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The nightly internet shutdowns in Myanmar are part of a strategy employed by many governments worldwide in times of crisis. But they come with costs. VOA’s Michelle Quinn reports.   
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At least 20 people are dead and hundreds more injured after a series of explosions at a military base in Equatorial Guinea. A party official in Myanmar tells VOA’s Burmese Service that a member from ousted de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party has died in police custody. Swiss citizens have narrowly approved a proposal that would prohibit women from wearing full facial coverings in public. On International Women’s Day, more on a debate in Nigeria over a proposal to make six months paid maternity leave a national right for women in both the private and public sectors. 
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Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Saturday said a metal barrier to wall off the presidential palace ahead of a planned women’s march on International Women’s Day was to avoid provocation and protect historic buildings from vandalism.In a country where femicides rose nearly 130% between 2015 and 2020, critics said the decision to erect the 3-meter-high barriers was symptomatic of Lopez Obrador’s apathy toward the crisis of violence afflicting women.Ahead of International Women’s Day on Monday, barriers were also installed around other emblematic buildings and monuments in downtown Mexico City, where a year ago tens of thousands of people protested rampant violence against women and impunity.”We have to avoid provocation of people who only want to cause damage,” Lopez Obrador said at an event in Yucatan. “Imagine, if we don’t take care of the national palace and they vandalize it. What image will this send to the world?”Lopez Obrador reiterated that women had the right to protest and cited his own movement in 2006 as an appropriate form of peaceful protest.”The presidency was stolen from us … and we protested but never broke glass. … I walked two, three times all the way from Tabasco to Mexico City,” he said. Lopez Obrador has repeatedly accused opponents of electoral fraud over the years.At least 939 women were victims of femicide last year in Mexico, official data shows.Interior Minister Olga Sanchez Cordero said on Twitter that the barriers were “for the protection of the women.”Anger among women was stoked this year after Felix Salgado, who has been accused of rape, announced his candidacy for governor for the southern state of Guerrero.A representative for Salgado did not reply to repeated requests for comment; he has denied the allegations, according to media reports.Lopez Obrador has said that those calling on him to drop support for Salgado, a member of the ruling Morena party, are politically motivated.
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A key U.S. partner in the fight against terrorism is growing increasingly uneasy about the Biden administration’s new guidance on the use of drones and airstrikes, concerned that the changes are giving an already emboldened al-Qaida affiliate more room to operate.Since U.S. President Joe Biden took office January 20, the United States has not launched a single airstrike against al-Shabab in Somalia, after seven strikes were conducted  from January 1 to 19.Senior Somali military officials worry the new guidance, which has imposed tighter controls on ordering airstrikes and requires the White House to sign off on operations, means al-Shabab will begin to gather momentum.“Lack of strikes mean al-Shabab leaders will come out of hiding,” a senior Somali military commander, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk about the issue publicly, told VOA’s Somali Service.“They will bring their battle wagons out. They will mount big guns on top of vehicles again. They will start to gather in large numbers again,” he said. “It will be detrimental not only to the security of Somalia but to the region if al-Shabab were given freedom to move around.”Grave threatU.S. defense and intelligence officials have long considered the Somalia-based al-Shabab one of the gravest threats emanating from Africa, targeting the group with 53 airstrikes in 2020 and  63 airstrikes in 2019.The impact, though, has been debatable.Recent U.S. intelligence estimates indicate al-Shabab commands as many as 10,000 fighters across Somalia and parts of Kenya. And despite consistent counterterrorism pressure, officials concluded by the latter half of 2020 that the group was starting to show it was operating without fear.“The terrorist threat in East Africa is not degraded,” the U.S. Department of Defense inspector general warned in a November report. “Al-Shabab retains freedom of movement in many parts of southern Somalia and has demonstrated an ability and intent to attack outside of the country, including targeting U.S. interests.”, are part of a larger review of the existing “legal and policy frameworks” governing such actions.“The purpose of the interim guidance is to ensure the president has full visibility on proposed significant actions,” according to National Security Council spokeswoman Emily Horne. She said it would be “premature to anticipate” when the review would conclude.Review understoodCurrent and former Somali security officials indicate they understand the new administration’s reasoning for the review. They just fear that the interim guidance is putting them and the U.S. at a disadvantage.