Kenya has become the first country in Africa to recognize people who identify their gender as intersex during a population count starting Saturday. As Mohammed Yusuf reports for VOA from Nairobi, the third category will be listed along with male and female on census forms. 

One hundred teenage girls from secondary schools in Malawi have this month undergone “Girls in Science” camp at the Malawi University of Science and Technology (“MUST”).  The camp aims to develop girl’s interest in science fields long believed to be a male domain. Lameck Masina has the story from Thyolo district of southern Malawi.

U.S. prosecutors will seek the death penalty for a Pennsylvania man accused of bursting into a Pittsburgh synagogue last year with a semi-automatic rifle and shooting 11 people to death, according to court papers filed on Monday.

Robert Bowers, 46, shouted “all Jews must die” as he fired on congregants gathered for Sabbath services at the Tree of Life synagogue on Oct. 27, authorities said.

Bowers, who is from a Pittsburgh suburb, has pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh to a 63-count indictment and is awaiting trial though a trial date has not been set. The charges include using a firearm to commit murder and obstruction of free exercise of religious belief resulting in death, the court filing said.

“Robert Bowers expressed hatred and contempt toward members of the Jewish faith and his animus toward members of the Jewish faith played a role in the killings,” prosecutors said.

The massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue was the deadliest attack ever on Jewish Americans in the United States.

The synagogue is a fixture in Pittsburgh’s historically Jewish neighborhood of Squirrel Hill, which is home to one of the largest and oldest Jewish populations in the United States.

Bowers targeted that location “to maximize the devastation, amplify the harm of his crimes and instill fear within the local, national and international Jewish communities,” prosecutors said in court papers.

An attorney for Bowers, death penalty specialist Judy Clarke, did not return calls or an email seeking comment.

‘Drawn out and difficult’

The Tree of Life synagogue hosted multiple Jewish congregations and, according to the New York Times, some people who worshipped there have opposed the possibility of the death penalty for Bowers.

According to the newspaper, Rabbi Jonathan Perlman of New Light congregation, which met at Tree of Life, said in a letter to U.S. Attorney General William Barr that “a drawn out and difficult death penalty trial would be a disaster with witnesses and attorneys dredging up horrifying drama and giving this killer the media attention he does not deserve.”

Perlman did not immediately return an email seeking comment.

Among those killed were a 97-year-old woman and a married couple in their 80s. Two civilians and five police officers were wounded before the gunman, who was armed with an assault-style rifle and three handguns, was shot by police at the synagogue and surrendered. He has been held in jail since then.

The mass shooting followed a rise in the number of hate crimes and the number of hate groups in the United States, according to separate reports from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Amnesty International named five new prisoners of conscience in Cuba on Monday and said their detention underscored how the presidential handover last year from Raul Castro had not changed the Communist-run country’s repressive tactics.

Amnesty said there were likely many more Cubans who had been detained for peacefully expressing their views whose cases it was a challenge to document because authorities deny access to international rights groups.

All of the prisoners it listed were associated with opposition organizations in the one-party state.

Cuban authorities do not comment on police activity such as the detention of dissidents, who have limited support inside the island, and dismisses them as a tiny minority of provocateurs financed by the United States to subvert the government.

“For decades, Cuba has stifled freedom of expression and assembly by locking up people for their beliefs and opposition to the government,” said Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas director at Amnesty International.

“Over the years, the names of Cuba’s prisoners of conscience have changed, but the state’s tactics have stayed almost exactly the same,” she added.

Many Cuban activists and independent journalists are complaining of growing harassment.

They say that is a sign the government is nervous because the launch of mobile internet last December has given them more of a public platform and ability to mobilize at a time of heightened political and economic tension.

Cuba, which was already struggling with a decline in Venezuelan aid in recent years, is facing more hostility and sanctions from its longtime foe, the United States.

Cuba has also undergone a leadership transition, with Castro handing the presidency over last year to his right-hand man, Miguel Diaz-Canel.

On Monday, the head of Cuba’s largest opposition group, the Patriotic Union of Cuba (UNPACU), Jose Daniel Ferrer, said on Twitter that security forces had detained 15 activists and prevented dozens of others from reaching their local headquarters in order to prevent activities to celebrate the group’s eighth anniversary.

