The U.S. government’s road safety agency is investigating complaints that the Nissan Rogue’s automatic emergency braking can turn on when no obstacle is in the way.
The probe covers about 554,000 Rogue small SUVs from the 2017 and 2018 model years.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says 843 owners have complained to the agency and to Nissan about the problem. Owners reported 14 crashes and five injuries.
The agency says Nissan has issued a technical service bulletin and two customer service actions related to the problem. It will try to find a cause and determine how often the false braking happens, and could seek a recall.
The investigation was opened in response to a March 21, 2019 petition from the Center for Auto Safety, a nonprofit group that represents consumers.
Nissan said in a statement Thursday that it has investigated the problem and taken action to tell customers of a free software update that improves the system’s performance. The company says that on some Rogues, the brakes can be activated by unique road conditions such as railroad crossings, bridges, and low-hanging traffic lights. Nissan says it’s cooperating with NHTSA.
But the auto safety center says the Rogues should be recalled, and that Nissan’s service campaigns don’t acknowledge the seriousness of the safety problem. In its petition, the center said that according to the complaints, the Nissan braking system can be triggered by railroad tracks, traffic lights, bridges, parking structures “and other fixed objects that do not pose a threat to the vehicle.”
President Donald Trump’s administration has released $250 million in military aid for Ukraine, U.S. senators said on Thursday, after lawmakers from both parties expressed anger that the White House had held up money approved by Congress.
Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Appropriations Committee said the White House released the money on Wednesday night, hours before the panel was due to debate an amendment to a defense spending bill that would have prevented Trump from such actions in the future.
It was one of several disputes recently between Trump and members of Congress, some of his fellow Republicans as well as Democrats, over his administration’s decision to sidestep congressional approval to fund its own policy initiatives.
A few Republicans, as well as Democrats, had said they expected Congress would pass legislation to reinstate the aid for Ukraine if the administration had not released the money. The money is intended for use by Ukraine in its struggle with pro-Russian separatists backed by Moscow. Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimea region in 2014.
The White House has sought repeatedly to slash foreign aid since Trump took office in January 2017, but Congress has pushed back repeatedly against such plans.
The White House Office of Management and Budget did not respond to a request for comment.
A Tanzanian journalist arrested in July after criticizing the president in print appeared in court Thursday, looking weak and having trouble walking.
Prospects for Erick Kabendera’s release were dashed Thursday when the government prosecutor said the investigation against him is still in progress.
FILE – Erick Kabendera
Kabendera had trouble walking when he entered the court chamber. His lawyer, Jebra Kambole, says the plan for his medical treatment is unclear, though the magistrate issued instructions that included meeting with a prison doctor for a checkup.
Kambole said a Sept. 18 hearing is set to look at Kabendera’s health status, and the court may issue more instructions at that time.
Kabendera, 39, was arrested at the end of July at his home amid questions about his citizenship. Later the charges were changed and he was accused of sedition, money laundering, and organized crime.
Kabendera’s work has been published in national and international newspapers. He regularly covers Africa’s politics, trade and extractive industries for leading publications, including The Guardian and The Times, both based in Britain.
After Kabendera was arrested, Kambole said his client was facing sedition charges in connection with an article in The Economist, in which Kabendera said President John Magufuli is “bulldozing” Tanzania’s freedom.
Earlier this month, the Committee to Protect Journalists included Kabendera on its 10 most urgent cases that require global attention.
The new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations took up her post on Thursday. Kelly Knight Craft will not have much time to settle in, as she arrives little more than a week before the annual gathering of world leaders at the General Assembly. VOA U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer has more.
Across Nigeria, there’s a rising demand for vultures, and poachers are driving the local population of four large vulture species to near extinction.
The Nigerian Conservation Foundation is now placing vulture preservation high on its agenda, hoping to revive the threatened population. Abidemi Balogun, a senior special conservation officer with the foundation’s educational unit, is engaging with local communities where superstitions and folklore about the birds persist.
“Someone actually asked me how do they identity the evil ones because there’s been a belief that vultures are evil birds,” Balogun told VOA with a laugh.
She’s been with the foundation for eight years and said vulture poaching was not taken seriously in the past.
