Goodbye, your royal highnesses. Hello, life as — almost — ordinary civilians.

Prince Harry and wife Meghan will no longer use the titles “royal highness” or receive public funds for their work under a deal that lets the couple step aside as working royals, Buckingham Palace announced Saturday.

Releasing details of the dramatic split triggered by the couple’s unhappiness with life under media scrutiny, the palace said Harry and Meghan will cease to be working members of the royal family when the new arrangements take effect in the “spring of 2020.”

The radical break is more complete than the type of arrangement anticipated 10 days ago when the royal couple stunned Britain with an abrupt announcement that they wanted to step down. They said they planed to combine some royal duties with private work in a “progressive” plan, but that is no longer on the table.

Harry and Meghan will no longer use the titles His Royal Highness and Her Royal Highness but will retain them, leaving the possibility that the couple might change their minds and return sometime in the future.

Harry’s late mother, Diana, was stripped of the Her Royal Highness title when she and Prince Charles divorced.

They will be known as Harry, Duke of Sussex, and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex. Harry will remain a prince and sixth in line to the British throne.

The agreement also calls for Meghan and Harry to repay 2.4 million pounds ($3.1 million) in taxpayers’ money spent renovating a house for them near Windsor Castle, Frogmore Cottage. The use of public funds to transform the house’s five separate apartments into a spacious single family home for them had raised ire in the British press. They will continue to use Frogmore Cottage as their base in England.

The deal came after days of talks among royals sparked by Meghan and Harry’s announcement last week that they wanted to step down as senior royals and live part-time in Canada.

The couple’s departure is a wrench for the royal family, and Queen Elizabeth II did say earlier this week that she wished the couple had wanted to remain full-time royals, but she had warm words for them in a statement Saturday.

The 93-year-old queen said she was pleased that “together we have found a constructive and supportive way forward for my grandson and his family. Harry, Meghan and Archie will always be much loved members of my family.

“I recognize the challenges they have experienced as a result of intense scrutiny over the last two years and support their wish for a more independent life,” Elizabeth said.

“It is my whole family’s hope that today’s agreement allows them to start building a happy and peaceful new life,” she added.

Despite the queen’s kind words, the new arrangement will represent an almost complete break from life as working royals, especially for Harry. As a devoted Army veteran and servant to the crown, the prince carried out dozens of royal engagements each year,

Royal expert and author Penny Junor said the new setup will benefit both sides of the family.

“There are no blurred lines. They are starting afresh and they are going with the queen’s blessing, I think it is the best of all worlds,” she said.

It is not yet clear whether Harry and Meghan will continue to receive financial support from Harry’s father, Prince Charles, who used revenue from the Duchy of Cornwall to help fund his activities and those of his wife and sons.

The duchy, chartered in 1337, produced more than 20 million pounds ($26 million) in revenue last year. It is widely regarded as private money, not public funds, so Charles may opt to keep details of its disbursal private. Much of the royals’ wealth comes from private holdings.

Though Harry and Meghan will no longer represent the queen, the palace said they would “continue to uphold the values of Her Majesty” while carrying out their private charitable work.

The withdrawal of Harry from royal engagements will increase the demands on his brother, Prince William, and William’s wife, Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge.

Buckingham Palace did not disclose who will pay for the couple’s security going forward. It currently is taxpayer-funded and carried out primarily by a special unit of the Metropolitan Police, also known as Scotland Yard.

“There are well established independent processes to determine the need for publicly funded security,” it said.

Harry and Meghan have grown increasingly uncomfortable with constant media scrutiny since the birth in May of their son, Archie. They married in 2018 in a ceremony that drew a worldwide TV audience.

Meghan joined the royal family after a successful acting career and spoke enthusiastically about the chance to travel throughout Britain and learn about her new home, but disillusionment set in fairly quickly.

She launched legal action against a newspaper in October for publishing a letter she wrote to her father. Harry has complained bitterly of racist undertones in some media coverage of his wife, who is biracial.

There has also been a breach in the longtime close relationship between Harry and William, a future king, over issues that have not been made public.

The couple’s desire to separate from the rest of the family had been the subject of media speculation for months. But they angered senior royals by revealing their plans on Instagram and a new website without advance clearance from the queen or palace officials.

Elizabeth summoned Harry, William and Charles, to an unusual crisis meeting at her rural retreat in eastern England in an effort to find common ground.

The result was Saturday’s agreement, which is different from Harry and Meghan’s initial proposal that they planned to combine a new, financially independent life with a reduced set of royal duties.

It is not known where in Canada the couple plan to locate. They are thought to be considering Vancouver Island, where they spent a long Christmas break, or Toronto, where Meghan filmed the TV series “Suits” for many years.

It is not clear what Harry and Meghan’s immigration and tax status will be in Canada, or whether Meghan will follow through on plans to obtain British nationality.

Cameras “miles in the sky,” a countdown and then “boom”: US President Donald Trump has recounted the final moments of Iran’s powerful military leader, Qassem Soleimani, in an American drone strike. 

Trump delivered the account Friday night to Republican Party donors at his Florida residence, Mar-a-Lago, for a fundraising dinner, U.S. media said. 

CNN on Saturday broadcast an audio recording in which the president gave new details about the January 3 strike at the airport in Baghdad. It killed the Revolutionary Guards Quds Force commander and members of Iraq’s Hashed al-Shaabi, a paramilitary force with close ties to Iran. 

“He was supposed to be invincible,” Trump said. 

Democrats and other critics have questioned the timing of the strike, the month before Trump’s Senate impeachment trial, and the administration’s shifting reasons for launching it. 