“Of course, the operations should be conducted with the utmost care and should protect civilians,” Gaid said. “But the reality is, the group [al-Shabab] needs to be on the defensive and should not have freedom of movement and operations, and that’s what the airstrikes helped with.”The extent to which those concerns have made it up the Somali chain of command and have been communicated to U.S. officials is unclear.In a statement on civilian casualties Friday, U.S. Africa Command acknowledged Somali defense officials have said airstrikes are a critical part of the effort against al-Shabab.“The Somali National Army fully supports U.S. Africa Command’s efforts to degrade al-Shabab through kinetic airstrikes,” the statement quoted Somali Chief of Defense Forces Brigadier General Odawa Yusuf Raage as telling U.S. officials at a recent meeting.“These strikes are a key part in our fight against an enemy that has shown no hesitation in terrorizing innocent Somali citizens through repression, extortion and murder,” Raage said.US Troops to Withdraw From Somalia Amid Ongoing Terror ThreatSenior US military spokesman says terror threat remains but ‘is contained’And that came after the Defense Department inspector general raised concerns that Somalia’s security forces were not yet ready to take the lead in the effort to contain al-Shabab.#Somalia reliant on #Danab Brigrade units for majority – 80% – of counter #alShabaab ops@StateDept tells @DoD_IG Danab performing relatively well but progress hurt by “inadequate troop generation, normal attrition, and combat losses”— Jeff Seldin (@jseldin) November 25, 2020Somalia’s security forces “continue to rely on international support,” the inspector general warned in November. “Al-Shabab is not degraded to the point where Somali security forces can contain its threat independently.”VOA’s Somali Service contributed to this report. 
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The Biden Administration ordered its first military strike on Iran-backed militias in eastern Syria. Ellen Laipson, professor and director of the Center for Security Policy Studies at George Mason University, and Randa Slim, Director of the Conflict Resolution and Track II Dialogues Program at the Middle East Institute, join Carol Castiel to discuss how these strikes could affect US-Iran nuclear talks, US-Iraq relations and US policy toward Syria.
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Top U.S. officials said Wednesday that the United States would not “shy away” from responding to the latest rocket attack on U.S. and coalition personnel in Iraq with military force, if necessary.Assailants launched rockets at the al-Asad air base in western Iraq’s Anbar province early Wednesday, defense officials said, with at least 10 rockets hitting inside the compound.One U.S. civilian contractor died after suffering a heart attack while taking shelter from the attack.FILE – This Dec. 29, 2019, aerial file photo shows the al-Asad air base in the western Anbar desert, Iraq.Pentagon press secretary John Kirby told reporters Wednesday that Iraqi security forces were leading the investigation, adding that it was still too early for any attribution.“Let’s let our Iraqi partners investigate this, see what they learn, and then if a response is warranted, I think we have shown clearly that we won’t shy away from that,” he said. “But we’re just not there yet.”Kirby said the initial investigation indicated the rocket attack against al-Asad was launched from multiple locations to the east of the air base.He also said the base’s defenses, including a counter-rocket system, activated, although it was not yet clear whether the system hit any of the incoming devices.Wednesday’s incident at al-Asad was the latest in a series of rocket attacks by Iran-backed militias on bases in Iraq that house U.S. and coalition forces. It also came less than a week after U.S. President Joe Biden ordered an airstrike against a compound in eastern Syria, which U.S. officials said the militias had used to facilitate those attacks.At the time, Biden said the strike was meant as a warning to Iran that it “can’t act with impunity.”FILE – A damaged roof is seen after a barrage of rockets hit in and near Erbil International Airport, in Erbil, Iraq, Feb. 16, 2021.Arrests in earlier attackSeparately, there appeared to have been some progress in efforts by officials in Iraq charged with tracking down those responsible for the February 16 rocket attack against Erbil International Airport, which killed a contractor and injured a U.S. servicemember.The Kurdistan Region Security Council announced Wednesday that after working with both Iraqi federal authorities and the U.S.-led coalition, it had arrested two men involved in the attack.Officials also released a video confession of one of the suspects, Haider Hamza.In it, Hamza admitted to working with the Kataib Sayyid al-Shuhada militia, adding, “The rockets were made in Iran.”Iraqi Kurdistan counterterrorism officials have not yet named a second suspect, also in custody, and said a search was underway for two other men believed to have taken part in the Erbil attack.Ahmad Zebari and Dilshad Anwar of VOA’s Kurdish Service contributed to this report.   
