The trickle-down effects of Russia’s war in Ukraine are still being felt on food prices in vulnerable places, nearly one year after Moscow invaded the neighboring country.
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Month: February 2023
Sixty Ukrainian ballet dancers fled Ukraine to escape Russia’s invasion over the past year. They ended up in the Netherlands, where they continue to dance together. Mariia Ulianovska has the story, narrated by Anna Rice. Camera: Kostiantyn Golubchyk
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Google is blocking some Canadian users from viewing news content in what the company said is a test run of a potential response to a Canadian government’s online news bill.
Bill C-18, the Online News Act, would require digital giants such as Google and Meta, which owns Facebook, to negotiate deals that would compensate Canadian media companies for republishing their content on their platforms.
The company said it is temporarily limiting access to news content for under 4% of its Canadian users as it assesses possible responses to the bill. The change applies to its ubiquitous search engine as well as the Discover feature on Android devices, which carries news and sports stories.
All types of news content are being affected by the test, which will run for about five weeks, the company said. That includes content created by Canadian broadcasters and newspapers.
“We’re briefly testing potential product responses to Bill C-18 that impact a very small percentage of Canadian users,” Google spokesman Shay Purdy said in a written statement on Wednesday in response to questions from The Canadian Press.
The company runs thousands of tests each year to assess any potential changes to its search engine, he added.
“We’ve been fully transparent about our concern that C-18 is overly broad and, if unchanged, could impact products Canadians use and rely on every day,” Purdy said.
A spokeswoman for Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez said Canadians will not be intimidated and called it disappointing that Google is borrowing from Meta’s playbook. Last year, that company threatened to block news off its site in response to the bill.
“This didn’t work in Australia, and it won’t work here because Canadians won’t be intimidated. At the end of the day, all we’re asking the tech giants to do is compensate journalists when they use their work,” spokeswoman Laura Scaffidi said in a statement Wednesday.
“Canadians need to have access to quality, fact-based news at the local and national levels, and that’s why we introduced the Online News Act. Tech giants need to be more transparent and accountable to Canadians.”
Rodriguez has argued the bill, which is similar to a law that Australia passed in 2021, will “enhance fairness” in the digital news marketplace by creating a framework and bargaining process for online behemoths to pay media outlets.
But Google expressed concerns in a Parliament committee that the prospective law does not require publishers to adhere to basic journalistic standards, that it would favor large publishers over smaller outlets and that it could result in the proliferation of “cheap, low quality, clickbait content” over public interest journalism.
The company has said it would rather pay into a fund, similar to the Canada Media Fund, that would pay news publishers indirectly.
The bill passed the Canadian House of Commons in December and is set to be studied in the Senate in the coming months.
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Ukrainians living in South Africa are marking one year since Russia’s invasion with a dance production titled ‘We Stand for Freedom.’ The performance, supported by the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation, draws parallels between racial oppression under apartheid and Moscow’s war on Ukraine. Vicky Stark meets some Ukrainians who fled the war in this report from Cape Town, South Africa.
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A federal judge on Thursday handed singer R. Kelly a 20-year prison sentence for his convictions of child pornography and the enticement of minors for sex but said he will serve nearly all of the sentence simultaneously with a 30-year sentence imposed last year on racketeering charges.
U.S. District Judge Harry Leinenweber also ordered that Kelly serve one year in prison following his New York sentence.
The central question going into the sentencing in Kelly’s hometown of Chicago was whether Leinenweber would order that the 56-year-old serve the sentence simultaneously with or only after he completes the New York term for 2021 racketeering and sex trafficking convictions. The latter would have been tantamount to a life sentence.
Prosecutors had acknowledged that a lengthy term served only after the New York sentence could have erased any chance of Kelly ever getting out of prison alive. It’s what they asked for, arguing his crimes against children and lack of remorse justified it.
With Thursday’s sentence, though, Kelly will serve no more than 31 years. That means he will be eligible for release at around age 80, providing him some hope of one day leaving prison alive.
