Статті

Darnella Frazier, the teenager who videoed George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis last year, said Wednesday that a man killed during a high-speed police chase in the city early Tuesday was her uncle.Police confirmed that the man, Leneal Lamont Frazier, was not involved in the chase.”Minneapolis police has cost my whole family a big loss … today has been a day full of heartbreak and sadness,” Frazier posted on her Facebook page. According to police, a squad car collided with two other vehicles during a high-speed pursuit of a driver linked to a carjacking and multiple robberies.Police confirmed Wednesday that the driver of one of those vehicles was taken to a hospital, where he later died, but they have not released the name of the victim, The Associated Press reported.”Another black man lost his life in the hands of the police!” Frazier wrote.Frazier was given a Pulitzer Prize special citation last month for capturing the murder of Floyd on video. She testified earlier this year in the murder trial of former Officer Derek Chauvin, who was found guilty of murdering Floyd after he kneeled on his neck for over nine minutes last year.”When I look at George Floyd, I look at my dad. I look at my brothers, I look at my cousins, my uncles, because they are all Black. I look at how that could have been one of them,” she told the jury at the time.Floyd’s murder sparked global protests over racial injustice and police brutality. Locally, the Minneapolis Police Department has come under intense scrutiny, with calls to defund the police seriously considered by the city’s government over the past year.The Associated Press contributed to this report.
…

A U.N. investigator accuses Belarusian authorities of enforcing a policy of repression aimed at purging its society of what the country’s leadership describes as undesirable, dissident elements.   The U.N. special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Belarus has submitted her report to the U.N. Human Rights Council.  U.N. investigator Anais Marin has issued a blistering attack against the brutal methods employed by the government of President Alexander Lukashenko to keep its population in line.  She says Belarus has suffered an unprecedented human rights crisis since the August 9 presidential election, widely viewed as fraudulent.    Over the past year, she notes more than 35,000 people have been arbitrarily detained for exercising their right to freedom of peaceful assembly or in support of victims of abuse.  Marin accuses the Belarusian authorities of launching a full-scale assault against civil society.  “Thousands of people are undergoing violence, beatings, humiliation and intimidation from the police.  I have been told of a systematic use of torture or other forms of degrading or inhuman treatment directed against people in detention,” she said.Marin says the government’s violent crackdown on civil society and the fear of reprisals have driven tens of thousands of people to seek safety abroad.  However, she adds opponents no longer feel safe anywhere.  This, since Belarus forced a civilian airplane to land in the capital, Minsk, on May 23 for the sole purpose of arresting a dissident aboard.FILE – In this May 23, 2021, photo, a Ryanair jet that carried opposition figure Raman Pratasevich was diverted to Minsk, Belarus, after a bomb threat.“This incident, which shocked the international community highlights the desire of the authorities to put an end to any form of dissidence,” she said.  “Purging society of those elements which it considers to be undesirable.  And I am deliberately using the word purge… It is a form of purge reminding us of those which totalitarian regimes practice.”    FILE – Belarusian blogger Raman Pratasevich is said to be seen in a pre-trial detention facility in Minsk, Belarus May 24, 2021, in this still image taken from video. (Telegram@Zheltyeslivy/Reuters TV)Polish Ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva Zbignew Czech delivered a joint statement on behalf of 46 states.  He condemned the forced diversion and landing of the Ryanair jet and the arrest of journalist Raman Pratasevich and his partner, Sofia Sapega by Belarusian authorities. “This act apparently endangering the lives of passengers and crew was an attack on human rights and an affront to international norms,” he said. “We deplore the ongoing and systematic repression of the Belarusian people… We stand in solidarity with the imprisoned journalists and of all the Belarusian political prisoners reaching 500.”On behalf of the 46 states, Czech called on Belarus to immediately and unconditionally release Pratasevich and his partner and all those unjustly detained.   Belarus boycotted the meeting so was not present to take the floor as a concerned country. 
…