Spiritual practices
She said that the birds aren’t being hunted for consumption as much as they’re being killed for spiritual practices. In 2017, the foundation conducted a market survey to see how the birds were traded.
“Some of the findings that we made is that the head is used for ritual purposes and the head is the most expensive part of it,” she said.
In local markets, vulture feathers are sold for about 100 naira, or less than 50 cents. But the head can fetch up to 25,000 naira, or about $70.
In Nigeria’s diverse cultural landscape, the beliefs around vultures vary widely. In the southwest, where they’re called igún, vultures are seen as sacred in traditional spirituality. According to folklore, they can be used to communicate with the dead or to appease the gods in elaborate sacrificial ceremonies.
In northern Nigeria, they are consumed. But they’re also sold by traders known as yan shinfida to be used in traditional medicine and spiritual healing.
Treatments
A 2013 report cited traders in the north marketing vulture parts to treat epilepsy, mental instability and stroke, as well as to offer supernatural protection, good luck, pain relief and relief for women in labor. Some say the head possesses clairvoyant powers.
In southeastern Nigeria, the bird is not eaten and has no place in traditional spirituality, Ike Nwakamma of the Nigerian Supreme Council of Traditional Worshippers told VOA. He said it is viewed as unclean, and therefore unacceptable to traditional gods. People don’t want them around, whether alive or dead.
That’s why an incident that happened in July caused panic at a local market.
Amateur videos captured shocked and fearful reactions at the sight of 50 dead vultures on the ground at Eke-Ihe market in the Awgu community, in the southeastern state of Enugu.
Igwe Godwin Ekoh, the traditional ruler of Ihe and the chairman of the Agwu Traditional Rulers Council, told VOA that a poacher had killed the vultures en masse, using poisoned meat, to sell the corpses.
Vulture trafficking has become a lucrative trade. The NIgerian Conservation foundation said 500 tons of vultures are trafficked every month.
BirdLife International, a global partnership organization, said that across Africa, vulture populations have virtually collapsed in the last 30 years, with poisoning as the major threat.
In June, 537 vultures were found dead in Botswana’s northeast, after ingesting poison left by elephant poachers.
BirdLife International describes vultures as nature’s sanitary workers, worthy of being celebrated.
Vulture workshops
In Enugu last week, Igwe Ekoh attended a forum that was organized by the Nigerian Conservation Foundation for International Vulture Awareness Day, held on the first Saturday every September. The foundation held workshops in Jalingo, Ibadan and Sokoto as well as Enugu.
Attendants at the Enugu edition went to a popular market to talk to meat butchers and asked them to inform authorities if they ever saw vulture parts being sold.
Igwe Ekoh said he left the forum with a newfound appreciation for vultures, saying he learned about how they are vital to reducing the spread of bacteria of dead animals.
A local NGO, the South Saharan Development Organization (SSDO), has agreed to partner with the Nigerian Conservation Foundation. SSDO will set up conservation clubs for high school students to learn about the environment and the role of animals, including vultures, in sustaining nature.
“It’s holistic,” SSDO’s executive director, Dr. Stanley Ilechukwu, told VOA.
Thailand’s Constitutional Court announced Wednesday that it had declined to hear a case accusing the country’s prime minister of violating the constitution by omitting a sentence from the oath of office he and his government took before King Maha Vajiralongkorn.
The issue raised questions about the legitimacy of Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha’s government, which took office in July.
Prayuth failed to include the phrase “I will also uphold and comply with the constitution of the kingdom in every aspect.” It was unclear whether the omission was accidental or intentional.
A statement from the court Wednesday said it lacked jurisdiction because the oath was a matter between the executive branch and the king.
It also mentioned that the king had issued a royal message, delivered late last month but dated the day of the oath-taking, that encouraged Cabinet members to perform their duties according to the oath they swore.
The king as a constitutional monarch is supposed to have no political role but holds a great amount of influence.
The court’s decision appeared to preclude further legal challenges of Prayuth’s omission. The lower house of Parliament is supposed to debate the matter on Sept. 18 at the request of the opposition, but the court’s position gives Prayuth’s government ammunition to stave off any political attacks.
