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Canada’s Foreign Minister François-Philippe Champagne said the flight data recorders from a Ukrainian passenger plane downed by an Iranian missile are in Paris where they are expected to be taken to France’s Civil Aviation Safety Investigation Authority for analysis Monday. Champagne said on Twitter that officials from Canada’s Transportation Safety Board will be present for the investigation. Most of the 176 people on board the plane were Canadian citizens or residents, or were traveling to Canada.People gather for a candlelight vigil to honor the victims of the Ukraine plane crash, at the gate of Amrikabir University, where some of the victims were former students, in Tehran, Iran, Jan. 11, 2020.Iran says its military accidentally shot down the Ukraine Airlines plane in January, shortly after it took off from Tehran’s airport, mistaking it for an incoming missile. The incident happened during a time of heightened tensions between Iran and the United States, just after Iran had launched missiles at several bases in Iraq in response to the U.S. killing of top Iranian general Qassim Soleimani. Canada, Ukraine and other nations whose nationals were on board the plane have demanded a thorough investigation, and the analysis of the so-called black box recorders recovered from the wreckage has been the subject of negotiation. The plane was manufactured by Boeing, a U.S. company, and due to U.S. sanctions on Iran the United States rejected sending Iran a piece of equipment needed to recover the data from the recorders. 
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Democratic Party leaders in the U.S. state of Georgia are gathering Monday to select a candidate to replace the late Congressman John Lewis in the November general election. A spokeswoman said 131 people applied by the Sunday evening deadline to be considered. A nominating committee will select between three and five finalists, and then a committee of 44 party figures will vote on the final candidate. The Democrat chosen will go up against Republican Angela Stanton-King in November. Lewis served 17 terms in Congress, and in 2016, the last time he faced a Republican challenger in his district, he won with 84% of the vote.FILE – This Jan. 3, 2019 file photo shows Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., during a swearing-in ceremony of Congressional Black Caucus members of the 116th Congress in Washington.Georgia’s governor has the power to call a special election to fill out the remaining months of Lewis’ current term. Lewis, a prominent champion of civil rights for African Americans, died Friday at the age of 80 after a yearlong battle with advanced stage pancreatic cancer. He rose to fame as a leader in the modern-day American civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s. At age 23, he worked closely with the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and was the last surviving keynote speaker from the August 1963 March on Washington, where King gave his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. 
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Astrophysicists on Monday published the largest-ever 3D map of the Universe, the result of an analysis of more than 4 million galaxies and ultra-bright, energy-packed quasars.The efforts of hundreds of scientists from about 30 institutions worldwide have yielded a “complete story of the expansion of the universe,” said Will Percival of the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada.In the project launched more than two decades ago, the researchers made “the most accurate expansion history measurements over the widest-ever range of cosmic time,” he said in a statement.The map relies on the latest observations of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), titled the “extended Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey” (eBOSS), with data collected from an optical telescope in New Mexico over six years.The infant universe following the big bang is relatively well known through extensive theoretical models and observation of cosmic microwave background — the electromagnetic radiation of the nascent cosmos.Studies of galaxies and distance measurements also contributed to a better understanding of the Universe’s expansion over billions of years.’Troublesome gap’But Kyle Dawson of the University of Utah, who unveiled the map Monday, said the researchers tackled a “troublesome gap in the middle 11 billion years.”Through “five years of continuous observations, we have worked to fill in that gap, and we are using that information to provide some of the most substantial advances in cosmology in the last decade,” he said.Astrophysicist Jean-Paul Kneib of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne, who initiated eBOSS in 2012, said the goal was to produce “the most complete 3D map of the universe throughout the lifetime of the universe.”For the first time, the researchers drew on “celestial objects that indicate the distribution of matter in the distant Universe, galaxies that actively form stars and quasars.”The map shows filaments of matter and voids that more precisely define the structure of the universe since its beginnings, when it was only 380,000 years old.  For the part of the map relating to the universe 6 billion years ago, researchers observed the oldest and reddest galaxies.For more distant eras, they concentrated on the youngest galaxies — the blue ones. To go back even further, they used quasars, galaxies whose supermassive black hole is extremely luminous.The map reveals that the expansion of the universe began to accelerate at some point and has since continued to do so.The researchers said this seems to be because of the presence of dark energy, an invisible element that fits into Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity but whose origin is not yet understood.Astrophysicists have known for years that the universe is expanding but have been unable to measure the rate of expansion with precision.Comparisons of the eBOSS observations with previous studies of the early universe have revealed discrepancies in estimates of the rate of expansion.The currently accepted rate, called the “Hubble constant,” is 10% slower than the value calculated from the distances between the galaxies closest to us.   