A press watchdog group, Reporters Without Borders, named 37 world leaders Monday as media “predators” who “crack down massively” on press freedom, including for the first time a Western European leader, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.The Paris-based group, in its first such list in five years, included two women, Sheikh Hasina, Bangladesh’s prime minister since 2009, and Carrie Lam, chief executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region since 2017.Reporters Without Borders said the “most notable” name on the new list “is undoubtedly Saudi Arabia’s 35-year-old crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, who is the center of all power in his hands and heads a monarchy that tolerates no press freedom. His repressive methods include spying and threats that have sometimes led to abduction, torture and other unthinkable acts. [Journalist] Jamal Khashoggi’s horrific murder exposed a predatory method that is simply barbaric.”The group said the officials it cited all “trample on press freedom by creating a censorship apparatus, jailing journalists arbitrarily or inciting violence against them, when they don’t have blood on their hands because they have directly or indirectly pushed for journalists to be murdered.”The group said Orban “has steadily and effectively undermined media pluralism and independence since being returned to power in 2010” by using “varied predatory techniques.”  “The methods may be subtle or brazen, but they are always efficient,” the report said. The watchdog group said oligarchs close to Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party controls more than 80% of the media in the country, while private media is discriminated against and characterized as publishing “fake news.”Hungarian government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs assailed the report and said the watchdog should be called “Fake News Without Borders.”Reporters Without Borders said Hasina’s “predatory exploits” in Bangladesh included “the adoption of a digital security law in 2018 that has led to more than 70 journalists and bloggers being prosecuted.”It said Lam “has proved to be the puppet of Chinese President Xi Jinping, and now openly supports his predatory policies towards the media.” The watchdog condemned the recent closing of Hong Kong’s leading independent newspaper, Apple Daily, and the jailing of its founder, Jimmy Lai.Christophe Deloire, the watchdog’s secretary-general, urged world governments to disavow the attacks on media by the 37 leaders it cited.”We must not let their methods become the new normal,” he said.This report includes information from the Associated Press.
 
…

At his first large event since his inauguration, President Joe Biden hosted a party at the White House in honor of the Fourth of July holiday Sunday.
 
“America is coming back together,” Biden said.
 
“Today, we’re closer than ever to declaring our independence from a deadly virus.”
 
The White House was open to hundreds of invited guests Sunday, serving up hamburgers and other dishes.
 
Among the guests were essential workers who helped with the response to the COVID-19 pandemic as well as military families.
In his remarks to his guests Sunday, Biden encouraged those who have not yet been vaccinated against the coronavirus to do so.
 
“My fellow Americans – it’s the most patriotic thing you can do,” he said.Attendees listen as President Joe Biden speaks during an Independence Day celebration on the South Lawn of the White House, in Washington, July 4, 2021.The administration had set a goal of having 70% of American adults vaccinated by the holiday. The nation got close: about 67% have had at least one shot.
 
Sunday also marked one of the first times that fencing, which had been erected around the White House during the anti-police violence protests in 2020 and in the wake of the January 6th assault on the Capitol, was removed. Visitors can now walk up to the North Lawn fence in front of the White House.  
 
Though the event is the largest since Biden took office in January, the crowds are much smaller than White House Independence Day events in previous years.  
 
With fireworks and gatherings, Americans celebrated their country’s 245th Independence Day this year with a sense of renewal as new cases of COVID-19 continued to drop but also with the reminder that more than 600,000 in the U.S. — the most of any country — have died of the disease.
 Some information for this report came from Reuters. 
…

As the last U.S. forces are withdrawn from Afghanistan after nearly 20 years of fighting, the American commander says he is worried about the territorial advance of Taliban insurgents attempting to take back control of the country. U.S. Army Gen. Scott Miller, in an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC’s “This Week” show, said the Taliban is “gaining strength.” “We should be concerned,” he said. “The loss of terrain is concerning.” For the Afghans trying to maintain control, he said, “Hope matters. Morale matters.” “I don’t like leaving friends in need,” Miller said as he oversaw the last U.S. troops leaving the mammoth Bagram Airfield this past week. “You look at the security situation and it’s not good.” he said. “The Taliban is on the move.” The Taliban have captured more 100 districts since early May. U.S. President Joe Biden ordered the U.S. troop withdrawal, a position also favored by former President Donald Trump before he left office in January. In April, Biden announced, “It is time to end the forever war” in Afghanistan, saying that the United States had accomplished its stated goal of denying terrorists a haven in the country. The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in 2001 to combat al-Qaida terrorists who had been training there in advance of their September 11 attacks on New York and the Pentagon outside Washington that killed nearly 3,000 people. Miller said there were “judgments” that had to be made about the withdrawal. He said there were U.S. victories in the Afghan fighting, even as 2,300 U.S. troops were killed over two decades. But he also said, “The amount of self-reflection [about the U.S. military performance in Afghanistan] will be important.” 
…

