Month: August 2019

The Democratic Republic of Congo has announced a coalition government.

The announcement comes eight months after President Felix Tshisekedi won a long-delayed presidential election.

“The government is finally here,” Prime Minister Sylvestre Ilunga Ilukamba said Monday.  “The president has signed the decree and we will begin work soon.”

Under the power-sharing deal, 23 posts are going to members of Tshisekedi’s Direction for Change, while the remaining 42 will be filled by members of former president Joseph Kabila’s Common Front for Congo.

The December vote was marred by disorganization at many polling stations, including missing voter rolls and malfunctioning electronic voting machines that pushed the vote well into nighttime hours, forcing election officials to conduct their activities by flashlight. A election observer mission set up by the Catholic Church said it had received at least 544 reports of malfunctioning voting machines.

Violence also overshadowed the vote, with four people killed in eastern South Kivu, including a police officer and an election official, over accusations of voter fraud.

The election to replace outgoing President Joseph Kabila was originally set to take place in 2016, but was called off when Kabila refused to step down after the end of his mandate.  Kabila had ruled the DRC since his father’s assassination in 2001.

The election was initially scheduled for December 23, but was postponed by a week because of a warehouse fire in the capital Kinshasha earlier in the month that destroyed thousands of voting machines.

Election officials also decided to postpone the election in three cities until March.  The eastern cities of Beni and Butembo were stricken with Ebola.  The western city of Yumbi was experiencing ethnic violence.  The move to delay the vote in the three locations affected more than one million voters.

…

A new book by a noted historian attempts to show how expanding American democracy hurt Native Americans in the early days of the nation and how tribes viewed the young United States as an entity seeking to erase them from existence.

University of Oregon history professor Jeffrey Ostler’s just-released “Surviving Genocide: Native Nations and the United States from the American Revolution and Bleeding Kansas” argues that the emergence of American democracy depended on the taking of Native lands.

Leaders of the fledgling nation also felt that removing Native Americans from the ancestral land — by any means necessary — was key to allowing an expanding and poorer white population to move west, the historian writes.

American Woman Promotes Philanthropy through Tourism

For Betty Fullagar an American woman from California,It started as a safari to
South Africa. She had
never been on the African continent before.  

 The tour
guide took the group to a village ?that you will not find in any tourist brochure,?
she says. It was a poor, remote village known as Boxahuku.

Ostler said he based his book on 30 years of research by other scholars in the field of Native American studies, but wanted to do a large survey of how tribes saw the looming U.S. threat.

“If I ask my students, ‘Why did we have an American Revolution?’ They’ll say ‘Taxation without representation,‘” Ostler said. “But a very significant issue among the leaders of the American Revolution was that the British were blocking the colonists’ access to western lands.”

Future President Thomas Jefferson would even write from France that the U.S. needed a constant supply of land to grow while ignoring the people who already lived there, Ostler said.

Ostler’s book is the first of two volumes on Native American history.

The book comes as scholars and writers are challenging narratives around American history and how it hurt people of color. These efforts are drawing criticism from some conservative columnists.

Most recently, The New York Times Magazine published a series of essays called The 1619 Project earlier this month around the 400th anniversary marking the beginning of American slavery. The writers argue that African Americans were the true “perfecters of this democracy” in the U.S. by continually fighting for the nation’s ideals of equality and against the legacy of slavery.

Maine Latest to Ditch Columbus Day, Honor Native Americans

Maine is joining a handful of states that have renamed Columbus Day to honor Native Americans.

Democratic Gov. Janet Mills said Friday that “there is power in a name and who we choose to honor” before signing a law that drops the state’s recognition of the federal holiday.

The October holiday will now be called Indigenous Peoples’ Day in Maine.

A small but growing number of states, including New Mexico and Vermont, have moved to swap celebrating explorer Christopher Columbus for a tribute to Native Americans.

Demands to do away with Columbus Day date to the 1970s.

Columbia University history professor Karl Jacoby called Ostler’s book an exciting work in Native American history. Jacoby said it would counter the romantic story portrayed in such recent books like David McCullough’s “The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West.”

Historians, scholars and activists took to social media accused McCullough of romanticizing white settlement and downplaying the pain inflicted on Native Americans.

“Ostler’s book is very different and gives a much more complex and accurate story about what happened,” Jacoby said.

Ostler said he is working on finishing his second volume of “Surviving Genocide” which will cover the how Native Americans responded to attempts to remove and kill them in New Mexico, Arizona and the Pacific Northwest.

…

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the military on Monday to cut fuel transfers to Gaza in half, in response to rocket attacks from the coastal strip, raising tensions along Israel’s southern border in addition to those stemming from a renewed threat from the north amid reported Israeli strikes on Iranian targets in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.

Netanyahu also instructed his staff to prepare plans for building a new neighborhood in a West Bank settlement near where a teenage Israeli girl was killed in an explosion last week. Israel said the blast was a Palestinian attack.

Israel’s Gaza Blockade Under Scrutiny After Latest Violence

For 12 years, Israel has maintained a blockade over the Gaza Strip, seeking to weaken the territory’s militant Hamas rulers. And for 12 years, Hamas has remained firmly in power, developing a thriving homegrown weapons industry along the way.

This weekend’s violence, the worst in a string of flare-ups since a 2014 war, provided the latest illustration of the limitations of the blockade and fueled calls Monday in Israel for a rethinking of the longstanding policy, which many see as ineffective and even counterproductive.

“Israel, similar to the leaders in Gaza, must look forward.

The flurry of activity comes amid a massive manhunt by Israeli troops for the 17-year-old’s killers and dire warnings from Lebanon’s Hezbollah leader of an imminent attack, just weeks before an unprecedented repeat Israeli election.