In the audio released by CNN, Trump did not refer to an “imminent” attack that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said Soleimani was planning. Nor was there a reference to “four embassies,” which Trump later alleged were being targeted.

‘Saying bad things’ 

“He was saying bad things about our country. He was saying like, ‘We’re going to attack your country. We’re going to kill your people.’ I said, ‘Look, how much of this s*** do we have to listen to?’ ” Trump told his guests. 

He then described the scene, relaying the words of the military officers giving live updates to him in Washington. 

“They said, ‘Sir’ — and this is from, you know, cameras that are miles in the sky — ‘they are together, sir. Sir, they have two minutes and 11 seconds.’ No bulls***. ‘They have two minutes and 11 seconds to live, sir. They’re in the car. They’re in an armored vehicle, going. … Sir, they have approximately one minute to live, sir … 30 seconds, 10, nine, eight … .’ Then, all of sudden, boom. ‘They’re gone, sir.’ ” 

Trump acknowledged that the U.S. strike “shook up the world” but said Soleimani “deserved to be hit hard” because he was responsible for killing “thousands of Americans.”  

Iran vowed revenge for the U.S. strike, raising fears of war, and later launched missiles at bases in Iraq housing U.S. troops. None were killed. 

Here are highlights from the 111-page House Impeachment Brief filed Saturday afternoon.

On impeachment: 

“President Trump has demonstrated his continued willingness to corrupt free and fair elections, betray our national security, and subvert the constitutional separation of powers—all for personal gain.”

“The Senate should convict and remove President Trump to avoid serious and long-term damage to our democratic values and the Nation’s security.

“If the Senate permits President Trump to remain in office, he and future leaders would be emboldened to welcome, and even enlist, foreign interference in elections for years to come.”

“Unless he is removed from office, he will continue to endanger our national security, jeopardize the integrity of our elections, and undermine our core constitutional principles.”

On the abuse of power article of impeachment:

“President Trump abused the power of the Presidency by pressuring a foreign government to interfere in an American election on his behalf.”

“President Trump illegally ordered the Office of Management and Budget to withhold $391 million in taxpayer-funded military and other security assistance to Ukraine.”

“The evidence is clear that President Trump conditioned release of the vital military assistance on Ukraine’s announcement of the sham investigations.”

“Overwhelming evidence demonstrates that the announcement of investigations on which President Trump conditioned the official acts had no legitimate policy rationale, and instead were corruptly intended to assist his 2020 reelection campaign.”

On the obstruction of justice article of impeachment:

“President Trump personally demanded that his top aides refuse to testify in response to subpoenas, and nine Administration officials followed his directive and continue to defy subpoenas for testimony.”

“The Senate should convict President Trump for his categorical obstruction of the House’s impeachment inquiry and ensure that this President, and any future President, cannot commit impeachable offenses and then avoid accountability by covering them up.”

Federal authorities are turning to a new tactic in the escalating conflict over New York City’s so-called sanctuary policies, issuing four “immigration subpoenas” to the city for information about inmates wanted for deportation.

“This is not a request — it’s a demand,” Henry Lucero, a senior U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement official, told The Associated Press. “This is a last resort for us. Dangerous criminals are being released every single day in New York.”

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration said Saturday the city would review the subpoenas.

“New York City will not change the policies that have made us the safest big city in America,” spokeswoman Freddi Goldstein said in an email.

Mounting frustration

The development comes days after ICE sent similar subpoenas to the city of Denver, a move that reflected the agency’s mounting frustration with jurisdictions that do not honor deportation “detainers” or provide any details about defendants going in and out of local custody.

The subpoenas sent to New York seek information about three inmates — including a man wanted for homicide in El Salvador — who were recently released despite immigration officials requesting the city turn them over for deportation.

The fourth subpoena asks for information about a Guyanese man charged this month with sexually assaulting and killing Maria Fuertas, a 92-year-old Queens woman.

That case became a flashpoint in the conflict after ICE officials said the city had released the woman’s alleged attacker, Reeaz Khan, 21, on earlier assault charges rather than turn him over for deportation. Khan was charged with murder Jan. 10 and remains in custody.

New York City police say they didn’t receive a detainer request for Khan, though ICE insists it was sent. Either way, the city would not have turned him over under the terms of New York’s local ordinance governing how police work with immigration officials.

Hours before the subpoenas were issued on Friday, the acting ICE director, Matthew Albence, told a news conference in Manhattan that city leaders had blood on their hands in Fuertas’ death.

“It is this city’s sanctuary policies that are the sole reason this criminal was allowed to roam the streets freely and end an innocent woman’s life,” Albence said.

‘Absolutely shameful’

Goldstein said in an email Saturday that “the Trump administration’s attempt to exploit this tragedy are absolutely shameful.”

De Blasio has accused ICE of employing “scare tactics” and spreading lies. He said on Twitter this week that the city has passed “common-sense laws about immigration enforcement that have driven crime to record lows.”

City officials in Denver said they would not comply with the requests, saying the subpoenas could be “viewed as an effort to intimidate officers into help enforcing civil immigration law.”

“The documents appear to be a request for information related to alleged violations of civil immigration law,” Chad Sublet, Senior Counsel to the Department of Safety in Denver, wrote in a letter to ICE officials.

Court order next?

But Lucero, ICE’s acting deputy executive associate director for enforcement and removal operations, said the agency may consult with federal prosecutors to obtain a court order compelling the city’s compliance. “A judge can hold them in contempt,” he told The AP.

Meanwhile, ICE is considering expanding its use of immigration subpoenas in other sanctuary jurisdictions.