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Top Republicans in Congress were expecting to meet Monday with President Donald Trump on the next COVID-19 aid package as the administration panned more virus testing money and interjected other priorities that could complicate quick passage.Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was prepared to roll out the $1 trillion package in a matter of days. But divisions between the Senate GOP majority and the White House posed fresh challenges. Congress was returning to session this week as the coronavirus crisis many had hoped would have improved by now only worsened — and just as earlier federal emergency relief was expiring.Trump insisted again Sunday that the virus would “disappear,” but the president’s view did not at all match projections from the leading health professionals straining to halt the U.S.’s alarming caseloads and death toll.McConnell and House GOP leader Kevin McCarthy were set to meet with Trump and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin “to fine-tune” the legislation, acting chief of staff Mark Meadows said on Fox News.The package from McConnell had been quietly crafted behind closed doors for weeks and was expected to include $75 billion to help schools reopen, reduced unemployment benefits alongside a fresh round of direct $1,200 cash payments to Americans, and a sweeping five-year liability shield against coronavirus lawsuits.But as the White House weighed in, the administration was panning some $25 billion in proposed new funds for testing and tracing, said one Republican familiar with the discussions. The administration’s objections were first reported by The Washington Post.Trump was also reviving his push for a payroll tax break, which was being seriously considered, said another Republican. Both spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the private talks.The new push from the White House put the administration at odds with GOP allies in Congress, a disconnect that threatened to upend an already difficult legislative process. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi already passed Democrats’ vast $3 trillion proposal and virus cases and deaths had only increased since.FILE – Health care workers take information from people in line at a walk-up COVID-19 testing site during the coronavirus pandemic, in Miami Beach, Florida, July 17, 2020.Trump raised alarms on Capitol Hill when he suggested last month at a rally in Oklahoma that he wanted to slow virus testing. Some of Trump’s GOP allies wanted new money to help test and track the virus to contain its spread. Senate Democrats were investigating why the Trump administration had not yet spent some of $25 billion previously allocated for testing in an earlier aid bill.The payroll tax Trump wanted also divided his party. Senate Republicans in particular opposed the payroll tax break as an insufficient response to millions of out-of-work Americans, especially as they tried to keep the total price tag of the aid package at no more than $1 trillion.Trump said Sunday in the Fox News interview that he would consider not signing any bill unless it included the payroll tax break, which many GOP senators opposed.”I want to see it,” he said.Lawmakers were returning to a partially closed Capitol still off-limits to tourists to consider what will be a fifth COVID-19 aid package. After passing the $2.2 trillion relief bill in March, Republicans hoped the virus would ease and economy rebound so more aid would not be needed.But with COVID-19 cases hitting alarming new highs and the death roll rising, the pandemic’s devastating cycle was happening all over again, leaving Congress little choice but to engineer another costly rescue. Businesses were shutting down again, schools could not fully reopen and jobs were disappearing, all while federal emergency aid expired.”It’s not going to magically disappear,” said a somber McConnell, R-Ky., last week during a visit to a hospital in his home state to thank front-line workers.As McConnell prepared to roll out his $1 trillion-plus proposal, he acknowledged it would not have full support.The political stakes were high for all sides before the November election, but even more so for the nation, which now registered more coronavirus infections and a higher death count than any other country.Just as the pandemic’s ferocious cycle was starting again, the first round of aid was running out.A federal $600-a-week boost to regular unemployment benefits would expire at the end of the month. So, too, would the federal ban on evictions on millions of rental units.With 17 straight weeks of unemployment claims topping 1 million — usually about 200,000 — many households were facing a cash crunch and losing employer-backed health insurance coverage.Despite flickers of an economic upswing as states eased stay-at-home orders in May and June, the jobless rate remained at double digits, higher than it ever was in the last decade’s Great Recession.Pelosi’s bill, approved in May, included $75 billion for testing and tracing to try to get a handle on the virus spread, funneled $100 billion to schools to safely reopen and called for $1 trillion to be sent to cash-strapped states to pay essential workers and prevent layoffs. The measure would give cash stipends to Americans, and bolster rental and mortgage and other safety net protections.In the two months since Pelosi’s bill passed, the U.S. had 50,000 more deaths and 2 million more infections.”If we don’t invest the money now, it will be much worse,” Pelosi said. 
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The United States is calling on leaders in Afghanistan to conclude an ongoing prisoner swap and launch a peace dialogue with the Taliban insurgency without delay.In a series of tweets Sunday, acting U.S. ambassador to Kabul Ross Wilson also stressed the need for Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and his political rival-turned-coalition partner, Abdullah Abdullah, to implement a power-sharing deal which the two signed in May.“We urge this country’s leaders promptly to establish the new government, create the High Council for National Reconciliation, complete the exchange of prisoners, and move to the opening of intra-Afghan negotiations,” said the American charge d’affairs.
 
Under his power-sharing deal with Ghani, Abdullah has been appointed as the head of the High Council for National Reconciliation, which is tasked to lead a team of Afghan negotiators in still-unscheduled talks with the Taliban.
 
The proposed negotiations, however, hinge on the prisoner swap, in which Kabul is required to free 5,000 Taliban prisoners in return for around 1,000 Afghan security force captives held by the insurgent group.  
 
Afghan officials have said that about 4,400 prisoners have been freed. But the government has refused to release the last batch of around 600 inmates, describing them as “too dangerous” and insisting some foreign governments also want them to remain in jails.