Ukrainian authorities found themselves buried in controversy Friday after official pictures showed women soldiers practicing for a parade in heels.Ukraine is preparing to stage a military parade next month to mark 30 years of independence following the Soviet Union’s breakup, and the defense ministry released photographs of fatigue-clad women soldiers marching in mid-heel black pumps.”Today, for the first time, training takes place in heeled shoes,” cadet Ivanna Medvid was quoted as saying by the defense ministry’s information site ArmiaInform.”It is slightly harder than in army boots, but we are trying,” Medvid added in comments released on Thursday.The choice of footwear sparked a torrent of criticism on social media and in parliament, and led to accusations that women soldiers had been sexualized.”The story of a parade in heels is a real disgrace,” commentator Vitaly Portnikov said on Facebook, arguing that some Ukrainian officials had a “medieval” mindset.Another commentator, Maria Shapranova, accused the defense ministry of “sexism and misogyny.””High heels is a mockery of women imposed by the beauty industry,” she fumed.Several Ukrainian lawmakers close to Ukraine’s former president Petro Poroshenko showed up in parliament with pairs of shoes and encouraged the defense minister to wear high heels to the parade.”It is hard to imagine a more idiotic, harmful idea,” said Inna Sovsun, a member of the Golos party, pointing to health risks.She also said that Ukraine’s women soldiers — like men — were risking their lives and “do not deserve to be mocked”.Ukraine has been battling Russian-backed separatists in the country’s industrial east, in a conflict that has killed more than 13,000 people since 2014.Olena Kondratyuk, deputy speaker of the legislature said authorities should publicly apologize for “humiliating” women and conduct an enquiry. Kondratyuk said that more than 13,500 women had fought in the current conflict.More than 31,000 women now serve in the Ukrainian armed forces, including more than 4,000 of whom are officers.
…

The World Health Organization is calling for urgent action to stem the rapid spread of COVID-19 across Africa, which is being fueled by a surge of more contagious variants of the disease. Latest reports say COVID-19 cases in Africa have been rising by 25% every week for the past six weeks, bringing reported cases there to more than 5.4 million, including 141,000 deaths.WHO regional director for Africa, Matshidiso Moeti, warns the rampant spread of the more contagious alpha, beta, and delta variants is raising the pandemic threat across the continent to a new level.”The speed and scale of Africa’s third wave is like nothing we have seen before,” said Moeti. “Cases are doubling every three weeks, compared to every four weeks at the start of the second wave.  Almost 202,000 cases were reported in the past week and the continent is on the verge of exceeding its worst week ever in this pandemic.”   In the same period, WHO reports deaths have risen by 15% across 38 African countries to nearly 3,000.  The jump is largely due to the highly transmissible coronavirus variants, which have spread to dozens of countries.  The most contagious delta variant has been found in 16 countries.  It reportedly has become the dominant strain in South Africa.Moeti says more people are falling ill and requiring hospitalization, even people younger than 45 years.  She says evidence is growing that the delta variant is causing longer and more severe illness.With Africa’s lack of life-saving vaccines, Moeti says it is important for people to practice public health measures, such as wearing masks, social distancing, and frequent handwashing to prevent the disease from spreading.”With WHO’s guidance, countries are taking action to curb the rise in cases,” said Moeti. “All countries in resurgence in the region have put limits on people gathering to help with physical distancing. …They are using nuanced, risk-based approaches, informed by the local epidemiology, in an effort to avoid nationwide lockdowns that we know cause great harm to livelihoods, particularly for low-income households.”   Vaccines are proving highly effective against the COVID-19 variants and in ending devastating surges of severe cases of the disease. They are widely available in the world’s richest countries, but not Africa.Moeti is urgently appealing to countries to share their excess doses to help plug the continent’s vaccine gap, saying Africa must not be left languishing in the throes of its worst wave yet.
…

New York Democratic voters continued to fret Thursday after a massive error in the tallying of votes for the mayoral primary election Tuesday cast doubt on the city’s election process.The first results released by the city’s Board of Elections, which showed candidate and Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams with a healthy lead, mistakenly included 135,000 test ballots.The board quickly deleted the tally and posted results Wednesday showing Adams with a much slimmer lead over former Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia.Final results could be weeks away as 125,000 absentee ballots still need to be counted.This is the first time the city has used ranked-choice voting, in which a candidate must garner 50% or more of the vote in the first round to win. Voters rank up to five candidates. Those with the fewest votes are eliminated, and their votes are then given to surviving candidates based on ranking until the candidate with half of the vote or more is declared the winner.”Yesterday’s ranked-choice voting reporting error was unacceptable, and we apologize to the voters and to the campaigns for the confusion,” Board of Elections President Frederic Umane and Board of Elections Secretary Miguelina Camilo said in a statement. “Let us be clear: (ranked-choice voting) was not the problem, rather a human error that could have been avoided. We have implemented another layer of review and quality control before publishing information going forward.”New York City Mayor Bill De Blasio called the city’s election system “broken,” while his predecessor, Michael Bloomberg, characterized the Board of Elections as “worse than the gang that couldn’t shoot straight.”The Associated Press reported that the latest problem with New York City’s elections is just another in a long line of mishaps that includes names wrongly removed from voter rolls, long lines at polling stations and other equipment breakdowns.“It’s mishap after mishap after mishap,” said Assemblywoman Nily Rozic, according to AP.  “No other government entity could have such a dismal track record and face absolutely no accountability.”Some information in this report came from The Associated Press.
…