Leinenweber said at the outset of the hearing that he did not accept the government’s contention that Kelly used fear to woo underage girls for sex.
“The [government’s] whole theory of grooming, was sort of the opposite of fear of bodily harm,” the judge told the court. “It was the fear of lost love, lost affections [from Kelly]. … It just doesn’t seem to me that it rises to the fear of bodily harm.”
Prosecutors say Kelly’s crimes against children and his lack of remorse justify the stiffer sentence.
A calm Kelly spoke briefly at the start of the hearing, when the judge asked him if he had reviewed key presentencing documents for any inaccuracies.
“Your honor, I have gone over it with my attorney,” Kelly said. “I’m just relying on my attorney for that.”
Two of Kelly’s accusers asked the judge to punish him harshly.
In a statement read aloud in court, a woman who testified under the pseudonym “Jane” said she had lost her early aspirations to become a singer herself and her hopes for fulfilling relationships.
“I have lost my dreams to Robert Kelly,” the statement said. “I will never get back what I lost to Robert Kelly. … I have been permanently scarred by Robert.”
The woman was a key witness for prosecutors during Kelly’s trial; four of his convictions are tied to her.
“When your virginity is taken by a pedophile at 14 … your life is never your own,” Jane’s statement read.
Another accuser, who used the pseudonym “Nia,” attended the hearing and addressed Kelly directly in court. Speaking forcefully as her voice quivered, Nia said Kelly would repeatedly pick at her supposed faults while he abused her.
“Now you are here … because there is something wrong with you,” she said. “No longer will you be able to harm children.”
Jurors in Chicago convicted Kelly last year on six of 13 counts: three counts of producing child porn and three of enticement of minors for sex.
Kelly rose from poverty in Chicago to become one of the world’s biggest R&B stars. Known for his smash hit “I Believe I Can Fly” and for sex-infused songs such as “Bump n’ Grind,” he sold millions of albums even after allegations about his abuse of girls began circulating publicly in the 1990s.
In presentencing filings, prosecutors described Kelly as “a serial sexual predator” who used his fame and wealth to reel in, sexually abuse and then discard star-struck fans.
U.S. Assistant Attorney Jeannice Appenteng on Thursday urged the judge to set a longer sentence and keep Kelly in prison “for the rest of his life.”
Kelly’s abuse of children was all the worse, she said, because he “memorialized” his abuse by filming victims, including Jane. She told the court Kelly “used Jane as a sex prop, a thing” for producing pornographic videos.
In prehearing filings, Kelly’s lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, accused prosecutors of offering an “embellished narrative” in an attempt to get the judge to join what she called the government’s “bloodthirsty campaign to make Kelly a symbol of the #MeToo movement.”
Bonjean said Kelly has suffered enough, including financially. She said his worth once approached $1 billion, but that he “is now destitute.”
In court Thursday, Bonjean said Kelly will be lucky to survive his 30-year New York sentence alone. To give him a consecutive 25-year sentence on top of that “is overkill, it is symbolic,” she said. “Why? Because it is R. Kelly.”
She also argued that Kelly’s silence should not be viewed as a lack of remorse.
She said that while she advised Kelly not to speak because he continues to appeal his convictions and could face other legal action, “He would like to, he would like to very much.”
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Federal wildlife officials on Wednesday announced a proposal to classify one of two dwindling California spotted owl populations as endangered after a lawsuit by conservation groups required the government to reassess a Trump administration decision not to protect the brown and white birds.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed that California spotted owls that have their habitats in coastal and Southern California be protected under the Endangered Species Act.
That population “does not have a strong ability to withstand normal variations in environmental conditions, persist through catastrophic events, or adapt to new environmental conditions throughout its range,” which led the agency to propose listing it as endangered, wildlife officials said.
The other California spotted owl population, which lives in Sierra Nevada forests in California and western Nevada, would be classified as threatened, the agency said.