“Like any law enforcement agency, we are used to modifying our tactics as criminals shift their strategies,” Lucero said in a statement. “But it’s disheartening that we must change our practices and jump through so many hoops with partners who are restricted by sanctuary laws passed by politicians with a dangerous agenda.”

Police fired volleys of tear gas and rubber bullets in Lebanon’s capital Saturday to disperse thousands of protesters amid some of the worst rioting since demonstrations against the country’s ruling elite erupted three months ago. More than 150 people were injured.

Thick white smoke covered the downtown Beirut area near Parliament as police and protesters engaged in confrontations that saw groups of young men hurl stones and firecrackers at police who responded with water cannons and tear gas. Some protesters were seen vomiting on the street from inhaling the gas.

The violence began after some protesters started throwing stones at police deployed near the parliament building, while others removed street signs, metal barriers and branches of trees, tossing them at security forces.

The clashes took place with the backdrop of a rapidly worsening financial crisis and an ongoing impasse over the formation of a new government after the Cabinet headed by Prime Minister Saad Hariri resigned in late October.

Lebanon has witnessed three months of protests against the political elite who have ruled the country since the end of the 1975-90 civil war. The protesters blame politicians for widespread corruption and mismanagement in a country that has accumulated one of the largest debt ratios in the world.

The protesters had called for a demonstration Saturday afternoon with the theme “we will not pay the price” in reference to debt that stands at about $87 billion, or more than 150% of GDP.

As rioting took place in central Beirut, thousands of other protesters arrived later from three different parts of the city to join the demonstration. They were later dispersed and chased by police into nearby Martyrs Square that has been a center for protests.

Lebanon’s Internal Security Forces called on all peaceful protesters to “immediately leave the area of riots for their own safety.” It added that some policemen who were taken for treatment at hospitals were attacked by protesters inside the medical centers.

As clashes continued, some two dozen men believed to be parliament guards attacked the protesters’ tents in Martyrs Square, setting them on fire. A gas cylinder inside one of the tents blew up. The fire spread quickly and charred a nearby shop.

The bells of nearby St. George Cathedral began to toll in an apparent call for calm, while loudspeakers at the adjacent blue-domed Muhammad Al-Amin mosque called for night prayers.

Later in the evening, hundreds of protesters chanting “Revolution” chased a contingent of riot police near the entrance of the mosque, forcing them to withdraw. Inside the mosque, several men were treated for gas inhalation and some families were said to be hiding inside.

“We call on the security forces to be merciful with women and children inside the mosque,” a statement blared through the mosque’s loudspeakers.

President Michel Aoun called on security forces to protect peaceful protesters and work on restoring clam in downtown Beirut and to protect public and private propery. He asked the ministers of defense and interior and heads of security agencies to act.

“The confrontations, fires and acts of sabotage in central Beirut are crazy, suspicious and rejected. They threaten civil peace and warn of grave consequences,” tweeted Hariri, the caretaker prime minister, who lives nearby. He called those behind the riots “outlaws” and called on police and armed forces to protect Beirut.

The Lebanese Red Cross said it took 65 people to hospitals and treated 100 others on the spot, calling on people to donate blood. As the clashes continued, more ambulances were seen rushing to the area and evacuating the injured.

Late Saturday, most of the protesters were forced out of the area by police firing tear gas and rubber bullets. Still, security remained tight as more reinforcements arrived.

Panic and anger have gripped the public as their local currency, pegged to the dollar for more than two decades, plummeted. The Lebanese pound lost more than 60% of its value in recent weeks on the black market. The economy has seen no growth and foreign inflows dried up in the already heavily indebted country that relies on imports for most of its basic goods.

Meanwhile, banks have imposed informal capital controls, limiting withdrawal of dollars and foreign transfers.

Earlier this week, protesters carried out acts of vandalism in a main commercial area in Beirut, targeting mostly private banks.

Prime Minister-designate Hassan Diab had been expected to announce an 18-member Cabinet on Friday, but last-minute disputes among political factions scuttled his latest attempt.
 

A missile attack launched by Shi’ite rebels in Yemen hit an army camp Saturday, killing at least 25 troops, Yemeni officials said.

The missile strike in the central province of Marib wounded approximately 10 others. Officials said they expected the death toll to rise as burn victims were rushed to hospitals.

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to talk to the media.

The Houthi attack on the military training camp followed an ongoing barrage of assaults by Saudi-backed forces on rebel targets east of the capital, Sanaa. Those attacks killed at least 22 people on both sides, according to officials.

Iran-backed Houthi rebels have remained in control of the capital, Sanaa, since ousting the government of President Abdu Rabbu Mansour Hadi in 2014.

The conflict became a proxy war months later, when a Saudi-led military coalition intervened to restore the internationally recognized government.

The war has killed more than 10,000 people, displaced more than 3 million and pushed the country to the brink of famine.
 

Goodbye, your royal highnesses. Hello, life as — almost — ordinary civilians.

Prince Harry and his wife, Meghan, are quitting as working royals and will no longer use the titles “royal highness” or receive public funds for their work under a deal announced Saturday by Buckingham Palace.

The palace said Harry and Meghan will cease to be working members of the royal family when the new arrangements take effect within months, in the “spring of 2020.” They will be known as Harry, Duke of Sussex and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex.

The couple will no longer use the titles His Royal Highness and Her Royal Highness, but they are not being stripped of them. Harry will remain a prince and sixth in line to the British throne.

The agreement also calls for Meghan and Harry to repay 2.4 million pounds ($3.1 million) in taxpayers’ money that was spent renovating their home near Windsor Castle, Frogmore Cottage.