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First lady Jill Biden and new U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona went back to school Wednesday in a public push to show districts that have yet to transition back to in-person learning that it can be done safely during the pandemic.”Teachers want to be back,” the first lady said after she and Cardona spent about an hour visiting classrooms and other areas at Benjamin Franklin Elementary School in Meriden, in the northeastern state of Connecticut. “We want to be back. I’m a teacher. I am teaching virtually.”Biden is a veteran community college English professor who is now teaching remotely from the White House. She said her students recently told her they can’t wait to be back in the classroom.”But we just know we have to get back safely,” she said.The trip was the first order of business for Cardona, Connecticut’s former education commissioner, who was sworn into his new Cabinet job only the day before.Biden and Cardona also visited a middle school in the state of Pennsylvania on Wednesday. They were joined by the heads of two big teachers unions during the trip, Randi Weingarten of the American Federation of Teachers in Connecticut and Becky Pringle of the National Education Association in Pennsylvania.The visits came as the clock ticks down on President Joe Biden’s promise to have most K-8 schools open for classroom instruction by the end of his first 100 days in office, or the end April.To help nudge that along, Biden said Tuesday he is pushing states to administer at least one coronavirus vaccination to every teacher, school employee and child care worker by the end of March.The issue of vaccinating teachers became a flashpoint in school districts around the country as many teachers held the line and refused to return to their classrooms unless they were given the shots.The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention did not include vaccinating teachers in its guidelines for schools to consider when reopening after months of teaching students remotely over computers.”We must continue to reopen America’s schools for in-person learning as quickly and as safely as possible,” Cardona said. He said the president’s directive that teachers and school staff be vaccinated quickly will be “my top priority.”Later Wednesday, Biden and Cardona visited Fort LeBoeuf Middle School in Waterford, Pennsylvania, where parents told them they appreciated that the school district had sought their opinion about reopening.After shutting down in March 2020, the school with several hundred students in grades six through eight began welcoming them in-person, on a voluntary basis, starting in early September.”I love that you have this holistic approach,” Biden said.She and Cardona also visited a robotics class at the middle school and a class for students who need or want a little extra push.During the elementary school visit in Connecticut, Biden and Cardona saw kids seated some distance apart at individual desks, each one wearing a mask. See-through plastic partitions separated groups of four students who sat at half-moon-shaped tables. Hand sanitizer dispensers were available in the hallways.”I love that,” Biden said after a teacher pointed out the partitions. The teacher also said her youngsters had “no issues” wearing the masks.The school reopened in late August, Cardona said, and “it was done in a way that protected the students and their families.”The first lady and Cardona also visited a “sensory room” with colorful climbing walls, zip lines, monkey bars, stability balls and a mat, where special needs students can collect their emotions.Biden asked the teacher in the sensory room whether she had seen anxiety in children increasing because of the pandemic. The teacher said she had.Biden and Cardona later listened as another teacher described her transition back to in-person learning.The school visit also served as a homecoming for Cardona, who is from Meriden and was so warmly praised that Biden referred to the welcome as a “love fest.” His parents were among those on hand in the school lobby for the remarks.”Now our nation is going to have that love for you,” she said.”Educators’ favorite three words are not ‘I love you’,” she joked. “It’s going to be ‘Education Secretary Cardona.’”