Netanyahu ordered the Gaza measure to take effect immediately and until further notice. The cut is expected to exacerbate the already dire flow of electricity in the impoverished coastal strip. The move follows airstrikes the military carried out overnight in the Gaza Strip, after three rockets were launched from the territory into southern Israel.

The military said the airstrikes included one on the office of a Hamas commander in the northern Gaza Strip. There were no reports of casualties.

Air raid sirens warning of an incoming attack wailed late on Sunday during an outdoor music festival in the Israeli border town of Sderot, sending panicked revelers scurrying for cover. The military said two rockets were intercepted by its missile defense system.

The rocket attack was the latest in a recent uptick following a relative lull that has threatened to unleash another round of fighting along the volatile Gaza-Israel border.

Palestinian Killed at Israel-Gaza Border During Weekly Demonstration

A Palestinian was killed by Israeli fire at a weekly demonstration along the Gaza-Israeli border fence, according to Palestinian officials.

Gaza’s health ministry said Friday that a 24-year old Palestinian was killed during the border protest and 30 others were wounded by gunfire.

An Israeli military spokeswoman said troops opened fire when some of the protesters approached the fortified fence.

The violence was the first escalation after a cease-fire deal ended last weekend’s fighting, which was the worst in several years.

Israel accused the Iranian-backed militant Islamic Jihad group of orchestrating the rocket attacks, as part of what it considers Iran’s region-wide campaign of chaos.

“Hostile elements near and far, attempting to ignite a war, are dragging you into violence and destroying the stability and security of your home,” wrote Maj. Gen. Kamil Abu Rukun, the coordinator of government activities in the territories, in a direct message to Gaza residents in Arabic on his Facebook page.

Gaza’s Hamas rulers say that Israel’s slow-moving approach to implementing an unofficial Egyptian-brokered truce aimed at alleviating the enclave’s dire living conditions could lead to further escalation.

Israeli Jets Strike Hamas Bases in Gaza

Exchange, in response to rocket fired into Israel, is the first since May cease-fire

The continued impasse, in which Gaza’s humanitarian crisis has been highlighted by the occasional outburst of violence, has also begun to spark a different tone in Israel, where critics have been advocating for a stronger military response alongside a need to address the civilian needs of Gaza’s impoverished 2 million residents.

“Israel’s strategy over the past few years has been to maintain the situation as it is,” retired general Guy Tzur told Israel’s Army Radio. “Therefore we are in a strategy of ‘rounds’ (of violence) and this does nothing to change the situation … we need to establish deterrence on the one hand and provide serious humanitarian relief on the other.”

3 Palestinians Killed By Israeli Forces at Gaza Border

The incident happened just hours after three rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel

In the West Bank, the search was still on for the attackers behind the deadly blast Friday at a water spring that killed Rina Shnerb, 17, near the settlement of Dolev, and wounded her brother and father. As politicians paid the family condolence visits, Netanyahu announced he had ordered his staff to prepare plans for building a new neighborhood in Dolev that would have about 300 residential housing units.

Dolev is a small settlement northwest of Jerusalem and, if approved, the new housing plans would herald a significant boost in its population. Most of the world considers settlements to be illegal and Netanyahu is typically careful in announcing such plans. But with Sept. 17 elections looming, he is wary of losing the backing of hard-liners who supports such measures.

“We will deepen our roots and strike at our enemies. We will continue to strengthen and develop the settlements,” Netanyahu said in a statement.

The flare-ups come as Israel has also dramatically stepped up its campaign against the growing Iranian military activity in the region. In recent days, Israel has acknowledged attacking targets near the Syrian capital, Damascus, to thwart what it called an imminent Iranian drone strike against Israel.

Israel has carried out hundreds of airstrikes in Syria in recent years, most of them aimed at arms shipments believed to be headed from Iran to its Shiite proxy Hezbollah. But direct clashes between Israel and Iranian forces have been rare, and Israel has typically been wary of publicly acknowledging them for fear of sparking a fierce response that could deteriorate into all-out war.

Lebanese officials reported that Israeli warplanes also attacked a Palestinian base in eastern Lebanon near the border with Syria early Monday, a day after an alleged Israeli drone crashed in a Hezbollah stronghold in southern Beirut while another exploded and crashed nearby.

In recent days, U.S. officials have said that Israeli strikes have also hit Iranian targets in Iraq.

Israel Security Cabinet was convening Monday to discuss the next steps in the various fronts the country currently faces.

Israel considers Iran to be its greatest enemy and has repeatedly vowed that it will not allow Iran to establish a permanent military presence in Syria, where Iranian troops have been supporting President Bashar Assad during the country’s eight-year civil war.

…

When starlight from billions of years ago zips across the universe and finally comes into focus on Earth, astronomers want their telescopes to be in the best locations possible to see what’s out there.

Despite years of legal battles and months of protests by Native Hawaiian opponents, the international coalition that wants to build the world’s largest telescope in Hawaii insists that the islands’ highest peak — Mauna Kea — is the best place for their $1.4 billion instrument.

But just barely.

Thirty Meter Telescope officials acknowledge that their backup site atop a peak on the Spanish Canary island of La Palma is a comparable observatory location, and that it wouldn’t cost more money or take extra time to build it there.

Astrophysicists to Hawaii: Stop ‘Criminalizing’ Telescope Protesters

Kanaka Maoli say they won’t back down

There’s also no significant opposition to putting the telescope on La Palma like there is in Hawaii, where some Native Hawaiians consider the mountain sacred and have blocked trucks from hauling construction equipment to Mauna Kea’s summit for more than a month.

But Hawaii has advantages that scientists say make it slightly better: higher altitude, cooler temperatures, and rare star-gazing moments that will allow the cutting-edge telescope to reach its full potential.

