Month: October 2023

The Pope has given cautious backing to the blessing of gay unions for the first time in a further step away from the Catholic Church’s traditional intolerance of homosexuality.

Francis, who famously said “Who am I to judge?” when asked about homosexuals in 2013, gave his verdict on gay unions in response to doctrinal questions from five hardline cardinals.

The Catholic Church officially considers homosexual sex as “intrinsically disordered” and the Pope has long opposed gay marriage, claiming wedlock can only happen between a man and woman. He has supported same-sex civil unions, however, arguing that gay couples need legal rights, and told a gay man in 2018 that “God made you that way and loves you as you are”.

Despite his stance, the

India has asked Canada to reduce its diplomatic staff in the country by more than half, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday, with ties fraying after Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau publicly levelled suspicions that Indian agents were involved in the killing of a Sikh separatist leader in Canada.

Hardeep Singh Nijjar was shot dead by unidentified gunmen outside a Sikh temple on June 18 in a Vancouver suburb. India had designated him as a “terrorist” three years earlier.

Here’s a list of diplomatic and trade actions taken by the two nations so far:

* Canada paused talks on a proposed trade treaty with India, a Canadian official said on Sept. 1, an unexpected move that came about three months after both countries said they planned to seal an initial pact this year.

* Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi conveyed strong concerns about Sikh separatist protests in Canada to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on the sidelines of a G20 summit in New Delhi on Sept. 10.

* Canada postponed a trade mission to India planned for October led by Trade Minister Mary Ng, a spokesperson for the minister said on Sept. 15. Canada’s decision to halt trade treaty talks and postpone the mission was due to concerns surrounding the murder, a Canadian source told Reuters.

* Trudeau told parliament on Sept. 18 that Canada was “actively pursuing credible allegations” linking Indian government agents to the killing of Nijjar, a Canadian citizen campaigning for the creation of an independent Sikh homeland carved out of India.

* India dismissed Trudeau’s assertion as “absurd” on Sept. 19. Both countries expelled a diplomat in tit-for-tat moves, with Canada throwing out India’s top intelligence officer in the country while India expelled his Canadian counterpart.

* India urged its citizens in Canada to exercise caution in a statement on Sept. 20, as the U.S., Australia and Britain expressed concerns about the issue.

* India’s JSW Steel Ltd (JSTL.NS) is slowing down the process to buy a stake in the steelmaking coal unit of Canada’s Teck Resources (TECKb.TO), Reuters reported on Sept. 21 citing a source close to the discussions.

* India suspended issuing new visas for Canadians on Sept. 22 and asked Ottawa to reduce its diplomatic presence in India.

* Fertiliser importer Indian Potash said on Sept. 22 that it does not expect supplies of Canadian potash to be affected by the row and that it hopes to extend a contract with Canadian supplier Canpotex beyond the end of September. Canada is one of the key suppliers of potash to India.

* Canadian lentil sales to India slowed after tensions rose between the two nations, industry sources in both countries told Reuters. Canada is India’s main import source of lentils, a protein-rich staple.

* India’s steel secretary told reporters on Sept. 28 that Indian exports to Canada were marginal and have not been affected by the diplomatic row.

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A bipartisan group of U.S. Senators visiting China next week hope to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Republican Senator Mike Crapo are among those set to make the trip.

Schumer’s office said last month the trip would also include stops in Japan and South Korea.

The tour comes at a time when U.S. officials have boosted engagement with Chinese officials, including visits to China by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo.

In addition to expressing the need to have open lines of communication, U.S. officials have also highlighted a need to address issues such as trade, and challenges that U.S. businesses face operating in China.

Some information for this report came from Reuters

An alliance of nations said on Tuesday members would raise $12 billion to protect coral reefs from threats such as pollution and overfishing, but experts warned the funding would only be a drop in the ocean unless broader climate risks are addressed.

The International Coral Reef Initiative (ICRI) said it would secure public and private investment to help conserve and restore coral ecosystems, which sustain a quarter of the world’s marine species and more than a billion people.

“The functional existence of these critical ecosystems is at stake due to the climate crisis and a myriad of other anthropogenic stressors,” it said. “The window for protecting these ecosystems is closing rapidly.”

Coral reefs have come under increasing pressure as a result of rising marine pollution, destructive coastal development and fishing fleets.

But they are also suffering because of rising sea temperatures, which cause coral to expel colourful algae living inside them, a phenomenon known as “bleaching”.

Marian Wong, senior lecturer at the School of Earth, Atmospheric and Life Sciences at Australia’s University of Wollongong, said that although additional funding for protection and restoration would be “good news”, rising temperatures are the bigger risk.

“Threats are very grave, especially as we head into another El Nino,” she said, referring to the semiregular ocean water warming phenomenon. “We are expecting coral bleaching on a mass scale to occur again, probably February to March, unless we are very lucky.”