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It’s the sort of chance that comes along just once in a blue Moon: a Japanese billionaire is throwing open a private lunar expedition to eight people from around the world. Yusaku Maezawa, an online fashion tycoon, was announced in 2018 as the first man to book a spot aboard the lunar spaceship being developed by SpaceX. Maezawa, who paid an undisclosed sum for the trip expected to launch around 2023, originally said he planned to invite six to eight artists to join him on the voyage.But on Wednesday, in a video posted on his Twitter account, he revealed a broader application process. “I’m inviting you to join me on this mission. Eight of you from all around the world,” he said. “I have bought all the seats, so it will be a private ride,” he added. Maezawa said his initial plan of inviting artists had “evolved” because he came to believe that “every single person who is doing something creative could be called an artist.” The Japanese entrepreneur said applicants would need to fulfill just two criteria: being ready to “push the envelope” creatively, and being willing to help other crew members do the same. In all, he said around 10 to 12 people will be on board the trip, which is expected to loop around the Moon before returning to Earth. The application timeline for spots on the trip calls for would-be space travelers to pre-register by March 14th, with initial screening carried out by March 21st. No deadlines are given for the next stages – an “assignment” and an online interview – but final interviews and medical checkups are currently scheduled for late May 2021, according to Maezawa’s website. Maezawa and his band of merry astronauts will become the first lunar voyages since the last US Apollo mission in 1972 – if SpaceX can pull the trip off.   Last month, a prototype of its Starship crashed in a fireball as it tried to land upright after a test flight, the second such accident, after the last prototype of the Starship met a similar fate in December. The company hopes the reusable, 394-foot (120-meter) rocket system will one day carry crew and cargo to the Moon, Mars and beyond. 
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A Phnom Penh court has sentenced nine senior leaders of the dissolved Cambodia National Rescue Party to 20-plus years in prison for allegedly plotting a coup in 2019.   The sentence, delivered Monday, means they are effectively banned from ever returning home. The Phnom Penh Municipal Court delivered its verdict in the so-called “attack” case in a hearing that was not attended by defense lawyers. Y Rin, a court spokesperson, said government lawyers were present when Judge Duch Soksarin delivered the verdict. Those sentenced are former party president Sam Rainsy, his deputies Mu Sochua and Eng Chhai Eang, and senior party members Tioulong Saumura, Nut Romduol, Ho Vann, Ou Chanrith, Long Ry and Men Sothavarin. Sam Rainsy was sentenced to 25 years in prison and the eight others received sentences of 20 to 22 years, according to Y Rin. The court added additional penalties that bar them from voting, running for election or holding any public positions. “This verdict was delivered before lawyers representing the Royal Government and it was considered to be in [the presence] of the nine accused,” Y Rin wrote in a Telegram message. Sam Rainsy, who lives in exile in France, said of the verdict that “I don’t care at all because Cambodia’s courts are a joke. We call it the puppet court serving Mr. Hun Sen.” Prime Minister Hun Sen, with his ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP), has held power in Cambodia in various coalitions since 1985. Reaction to the sentencing was swift. “A prison sentence from a court which is controlled by the government cannot be taken seriously,” Rainsy said in a statement posted on his social media page.   Human Rights Watch said the verdict was an “outrageously harsh prison sentence” and intended to block the nine CNRP leaders from ever returning to Cambodia. “But even with the cases being heard by a kangaroo court, PM Hun Sen didn’t dare allow even a minimally fair proceeding, barring Mu Sochua and the other defendants from returning to the country to have their day in court,” said Phil Robertson, the group’s deputy Asia director. “Once again, Cambodia’s politically controlled judiciary make a mockery of justice rather than defending it,” Robertson said, adding that the case against Sam Rainsy was based on “bogus, politically motivated allegations manufactured by a dictatorial, single-party state.” Ministry of Justice spokesperson Chin Malin defended the Phnom Penh Municipal Court’s decision, adding that the CNRP leaders could appeal the lower court’s verdict.   “The courts in a sovereign state make decisions based on the facts and the law,” he said. “And if perpetrators or their fellow [defendants] are not satisfied, then they can use their legal rights to appeal.” The case relates to Sam Rainsy’s attempt to return to Cambodia in November 2019. The former CNRP president had remained overseas after an arrest warrant was issued for him in 2015 in a defamation case. Other senior leaders fled the country after then-party president Kem Sokha was arrested in 2017 and the party dissolved months later.Cambodia High Court Dissolves Opposition Party, Cementing One-party Rule

        Cambodia's Supreme Court has dissolved the country's main opposition party in a ruling likely to cement Prime Minister Hun Sen's already expansive grip on power.Thursday's unanimous ruling by the nine-member court also bans 118 members of the now-defunct Cambodia National Rescue Party from any political activity for the next five years.  The court sided with a lawsuit filed by Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party, accusing the CNRP of being involved in a foreign-backed plot to topple the…