 
“The Afghan people have made clear their impatience. Start intra-Afghan negotiations now so that discussions on a permanent and comprehensive ceasefire can begin,” said the ambassador, underscoring Washington’s apparent frustration at Kabul’s refusal to move forward with more prisoner releases.FILE – Afghanistan’s President Ashraf Ghani and his rival-turned-coalition-partner Abdullah Abdullah attend a ceremony to sign a political agreement in Kabul, Afghanistan, May 17, 2020.The prisoner exchange was agreed to in a landmark deal signed by Washington and the Taliban in February to end the nearly 19-year-old Afghan war, America’s longest.  
 
The Taliban says it has already released 845 Afghan security force captives from its custody and is working to free the remainder. However, insurgent officials have ruled out participation in peace talks until all 5,000 Taliban prisoners are set free.  
 
On Sunday, the Taliban criticized Kabul for “creating hurdles” in the way of intra-Afghan talks by not releasing the remaining prisoners. The insurgent group’s statement dismissed as “lame excuses” the claim by Afghan officials that foreign governments opposed the prisoner releases. It noted that the U.S.-Taliban agreement has been endorsed not only by the United Nations but also by a number of countries.
 
The completion of the prisoner exchange process was “one of the most fundamental issues” of the Afghan peace process, the Taliban said.
 
“If the Kabul administration officials truly seek intra-Afghan negotiations then they must execute their responsibilities related to completion of the prisoner exchange process,” the group said.
 
Under its deal with the Taliban, the Trump administration has committed to withdraw all American and allied troops from Afghanistan by July 2021.  
 
In return, the insurgents have pledged to prevent al-Qaida and other terrorist groups from using Afghan soil for international attacks, and promised to seek reconciliation with other Afghan groups through a dialogue process.  
 
The Taliban also pledged in its deal with the U.S. to cease all attacks on international forces in the country. But insurgent battlefield raids against Afghan security forces have spiked in recent weeks, killing scores of government personnel and civilians.  
 
The May 17 power-sharing deal gave Abdullah the right to appoint half of the cabinet. But the political situation in Kabul remains tense.
 
The Ghani-Abdullah deal grew out of last September’s fraud-marred presidential election, which both leaders claimed to have won. The two formed parallel governments in March before reaching the deal, mainly under pressure from the United States and other international partners of Afghanistan. 
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The Iranian judiciary has suspended the executions of three men linked to anti-government protests in November, one of their attorneys, Babak Paknia, said on Sunday. Rights activists had said the death sentences were aimed at intimidating future protesters. With hardship mounting because of U.S. sanctions and the coronavirus pandemic, Iran’s clerical rulers have been trying to prevent a revival of anti-government protests that took place in November last year, when hundreds are believed to have been killed in the worst street violence since the 1979 revolution. Photos received by VOA Persian, appearing to show Iranians staging an anti-government protest in the southwestern city of Behbahan on July 16, 2020.Last Thursday, security forces fired tear gas to disperse demonstrators in the southwestern city of Behbahan, witnesses said, who were protesting against the economic problems but also the death sentences against the three men. The Farsi hashtag “Don’t execute” was tweeted millions of times last week. In a rare acknowledgement of popular dissent, government spokesman Ali Rabiei wrote a commentary in Saturday’s Iran newspaper, saying that the tweets were “a civil action by citizens [trying] to be heard.”  
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Myanmar’s public marked one of the Southeast Asian nation’s darkest moments on Sunday with tributes to slain independence heroes, though the annual Martyrs’ Day gatherings were muted by the coronavirus pandemic due to social distancing measures.Flanked by senior government and military officials, state counselor Aung San Suu Kyi laid a wreath at a mausoleum dedicated to Aung San, her father and the country’s independence hero, who was assassinated alongside members of his cabinet on July 19, 1947.Crowds also laid flowers beside statues of Aung San, who remains a potent political force in the country, with his image used by his daughter and some of her rivals to garner support among a public that continues to revere him. The former ruling military junta for years curtailed use of his image for fear it would help the democracy movement that emerged in 1988 led by Suu Kyi.In the commercial capital of Yangon on Sunday, crowds queued to approach a statue of Aung San clutching portraits of the independence leader and his daughter, waiting on markers painted in the road to encourage people to keep a distance.”The Martyrs’ Day was once extinct, during the political crisis,” said Yin Yin Phyo Thu, as she laid flowers.”We young people are responsible for preserving the image of Martyrs’ Day not to fade away during COVID-19,” she said.Myanmar has reported 340 cases of COVID-19, the illness caused by the novel coronavirus.The country goes to the polls again in November in a vote that will serve as a test of the fledgling democracy.”We came here to pay respects and also to get ourselves politically motivated in 2020, the election year,” said Kyaw Swar, a university student. 
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As in the past several U.S. presidential election cycles, the outcome of the 2020 contest between Republican President Donald Trump and presumptive Democrat nominee Joe Biden depends on how a handful of states vote. VOA’s Steve Redisch explains the geography of America’s Electoral College.