The habitat of the medium-sized brown owl with white spots on its head and chest and a barred tail is under serious threat from current logging practices and climate change, including increased drought, disease and more extreme wildfires.
Most California spotted owls live on land overseen by the Bureau of Land Management and the U.S. Forest Service.
How much the population has declined since conservation groups started their effort to protect it more than 20 years ago is unclear.
The only available demographic data on spotted owls living in coastal and Southern California was collected in San Bernardino National Forest and shows a decline of 9%, the federal wildlife service said.
The Sierra Nevada population shows declines ranging from 50% to 31% percent in some areas, the agency said.
The federal agency’s decision follows an agreement reached in November between the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and several conservation groups that sued the federal agency in 2020 over its decision not to protect the California spotted owl population.
Justin Augustine, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the groups that sued, applauded the agency’s decision and said he was happy to see the California spotted owls could finally get the safeguards they need.
Augustine said he planned to use the 60-day public comment period to push for more protections for the California spotted population in the Sierra Nevada.
“One of the things I’ll be addressing is the issue of how to make sure that (Sierra Nevada) spotted owls are actually protected under their threatened status rather than potentially allowing some logging to occur that would be harmful,” he said.
The California spotted owl is one of three spotted owl subspecies and the last to be protected under the Endangered Species Act, Augustine said.
The other two subspecies are the northern spotted owl and the Mexican spotted owl.
The northern spotted owl habitat is in Oregon, Washington state and Northern California. The tiny owl was listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act in 1990, sparking an intense battle over logging in the region. In 2020, the Trump Administration refused to upgrade it to endangered status despite losing nearly 4% of its population annually.
The Mexican spotted owl was first listed as threatened in the U.S. in 1993. It is found in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Utah, parts of West Texas and Mexico.
The species is in danger of extinction due to lose of habitat to logging, development, mining and wildfires.
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A new report by four leading United Nations agencies and the World Bank estimates every two minutes, one woman dies during pregnancy or childbirth, mostly from preventable causes.
The report, “Trends in maternal mortality 2000 to 2020,” was produced by WHO, UNICEF, and the UNFPA, along with the World Bank Group and UNDESA/Population Division.
Health officials say the data presented in the report should be a wakeup call for world leaders to take action to end maternal deaths by investing in health care systems and closing the widening social and economic inequities that contribute to these deaths.
“While pregnancy should be a time of immense hope and a positive experience for all women, it is tragically still a shockingly dangerous experience for millions around the world,” said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the World Health Organization’s director-general.
“These new statistics reveal the urgent need to ensure every woman and girl has access to critical health services before, during and after childbirth,” he said, “And that they can fully exercise their reproductive rights.”
The report finds an estimated 287,000 women around the world died from a maternal cause in 2020. That is equivalent to 800 deaths a day, or one death every two minutes.
“These numbers show persistent inequities between countries which are undermining women’s rights.,” said Anshu Banerjee, assistant director general for universal health coverage at WHO.
“There is over a hundred-fold risk of dying depending on where a woman delivers her baby, particularly in low-income countries compared to high income countries,” he said.
The statistics bear this out. While some significant progress in reducing maternal deaths was made between 2000 and 2015, the report notes this progress has largely stalled, and in some cases been reversed.
For example, between 2016 and 2020, it says the maternal mortality rate increased in Europe, Northern America, Latin America and the Caribbean.
While the number of deaths has gone up, the report says the regions have among the lowest maternal mortality rates in the world.
During this same period, the report says two regions, Australia and New Zealand, and Central and Southern Asia, reduced maternal deaths significantly. The picture is quite different in sub-Saharan Africa, which has the highest rate of maternal mortality, accounting for 70 percent of maternal deaths worldwide.
Jenny Cresswell, an epidemiologist at WHO and author of the report, said the maternal mortality ratio per 100,000 live births in sub-Saharan Africa in 2020 is estimated to be 545 maternal deaths for every 100,000 live births.