The Madrid-based non-governmental rights group Cuban Prisoners Defenders, which has links to UNPACU, estimates there are at least 70 political prisoners on the island.

Amnesty said it updated its own list after reviewing some of those cases.

All of the prisoners Amnesty listed on Tuesday were men who had been detained since 2015 and sentenced to one to five years of prison for “public disorder,” “contempt” or “dangerousness.”

The latter two charges are inconsistent with international law, it said. “Dangerousness” – the possibility someone could eventually commit a crime – is a catch-all used against anyone authorities do not like, critics say.

Two of the five prisoners had been badly beaten by prison officials, Amnesty cited their relatives as saying.

Two yellow burqas are on display at a television station in Kabul, bright versions of the blue ghostlike garments some women in the capital still wear. For the young women at Zan TV they are relics, a reminder of a Taliban-ruled past that few of them can recall.

Their generation is the most vulnerable, and perhaps the most defiant, as the United States and the Taliban near a deal on ending America’s longest war. Worried about losing what they’ve gained over nearly two decades, they are demanding a voice in high-level talks to determine their country’s future.

“For me, I will not submit myself to the Taliban,” said Shogofa Sadiqi, Zan TV’s 25-year-old chief director, who believes the insurgent group will have less impact as it faces a new generation. She described the burqas as a symbol of the challenges women have faced over the years and practically shuddered when asked if she’d worn one herself. Never, ever. “I don’t like it,” she said, switching to English to make her feelings clear.

About two-thirds of Afghanistan’s population is 25 or younger, with little or no memory of life before 2001. That’s when a U.S.-led invasion pushed out the Taliban, who had sheltered al-Qaida and its leader Osama bin Laden before the 9/11 attacks and imposed a harsh form of Islamic law that kept women out of public view.

Now this young generation watches as U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad negotiates a troop withdrawal in return for Taliban assurances on countering terror groups. With talks focusing on security, little else is assured. Few know what the Taliban are thinking or what they will do as international forces leave and the world’s attention moves on.

The insurgent group has recovered from its defeat and now controls roughly half of Afghanistan. With its position stronger than ever it has rejected negotiations with the Afghan government, though intra-Afghan talks on political and security issues are meant to follow a U.S.-Taliban deal. The Taliban could join the government.

As for women’s rights in this still highly conservative country, the U.S. has said it will be left for Afghans to decide.

For Karishma Naz, a 23-year-old music presenter on Zan TV — “Woman TV” in the Dari language — the uncertainty is unsettling. She doubts the Taliban have changed their beliefs and imagines two options if the “dark days” return: she will stay at home by force or leave the country, an option unavailable for many young Afghan women.

“Why are there no women to represent and defend us?” Naz asked, worried about losing the career in front of the camera that she’d wished for as a child. But as the seconds counted down to her live broadcast she adjusted her pink headscarf, straightened up and put on a smile.

Her generation has seen Afghan women become street artists, CEOs, a member of the Supreme Court and the first female winner of the televised talent show “Afghan Star.” Young Afghan women have formed an all-female orchestra and competed in the Olympics. A woman opened the country’s first yoga studio, another leads the state-run film production company and a third held a Kabul street concert with her rock band earlier this year.

They have equal rights under the post-2001 constitution, but reality often lags behind. Women still have to stand up to conservative relatives, community members and judgmental strangers. A bill criminalizing violence against women still hasn’t been passed.

Little has changed in areas controlled by the Taliban, who have said girls can be educated and even work in politics and the judiciary, though not as president or chief justice.

“This research could not identify a single girls’ secondary school open in an area of heavy Taliban influence or control,” said a report last year by the Overseas Development Institute, which interviewed more than 160 Taliban fighters, officials and civilians in seven of the country’s 34 provinces.

Maryam Sama, a 27-year-old member of Parliament, said much still needs to be done even in areas under government control. About half of all girls in Afghanistan still don’t attend school, more than half are married before age 19 and domestic violence is widespread despite billions of dollars in humanitarian aid since 2001.