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Police in Portland, Oregon, declared a riot late Saturday after protesters broke into the Portland Police Association building and started a fire.  The fire was quickly extinguished.Protesters also took down a fence just hours after it had been placed around the federal courthouse in Portland. The fence was put in place to “de-escalate” tensions between protesters and law enforcement officials, the U.S. Attorney’s office said on Twitter.There have been daily protests around the federal courthouse in Portland since May 25 when George Floyd, a Black man, died in Minneapolis after a white police officer held him down. Anti-racism protests quickly erupted in Minneapolis and spread to other U.S. cities, such as Portland, and to other countries.The speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, and Portland Congressman Earl Blumenauer issued a statement late Saturday criticized the actions of federal officials in detaining and teargassing protesters: “Last month, the Administration tear-gassed peaceful protesters in Washington, D.C.  Now, videos show them kidnapping protesters in unmarked cars in Portland – all with the goal of inflaming tensions for their own gain.  While Portland is the President’s current target, any city could be next.”A banner against the presence of federal law enforcement officers is pictured on a fire escape in downtown Portland, Oregon, July 17, 2020.The statement went on to say, “The House is committed to moving swiftly to curb these egregious abuses of power immediately.”The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Oregon on Friday called actions of federal officers against protesters in Portland “flat-out unconstitutional.”“What is happening now in Portland should concern everyone in the United States,” said Jann Carson, interim executive director of ACLU Oregon. “Usually when we see people in unmarked cars forcibly grab someone off the street, we call it kidnapping.”Homeland Security Acting Deputy Secretary Ken Cuccinelli speaking on NPR’s “All Things Considered” Friday said federal agents had used unmarked vehicles to pick up people in Portland. But he said it was done to keep officers safe and away from crowds and to move detainees to a “safe location for questioning.”Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said Friday he wants President Donald Trump to remove the militarized federal officers that have been deployed to the city. “Keep your troops in your own buildings, or have them leave our city,” Wheeler said following reports that the officers had apprehended people in Portland who were not on federal property.Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum has filed a lawsuit against the federal government for detaining people without probable cause. 
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Indian ship worker Tejasvi Duseja is desperate to go home after months stranded offshore by coronavirus border closures and lockdowns that have left more than 200,000 seafarers in limbo.From engineers on cargo ships to waiters on luxury cruise liners, ocean-based workers around the world have been caught up in what the United Nations warns is a growing humanitarian crisis that has been blamed for several suicides.Many have been trapped on vessels for months after their tours were supposed to end as travel restrictions disrupted normal crew rotations.”Mentally, I am just done with it… but I’m still holding up because I have no other option,” Duseja, 27, told AFP via WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger in late June as the Indian-owned cargo vessel he works on floated near Malaysia.Duseja, one of roughly 30,000 Indian workers unable to leave their ships, had extended his seven-month contract a few months before the pandemic struck.”The last time I stepped off from this 200-meter ship was in February,” he said.Seafarers typically work for six to eight months at a stretch before disembarking and flying back to their home countries, with new crews taking their place.But as the deadly virus whipped around the world and paralyzed international travel, that was suddenly impossible.Underscoring the growing urgency of the situation, more than a dozen countries at a UK-hosted International Maritime Summit this month vowed to recognize seafarers as “key workers” to help them get home.UncertaintyPhilippine luxury cruise ship technician Cherokee Capajo spent nearly four months on ships without setting foot on land due to virus shutdowns.The 31-year-old had barely heard of COVID-19 when he boarded the Carnival Ecstasy in Florida in late January.Soon, a number of Carnival-owned cruise ships were stricken with severe outbreaks — including the Diamond Princess in Japan.After the Ecstasy passengers disembarked in Jacksonville on March 14, Capajo and his colleagues were forced to stay on board for the next seven weeks.Finally, on May 2, the ship sailed to the Bahamas where Capajo says he and 1,200 crew members were transferred to another boat that took them to Jakarta before arriving in Manila Bay on June 29.He wanted to “kiss the ground” when he came ashore nearly two weeks later after finishing quarantine.”This could probably be the hardest part of my experience as a seaman because you are not sure what will happen every day,” Capajo told AFP via Facebook Messenger last week, as he endured a second quarantine near his hometown in the central Philippines.”You worry if you’ll ever come back home, how long will you be stuck on the ship. It’s difficult. It’s really sad.”Filipinos account for around a quarter of the world’s seafarers. About 80,000 of them are stranded because of the pandemic, according to Philippine authorities.Mental strainThe ordeal has taken a toll on the mental health of many seafarers, with reports of some taking their own lives.In one case, a Filipino worker died of “apparent self-harm” on the cruise ship Scarlet Lady as it anchored off Florida in May, according to the U.S. Coast Guard.Shipping industry groups have expressed their concerns about “suicide and self-harm” among workers in a joint letter to UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who said last month some seafarers have been “marooned at sea for 15 months.”An International Labour Organization (ILO) convention widely known as the Seafarers’ Bill of Rights limits a worker’s single tour of duty to less than 12 months.The strain is also being felt by families waiting at home.Priyamvada Basanth said she did not know when she would see her husband who has been at sea for eight months on a ship owned by a Hong Kong company.”The government is not even doing anything,” said Basanth, from the southern Indian port of Kochi. “I just want him to come home.”Lala Tolentino, who runs the Philippine office for a UK-based seafarers support group, said they had been swamped by “hundreds” of pleas for help from stranded workers since March.”They want to know what will happen to them, where they are going. Will they be able to get off their ships,” she told AFP.Many of those stuck onboard completed their tours more than four months ago and were exhausted, the ILO said last month.For Duseja, who comes from the northern Indian city of Dehradun at the foothills of the Himalayas, the end of his ordeal is in sight.”I’m still on the ship,” he told AFP in a WhatsApp message last week.”But mentally, I am feeling slightly better because I’ve been told that I’m finally getting off the ship mid-August.” 