“This number is 136 times bigger than MMR (maternal mortality ratio) in Australia and New Zealand, the lowest region,” Cresswell said.
She adds, “A 15-year-old girl in Chad in 2020 has a one in 15 chance of dying from a maternal cause during her lifetime, and that is 4,000 times greater than the probability in Belarus.”
In 2020, Belarus had one MMR per 100,000 live births compared to Chad, which had 1,063 MMRs per 100,000 live births.
Leading causes
The leading causes of maternal deaths include severe bleeding, high blood pressure, pregnancy-related infections, complications from unsafe abortions, and underlying conditions such as HIV/AIDS and malaria.
Banerjee said nearly all these maternal deaths are preventable.
“Nearly half of all pregnancies are unintended, which is highlighting the lack of access of some 270 million women globally to modern family planning methods —meaning they are unable to choose how and when to plan their families,” he says.” Many lack access to safe abortion, which increases risk of complications, including deaths associated with unsafe procedures,” said Banerjee.
Natalia Kanem, executive director of the U.N. Population Fund, said it is unacceptable that so many women continue to die needlessly during pregnancy and childbirth.
She said, “We can and must do better by urgently investing in family planning and filling the global shortage of 900,000 midwives so that every woman can get the lifesaving care she needs.
“We have the tools, knowledge, and resources to end preventable maternal deaths,” she said. “What we need now is the political will.”
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Zimbabweans living on the border with Zambia are increasingly taking advantage of their neighbor’s superior health care. But Zambian officials say they are also draining resources as nearly one-third of patients in some clinics and hospitals are Zimbabweans. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Lusaka, Zambia. VOA footage by Blessing Chigwenhembe.
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Overdose deaths from the drug fentanyl have communities across the United States scrambling to respond. In Washington state, librarians are becoming unlikely first responders in this latest wave of the US opioid crisis. Natasha Mozgovaya has our story
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People generate more than 50 million tons of electronic waste every year, including copiers, televisions, and computers. Laptops are part of the problem, but engineers at Dell Technologies are working on a new approach to help keep them out of landfills. Tina Trinh reports. Camera: Deana Mitchell
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The man who shot dead Grammy-winning rapper Nipsey Hussle on a Los Angeles street in 2019 was jailed for at least 60 years Wednesday.
Eric Holder had not denied killing Hussle — a fast-rising star whose death sent shockwaves through the music world — but his lawyers argued it was an impulsive crime that took place in the “heat of passion.”
But a jury last year found Holder had acted with premeditation as he fired at Hussle at least 10 times following a dispute between the two men over claims the assailant was “snitching” to the police.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge H. Clay Jacke sentenced Holder to a minimum of 25 years for the killing, with an additional 25 years because a gun was used in the crime.
Holder was given another 10 years for shooting and wounding two other men who were nearby.
The violent killing of Hussle, a former gang member, in front of a clothing store he owned triggered widespread grief in his native Los Angeles and among his superstar peers, who hailed his musical talents and community activism.
Raised in the city’s Crenshaw district, Hussle, who was 33 when he died, had transformed the block he used to hustle on into a retail, job-creating hub for his Marathon Clothing company.
But he remained linked to the gang-ridden world he grew up in.
Holder, a 32-year-old gang member, and Hussle were both members of the same “Rollin 60s” Crips faction.
During the trial, prosecutor John McKinney said Hussle had told Holder there were rumors Holder had been “snitching,” before Holder left the parking lot where the two were talking.
When he returned a short time later, Holder “pulls out not one but two guns and starts shooting” in an “explosion of violence.”
The killing was captured on video.
In his closing argument, McKinney called the killing “cold-blooded” and “calculated,” saying Holder had “quite a bit of time for premeditation and deliberation.”
But Holder’s attorney told jurors the killing was “an act of impulse and rashness” which should have been charged as manslaughter.