Dissolving the party, which had been gaining popularity in local elections, guaranteed that Hun Sen’s CPP would sweep the 2018 general election. It won all the seats in Parliament, in what international groups that spent billions of dollars funding pro-democracy civil society efforts condemned as the most unfair and unfree since the United Nations organized the first post-genocide election in 1993.  Sam Rainsy was prevented from entering Cambodia in 2019 after the government issued travel bans and warned neighboring countries and airlines from allowing him to board Phnom Penh-bound flights. During the trial, which started in November 2020, the government characterized Sam Rainsy’s efforts to return to Cambodia as an attempted coup, pointing to plans to gather party supporters and organize other repatriations. Over 130 other CNRP members and supporters are currently before the Phnom Penh court for allegedly supporting the return plan. The nine leaders are co-defendants in two of these cases. Mu Sochua, one of the nine leaders, said the ruling was a blow to Cambodian democracy and was in line with Hun Sen’s political needs.   “This conviction meets the desires of Mr. Hun Sen,” she said on Monday. “It’s not a typical court in a country where there is an impartial and independent judiciary.” Sochua said the court proceeded to try the nine leaders in absentia, despite their willingness to return to Cambodia for the trial and robbing them of their fair trial rights.   This story originated in VOA’s Khmer Service. 
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The Senate voted Monday to confirm Miguel Cardona as education secretary, clearing his way to lead President Joe Biden’s effort to reopen the nation’s schools amid the coronavirus pandemic.Cardona, 45, a former public school teacher who went on to become Connecticut’s education chief, was approved on a 64-33 vote.He takes charge of the Education Department amid mounting tension between Americans who believe students can safely return to the classroom now, and others who say the risks are still too great.Although his position carries limited authority to force schools to reopen, Cardona will be asked to play a central role in achieving Biden’s goal of having a majority of elementary schools open five days a week within his first 100 days. He will be tasked with guiding schools through the reopening process and sharing best practices on how to teach during a pandemic.The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention last month released a road map for getting students back into classrooms safely. The agency said masks, social distancing and other strategies should be used, but vaccination of teachers was not a prerequisite for reopening.Cardona, who gained attention for his efforts to reopen schools in Connecticut, has vowed to make reopening schools his top priority. At his Senate confirmation hearing last month, he said there are “great examples throughout our country of schools that have been able to reopen safely.”The debate has become a political firestorm for Biden, who is caught between competing interests as he aims to get students into the classroom without provoking the powerful teachers unions that helped put him in the White House. He says his goal of returning students to the classroom is possible if Congress approves his relief plan, which includes $130 billion for the nation’s schools.Republicans have rebuked Biden for failing to reopen schools faster, while teachers unions opposed the administration’s decision to continue with federally required standardized tests during the pandemic.The tricky terrain is nothing new for Cardona, however, who faced similar tension navigating the pandemic in Connecticut, and who has won early praise even from Biden’s critics.Republicans in Congress have applauded Cardona’s efforts to reopen schools in Connecticut, and some see him as a potential ally in their support for charter schools. Teachers, meanwhile, see him as a partner who brings years of experience in education and knows the demands of the teaching.The nomination continues a meteoric rise for Cardona, who was appointed to lead Connecticut’s education department in 2019 after spending 20 years working in Meriden, Connecticut, public schools — the same district he attended as a child.He began his career as a fourth-grade teacher before becoming the state’s youngest principal at age 28. In 2012, he was named Connecticut’s principal of the year, and in 2015 he became an assistant superintendent of the district. When he was appointed state education commissioner, he became the first Latino to hold the post.Cardona grew up in a public housing project in Meriden, raised by parents who came to Connecticut from Puerto Rico as children. Through his career, he has focused on closing education gaps and supporting bilingual education. It’s a personal issue for Cardona, who says he spoke only Spanish when he entered kindergarten and struggled to learn English.Cardona was the first in his family to graduate from college, and his three degrees include a doctorate in education from the University of Connecticut. He and his wife, Marissa, have two children in high school.His deep roots in public schooling fit the criteria Biden was looking for in an education secretary. During his campaign, Biden vowed to pick a secretary with experience in public education. It was meant to draw a contrast with then-secretary Betsy DeVos, a Michigan billionaire who spent decades advocating for school choice policies.In an increasingly fractionalized world of education, Cardona has vowed to be a