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Paris Plages (Paris Beaches) opened this year with an outdoor movie showing on the banks of the River Seine, as the city is coping with the COVID-19 pandemic.MK2 Cinemas partnered with the city of Paris to organize this year’s event.”It’s been years, we’re creating operations to take the cinema out of the cinema rooms as a promotion tool, and after the few months of confinement, we thought we needed a way to tell to the people and to tell to the world that cinemas are open in Paris, that Paris is one of the worldwide capital of cinema, and also to create a way for them to enjoy with their families a magnificent night, said Elisha Karmitz, CEO of MK2 Cinemas.On Saturday people watched the 2018 French comedy “Le grand bain” from boats or on deck chairs on the Seine’s banks. Some said they felt safer at an open-air screening.”I already went back to the cinema once, wearing a mask, but I have to admit there is still some apprehension to go back to cinema,” said Luc Bouvier, an attendee. “But here, since it is an open-air screening, there are less doubts, we feel safer.”Paris Plages is an annual event held in July and August during which roads along the River Seine are closed to turn the waterfront into beach front.The event was initiated in 2002 by the newly elected Socialist Mayor of Paris Bertrand Delanoë, to help people cope with the hot summer in the city. 
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Protesters trying to topple a Christopher Columbus statue in downtown Chicago’s Grant Park clashed with police who used batons to beat people and made at least a dozen arrests after they say protesters targeted them with fireworks, rocks and other items.The clash Friday evening unfolded after at least 1,000 people tried to swarm the statue in a failed attempt to topple it following a rally in support of Black and Indigenous people.Police said 18 officers were injured and at least 12 people were arrested during the clash. Four protesters were also hurt during the confrontation, which led local elected officials and activists to condemn the officers’ tactics.”We unequivocally condemn Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s decision to send the Chicago police to beat, arrest, and terrorize the demonstrators and journalists gathered in Grant Park tonight,” a group of elected officials said in a statement released late Friday.The statement was signed by several members of the City Council, including Alderwoman Jeanette Taylor and Alderwoman Rossana Rodriguez Sanchez, and two members of the Legislature — state Rep. Delia Ramirez and state Sen. Robert Peters.Lightfoot said Saturday that she “will always fight for the rights of individuals to peacefully protest on any issue” but noted that “a portion of the protesters turned violent” during Friday’s protest.”A number of individuals came with frozen water bottles, rocks, bottles, cans and other gear to throw at officers. People in the crowd also threw fireworks and other incendiary devices at police, causing injury in several cases. These violent acts are unacceptable and put everyone at risk,” she said in a statement.The mayor said reports of excessive force by officers during their response to the protest “are also unacceptable” and urged anyone who believes they were mistreated by police to file a complaint with the city’s Civilian Office of Police Accountability, or by dialing 311.Local news site Block Club Chicago reported that one protester, an 18-year-old woman, had several of her front teeth knocked out when an officer punched her. It also shared a video of that assault and a photo of the woman’s bloodied mouth and missing teeth. It identified her as Miracle Boyd, a member of the anti-gun violence group GoodKids MadCity.The police department said in a statement that officers assembled in the park as the protesters converged there and were “providing security and protecting their First Amendment right to peacefully assemble.” It said that as demonstrators approached the statue “some members of the crowd turned on the police and used the protest to attack officers with fireworks, rocks, frozen bottles, and other objects.”Amika Tendaji, an organizer for the protest, during which artists tagged the statue with slogans including “Decolonize Chicago” and “Black Lives Matter,” decried the officers’ use of force to protect a statue.”I think the people of Chicago and the world have proven that they are over police brutalizing people,” she said. “They’re over police murder, they’re over police terrorism, so the people are going to keep fighting.”The Columbus statue in Grant Park and another in the city’s Little Italy neighborhood were also vandalized last month.Protesters across the county have called for the removal of statues of Columbus, saying that the Italian explorer is responsible for the genocide and exploitation of native peoples in the Americas.Statues of Columbus have also been toppled or vandalized in cities such as Miami; Richmond, Virginia; St. Paul, Minnesota; and Boston, where one was decapitated.  
