directly in terms of what they’ve done outside the nuclear programme,” he said.

{{‘Emerging proxy war’}}

Senator Christopher Murphy, a Democrat and member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the US needed to decide whether to take a broader role in the regional conflict.

“We have to make a decision whether we are going to get involved in the emerging proxy war in a bigger way than we are today, between Iran and Saudi Arabia,” he said.

International sanctions on Iran were lifted a year ago under a nuclear deal with world powers.

However, Republican senators said at the conference they would press for new US measures over the missiles issue and what they called Iran’s actions to “destabilise” the Middle East.

Source:Al Jazeera

{At least 25 killed in country’s north, more than a week after over 100 died from avalanches and heavy snowfall.}

At least 25 people have been killed by snowstorms and avalanches in northern Afghanistan, more than a week after more than 100 people died due to heavy snowfall across the country, according to an official.

Northern Faryab province bore the brunt of freezing temperatures and heavy snow on Sunday.

Ammanullah Zafar, director for security in Faryab, told Anadolu news agency that Kohistan district was the worst hit.

“We can confirm that 25 people have died in this unprecedented heavy snow,” he said.

Zafar said police along with National Disasters Management Authority teams were trying hard with their limited resources to save the lives of several residents in the area, particularly the stranded passengers on the inter-district highways and the people stuck up in the mountains.

“We have received reports about people missing from Pashtoonkot, Andkhoy, Qurmkul, Balcheragh and Dawlat Abad districts; efforts are under way to locate and rescue people,” Zafar said.

Hundreds of thousands of Afghans, particularly the internally displaced persons and the recently repatriated refugees from Pakistan, remain vulnerable to the harsh winter in the country that relies heavily on aid.

On February 6, Afghanistan’s northeastern Nuristan province was hit hardest by heavy snowfall and avalanches that wreaked havoc and claimed about 106 lives in the region, officials said.

Dozens of houses were destroyed and some of the victims had reportedly frozen to death.

“Avalanches have buried two entire villages,” a spokesperson for the ministry of state natural disasters told the AFP news agency of the Barg Matal area in Nuristan.

At least 13 people were also killed by the disasters in the Pakistani town of Chitral.

Neighbouring Pakistan has seen a lesser death toll.

Source:Al Jazeera

{Both Merkel and US Vice President Mike Pence attend key security conference in Munich with Russia high on the agenda.{}}

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has said Islam is not the source of “terrorism” and that cooperating with predominantly Muslim states in the fight against it is vital.

Merkel, who has been critical of US President Donald Trump’s attempt to impose a temporary travel ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries, was speaking on Saturday at the Munich Security Conference, with US Vice President Mike Pence in the audience.

Merkel said Europe’s ties with Russia remained challenging, but it was important to work with Russia in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, known as ISIS) and similar groups.

She stressed the need to preserve and strengthen multilateral structures such as the EU, NATO and the UN during an address that came as concern grew about the Trump administration’s approach to international affairs and fears that it may have little interest in working in multilateral forums.

Trump’s criticism of NATO as “obsolete”, his praise for Britain’s decision to leave the EU as well as his softer approach towards Russia have unnerved allies.

“Acting together strengthens everyone,” said Merkel. “We must see that the multilateral structures are in many places not efficient enough.

“I am firmly convinced that it is worth fighting for our common international multilateral structures, but we must improve them in many places.”

Pence reassures watchful allies

Pence, though, in his first overseas trip since being named vice president, said Trump would stand by NATO and no one should doubt his commitment after the sacrifices made to defend it.

“The president asked me to be here today to convey a message, a reassurance – the US strongly supports NATO and we will be unwavering in our commitment to this transatlantic alliance,” Pence said. “Let no one doubt our commitment.”

READ MORE: Donald Trump ‘committed to NATO’

Al Jazeera’s Dominic Kane, reporting from the conference, said many people had wanted to hear Pence speak as speculation grew about Trump’s approach to foreign policy.

“Delegates here will be discussing the future of NATO as well as the future of the West,” Kane said. “With all these leaders speaking, it shows how important the conference has become in recent time.

“The fact that Merkel spoke about ISIL and Boko Haram and the need to consign these people to history shows leaders here are in earnest about how they deal with the problem.

“The question is though what policy will emerge from this. Is it likely this conference will arrive at a meaningful policy which will deal with these groups? That’s a much more difficult question to answer.”

Pence is also scheduled to sit down with the leaders of the Baltic States of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania and Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko – all countries dealing with the threat of Russian incursion – along with Turkey’s prime minister, Binali Yildirim.

Source:Al Jazeera