“But if we turn into an Islamic emirate we will have no voice,” Sama said, referring to the Taliban’s name for its self-styled government. “If anything happens in Afghanistan, if anything goes wrong, all the responsibility goes back to the United States and the people at this (negotiating) table.”

One of the few women who spoke with Taliban leaders during their meetings with representatives of Afghan society this year in Moscow and Qatar is former lawmaker Fawzia Koofi, who pushed past her uncomfortable memories of the Taliban’s rule to attend in the interest of peace.

Taliban representatives told her they regretted many things that had occurred and said women were forced to stay at home because of the insecurity at the time. She didn’t believe it.

The Taliban still don’t support women’s rights according to international principles, she said. A Taliban statement at the Moscow talks said the group is committed to women’s rights within the framework of Islam “and then Afghan tradition.” It also criticized immorality and indecency “under the name of women’s rights.”

“I think the new generation of people in Afghanistan will not be able to accept this kind of approach,” Koofi said.

She told the Taliban that a girl born in the final months of their rule would now be 18. “She knows how to use all the technology and the opportunities of the world, and if you try to oppress her or deprive her of her rights, definitely she will use her abilities to inform the world,” she recalled during an interview.

Then she excused herself for a meeting, one that was a reminder of how fragile Afghan women’s gains can be.

A young former TV presenter was shot dead on her way to work in Kabul earlier this year. Her parents accused her husband, and they told Koofi they’ve faced attacks from people angry that he, the man, was blamed. Could she help?

President Michel Aoun said Monday that Lebanon had a right to defend itself, likening Israeli drone strikes to a “declaration of war” amid rising tensions between the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement and Israel.

Israel’s military said its northern command was on high alert at the borders with Syria and Lebanon, as Lebanon’s Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri urged diplomats to help prevent an escalation.

After two drones crashed Sunday in Beirut’s southern suburbs, which are dominated by Hezbollah, the heavily armed movement warned Israel to await a response.

In a Sunday speech, the leader of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, issued the toughest threats to his enemy in years and said the drones had launched a “new phase.”

While Israel has not claimed the Beirut drone attack, Nasrallah deemed it the first Israeli attack inside Lebanon since the two sides fought a deadly month-long war in 2006.

Only hours later, a Palestinian faction said Israeli drones had struck a military position it holds in Lebanon’s Bekaa valley before dawn Monday.

“What happened was similar to a declaration of war which allows us to resort to our right to defending our sovereignty,” the Lebanese president’s office quoted Aoun, a political ally of Hezbollah, as saying Monday on Twitter. “We are a people seeking peace, not war, and we don’t accept anyone threatening us in any war.”

Aoun discussed the “Israeli assault” with the country’s United Nations Special Coordinator Jan Kubis on Monday, the presidency said. He told Kubis the attacks in the Dahyeh suburbs and in the Bekaa violated U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701 that ended the July 2006 war.

Aoun and Hariri called for Lebanon’s Higher Defense Council to meet Tuesday.

‘Blatant violation’

Hariri said his government wants to avoid a “dangerous escalation” of tensions with Israel. But this requires the international community rejecting Israel’s “blatant violation,” he told ambassadors from the U.N. Security Council’s five permanent members.

The Western-backed Hariri, whose coalition cabinet includes Hezbollah, told the diplomats their countries must help to preserve stability in Lebanon. “Any escalation could develop into a regional cycle of violence that nobody can predict the extent of,” he said.

Israeli Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz said his country remained vigilant about the possibility of a Hezbollah attack under orders from its regional arch-foe Iran.

“Undoubtedly, the situation is tense. One does not know what a new day will bring,” Steinitz, a member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet, said in a video interview with Israel’s YNet news website.

U.S. Vice President Mike Pence said he spoke on Monday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and reiterated U.S. support for Israel.

Had a great conversation with Prime Minister

A coalition of 19 states and the District of Columbia, led by California and Massachusetts, said on Monday they will sue the Trump administration to stop a sweeping new rule to indefinitely detain migrant families seeking to settle in the United States.

The lawsuit, which is to be filed in federal court in California, will be only the first of what is expected to be a flurry of lawsuits aimed at blocking the rule, officially published on Friday, from taking effect in October.

However, the Trump administration’s effort to overturn a two-decade-old legal settlement limiting how long migrant children can be detained is likely to face more than just legal hurdles.