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A government-funded project to construct a temple for minority Hindus in the capital, Islamabad, has stirred controversy in majority-Muslim Pakistan, with hardline Islamic clerics and politicians saying allocation of state money to the building goes against the Islamic ideology of the country.Members of the Hindu community, however, say the project is their basic religious right and vow to build it at their expense if the government does not provide them with support.Lal Chand Malhi, a Hindu-minority member and federal parliamentary secretary for human rights in Pakistan’s National Assembly, told VOA that Prime Minister Imran Khan has agreed to grant Rs100 million in funds upon his request.He said the building, known as the Shri Krishna Mandir, or Krishna temple, would serve as a multipurpose complex that would include a crematorium and community center for the estimated 4 million Hindus living in Pakistan.“The prime minister readily agreed to my request. He was quite happy. And he directed the minister for religious affairs to clear any obstacles in the way to provide the funds for the temple to the Hindu Panchayath,” Malhi told VOA, adding, “there should be no obstacles. We should be allowed to build the temple over here.”Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
download this video to view it offline.Download File360p | 9 MB480p | 12 MB540p | 17 MB720p | 40 MB1080p | 71 MBOriginal | 583 MB Embed” />Copy Download AudioInitial work on the temple started June 23 during a ceremony. Its construction was welcomed by rights activists as an important step toward religious tolerance in the country.On July 1, Islamic clerics from various seminaries held a press conference at the National Press Club in Islamabad protesting the construction. Right-wing Islamic political party Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam (JUI-F), vowed that it was not going to allow the construction, with its leader Maulana Abdul Majeed Hazarvi threatening “severe reactions” if the government allowed the temple to be built in an “Islamic state.”The government has since halted the construction and temporarily withdrawn funding after petitions were filed in court, challenging the construction of the temple.Islamabad High Court dismissed the petitions after the government announced it would seek the guidance from the Council on Islamic Ideology, a constitutional body responsible for giving legal advice on Islamic matters.Hafiz Maqsood Ahmed, the head of the Islamic political party known as Markazi Jamiat Ahle Hadith in Islamabad, told VOA that the temple was seen by many Muslims of the country as offensive.“Bringing idol worship here amid a Muslim community in an Islamic society that is something different. The foundation of our country is that there is no God but Allah,” Ahmed said.Pakistani authorities deny that the construction was stopped because of communal matters. The Capital Development Authority (CDA), a public benefit corporation operating under the government, said the Islamabad Hindu Panchayat failed to submit a building plan to begin construction.”Until their building plans are approved, they cannot begin construction on the site. As far as the CDA is concerned, we issue allotments and approve building plans. They are responsible for the construction,” Shahid Mehmood, the chairman of CDA Design Vetting Committee, told VOA.Pakistan has often come under international scrutiny for marginalizing religious minority groups and openly allowing their discrimination by hardline politicians, clerics and media outlets in the country. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has designated Pakistan a “Country of Particular Concern” for its “systematic” discrimination of religious minorities.Pakistani media earlier this month reported that a group of men destroyed the temple’s boundary wall. The unverified video of the attack was posted on Facebook and widely circulated in the country’s social media.Pritam Das, the president of the Islamabad Hindu Panchayat, confirmed the attack to VOA.“We were constructing a boundary wall, but miscreants demolished the wall and destroyed the water boring. People are coming on the ground and giving [Islamic prayer] Azaan and offerings prayers. Others are openly threatening us. We are helpless, in this situation. This boundary wall was constructed with our own donations.”International watchdog groups, such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have called the hard-liner’s campaign discriminatory and are urging the government to immediately resume work on the temple.VOA’s Gaiti Ara Anis and Aurangzeb Khan contributed to this report from Islamabad.  
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Malawi police have rearrested former President Peter Mutharika’s bodyguard, this time on a charge of attempted murder.  The government said Friday’s arrest of Norman Chisale was part of an initiative to fight corruption left over from the Mutharika administration. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), now in opposition, said the fresh charge was politically motivated.Chisale was arrested Tuesday on fraud and money-laundering charges related to a cement import investigation. A court in Lilongwe granted him bail. His second arrest was on an attempted-murder charge for allegedly shooting a woman in the knee two months ago in Blantyre.Chisale’s attorney, Chance Gondwe, said the second arrest amounted to political persecution.“Actually, it was an accidental shooting,” Gondwe said. “It was nothing like attempted murder. There were attackers on the accused person on that particular day, and in trying to defend himself, the bullet ended upon the knee of the victim.”Gondwe said some people just wanted to victimize Chisale.The government said the arrests were part of an anti-corruption crackdown initiated after Mutharika lost the June 23 presidential election and new President Lazarus Chakwera took office.Several prominent figures have been arrested since then, mostly for crimes allegedly committed during Mutharika’s administration.They include Jomo Osman, a DPP councillor; Roza Mbilizi, deputy director-general of the Malawi Revenue Authority; and Gerald Viola, deputy chief executive officer of the National Food Reserve Agency.Mutharika’s DPP said the arrests were politically motivated, and political analyst Vincent Kondowe had a similar view.  He told VOA the arrests produced more questions than answers.“One can only speculate that probably, maybe, they [police] are politically captured,” he said. “But also, the question we also need to answer is: These [alleged] crimes were committed way back;  why couldn’t the police execute the warrants of the arrests [then]”?Police said they could not make the arrests earlier because the political environment would not allow them.“The environment at that particular time was not conducive for us to continue arrests,” said national police spokesman James Kadadzera. “Sometimes we do judge that if we do effect an arrest now, we may escalate issues politically as well as socially.”Kadadzera said police were now free to arrest any offender regardless of political affiliation.