The couple’s departure is a wrench for the royal family, but Queen Elizabeth II had warm words for them in a statement Saturday.

The queen said she was pleased that “together we have found a constructive and supportive way forward for my grandson and his family. Harry, Meghan and Archie will always be much loved members of my family.”

“I recognize the challenges they have experienced as a result of intense scrutiny over the last two years and support their wish for a more independent life,” Elizabeth said.

“It is my whole family’s hope that today’s agreement allows them to start building a happy and peaceful new life,” she added.

The announcement came after days of talks among royal courtiers sparked by Meghan and Harry’s announcement last week that they wanted to step down as senior royals and live part-time in Canada.

The details of the deal solidify the couple’s dramatic break from life as working royals. Army veteran Harry will have to give up the military appointments he has as a senior royal.

While he and Meghan will no longer represent the queen, the palace said they would “continue to uphold the values of Her Majesty” while carrying out their private charitable work.

Buckingham Palace did not disclose who will pay for the couple’s security going forward. It currently is taxpayer-funded.

“There are well established independent processes to determine the need for publicly funded security,” it said.
 

A French government minister warned that seditious groups bent on violence were hijacking the protest movement against pension reform that has gripped the country, after a fire Saturday damaged a renowned Paris restaurant patronized by President Emmanuel Macron.

The Paris fire service said the pre-dawn blaze that singed a corner of the La Rotonde eatery was quickly extinguished. The Paris prosecutor’s office launched an investigation to determine the cause of the fire.

But Marlene Schiappa, the government’s secretary of state for equality, said the blaze “probably” resulted from a criminal act. She described a climate in France “of hate and of violence that is quite incredible,” citing the restaurant fire among a list of examples.

“Seditious groups want the law of ‘might is right’ to reign, to impose violence on all people who think differently from them,” Schiappa said on French news channel BFM-TV. “It is very alarming and unworthy of a democracy like France.”

After six weeks of labor strikes and nationwide protests against government plans to overhaul France’s pension system, there are mounting signs of splits within the movement. As some strikers return to work and train services that have been severely disrupted by walkouts see notable improvements, more radical protesters are trying to keep the movement going.

The fire at La Rotonde came just days after demonstrators shouting “Death to Macron, death to La Rotonde” marched past the eatery, restaurant manager Gerard Tafanel said.

He said marchers wore the bright jackets of the ‘yellow vest’ protest movement that has demonstrated against the policies of Macron’s government for more than a year. Tafanel said a yellow vest also was found by police officers investigating Saturday’s fire.

Macron’s name has been associated with the restaurant since he celebrated there during the 2017 presidential election, after qualifying for the second-round runoff that he later won.

Macron was a target of protesters himself on Friday night, too.

Seemingly tipped off to his presence by people inside, several dozen protesters converged on a Paris theater where Macron was watching an evening performance with his wife. Video showed protesters chanting “Macron resign” and some entering a door as surprised police tried to hold them back. A black car reported to be carrying Macron then sped away under a hail of boos.

Earlier Friday, dozens of protesters also blocked the entrance to the Louvre museum and forced the famous Paris landmark to close.

Transportation strikes against the pension overhaul began on Dec. 5. Saturday marked their 45th consecutive day, although the job actions are no longer as disruptive as they were earlier.

Workers in other sectors of the economy have held strikes, too, including at ports and oil refineries.

On Saturday, musicians, singers and other members of the striking Paris Opera drew a crowd with a free concert in front of the Palais Garnier opera house.

Chinese President Xi Jinping reinforced his support for embattled Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi Saturday, signing 33 bilateral agreements covering a range of projects, including rail and port ventures to allow China access to the Indian Ocean and to shorten the route for its oil and gas imports from the Persian Gulf.

The agreements were signed in the Myanmar capital of Naypyitaw at the end of Xi’s two-day visit, the first to the country by a Chinese head of state in nearly two decades.

Xi’s visit came as the Myanmar government faces intense global criticism for a 2017 military campaign that targeted minority Rohingya Muslims, resulting in the deaths of thousands and the exile of nearly 750,000 others.

United Nations investigators have described the military campaign as genocide, a charge Myanmar is facing at the International Court of Justice.

The two leaders also signed agreements covering the resettlement of internally displaced persons in Myanmar’s Kachin State, on the border with China, and deals pertaining to security, agriculture and information.

China has supported Myanmar throughout the Rohingya crisis and is now increasing efforts to solidify its relationship with the Southeast Asian country, a strategically located country in the region.“

We are drawing a future road map that will bring to life bilateral relations based on brotherly and sisterly closeness in order to overcome hardships together and provide assistance to each other, Xi said Friday.

The agreements are part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, an ambitious global infrastructure development and investment plan to facilitate trade from East Asia to Europe.  

Xi’s visit coincided with the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Myanmar, then known as Burma, and the first to the country by a Chinese president in the past 19 years.

 

A Supreme Court that seems more favorable to religion-based discrimination claims is set to hear a case that could make it easier to use public money to pay for religious schooling in many states.

The justices will hear arguments Wednesday in a dispute over a Montana scholarship program for private K-12 education that also makes donors eligible for up to $150 in state tax credits. Advocates on both sides say the outcome could be momentous because it could lead to efforts in other states to funnel taxpayer money to religious schools.

Montana is among 37 states that have provisions in their state constitutions that bar religious schools from receiving state aid.

The Legislature created the tax credit in 2015 for contributions made to certain scholarship programs for private education. The state’s highest court had struck down the tax credit as a violation of the constitutional ban. The scholarships can be used at both secular and religious schools, but almost all the recipients attend religious schools.

