Year: 2019

A former Buddhist monk has died in eastern Tibet after setting himself on fire this week to protest China’s repressive rule, a spokesperson for the monastery told VOA Tibetan Service. Yonten, a 24-year-old former monk at Kirti Monastery in Amdo Ngaba, in the western China province of Sichuan, carried out his self-immolation Tuesday in Meruma township, spokesperson Kanyag Tsering said. He said China had imposed restrictions in the area, including cellphone use, slowing the gathering and dissemination of information about the incident. “We have no further information on whether the body of the deceased has been handed over to the family or not since all channels are now blocked,” the monastery said in a statement. There have been 156 self-immolations across Tibet over the past decade, 44 of which took…

A Russian-backed bank payment card, introduced after Western sanctions upended Russia's financial system five years ago and prompted Visa and Mastercard to deny electronic services to some of the country's leading banks, is set for its European debut on London Wednesday, when a pilot project will be launched in collaboration with the Dutch global payment company PayXpert. Moscow authorities hoped to get the MIR card accepted eventually in foreign markets, but progress has been slow outside Russia for the MIR payment system,  which operates outside of Western-controlled international financial systems such as Swift, which banks use to transfer money.   The pilot project with PayXpert "will lay the foundation for new promising trends in the foreign expansion of Russian payment cards,"  according to Vladimir Komlev, the head of Russia's National…

China summoned the U.S. ambassador in Beijing Thursday to "strongly protest" President Donald Trump's signing of bills on Hong Kong's human rights. Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Le Yucheng told Ambassador Terry Branstad the move constituted "serious interference in China's internal affairs" and described the action as a "serious violation of international law," a statement from the foreign ministry said.  He urged Washington to refrain from implementing the bills to "avoid further damage" to U.S.-China relations. President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally in Sunrise, Fla., Nov. 26, 2019. Trump Wednesday signed two separate bills backing pro-democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong, despite a trade deal in the balance and threats from Beijing. The House and Senate passed both bills last week nearly unanimously. One law requires the State Department to…

Iran on Thursday condemned the burning of its consulate in southern Iraq hours earlier, which came amid an escalation in Iraq's anti-government protests that erupted nearly two months ago.                     Violence across southern Iraq had continued throughout the night, with security forces killing 16 protesters and wounded 90 since Wednesday. Protesters closed roads while a large number of police and military forces were deployed across key oil-rich provinces. Protesters had set fire to the Iranian consulate in the holy city of Najaf late Wednesday. The Iranian staff were not harmed, and escaped out the back door.                     Anti-government protests have gripped Iraq since Oct. 1, when thousands took to the streets in Baghdad and the predominantly Shiite south. The largely leaderless movement accuses the government of being hopelessly…

A TikTok post by a young woman, pretending to give eyelash curling advice while actually condemning China's crackdown on Muslims in Xinjiang, has gone viral on the Chinese-owned app that has been accused of censoring anti-Beijing content. The clip by US teen Feroza Aziz, who describes herself as "17 Just a Muslim", had millions of views across several social media platforms by Wednesday. But Aziz said she has been blocked from posting on the hugely popular video platform TikTok for a month after uploading Sunday's clip slamming China, a claim disputed by the app. Part three to getting longer lashes #tiktok#muslims#muslimmemes#Uyghurmuslims#freepalestinepic.twitter.com/OoFpDpYPvj— feroza.x (@x_feroza) November 25, 2019 Human rights groups and outside experts say more than one million Uighurs and other mostly Muslim minorities have been rounded up in a network…

The enemy next door. Plugged In takes you to the Iraqi town of Shoura, once controlled by the Islamic State. Now, Shoura's residents are trying live side-by-side with the wives and children of the ISIS fighters who terrorized the town. VOA Middle East Correspondent Heather Murdock brings us the story of Shoura, an experiment in reconciliation. Air date: November 27, 2019.  ...