“Every once in a while at Mauna Kea, you get one of those magic nights,” said University of California, Santa Cruz astronomy and astrophysics professor Michael Bolte, a Thirty Meter Telescope board member. “When the air is super stable above the site, you get images that you simply couldn’t get anyplace else.”

Bolte, who has used existing Mauna Kea telescopes, said those “magic” Hawaii nights could hold discoveries that might be missed in La Palma.

“Let’s suppose one of your big science cases is to look for life on planets that are orbiting other stars,” he said. “The star is so much brighter than the planet you’re trying to observe, it’s really hard to do.”

The advanced optics and huge size of the Thirty Meter Telescope, especially if built at Mauna Kea’s higher altitude, could allow scientists to more easily detect potentially life-filled planets, Bolte said.

To see distant planets near bright stars, astronomers use telescopes to capture infrared light that emanates from the space objects.

But John Mather, an astrophysicist who won the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2006 for his work on the Big Bang theory, says there are other ways to get that data.

Mather, the senior project scientist for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, planned for launch into space in 2021, said the new instrument will be extremely effective at gathering infrared light. The atmosphere won’t get in the way of the telescope’s imaging capabilities because it won’t be on Earth.

Data from the Webb telescope can be combined with information from other Earth-based telescopes to compensate for the infrared advantage that Mauna Kea has over La Palma, Mather said.

He said Webb will open up “new territory that you’ll never be able to tackle from the ground.”

Telescope Foes Tie Together, Block Road to Hawaii Summit 

Scientists hope the massive telescope they planned for the site — a world-renowned location for astronomy — will help them peer back to the time just after the Big Bang and answer fundamental questions about the universe

Mather is also working on a longer-term solution to the problem of seeing Earth-like planets orbiting distant stars, which he likened to seeing a “firefly next to a spotlight.”

It’s a large “star shade” that would be launched far into space and positioned to block bright stars while allowing telescopes on Earth to see the planets orbiting them.

Those advancements could level the playing field between places such as Mauna Kea and La Palma, said astrophysicist Avi Loeb, who chairs Harvard University’s astronomy department.

“One thing that you need to keep in mind is that humans can change the system as to compensate for the slightly worse conditions” in Spain, Loeb said. “In the end, it might perform as well or maybe even better.”

Loeb agreed that Mauna Kea is a slightly better location for infrared observations. But La Palma is “an excellent site, so there would be exceptional science done there,” he added.

The Native Hawaiian opponents call themselves “protectors” of Mauna Kea and aren’t concerned about their mountain’s advantages for astronomers. They just want the telescope group to abandon Hawaii.

That would “be a win for everyone,” said protest leader Kealoha Pisciotta shortly after Thirty Meter Telescope officials announced they would move forward with a building permit application for the La Palma site a few weeks ago.

“There’s lots of good science to be done from the Canary Islands,” Pisciotta said.

Not all Native Hawaiians are opposed to the telescope. Some tout the educational and economic opportunities it would bring to the Big Island. Others have compared modern astronomers to their Polynesian ancestors who used stars to navigate their wooden outriggers across the Pacific and discover new lands — including Hawaii.

Mauna Kea stands nearly 14,000 feet (4,300 meters) above sea level, more than twice as high as the Spanish site that is already home to the world’s largest optical telescope. Like Hawaii’s Big Island, the Spain site has good weather, a stable atmosphere and very little light pollution.

Thirty Meter Telescope would be a next generation model that’s expected to transform ground-based astronomy — allowing scientists to see deeper into space than previously possible. Its large mirror will produce sharper, more detailed images of space.

“You can get images that are 12 times sharper than the Hubble Space Telescope,” Bolte said.

And most of the same science planned for Hawaii would still get done in Spain — it would just take longer.

“Depending on the kind of science you want to do, it’s going to be a 10% hit to a 50% hit in speed,” Bolte said. “You are going to have to observe that much longer at La Palma to get the same quality data.”

José Manuel Vilchez, an astronomer with Spain’s Higher Council of Scientific Research and a former member of the scientific committee of the Astrophysics Institute of the Canary Islands, said that building the telescope on La Palma would not be a downgrade.

“We are talking about the best of the best. One is a 10, the other is a 9.9,” Vilchez said. “We are talking about decimals.”

But for astronomers, decimals can make the difference between seeing something extraordinary and missing it.

“Mauna Kea, since it is higher, would have a thinner atmospheric layer and would observe more in certain infrared ranges,” Vilchez said. “The possibility of capturing the image is lower” on La Palma.

Vilchez also said there is greater public support for the telescope in Spain and that the cost of operating it at a lower elevation would be cheaper.

On Mauna Kea “you are further away from the base and the cost goes up,” Vilchez said. “In the Canary Islands the institutional support is 100% and 99% of citizens support the astronomy work.”

That lack of opposition is something officials cannot claim for Mauna Kea.

The telescope group’s Bolte said what began as opposition to the project has “become the focus of the whole Hawaiian sovereignty and self-determination” movement and is a reflection of how Native Hawaiians have felt “displaced from their own lands” for over a century.

“Now that they have the attention of everyone by stopping this telescope, how can that be used to somehow take some steps forward in the well-being of Native Hawaiians?” he asked.

…

Heavy rainfall and flash floods have killed 62 people in Sudan and left 98 others injured, the official SUNA news agency reported on Sunday.

Sudan has been hit by torrential rains since the start of July, affecting nearly 200,000 people in at least 15 states across the country including the capital Khartoum.

The worst affected area is the White Nile state in the south.

Flooding of the Nile river remains “the biggest problem”, SUNA said, citing a health ministry official.