Kendra Espinoza of Kalispell, Montana, the lead plaintiff in the Supreme Court case, said the state court decision amounts to discrimination against her religious freedom. “They did away with the entire program so that no one could use this money to send their kids to a religious school,” said Espinoza, whose two daughters attend the Stillwater Christian School in Kalispell, near Glacier National Park.

She said she could not afford to keep her daughters enrolled without financial aid from the school, where tuition this year is $7,735 for elementary and middle school and $8,620 for high school. But Espinoza said she has never received money from the scholarship program and only began the application process late last year.

For Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, the Montana program is part of a nationwide, conservative-backed campaign against public schools. “This is a ruse to siphon off money from public education,” Weingarten said. Teacher unions generally oppose school choice programs.

Montana is one of 18 states that offer scholarship tax-credit programs, according to EdChoice, an organization that promotes school-choice programs. Most have more generous tax credits, one of several ways states have created programs to boost private schools or defray their tuition costs. Others include vouchers, individual tax credits or deductions and education savings accounts.

“These programs are about empowering parents, low-income parents, to make the same educational choices that their well-to-do peers make every day, which is to choose private schools for their kids, if public schools aren’t working for them,” said Richard Komer of the Virginia-based Institute for Justice, which backs school choice programs. Komer represents the Montana parents at the Supreme Court.

When the Montana Supreme Court considered the scholarship program, it found that allowing public money to flow to religious schools, even indirectly, ran afoul of the state constitution. But rather than leave the program in place for secular schools, the court struck it down altogether. The state court ruling has been put on hold pending a Supreme Court decision.

The state hoped the wholesale invalidation of the program would shield it from Supreme Court review. In urging the Supreme Court to reject the case, Montana said it can’t be compelled to offer a scholarship program for private education. The state told the justices that the Montana court decision did not single out students at religious schools because the state court ruling struck down the entire program.

But at least four justices, the minimum needed to hear a case, were not persuaded by that reasoning. The Trump administration, which is taking steps to give religious organizations easier access to federal programs, has now joined the case on the parents’ side. This past week, President Donald Trump also pledged to protect prayer in public schools as part of his bid to solidify his evangelical base for the 2020 election.

Recent rulings from the Supreme Court, which now includes Trump appointees Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh, in favor of religion-based discrimination claims suggest the state has an uphill fight. In 2014, the justices allowed family-held for-profit businesses with religious objections to get out from under a requirement to pay for contraceptives for women covered under their health insurance plans. In 2017, the court ruled for a Missouri church that had been excluded from state grants to put softer surfaces in playgrounds.

The Supreme Court also has upheld some school voucher programs and state courts have ratified others. But other state courts have relied on constitutional provisions banning the allocation of public school funds to religious institutions to strike down school choice programs.

The language in Montana’s constitution is itself under attack in the case being argued Wednesday. Lawyers for the parents and legal groups supporting them argue that anti-Catholic bias motivated the adoption of the Montana provision and similar measures in other states in the late 1800s. They are similar to the proposed 1875 Blaine Amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would have prohibited the allocation of public school funds to religious institutions.

But Montana and its supporters dispute that bigotry was behind the adoption the state’s “no-aid” clause in 1889. In any event, they contend, the provision is a part of the Montana Constitution that was adopted at a state constitutional convention in 1972, where one of the delegates who voted for it was a Catholic priest.

It’s unfair to label the convention delegates and Montana voters who later ratified the constitution as “mere rubber-stampers of bigotry,” the state wrote in its Supreme Court brief.

The Stillwater Christian School, like most Montana schools in the scholarship program, is not Catholic.

Espinoza said she chose it for her daughters, now 11 and 14, because “I really wanted values-based education for them, taught from the Bible, because that’s what we do at home.”

Four more cases have been identified in a viral pneumonia outbreak in the central Chinese city of Wuhan that has killed two people and prompted countries as far away as the United States to take precautionary measures.

The latest cases bring to 45 the number of people who have contracted the illness, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said Saturday. Five are in serious condition, two died and 15 have been discharged. The others are in stable condition.

The cause of the pneumonia has been traced to a new type of coronavirus.

Health authorities are keen to avoid a repeat of SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, another coronavirus that started in southern China in late 2002 and spread to more than two dozen countries, killing nearly 800 people.

The U.S. announced Friday that it would begin screening passengers at three major airports arriving on flights from Wuhan. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said it would deploy 100 people to take the temperatures and ask about symptoms of incoming passengers at the Los Angeles, San Francisco and New York City’s Kennedy airports.

At least a half-dozen countries in Asia have started screening incoming airline passengers from central China. The list includes Thailand and Japan, which have together reported three cases of the disease in people who had come from Wuhan. It  is an unusually busy travel period as people take trips to and from China around Lunar New Year, which falls on Jan. 25 this year.

Doctors began seeing a new type of viral pneumonia – fever, cough, difficulty breathing – in people who worked at or visited a food market in the suburbs of Wuhan late last month. The city’s health commission confirmed a second death this week, a 69-year-old man who fell ill on Dec. 31 and died Wednesday.

Officials have said the pneumonia probably spread from animals to people but haven’t been able to rule out the possibility of human-to-human transmission, which would enable it to spread much faster.

No related cases have been found so far among 763 people who had close contact with those diagnosed with the virus in Wuhan. Of them, 665 have been released and 98 remain under medical observation, the Wuhan health authorities said.

 

Days after President Donald Trump killed an Iranian general and said he was sending more soldiers to the Middle East, about 100 protesters stood on a pedestrian bridge over Chicago’s Lake Shore Drive with an illuminated sign that read “No War in Iran.”

