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The decision by Twitter to block the dissemination of a story on its site about Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, has added to an already heated discussion in the U.S. about whether internet companies have too much power and are making decisions that could affect the U.S. elections.Some have applauded Twitter’s move as a stand against misinformation. Others have criticized Twitter’s decision as biased, curtailing speech in a way that could affect the outcome of the U.S. election.In recent weeks, Twitter, Facebook and Google, the owner of YouTube, have increasingly taken steps to restrict the spread of what they describe as misinformation and extremist speech on their sites. After the 2016 U.S. election, internet companies were criticized for not doing enough to stop misinformation on their services.This week, Twitter blocked certain accounts on its site as they tried to share a story by the New York Post that cited supposed email exchanges between Hunter Biden and a Ukrainian official about setting up a meeting with Hunter Biden’s father when Joe Biden was the U.S. vice president. The story claimed to rely on records from a computer drive that was allegedly abandoned by Hunter Biden. Rudy Giuliani, lawyer to President Donald Trump, reportedly gave the drive to the Post.No meeting, campaign saysThe Biden campaign said it had “reviewed Joe Biden’s official schedules from the time and no meeting, as alleged by the New York Post, ever took place.””Investigations by the press, during impeachment, and even by two Republican-led Senate committees whose work was decried as ‘not legitimate’ and political by a GOP colleague, have all reached the same conclusion: that Joe Biden carried out official U.S. policy toward Ukraine and engaged in no wrongdoing,” said Andrew Bates, a spokesman for Biden.FILE – President Donald Trump holds up a copy of the New York Post as he speaks before signing an executive order aimed at curbing protections for social media giants, in the Oval Office of the White House, May 28, 2020.No tweeting, no sharingCiting the firm’s hacked-materials policy, Twitter blocked the Post’s ability to tweet about the story from its Twitter account. It also blocked the Trump campaign and other accounts from sharing the story.Facebook said it reduced the reach of the post, pending fact checking from third party fact-checkers.For Lisa Kaplan, chief executive of the Alethea Group, which tracks misinformation and online threats, Twitter’s recent decisions to block some posts are a good sign.“I do applaud Twitter’s efforts and the stances they have taken to address disinformation, making it so that people can’t share a link known to be false that could have potential implications on the election,” she said. “It’s an important step if they are truly going to be a source of accurate information for their users.”GOP respondsThe reaction from Republicans over the Post story has been swift. Senate Republicans said Thursday that they would subpoena Jack Dorsey, CEO of Twitter, to testify next week. Dorsey should “explain why Twitter is abusing their corporate power to silence the press,” said Senator Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican.Senator Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, said he had sent a letter to Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, asking them to testify at a committee hearing.The companies’ decision about the Post stories throws fuel on an issue that has gained traction over the past year: whether companies are publishers, making editorial decisions, or “platforms,” places where people share information but with the companies providing little oversight of what’s said.FILE – FCC Chairman Ajit Pai testifies at a House subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, Dec. 5, 2019.Protections weighedCongressional leaders of both parties are considering whether to strip the companies of some of their legal protections that say they aren’t responsible for the speech on their sites. On Thursday, Republican Ajit Pai, chairman of the U.S. Federal Communications Commission, said the agency would consider weakening the legal protections the companies enjoy.Some Democrats as well have called for stripping the internet firms of some of their legal protections.With the decision about the Post story, Ken Paulson, director of the Free Speech Center at Middle Tennessee State University, says the internet firms have not moved closer to being publishers.“If you have a business and the last thing you want is untruthful stories, then you can say, ‘We’re uncomfortable to share this with millions of people globally.’ That’s your right,” Paulson said. “I don’t think we want to mistake Facebook or Twitter for a public utility. And I don’t think a simple ban on content you believe to be unreliable and fraudulent makes you a publisher.“A company has a right to decide what it stands for, and that’s where we are now with Twitter and Facebook,” he said.One thing is certain: With the internet firms making decisions almost daily about curtailing or blocking posts, lawmakers and regulators will have more fodder to point to for changing the rules.