ICRI said it aims to “secure the future” of 125,000 square kilometres of shallow-water tropical coral reefs and double the areas under effective protection by the end of the decade.

It also vowed to “accelerate” restoration of damaged reefs using innovative new solutions.

David Booth, marine ecologist at the University of Technology Sydney, warned that restoration was no panacea, saying that it would be “unfathomably expensive” to do on a meaningful scale.

ICRI was launched in 1994 by Australia, France, Japan, Jamaica, the Philippines, Sweden, Britain and the United States. Its members now include 45 countries that represent three quarters of the world’s coral reefs.

“ICRI countries should be focused squarely on reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said Terry Hughes, a coral expert at Australia’s James Cook University. “Ironically, Australia and Saudi Arabia are strong supporters of coral restoration ‘solutions’ because it buys time for fossil fuel industries to continue to pollute the atmosphere for as long as it’s profitable.”

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TIMBUKTU/DAKAR (Reuters) – Islamist militants in Mali began a blockade of Timbuktu by cutting road access in August and then shut off river and air routes in an offensive that has put the city once again on the frontline of a jihadist insurgency.

The bombing began soon after. On Sept. 21, witnesses said rockets hit a hospital, killing two children, and landed near a school where survivors of a passenger boat attack that killed more than 100 people were sheltering.

“Our worry is the shelling,” businessman Sory Touré said in Timbuktu, which was occupied by jihadists a decade ago. “It creates a real psychosis and leaves a lasting impression. I have this fear within me.”

Since the United Nations began winding down its peacekeeping mission in July, al Qaeda affiliated militants launched an offensive in central Mali, fighting has resumed between the army and Tuareg rebels from the north and, in the east, Islamic State-allied insurgents have continued to carry out attacks.

Mali, run by a junta that has spurned the support of U.N. and French forces, is in meltdown and the violence risks adding to instability across West Africa’s Sahel, a region already reeling from military coups in neighbouring Burkina Faso and Niger.

Experts compare Mali’s situation now to its position in 2012 when another Tuareg rebellion was overtaken by jihadists who captured Timbuktu and pressed south towards the capital Bamako.

“This conflict is escalating fast,” said Ulf Laessing, the Bamako-based head of the Sahel programme at the Konrad Adenauer foundation. “There is a risk of civil war.”

Back in 2012, French forces and the U.N. intervened to halt the advance in Mali. But there will be no such intervention now.

Mali’s military rulers, who consolidated power over two coups in 2020 and 2021, severed ties with former colonial power France and kicked out its troops. In June, it ordered the 13,000-strong force deployed by the United Nations to leave.

Russia’s Wagner Group, which has sent 1,000 mercenaries to support the junta, has failed to fill the gap and is accused of attacks against civilians.

More than 650 people have died in conflict in Mali in the two months after the U.N. began pulling out, a more than 40% rise over the previous two months, U.S.-based group Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project said.

Mali’s authorities did not respond to specific requests for comment for this article. The army said in a statement on Monday that September had been a “turbulent” month but it would continue to fight its enemies to protect the nation and its people.

‘TOO FEW TROOPS’

In 2013, French forces beat back Islamists. But they regrouped and waged a new campaign that has killed thousands and displaced millions in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, a band of countries on the edge of the Sahara. Insurgents also have a foothold in West African coastal states, including Benin, Togo and Ivory Coast.

Insecurity has spawned coups whose leaders have jilted regional and Western states. France said last week it would pull out troops from Niger. Domestic armies are struggling alone.

In Mali, fighting began in August between the army and an ethnic Tuareg group called the Coordination of Azawad Movements (CMA) around a base vacated by the U.N. Since then, CMA has attacked other Malian army bases, some hundreds of miles apart.

The group laid down arms in 2015 under a U.N.-brokered deal but says the army has encroached on its territory and says these are “times of war”. The army calls CMA fighters “terrorists”.

Al Qaeda-affiliated Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wa al-Muslimin (JNIM) raided other military camps, attacked an airport, fired on passenger boats and launched its blockade of Timbuktu.

“The problem is Mali has too few troops and too little mobility,” said Michael Shurkin, director of global programs at 14 North Strategies consultancy. “JNIM and CMA have freedom of movement over the entire area.”

There is no evidence the groups coordinate, security experts said. But they have other ties. JNIM’s leader Iyad Ag-Ghali is a former Tuareg rebel.

“They have each other’s phone numbers. That doesn’t mean they are in lock step, but they can communicate,” Shurkin said.

‘BAD TO WORSE’

Timbuktu, a centuries-old centre of Islamic learning, is now under siege. Food and other supplies are blocked, driving up prices for essentials. Traders in the city say sugar is up 25%, while charcoal for cooking, potatoes and onions are up 30%.

