American Cindy McCain to Head UN World Food Program

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American Cindy McCain will take over as executive director of the United Nations World Food Program when current director David Beasley steps down next month.

“Ms. McCain, a champion for human rights, has a long history of giving a voice to the voiceless through her humanitarian and philanthropic work,” said U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) Director-General Qu Dongyu in a statement announcing the appointment.

McCain is a prominent Republican Party member who is currently U.S. ambassador to United Nations agencies in Rome, which include the FAO, the WFP, and the International Fund for Agricultural Development.

She has been active in U.S. politics for decades as the wife of Arizona Senator John McCain, who died of brain cancer in August 2018. Since then, she has forged her own political profile, including backing Democrat Joe Biden in his presidential bid against then-incumbent Republican president Donald Trump in 2020.

Biden appointed McCain to the Rome post in November 2021. Typically, the White House is involved in nominating the U.S. candidate to head the WFP, which is often a U.S.-held post.

McCain has worked in philanthropy, starting the American Voluntary Medical Team in 1988, which provides emergency medical and surgical care to poor children across the world. She has also traveled in her personal capacity on behalf of the WFP, visiting mother and child feeding programs in Cambodia, Sierra Leone, Chad and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Mammoth challenges

McCain, 68, takes over the agency at a time of unprecedented global need. The WFP says 349 million people across 79 countries are acutely food insecure. The agency is attempting to raise $23 billion this year to reach almost 150 million people worldwide.

In 2022, the WFP reached 160 million people with humanitarian assistance.

“McCain takes over as head of the World Food Program at a moment when the world confronts the most serious food security crisis in modern history and this leadership role has never been more important,” the president of the WFP’s executive board, Polish Ambassador Artur Andrzej Pollok, said in a statement. “We wish her well and can assure her she will have the full support of the Executive Board.”

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken offered his congratulations and said Washington is “deeply invested” in the WFP’s continuing success.

“I am confident that she will bring renewed energy, optimism, and success to the World Food Program,” Blinken said of McCain.

The Republican chairman of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee, Michael McCaul, and the highest-ranking Democrat, Gregory Meeks, welcomed McCain’s appointment saying she is “an exceptionally qualified leader.”

“At a time when food insecurity and fuel costs are at an all-time high and there is soaring global hunger, the task of leading the World Food Program is more significant and consequential than ever,” they said in a joint statement.

Former leader warns against partisanship

The United States is the WFP’s largest contributor, providing about 40% of its budget or $7 billion in 2022, so McCain’s political clout will be an asset in securing funding.

But former U.S. ambassador Ertharin Cousin, who headed the WFP from 2012-2017 and is now CEO of the Chicago-based Food Systems for the Future, cautioned that McCain is serving as an international civil servant, not as member of the Republican Party.

“She must serve on a non-partisan basis in order to effectively support the work of the organization,” Cousin told VOA. “But having said that, of course, I am not naive that she will need to continue to work with both sides of the aisle in order to secure the commitment from the U.S. for the level of contribution that is required to meet the global food insecurity needs.”

Cousin also said it will be important for McCain to keep the organization fit for its purpose.

“You are stewards of taxpayers’ dollars from across the globe, and as a result you have a responsibility to make sure the organization remains the efficient behemoth that the world needs,” Cousin said.

Outgoing chief Beasley offered his congratulations on Twitter Wednesday, a day ahead of the official announcement.

Outgoing WFP leader praised

Beasley said in mid-December that he would be leaving in April. He has served as the food agency’s chief since 2017. In 2020, the World Food Program was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize “for its efforts to combat hunger, for its contribution to bettering conditions for peace in conflict-affected areas and for acting as a driving force in efforts to prevent the use of hunger as a weapon of war and conflict.”

Guterres and the FAO Director-General expressed deep appreciation for Beasley’s leadership.

“He has led WFP with a deep compassion for the world’s hungry and most vulnerable during what can only be described as unprecedented crises that severely impacted global food security,” Guterres and Qu said. “He has humanized for the world the women and children most affected by hunger and has used his powerful voice to bring awareness and substantial resources to one crisis after another.”

Beasley’s tenure has coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic, unprecedented droughts and floods in several developing countries, as well as a steady stream of conflicts, including Russia’s invasion last year of Ukraine.