Some 200 people marched in the bitter cold near Boston, while a few dozen people demonstrated on the steps of Los Angeles City Hall and at similarly sized gatherings across the U.S.

Three years after Trump took office and millions of people swarmed to the Women’s March in Washington and companion marches across the country, these typically modest protests are often the most visible sign of today’s Trump resistance.

Activists say the numbers should not be mistaken for a lack of energy or motivation to vote Trump out of office come November.

The anti-Trump movement of 2020, they say, is more organized and more focused on action. Many people have moved from protesting to knocking on doors for candidates, mailing postcards to voters, advocating for specific causes or running for office.

But the movement that sprung up to oppose Trump’s presidency also is more splintered than it was when pink-hatted protesters flooded Washington the day after his inauguration for what is generally regarded as the largest protest in the city since the Vietnam era. There have been schisms over which presidential candidates to back in 2020, as well as disagreements about race and religion and about whether the march reflected the diversity of the movement. Those divisions linger even as many on the left say they need a united front heading into November’s election.

The disputes led to dueling events in New York City last year, the resignation of some national Women’s March leaders and the disbanding of a group in Washington state.

Organizers expect about 100,000 people across the country to participate in this year’s Women’s March, which is scheduled for Saturday in over 180 cities. They say up to 10,000 people are expected at the march in Washington, far fewer than the turnout last year,  when about 100,000 people held a rally east of the White House. Instead of a single big event, the group has been holding actions in a run-up to the march this week around three key issues: climate change, immigration and reproductive rights.

The week reflects that the movement is “moving into the next stage,” said director Caitlin Breedlove.

Leaders of MoveOn.org, which organized some of the anti-Iran war protests, agreed. Mobilization manager Kate Alexander said the group and its members pulled together over 370 protests in 46 states in less than 48 hours to show resistance to Trump’s actions. The president ordered airstrikes that killed Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran’s Quds Force who has been blamed for deadly attacks on U.S. troops and allies going back decades. Iran pledged retribution, sparking fears of an all-out war.

Alexander noted that the Iran protest is just one of many issues MoveOn members have organized in response to in the past few years.

“It’s not that there are fewer people mobilizing – it’s that they’re mobilized in different campaigns. There’s more to do,” Alexander said. “I don’t believe people are tuning out. I think people are lying in wait.”

While waiting, many have passed on some major moments in Trump’s presidency. Resistance groups rallied on the eve of the House vote for impeachment, but even some of those who participated said they were disappointed more people didn’t turn out.

Several organizations also said much of their organizing is done through social media or text message and email programs, which are less visible but have a significant impact. In 2018, the Women’s March had over 24 billion social media impressions, Breedlove said.

Atef Said, a sociology professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said all social movements evolve over time. He noted the Trump resistance movement is global and will continue regardless of whether Trump is reelected.

“Movements always rise and decline in terms of numbers on the ground,” he said.

Andy Koch, a 30-year-old nurse who lives in Chicago, has seen that ebb and flow firsthand. Koch has been active in protesting Trump’s policies even before he took office. When Koch was a student at University of Illinois at Chicago, Trump’s campaign canceled a 2016 speech at the campus following tense student protests.

Koch said the anti-Trump activism swelled when he first took office and again in early 2017 when he announced his first travel ban affecting people from several predominantly Muslim countries.

Roughly 1,000 people mobilized in Chicago immediately after Trump authorized the attack on the Iranian leader, and then the crowds subsided a few days later after the threat of war seemed to subside following Trump’s address to the nation Jan 8. That day, a few dozen – including Koch – showed up in 20-degree Fahrenheit (minus 7 Celsius) temperatures outside Trump International Hotel Chicago during rush hour.

Koch understands that masses of people won’t show up for every protest. ” What allows those numbers to come out … is continued organizing going on in between these events,” he said.

He said there have been numerous smaller protests he’s been involved with, including protesting U.S. foreign policy in Venezuela and Syria, and they’ve taken other forms. For instance, he’s helped plan a teach-in on Iranian foreign policy this week at UIC.

Maya Wells, a 21-year-old political science senior at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, was a speaker at a rally last week in Charlotte. Wells, who is Persian American and has family in Iran, said she doesn’t look at the numbers of people who turn out but rather at the fact that they took time out of their day to be there.

“I see more people coming. Because some of my friends who are conservatives and voted for Trump, they’re against this,” she said, adding that the most recent protest wasn’t the last.

“There will be more days to come,” Wells said. “I have no doubt in my mind.”

 

Iranian state media have given a distorted view of Western news coverage of a rare public sermon by Iran’s supreme leader, ignoring how Western outlets highlighted perceived shortcomings in his responses to domestic problems.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei led Friday prayers in Tehran for the first time since 2012, giving a sermon at the capital’s Grand Mosque. The longtime supreme leader has limited such public sermons to times of national crisis in the past.

In his speech, Khamenei harshly criticized the United States and its European allies Britain, France and Germany. He singled out American leaders as “clowns” for professing to stand with Iran’s people while in practice seeking to “stab” Iranians in the back with a “poisoned dagger.”

Khamenei’s speech came two weeks after the U.S. carried out what it called a self-defensive strike that killed his top general, Qassem Soleimani, at Baghdad airport. In his remarks, Khamenei accused the U.S. of engaging in a “terrorist” act by killing Soleimani, who led Iran’s elite Quds Force and whom the U.S. had designated as the head of a terrorist organization that killed hundreds of U.S. troops in Iraq and directed proxy militias to fight U.S. allies in the region.  