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Rights groups are voicing concerns over the release of 200 jihadist militants in a recent prisoner exchange in Mali.The militants were freed by the government earlier this month in exchange for the release of four people, including a French aid worker, two Italian nationals and a prominent Malian opposition leader, who had been held captive by an al-Qaida-affiliated group in northern Mali.While local rights groups have welcomed last week’s release of the four individuals, they also believe that freeing a large number of “presumed terrorists” could pose a further threat to Mali’s stability and undermine the country’s judicial system.This release “means that the fundamental rights of those murdered by jihadists in Mali have been violated, while (their relatives) were waiting for justice to take its course,” said Aguibou Bouare, president of the National Human Rights Commission in Mali.“These people were released even though they have committed crimes,” he told VOA, adding, “Not complying with the rule of law, gives birth to impunity.”Mali has been struggling to contain a growing Islamist insurgency that began as a separatist uprising in the north in 2012, which was later taken over by jihadists. The conflict has also spread to central Mali and neighboring countries such as Burkina Faso and Niger.The violence has killed thousands of people and forced hundreds of thousands to flee their homes.Accountability for abusesAdotei Akwei, deputy director for advocacy and government relations at Amnesty International, said while they have been urging governments around the world to release prisoners because of the overcrowding and the risks presented by coronavirus pandemic even before the recent releases in Mali, they also have been advocating for accountability for those responsible for human rights abuses.“We are concerned over the possible release of persons who need to be held accountable, or else there will be no incentive to change behavior by those released or by the captors,” he told VOA.Moctar Mariko, president of the Malian Human Rights Association, said Malian authorities should make real efforts “to free other civilians and military personnel kidnapped or detained by jihadists in order to avoid this selective discrimination and double standards justice towards hostages.”He told VOA that releasing jihadist militants this way “would encourage and increase cross-border crime,” adding that, “Those individuals will still commit robbery, make improvised explosive devices and continue their organized crimes against peaceful citizens.”Skilled militants releasedExperts say some of the jihadists freed in the recent prisoner swap are battle-hardened fighters with years of combat experience.“We have identified some of them who are seasoned commanders that could perform important functions in the near future,” said Heni Nsaibia, a researcher at the conflict monitoring group Armed Conflict Location and Event Data project (ACLED).“There is a high probability that these militants would go back to the insurgency, taking into consideration that the government’s hold of the northern and central parts of Mali is very tenuous,” he told VOA.Militants have a history of kidnappings in Mali targeting prominent local leaders and foreign nationals, experts say, to extort concessions from the Malian and foreign governments.For example, Sophie Petronin, the French aid worker released in the prisoner exchange, was kidnapped by Islamist militants in 2016 in northern Mali where she had been working to assist orphaned children.The recent release of jihadists “essentially incentivizes this type of behavior, specifically among these groups who are quite highly skilled and trained, and have experience in conducting kidnappings,” said Ryan Cummings, director of Signal Risk, a security risk management firm based in Cape Town, South Africa.“It does certainly send a message out to jihadist groups in the region that ‘if you engage in kidnapping for ransom and extortion, you will be rewarded, and concessions will be provided over the longer term,’” he told VOA.Opportunity for reconciliation?Some experts say the release of these jihadists could be a sign for a negotiated political process between the central government in Bamako and jihadist groups. Others, however, believe that jihadist militants are less inclined to engage in a dialogue with the government.“I’m not sure that jihadists would particularly embrace a dialogue with the Bamako government, unless it conferred a sort of short-term tactical advantage,” said John Campbell, a senior fellow for African policy studies at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington.Earlier this year, former Malian President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who was ousted in August in a bloodless military coup, had expressed his readiness to hold talks with Islamist militants, particularly those affiliated with the al-Qaida-linked Jama’at Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM), an alliance of several jihadist groups.Campbell, a former U.S. ambassador to Nigeria, said there are mainly two reasons that JNIM would not participate in any negotiation with Malian authorities.“The first one is a very long history of Bamako breaking promises in its talks with various northern groups, not just jihadis but also particularly Tuareg groups,” he told VOA, noting that the other reason is “there is now a military dominated government in Bamako.”“I think the new government would be less trustworthy than the previous one from a northern perspective,” Campbell added.And from the military perspective, analyst Cummings said, initiating peace talks with jihadist militants is not realistic at this point.“If anyone is not to be interested at this stage in peace with jihadists, it would be senior members of the military who have been — for lack of a better word — the primary victims of jihadist violence in the country,” he said.This week, suspected Islamist militants carried out multiple attacks in central Mali, killing at least 25 people, including 12 civilians and 13 soldiers.VOA’s Bambara service contributed to this report.   