At least three workers were injured in an early morning explosion on Wednesday that sparked a blaze at a Texas petrochemical plant, the latest in a series of chemical plant accidents in the region. An initial explosion at a TPC Group complex in Port Neches, Texas, was followed by secondary blasts, shattering windows, blowing locked doors off their hinges and prompting officials to evacuate homes within a half-mile radius of the facility, which about 90 miles east of Houston. Toby Baker, head of the state’s pollution regulator, criticized the “unacceptable trend of significant incidents” in the region and pledged to review the state’s compliance efforts. The fiery blast follows others at petrochemical producers and storage facilities in Texas. A March blaze at chemical storage complex outside Houston burned for days…

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has agreed to expand its anti-bias training and expressly forbid anti-Semitism in campus policies as part of an agreement with the U.S. Education Department following complaints about a March conference featuring a rapper accused of anti-Jewish bias. The university announced the changes Monday after reaching a resolution with the department's Office for Civil Rights. The deal puts an end to the inquiry without any admission of wrongdoing on the school's part, and without any official finding from the department on the allegation of illegal discrimination. Interim Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz reiterated that the university will not tolerate any form of harassment, and he encouraged students and faculty to report any problems. "I reaffirm the university's commitment to creating a place where every member…

Many new refugees in America experience culture shock when they first arrive in the United States.  Many have to deal with a new language, culture, and even holidays. But settled refugees can play a big role in helping new arrivals adapt to life in the U.S. One example is the Ethiopian Community Center, which hosts a Thanksgiving meal every year for new refugees.  VOA's Shahnaz Nafees has more on the event. ...

Critics say the widespread African tradition of giving cash and gifts to a bride's family before marriage, known as a "bride price," degrades women by putting a required, monetary value on a wife. In Nigeria, the financial pressure in a recent case ended in suicide, underscoring those concerns. But supporters of the bride price tradition uphold it as a cherished cultural and religious symbol of marriage, as Chika Oduah reports from Yola, Nigeria. ...

Israel's attorney general Avichai Mandelblit says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu can stay on as head of government even after he was indicted last week for alleged corruption. Although Cabinet ministers are required to step down after an indictment, the laws about a prime minister are not explicit. Mandelblit says Netanyahu can stay in office unless he is convicted and all his appeals are exhausted. Netanyahu is facing pressure from the opposition to resign after Mandelblit announced his indictment last week. Netanyahu is charged with allegedly taking hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, cigars, champagne, and jewelry from billionaire friends in exchange for personal favors, including helping one wealthy friend get favorable newspaper coverage. He also is accused of doing favors for a newspaper editor so the prime minister himself…

Turkish riot police used force to break up a march by thousands of women calling for what they call an "end to impunity" for men guilty of violence against women. Police stopped more than 2,000 from marching up Istikal Street in Istanbul’s main shopping district. Police fired pepper spray at the protesters with some witnesses reporting the use of tear gas and plastic bullets. No casualties or arrests were reported. March organizers say they are tired at what they believe are the relatively light sentences handed out to husbands and boyfriends who murder or abuse women. Women at the front of Monday's march spread out a banner reading "We cannot tolerate the loss of one more woman." A Turkish women's rights group says nearly 380 women have been killed so…

A Lebanese-born business tycoon says he is donating Hitler's top hat and other Nazi memorabilia he won at an auction to an Israeli Jewish group to keep the stuff out of the hands of neo-Nazis. Abdallah Chatila, who made his fortune in diamonds and Swiss real estate, paid $660,000 for the items last week. He says he bought the the hat and memorabilia intending to destroy it, but decided it was better to hand it over to the Keren Hayeson-United Israel Appeal. Along with the Nazi dictator’s hat, the items include a silver plated edition of "Mein Kampf," and a typewriter used by Hitler's secretary. Although Chatila says some Lebanese are criticizing him for helping the so-called enemy, his act was totally non-political. He said he "wished to buy these…

Feature films on slavery have been part of Hollywood since the beginning of the film industry in United States. However, only recently, movies on slavery have been told from the perspective of the slaves, and now, with the film "Harriet" from the perspective of a female slave.  “Harriet", the latest of antebellum dramas, focuses on Harriet Tubman a female runaway slave.  Tubman played a significant role in the so called "Underground Railroad", a human network helping enslaved African - Americans to flee to free American states and Canada. VOA’s Penelope Poulou has more. ...