The Iranian supreme leader also denounced Britain, France and Germany as U.S. lackeys after they decided this week to trigger a dispute resolution mechanism in their 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, a potential step toward joining the U.S. in re-imposing economic sanctions on Tehran.   

Khamenei expressed sorrow over the Jan. 8 shooting down of a Ukrainian passenger plane by Iranian forces that mistook it for an enemy threat shortly after it took off from Tehran. Hours earlier, his forces had fired missiles at U.S. troops in Iraq in retaliation for the Soleimani killing and had braced themselves for a U.S. counterattack. No U.S. forces were killed in the Iranian missile strike, however, and Washington did not hit back.  

For three days after the plane crashed, killing all 176 people on board, Iranian officials insisted it was not their fault despite Western media and officials citing intelligence sources as saying Iranian missile fire downed the aircraft. Officials belatedly acknowledged that their denials of responsibility were false on Saturday, angering hundreds of Iranians who joined four days of anti-government protests in Tehran and other cities.  “

The plane crash was a bitter tragedy that burned through our heart,” Khamenei said in his sermon. However, he made no apology for his government’s initial false statements about the crash and criticized those who joined the anti-government protests as unrepresentative of the Iranian people.  

Prominent Western news agencies had extensive coverage of Khamenei’s rare public sermon.   

Iranian state media outlets Fars News Agency  and ISNA published summaries of those Western news reports, highlighting their references to Khamenei’s strong denunciations of the U.S. and European powers. Fars and ISNA also cited the Western news agencies as noting the large size of Khamenei’s audience, with thousands of people cramming into the mosque for the sermon.     

A VOA Persian review of Khamenei sermon articles by the eight Western news agencies cited by Fars and ISNA, though, found that the two Iranian state media outlets ignored several key elements of the Western news coverage.   

In one example, Fars avoided mentioning that a Reuters report said Khamenei stopped short of a direct apology for the plane disaster. “On social media, some Iranians reacted angrily” to the lack of an apology, the report said.  

In another example, ISNA made no mention of the New York Times reporting that Khamenei “offered only scant condolences” to the families who lost victims in the plane crash and dismissed the anti-government protesters as “stooges of the United States.” The New York Times article also noted that Iran “choreographed” the Friday sermon by busing in schoolchildren, civil servants and worshippers from neighboring provinces “to present an image of power and unity.” “

When it comes to reporting an important speech by the supreme leader, it is no surprise to see there has been an  attempt to pick and choose  bits of coverage in international media that are either positive or neutral and leave out the negative bits,” said BBC Monitoring journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh, a former Iranian state media employee, in a message to VOA Persian.  

“Reports about the views and speeches of Khamenei are almost always entirely supportive,” Sardarizadeh said. “It would be highly unusual to see state media highlight any criticism of the supreme leader even in normal times, let alone now.  But Khamenei is one of the few individuals about whom all media sources in Iran tend to be highly cautious and selective in their reporting.”

This article originated in VOA’s Persian Service. It was produced in collaboration with VOA’s Extremism Watch Desk. 

A U.S. official says women are the force behind the massive protests in Iran, and that the United States is unaware of whether Iranian Olympic athlete Kimia Alizadeh is seeking asylum in the U.S.

Alizadeh, Iran’s only female Olympic medalist, said earlier this week on social media that she has permanently left Iran because she had had enough of being used by its authorities for political purposes.“

I don’t know if she is seeking asylum so I can’t speak to that,” Brian Hook, U.S. Special Representative for Iran, said Friday when asked by VOA if the  U.S. would welcome Alizadeh if she seeks asylum in the United States. 

“Much of the strength and the energy in the anti-regime protests are being led by Iranian women,” Hook said, adding he believes “many more Iranian women would like to leave the oppression that this regime presents to them.”
Iran was shocked when Alizadeh announced her defection earlier this week.

Iranian politician Abdolkarim Hosseinzadeh accused “incompetent officials” of allowing Iran’s “human capital to flee,” according to media reports.

A deputy Iranian sports minister, Mahin Farhadizadeh, reportedly told the news agency ISNA that Alizadeh defected to pursue her education “in physiotherapy,” according to a New York Post report.

Friday, Shohreh Bayat, an Iranian chess referee who is in Russia for the Women’s World Chess Championship, told Reuters she does not want to return home out of fear for her safety. Bayat has been accused of violating her nation’s Islamic dress code while adjudicating a women’s tournament.

Last week, protests erupted across Iran after a period of increasing tensions between Washington and Tehran. The U.S. killed the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Quds Force commander Qassem Soleimani on Jan. 2, and Iran responded Jan. 8 by launching an airstrike from Tehran against an Iraqi base that housed U.S. military. Shortly after, a Ukrainian International Airline Boeing 737 taking off from Tehran’s airport crashed, killing all 176 people on board. Three days later, Iran admitted to mistakenly shooting down the airplane, which led to street protests in Tehran and several other Iranian cities.

The 21-year-old Alizadeh, who won a bronze medal in taekwondo at the 2016 Rio Olympics, did not reveal her whereabouts but in the past has said she wants to settle in the Netherlands.

She said she no longer wanted to “sit at the table of hypocrisy, lies, injustice, and flattery.”
“I am one of the millions of oppressed women in Iran with whom they have been playing for years,” she wrote on social media.

In a tweet, State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus said “#KimiaAlizadeh, Iran’s only female Olympic medalist, has rejected the regime’s oppression of women. She has defected for a life of security, happiness, and freedom. #Iran will continue to lose more strong women unless it learns to empower and support them.”