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Senate Republicans said Thursday they will subpoena Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey over the decision to block a news report critical of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden. “This is election interference and we’re 19 days out from an election,” Senator Ted Cruz said, a day after the social network blocked links to the article by the New York Post alleging corruption by Biden in Ukraine. Cruz said the Senate Judiciary Committee would vote next Tuesday to subpoena Dorsey to testify at the end of next week and “explain why Twitter is abusing their corporate power to silence the press.” “The Senate Judiciary Committee wants to know what the hell is going on,” he said. “Twitter and Facebook and big tech millionaires don’t get to censor political speech and actively interfere in the election. That’s what they are doing right now.” Republican Senator Josh Hawley announced separately that he had sent letters to Dorsey and Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg asking them to appear before his Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism. The hearing will “consider potential campaign law violations” in support of Biden with the blocking of the article.  The Post’s story purported to expose corrupt dealings by Biden and his son Hunter Biden in Ukraine. The newspaper claimed that the former vice president, who was in charge of U.S. policy toward Ukraine, took actions to help his son, who in 2014-2017 sat on the board of controversial Ukraine energy company Burisma. But the newspaper’s source for the information raised questions. It cited records on a drive allegedly copied from a computer said to have been abandoned by Hunter Biden, that Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani gave to the Post. The report also made claims about Joe Biden’s actions in Ukraine, which were contrary to the record.   Wary of “fake news” campaigns, both Facebook and Twitter said they took action out of caution over the article and its sourcing. “This is part of our standard process to reduce the spread of misinformation,” said Facebook spokesman Andy Stone. The role of Giuliani, who has repeatedly advanced unproven and poorly sourced conspiracy theories about the Bidens and Ukraine, also raised flags. The Biden campaign rejected the assertions of corruption in the report but has not denied the veracity of the underlying materials, mostly emails between Hunter Biden and business partners. Trump, who trails Biden in polls 19 days before the presidential election, blasted the two social media giants on Wednesday. “So terrible that Facebook and Twitter took down the story of ‘Smoking Gun’ emails related to Sleepy Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, in the @NYPost,” Trump posted on Twitter. 
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Hundreds of protesters marched Thursday to the gates of Nigeria’s parliament, hours after the army said it was ready to step in and restore order after more than a week of demonstrations against police brutality.The protest defied a ban on mass rallies in the capital, Abuja, that the government said was imposed earlier Thursday to stop the spread of the coronavirus.Chanting crowds also blocked roads and waved flags and banners in the commercial hub Lagos, where protesters reported clashing with unidentified men wielding weapons.People hold banners as they demonstrate on the street to protest against police brutality in Lagos, Nigeria, Oct. 15, 2020.Video on social media appeared to show men coming out of a bus and chasing protesters, though Reuters could not verify the footage.”We have suffered enough. We youths want to stand — no more brutality,” one demonstrator, Obinna Paul, said in another part of the city where crowds blocked a toll gate funneling traffic to and from the main airport.Lagos state governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu said on Twitter he condemned the attacks on peaceful protesters “by armed and unscrupulous elements trying to cause chaos.”Lagos state set up a 200 million naira ($525,000) compensation fund for victims of police brutality, a core demand of protesters, and a presidential spokesman said on Twitter that the government had directed all governors to establish victim compensation funds. He also said judicial panels of inquiry would investigate police brutality.Late on Wednesday, the military issued a statement titled “Nigerian Army warns subversive elements and troublemakers.””The [Nigerian Army] is ready to fully support the civil authority in whatever capacity to maintain law and order and deal with any situation decisively,” it said.Protesters have staged daily marches since Wednesday last week, calling for an overhaul of police forces.Police had responded to the demonstrations with beatings, tear gas and gunfire, which human rights group Amnesty International said had killed at least 10 people. But the police agreed on Tuesday to stop using force against protesters.In response to the protests, the head of Nigeria’s police force on Sunday dissolved the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), a unit that demonstrators have accused of beatings, killings and extortion.Demonstrators have called for more meaningful reforms. Protesters say they fear a new unit, whose creation to “fill the gaps” left by SARS was announced on Tuesday, was just a rebranding of the squad.
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New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is expected to return to power in Saturday’s general election. Ardern has been praised globally for her response to the Christchurch mosque attacks in 2019 and the COVID-19 pandemic. But critics point to her coalition government’s failure to tackle child poverty.Jacinda Ardern is the type of leader New Zealand has never seen before. She has several million social media followers, and she won global acclaim for her sensitivity after a gunman murdered 51 people at two mosques in the city of Christchurch last year. Her swift response to the threat of COVID-19 has also attracted widespread praise.Ardern’s center-left Labour party came to power in 2017 even though it lost the election. Under New Zealand’s proportional representation voting system, it managed to put together a coalition with a small group of nationalist lawmakers and the Green party.Her main challenger in Saturday’s poll is a seasoned politician nicknamed “Crusher” Collins.When the leader of the conservative National Party, Judith Collins, was the police minister in a previous government, she supported a policy to crush the cars of repeat traffic offenders. She has clashed with Ardern during the campaign, calling the prime minister a “liar “over testing protocols for COVID-19 at New Zealand’s closed international borders.Political commentator Ben Thomas told Radio New Zealand that personal insults will not sway voters.“This kind off language does not come from a position of strength,” he said. “It is an attempt to provoke Ardern into responding to Collins, you know, putting a spotlight on a confrontation between those two leaders, and yet trying to make National seem a little bit more relevant in the dying days of an election that they certainly do not look on track to win.”Much of the campaign has been around New Zealand’s response to COVID-19. The government’s decision to close its international borders to foreign nationals in March, and a series of strict domestic lockdowns appear to have been well received by voters, although the virus has pushed the nation into recession.New Zealand has had about 1,800 coronavirus infections and 25 deaths.Analysts have said the pandemic has helped the Ardern government avoid greater scrutiny over its failures to reduce child poverty and build more affordable housing.The South Pacific nation adopted the German-style Mixed Member Proportional voting system in 1996. That has led to coalition governments ever since. Seven seats are reserved for Indigenous Maori candidates in the 120-seat national parliament.About 3.5 million people are expected to vote in Saturday’s poll.