When politicians try to win votes by blaming foreigners for stealing jobs, economists say they ignore technology, which is what is really replacing many of these jobs. However the issue remains that many workers and small businesses do not benefit from foreign trade as much as corporations do, and that is something Vietnam hopes to fix. Hanoi is trying to avoid the mistakes of the U.S., Britain, and other countries where lower income citizens felt left behind by global trade, and one part of its approach is to focus on small business loans. Vietnam hopes to make loans available to family businesses and other small businesses, which in many cases do not have the right connections or the expertise to get these loans. Last week the State Bank of Vietnam…

Hong Kong pro-democracy forces won a landslide victory in local elections Sunday. Though primarily symbolic, the vote represents a stunning rebuke to Beijing, as VOA’s Bill Gallo reports from Hong Kong. ...

Devin Nunes, the top Republican on the Congressional committee investigating President Donald Trump, refused to answer questions Sunday as to whether he met with a former Ukrainian official to gather information on the son of former vice president Joe Biden. A lawyer representing Lev Parnas, an indicted associate of Trump's personal lawyer, Rudolph Giuliani, has told multiple news outlets since Friday that Nunes met Ukraine's former top prosecutor Viktor Shokin in Vienna in 2018. The claim is controversial because Nunes did not disclose any such meeting while leading the Republican defense of President Donald Trump during related impeachment hearings. Speaking on Fox News Sunday morning, Nunes was asked point blank by the Fox news anchor whether he had met with Shokin. The congressman replied that he wanted to answer questions…

Machine gun fire answers rock-throwing protesters. Motorcycle-riding Revolutionary Guard volunteers chase after demonstrators. Plainclothes security forces grab, beat and drag a man off the street to an uncertain fate. As Iran restores the internet after a weeklong government-imposed shutdown, new videos purport to show the demonstrations over gasoline prices rising and the security-force crackdown that followed. The videos offer only fragments of encounters, but to some extent they fill in the larger void left by Iran's state-controlled television and radio channels. On their airwaves, hard-line officials allege that foreign conspiracies and exile groups instigated the unrest. In print, newspapers offered only PR for the government or had merely stenographic reporting at best, the moderate daily Hamshahri said in an analysis Sunday. They don't acknowledge that the gasoline price hike Nov.…

More than three dozen people are reported dead in a series of security-related incidents in Afghanistan, including a fatal attack on a U.N. vehicle in the capital, Kabul. Several of the dead were civilians. Afghan officials said Sunday that Taliban rebels assaulted a security outpost in central Daykundi province overnight, killing eight soldiers and wounding four others. Senior provincial authorities claimed the ensuing firefight also killed at least 20 assailants, though the Taliban disputed those claims. Meanwhile, doctors and residents in western Farah province said an Afghan government air strike has killed at least nine civilians and injured several others. The mainstream local TOLO news channel reported Sunday relatives took to the streets with bodies of the victims to protest and demand an immediate investigation into the deadly incident. In…

Iraqi security forces fired rubber bullets and tear gas to disperse crowds of protesters Saturday, killing two people in a third day of fierce clashes in central Baghdad, security and hospital officials said.    Two protesters were struck with rubber bullets and died instantly and over 20 others were wounded in the fighting on Rasheed Street, a famous avenue known for its old crumbling architecture and now littered with rubble from days of violence. Sixteen people have died and over 100 have been wounded in the renewed clashes. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in line with regulations.    At least 342 protesters have died in Iraq's massive protests, which started October 1 when thousands of Iraqis took to the streets to decry corruption and lack of services despite…

Hong Kongers are voting Sunday in a local election widely seen as a de facto referendum on pro-democracy protests that have recently taken a more aggressive turn.  The territory is on edge following days of intense clashes between police and groups of mostly student protesters, though the violence has subsided in the past few days.  Though the district council members being chosen Sunday have little power, pro-democracy forces still hope for a big win that will confirm public support for the protests.  Police have promised a heavy security presence at voting locations. Public broadcaster RTHK reports officers will be stationed inside and outside polling stations in riot gear.  "If there's any violence, we will deal with it immediately, without hesitation," Chris Tang, Hong Kong’s police commissioner, said.  A riot policeman stands as…