#KimiaAlizadeh, Iran’s only female Olympic medalist, has rejected the regime’s oppression of women. She has defected for a life of security, happiness, and freedom. #Iran will continue to lose more strong women unless it learns to empower and support them. https://t.co/NIzdo4PPwI

— Morgan Ortagus (@statedeptspox) January 12, 2020

Western media had credited the taekwondo medalist with “emboldening Iranian girls and women to push the boundaries of personal freedom.”

In December, Alireza Firouzja, Iran’s top-rated chess champion, said he would not play for Iran in an upcoming tournament and is ready to renounce his citizenship because of a ban on competing against Israeli players.

Saeid Mollaei, an Iranian judo world champion, left the country for Germany last fall and sought asylum. Mollaei said he had been pressured to deliberately lose in the semifinals at the 2019 World Judo Championships in Tokyo to avoid facing Israelis.

The prospects that Iran and the United States will develop a new, more extensive nuclear agreement appear bleak, at least for now, after leaders in Tehran this week defiantly abandoned the 2015 deal, one that President Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018. Tensions remain high as international sanctions could be added to those already imposed by the U.S.  VOA’s Brian Padden reports on growing concerns that there is no realistic diplomatic strategy at play to peacefully resolve this crisis.

U.S. firearms makers will be able within days to export as much as 20% more guns, including assault rifles and ammunition, under rules the Trump administration announced on Friday.

The change, which had been contemplated for more than a decade, will officially move oversight of commercial firearm exports from the State Department to the Commerce Department, where export licenses will be much easier to obtain.

Set in the 1933 Soviet Union, the historical movie drama “Mr. Jones,” director by Agnieszka Holland and first-time screenwriter Andrea Chalupa,  packs a powerful message. The movie tells a story of a young Welsh reporter searching for truth in the 1933 Soviet Union. Tatiana Vorozhko has the story, narrated by Joy Wagner.

Bobby Humphreys never thought that it would be a tiny Chihuahua that would help him go through a very large rough patch in life. But the small dog named Lady did more than that – she also inspired the Maryland native to turn his home into a shelter for abandoned, abused and neglected Chihuahuas. Evgeniya Samus has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. 

The Interior Ministry of Ukraine tells VOA that a special task force involving U.S. and Ukrainian officials will be launched Monday to look into reports that the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine had been subjected to surveillance and threats in Ukraine.

After meeting Friday with U.S. diplomats, Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in statement to VOA that “Our goal is for the investigation to determine whether the published messages and conversations are fakes and boastings in informal talks, or Ukrainian and international law was violated, in which case the law enforcement will react.”  

Ukraine says Avakov invited the U.S. to participate based on a cooperation agreement between Ukraine’s Interior Ministry and the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation.

Also Friday, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Friday that he was unaware that former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch had been under surveillance in Ukraine. He said he was obligated to investigate the accusation but asserted it eventually would be proven untrue. 

Pompeo’s remarks were made during interviews with two conservative radio hosts, his first since the allegations surfaced late Tuesday. 

The information also suggested that Yovanovitch might have been threatened shortly before Trump removed her in May. 

“To the best of my recollection, I had never heard of this at all,” Pompeo told radio show host Hugh Hewitt. 

Pompeo broke his silence after legislators and diplomats harshly criticized him for not addressing the allegations. 

“We will do everything we need to do to evaluate whether there was something that took place there,” Pompeo said in an interview with broadcaster Tony Katz. “I suspect that much of what’s been reported will ultimately prove wrong, but our obligation, my obligation as secretary of state, is to make sure that we evaluate, investigate.” 

The allegations are central to the Senate impeachment trial against Trump, who has been charged by the Democratic-led House of Representatives with abusing his power by pressuring Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden, Trump’s possible Democratic opponent in the 2020 presidential election, and Biden’s son Hunter. 

The allegations about the surveillance and threats to Yovanovitch are based on documents released by Democrats that were provided by Lev Parnas, a former associate of Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani. Pompeo said Friday that he had never met or communicated with Parnas.

Obstacle 

During Trump’s alleged pressure campaign, Yovanovitch was reportedly seen as an obstacle to an investigation of the Bidens. 

She returned to Washington after receiving a late-night phone call from the director general of the Foreign Service, telling her to leave Ukraine immediately to ensure her safety. 

Trump repeatedly has said he is innocent of the charges and has described the impeachment probe as a “hoax.” 

An ancient and rare species of tree has been saved from Australia’s bush fires by a specialist team of firefighters.  

Australia’s Wollemi pines survived the dinosaurs, and were protected from huge blazes near Sydney by water-bombing aircraft and specialist firefighters, who were winched into a narrow gorge by helicopter.  

“It was a military-style operation,” said Matt Kean, the New South Wales environment minister. “We had fire retardant, irrigation systems. We winched staff into the area to make sure that we were doing everything we could to protect the trees, and fortunately it paid off.

“These trees can be found nowhere else in the world. In fact, there are only 200 left on the planet, so we needed to do everything we could to protect them and ensure they were able to survive into the future,” he added.

The Wollemi National Park near Sydney is the only place in the world where these giant trees are found in the wild. Before 1994, they were thought to be extinct. Experts believe the pines are an invaluable link to Australia’s prehistoric past, and have estimated the grove could be up to 200 million years old.

Their exact location is a secret because of fears that visitors could bring in pathogens that might cause disease. Some trees were charred by the flames, and a couple of trees were destroyed, but this rare species has survived Australia’s bush fire crisis.

The fires have killed 29 people and an estimated one billion animals, as well as destroying hundreds of homes.

Heavy rain has fallen across southeastern Australia, offering some relief for fire crews battling dozens of blazes, but there are concerns the wet weather could cause landslides and flash flooding.