unifier. At his confirmation hearing, he promised to engage with “the vast, diverse community of people who have a stake in education.” He added that, “we gain strength from joining together.”As he works to help schools reopen, he will also be tasked with helping them address the damage the pandemic has done to student learning. He has echoed Biden’s call for further education funding, saying schools will need to expand summer academic programs and hire more counselors to help students with mental health issues.He’s also likely to face an early test as he weighs how much flexibility to grant states as they administer standardized tests. Last week, the Education Department ordered states to continue with annual testing but said assessments could be offered online or delayed until fall. The agency also held out the possibility that states could be granted “additional assessment flexibility” in certain cases.Some states are already pushing for that extra flexibility, including Michigan, which is asking to replace state tests with local “benchmark” assessments that were administered this year. It will be up to Cardona to decide how much leniency to provide.Republicans have also set the stage for a fight over transgender athletes. At last month’s hearing, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., raised objections with policies that allow transgender girls to participate in girls’ athletics. It’s the subject of a legal battle in Connecticut, where some cisgender athletes are challenging a state policy that lets transgender students participate as their identified gender.Pressed by Paul to take a stance on the issue, Cardona said he would support the right of “all students, including students who are transgender.” 
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U.S. special envoy Zalmay Khalilzad visited Kabul on Monday and met with Afghan leaders to discuss ways to accelerate the peace process. He is also expected to meet with the Taliban in Doha. VOA’s Sayed Hasib Maudoodi reports from Kabul. 
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Less than six weeks after leaving office, former U.S. President Donald Trump on Sunday unleashed a torrent of attacks on his successor, contending President Joe Biden has had the “most disastrous first month in modern history” in the White House and strongly hinting he may try to reclaim the presidency in the 2024 election.“In one short month, we’ve gone from America first to America last,” Trump told a cheering crowd of hundreds of conservative supporters crammed into a hotel ballroom in Orlando, Florida.“I may even decide to run again,” Trump told the gathering at the Conservative Political Action Conference but ruled out forming a third party. He vowed to campaign for “strong, tough Republican leaders” to try to retake control of the House of Representatives and Senate in the 2022 congressional elections halfway through Biden’s four-year term and then the White House two years later.Trump Rejoins US Political Fray at Conservative ConclaveOut of office, Trump set to claim his dominance of Republican Party“I wonder who that will be,” Trump said of the party’s 2024 presidential nominee in his first major address since leaving office. “Who, who, who will that be?”  In a 90-minute speech, he left no doubt that it could be him, citing a poll taken at the highly partisan conference showing a 97% approval rating for his four years in the White House even as national polls of voters show Biden with a wide approval rating and Trump’s stock diminished since his White House tenure ended.Trump’s loss to Biden was fresh on his mind as he continued to voice months of unfounded allegations that he was cheated out of reelection.He voiced particular disdain for the conservative-dominated U.S. Supreme Court, three of whose justices he appointed. He said the country’s highest court “didn’t have the guts or the courage” to hold a hearing on his election fraud claims. Trump and his supporters lost about 60 court challenges of the November vote.His supporters at the conference shouted, “You won! You won!” even though Biden won the national popular vote by 7 million votes and the Electoral College vote that decides U.S. presidential elections by a 306-232 margin.Trump did not directly mention the storming of the U.S. Capitol by hundreds of his supporters on January 6, mayhem that led to five deaths and his impeachment on a charge that he incited the insurrection by urging his supporters to go to the Capitol to confront lawmakers as they were certifying Biden’s victory.Republicans Hold Annual Conference With Trump Still at Center Stage Prominent annual gathering for conservatives will feature speech by former president on SundayTrump was acquitted in a Senate trial in early February, with the chamber voting 57-43 to convict him, short of the two-thirds vote necessary for a conviction.In his speech Sunday, Trump named all 10 Republicans in the House who voted to impeach him a week before he left office January 20 and all seven U.S. senators who voted to convict him in the five-day Senate trial.“Get rid of them all,” Trump demanded.He said lawmakers who have attacked him are “a handful of Washington political hacks.” He credited Democrats as being “smart” and “vicious,” but said they “have bad policies.”Trump assailed Biden’s dozens of executive orders, new directives that have overturned Trump’s tough immigration policies to thwart migrants at the U.S.