Even if the courts allow the rule to take effect, there are also practical problems: paying for thousands of additional family detention beds.

U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement has only three family detention facilities — two in Texas and one in Pennsylvania — that have between 2,500 and 3,000 beds, Acting Secretary of Homeland Security Kevin McAleenan said in announcing the new rule last week.

More than 42,000 families, mostly from Central America, were arrested along the U.S. southern border just last month. The July arrest numbers are at record highs, even though they have dropped more than half compared with levels seen in May.

“Even if the number of border crossings doesn’t go back up in the fall, all this (new rule) would enable them to do is to detain a relatively small percentage of the arriving families for longer,” said Kevin Landy, a former ICE assistant director responsible for the Office of Detention Policy and Planning under the Obama administration.

Shawn Neudauer, a spokesman for ICE, said the agency could not comment on potential increases to the agency’s detention capacity.

The new rule seeks to scrap the 1997 agreement, known as the Flores settlement, which puts a 20-day limit on how long children can be held in immigration detention. 

The court overseeing the settlement expanded its interpretation in 2015 to apply not just to unaccompanied children but also to children traveling with their parents.

Trump administration officials have said the detention limits have become a “pull” factor for migrants who bet that if they show up at the U.S.-Mexico border with a child and ask for asylum, they will be quickly let go to wait for a hearing in U.S. immigration court. Trump has decried this as a “catch-and-release” practice.

Without more space, that practice is likely to continue, Landy said. “The longer they keep those families, the fewer new arrivals they can detain, which means the Border Patrol is releasing more people overall” while a small percentage of families suffer the impacts of prolonged detention, he said.

Funding questions 

California Attorney General Xavier Becerra said in a statement on Monday that the rule is unlawful and “callously puts at risk the safety and well-being of children.”

McAleenan last week said ICE’s family facilities meet “high standards” including appropriate medical, educational, recreational and dining operations and private housing.

Setting up those types of “family residential centers,” as the agency calls them, can be more expensive than facilities dedicated only to adults.

Congress mandates how much ICE can spend on immigration detention, and the 2019 budget has $2.8 billion earmarked to pay for 49,500 beds for solo adults — but only 2,500 beds for parents and children.

However, ICE is currently detaining more than 55,000 immigrants, a record high, a small percentage of them at family facilities, according to agency statistics.

The Department of Homeland Security has been able to stretch its budget by reprogramming funds from other areas to pay for more detention, but there are limits on how much money it can move without congressional approval.

Democrats in Congress are trying to put more limits on ICE’s detention spending for the next fiscal year.

Congresswoman Nita Lowey, a New York Democrat who chairs the U.S. House of Representatives’ Appropriations Committee, said the aim of proposed controls in the 2020 budget is to “tighten the reins on the administration’s practice of transferring funds for purposes other than those intended by Congress, including the dramatic expansion of interior immigration enforcement.”

ICE has also had a hard time finding communities willing to accept the construction of facilities in their backyards, said Theresa Cardinal Brown, a former policy adviser at U.S. Customs and Border Protection now at the Washington-based Bipartisan Policy Center.

It is also not clear how the family detention rule will work with another Trump administration policy pushing thousands of Central American families back to Mexico to wait out their U.S. court hearings there instead of in the United States, she said. 

“They are putting out policies without having an operational plan in place,” said Cardinal Brown. “It’s a throwing-spaghetti-against-the-wall-type approach.”

More than 85,000 Venezuelan migrants crossed into Ecuador from Colombia in the last month, ahead of new visa restrictions from Quito that took effect Monday, the Colombian government said.

The number of migrants entering Ecuador at the Rumichaca border crossing reached 11,000 over the weekend, an uptick of 30% compared to normal traffic, according to figures from Colombia’s migration agency.

Colombia is home to some 1.4 million Venezuelans who have fled a deep political and economic crisis that has caused long-running shortages of food and medicine. Hundreds of thousands of others have passed through the country on their way to Ecuador, Peru, Chile and other destinations.

Ecuador will now require a visa for Venezuelan citizens, part of stricter immigration policies being implemented in several countries.