On Friday the United Nations said 54 people had died due to the heavy rains.

It said more than 37,000 homes had been destroyed or damaged, quoting figures from the government body it partners with in the crisis response.

“Humanitarians are concerned by the high likelihood of more flash floods,” the UN said, adding that the rainy season was expected to last until October.

The floods are having a lasting humanitarian impact on communities, with cut roads, damaged water points, lost livestock and the spread of water-borne diseases by insects.

The UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said an extra $150 million were needed from donors to respond to surging waters, in addition to the $1.1 billion required for the overall humanitarian situation in Sudan.

…

Sudan’s new prime minister says in an interview that ending his country’s international pariah status and drastically cutting military spending are prerequisites for rescuing a faltering economy.

Abdalla Hamdok, a well-known economist, told The Associated Press on Sunday that he has already talked to U.S. officials about removing Sudan from Washington’s list of countries sponsoring terrorism and portrayed their reaction as positive. He says that “a democratic Sudan is not a threat to anybody in the world.”

He also hopes to drastically cut Sudan’s military spending which he says makes up a large chunk of the state budget.

Hamdok was sworn in last week as the leader of Sudan’s transitional government. His appointment came four months after the overthrow of autocratic leader Omar al-Bashir, who ruled for nearly three decades.

…

 Two members of an Iran-backed Iraqi paramilitary force say that a new drone attack has killed one commander and wounded another near the border with Syria.
 
Officials from the Hezbollah Brigades, separate from the Lebanese groups of the same name, said the drone attack occurred Sunday near the Qaim border crossing. 
 
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists about the matter. 
 
Iraq’s Hezbollah Brigades operate under the umbrella of the state-sanctioned militias known collectively as the Popular Mobilization Forces. Many of them are supported by Iran. 
 
If confirmed, it would be the latest in a series of attacks that have targeted PMF bases and weapons depot in Iraq. U.S. officials have said that Israel was behind at least one of them.

…

Last updated at 2:40p.m.

Iran’s top diplomat, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, showed up Sunday at the French city hosting the G7 summit of top world leaders, but did not meet with U.S. officials during the brief visit.

Zarif’s appearance in Biarritz, where U.S. President Donald Trump has been meeting with leaders of six other countries, came as a surprise.   When asked about the development, Trump had no comment.

But Zarif’s visit was at the behest of French President Emmanuel Macron, who has had talks with his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani, about tensions in the Persian Gulf region that stem from Trump’s withdrawal last year from the 2015 international accord aimed at restraining Tehran’s nuclear weapons program.

Macron had met with Zarif on Friday in Paris before the summit opened, but invited him back to the Atlantic coastal town where the summit is being held after tense exchanges among the world leaders about Iran at their Saturday night dinner.

Asked about a possible Trump meeting with Zarif, a French diplomat said, “Not at this stage.” But U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin noted that Trump has in the past not “set preconditions” on negotiations with Iran.

Macron had lunch with Trump on Saturday, and, according to French sources, outlined his plan to ease the West’s tensions with Iran. The French leader is calling for allowing Iran to export its oil for a short time, fully implement the 2015 agreement, reduce conflict in the Gulf region and open new talks.

Macron has sought to salvage the international agreement, but Trump has accused the French leader of sending “mixed signals” to Iran over possible talks with Washington.

“Iran is in serious financial trouble,” Trump said on Twitter earlier this month, because of the U.S. leader’s reimposition of sanctions against Iran as he abrogated the accord.

 “They want desperately to talk to the U.S.,” Trump said, “but are given mixed signals from all of those purporting to represent us, including President Macron of France.”

…

U.S. President Donald Trump is in Biarritz, France, for the G-7 summit, where he will be meeting world leaders who oppose his stances on many issues, including tariffs, Brexit, climate protection, China, Iran and Russia. 

But in this meeting of the leaders of the world’s major industrialized countries, there could be areas of cooperation where Trump is willing to offer support, or at least not resist: women’s empowerment and Africa. 

French President Emmanuel Macron, as the G-7 2019 president and summit host, has chosen combating inequality as the theme, with gender equality and partnership with Africa as key issues. He will be pushing several initiatives, including the Biarritz Partnership for Gender Equality and Partnership for the African Sahel. Macron also will be calling for renewed support for Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa. 

Despite Trump’s skepticism of foreign aid and his rejection of globalism, including his famous statement in front of the 2018 U.N. General Assembly that the U.S. “will not tell you how to live or work or worship,” his administration has indicated it may support at least some of these initiatives, noting that the White House has launched similar efforts. 

On Sunday Trump will participate in a G-7 working lunch on inequality and a session on the partnership with Africa later in the afternoon. 

Biarritz partnership for gender equality 

Earlier this year, Macron formed a G-7 Gender Equality Advisory Council whose members include Executive Director of U.N. Women Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka and gender equality activist and actor Emma Watson. The council is tasked with identifying legislative measures worldwide to combat gender violence and discrimination, as well as to improve girls’ access to education and support women’s economic empowerment. 

Macron is pushing countries to join the partnership and adopt the laws and public policies identified by the council. 

He also will call for renewed support for African women’s credit financing through the Affirmative Finance Action for Women in Africa initiative, a pan-African mechanism to reduce the cost of accessing credit and bridge the $42 billion financing gap being faced by women on the continent. 

The White House has not announced whether it will sign on to any of the G-7 initiatives on gender equality. But a senior administration official told reporters that global women’s empowerment is a “huge priority for this administration” and a message “we really want to drive home this weekend in France,” citing the launch of the Women’s Global Development and Prosperity (W-GDP) initiative and commitment as a founding member to We-Fi, a partnership hosted by the World Bank Group to finance women entrepreneurs. 