President Donald Trump's new national security adviser is criticizing what he says is silence from the rest of the world about China's confinement of more than 1 million Muslims in re-education camps, linking the lack of a global outcry to China's economic clout.    National security adviser Robert O'Brien also questioned whether international leaders will stand up if Beijing carries out a Tiananmen Square-style crackdown on the pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong.    O'Brien met with journalists and was interviewed by a moderator at the Halifax International Security Forum on Saturday.  Speak up   "Where is the world? We have over a million people in concentration camps," O'Brien said. "I've been to the genocide museum in Rwanda. You hear `never again, never again is this going to happen,' and yet…

A Hong Kong university campus under siege for more than a week was a deserted wasteland Saturday, with a handful of protesters holed up in hidden refuges across the trashed grounds, as the city’s focus turned to local elections. The siege neared its end as some protesters at Polytechnic University on the Kowloon peninsula desperately sought a way out and others vowed not to surrender, days after some of the worst violence since anti-government demonstrations escalated in June. “If they storm in, there are a lot of places for us to hide,” said Sam, a 21-year-old student, who was eating two-minute noodles in the cafeteria, while plotting his escape. Another protester, Ron, vowed to remain until the end with other holdouts, adding, “The message will be clear that we will…

U.S. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland has been a key witness in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. Sondland was appointed to his post after donating $1 million to Trump's inaugural committee. The practice of awarding ambassador positions to wealthy political supporters is not new to either party, but some lawmakers and presidential candidates say it is time to limit the practice. VOA's Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine reports from the State Department.   ...

In late December, it will be one year since Moscow detained U.S. citizen Paul Whelan on espionage charges. During his 11 months in the infamous Lefortovo prison, Whelan has denied the allegations and complained of systematic mistreatment. His family in the U.S. is working to bring the former Marine home. Yulia Savchenko met with Whelan's sister, Elizabeth, in Washington to get the latest on the case.   ...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's indictment is expected to sharpen the battle lines in Israel's already deadlocked political system and could test the loyalty of his right-wing allies, Israeli commentators said Friday.                     The serious corruption charges announced Thursday appear to have dashed already slim hopes for a unity government following September's elections, paving the way for an unprecedented repeat vote in March, which will be the third in less than a year.                     In an angry speech late Thursday, Netanyahu lashed out at investigators and vowed to fight on in the face of an “attempted coup.”                     His main opponent, the centrist Blue and White party, called on him to “immediately resign” from all his Cabinet posts, citing a Supreme Court ruling that says indicted ministers cannot…

Tens of thousands of people in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore are at risk of respiratory disease because of poor air quality related to thick smog hanging over the region, an international rights group said Friday.                     Amnesty International called for “urgent action” for residents of Lahore in a bid to mobilize supporters around the world to campaign on their behalf due to smog that has engulfed the city of more than 10 million people over the past week.                     Amnesty says Pakistani officials' inadequate response to the smog raises significant human rights concerns.                     “The hazardous air is putting everyone's right to health at risk,” said Rimmel Mohydin, South Asia Campaigner at Amnesty. “The issue is so serious that we are calling on our members around…

Pope Francis Friday called on bishops in Thailand to keep their doors open for priests and to spread the faith as their missionary predecessors did. "Be close to your priests, listen to them and seek to accompany them in every situation, especially when you see that they are discouraged or apathetic, which is the worst of the devil's temptations. Do so not as judges but as fathers, not as managers who deploy them, but as true elder brothers." Francis gave a speech to the Asian Bishops Conference at the Shrine of Blessed Nicholas Bunkerd Kithamrung in Sam Phran, 56 kilometers west of capital Bangkok. Huge crowds, including faithful from Vietnam, Cambodia and China welcomed the pope  when he earlier arrived for a meeting with clergy and seminarians at Saint Peter's…