Despite tremendous levels of fundraising, a number of the agency’s programs are hurting for cash and facing cutbacks as needs continue to rise.
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Pakistan’s Health Sector Hit Hard by Economic Crisis

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Pakistan’s economic crisis is hitting the health sector hard. Pakistan relies heavily on imports such as raw material needed to manufacture medicines and complex surgical equipment. The medical supply chain is coming under increased pressure due to the country’s low foreign exchange reserves and declining rupee. Sarah Zaman reports from Islamabad. Camera and edit: Wajid Asad, Waqar Ahmad
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Pakistan’s Economic Turmoil Worsens Amid IMF Bailout Delay

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Pakistan’s currency fell 7% against the U.S. dollar Thursday as the government struggles to persuade the International Monetary Fund to resume lending to the cash-strapped country to help avert a default on its foreign debt.

The Pakistani rupee has weakened to a record low in recent weeks after foreign exchange companies were allowed in January to remove a cap on the exchange rate. The currency’s official value closed at 285.09 rupees against the dollar Thursday versus 266.11 the previous day.

The market-determined currency exchange rate is a key IMF demand for Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s government to complete before the lender’s board approves a funding tranche of more than $1 billion to Pakistan. 

Islamabad has since failed to secure the tranche, which was initially expected to be disbursed in December as part of a stalled $6.5 billion IMF bailout program, over a lack of progress on fiscal consolidation.

“A delay in IMF funding is creating uncertainty in the currency market,” said Mohammed Sohail of Topline Securities, a Karachi-based brokerage house.

The IMF program is key to unlocking other external bilateral and multilateral financing sources for Pakistan. The drawn-out negotiations between the two sides are putting pressure on government finances and the country’s more than 220 million population.  

Pakistan’s foreign exchange reserves have dwindled to precarious levels and stood at just over $3 billion, hardly enough for three weeks of imports.

Inflation has also skyrocketed to 31.5%, according to official data published Wednesday. Food and fuel prices have soared beyond the means of many Pakistanis.

Decades of financial mismanagement, corruption, and political instability are blamed for pushing Pakistan’s economy to the brink of default. A global energy crisis and last year’s devastating floods across the country have worsened the crisis. 

The Sharif administration has already taken most other actions to keep the talks with the IMF on track. They include a hike in fuel and energy tariffs, the withdrawal of subsidies in export and power sectors and generating more revenue through new taxation in a supplementary budget.

Analysts anticipated the fiscal adjustments would likely further fuel inflation in Pakistan whether or not a deal with the IMF has been reached. 

Pakistani Finance Minister Ishaq Dar rejected reports as “malicious rumors” that the country was on the verge of a default.

“This is not only completely false but also belie the facts. SBP forex reserves have been increasing and are almost U.S. $1 billion higher than four weeks ago, despite making all external due payments on time,” Dar tweeted Thursday.

“Our negotiations with IMF are about to conclude and we expect to sign staff level agreement with IMF by next week. All economic indicators are slowly moving in the right direction,” Dar asserted. He added that foreign commercial banks had started extending facilities to Pakistan.

China, a longtime ally of Pakistan, is the only country that has helped Islamabad get a $700 million loan facility from the China Development Bank last month.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva, while speaking at last month’s Munich Security Conference, urged Pakistan to collect more taxes from the wealthy and spend the money on the poor.

“Why should rich people benefit from subsidies when the country faces such a difficult task? Why should rich people and businesses not pay their taxes when the country has such tremendous challenges?” she asked while responding to a question about the delay in reaching a deal with Pakistan.

“In my view what is at stake is fairness in society and we will stand for this fairness, of course, very much hoping that we can get to a good point in moving the policy in Pakistan in the right direction,” Georgieva said. 

Pakistan has long been under fire for not imposing taxes on the wealthy in a country where less than 2% pay income taxes. The rest evade it either in collusion with tax authorities or by exploiting loopholes in the legal system, say financial experts. 

The World Food Program, in its latest assessment, has warned the ongoing economic crisis in Pakistan is “progressively deteriorating, with a depreciated currency, increased food and fuel prices and uncertainty over resuming a $6.5 billion funding package with the IMF.”

The statement added that flood-affected people “are resorting to negative coping strategies that include the sale of income-producing assets, taking on additional debt, withdrawing children from school, and skipping meals.”

Some information for this report came from Reuters.
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White-Collar Layoffs While Blue-Collar Worker Demand, Wages Rise

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Big Tech shed tens of thousands of jobs over the past several months as giants Google, Amazon, Meta and Microsoft have reduced their workforces. But while white-collar jobs are cut, some blue-collar jobs are difficult to fill despite the rising wages in that sector of the economy. Keith Kocinski has more.
Camera: Keith Kocinski, Rendy Wicaksana
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Внаслідок обстрілу російськими військами Сумщини пошкоджено лінію електропередач – ОВА

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Внаслідок обстрілу російськими військами Сумської області у середу ввечері пошкоджено лінію електропередач, повідомила обласна військова адміністрація.

