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Years of conflict in Syria created millions of refugees in one of the world’s worst ongoing humanitarian crises.  Refugees live in crowded camps with limited access to food or land to grow crops.  VOA’s Arash Arabasadi reports on a camp in Jordan where experts teach Syrian refugees how to farm in tight spaces.Produced by: Arash Arabasadi
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Partial list of nominees for the annual prime-time Emmy Awards, announced Tuesday by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences. For the complete list, visit Emmys.com: Comedy series: “Curb Your Enthusiasm”; Dead to Me”; “The Good Place”; “Insecure”; “The Kominsky Method”; “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; “Schitt’s Creek”: “What We Do in the Shadows.” Actor, comedy series: Anthony Anderson, “black-ish”; Don Cheadle, “Black Monday”; Ted Danson, “The Good Place”; Michael Douglas, “The Kominsky Method”; Eugene Levy, “Schitt’s Creek”; Ramy Youssef, “Ramy.” Actress, comedy series: Christina Applegate, “Dead to Me;” Rachel Brosnahan, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel;” Linda Cardellini, “Dead to Me;” Catherine O’Hara, “Schitt’s Creek;” Issa Rae, “Insecure;” Tracee Ellis Ross, “black-ish.” Supporting actress, comedy: Yvonne Orji, “Insecure”; Alex Borstein, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Betty Gilpin, “GLOW”; Marin Hinkle, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Kate McKinnon, “Saturday Night Live”; Cecily Strong, “Saturday Night Live”; D’Arcy Carden, “The Good Place;” Annie Murphy, “Schitt’s Creek.” Supporting actor, comedy: Mahershala Ali, “Ramy”; Alan Arkin, “The Kominsky Method”; Sterling K. Brown, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Daniel Levy, “Schitt’s Creek”; Tony Shalhoub, “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”; Kenan Thompson, “Saturday Night Live”; William Jackson, “The Good Place”; Andre Braugher, “Brooklyn Nine-Nine.” Drama series: “Better Call Saul”; “The Crown”; “Killing Eve”; “The Handmaid’s Tale”; “The Mandalorian”; “Ozark”; “Stranger Things”; “Succession.” Actor, drama series: Jason Bateman, “Ozark”; Sterling K. Brown, “This is Us”; Billy Porter, “Pose”; Jeremy Strong, “Succession”; Brian Cox, “Succession”; Steve Carell, “The Morning Show.” Actress, drama series: Jennifer Aniston, “The Morning Show”; Olivia Colman, “The Crown”; Jodie Comer, “Killing Eve”; Laura Linney, “Ozark”; Sandra Oh, “Killing Eve”; Zendaya, “Euphoria.” Supporting actor, drama series: Kieran Culkin, “Succession”; Billy Crudup, “The Morning Show”; Giancarlo Esposito, “Better Call Saul”; Bradley Whitford, “The Handmaid’s Tale”; Mark Duplass, “The Morning Show”; Nicholas Braun, “Succession”; Matthew Macfadyen, “Succession”; Jeffery Wright, “Westworld.” Supporting actress, drama series: Helena Bonham Carter, “The Crown”; Laura Dern, “Big Little Lies”; Julia Garner, “Ozark”; Thandie Newton, “Westworld”; Fiona Shaw, “Killing Eve”; Sarah Snook, “Succession”; Meryl Streep, “Big Little Lies”; Samira Wiley, “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Limited series: “Little Fires Everywhere”; “Mrs. America”; “Unbelievable”; “Unorthodox”; “Watchmen.” 