Residents wary of falling rockets avoid markets and a nightly curfew empties the streets.

“Things are going from bad to worse,” said market trader Mohamed Massaya. “Our business has stopped working. We are making do with our old stocks.”

Hundreds of survivors were brought to the city after a JNIM attack on Sept. 7 on the “Timbuktu”, a boat carrying soldiers and residents from Gao. Ferry services stopped after that.

Salaha Maiga, a member of Mali’s National Transitional Council, the junta’s equivalent of a national assembly, told Reuters that 111 people were killed in the attack. Authorities originally said 64 died.

Survivors are struggling in the aftermath.

“We cannot describe the horror,” said Aicha Sababou, who was on the boat. “Seeing dozens of people die and burying them together is scary. We are happy to rejoin our families even if there are still wounds we need to heal.”

Give us 5 minutes, and we’ll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

The White House is still determined to support Kyiv. The U.N. approves multinational force in Haiti; Kenya says it’s ready. We get a look at the situation as nearly all ethnic Armenians flee Nagorno-Karabakh, and a look at the turmoil in the U.S. House of Representatives: Is the Speaker’s job safe?

Hours after the People’s Republic of China celebrated its 74th birthday October 1 with fireworks and flowers, the World Bank cut its forecast for the country’s growth next year. 

The World Bank said in its semiannual regional forecast released Sunday that it now expected China’s economic output will grow 4.4% in 2024, down from the 4.8% it expected in April. The bank cited the persistent weakness of its property sector for the changed outlook. 

The bank also warned that east Asia’s developing economies, including China, are set to expand at one of the lowest rates “since the late 1960s,” excluding extraordinary events such as the COVID-19 pandemic, the Asian financial crisis in the late 1990s and the global oil shock in the 1970s.

The bank cut its 2024 forecast for GDP growth for developing economies in east Asia and the Pacific, which includes China, to 4.5%, down from the 5% rate expected this year, it said.

For 2024, the bank lowered its regional outlook to 4.5% growth from 4.8%, citing external factors including a sluggish global economy, high interest rates and trade protectionism. (( https://finance.yahoo.com/news/world-bank-keeps-china-2023-074357699.html )) 

Manuela Ferro, vice president of East Asia and Pacific at the World Bank, was quoted by Investopedia as saying the region is one of the “fastest-growing and most dynamic in the world, even if growth is moderating.” She said sustaining high growth over the medium term will require reforms to “maintain industrial competitiveness, diversify trading partners, and unleash the productivity-enhancing and job-creating potential of the services sector.”

Prior to China’s National Day on Oct. 1, President Xi Jinping gave a speech acknowledging that China’s path ahead would not be smooth sailing. 

“Our future is bright, but the road ahead will not be smooth,” Xi told his roughly 800 guests, some of whom were foreign diplomats, at the Great Hall of the People in the heart of Beijing. At the reception on September 28, Xi told his guests that China must continue to climb over “obstacles,” and the nation’s “strength comes from unity, and confidence is more valuable than gold.”

Tseng Chien-yuan, chairman of the New School for Democracy, a Taiwanese organization that supports human rights activists, told VOA Mandarin that Xi’s speech shows China faces challenges that include the sluggish domestic economy that continues to recover from Beijing’s strict “zero-COVID” policy as it faces the global economic uncertainties triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Tseng said, “Xi Jinping’s remarks make people feel that [he] is a little confused about the future, [but] he is also becoming more and more aware that the international situation China is facing is caused by his excessive political moves which led him into a dilemma.” 

Pressure from the property sector also appears to be weighing on China’s economy. On the day of Xi’s speech, the Chinese real estate giant Evergrande Group issued an announcement confirming that Hui Ka Yan, chairman of the company’s board of directors, had been arrested for suspicion of committing unspecified crimes. Stock prices of many of Evergrande’s subsidiaries fell in response.  

The Wall Street Journal reported on Sept. 29 that due to the intervention of Chinese regulatory agencies, Evergrande may be split up or liquidated, which may upend China’s economy since the real estate industry accounts for as much as a quarter of China’s economy. 

The market consensus is that China’s economic growth rate this year will not reach the annual target of 5%, slightly higher than that of the World Bank.

According to statistics from Taiwan’s Central News Agency issued on September 13, at least 76 international financial experts and six multinational investment institutions shared the same view: China’s economic growth rate this year and next year will be lower than expected.

Although Japanese investment bank Nomura Holdings slightly raised its forecast for China’s GDP growth this year from 4.6% to 4.8% on September 28, the growth forecast for 2024 still remains at a low-end 3.9%. Nomura believes that the property market continues to deteriorate, and exports are weak. Other factors contributing to slowing growth include wavering confidence in private enterprises.