The new rule will not stop people from migrating out of necessity, but will instead increase the number of people using informal crossings, Colombia’s Foreign Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo said in a statement.

“The passage of migrants through unauthorized areas, the so-called ‘shortcuts,’ boosts crime and human trafficking, putting people at risk,” said Trujillo. “It also stops the state from identifying the population that is entering, meaning migration figures are not known with certainty and necessary policies cannot be implemented to tend to that population.”

Unlike its neighbors, Colombia has not put in place stringent immigration requirements, instead encouraging migrants who entered the country informally to register with authorities so they can access health care, school places and other social services. 

Colombia said this month it would give citizenship to more than 24,000 children born in the country to Venezuelan migrant parents, to prevent the children from being stateless and less able to access public services.

Some 320,000 Venezuelans currently live in Ecuador. The government estimates that figure could increase to nearly half a million by the end of the year.

US President Donald Trump said Monday he had no need to help mediate between Pakistan and India over tensions in disputed Kashmir because Prime Minister Narendra Modi feels he has it “under control”.

On August 5 Modi’s Hindu-nationalist government revoked the autonomy of the Muslim-majority territory where tens of thousands of people have been killed in an uprising against Indian rule since 1989, most of them civilians.

Earlier this month, Trump said he was ready to step in, but at a meeting with Modi at the G7 in France, Trump said “the prime minister really feels he has it under control”.

Trump added he and Modi spoke about Kashmir “at great length” on Sunday.

New Delhi’s contentious decision angered Pakistan, which has fought two wars with India over the region, and Prime Minister Imran Khan said Monday he would continue fighting for the rights of Kashmiris.

Khan said he planned to embark on a diplomatic tour soon to raise the issue in international forums including the UN General Assembly in September.

“I will tour the world and tell them what is happening… the Modi government is pursuing a policy which brought havoc globally in the past,” Khan said in a televised broadcast.

“Many Muslim governments, which are not openly supporting us due to their business interests, will sooner or later support our position… It is imperative that we should stand by Kashmiris. We should give a message to Kashmiris that we are with them.”

Fallen movie mogul Harvey Weinstein pleaded not guilty to two new charges of sexual predatory assault Monday as a judge postponed his trial until next year.

Weinstein, already indicted over two sexual assault allegations, was slapped with the additional counts in a new indictment put before a court in New York.

Judge James Burke postponed the start of the trial from next month to January 6, 2020 to give Weinstein’s defense time to prepare.

Weinstein, 67, laughed and said “not really” when the judge asked him whether he wanted to go to trial.

It was not immediately clear if the new indictment contained accusations by new women.

Once one of the most powerful men in Hollywood, Weinstein has been accused of harassment and assault by more than 80 women, including stars such as Angelina Jolie and Ashley Judd.

But the “Pulp Fiction” producer has only faced charges involving two women — one who alleges he raped her in 2013, the other who claims he forcibly performed oral sex on her in 2006.

New York prosecutors announced on Thursday that they had filed a new indictment against the 67-year-old. The original accusations against him were a catalyst for America’s #MeToo movement.

According to U.S. media, the new indictment will include testimony from actress Annabella Sciorra, known for her appearances in the hit television series “The Sopranos.”

Sciorra helped trigger the #MeToo movement in October 2017 when she told The New Yorker magazine that Weinstein raped her at her home in Manhattan in 1993.  

Weinstein has always insisted his sexual relationships were consensual and is again expected to enter a not guilty plea on Monday.

Sciorra reportedly approached prosecutors too late for her allegations to be included in the original indictment, The New York Times reported, citing a letter written by the prosecutor in charge of the case.

The judge denied a prosecution request that Sciorra be allowed to give evidence at Weinstein’s trial because she had not testified before a grand jury as is procedure under U.S. law.

Prosecutors hope the new indictment will allow her to testify. The number of accusers appearing in court can influence the verdict, as seen in the 2018 conviction of Bill Cosby.

Weinstein’s lawyers have denounced the new indictment as a “desperate” last-minute move and are expected to ask for the indictment to be dismissed.

His attorneys have also asked for the trial to be moved, arguing that intense coverage in New York’s tabloids has meant he won’t get a fair trial.

A decision will also likely come Monday but the request is expected to be rejected.