Aaron Jansen said his client, who he said suffered from mental illness, had already received death threats and that “his life in prison is going to be hell for as long as it lasts.”
The judge said he would recommend Holder be housed in a facility that can address his mental health needs.
‘He saw hope’
The month after his 2019 killing, thousands of people gathered for a service in Hussle’s honor, with Stevie Wonder and Snoop Dogg among those paying tribute, and former President Barack Obama penning a letter that was read during the service.
“While most folks look at the Crenshaw neighborhood where he grew up and see only gangs, bullets and despair, Nipsey saw potential,” wrote Obama.
“He saw hope. He saw a community that, even through its flaws, taught him to always keep going.”
Hussle — real name Ermias Asghedom — was posthumously honored with two Grammy Awards in 2020 for best rap performance for Racks in the Middle and best rap/sung performance for Higher.
In August, on what would have been his 37th birthday, he was granted a star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame.
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To address the relatively high cost of health care in Africa, a Kenyan mobile application lets users pay for medical services by selling their personal data through blockchain technology. Officials say Snark Health’s Hippocratic Coins have attracted more than 300 doctors and 4,000 users. Victoria Amunga reports from Nairobi, Kenya. Camera: Jimmy Makhulo.
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An organization that trains young people for conservation jobs is recycling dead trees and replacing them with new ones, salvaging valuable lumber in the process. Mike O’Sullivan reports from Long Beach, California.
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A controversial Chinese biophysicist, who had been imprisoned after creating the world’s first gene-edited babies, had his Hong Kong work visa revoked after immigration officials suspected he lied on an application form for a talent scheme.
He Jiankui, who sparked an international scientific and ethical debate in 2018 when he revealed he had created the world’s first “gene-edited” babies resistant to HIV, said at the time at an international conference in Hong Kong that he had modified two embryos before they were placed in their mother’s womb.
The scientist said he used a technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 to alter the embryonic genes of twin girls before birth. He said he had targeted a gene known as CCR5 and edited it in a way he believed would protect the girls from infection with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. It later emerged that a third gene-edited baby had been born.
The former associate professor at the Southern University of Science and Technology — who has since been fired — was later accused of having forged approval documents from ethics boards. He was sentenced by a Chinese court to three years in prison in late 2019 for illegally carrying out human embryo gene-editing intended for reproduction. He was released in April 2022.
The scientist posted on the Chinese social media platform WeChat on Saturday that he had been granted the visa on February 11 under the talent scheme. It was aimed at attracting people with rich work experience and good academic qualifications from all over the world to explore opportunities in Hong Kong.
He said he would conduct gene-editing research using artificial intelligence and was “optimistic about [the future of] Hong Kong,” reported the South China Morning Post. His original post cannot be found.
“We plan to use artificial intelligence tools to evolve the adeno-associated virus (AAV) capsids to improve the efficiency of gene therapy and promote affordable gene therapy for rare diseases,” he was quoted by the paper as saying. AAV is a small virus that has emerged as the most promising platform for gene therapy.
Scientists engineer the outer protein shell of AAV, known as capsid, to improve targeting and efficacy.
In response to the furor, the Hong Kong government issued a late-night statement on Tuesday, saying the visa of an individual who “made false representation” has been rescinded and a criminal investigation launched. Officials did not name He but made reference to media reports regarding an applicant being granted a visa “despite having been imprisoned for illegal medical practice.”
“After reviewing the application, the Immigration Department suspected the visa/entry permit was obtained by false representation, and the Director of Immigration had declared the visa/entry permits invalid in accordance with the law, and would conduct a criminal investigation to follow up,” said the statement.
The statement also warned that applicants who give false information face a maximum sentence of 14 years in prison and a fine of $17,842 upon conviction. The government has also issued a new requirement that future applicants under the visa scheme must declare whether they have any criminal records.
Since his prison release 10 months ago, He has established a laboratory in Beijing dedicated to developing affordable drugs for rare genetic diseases. Although He insisted that his work was to help people, international medical experts have criticized his gene-editing procedure as risky, ethically contentious and medically unjustified with inadequate consent from the families involved.