American comedian Bill Cosby issued his first statement Wednesday after being freed from prison by the state of Pennsylvania Supreme Court, saying he has never changed his story and has always maintained his innocence.  On his Twitter account, Cosby went on to say, “Thank you to all my fans, supporters and friends who stood by me through this ordeal. Special thanks to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court for upholding the rule of law.” In 2018, Cosby received a sentence of three to 10 years based on testimony he gave in 2005 in a civil lawsuit brought against him by Andrea Constand, who accused him of sexual assault after he gave her a sedative without her knowledge, leaving her incapacitated. The state high court ruled Wednesday that the testimony he gave should have never been heard because a previous district attorney had promised he wouldn’t be charged if he gave it.  The 83-year-old Cosby returned to his Philadelphia-area home Wednesday hours after the court threw out his conviction. Constand’s accusation was one of dozens leveled against the popular entertainer, many of them going back decades. His conviction was one of the first in the so-called “Me Too” era, which saw scores of women coming forward to accuse powerful men in entertainment, media and politics of sexual assault and related crimes.    Constand and her lawyers issued a statement Wednesday calling the ruling disappointing, and expressed fear that it could discourage sexual assault victims from coming forward. The Associated Press news service and the Reuters news agency contributed to this report.  
…

The decision by Myanmar’s junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to visit Russia before next-door neighbor China highlights his military’s easier relations with Moscow and hopes of drawing the Kremlin closer to avoid relying on Beijing alone, analysts say. Min Aung Hlaing visited Russia last week for a three-day international security conference.   China and Russia have been the junta’s most powerful allies since the military, or Tatmadaw, toppled Myanmar’s democratically elected government four months ago. Amid international rebuke of the military’s bloody crackdown on peaceful protests, Beijing and Moscow have blocked efforts in the United Nations Security Council to pressure the junta to back down. The two are also Myanmar’s main arms suppliers.   As a neighbor, China has the far older, deeper and intricate ties to Myanmar. It is the country’s top trade partner and a major investor. Myanmar also figures large in Beijing’s sprawling Belt and Road Initiative, offering China a new route to the Indian Ocean and vital oil and gas supplies in the Middle East.   Instead of making Beijing his first stop outside of Southeast Asia since the coup, though, Min Aung Hlaing headed to Moscow on June 20 for the security conference. The visit included meetings with Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev.   Those who watch Myanmar closely were not surprised by the choice.   “Moscow’s support for the new regime has been unequivocal and the junta chief was assured of a warm welcome from a major international power and the opportunity to discuss expanding military and economic cooperation,” said Anthony Davis, a Bangkok-based security analyst with Janes defense publications.   “The relationship with China has been far testier given Beijing’s dissatisfaction over the chaos triggered by the coup, and longstanding Tatmadaw suspicion over Chinese goals and support for certain ethnic insurgent groups,” he said.   Foul weather friend Smuggling, gambling operations and weapons flows between southern China and northeast Myanmar have been helping prop up ethnic minority rebel armies fighting the Tatmadaw for autonomy along the border for decades, a major thorn in the military’s side. Last year Min Aung Hlaing openly complained about a “foreign country” backing some of the rebels.   “Though he did not mention the name of this country, it was automatically known that he referred to China,” said Ye Myo Hein, who heads the Tagaung Institute for Political Studies, a Myanmar think tank.   He noted too that Min Aung Hlaing was speaking to Russian state media on a trip to Russia.   FILE – Commander-in-Chief of Myanmar’s armed forces, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing delivers his speech at the IX Moscow conference on international security in Moscow, June 23, 2021. (AP Photo/Alexander Zemlianichenko, Pool)As both a neighbor and big investor, China is also far more worried than Russia about the violence and economic nosedive the February 1 coup has sparked or inflamed, he added. Financial forecasters say Myanmar’s gross domestic product may plummet by as much as 20% this year. Assassinations and bomb attacks targeting government administrators and facilities are tearing through the country, while long-dormant standoffs between the Tatmadaw and some rebel armies have flared up.   Ye Myo Hein said Min Aung Hlaing traveled to Russia before China to avoid the added pressure that would come with a trip to Beijing to stick to a five-point plan for saving Myanmar from collapse drawn up by the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.   “He knows China will not give blank check support, which the coup leaders will not be happy about. China has a great deal of concern with instability and the spillover effects in neighboring countries. That’s why it is pushing the five-point consensus from ASEAN, but the junta has not been ready to follow it,” he said.   Min Aung Hlaing reportedly agreed to the plan during a special meeting of the bloc in Jakarta in April, including an immediate end to violence and negotiations with “all parties concerned,” but has shown no sign of following though since then.   Balancing Beijing Davis said Russia also offers Myanmar “a critical great-power counterbalance to the sort of over-reliance on Beijing seen in the 1990s.”   Min Aung Hlaing’s decision to attend the security conference in Moscow rather than send a representative may signal his interest to draw Russia even closer, said Moe Thuzar, a Myanmar analyst at Singapore’s Institute of Southeast Asian Studies.   “So the decision to make Russia the destination of his first visit out of the region would be motivated by Min Aung Hlaing’s interest to seek more legitimacy and more strategic support, and present that balancing and diversification element to existing relations with China,” she said.   To date, Russia has filled that role largely as an arms supplier, and an ever more important one. The Tatmadaw has bought more military hardware from China over its history. In the past two decades, though, it has sourced nearly as much from Russia as from China, according to data collected by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.   The same data show the Tatmadaw lately turning to Russia mainly for airpower, from surface-to-air missiles to helicopters and fighter jets. Davis said Russian hardware’s superior quality and competitive prices make them a better deal than their Chinese alternatives, and that the Tatmadaw’s possible purchase of more planes and armored vehicles — and interest in Kilo-class submarines — could soon make Russia Myanmar’s top arms supplier. Whether that happens will depend in large part on how much the junta can afford as the economy tumbles, he added.   Those financial woes are also why Min Aung Hlaing wants to move relations with Russia beyond the military-to-military level they are mostly at now, said Ye Myo Hein.   With Western governments imposing targeted sanctions and foreign companies holding off on new deals, he said the junta “urgently needs more investment as the economy is tremendously going down. Currently there will be investment only from China, and I think the junta is trying to invite more investments from other countries,” Russia included.   Value systems Ye Myo Hein said the junta will entice Russia with the promise of more weapons sales and may even offer up Myanmar’s ports for calls from Russia’s navy on any forays it makes into the Indian Ocean.   Ian Storey, another analyst at the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, said Russia would like to expand its presence in the ocean, having forged close security ties with India but has few friendly ports along the way from Vladivostok on Russia’s east coast. He said a reliable stop in Myanmar would help but added the limited number of warships in the Russian navy’s Western Pacific fleet would keep those trips modest “for the foreseeable future.”   The Russian navy may send the odd ship or two into the Indian Ocean using Myanmar as a stepping stone, but not in any numbers to shift the balance of power there, said Eugene Rumer, a Russia expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington.   He said Russia’s naval ambitions will remain elsewhere, including the north Atlantic and northeast Pacific.   Rumer said Moscow will seek some business concessions for the diplomatic cover it gives Myanmar’s junta but, like others, he does not expect Russia to prove the economic lifeline the junta may be looking for.   Analysts say that role will continue to go mainly to China.   What the junta does also offer Russia is another chance to chip away at the West’s push for an international relations regime based on democratic values, said Rumer. By coming to the aid of pariah states from Venezuela to Zimbabwe, and now Myanmar, he said Moscow hopes to advance a regime void of those values, much in line with Beijing.   “It undercuts U.S. insistence on values as being a major aspect of our foreign policy,” he said. “The flip side of it is that it helps show that the United States is not omnipotent; it brings it down a peg or two. And it brings Russia and China closer together, something that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin has made part of his foreign policy priorities.”  
…