 

U.S. President Donald Trump said Monday he would likely host the 2020 G-7 summit at one of his properties, the Trump National Doral Golf Club resort in Florida.

No final decision has been made for next year’s venue, when it is the U.S.’s turn to stage the annual gathering. But Trump, who often touts the beauty and amenities of his clubs and hotels, says the posh, palm tree setting would be perfect for meetings with the leaders of France, Germany, Italy, Britain, Japan and Canada.

He said other leaders “love the location of the hotel, they also like the fact is it right next to the airport for convenience. And it is Miami, Doral, Miami, so it is a great area,” he said as this year’s summit in the Atlantic coastal town of Biarritz, France wound down. “We haven’t had anything that could even come close to competing with it, especially when you look at the location.”

The club’s web site touts “a new generation of style and service,” and has four golf courses, including the “Blue Monster” that has hosted major championships in the past and charges golfers $250 to play an 18-hole round.

Other G7 leaders have often staged the summits they hosted in locales far removed from major cities, to promote the natural beauty of the sites, such as at the three G7 gatherings Trump has attended in Italy, Canada and France.

“So many places are so far away, the drive is so long, they need helicopters,” Trump said. Doral “is somewhere you can be at within minutes of landing.”

Even so, he praised the setting in Biarritz, saying, “We can learn from what they did here, even architecturally, the way the rooms were set up and designed.”

Trump critics have often attacked him for maintaining ownership of his vast global real estate empire during his presidency and promoting it, even as he has turned over its management to his two oldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump.

Government watchdogs have criticized the fact that foreign governments frequently book their diplomats at Trump’s hotel in downtown Washington blocks from the White House, so they are effectively paying the U.S. leader for a place to sleep.

But the Trump Organization, the president’s corporation, says it donates profits – $151,470 last year –  from the hotel revenues generated by the foreign nationals to the U.S. Treasury.

The Trump Organization says it makes the donation so as not to violate the U.S. Constitution’s prohibition against foreign governments giving “emoluments” – foreign gifts and money – to American presidents without Congress’ permission.

Immigrants, including sex workers, in Botswana could get a lifeline as the southern African country’s cabinet is due to decide on offering free Anti-Retroviral (ARV) treatment to foreigners. An estimated 30,000 migrants in the diamond rich country are HIV positive. Mqondisi Dube has more from Gaborone.

It’s called the  “Year of Return”, where people of African descent are encouraged to come to Ghana to mark 400 years since the first enslaved Africans were brought to what became the United States. This week a delegation from U.S. civil rights organization, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, is in Ghana visiting the sites of their ancestors.  Stacey Knott reports from Accra.

U.S. farmers, currently caught in the middle of a trade dispute between the Trump Administration and China, are also facing one of the most erratic years of weather variations, leaving many fields unplanted. Although prices for U.S. corn and soybeans have stabilized despite the weather, new tariffs imposed by China and the uncertain fate of the US, Canada, Mexico Trade Agreement is creating a perfect storm in a season already filled with uncertainty for farmers. VOA’s Kane Farabaugh reports from Colfax, Illinois.

Hong Kong police drew their guns and fired a warning shot Sunday night after protesters attacked officers with sticks and rods, and brought out water cannon trucks for the first time, an escalation in the summerlong protests that have shaken the city’s government and residents.

The day’s main showdown took place on a major drag in the outlying Tsuen Wan district following a protest march that ended in a nearby park. While a large crowd rallied in the park, a group of hard-line protesters took over a main street, strewing bamboo poles on the pavement and lining up orange and white traffic barriers and cones to obstruct police.

After hoisting warning flags, police used tear gas to try to disperse the crowd. Protesters responded by throwing bricks and gasoline bombs toward the police. The result was a surreal scene of small fires and scattered paving bricks on the street between the two sides, rising clouds of tear gas and green and blue laser lights pointed by the protesters at the police.

The protesters eventually decided to abandon their position. Two water cannon trucks and a phalanx of police vehicles with flashing lights joined riot police on foot as they advanced up the street. They met little resistance. Television footage showed a water cannon being fired once, but perhaps more as a test, as it didn’t appear to reach the retreating protesters.