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At least 30 people have been killed because of sudden torrential rains and flooding in southern India, officials said Thursday.
 
In Hyderabad city, home to top IT companies, nine people were killed when a wall collapsed on them and 10 others died from electrocution and drowning, a local official told AFP.
 
Dramatic images showed cars being washed away by swirling waters, bridges submerged by swollen rivers and trucks stranded on roads inundated by flooding Wednesday.
 
Eight members of a family, who were standing on their balcony to watch the rain, were also washed away due to sudden flooding in Hyderabad.  
 
Two of them were found dead and the search is on for the remaining six, the Times of India reported.  
 
Personnel from the army and the National Disaster Response Force have been deployed to evacuate stranded residents.
 
Weather officials blamed the sudden deluge on a depression in the Bay of Bengal.  
 
Telangana state is the hardest hit area but the flooding has also affected neighboring Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.
 
Flash floods kill hundreds of people across India every year, with experts blaming poor construction and warning systems for the fatalities.
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Fake news about the coronavirus can do real harm. Polygraph.info is spotlighting fact-checks from other reliable sources here​.Daily Debunk”Covid-19 and the economy: Kenya president’s maths doesn’t add up,” Africa Check, October 1.​Social Media DisinfoRapplerCirculating on social media: Infographic claiming that the correct way to wear a mask is with the white side facing outwards if you are healthy, and with the blue side facing outwards if you are sick.Verdict: FalseRead the full story at: Rappler Factual Reads on CoronavirusWatch: Understanding dexamethasone, the steroid used to treat Trump’s Covid-19
It is inexpensive and widely prescribed. But side effects of dexamethasone can be quite serious.
— Stat, October 12Eight Persistent COVID-19 Myths and Why People Believe Them
From a human-made virus to vaccine conspiracy theories, we rounded up the most insidious false claims about the pandemic
— Scientific American, October 12
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The former owner of a Mexico City private school who was convicted of manslaughter last month in the deaths of 26 people during a 7.1-magnitude earthquake was sentenced to 31 years in prison.During Wednesday’s sentencing, the court ruled Mónica García Villegas, former owner and director of the Enrique Rébsamen School, acted carelessly by building an apartment for herself on the roof of the school building.The court deemed the extra weight was a factor in the building’s collapse during the September 19, 2017, earthquake that killed 19 children and seven adults.In addition to the prison sentence, Villegas was ordered to pay nearly $19,000 to each victim’s family and fined $5,800 for criminal negligence.The Mexico News Daily reports Villegas was arrested in May of last year in Mexico City on a tip from her brother who received a reward of just over $234,000 for leading authorities to her.
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This week, the U.S. Senate is holding confirmation hearings for U.S. Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett to fill the seat left empty by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who passed away last month. Supreme Court justices receive lifetime positions, and the battle to fill the seat has become a focus of the contest between President Donald Trump and his challenger, Joe Biden. Patsy Widakuswara reports.