 
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Everyone attending the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee next month will have to wear a face mask, consent to daily testing for COVID-19, fill out questionnaires and maintain a physical distance from others.Organizers of the convention released details of the coronavirus safety plan Monday, three weeks before the Aug. 17 start of the four-day event. The convention has been scaled down from original plans and now will be mostly online with only a few hundred people gathered at the Wisconsin Center in downtown Milwaukee.Attendees will have to self-isolate for a minimum of 72 hours before departing for Milwaukee or when first entering the convention’s main venue if they’re already in the city. Once at the convention, attendees must fill out a daily questionnaire indicating that they are not experiencing symptoms of COVID-19 and have not had contact with anyone who is infected.All convention guests, law enforcement, media, and staff must agree to daily COVID-19 testing, either at the Wisconsin Center or another offsite location. They must also agree to follow any other “reasonable restrictions that convention organizers may impose based on changing health conditions.”While presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden and everyone else will be required to wear a mask once inside, anyone making a speech will be allowed to remove theirs. The podium will be 20 feet from other people. Organizers are also encouraging attendees to wear a face shield or goggles to protect their eyes.Organizers are also recommending that attendees “avoid bars, restaurants, and other locations where social distancing is not possible or not practiced.””Ensuring the safety and well-being of everyone involved with the convention is our top priority,” said convention spokeswoman Katie Peters. “After consultation with public health officials, the Democratic National Convention Committee will implement robust health and safety protocols that will govern the convention’s in-person activities and keep attendees safe before and during the convention.”Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, a Democrat, called the safety protocols “thoughtful and thorough.””While it is important to protect every person attending the convention, it is also important to protect the entire Milwaukee community,” Barrett said. “These protocols establish reasonable requirements in order to prevent additional COVID-19 infections in Milwaukee.”Confirmed cases of COVID-19 have spiked in Wisconsin since mid-June, with roughly a third of the state’s 49,417 cases in Milwaukee County and nearly half of the state’s 893 deaths there. A city ordinance requires masks to be worn when in a building that is open to the public or outside in a public space and within 6 feet of any other person who is not a household or family member. 
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President Donald Trump’s lawyers filed fresh arguments Monday to try to block a criminal subpoena for his tax records, saying it was issued in bad faith, might have been politically motivated and calling it a harassment of the president. Lawyers filed a rewritten lawsuit in Manhattan federal court to challenge the subpoena by a state prosecutor on grounds they believe conform with how the U.S. Supreme Court said the subpoena can be contested. They asked a judge to declare it “invalid and unenforceable.” FILE – Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., responds to a question during a news conference in New York, May 10, 2018.The high court ruled earlier this month that Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. could subpoena tax records from Trump’s accountant over his objections. But the court said Trump could challenge the subpoena as improper just as anyone else can. Trump’s lawyers had argued that the president could not be criminally investigated while he was in office. In their new court papers, Trump’s lawyers said the subpoena of his tax records was “wildly overbroad” and “amounts to harassment of the President.” They said it was issued in bad faith, copying a Congressional subpoena. “Whether the District Attorney photocopied a congressional subpoena for political reasons, for efficiency reasons, or for both, he knowingly and intentionally issued a wildly overbroad subpoena for the President’s records,” the lawyers said. They said the subpoena seeks detailed information about all of Trump’s assets in the U.S. and abroad for a 10-year period. “Simply put, it asks for everything,” the lawyers wrote. FILE – This combination photo shows, from left, President Donald Trump, attorney Michael Cohen and adult film actress Stormy Daniels.Vance sought the tax records in part for a probe of how Trump’s then-personal lawyer arranged during the 2016 presidential race to keep the porn actress Stormy Daniels and model Karen McDougal from airing claims of extramarital affairs with Trump. Trump has denied the affairs. Vance, a Democrat, has requested eight years of the Republican president’s personal and corporate tax records. Danny Frost, a spokesperson for Vance, declined comment Monday. The Supreme Court had returned the case to a federal judge in Manhattan who has arranged for both sides to finish filing their legal arguments over challenges to the subpoena by mid-August. Last year, the same judge ruled against Trump in a written opinion that was upheld by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals and the Supreme Court. In their new court filing, Trump’s lawyers said the tax subpoena “demands voluminous documents related to every facet of the business and financial affairs of the President and numerous associated entities — from the banal to the complex, from drafts and memoranda to formal records, from source documents to summaries.” They said it was wrong for Vance to seek records dating to 2011 when he was primarily investigating events that took place in 2016. The lawsuit said the subpoena concerns entities in California, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, New Jersey, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and the District of Columbia. It said other affected entities are located outside the U.S., including in Canada, the Dominican Republic, Dubai, India, Indonesia, Ireland, the Philippines, Scotland, and Turkey. “Taken together, the subpoena demands an accounting and analysis of every single asset and liability of the President, including each one of the listed entities,” the lawyers wrote, calling the request “an overreaching demand designed to pick apart the President.”  