«Ворог здійснив артилерійський обстріл, попередньо 152 мм снарядами, на ділянках місцевості Сумського району. В результаті обстрілу було пошкоджено лінію електропередач. Тож у прикордонних населених пунктах на деякий час можливі перебої з електропостачанням», – йдеться в повідомленні.

За попередньою інформацією ОВА, постраждалих немає.

Ввечері 1 березня Сумська ОВА повідомляла, що звуки вибухів, які могли почути жителі Сум, – це відлуння обстрілів прикордоння з важкої артилерії.

Останнім часом російська армія систематично обстрілює прикордоння.
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«Укренерго»: дефіциту потужності немає вже 18 днів і поки не прогнозується

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В «Укренерго» згадали, що за 4,5 місяці, за даними прокуратури, 255 ракет і дронів влучили по енергетичній інфраструктурі, з них 214 – по об’єктах високовольтної мережі НЕК
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Українською залізницею з початку вторгнення РФ скористалися 300 іноземних делегацій – УЗ

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Першими, «хто ризикнув поїхати в Україну залізницею» всього лиш через три тижні після початку вторгнення, були прем’єр-міністри Польщі, Чехії та Словенії
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Top Lawmakers Briefed on Trump, Biden, Pence Documents

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Top lawmakers in Congress were briefed Tuesday on the investigations into classified documents found in the private possession of President Joe Biden, former President Donald Trump and former Vice President Mike Pence. 

U.S. Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines was among the officials who met privately with congressional leaders for roughly an hour. Attending the briefing were the House and Senate leaders of both parties and the leaders of both intelligence committees, who comprise what’s known as the “Gang of Eight.” Lawmakers leaving the briefing declined to specify what was discussed. 

Both Republicans and Democrats have long demanded more information from the Biden administration about the successive discoveries of classified documents in the homes of two presidents and a vice president. The U.S. strictly controls who has access to classified material and how they can view it. 

Leaders of the intelligence committees have expressed concerns about the possible exposure of highly classified secrets in those documents. 

“We still have considerable work to do, oversight work to do, to satisfy ourselves that absolutely everything is being done to protect sources and methods,” Democratic Representative Jim Himes, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, said in an interview. 

The chairman and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee issued a joint statement that also called for more information about any potential damage. 

“While today’s meeting helped shed some light on these issues, it left much to be desired, and we will continue to press for full answers to our questions in accordance with our constitutional oversight obligations,” Senators Mark Warner and Marco Rubio said. 

The Justice Department and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence have declined to share details of their investigations. Attorney General Merrick Garland has directed separate special counsels to review the documents linked to Trump and Biden. 

Federal agents searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in August after developing evidence that led them to believe that Trump and his representatives had not returned all classified files. The Justice Department has said in court filings that roughly 300 documents with classified markings, including at the top-secret level, have been recovered from Mar-a-Lago after being taken there after Trump left the White House. 

Biden’s lawyers have said they discovered a “small number” of classified documents in November after searching a locked closet at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement. A second batch of documents — again described by Biden’s lawyers as a “small number” — were found in a storage space in Biden’s garage near Wilmington, Delaware, along with six pages located in Biden’s personal library in his home. 

FBI agents in January found six additional items that contained documents with classified markings and also took possession of some of Biden’s handwritten notes, according to Biden’s lawyers. 

Pence’s lawyers have also said they found a “small number of documents” in his Indiana home that appeared to have been inadvertently taken there at the conclusion of his vice presidency. Federal agents found an additional classified document during a voluntary search. 

Underscoring the political and legal sensitivities for Biden, the White House issued a statement saying the Justice Department and the director of national intelligence decided on their own to brief Congress and what information to share. 

“The White House has confidence in DOJ and ODNI to exercise independent judgment about whether or when it may be appropriate for national security reasons to offer briefings on any relevant information in these investigations,” said spokesperson Ian Sams. 
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China Said to Ask Domestic Firms to Shun Big Four Accountants

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In a possible sign that the so-called “decoupling” of the U.S. and Chinese economies is continuing, a recent media report said that the Chinese government has urged large state-owned enterprises (SOEs) to cease using the world’s biggest global accounting firms to audit their onshore businesses.

The report, published last week by Bloomberg, cites people familiar with communications between the Chinese Ministry of Finance and large SOEs, in which the ministry encouraged the companies to allow their existing contracts with Western firms to lapse when they expire, and to replace them with accounting firms from mainland China or Hong Kong.