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The United States, the world leader in COVID-19 infections and deaths, continues to set new daily records for coronavirus infections.U.S. states reported more than 76,400 cases Friday, the second time reported infections for a single day exceeded 70,000 and the 11th time in the past month a single-day record had been set.The U.S. has more than 3.67 million of the world’s 14.1 million COVID-19 infections, according to Johns Hopkins University statistics, largely because of surges in Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia and Texas.The surges come as the U.S. lacks a clear national plan to contain the spread of the coronavirus and no requirement for people to wear protective masks in public.“I want people to have a certain freedom, and I don’t believe in that,” President Donald Trump said in an interview with Fox News that is scheduled to air Sunday.FILE – U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.Meanwhile, U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called Saturday for an end to worldwide inequalities that triggered recent anti-racism protests and have been further exposed by the coronavirus pandemic.“COVID-19 has been likened to an X-ray, revealing the fractures in the fragile skeleton of the societies we have built,” Guterres said at an event in Johannesburg marking what would have been former South African President Nelson Mandela’s 102nd birthday.Stunning statistic on wealthTo help make his point, Guterres said the world’s 26 richest people have as much wealth as half the world’s population. He accused developed countries of investing in their own survival and said they had “failed to deliver the support needed to help the developing world through these dangerous times.”Brazil follows the U.S. with 2 million cases and India comes in third with 1 million infections, according to Johns Hopkins statistics.Brazilian health experts blame their federal government for the country’s large number of cases.“The virus would have been difficult to stop anyway. But this milestone of 2 million cases, which is very underestimated, shows this could have been different,” said Dr. Adriano Massuda, a health care professor at Sao Paulo’s Getulio Vargas Foundation University. “There’s no national strategy for testing, no measures from the top … too little effort to improve basic care so we find serious cases before they become too serious, no tracking.”Health workers take residents’ blood samples at a testing site for COVID-19 amid the new coronavirus pandemic in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, July 17, 2020. The federal health ministry said the country had passed 2 million confirmed cases of infection.Although the number of cases appears to be ebbing in some of the larger Brazilian cities, the disease is now starting to hit places that had been spared.The World Health Organization said Friday that Brazil was “still in the middle of this fight.”EU sessionIn Europe, leaders gathered in Brussels on Saturday, the last day of a two-day meeting to negotiate the terms of an $855 billion economic rescue plan. As of Saturday afternoon, there was no sign a deal was imminent. Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said EU leaders’ views on the stimulus plan remained “diametrically different” after Friday’s talks.In Spain, officials asked residents of Barcelona to stay at home as much as possible to stop the spread of the virus.Israel imposed a new weekend shutdown in an attempt to lower infection rates.FILE – A pharmacy tech pours out pills of hydroxychloroquine at Rock Canyon Pharmacy in Provo, Utah, May 20, 2020.Another trial of the malaria drug hydroxychloroquine has proved it to be ineffective as an early treatment for mild cases of COVID-19, researchers at the University of Minnesota School of Medicine concluded.“There is not convincing evidence that hydroxychloroquine can either prevent COVID-19 after exposure or reduce illness severity after developing early symptoms,” said Caleb Skipper, lead author of the study. “While disappointing, these results are consistent with an emerging body of literature that hydroxychloroquine doesn’t convey a substantial clinical benefit in people diagnosed with COVID-19, despite its activity against the coronavirus in a test tube.”Trump had promoted hydroxychloroquine as an effective treatment early in the pandemic and said he took the drug himself. He has tested negative for the coronavirus.After initially approving it as an emergency treatment, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration reversed itself once doctors warned of potentially deadly side effects.
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The World Health Organization reports the COVID-19 pandemic and lack of money are hampering efforts to bring a speedy end to the Ebola outbreak in Democratic Republic of Congo’s Equateur Province.  Since the outbreak was declared June 1, 56 cases, including 20 deaths have been recorded.Shortly after Ebola was detected in the DRC, World Health Officials expressed confidence they would be able to quickly control the spread of the deadly virus.  They noted many lessons had been learned from previous outbreaks.  They said the availability of a vaccine, and therapeutics could help them prevent the onset of the disease and treat those who fell ill.   World Health Organization spokeswoman, Fadela Chaib says these new tools are being used to good effect.  Over the course of four days, she says 12,000 people have been vaccinated.   However, she says it is difficult to contain virus spread because cases are scattered across a remote, dense rain forest area.  Additionally, she says WHO has less than $2 million, which will allow it to carry out this costly operation for a few more weeks.“After that, we are short of money.  We need this money for key services,” said Chaib. “For example, health education, community engagement, vaccinations, testing, contact tracing, treatment, etc.”  This is the 11th Ebola outbreak in DRC.  An epidemic that broke out in this same region two years ago was crushed after just four months.  The current outbreak was preceded by a devastating epidemic in conflict-ridden North Kivu and Ituri provinces.  That outbreak, which was declared August 1, 2018, infected more than 3,460 people and killed 2,280 before it was stopped at the end of June.Chaib says gaining the trust of local communities is essential in successfully combatting this deadly virus and no effort is being spared to achieve this.  For example, she tells VOA most of the vaccinators are being drawn from the local population.“Despite all our work there is a lot of fear and stigma surrounding the Ebola virus.  It is complicating the response,” said Chaib. “This being said everyone at WHO…are working to control this outbreak.  It is challenging.  It is difficult but it is not impossible.  We know how to do it.”  WHO acknowledges the complexities of responding to Ebola during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.  However, it says it is critical not to allow COVID-19 to distract health workers from tackling Ebola and other pressing health threats. 