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The mayors of Portland, Oregon, and five other major U.S. cities appealed Monday to Congress to make it illegal for the federal government to deploy militarized agents to cities that don’t want them.  
“This administration’s egregious use of federal force on cities over the objections of local authorities should never happen,” the mayors of Portland, Seattle, Chicago, Kansas City, Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Washington wrote to leaders of the U.S. House and Senate.
Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler and City Commissioner Jo Ann Hardesty late called for a meeting with Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf to discuss a cease-fire and removal of heightened federal forces from Portland.
Earlier in the day, a U.S. official said militarized officers would remain in Portland until attacks on a federal courthouse cease — and more officers may soon be on the way.
“It is not a solution to tell federal officers to leave when there continues to be attacks on federal property and personnel,” U.S. Attorney Billy Williams said. “We are not leaving the building unprotected to be destroyed by people intent on doing so.”  
Local and state officials said the federal officers are unwelcome.  
The city has had nightly protests for two months since the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis in May. President Donald Trump said he sent federal agents to Portland to halt the unrest, but state and local officials said they are making the situation worse.
Trump’s deployment of the federal officers over the July 4 weekend stoked the Black Lives Matter movement. The number of nightly protesters had dwindled to perhaps less than 100 right before the deployment, and now has swelled to the thousands.Federal officers launch tear gas at a group of demonstrators during a Black Lives Matter protest at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse in Portland, Oregon, July 26, 2020.Early Monday, U.S. agents repeatedly fired tear gas, flash bangs and pepper balls at protesters outside the federal courthouse in downtown Portland. Some protesters had climbed over the fence surrounding the courthouse, while others shot fireworks, banged on the fence and projected lights on the building.
Trump said on Twitter that federal properties in Portland “wouldn’t last a day” without the presence of the federal agents.
The majority of people participating in the daily demonstrations have been peaceful. But a few have been pelting officers with objects and trying to tear down fencing protecting the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse.
Williams, whose office is inside the courthouse, called on peaceful protesters, community and business leaders and people of faith to not allow violence to occur in their presence and to leave downtown before violence starts. He said federal agents have made 83 arrests.
Demonstrations in support of racial justice and police reform in other cities around the U.S. were marred by violence over the weekend. Protesters set fire to an Oakland, California, courthouse; vehicles were set ablaze in Richmond, Virginia; an armed protester was shot and killed in Austin, Texas; and two people were shot and wounded in Aurora, Colorado, after a car drove through a protest.
The U.S. Marshals Service has lined up about 100 people they could send to hot spots, either to strengthen forces or relieve officers who have been working for weeks, agency spokesperson Drew Wade said.
Kris Cline, principal deputy director of Federal Protective Service, said an incident commander in Portland and teams from the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice discuss what force is needed every night.
Cline refused to discuss the number of officers currently present or if more would be arriving.
Some protesters have accused Wheeler of hypocrisy for speaking out against the federal presence because, under his watch, Portland police have used tear gas and other riot-control weapons on protesters, including peaceful ones.
Cline said Portland police should take over the job of dispersing protesters from the courthouse area from the federal officers.
“If the Portland Police Bureau were able to do what they typically do, they would be able to clear this out for this disturbance and we would leave our officers inside the building and not be visible,” Cline said.
He said relations between the federal officers, some of whom live in Portland, and city police were good.
Portland police responded Sunday evening to a shooting at a park close to the site of the protests. Two people were detained and later released, police said. The person who was shot went to the hospital in a private vehicle and was treated for a non-life-threatening wound.
Also late Sunday, police said someone pointed out a bag in the same park, where officers found loaded rifle magazines and Molotov cocktails. The shooting was not related to the items, police said. 