The drought-plagued city of Los Angeles announced that a fireworks buyback program would be held Wednesday ahead of the U.S. July 4 holiday, hoping to rein in the explosives’ illegal use in a setup similar to gun buyback programs.
 
The initiative will make it possible to anonymously hand in fireworks — whose sale and use are banned in the city — to the police in exchange for baseball tickets and other gifts.
 
The majority of California is under extreme drought conditions, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, creating parched vegetation and conditions ripe for wildfires.
 
“Last year with the pandemic and the necessity of canceling public-sanctioned fireworks shows, we saw a 72% increase in calls” concerning illegal fireworks, Los Angeles Police Department chief Michel Moore said.
 
In total, more than 6,000 calls were received, and more than four tons of fireworks were seized, he said.
 
The buyback program is targeting the San Fernando Valley, north of Los Angeles, in particular, an arid area susceptible to fires.
 
In addition to increased risk of fire and injury, fireworks launched by individuals also aggravate air pollution. According to air quality control authorities, the concentration of fine particles in the air on the night on July 4, 2020, was 70% higher than in previous years.
 
Moore warned that police would act against retailers and manufacturers who sell the products illegally.
 
Last week, the Los Angeles city attorney ordered major internet platforms, including Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist, to remove posts selling fireworks within Los Angeles or face legal action.
 
The city of Pomona, east of Los Angeles, is offering a $500 reward for information leading to the arrest of people selling or storing fireworks illegally.
 