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The mayor of Portland demanded Friday that President Donald Trump remove militarized federal agents he deployed to the city after some detained people on streets far from federal property they were sent to protect.”Keep your troops in your own buildings, or have them leave our city,” Mayor Ted Wheeler said at a news conference.Democratic Gov. Kate Brown said Trump is looking for a confrontation in the hopes of winning political points elsewhere. It also serves as a distraction from the coronavirus pandemic, which is causing spiking numbers of infections in Oregon and the nation.Brown’s spokesman, Charles Boyle, said Friday that arresting people without probable cause is “extraordinarily concerning and a violation of their civil liberties and constitutional rights.”Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said she would file a lawsuit in federal court against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, the Marshals Service, Customs and Border Protection and Federal Protection Service alleging they have violated the civil rights of Oregonians by detaining them without probable cause. She will also seek a temporary restraining order against them.ACLU: US Federal Officers’ Actions at Protests ‘Flat-Out Unconstitutional’Officials in the northwestern state of Oregon oppose federal troop presence in response to nightly demonstrations against police brutality The ACLU of Oregon said the federal agents appear to be violating people’s rights, which “should concern everyone in the United States.”  “Usually when we see people in unmarked cars forcibly grab someone off the street we call it kidnapping,” said Jann Carson, interim executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Oregon. “The actions of the militarized federal officers are flat-out unconstitutional and will not go unanswered.”Federal officers have charged at least 13 people with crimes related to the protests so far, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported Thursday. Some have been detained by the federal courthouse, which has been the scene of protests. But others were grabbed blocks away.”This is part of the core media strategy out of Trump’s White House: to use federal troops to bolster his sagging polling data,” Wheeler said. “And it is an absolute abuse of federal law enforcement officials.”One video showed two people in helmets and green camouflage with “police” patches grabbing a person on the sidewalk, handcuffing them and taking them into an unmarked vehicle.”Who are you?” someone asks the pair, who do not respond. At least some of the federal officers belong to the Department of Homeland Security.Customs and Border Protection said in a statement that its agents had information indicating the person in the video was suspected of assaulting federal agents or destroying federal property.  “Once CBP agents approached the suspect, a large and violent mob moved towards their location. For everyone’s safety, CBP agents quickly moved the suspect to a safer location,” the agency said. However, the video shows no mob.In another case, Mark Pettibone, 29, said a minivan rolled up to him around 2 a.m. Wednesday and four or five people got out “looking like they were deployed to a Middle Eastern war.”Pettibone told The Associated Press he got to his knees as the group approached. They dragged him into the van without identifying themselves or responding to his questions and pulled his beanie over his eyes so he couldn’t see, he said.”I figured I was just going to disappear for an indefinite amount of time,” Pettibone said.Pettibone said he was put into a cell and officers dumped the contents of his backpack, with one remarking: “Oh, this is a bunch of nothing.”After he asked for a lawyer, Pettibone was allowed to leave.  “Authoritarian governments, not democratic republics, send unmarked authorities after protesters,” Democratic U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley said in a tweet.  U.S. Attorney Billy Williams in Portland said Friday he has requested the Department of Homeland Security Office of the Inspector General to investigate the actions of DHS personnel.In a letter Friday, Oregon’s two senators and two of its House members demanded that U.S. Attorney General William Barr and Homeland Security Acting Secretary Chad Wolf immediately withdraw “these federal paramilitary forces from our state.”The members of Congress also said they’ll be asking the DHS inspector general and the U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the presence and actions of federal forces in Portland.”It’s painfully clear this administration is focused purely on escalating violence without answering my repeated requests for why this expeditionary force is in Portland and under what constitutional authority,” Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden said.On Thursday night, federal officers deployed tear gas and fired non-lethal rounds into a crowd of protesters.Wolf visited Portland on Thursday and called the demonstrators, who are protesting racism and police brutality, “violent anarchists.”Wolf blamed state and city authorities for not putting an end to the protests. But Portland police said Friday they wound up arresting 20 people overnight.  At least two protests occurred Thursday night, one near the federal courthouse and the other by a police station in another part of the city. Police told protesters to leave that site after announcing they heard some chanting about burning down the building. Protester Paul Frazier said Friday the chant was “much more rhetorical than an actual statement.”Portland Police Chief Chuck Lovell told reporters Friday that his officers are in contact with the federal agents, but that neither controls the others’ actions.”We do communicate with federal officers for the purpose of situational awareness and deconfliction,” Lovell said. “We’re operating in a very, very close proximity to one another.”The American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Oregon on Friday added the federal government to a lawsuit it filed earlier to halt the use of crowd control measures, including tear gas and rubber bullets, against journalists and legal observers at protests in Portland.  “The lawsuit is one of many the ACLU will be filing against federal authorities in Portland for their unconstitutional attacks on people protesting the police killing of George Floyd,” the group said.Tensions have escalated in the past two weeks, particularly after an officer with the U.S. Marshals Service fired a less-lethal round at a protester’s head on July 11, critically injuring him.The protests following the police killing of Floyd in Minneapolis have often devolved into violent clashes between smaller groups and the police.    
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