Monarchy’s special status
The mention of the king’s note giving moral support to the government helps it defend against criticism, because the monarchy is treated as an untouchable institution in Thailand, where a tough lese majeste law provides penalties of up to 15 years in prison for insulting the royal family.
The case went to the Constitutional Court after the state ombudsman forwarded complaints from two citizens who charged that Prayuth’s failure to pledge allegiance to the constitution was a breach of the charter.
Opposition lawmakers pointed out the omission, and Prayuth responded that the matter was not a problem. The ombudsman’s office said he told them he had completed the oath-taking, without elaborating.
The oath is written into the constitution that was adopted in 2017 when Prayuth headed a military government that took power in a 2014 coup.
He became prime minister again after a general election in March that was held according to laws the military regime wrote to favor its political allies.
Divers on Wednesday recovered the body of the last missing victim of a boat fire off the California coast that killed 34 people.
The Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office announced the end of the search on Twitter, saying it was “relieved to report” the final victim had been found.
Authorities were still doing DNA tests to confirm the identities of seven of the victims.
FILE – Vans carry the victims of a predawn fire that sank a commercial diving boat off the coast of Santa Barbara, Calif., Sept. 2, 2019.
New safety bulletin
Earlier in the day, the Coast Guard announced it has issued new safety recommendations in the wake of the tragedy near Santa Cruz Island, such as limiting the unsupervised charging of lithium-ion batteries and the use of power strips and extension cords.
The bulletin also suggests that owners and operators of vessels review emergency duties with the crew, identify emergency escapes, check all firefighting and lifesaving equipment onboard, and look at the condition of passenger accommodation spaces for “unsafe practices or other hazardous arrangements.”
The cause of the Sept. 2 fire has yet to be determined. Salvage efforts to recover the Conception, which authorities have said is expected to aid the investigation, resumed this week after several days of weather delays.
Five of the Conception’s six crew members survived and told investigators they made multiple attempts to save people who were trapped below deck.
Criminal, Marine Board investigations
Authorities have said they are looking at several factors in their investigation, including how batteries and electronics were stored and charged. They will also look into how the crew was trained and what crew members were doing at the time of the fire, which erupted in the middle of the night as the passengers slept.
The boat’s design will also come under scrutiny, particularly whether a bunkroom escape hatch was adequate.
The FBI, Coast Guard and U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles are conducting a criminal investigation, and the Coast Guard has convened a formal Marine Board of Investigation.
The four members of the board will look into “pre-accident historical events, the regulatory compliance of the Conception, crew member duties and qualifications, weather conditions and reporting, safety and firefighting equipment, and Coast Guard oversight.”
FILE – A woman places flowers at a makeshift memorial near Truth Aquatics, Sept. 3, 2019, for those killed in a predawn fire that sank a commercial diving boat near Santa Barbara, Calif.
That investigation is expected to take at least a year. The panel will seek to determine the factors that led to the fire, any possible evidence of misconduct, inattention to duty, negligence or willful ignorance of the law, and if any other factors caused or contributed to the deaths.
Coast Guard records show the Conception passed its two most recent inspections with no safety violations. Previous customers said the company that owns the vessel, Truth Aquatics, and the captains of its three boats, were very safety conscious.
Authorities have said 21 women and 13 men from 16 to 62 years old appear to have died from smoke inhalation.
U.S. President Donald Trump is set to visit Baltimore, the eastern U.S., majority-black city he recently called a “disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess” where “no human being would want to live.”
Trump will be in Baltimore on Thursday to address Republican congressional leaders attending an annual retreat.
Several protests are planned to coincide with his visit. Activist groups are planning to protest “racism, white supremacy, war, bigotry and climate change,” organizers told The Baltimore Sun.
Trump has denied charges of racism regarding his attacks on the city and U.S. Representative Elijah Cummings, a Maryland Democrat who is a native of Baltimore.
“There is nothing racist in stating plainly what most people already know, that Elijah Cummings has done a terrible job for the people of his district, and of Baltimore itself,” he tweeted in July.
The U.S.-led Global Coalition to Defeat the Islamic State (IS) was announced five years ago. Despite defeating the terror group militarily, some experts believe IS still poses a major threat to global security. Sirwan Kajjo reports from Washington.