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G-20 nations announced a six-month extension Wednesday to a debt suspension initiative for poor countries ravaged by the coronavirus pandemic, falling short of calls by the World Bank and campaigners for a full-year renewal.The 20 most industrialized nations pledged in April to suspend debt service from the world’s most vulnerable countries through the end of the year as they faced a sharp economic contraction caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.The initiative will now be extended until the end of June next year, G-20 finance ministers and central bankers said after a virtual meeting, as they also agreed on a “common framework” to individually deal with poor nations distressed by rising debt.”We have agreed to extend the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) by six months,” said Mohammed Al-Jadaan, the finance minister of Saudi Arabia, which is the current G-20 president.In its final statement after the meeting, the group said the DSSI could be further extended until the end of 2021 when the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank meet next spring “if the economic and financial situation requires” the move.”Given the scale of the COVID-19 crisis, the significant debt vulnerabilities and deteriorating outlook in many low-income countries, we recognize that debt treatments beyond the DSSI may be required on a case-by-case basis.”‘Bare minimum’The group pledged to publish the common framework ahead of the G-20 leaders’ summit in November.The agreement on the framework marks a leap for China, a major creditor to poor countries that officials say has resisted attempts to write off debts.”The G-20 took an important step today, but it didn’t go far enough,” said Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, France director of the ONE campaign, an international nonprofit organization that advocates worldwide eradication of extreme poverty by 2030.”They could have extended the debt service standstill until the end of 2021, helping the world’s poorest countries combat this global pandemic,” she said. “They simply chose not to.”Campaigners warn of a looming debt crisis across poverty-wracked developing nations.The World Bank on Monday said the debt of the world’s 73 poorest countries grew 9.5% last year to a record $744 billion.The countries’ debt burden owed to government creditors, most of whom are G-20 states, reached $178 billion last year, and China is owed more 63% percent of that.”The tendency in past debt crises (was) for countries in debt distress to go through a series of ineffective debt reschedulings that leaves them weaker,” said World Bank President David Malpass.”Creditors may eventually allow them to get to a debt reduction process, but at a tremendous cost to the poor. We need to work better and faster this time.”U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also pushed for more help for poor nations and signaled American support for debt restructuring deals.The G-20 framework “will facilitate debt write-downs when needed,” Mnuchin said in a speech to the IMF and World Bank annual meetings.”In a number of countries, debtors and creditors will need to work together expeditiously to restructure debt, in particular to unlock much-needed IMF financing,” he said in the prepared statement.’Tsunami of debt’Amid the economic crisis, extending the DSSI was the “bare minimum” the G-20 could do, said Jaime Atienza of Oxfam International.”Despite the common framework announced — good news to deal with deep solvency problems but with details still unknown — the failure to cancel debt payments will only delay the tsunami of debt that will engulf many of the world’s poorest countries,” Atienza added.In April, the G-20 indicated about 70 countries would be eligible for the DSSI. But last month, the group said it had received only 46 applications from eligible countries across the world, most of them from Africa.The initiative has covered “a meager 1.66%” of debt payments due in 2020 by developing nations, according to the European Network on Debt and Development (Eurodad).”Of the 46 beneficiary countries, it has had very limited impact, due to the failure of private and multilateral lenders to participate,” Eurodad said in a report that likened the initiative to “draining out the Titanic with a bucket.”The G-20 announcement came a day after the IMF said the global economy would contract 4.4% in 2020, and the damage inflicted by the pandemic would be felt for years.Huge injections of government aid have kept economies from plunging further in 2020, but the continued presence of COVID-19 means the outlook is highly uncertain, the IMF said.
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President Donald Trump’s recovery from COVID-19 was made possible by a combination of medical treatments. Plugged In with Greta Van Susteren examines what experts have learned and how they have adapted treatments to help patients recover and keeping others healthy and safe. Joining Greta is infectious disease expert Dr. Monica Ghandi from USCF/San Francisco General Hospital and Dr. Joseph Allen, professor at Harvard University. Air date: October 14, 2020.
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Millions more Americans than usual have been working from home since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic earlier this year.Google said it will be at least July 2021 before workers will be back in the office. Twitter and Microsoft have announced staff may work remotely … forever.That is why some office workers are rethinking where to live. While some cities are big job centers, they come with a high cost of living that may no longer make sense for people working remotely.A growing number of these remote workers are striking out, and some are taking advantage of special programs being offered by cities across the U.S. that are luring them with cash incentives and other benefits.One of them is Stephanie Robesky.San Francisco to Tulsa, OklahomaRobesky, who works in the tech industry, was thinking about leaving San Francisco and searching for a different place to live when she read an article about Tulsa Remote – a program that is offering a $10,000 grant to eligible remote workers to move to and work in Tulsa, Oklahoma, about 2,700 kilometers (1,700 miles) from San Francisco.“It is not a place that I had ever visited,” says Robesky, “so I went on Google Maps and took a look at it and said ‘OK, that’s right smack dab in the center of the United States.”“I went and did the application online, and it all worked out and here I am!”Stephanie Robesky found a new life — and love, Chris Bouldin — since moving to Tulsa, Oklahoma in 2019, to participate in the Tulsa Remote program. (Courtesy – Stephanie Robesky)In addition to receiving $10,000 paid over the course of the first year, Robesky received other benefits, like help with housing and free co-working space.These kinds of programs may make sense for regions that have seen people leave for job meccas and have struggled to attract new residents, especially now with more companies allowing remote work, said Richard Florida, a professor at the University of Toronto and consultant to the George Kaiser Family Foundation, which pays for the Tulsa Remote program.“When you attract remote workers, you diversify your labor force,” he said. “It gives you a different kind of resiliency and the ability to weather bad things.”The arrival of COVID-19 has forced businesses – and cities – to adapt. That’s what communities have always done, said James Schrager, a clinical professor of entrepreneurship and strategy at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.“Going way back to the industrial revolution, cities and towns were changed dramatically with advances in technology,” he said. “What Tulsa is doing is that same game plan over again, with today’s technology shift of working from home, working remotely.”New friends, new house, new boyfriendBen Stewart, the interim executive director of the Tulsa Remote program, said the goal is to roll out the welcome mat for newcomers.“We believe that building out that community is the core of the program, and the core of our retention goal,” he said.More than 300 people have participated in the Tulsa Remote program since its inception in 2018. (Courtesy – Josh New)Since its inception in 2018, the Tulsa Remote program has seen more than 25,000 applications, which surged after the start of the pandemic.Just over 300 members have been accepted into the program with “hundreds more in the pipeline,” said Stewart.About 95% of participants have ended up staying in Tulsa beyond the life of the program, Stewart said.Robesky remembers thinking: “I’ll move to Tulsa, take the money, try it out.”Since arriving in 2019, she has made new friends, owns a house. And met her boyfriend Chris Bouldin.“I never anticipated that I would fall this deeply in love with this town,” she said.With many office workers saying they want to continue with remote work even after the pandemic, experts predict more people will be like Robesky, rethinking where and how they want to live. 