W-GDP was launched by the White House in February 2019, and it is billed as “the first whole-of-government effort to advance global women’s economic empowerment.” 

The president’s daughter and adviser, Ivanka Trump, is leading the administration’s efforts on global women’s empowerment.

Renewed focus on Africa 

Africa is Europe’s immediate neighbor, and instability on the southern side of the Mediterranean has an impact on the northern side, with the migrant crisis being the most visible example. 

With that in mind, Germany and France are proposing a new partnership with Africa, including an initiative to enhance international commitment for the Sahel, a region facing multiple challenges ranging from the impact of climate change to the threat of terrorism. 

The G-5 Sahel countries are Burkina Faso, Chad, Mali, Mauritania and Niger. 

Macron also has invited Senegal, Egypt, Burkina Faso, South Africa and Rwanda to join the G-7 countries in discussions about issues important to the continent. 

The formal invitation of African partners to the G-7 “opens an opportunity to drive forward key items on the African agenda, where priorities should be placed, how they should be financed, what the necessary coalitions for success are,” Yvonne Mburu told VOA. Mburu is founder and CEO of Nexakli, a global network of African health professionals and member of Macron’s Presidential Council of Africa. 

Mburu said the litmus test would be whether there will be measurable outcomes from the G-7 deliberations, and whether there is an accompanying mobilization of financial resources. 

Sahel Alliance 

At the summit, G-7 leaders will be encouraged to join the Sahel Alliance, which seeks to economically develop the region and strengthen support for members’ national security. 

The U.S. government has already expressed doubts about financing a new U.N.-backed mission in the Sahel, but it might be open to the new format of cooperation that the French team wants to discuss, said Karoline Postel-Vinay, a research professor at the Paris-based institute Sciences Po. “However, as we now know, American foreign strategy seems predictably unpredictable,” she added. 

Despite not outwardly obstructing the G-7 agenda on Africa, it’s unclear how much substantive support the administration would provide. 

A White House statement ahead of the summit applauded the efforts of partners and the international community to promote peace and stability in Africa but did not mention whether the U.S. would provide additional economic or security assistance in the Sahel as called for by Macron. 

The White House instead pointed to its Prosper Africa private-financing initiative and the BUILD Act as proof of the administration’s commitment. The law was passed in 2018 and aims to facilitate private capital in developing low-income economies. 

Analysts say the administration’s policy on Africa is focused more on investment, in particular in the context of countering China. 

While it hasn’t abandoned any of the pillars of focus that previous administrations have had on the continent, the Trump administration is “doing less with less,” said Judd Devermont, director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. 

“The administration is running the traps on some of the security stuff,” said Devermont, “but without the same robustness of previous administrations and certainly not anywhere near where we were in democracy and governance.” 

He added that Trump does not have the personal connection that President Barack Obama had with the continent, nor the interest in development that President George W. Bush had. 

On Thursday, Trump scrapped a proposal to freeze more than $4 billion in foreign aid after objections from lawmakers of both parties and his own Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Divisions elsewhere 

While there may be some consensus on gender equality and Africa, there clearly are deep divisions between members. 

For the first time in its history, this summit will not produce a joint communique amid deepening divisions between leaders over myriad issues. 

…

Six people were injured Saturday when lightning struck a 60-foot pine at the Tour Championship where they were taking cover from rain and showered them with debris, Atlanta police said. 

The third round of the season-ending PGA Tour event at East Lake Golf Club had been suspended for about 30 minutes because of storms in the area, and fans were instructed to seek shelter. The strike hit the top of the tree just off the 16th tee and shattered the bark all the way to the bottom. 

Ambulances streamed into the private club about 6 miles east of downtown Atlanta. The players already had been taken into the clubhouse before the lightning hit. 

Brad Uhl of Atlanta was among those crammed under a hospital tent to the right of the 16th hole that was open to the public. 

“There was just a big explosion and then an aftershock so strong you could feel the wind from it,” Uhl said after the last of the ambulances pulled out of the golf course. “It was just a flash out of the corner of the eye.” 

Atlanta police spokesman James H. White III said five men and one female juvenile were injured in the lightning strike. He said they were taken to hospitals for further treatment, all of them alert, conscious and breathing. 

The PGA Tour canceled the rest of golf Saturday, with the round to resume at 8 a.m. Sunday, followed by the final round. 

Last week at the BMW Championship in the Chicago suburbs, Phil Mickelson was delayed getting to the golf course when lightning struck the top of his hotel, causing a precautionary evacuation. 

…

When a “Himalayan tsunami” roars down from the rooftop of the world, water from an overflowing glacial lake obeys gravity. Obliterating everything in its path, a burst is predictable only in its destructiveness. 
 
“There was no meaning in it,” one person who withstood the waters in India’s Himalayas told a Public Radio International reporter. “It didn’t give anyone a chance to survive.”  
 
Christian Huggel, a professor at the University of Zurich in Switzerland who specializes in glaciology and geomorphodynamics (the study of changing forms of geologic surfaces), said thousands of cubic meters of water moving down a mountain “is really quite destructive and it can happen suddenly.” 
 
That water comes from glacial lake outburst floods, or GLOFs, which are increasing in frequency as climate change increases the rate of glacial melting. This catastrophic lake drainage occurs wherever there are glaciers in places such as Peru and Alaska.  
 
The most devastating GLOFs occur in the Himalayan regions of India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal and the Tibetan Plateau. When combined, the area has the third-largest accumulation of snow and ice after Antarctica and the Arctic. 
 
Melting glaciers 
 
In the Himalayas, climate change melted glaciers by a vertical foot and half of ice each year from 2000 to 2016, according to a study released in June’s Science Advances by Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y.  
 
That is twice the rate of melting from 1975 to 2000.  
 