In neighboring Ontario, two people died last March when a large stock of fireworks exploded in the house they were in.
…

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un says a “grave incident” has threatened his country’s coronavirus prevention efforts — a rare admission by Pyongyang, which claims to be free of COVID-19.During a Politburo meeting of the ruling Workers’ Party, Kim chastised senior officials for unspecified carelessness related to the coronavirus pandemic, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Wednesday.The officials “have caused a grave incident that poses a huge crisis to the safety of the nation and its people,” KCNA said. The report provided no details about the “grave incident” or how it posed a threat.  FILE – A station employee checks the temperature of a passenger to help prevent the spread of COVID-19, in Pyongyang, in this undated picture released from North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency on Aug. 29, 2020. (KCNA via KNS / AFP)North Korea continues to insist it has found zero cases of COVID-19, a nearly impossible claim that is widely disputed by global health experts.  It is not clear whether Wednesday’s admission of failure reflects any wider change in North Korea’s approach to the virus or if it was a pretext for other domestic plans. The KCNA report said that several senior officials were replaced during the Politburo meeting, though it did not say if the moves were related to the coronavirus incident. “The regime may … be using the incident as a way to engage in a small purge, getting rid of unwanted elements and underscoring Kim’s rule by fear,” said Mason Richey, a professor at South Korea’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies. “The public statement also provides a built-in excuse for future economic downturns.” Since January 2020, North Korea has closed its borders, restricted domestic travel and even cut off nearly all trade with its economic lifeline, China.  FILE – A health worker sprays disinfectant as part of preventative efforts against COVID-19, at the Okryu restaurant in Pyongyang, Oct. 21, 2020.Kim has repeatedly warned of a “prolonged” lockdown amid what he says is a worsening global pandemic. State media have warned vaccines produced overseas are no “panacea.”COVAX, the global vaccine-sharing program, had expected to send nearly 2 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to North Korea by the first half of this year. But that has been delayed in part because of ongoing negotiations between COVAX and Pyongyang. An outbreak in North Korea could be extremely dangerous because many parts of the country are impoverished and lack an adequate health care system.In a report last week, the World Health Organization said North Korea claimed it had conducted over 31,000 COVID-19 tests, all of which came back negative.Last July, North Korea seemed to briefly admit that COVID-19 might have entered its borders. State media blamed a North Korean “runaway” who had fled for South Korea but returned to the North.  North Korea said the man was “suspected to have been infected with the vicious virus” but later said his COVID-19 test results were “uncertain.” 
 
…

Owners of units in a Florida oceanfront condo building that collapsed with deadly consequences were just days away from a deadline to start making steep payments toward more than $9 million in major repairs that had been recommended nearly three years earlier. That cost estimate, from the Morabito Consultants engineering firm in 2018, meant owners at Champlain Towers South were facing payments of anywhere from $80,000 for a one-bedroom unit to $330,000 or so for a penthouse, to be paid all at once or in installments. Their first deadline was July 1. One resident whose apartment was spared, Adalberto Aguero, had just taken out a loan to cover his $80,000 bill.  “I figured I would pay it off after they fixed the building. I didn’t want to pay it off before because you never know,” said Aguero, adding that he pulled paperwork to make the installment payments a day after Thursday’s collapse. “I said cancel everything.” An itemized bill sent by the condo board in April to owners of the building’s 136 units showed that much of the planned work was in the pool area and the façade. Installing new pavers and waterproofing the pool deck and building entrance would cost $1.8 million, with another $1 million going to “structural repairs” and “planter landscaping,” according to a condo board email obtained by The Associated Press. A line item of “miscellaneous repairs” that included work on the garage was estimated to cost $280,000. Total costs assessed, including many items that appeared to be for aesthetic purpose: $15 million. In this image, released by the Miami-Dade Fire Department, rescuers search for survivors in the rubble of the Champlain Towers South building in Surfside, Florida, on June 25, 2021.Engineers and construction experts say the Morabito documents that focused just on the structural work make clear there were several major repairs that needed to be done as soon as possible. Other than some roof repairs, that work had not begun, officials said. The cost estimate emailed by Morabito Consultants to Surfside officials was among a series of documents released as rescue efforts continued at the site of the collapsed building, where more than 150 people remained unaccounted for. At least nine people were killed in the collapse, authorities said Sunday. Another 2018 Morabito report submitted to the city said waterproofing under the pool deck had failed and had been improperly laid flat instead of sloped, preventing water from draining off. “The failed waterproofing is causing major structural damage to the concrete structural slab below these areas. Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially,” the report said. The firm recommended that the damaged slabs be replaced in what would be a major repair. That came as news to Susana Alvarez, who lived on the 10th floor of the doomed tower and said a Surfside official assured residents in a 2018 meeting that there was no danger. It wasn’t clear who that official was. “The Town of Surfside told us the building was not in bad shape. That is what they said,” Alvarez said on National Public Radio’s Weekend Edition program. “No one ever told us that building was in such bad shape.” A daughter of Claudio Bonnefoy, a resident from Chile who is missing, said it appears that someone ignored key signals the building was in danger. “This is starting to make me angry because reports from years ago reporting serious structural damage to the building are little by little being known,” said the daughter, Pascale Bonnefoy. “It seems this was predictable because the technicians alerted [others about it] and nobody did anything.” The Morabito firm said in a statement that it was hired in June 2020 by Champlain Towers South to begin the 40-year recertification process required of all buildings in Miami-Dade County that reach that age. The Champlain building was constructed in 1981. “At the time of the building collapse, roof repairs were under way, but concrete restoration had not yet begun,” the statement said. An attorney for the Champlain Towers South condominium association, which was in charge of the repair work, did not immediately respond Sunday to an email seeking comment. Surfside officials also did not respond to an email seeking comment. A new batch of emails from building officials and condo board members that were made public Sunday has added to the mystery.  In one email, a Surfside official praised the building’s board for plans to start the 40-year recertification process early after attending a November 2018 meeting. “This particular building is not due to begin their forty year until 2021 but they have decided to start the process early which I wholeheartedly endorse and wish that this trend would catch on with other properties,” said Surfside Building Official Ross Prieto.  A few months later, a board member wrote to Prieto that workers next door were digging “too close to our property, and we have concerns regarding the structure of our building.” Prieto wrote back to monitor a nearby fence, the building’s pool and adjacent areas for damage. Surfside has hired Allyn Kilsheimer of KCE Structural Engineers to consult on the Champlain Towers disaster. Surfside officials say Kilsheimer has worked on numerous such cases, including the World Trade Center after the 9/11 attacks and the collapse of a pedestrian bridge at Florida International University. Stephanie Walkup, an engineering professor at Villanova University, said it will take time to pinpoint the cause — or series of causes — that brought down Champlain Towers South. “The ultimate cause of the collapse may have been related to design error, construction error, deterioration or other event,” Walkup said in an email. “We all want answers and engineers will want to learn from this collapse as we have others, but we want to make sure we have the right ones,” she added.  
…