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A federal judge on Wednesday extended the deadline for registering to vote in the U.S. state of Virginia by 48 hours. The order came one day after an accidentally severed fiber optic cable at a field project site caused the state’s online portal to shut down on the last day of registration before the November 3 general election.U.S. District Judge John Gibney, in the state capital of Richmond, issued the order extending the deadline to make up for several hours of lost time. He said the disruption caused “a tremendous harm” to those who wanted to register.Gibney’s order came after voting rights activists filed a lawsuit seeking an extension, which was agreed to by Virginia officials, who were named as defendants.Virginia residents now have until 11:59 p.m. local time on Thursday to register online or in person.The state’s Department of Elections said in a statement six hours after the system was shut down that the registration portal was back online, but that did not stop voting advocates from noting the technological failure occurred on the registration deadline.  The lawsuit filed by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law said the state should also make a “significant effort” to inform the public about the extension.“Absent relief, voters who attempted to register to vote through the online portal on October 13, 2020, but were unable through no fault of their own, will be absolutely disenfranchised in the upcoming elections,” the suit said.Virginia Governor Ralph Northam told reporters Tuesday he supported a deadline extension. Northam also said the state did not have a backup plan for the severed cable but that the disruption highlighted the need for the state to continue efforts to develop a secure network.The disruption occurred as three tight congressional races are under way in Virginia, the outcomes of which could affect the makeup of the U.S. House of Representatives.Democratic freshmen Representatives Abigail Spanberger and Elaine Luria are locked in close races in the state’s 7th District and 2nd District, respectively. Republican Bob Good and Democrat Cameron Webb are vying for the open 5th District seat.In 2016, an undetermined number of Virginia residents were unable to meet the voter registration deadline because of unprecedented demand. A federal judge granted a brief extension of the deadline after a lawsuit filed by the New Virginia Majority Education Fund.The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, which filed the 2016 lawsuit on behalf of the fund, swiftly denounced Tuesday’s disruption, saying Virginia election officials “have again failed the public.”
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China’s economic rise and its greater assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific is setting off alarms in Washington, already rattled by the devastating consequences from COVID-19 — the virus that came from Wuhan. As the two countries navigate their evolving and tense relationship, some analysts are looking back at how American policy toward China failed and what that means for the future.  VOA’s Jela de Franceschi speaks with two influential American military strategists for what to expect next. Mary Alice Salinas narrates.Producer: Marcus Harton 
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U.S. Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett returns to the U.S. Capitol Wednesday for more questioning after a nearly 12-hour session Tuesday in which she declined to answer a range of questions from senators on how she might rule on legal disputes she would face if confirmed to fill a crucial vacancy on the country’s highest courtBarrett told members of the Senate Judiciary Committee conducting her confirmation hearing that she wouldn’t let her personal and religious views determine how she would decide cases.  “I have no agenda,” Barrett said. “I’ll follow the law.” Abortion, gun ownership
Barrett, in initial queries from two Republicans, the panel chairman, Sen. Lindsey Graham, and Sen. Chuck Grassley, and two Democrats, Sens. Dianne Feinstein and Patrick Leahy, declined to say how she might rule on the court’s 1973 legalization of abortions in the United States, gun ownership rights sanctioned by the U.S. Constitution and whether, in a case to be heard by the court next month, the country’s national health care law should remain in effect. She also rebuffed a question on whether she would recuse herself, if she is quickly confirmed by the Senate, from considering any legal disputes arising from the Nov. 3 national election. President Donald Trump, who nominated Barrett, is trying to win a second four-year term in the White House and faces Democratic former Vice President Joe Biden. Trump has assailed mass balloting by mail and said he wants the court to help decide the election. The president, trailing Biden in national polls, says he wants Barrett confirmed to avoid a 4-4 stalemate on contested election issues. Barrett said she has had no conversations with Trump or his staff “on how I would rule” on election disputes. She said it would have been unethical for her as a sitting federal appellate court judge to have such a discussion.  Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