In a study published in the journal Nature Medicine in June 2019, scientists found that people who have two copies of a so-called “Delta 32” mutation of CCR5 — which protects against HIV infection in some people — also have a significantly higher risk of premature death.
He told The Guardian newspaper early this month that he moved “too quickly” by pressing ahead with the gene-editing procedure but stopped short of apologizing. He declined to elaborate on what measures should have been taken but said he would give further details at a scheduled talk on the use of CRISPR gene-editing technology at the University of Oxford next month.
He then said in a Twitter message on February 10 that he was “not ready to talk about my experience in the past three years, so I decided that I will not visit Oxford in March.”
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Researchers in Kenya say they’ve detected an invasive mosquito that can transmit malaria in different climates, threatening progress to fight the parasitic disease. Kenya’s Medical Research Institute this week urged the public to use mosquito nets and clean up areas where mosquitos can breed.
Kenya has detected the presence of a new malaria carrier, which was first discovered in the region in Djibouti in 2012.
The new carrier, the Anopheles stephensi mosquito, transmits plasmodium vivax, the parasite the causes the deadliest type of malaria.
Bernhards Ogutu is a chief researcher at Kenya Medical Research Institute. He says it was only a matter of time before the mosquito was discovered in the country after it appeared in Ethiopia and South Sudan.
“We’ve not been able to pick plasmodium vivax which is found in Asia and Kenya. It’s there in Ethiopia and this vector can also transmit it,” said Ogutu. “So that will also look at whether we might have plasmodium vivax in coming up with this new vector showing in our place. Vivax is more difficult to treat in that you can get treated and real up because it keeps staying in the body and the liver.”
Malaria affects over 229 million people each year and kills over 400,000 people, according to the World Health Organization.
More than a quarter of a million children die in Africa each year as a result of the mosquito-borne disease, including over 10,000 in Kenya.
Ogutu expresses concern for urban residents, saying that the new carrier may feed on poor environmental management systems.
“So the fact that this can survive in urban areas where water is not clean and that can transmit, that’s the worry people are having. For the time being its to monitor and see to what extent we are going to have its spreading and what impact it will be having,” said Ogutu.
Redentho Dabelen is a public officer in the Marsabit County town of Laisamis, where the vector was discovered.
He says experts are going to communities to teach people how to protect themselves from the disease.
“To sensitize them and teach them how to prevent themselves from the vector bites. We are trying to spray the houses,” said Dabelen. “We are trying to tell them about the disease through the community health volunteers and if they get infected they go to the hospital.”
According to the researchers, the population should continue to use malaria control tools such as sleeping under mosquito nets and practicing good environmental management and sanitation.
In 2021, the WHO approved a malaria vaccine for children aged five months to two years that has been shown to reduce child deaths.
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Participants at a global U.N. conference in France’s capital on Wednesday urged the international community to find better safeguards against online disinformation and hate speech.
Hundreds of officials, tech firm representatives, academics and members of civil society were invited to the two-day meeting hosted by the United Nation’s cultural fund to brainstorm how to best vet content while upholding human rights.
“Digital platforms have changed the way we connect and face the world, the way we face each other,” UNESCO Director-General Audrey Azoulay said in opening remarks.
But “only by fully evaluating this technological revolution can we ensure it is a revolution that does not compromise human rights, freedom of expression and democracy.”
UNESCO has warned that despite their benefits in communication and knowledge sharing, social media platforms rely on algorithms that “often prioritize engagement over safety and human rights.”
Filipina investigative journalist Maria Ressa, who jointly won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021 for exposing abuses under former president Rodrigo Duterte, said social media had allowed lies to flourish.
“Our communication systems today are insidiously manipulating us,” she told attendees.
“We focus only on content moderation. It’s like there is a polluted river. We take a glass … we clean up the water and then dump it back,” she said.