Local people have noticed the change. In a 2016 interview from the Everest basecamp, Dr. Nima Namgyal Sherpa told VOA that in the past, the glacial streams in the mid-Everest region started flowing in May, but the Sherpas now see the flow beginning in April. 
 
That melted snowpack seeps down to fill mountainside indentations to form glacial lakes. As global warming accelerates the melting, the lakes are expanding, as is their number and threat, monitored in some areas with automated sensors and manual early warning systems by army and police personnel with communication gear. 
 
“Bigger lakes may increase the risk of catastrophic dam failure,” Joseph Shea, a glacier hydrologist at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada, told the magazine Science.  
 

Today, there are more than a thousand glacial lakes on the Tibetan Plateau, with more than 130 larger than 0.1 square kilometer in Nepal alone. The lakes threaten the livelihoods and lives of tens of thousands of people who live in some of the world’s most remote areas.
 
On June 12, 2016, a GLOF near Mount Everest sent 2 million cubic meters of water toward the Nepalese village of Chukhung, which lost just one outhouse to the torrents, in part because scientists warned residents in the area about the approaching danger. 
 
Weeks later, on July 5, a GLOF near the village of Chaku registered on seismometers, which had been installed after an earthquake the year before, as a “huge pulse of energy,” Kristen Cook, a geologist at the GFZ German Research Center for Geosciences, told EOS, an online site that covers earth and space science news.
 
Examining satellite images, Cook and her colleagues found the GLOF moved boulders as large as 6 meters in diameter. 
 
Early warning systems 
 
This year, on July 7, a GLOF early warning system of weather monitoring stations and river discharge sensors saved lives in Pakistan’s Golain Valley, which has more than 50 glaciers and nine glacial lakes.  
 
The event destroyed villages, roads and bridges, but there were no reported deaths. A shepherd located upstream from the valley called authorities to report the burst, which gave communities downstream as much as an hour to evacuate.  
 
“Our standing crops [and] apple and apricot orchards have been completely destroyed,” Safdar Ali, whose shop was heavily damaged as the water swept away livestock, stored grain, irrigation channels and micro hydropower plants, told Reuters.  
 
“I see no loss of human life this time as a positive,” Amanullah Khan, assistant country director for the U.N. Development Program (UNDP) told Reuters. “It shows our training has been a success.”  
 
The UNDP program, which helped establish flood protection systems in the area starting in 2011, has installed small-scale drainage systems and mini-dams, and taught people in the remote region survival skills, such as simple first aid, because the arrival of skilled emergency help can be delayed by the rugged topography. 
 
The International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) and other international groups are setting up early warning systems for glacial lakes in Nepal. 
 
Local governments are taking preventive measures, such as removing loose rocks and debris that make the bursts of water even more destructive. Authorities are also draining glacial lakes to reduce the amount of water released by a breach, and they are discouraging settlement in GLOF hazard zones.  
 
“If the lakes burst above the villages up in the Everest area, up between 12,000 to 13,000 feet, there are villages all the way downstream and they will wipe [away] some of these villages,” said Norbu Tenzin Norgyal, whose father, Sherpa Tenzin Norgyal, summited Mount Everest with Sir Edmund Hillary in 1953. “The danger is real.” 

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The U.N. refugee agency said Saturday that 8,500 refugees from the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Kasai province had spontaneously abandoned their camp in Angola and were heading to the homes they fled more than one year ago. 

The march home from the Lovua settlement in Angola’s Lunda Norte province began one week ago.  U.N. refugee spokesman Andrej Mahecic said more than 1,000 refugees already had crossed into DRC and many more were moving toward the border with DRC’s Kasai region. 

“This appears to be in response to reports of improved security in some of their places of origin,” Mahecic said. “It is also linked to their wish to return, as well as to be back home in time for the beginning of the new school year.” 

Displaced by violence

Violence broke out in the Kasai region in August 2016, triggered by tensions between traditional chiefs and the government.  Deadly clashes intensified between the government and armed groups in March 2017, displacing about 1.4 million people from their homes.  An estimated 37,000 others fled across the border into Angola in search of refuge. 
 
Mahecic told VOA the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees was engaged in tripartite discussions with Angolan and Congolese authorities to make sure this refugee return movement was well-organized and sustainable.   
 
“The key point for us is to make sure there is proper planning and transport,” he said. “That is why we have engaged both governments on setting up a system where this can be planned, and the transport can be facilitated for those who wish to return home.  And that is the key factor.  The refugees themselves are the ones making that decision.”  

Staff members along routes
 
Mahecic said UNHCR staff members were placed along the return routes to monitor the condition of people arriving and to assess the nature of these spontaneous returns.  He said staff members were on hand to provide immediate help and to get firsthand information about the type of assistance the refugees would need when they returned home. 

He added that not everyone was on the move.  He noted most of the Congolese refugees remained in Angola.  He said the UNHCR would continue to monitor the situation to make sure those who returned to their homes in Kasai were doing so voluntarily. 

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The Taliban said Saturday that they expected negotiations with the United States to conclude the following day, finalizing a peace deal to end the 18-year-old war in Afghanistan. 

The crucial ninth round in the yearlong dialogue between the two adversaries started Thursday in the traditional venue, the Persian Gulf state of Qatar. Afghan-born U.S. diplomat Zalmay Khalilzad is leading the American team of negotiators.
 
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told VOA on Saturday that the two sides were fleshing out details of a mechanism for U.S.-led foreign troops to withdraw from the country. 

‘We are hopeful’
 
“Inshallah [God willing], this time we are hopeful that each and every thing will be finalized. Work is underway to streamline the mechanism, but there is no such sticking point left that is not agreeable,” Mujahid said. 
 