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The 48-year-old Barrett is a favorite of U.S. conservatives looking to give the court a decided 6-3 conservative majority. She has cited the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, for whom she served as a law clerk two decades ago, as her philosophical mentor, for his strict interpretation of the U.S. Constitution as written two centuries ago rather than reinterpreting it to address current life in the U.S.   Barrett said that if she is confirmed as the fifth woman ever to serve on the court, “You would be getting a Justice Barrett, not a Justice Scalia.”         If confirmed, Barrett would replace the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, a liberal icon who died last month at 87. Democratic critics fear that Barrett would vote to undo many of the reforms championed by Ginsburg, including abortion rights and the right for gays to marry and be treated equally in American society.  Graham called Barrett’s selection “one of the greatest picks President Trump could make.” He predicted Monday that the committee’s 12 Republicans will all vote in favor of Barrett’s nomination with all 10 Democrats opposed. Republican leaders say they have enough votes in the full Senate to confirm her nomination. Barrett assured Graham that despite her family owning a gun, she could fairly “decide such a case” calling for tighter restrictions on gun ownership sanctioned by the Constitution’s Second Amendment.  Barrett said that even as the court has ruled that Americans have a personal right to own a gun, the ruling “leaves room for gun regulation. I promise I would come to that with an open mind. Any issue should be decided by the facts of the case.”  Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) questions U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Amy Coney Barrett about her position on court cases involving LGBT rights.Religious beliefs Similarly, Barrett said as an appellate court judge she has set aside her devout Catholic beliefs to issue rulings according to U.S. law and could do so again on the Supreme Court.  But she made no promises on how she might rule on abortion, which the Catholic Church opposes.   She said high court precedent from long ago rulings is “presumptively controlling,” and that some decisions fall into the “super precedent” category, such as the 1954 decision banning school segregation by races as unequal treatment of Blacks and unconstitutional.  Scalia dissented against abortion rights, but Barrett declined to say whether she also thinks the legality of abortion was wrongly decided. “It would be wrong for me as a sitting judge to say,” Barrett told Feinstein. “I have to decide cases as they come before me. I can’t pre-commit to judge a case in any way. I’ll follow the law.”  At another point in Tuesday’s questioning, Barrett told Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar, “I’m 100% committed to judicial independence.”  But Klobuchar said she fears that a Justice Barrett “would be the polar opposite” of Ginsburg in the way she votes on key cases. “That’s what concerns me,” Klobuchar said.  Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) attends the second day of the U.S. Supreme Court nominee Judge Amy Coney Barrett’s confirmation hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C., Oct. 13, 2020.Initial vote planned for Thursday
Graham plans to call for an initial committee vote for Thursday on Barrett’s nomination.  That would allow for final approval late next week and a vote by the full Republican-majority Senate before the end of the month, just days ahead of the presidential and congressional elections.
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Australia is trying to clarify reports of a Chinese ban on its coal imports. Industry sources have said Beijing told energy providers and steel firms to stop buying Australian coal. Trade tensions between the Asia-Pacific partners have deteriorated in recent years. Coal is one of the major Australian commodity exports to China, behind iron ore and liquefied natural gas.  So, any disruption to this multi-billion trade would hurt.  State-owned energy providers and steel mills in China have reportedly been told not to buy Australian coal.  Australian officials believe it could be temporary and part of informal quotas in China, or an attempt to restrict imports to protect China’s domestic coal mining industry. However, analysts have speculated that the reported ban on Australian coal could be part of an emerging trade war.     Earlier this year, China was infuriated when Canberra called for a global investigation into COVID-19, which was first detected in the Chinese city of Wuhan. Relations have also soured over allegations of Chinese interference in Australia’s domestic politics, cyber-espionage and the detention of Australian citizens in China. Beijing has accused Australia of being “anti-China.” Australian Trade Minister Simon Birmingham says he has not confirmed that coal exports to China are being disrupted. “We have also been working to seek a response from Chinese authorities in relation to the accusations that have been made publicly. But we take the reports seriously enough to certainly to try to seek some assurances from Chinese authorities that they are honoring the terms of the China-Australia free trade agreement,” Birmingham said.Earlier this year, Beijing effectively banned imports of Australian barley, placed restrictions on meat, and discouraged students and others from traveling to Australia.  In August, China said it had launched an anti-dumping investigation into Australian wine imports. China is Australia’s biggest trading partner. Australia owes its recent prosperity in large part to Chinese demand for iron ore and other resources.  Given this economic reality, standing up to Beijing isn’t easy. 