Officers pulled their guns after a group of remaining protesters chased them down a street with sticks and rods, calling them “gangsters.” The officers held up their shields to defend themselves as they retreated. Police said that one officer fell to the ground and six drew their pistols after they were surrounded, with one firing the warning shot.

Some protesters said they’re resorting to violence because the government has not responded to their peaceful demonstrations.

“The escalation you’re seeing now is just a product of our government’s indifference toward the people of Hong Kong,” said Rory Wong, who was at the showdown after the march.

One neighborhood resident, Dong Wong, complained about the tear gas.

“I live on the 15th floor and I can even smell it at home,” he said. “I have four dogs, sneezing, sneezing all day. … The protesters didn’t do anything, they just blocked the road to protect themselves.”

Police said they arrested 36 people, including a 12-year-old, for offenses such as unlawful assembly, possession of an offensive weapon and assaulting police officers.

Earlier Sunday, tens of thousands of umbrella-carrying protesters marched in the rain. Many filled Tsuen Wan Park, the endpoint of the rally, chanting, “Fight for freedom, stand with Hong Kong,” the South China Morning Post newspaper reported.

The march in Hong Kong’s New Territories started near the Kwai Fong train station, which has become a focal point for protesters after police used tear gas there earlier this month. Police with riot gear could be seen moving into position along the march route.

Protesters have taken to the semiautonomous Chinese territory’s streets for more than two months. Their demands include democratic elections and an investigation into police use of force to quell the protests.

A large group clashed with police on Saturday after a march in the Kowloon Bay neighborhood, building barricades and setting fires in the streets. Police said they arrested 29 people for various offenses, including unlawful assembly, possession of offensive weapons and assaulting police officers.

The clashes, while not as prolonged or violent as some earlier ones, ended a brief lull in the violence. The protests, which began in early June, had turned largely peaceful the previous weekend, after weeks of escalating violence.

In nearby Macao, another Chinese territory, a pro-Beijing committee chose a businessman as the gambling hub’s next leader with little of the controversy surrounding the government in Hong Kong.

Ho Iat-seng, running unopposed, will succeed current leader Chui Sai-on in December. Asked about the protests in Hong Kong, the 62-year-old Ho said they would end eventually, like a major typhoon.

Protesters in Hong Kong have demanded that the city’s leader, Carrie Lam, also chosen by a pro-Beijing committee, step down, though that demand has evolved into a broader call for fully democratic elections.

Opera legend Placido Domingo was greeted with a standing ovation in Salzburg, Austria, at his first appearance on stage since nine women accused him of sexual harassment dating back three decades.

Even before he sang a single note, Domingo was greeted with a thunderous applause that grew to a crescendo until most of the house was on its feet.

“Wonderful public, good performance all,” the Spanish-born singer said as he signed autographs after the performance of Verdi’s tragic opera Luisa Miller.  “I mean, so much love from the public.”

The Associated Press reported last week that nine women accused Domingo of using his position as general director at the Los Angeles Opera and elsewhere to try to pressure them into sexual relationships. Several of the woman said he offered them  jobs and then punished them professionally if they refused his advances. Allegations included repeated phone calls, invitations to hotel rooms and his apartment, and unwanted touching and kisses.

In a statement to the AP, Domingo called the allegations “deeply troubling and, as presented inaccurate” and that he believed his interactions with the women were consensual.

Two U.S. opera houses, in Philadelphia and San Francisco cancelled performances by Domingo after the allegations surfaced, while others, including New York’s Metropolitan Opera, took a wait-and-see attitude pending an investigation.

As of Sunday, Domingo was still booked to star in Macbeth at the Met in New York next month.

 

 

Nigeria’s agency for combating human trafficking is repatriating and re-settling women who have been subjected to forced labor and prostitution after being smuggled into Europe on false promises of working at well-paying jobs.  Thousands of Nigerian women have been trafficked in recent years, though some were lucky enough to be able to return to their country.  Timothy Obiezu takes a closer look at the story of some human trafficking victims who are now back in Nigeria rebuilding their lives.

A former Republican Congressman says he’ll launch a primary challenge to US President Donald Trump in 2020. Joe Walsh is now the second candidate to unveil a challenge to President Trump from within his own party, as VOA’s Elizabeth Cherneff tells us in this report

Astronaut Anne McClain has denied reports that she may have committed the first crime in space.