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The coronavirus pandemic has forced small businesses around the world to come up with new ways to cope with the new reality – including using technology to stay afloat.   VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo reports.
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U.S. Attorney General William Barr is set to testify Tuesday before the House Judiciary Committee where lawmakers are expected to ask him about a range of topics involving the Trump administration, including the deployment of federal officers in response to protests in the northwestern city of Portland, Oregon. Text of Barr’s opening statement released ahead of the hearing says the late May death of George Floyd in police custody was a “horrible” event that sparked a necessary examination of the relationship between law enforcement and African Americans in the United States. But Barr says the ongoing protests in Portland and elsewhere have become disconnected from Floyd’s death. “Largely absent from these scenes of destruction are even superficial attempts by the rioters to connect their actions to George Floyd’s death or any legitimate call for reform,” Barr says. He reiterates Trump administration criticisms of local leaders, many of whom have offered their own rejections of the federal government’s responses and called for Congress to block deployments of federal forces in their cities.A bloodied demonstrator is arrested by federal police during a Black Lives Matter protest at the Mark O. Hatfield United States Courthouse, July 27, 2020, in Portland, Ore.“As elected officials of the federal government, every Member of this Committee – regardless of your political views or your feelings about the Trump Administration – should condemn violence against federal officers and destruction of federal property,” Barr says. “So should state and local leaders who have a responsibility to keep their communities safe. To tacitly condone destruction and anarchy is to abandon the basic rule-of-law principles that should unite us even in a politically divisive time.” There have been clashes between protesters and federal forces in Portland, with the situation there escalating in the days following accusations the federal officers were hauling people away from the demonstration area without probable cause.  Federal officials have defended the deployments as necessary to defend federal property such as the courthouse in the city. Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said Monday in sharing a letter from a group of mayors asking Congress to act to restrain the use of federal forces that “the actions taken in recent weeks have no place in this nation.” “We demand that federal troops be removed from our cities and encourage Congress’ continued vigilance and action to pass legislation in both chambers to end this dangerous overreach,” Wheeler tweeted.  “This Administration has shown no hesitation or remorse in playing the most toxic and damaging form of politics with the lives and livelihoods of the American people. We say no more. We say unequivocally Black Lives Matter.” Lawmakers could also ask Barr about another instance of clashes between federal officers and protesters that took place June 1 in Lafayette Square, just across from the White House.  The officers drove the protesters from the park with smoke bombs and pepper balls, shortly before Trump, accompanied by Barr and others, walked to a nearby church to pose in front of cameras. That incident is the subject of another hearing Tuesday on Capitol Hill in front of the House Natural Resources Committee. Adam DeMarco, a major in the District of Columbia National Guard, says in his prepared opening remarks to the committee that what he witnessed at the site was “deeply disturbing” to both himself and fellow National Guard members. “Having served in a combat zone, and understanding how to  assess threat environments, at no time did I feel threatened by the protestors or assess them to be violent,” DeMarco says.  “In addition, considering the principles of proportionality of force and the fundamental strategy of graduated responses specific to civil disturbance operations, it was my observation that the use of force against demonstrators in the clearing operation was an unnecessary escalation of the use of force.” DeMarco further says those protesting were fellow Americans peacefully expressing their rights, and that they were subject to “an unprovoked escalation and excessive use of force.” Acting U.S. Park Police Chief Gregory Monahan is set to give a different perspective of the events, saying in his prepared testimony that during demonstrations at the park from May 29 to June 1, protesters threw “bricks, rocks, caustic liquids, water bottles, lit flares, fireworks” and pieces of wood at law enforcement officers. “The unprecedented and sustained nature of the violence and destruction associated with some of the activities in Lafayette Park and surrounding park areas immediate and adjacent to the White House required de-escalation,” Monahan says.  “On the whole, the United States Park Police acted with tremendous restraint in the face of severe violence from a large group of bad actors who caused 50 of my officers to seek medical attention. Our actions as an agency on June 1 centered around public safety and the safety of my officers.” 
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