According to the report, the Chinese government’s focus is on the so-called “Big Four” accounting firms, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), Ernst & Young, KPMG and Deloitte. All four firms have headquarters in London but are instrumental in helping many global companies comply with the audit requirements U.S. authorities require of public firms with shares listed on U.S. stock exchanges.

There has long been tension between the Chinese government, which highly values the security of information held by its large companies, and Western financial services regulators, who prize the kind of transparency that allows investors to make informed decisions about companies seeking to raise money in the capital markets.

Chinese authorities have, for years, been trying to strike a balance between the protection of Chinese firms’ information and the access to international investment capital that comes with exposure on stock markets like those in the U.S.

China disputes report

The Chinese government, through the state-controlled publication the Global Times, has disputed the Bloomberg report. A recent news story in the Global Times said that Big Four firms “have won bids to provide accounting services to China’s state-owned enterprises in recent days.”

The Global Times cited a decision in February by state-run insurance firm China Taiping to hire PwC to provide its audits from 2023-2027, and another recent decision by Liaoshen Bank, closely connected to the state-owned Liaoning Financial Holding Group, to hire KPMG. Neither report could be independently verified.

The Global Times article, published under a “GT Staff reporters” byline, did not quote any government officials by name.

A request for comment emailed by VOA to the Chinese Embassy in Washington was not answered in time for publication.

An uneven pattern

In recent years, Beijing has taken a number of measures to curtail the outside world’s access to information about Chinese companies.

Last year, citing concerns about potential privacy violations, the Chinese Communist Party forced several firms to give up their listings on U.S.-based stock exchanges, and blocked the efforts of others to list in the U.S.

At the same time, the Communist Party has, at times, seemed willing to cooperate with Western regulators. Last year, Beijing struck a deal that provided U.S. regulators with data on Chinese firms, eliminating the possibility that several would have been forced off of U.S. stock exchanges.

Report comes amid tension

The Bloomberg report was published at a low point in relations between the U.S. and China. Early this month, the U.S. shot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon after it traversed most of the continental U.S. The presence of the balloon led Secretary of State Antony Blinken to cancel a trip to China that was seen as the beginning of an effort to restore dialogue.

Since then, U.S. and Chinese officials have had conversations at international gatherings, but those interactions were marked by U.S. warnings that China should avoid providing arms to Russia to support its invasion of Ukraine or risk serious consequences.

The House of Representatives Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party was scheduled on Tuesday evening to hold a prime-time hearing entitled “The Chinese Communist Party’s Threat to America.” The hearing is expected to be the first in a long series of high-profile public forums in which members of Congress dig into perceived threats from China.

Data security concerns

Also on Tuesday, media reports revealed that the White House Office of Management and Budget had given all federal agencies 30 days to ensure that the Chinese social media app TikTok is removed from all electronic devices owned by the federal government.

As minor as it might seem on its face, the TikTok ban is actually a mirror image of some of the concerns driving China’s suspicion of Western auditing firms. The concern on the part of the White House is that ByteDance, the firm that owns TikTok, is collecting personal information about the app’s users, and making it available to the Chinese government.

U.S. officials frequently point to a Chinese law that obligates companies to assist state intelligence services in their investigations.

Experts dubious

Some experts told VOA they were not convinced of the validity of the Chinese government’s fears about data security, especially because Western accounting firms are legally bound to protect the privacy of client data that is not part of publicly released reports.

“It’s an excuse. No other government or country has this problem,” said James Lewis, director of the Strategic Technologies Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington. “Beijing is paranoid about controlling the economic narrative and worries that the audits might give access to information about the problems of the SOEs that they regard as sensitive.”

Lewis added in an interview, “This is another part of China’s decision to separate itself from the global market and force other countries to accept China’s rules.”

Impact on business may be small

Derek Scissors, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told VOA that if the Bloomberg report is correct, and the Chinese government’s request went to state-owned enterprises only, the impact on foreign investment in Chinese firms might not be significant.

“Most foreign investment does not involve state-owned enterprises,” Scissors said. “If this is the only step taken, it will not have a big effect. If other firms are urged to drop foreign auditors, that could frighten investors.”

Scissors also said that the request would not necessarily cut off Chinese state firms from overseas listings.

“They can use foreign auditors just for [initial public offerings] if they ever want to list units overseas,” he said.

Rong Shi of VOA’s Mandarin Service contributed to this report.
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Chicago Mayor Lightfoot Taking On 8 Rivals in Reelection Bid 

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Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot is fighting for reelection Tuesday after a history-making but tumultuous four years in office and a bruising campaign threaten to make her the city’s first one-term mayor in decades.