McClain’s estranged wife, Summer Worden, accused the astronaut of accessing her bank account while on a six-month mission aboard the International Space Station, The New York Times first reported.

“There’s unequivocally no truth to these claims,” McClain wrote on Twitter. “We’ve been going through a painful, personal separation that’s now unfortunately in the media.”

McClain’s lawyer told investigators that the astronaut had accessed the bank records while aboard the ISS in order to monitor the couple’s combined finances — something she had done over the course of their relationship, the Times reported.

Worden has not accused McClain of moving or using the money in the account she accessed, the Times reported.

Worden, a former Air Force intelligence officer, filed a complaint with the Federal Trade Commission accusing McClain of identity theft for improperly viewing the account. Soon after, her family filed a second complaint with NASA’s Office of Inspector General.

NASA has touted McClain’s accomplishments saying, “”Lt Col. Anne McClain has an accomplished military career, flew combat missions in Iraq and is one of NASA’s top astronauts.”

 

 

Leaders of the Group of Seven nations said Sunday they are preparing to help Brazil battle fires burning across the Amazon region and repair the damage even as tens of thousands of soldiers got ready to join the fight against blazes that have caused global alarm.

French President Emmanuel Macron said the summit leaders were nearing an agreement on how to support Brazil and said the agreement would involve both technical and financial mechanisms “so that we can help them in the most effective way possible.”

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said her country and others will talk with Brazil about reforestation in the Amazon once fires there have been extinguished.

“Of course (this is) Brazilian territory, but we have a question here of the rainforests that is really a global question,” she said. “The lung of our whole Earth is affected, and so we must find common solutions.”

Pope Francis also added his voice to the chorus of concern over the fires in Brazil, which borders his homeland of Argentina, and urged people to pray so that “they are controlled as quickly as possible.” He told a crowd in St. Peter’s Square that “we’re all worried” about the Amazon fires. He warned that that green “lung of forest is vital for our planet.”

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro announced Friday that he would send 44,000 soldiers to help battle the fires that are scattered across his nation’s share of the vast Amazon, an overall region 10 times the size of Texas that is seen as a global bulwark against climate change. Only a few hundred troops had been sent so far.

The country’s satellite monitoring agency has recorded more than 41,000 fires in the Amazon region so far this year — with more than half of those coming this month alone. Experts say most of the fires are set by farmers or ranchers clearing existing farmland. But the same monitoring agency has reported a sharp increase in deforestation this year as well.

Brazil’s federal police agency announced Sunday it would investigate reports that farmers in the state of Para, one of those most affected by the blazes, had called for “a day of fire” to ignite fires Aug. 10.

Local news media said the group organized over WhatsApp to show support for Bolsonaro’s efforts to loosen environmental regulations.

Justice Minister Sergio Moro, who oversees the police, said on Twitter that Bolsonaro “asked for a rigorous investigation” and said “the criminal fires will be severely punished.”

Critics have accused Bolsonaro’s pro-development policies of encouraging farmers and ranchers to increase efforts to strip away the forest, though the president has issued repeated pledges recently to protect the area, and backed that up by sending in soldiers and other federal forces.

Merkel noted that Bolsonaro is putting “significant forces” into the effort to save the rainforest.

But Bolsonaro has had a tense relationship with foreign governments — including Germany’s — and non-governmental groups that he accuses of meddling in his country’s management of the Amazon. He last week floated the idea, without evidence, that non-governmental groups were setting fires to embarrass him.

Macron’s office on Friday complained that the Brazilian leader “had lied to him” about environmental commitments.

Asked if he would speak with Macron, Bolsonaro said Saturday, “If he calls me, I will answer. I am being extremely well-mannered with him even though he called me ‘a liar.’”

Meanwhile, Bolivian President Evo Morales said Sunday he would welcome aid in fighting his own country’s wildfires, which have scorched more than 2,900 square miles (744,000 hectares) of land in the Chiquitanía region over the past two weeks.

He told a news conference that he had accepted offers of assistance from the leaders of Spain, Chile and Paraguay.