The Biden administration’s $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure agreement on spending to rebuild roads, bridges and other projects faces a critical week that could determine the scope of U.S. infrastructure investment. Michelle Quinn reports.
…

Classified documents from Britain’s defense ministry containing details about a British warship and Russia’s potential reaction to its passage through the Black Sea have been found at a bus stop in southern England, the BBC reported on Sunday.The BBC said the documents, almost 50 pages in all, were found “in a soggy heap behind a bus stop in Kent early on Tuesday morning” by a member of the public, who wanted to remain anonymous.The Ministry of Defense said it had been informed last week of “an incident in which sensitive defense papers were recovered by a member of the public”. “The department takes the security of information extremely seriously and an investigation has been launched. The employee concerned reported the loss at the time. It would be inappropriate to comment further,” a spokesperson said. The BBC reported that the documents, which included emails and PowerPoint presentations, related to British warship Defender, which sailed through waters off the Crimean peninsula which Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014 last week.Russia said on Wednesday it had fired warning shots and dropped bombs in the path of the ship to chase it out of what the Kremlin says are its territorial waters but which Britain and most of the world say belong to Ukraine.It later summoned the British ambassador in Moscow for a formal diplomatic scolding over what it described as a provocation.Britain rejected Russia’s account of the incident. It said it believed any shots fired were a pre-announced Russian “gunnery exercise”, and that no bombs had been dropped.It confirmed the destroyer had sailed through what it said were Ukrainian waters, describing its path as “innocent passage” in accordance with international law of the sea.The BBC said the documents suggested the ship’s mission was conducted in the expectation that Russia might respond aggressively.”What do we understand about the possible ‘welcome party’…?” asked an official at Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ), the UK’s tri-service headquarters at Northwood, according to the BBC.  
…