-Mexican border and called for the U.S. to rejoin the World Health Organization and the international Paris climate change agreement.Trump’s supporters booed at the mention of Biden rejoining the Paris accord.He demanded that Biden reopen schools across the country, accusing him of fealty to teachers’ unions, some of which oppose classroom instruction amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. Trump attacked Biden’s proposed $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package, saying a chunk of it would go to “bail out badly run Democrat cities.”With millions of Americans now being vaccinated, Trump said, “Never let them forget this was our plan.”The Biden White House dismissed Trump’s speech.”While the GOP casts about for a path forward, President Biden is going to remain laser-focused on crushing the virus, re-opening schools, and getting Americans back to work,” White House spokesman Michael Gwin said after the speech.Despite the cheers at the conservative gathering, Trump’s political role in Republican circles in the coming months remains uncertain. A base of Trump voters remains loyal for sure, but some Washington lawmakers are skeptical of his staying power and some appear to be planning their own 2024 presidential campaigns.    U.S. Senators Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton, former United Nations ambassador Nikki Haley and others are eyeing a run for the presidency. Haley has specifically said it is time for the party to move past the Trump era.Trump is the only president in U.S. history to be twice impeached and twice acquitted and the first president in 90 years to lose political control of the White House and both chambers of Congress in a single term in office.Conservatives at the three-day conference repeatedly cheered mention of his name, with many of them posing for pictures with a large golden caricature of his face that was sculpted in Mexico and was wheeled around the convention hall.Asked whether Trump still controls the Republican Party, Senator Rick Scott of Florida told the “Fox News Sunday” show, “It’s the voters’ party.” But he said he believes Trump is “going to be helpful” in the immediate future.“We’re on the right side of the issues,” Scott said of Republicans. “The Democrats are on the wrong side.”But one Republican lawmaker who voted to convict Trump on the impeachment charge, Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, told CNN that if Republicans reclaim the White House in four years, “it will be because we speak to the issues, not by putting one person (Trump) on a pedestal. CPAC is not the entirety of the Republican Party.”“You’ve got to speak to voters who didn’t vote for us last time,” Cassidy said. “If we idolize one person, we will lose.”“I don’t think he’ll be our nominee,” Cassidy said. “We need a person who lifts all boats.”
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Church bells rang and a World War II-era plane flew Saturday over the funeral for Captain Tom Moore, the veteran who single-handedly raised millions of pounds for Britain’s health workers by walking laps in his backyard.Soldiers performed ceremonial duties at the private service for Moore, who died February 2 at age 100 after testing positive for COVID-19. Captain Tom, as he became known, inspired the U.K. during the first months of the coronavirus pandemic with his humble endeavor that raised almost 33 million pounds ($46 million) for Britain’s National Health Service last year.The funeral cortege of Captain Tom Moore arrives at Bedford Crematorium, in Bedford, England, Feb. 27, 2021.The service was small, attended by eight members of the veteran’s immediate family. But soldiers carried his coffin, draped in the Union flag, and formed a ceremonial guard. Others performed a gun salute before a C-47 Dakota military transport plane flew past.A Dakota performs a flyby at the funeral of Captain Tom Moore, in Bedford, England, Feb. 27, 2021.”Daddy, you always told us, ‘Best foot forward,’ and true to your word, that’s what you did last year,” Moore’s daughter Lucy Teixeira said at the service. “I know you will be watching us, chuckling, saying, ‘Don’t be too sad as something has to get you in the end.’ “His other daughter, Hannah Ingram-Moore, said the world was “enthralled” by her father’s “spirit of hope, positivity and resilience.””They, too, saw your belief in kindness and the fundamental goodness of the human spirit,” she said.The service featured music that reflected the man being honored, opening with the rendition of You’ll Never Walk Alone that Moore recorded for charity with Michael Ball and the NHS Voices of Care Choir. The song topped the U.K. singles charts last April.Singer Michael Bublé recorded a version of Smile for the funeral, and as requested by Moore, Frank Sinatra’s My Way was played. A bugler sounded The Last Post to close the service.A church in Bedfordshire, England, where the family is based, rang its bell 100 times in Moore’s honor. A post on Moore’s Twitter account invited his admirers to remember him Saturday with a cup of tea and a slice of Victoria sponge cake.Moore, who served in India, Burma and Sumatra during World War II, set out to raise a modest 1,000 pounds for Britain’s NHS by walking 100 laps of his backyard by his 100th birthday last year. But donations poured in from across Britain and beyond as his quest went viral, catching the imagination of millions stuck at home during the first wave of the pandemic.FILE – In this July 17, 2020, photo, Captain Tom Moore poses for the media after receiving his knighthood from Britain’s Queen Elizabeth, during a ceremony at Windsor Castle in Windsor, England.His positive attitude — “Please remember, tomorrow will be a good day” became his trademark phrase — inspired the nation at a time of crisis. Prime Minister Boris Johnson described him as a “hero in the truest sense of the word.”He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in July in a socially distanced ceremony at Windsor Castle, west of London. 