But “what we have to do is to go all the way to the factory polluting the river, shut it down and then resuscitate the river.”
She said that at the height of online campaigns against her for her work, she had received up to 98 hate messages an hour.
A little over half sought to undermine her credibility as a journalist, including false claims that she peddled “fake news,” she said.
The rest were personal attacks targeting her gender, “skin color and sexuality” or even “threats of rape and murder.”
‘This must stop’
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula earlier addressed the conference in a letter, after disgruntled supporters of his predecessor Jair Bolsonaro on January 8 invaded the presidential palace, Congress and the Supreme Court in Brasilia.
“What happened that day was the culmination of a campaign initiated much before, and that used as ammunition, lies and disinformation,” he said.
“To a large extent, this campaign was nurtured, organized and disseminated through several digital platforms and messaging apps,” he added.
“This must stop. The international community needs, from now on, to work to give effective answers to this challenging question of our times.”
Facebook whistleblower Christopher Wylie also contributed to the discussions.
The data scientist has revealed how he helped Cambridge Analytica, founded by former U.S. president Donald Trump’s former right-hand man Steve Bannon, to use unauthorized personal data harvested from Facebook to help swing a string of elections, including Trump’s U.S. presidential win in 2016.
“Many countries around the world have issued or are currently considering national legislation to address the spread of harmful content,” UNESCO said in a statement ahead of the conference.
But “some of this legislation risks infringing the human rights of their populations, particularly the right to freedom of expression and opinion,” it warned.
Decades of violence and humanitarian crises have left many Somali people traumatized, according to a health study by the U.N. and Somali organizations. Harun Maruf reported from Washington and Abdulkadir Zubeyr in Mogadishu spoke to mental health doctors and patients in the country. They have this report narrated by Salem Solomon. Camera: Abdulkadir Zubeyr. Video editor Betty Ayoub.
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The Supreme Court is taking up its first case about a federal law that is credited with helping create the modern internet by shielding Google, Twitter, Facebook and other companies from lawsuits over content posted on their sites by others.
The justices are hearing arguments Tuesday about whether the family of an American college student killed in a terrorist attack in Paris can sue Google for helping extremists spread their message and attract new recruits.
The case is the court’s first look at Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, adopted early in the internet age, in 1996, to protect companies from being sued over information their users post online.
Lower courts have broadly interpreted the law to protect the industry, which the companies and their allies say has fueled the meteoric growth of the internet and encouraged the removal of harmful content.
But critics argue that the companies have not done nearly enough and that the law should not block lawsuits over the recommendations, generated by computer algorithms, that point viewers to more material that interests them and keeps them online longer.
Any narrowing of their immunity could have dramatic consequences that could affect every corner of the internet because websites use algorithms to sort and filter a mountain of data.
“Recommendation algorithms are what make it possible to find the needles in humanity’s largest haystack,” Google’s lawyers wrote in their main Supreme Court brief.
In response, the lawyers for the victim’s family questioned the prediction of dire consequences. “There is, on the other hand, no denying that the materials being promoted on social media sites have in fact caused serious harm,” the lawyers wrote.
The lawsuit was filed by the family of Nohemi Gonzalez, a 23-year-old senior at Cal State Long Beach who was spending a semester in Paris studying industrial design. She was killed by Islamic State group gunmen in a series of attacks that left 130 people dead in November 2015.
The Gonzalez family alleges that Google-owned YouTube aided and abetted the Islamic State group, also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, by recommending its videos to viewers most likely to be interested in them, in violation of the federal Anti-Terrorism Act.
Lower courts sided with Google.
A related case, set for arguments Wednesday, involves a terrorist attack at a nightclub in Istanbul in 2017 that killed 39 people and prompted a lawsuit against Twitter, Facebook and Google.
Separate challenges to social media laws enacted by Republicans in Florida and Texas are pending before the high court, but they will not be argued before the fall and decisions probably won’t come until the first half of 2024.
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