He said the “mechanism” would outline the nature of an American troop drawdown, areas where it will begin and the duration needed to complete the process. 
 
Mujahid said Taliban and American negotiators would require “one more day” to shape up the details. He spoke to VOA just before the two sides resumed a third day of discussions Saturday night in Doha, Qatar. Mujahid would not discuss the foreign troop withdrawal timeline, nor has the American side shared specifics.  

Pro-Taliban media outlets, meanwhile, released a video message Saturday from the head of the insurgent negotiating team, Sher Muhammad Abbas Stanekzai, claiming his group had brought U.S. and its NATO allies “on their knees” in war. 
 
“I believe that Americans will leave Afghanistan very soon. Americans stand defeated and Afghanistan will again be liberated,” Stanekzai said while addressing his colleagues in the Qatar office just days before he entered into the current round of talks with American interlocutors. 

Stanekzai’s assertions strengthen fears that the withdrawal of U.S. and NATO forces would embolden the Taliban, and that the insurgents may not uphold their commitments.

Khalilzad plans to travel to Kabul after finishing the talks with the Taliban in Doha, reportedly to share details of the agreement with the Afghan leadership. 
 
Taliban political spokesman Suahil Shaheen, in a recent interview, told VOA the final agreement with the U.S. would be signed in the presence of international guarantors, including Russia, China, Pakistan and other neighbors of Afghanistan, as well as the United Nations. 
 
The U.S.-Taliban deal reportedly could mean the withdrawal of all 20,000 foreign troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2020. 

Residual force
 
Within the first few months, Washington would bring down the number of American forces to about 8,600 from roughly 14,000 now. The residual military force reportedly would remain in Afghanistan to ensure the Taliban are living up to their part of the commitments outlined in the agreement. 
 
Taliban officials have said the deal being negotiated with the U.S. would require the insurgent group to open a peace process with Afghan stakeholders to discuss a cease-fire or reduction in attacks against government forces and matters related to future political governance. 
 
U.S. officials say the Taliban also would be bound to prevent al-Qaida from establishing a safe haven in insurgent-controlled Afghan areas, and to help defeat Islamic State terrorists in the country. 
 
The Afghan branch of Islamic State has intensified its deadly attacks in the country lately, raising questions about whether a U.S.-Taliban deal could end violence in Afghanistan. Last week, Islamic State claimed responsibility for a suicide bombing at a wedding ceremony in Kabul that killed more than 80 people and injured about 160 others. Almost all the victims were civilians. 
 
President Donald Trump has been a strong critic of U.S. involvement in overseas wars. He promised during his 2016 presidential campaign that he would extricate America from international conflicts. 
 
Trump appears to be eager to withdraw U.S. forces from Afghanistan before next year’s presidential election. 

Afghan leader

Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani’s aides have said a U.S.-Taliban deal must lead to a cease-fire and direct peace talks between the government and insurgents. 
 
Ghani, who is seeking re-election in the presidential vote set for Sept. 28, told a campaign rally in Kabul this week that his administration was determined to hold the election because only an elected government could represent Afghans in peace talks with the Taliban. 
 
The insurgent group refuses to engage in any talks with the government in Kabul, however, dismissing them as American puppets and an outcome of the “foreign invasion” of Afghanistan. The intra-Afghan talks, if and when they start, will include government officials among the delegates representing the Afghan society, but they will not participate as government representatives, Mujahid reiterated Saturday. 

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Two years ago, Myanmar’s army drew international condemnation for driving more than 750,000 Muslim Rohingya into neighboring Bangladesh. This week the Myanmar and Bangladesh governments announced the beginning of a voluntary repatriation plan for many, however not a single person volunteered to go back. Steve Sandford spoke to refugees and rights workers about the prospect of returning home amid security and rights concerns.
 

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Will Russia join next year’s G-7 summit? The question is being considered after U.S. President Donald Trump raised the idea ahead of the group’s annual summit this week in France. The group voted to suspend Moscow’s membership in 2014 after it annexed Crimea, which Russia continues to hold. Trump says it’s time for them to rejoin. Anna Rice reports on whether that’s likely to happen.
 

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President Donald Trump has abandoned his fight with Congress over slashing $4 billion in foreign aid and will allow the appropriated funds to be spent. But the State Department says it agreed with the White House to “redirect all funding that does not directly support our priorities.” VOA Diplomatic Correspondent Cindy Saine has more from Washington.
 

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VOA State Department Correspondent Nike Ching contributed to this report.

WHITE HOUSE — The trade war between Washington and Beijing further escalated Friday.

The United States will additionally hike tariffs on Chinese products, President Donald Trump announced.

Terming China’s announcement Friday of additional tariffs on $75 billion worth of American products “politically motivated,” Trump said he is retaliating by increasing the 25% tax, effective October 1, on $250 billion on goods of products from China to 30%.

Additionally, Trump announced on Twitter, the tariffs on the remaining $300 billion of Chinese goods to be imposed September 1 will rise from the 10% level to 15%.

….Sadly, past Administrations have allowed China to get so far ahead of Fair and Balanced Trade that it has become a great burden to the American Taxpayer. As President, I can no longer allow this to happen! In the spirit of achieving Fair Trade, we must Balance this very….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019

…Additionally, the remaining 300 BILLION DOLLARS of goods and products from China, that was being taxed from September 1st at 10%, will now be taxed at 15%. Thank you for your attention to this matter!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019

Trade talks between the United States and China are tentatively set to resume next month in Washington.

VOA asked Trump Friday night if he still wanted those negotiations to proceed.

“At this moment they want to do that,” the president replied before he boarded the Marine One helicopter for the start of his trip to the G-7 leaders’ summit in France. “I’m always open to talks.”