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As coronavirus infections surged in Malaysia this year, a wave of hate speech and misinformation aimed at Rohingya Muslim refugees from Myanmar began appearing on Facebook.   Alarmed rights groups reported the material to Facebook. But six months later, many posts targeting the Rohingya in Malaysia remain on the platform, including pages such as “Anti Rohingya Club” and “Foreigners Mar Malaysia’s Image,” although those two pages were removed after Reuters flagged them to Facebook recently.   Comments still online in one private group with nearly 100,000 members included “Hope they all die, this cursed pig ethnic group.”   Facebook acknowledged in 2018 that its platform was used to incite violence against the Rohingya in Myanmar, and last year spent more than $3.7 billion on safety and security on its platform. But the surge of anti-Rohingya comment in Malaysia shows how xenophobic speech nonetheless persists.   “Assertions that Facebook is uncommitted to addressing safety and security are inaccurate and do not reflect the significant investment we’ve made to address harmful content on our platform,” a company spokeswoman told Reuters.   Reuters found more than three dozen pages and groups, including accounts run by former and serving Malaysian security officials, that featured discriminatory language about Rohingya refugees and undocumented migrants.   Dozens of comments encouraged violence.   Reuters found some of the strongest comments in closed private groups, which people have to ask to join. Such groups have been a hotbed for hate speech and misinformation in other parts of the world. Facebook removed 12 of the 36 pages and groups flagged by Reuters, and several posts. Five other pages with anti-migrant content seen by Reuters in the last month were removed before Reuters queries.   “We do not allow people to post hate speech or threats of violence on Facebook and we will remove this content as soon as we become aware of it,” Facebook said. Some of the pages that remain online contain comments comparing Rohingya to dogs and parasites. Some disclosed where Rohingya had been spotted and encouraged authorities and the public to take action against them. Widespread hate speech   “This kind of hate speech can lead to physical violence and persecution of a whole group. We saw this in Myanmar,” said John Quinley, senior human rights specialist at Fortify Rights, an independent group focused on Southeast Asia.   “It would be irresponsible to not actively take down anti-refugee and anti-Rohingya Facebook groups and pages.”   Muslim-majority Malaysia was long friendly to the Rohingya, a minority fleeing persecution in largely Buddhist Myanmar, and more than 100,000 Rohingya refugees live in Malaysia, even though it doesn’t officially recognize them as refugees. But sentiment turned in April, with the Rohingya being accused of spreading the coronavirus. Hate speech circulated widely, including on Facebook – a platform used by nearly 70% of Malaysia’s 32 million people.   Rights groups and refugees said comments on Facebook helped escalate xenophobia in Malaysia.   “Malaysians who have lived with Rohingya refugees for years have started calling the cops on us, some have lost jobs. We are in fear all the time,” said Abu, a Rohingya refugee who did not want to give his full name fearing repercussions. Another refugee who declined to be identified said he deactivated his Facebook account after his details were posted and Malaysians messaged him telling him to go back to Myanmar – from where he fled five years ago. “Facebook has failed, they don’t understand how dangerous such comments can be,” he said, referring to posts he had seen supporting action in Myanmar against Rohingya.   ‘Absent’ Rights groups said the government of Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin had failed to do enough to curb xenophobia as it rounded up thousands of undocumented migrants and said it would no longer accept Rohingya refugees.   “The Malaysian government was completely absent from any sort of effort to try to curtail this wave of hate speech,” said Human Rights Watch deputy Asia director Phil Robertson. Muhyiddin’s office did not respond to requests for comment.   Reuters found four pages with links to security and enforcement agencies voicing anti-immigrant sentiment. “Let us not suffer the cancer of this ethnic (group),” administrators of a group called “Friends of Immigration” posted. The group says it is run by current and former immigration officials. That post from April was removed this month after Reuters queries to Facebook. The immigration department did not respond to Reuters queries. The communications and home ministries also did not respond to queries on hate speech in social media.   Among the earliest posts to draw comments calling for Rohingya to be shot was one from the Malaysian Armed Forces Headquarters asking the public to be its “ears and eyes” and report undocumented migrants. A military spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the page.   Another post that was shared more than 26,000 times was from a page calling itself the Military Royal Intelligence Corps that said undocumented migrants “will bring problems to all of us.”   Reuters was unable to contact the administrator of the page. The military said it had nothing to do with the page and it was run by a former member of the intelligence unit.   Facebook removed both posts after Reuters queries. The Intelligence Corps page was also taken down. 
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