At his first rally since leaving the White House, former President Donald Trump on Saturday lambasted the Biden administration’s immigration policies and urged his supporters to help Republicans take back majorities in Congress.While Trump has made speeches at Republican events since his election defeat by Democratic President Joe Biden, the rally in a state he carried in the 2020 election marks a return to the kind of freewheeling mass gatherings that have been critical to retaining the support of his base.Trump left office in the aftermath of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol by his supporters, shortly after a speech in which he repeated his false claims that his election defeat was the result of fraud. He survived a second impeachment and has kept a broad influence over the Republican Party, in part by leaving open the question of whether he will run for office again in 2024.On Saturday, to a crowd of thousands of cheering supporters, Trump highlighted some of his regular list of grievances, with criticism of U.S. elections and a particular focus on the rising number of immigrants crossing into the United States along its southern border.”We will take back the House, we will take back the Senate, and we will take back America, and we will do it soon,” he said.Democrats’ thin majorities in both chambers of Congress will be on the line in the 2022 midterm elections and history favors Republicans’ chances of gaining seats in those contests.Trump’s return to a big rally marks the start of public events lashing out at elected Republicans who he views as having crossed him.In Ohio he campaigned for former White House aide Max Miller, who has launched a primary challenge against Representative Anthony Gonzalez, one of the 10 House Republicans who voted to impeach Trump on a charge of inciting the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol that left five dead including a Capitol Police officer.Trump has vowed to campaign against all 10. He has also endorsed a challenger to Sen. Lisa Murkowski, the only one of the seven Senate Republicans who voted to convict him in his January impeachment trial who is up for reelection in 2022.The Ohio event in Wellington, about 64 kilometers southwest of Cleveland, was the first of three public appearances. Next is a trip to the U.S.-Mexico border with Texas Gov. Greg Abbott on June 30 and a rally in Sarasota, Florida, on July 3.Supporters said they hoped Trump would use such events to help unify the party behind like-minded candidates for Congress.”Continuing these rallies is extremely important,” said Jessica Dicken, a 30-year-old stay-at-home mom from southeast Ohio, adding Trump could be “a voice for the more conservative movement here in Ohio and across the nation.”‘We’ll lose our country’Trump has continued to feud with other senior Republicans. He has lashed out at former Vice President Mike Pence, who he falsely claims could have stopped Congress from certifying Biden’s victory on Jan. 6, as well as at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell for calling Trump “practically and morally responsible” for that day’s violence.Pence defended his actions in a Thursday speech at the Ronald Reagan library.”There’s more at stake than our party and our political fortunes in this moment,” Pence said. “If we lose faith in the Constitution, we won’t just lose elections — we’ll lose our country.”Trump’s repeated false claims of election fraud have taken hold of Republican voters. Some 53% of Republicans believe Trump won the 2020 election and blame his loss on illegal voting, and one quarter of the overall public agreed that Trump won, a Reuters/Ipsos poll found.Republican strategist Matt Dole said both Trump and those vying to stay close to him benefited from such public displays of bonhomie. Some of the candidates now seeking his endorsement have made disparaging comments about Trump in the past.”These are marriages of convenience,” said Dole, who is based in Ohio. “Donald Trump is using these opportunities to keep his name out there, to keep the base motivated.”  
…

Thousands of Peruvians supporting socialist Pedro Castillo and right-wing rival Keiko Fujimori took to the streets Saturday amid swirling uncertainty over the result of a tight June 6 presidential election that has been held up by legal challenges.Castillo supporters marched in downtown Lima toward Plaza San Martín, a block from the headquarters of the electoral jury, with giant banners and photos of the socialist candidate, calling for his apparent election win to be confirmed.A few blocks away, thousands of others supporting Fujimori paraded with Peruvian flags and banners that read “no to fraud,” arriving at the Plaza Bolognesi, where a stage had been set up ahead of the expected arrival of the conservative.Castillo holds a slender 44,000-vote lead over Fujimori with all ballots counted. But his right-wing rival has sought to disqualify votes, largely in rural areas that backed the leftist, making claims of fraud with little evidence.Castillo’s Free Peru party has denied the allegations of fraud while international election observers have said the vote was carried out cleanly. The U.S. State Department described the process as a “model of democracy.”A supporter wears a shirt with an image of Peru’s presidential candidate Keiko Fujimori that reads, “Always with you,” in Lima, Peru, June 26, 2021.In Fujimori’s march were members of various right and center-right parties, as well as retired military personnel who have backed her fraud claims. Many had banners saying “no to communism,” a criticism they often aim at Castillo.In the rival camp, many wore the same wide-brimmed hats Castillo has used in the campaign. Some wore outfits from the country’s Andean regions and danced, while others carried whips as used by rural “ronderos,” or civil police.Castillo, 51, a former elementary school teacher and the son of peasant farmers, plans to redraft the country’s constitution to give the state a more active role in the economy and take a larger share of profits from mining companies.The already tense election process was plunged into disarray this week after one of the four magistrates on the jury reviewing contested ballots quit after clashing with the other officials over requests to nullify votes.Replacement sworn inOn Saturday the electoral jury swore in a replacement to allow the process to restart, key to restoring stability in the copper-rich Andean nation, which has been rattled by the tight vote.”Electoral justice cannot be paralyzed or blocked, much less in this phase of the process,” said the president of the National Elections Jury, Jorge Salas. “These interruptive arts will not prosper.”The election jury will restart its work reviewing contested ballots Monday, a spokeswoman for the body said. It must complete the review before an official result can be announced.The polarized election has deeply divided Peruvians, with poorer rural voters rallying behind Castillo and wealthier urban voters from Lima supporting Fujimori, the daughter of jailed ex-President Alberto Fujimori.The demonstrations came despite calls from health authorities to avoid crowds, with the country battling the most deadly per capita COVID-19 outbreak in the world.
…