Ordering companies to leave China

Hours earlier, Trump declared he is “ordering” American companies “to immediately start looking for alternatives to China” after Beijing announced it is raising tariffs on $75 billion of U.S. goods and resuming 25% tariffs on American autos, in retaliation against Trump’s September 1 duty increase.

In a series of tweets, the U.S. president said the companies should bring their manufacturing home. 

Our Country has lost, stupidly, Trillions of Dollars with China over many years. They have stolen our Intellectual Property at a rate of Hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year, & they want to continue. I won’t let that happen! We don’t need China and, frankly, would be far….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019

Asked, as he departed the White House, under what authority he could do that, Trump told reporters to look up the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, enacted in 1977, which authorizes the president to regulate international commerce after declaring a national emergency in response to extraordinary threats originating outside the United States.

“I have the absolute right to do that,” Trump stated.

Markets drop

The escalating trade war unsettled markets Friday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average of the New York Stock Exchange closed down more than 620 points, a loss of 2.37%.

Trump, before boarding the helicopter Friday night, brushed off the plunge in share prices, saying that since the time of his November 2016 election “we’re up 50 percent or more.”

Trump, earlier on Twitter, also criticized Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell, both before and after he made a closely watched speech at the institution’s annual symposium in the state of Wyoming.

Powell indicated that the Federal Reserve, which cut interest rates last month for the first time in a decade, is willing to make another reduction to keep the U.S. economy growing, but he did not specify the amount or the timing of such action.

That angered the president, who tweeted: “As usual, the Fed did NOTHING! It is incredible that they can speak’ without knowing or asking what I am doing, which will be announced shortly.” The president then added: “My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or (Chinese Communist Party) Chairman Xi?”

Xi is also China’s president.

Our Country has lost, stupidly, Trillions of Dollars with China over many years. They have stolen our Intellectual Property at a rate of Hundreds of Billions of Dollars a year, & they want to continue. I won’t let that happen! We don’t need China and, frankly, would be far….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 23, 2019

Trump has repeatedly referred to Xi as a friend and touted his relationship with Xi as a way to achieve significant breakthroughs on trade and other major issues.

China’s commerce ministry, earlier Friday, stated it will be imposing additional tariffs of 5% or 10% on a total of 5,078 products originating from the U.S., including agricultural products, crude oil, small aircraft and cars.

Chinese tariffs on some U.S. products would take effect September 1 and on others December 15.

“America’s manufacturing workers will bear the brunt of these retaliatory tariffs, which will make it even harder to sell the products they make to customers in China,” said Jay Timmons, the president and chief executive officer of the National Association of Manufacturers.

“While we share the president’s frustration, we believe that continued, constructive engagement is the right way forward,” said Myron Brilliant, executive vice president and head of international affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. “Time is of the essence. We do not want to see a further deterioration of U.S.-China relations.”

Rick Helfenbein, president and CEO of the American Apparel and Footwear Association, said: “This is not how you negotiate. This is tit-for-tat exercise that is hurting Americans and distracting from the task at hand — creating a sustainable trade agreement that solves long-standing and deep-seated issues.”

“The administration needs to rise above the fray and start negotiating for the American people,” Helfenbein added.

Analysts are expressing fears that if there is no truce soon in the trade war with China, it could lead to a recession in the United States.

However, Trump is holding firm to his policies.

“Our economy is doing great. We’re having a little spat with China and we’ll win it …” he said Friday night. Adding, “I think that our tariffs are working out very well for us, people don’t understand that yet…”

“We’re not going to lose close to a trillion dollars a year to China,” Trump told reporters Friday. “This is more important than anything else right now, just about, that we’re working on.”
 

…

A wildfire burning north of Anchorage has destroyed 51 homes and three businesses, officials said Friday.

Another 84 buildings between the communities of Willow and Talkeetna, about 70 miles north of the state’s largest city, also have been destroyed, fire information manager Kale Casey said.

Hundreds of people have been evacuated because of the fire that started Sunday night along the Parks Highway, the main thoroughfare that connects Anchorage to Denali National Park and Preserve and Fairbanks. 

The exact cause of the fire is under investigation, but officials have said it was human-caused.

Homeowners at one of two evacuation centers had closed-door meetings Friday with officials from the Matanuska-Susitna Borough to learn the fate of their homes, Casey said. Others who were not at evacuation centers have not been notified.

The wildlife is one of two major blazes in Alaska.

The fire had blackened nearly 6 square miles (16 sq. kilometers) and was 10% contained, said Tim Mowry, a spokesman for the Alaska Division of Forestry. 

About 100 firefighters, 20 engine crews and three helicopters were fighting the fire, he said. Another 100 firefighters were expected to arrive Sunday.

“They’re dropping water and retardant on and around it, but we really need people on the ground to reinforce those aerial assets,” Mowry said.

Conditions were dry, giving the fire ample fuel, Casey said. A forecast of increased winds for Saturday has fire managers on edge, and additional residents were told to be ready to evacuate if needed.

“With conditions so dry in this area, a 15 mph (24 kph) wind is a significant event,” Casey said. “The ground fuels are extremely resistant to control.”

Alaska’s fire season is usually over by now, but hot, dry conditions have extended it. Alaska recorded its warmest month ever in July.

It’s unusual for firefighters to be sent to Alaska from other states this time of the year.

“Usually, our crews are in the Lower 48 by now, helping out there,” Mowry said.

Another large wildfire is burning south of Anchorage, in Kenai National Wildlife Refuge. It started in June but was reinvigorated. It had burned about 222 square miles (575 square kilometers) and was 20% contained.

Smoke from the two fires has made Anchorage smoky, prompting health warnings and leading schools to cancel outdoor activities.

…