Ming Xia, a political science professor at the City University of New York, told VOA Mandarin the combined effects of economic weakness, the depreciation of China’s currency and plummeting real estate prices will leave Chinese consumers feeling battered.

He compared Xi with China’s former leader Deng Xiaoping, who promoted economic reform and opened up China to save the economy in the 1970s after the Cultural Revolution. Xi, according to Xia, seems unaware of the seriousness of the problems China faces and has yet to implement rescue measures. This makes it hard to boost the confidence of private enterprises or foreign investors in China in the short term, he added. 

Xia also said Xi lacks understanding of the global economy and wants to return to the old way of the state controlling the economy. 

Adrianna Zhang contributed to this story. Some information in this report came from Reuters. 

(NewsNation) — A local restaurant owner in West Philadelphia is focused on rebuilding after he suffered $18,000 in damages during a string of looting in the city last week.

Brendan Hartranft’s establishment, Clarkville, was hit twice in two days, leaving 12 shattered windows and several spray-painted doors.

“I understand that it’s kind of a cash grab or protest for everybody, but that’s not something a small business can sustain,” Hartranft said Monday on “Elizabeth Vargas Reports.” “You’re talking about more than a week’s payroll, you’re talking about close to two months rent — I could factor in a bunch of different things this money could be going toward, but that’s just how it goes sometimes.”

Philadelphia police are making a major push to arrest the looters who ransacked multiple stores, releasing surveillance footage and asking the public’s help to identify suspects.

So far, 72 arrests have been made, and all but five of them are adults, according to the Philadelphia District Attorney’s office. The chaos began last Tuesday around 7:30 p.m. after several 911 calls said a group of as many as 100 people were moving through Philadelphia’s Center City.

Hartranft discovered damage to his restaurant Wednesday morning after the first night of looting and then again on Friday morning. It happened while his business was closed.

“I would have much more respect if they did it in broad daylight as opposed to the cover of night. At least it would show some conviction,” he said.

The flash mob-style ransacking Tuesday night came after a peaceful protest over a judge’s decision to dismiss murder and other charges against a Philadelphia police officer who shot and killed a driver, Eddie Irizarry, through a rolled-up window.

Those doing the ransacking were not affiliated with the protest, Interim Police Commissioner John Stanford said at a news conference last week, calling the group “a bunch of criminal opportunists.”

“People are using my restaurant almost as like a palette to voice their frustration, and I have the same exact frustration. So, not only is it frustrating, but it’s also pretty ironic,” Hartranft said of the vandalism.

Jabari Jones, president of the Corridor Collaborative and a candidate for City Council, says many businesses haven’t yet fully recovered from a spate of looting in 2020 during social justice protests, and this week’s damage “opened up a lot of fresh wounds” in West Philadelphia.

The difference this time, he said, is there appears to be a much more robust police response.

“They acted very quickly; they made sure that there was a police presence at all of our major shopping plazas and along many of the commercial corridors that got hit during the previous day,” Jones said. “It’s been very reassuring to the businesses in our district when they hear that the police is very rigorously going after the individuals that were involved.”

NewsNation digital producer Urja Sinha and Nexstar Media Wire contributed to this report.

Malaysia will try to make rain by seeding clouds and prepare to shut schools as the quality of air in various places deteriorates, the Department of Environment said, raising fears of a new round of pollution from forest fires.

Almost every dry season, smoke from fires to clear land for palm oil and pulp and paper plantations in Indonesia clouds the skies over much of the region, bringing risks to public health and worrying tourist operators and airlines.

Malaysia’s air quality was deteriorating, particularly in the western part of Peninsular Malaysia, with 11 areas recording unhealthy air pollution index (API) readings, the department’s director general, Wan Abdul Latiff Wan Jaffar, said in a statement late on Monday.

Malaysia said last week fires in neighbouring Indonesia were causing the pollution although Indonesia has denied detecting any smoke drifting over its borders into Malaysia.

The Malaysian department said earlier on Monday a regional meteorological agency had detected nearly 250 “hotspots”, indicating fires, on Indonesia’s Sumatra island and in its part of Borneo island, with none in Malaysia.

Efforts to clear the air with rain by seeding clouds and other measures to cope with the pollution would come into effect when API readings reached 150 for more than 24 hours, Wan Abdul Latiff.

Schools and kindergartens must stop all outdoor activities when API readings reach 100, and close when they reach 200, he said.

The environmental group Greenpeace, meanwhile, called on countries in the region to introduce legislation to stop plantation companies causing air pollution.

“Enacting a domestic transboundary haze act is necessary to act as a deterrent, especially as there are bad apples in the industry,” Heng Kiah Chun, regional campaign strategist for Greenpeace Southeast Asia, said in a statement.

Singapore, which prides itself on its clean air, passed a cross-border air pollution law in 2014 that makes those who cause haze both criminally and civilly liable.