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Two skiers navigated a thin layer of snow with no margin for error down the precipitous shoulder of Half Dome in Yosemite National Park and alternately skied and rappelled back to the valley floor in an unusually daring feat.Jason Torlano, 45, and Zach Milligan, 40, completed the descent in five hours Sunday by carefully carving their way in crusty snow and using ropes to rappel several sections of bare rock known as the “death slabs” beneath the iconic face of Half Dome, the Fresno Bee reported Thursday.”If you fall to your left or right, you’re definitely dead,” said JT Holmes, a professional free skier and a friend of Torlano. “If you fall down the middle, you have a small chance of not falling to your death — but it’s a maybe.”Snowboarder Jim Zellers is believed to be the first to descend the 243-meter upper section on the shoulder of the dome in 2000. But no one is known to have attempted the entire 1,463-meter descent from peak to valley.Torlano said he had been dreaming about skiing the dome since his family moved to Yosemite when he was 5 years old.He first climbed Half Dome as a youngster, clinging to the same cables tens of thousands of visitors do every year to ascend the final steep pitch up the rounded side of the polished granite feature. He advanced to become one of an elite group of climbers to scale the sheer granite face at least a dozen times, using only ropes to catch his fall. He later became a ranger in the park.”It’s just always been there,” Torlano told the San Francisco Chronicle. “I’ve been attracted to Half Dome for as long as I can remember.”After also serving a stint in the U.S. Army, he settled down with his wife and children in a community near Yosemite. He specializes in using ropes to work in high-altitude and dangerous settings.He said he tried to ski down Half Dome each of the past three years but called it off after finding unsuitable snow. This year, an early February storm filled Yosemite with fresh powder, including about 7.6 centimeters of snow at the peak of Half Dome.He rented a friend’s small plane Feb. 19 to study the snow conditions and possible route before calling Milligan, a rock-climbing buddy, to join him.Milligan said he initially planned to only film Torlano skiing but decided to make his own descent by carefully side slipping down on skis. He said things quickly turned dangerous when he skied over part of one of the cables and lost control before using an ice ax to stop his slide and right himself.”I was just trying to stay in control and stay alive,” Milligan said. “You’re on that spine and you don’t have a lot of room for error.” 
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Issues in the News moderator Dan Raviv talks with panelists Linda Feldmann, Washington Bureau Chief for the Christian Science Monitor and Tom DeFrank, Contributing Editor to the National Journal, about US President Joe Biden’s recent foreign policy initiatives, including his recent virtual summit with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and reviving talks with European allies over Iran’s nuclear program, among other major stories dominating the US political landscape.
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U.S. Attorney General nominee Judge Merrick Garland told lawmakers Monday an investigation into the January 6th riot at the US Capitol will be his first priority if confirmed. VOA’s congressional correspondent Katherine Gypson has more on President Joe Biden’s pick to be the nation’s top law enforcement officer.Camera: Mike Burke  Produced by: Katherine Gypson
 
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