Lightfoot in 2019 became the first Black woman and first openly gay mayor of the third-largest U.S. city, and only the second woman to hold the office. But Lightfoot, a former prosecutor and head of a city police review board, now faces serious challenges from multiple candidates, who have hammered her over crime that spiked during the COVID-19 pandemic and a leadership style they say is unnecessarily combative.

With none of the nine candidates likely to receive over 50% of the vote, the race is expected to move to an April runoff between the top two vote-getters. Lightfoot may not be among them.

Lightfoot has touted her record of investing in neighborhoods and supporting workers, such as by increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour. She also notes that the city has navigated unprecedented challenges such as the pandemic and its economic and public safety fallout to protests over policing.

“The world is very different than it was four years ago. I believe that I’m still the right person and I think the voters will validate that, but we’ve been through a lot,” Lightfoot said after a rally on the city’s west side during the final days before the election. “We can’t go back.”

Lightfoot’s top rivals include Paul Vallas, who has run as the law-and-order candidate with support from the city’s police union and promises to put hundreds more officers on the streets, and U.S. Rep. Jesus “Chuy” Garcia, who forced then-Mayor Rahm Emanuel to a runoff in 2015. Brandon Johnson is endorsed by the Chicago Teachers Union, a group that has tangled with Lightfoot, including during an 11-day teachers strike in her first year in office.

If Lightfoot loses on Tuesday, she would be one of the few big-city mayors in recent history to lose their reelection bid. That’s particularly true in the first round of voting, when incumbents generally enjoy an advantage.

‘This election is different’

But this election is very different, said Constance Mixon, a lifelong Chicago resident and political science professor at Elmhurst University. Of the 10 largest U.S. cities, Chicago is the only place without mayoral term limits, which may make voters in other cities more willing to give an incumbent one more term, Mixon said. 

Lightfoot also is the first mayor of a major U.S. city to face reelection following the pandemic, recession and the crime wave that’s occurred in many places, she said.

“I suspect that other mayors — and we’ve got a handful of them that are up this year, but after Lightfoot — are going to face many of the same challenges as Lightfoot,” she said.

Race also is a factor as candidates court votes in the highly segregated city, which is closely divided in population among Black, Hispanic and white residents. Lightfoot, Johnson and five other candidates are Black, though Lightfoot — who is hoping strong support from Black voters will help propel her to victory — has argued that she is the only Black candidate who can win. Garcia, the only Latino in the race, would be Chicago’s first Hispanic mayor, while Vallas is the only white candidate in the field.

Lightfoot has accused Vallas of using “the ultimate dog whistle” by saying his campaign is about “taking back our city,” and of cozying up to the president of the Fraternal Order of Police, whom she calls a racist. A recent Chicago Tribune story also found Vallas’ Twitter account had liked racist tweets and tweets that mocked Lightfoot’s appearance and referred to her as masculine.

Vallas denied his comments were related to race and says his police union endorsement is from rank-and-file officers. He also said he wasn’t responsible for the liked tweets, which he called “abhorrent,” and suggested someone had improperly accessed his account.

But Lightfoot and some of her supporters see some of the criticism of her leadership as motivated by racism, sexism and anti-gay sentiment.

“No other mayor has been asked to change this city within four years,” said city Treasurer Melissa Conyears-Ervin, who is Black, and noted that white mayors like Emanuel and Richard Daley served multiple terms. “When we get in the game, the rules change.”

At a weekend campaign stop, Vallas said he is focused on things like public safety, Chicago’s “demoralized” police department and the number of residents “fleeing” the city’s school district.

“It’s all a product of bad leadership,” Vallas said.

A former city budget director who also led school systems in Chicago, New Orleans and Philadelphia, Vallas lost a 2019 bid for mayor. This time, he has been laser-focused on public safety, saying police officers who left the force under Lightfoot’s administration will return if he’s elected.

It seems to have resonated with voters, such as Antwoin Jackson, who are concerned about an uptick in crime. Jackson said he supported Lightfoot four years ago but cast his ballot for Vallas in Tuesday’s election because he said Lightfoot “did not hold control over the violence in the communities.” Jackson said he feels particularly unsafe when riding public transit.

Johnson, who lives in one of Chicago’s most violent neighborhoods, says more needs to be done to provide affordable housing and social services such as mental health care.

Garcia, a former City Council member, state lawmaker and county commissioner, has called Lightfoot too combative and says he has a record of bringing people together.

The other candidates are businessman Willie Wilson, Chicago City Council members Sophia King and Roderick Sawyer, activist Ja’Mal Green and state Rep. Kambium “Kam” Buckner. 
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