WORLD NEWS

World News

Latest news from and about the homeland

  Three United Nations (UN) experts called for a full and independent investigation into the killing of three Lebanese journalists by Israel last week, which they described as ‘another attack on press freedom by Israeli forces.’ On March 28, Israeli forces killed Al Mayadeen reporter Fatima Ftouni, her brother and cameraman Mohamed Ftouni, and Al Manar TV reporter Ali Shoeib as they were…

Government accused of another massacre in Syria

Activists have accused the Syrian government of killing over 300 people in Daraya, on the outskirts of Damascus.

Government forces have seized control of the area after 5 days of intense battles against opposition fighters but local activists have reported dozens of summary executions.

“We are in the process of identifying the bodies and documenting how they died,” Mohammed Hur told the Reuters news agency.

Ban’s visit to Iran faces criticism

The United States and Israel have united in criticising the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon’s decision to visit Iran for the Non-Aligned Movement summit, amidst efforts to isolate the country.

The Secretary-General will be joining officials from 120 countries, despite notable objections, including a direct appeal from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was quoted as telling Ban,
“Your visit will grant legitimacy to a regime that is the greatest threat to world peace and security.”
Tommy Vietor, spokesman for the US National Security Council, also commented,
“We think that Iran is going to try to use the event for propaganda purposes and to try to cover up the extreme isolation Iran is feeling politically and economically.”

“That said, if people choose to participate, we believe they should take the opportunity of any meetings that they have with Iran’s leaders to press them to comply with their international obligations without further delay.”

Former Israeli soldiers reveal abuse of Palestinian children

A group of over 30 former Israeli soldiers have disclosed testimonies of the treatment of Palestinian children by the armed forces, pointing towards a trend of abuse.

The testimonies, put together by Breaking the Silence, describes beatings, night-time arrests, verbal abuse and intimidation of Palestinian children in the occupied territories by Israeli soldiers.

One ex-soldier recalled his experiences in 2010, stating,
"You never know their names, you never talk with them, they always cry, shit in their pants … There are those annoying moments when you're on an arrest mission, and there's no room in the police station, so you just take the kid back with you, blindfold him, put him in a room and wait for the police to come and pick him up in the morning. He sits there like a dog …"


Yehuda Shaul of Breaking the Silence said,
"Sadly enough this is the moral consequence of prolonged occupation of the Palestinian people,"

Israeli minister visits Armenia genocide memorial

An Israeli cabinet minister laid a wreath at an Armenian genocide memorial as he visited the country earlier this week, stating that the genocide was “widely recognised in Israel”.

Public Diplomacy and Diaspora Affairs Minister Yuli-Yoel Edelstein spoke on the experience of the Holocaust telling journalists that,
“I think that in Israel, in view of … our common history and some similar elements and moments, you will hardly find people who will deny the genocide, who will say, like we unfortunately hear, that all this is fabrications and lies.”
“So I think that unfortunately — I stress, unfortunately — in this area our peoples have quite a lot in common, quite a lot for mutual understanding”.
Visiting the genocide museum in the city of Yerevan, Edelstein signed the visitor’s book writing,
“Nobody in Israel denies the fact of Armenian Genocide.”
His visit comes as reports emerged of a newly issued French secondary-school textbook including details of the 1915 mass killings of ethnic Armenians as a genocide.

China urged to stop deporting Burma refugees

The past week has seen China force at least 1000 refugees back into the combat zone in northern Burma, with alleged plans to deport a further 4000 displaced people, warned Human Rights Watch.

Human rights watch urged the Chinese government to provide temporary protection for the refugees instead of repatriating them to Burma.

Ecuador motion passed by American countries

A motion, backing the ‘inviolability of diplomatic missions’ has been passed by the Organisation of American States, amidst the ongoing row over Wikileaks founder Julian Assange’s avoidance of facing extradition to Sweden by hiding in Ecuador’s embassy in London.

Ecuador called for the vote saying the UK threatened to storm the embassy to arrest Assange, however the resolution was reworded after the UK insisted it made no such threat.

Former prosecutor slams UN war crimes program in DRC

A Crown prosecutor, formerly part of a UN initiative to investigate war crimes in the DRC, has slammed the ‘floundering’ program stating he was ‘blocked’ from making any substantial progress in bringing war criminals to justice.

John Lester, who served as a Crown prosecutor in British Columbia, Canada before joining the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, stated the initiative was “accomplishing nothing.“
It’s bullsh**, just spinning. People aren’t doing anything there except writing and reading reports.”
Under the UN mandate, it is up to the Congolese to investigate and prosecute any war criminals, with Mr Lester and his colleagues left to “assist” the Congolese military courts.

However, the military prosecutors soon stated “there were no crimes to prosecute”, noting that the UN was only “invited” to help assist in cases of war crimes.

Lester stated he was “blocked from doing my job”, adding,
“The entire expensive mission depends upon the individual whims of military prosecutors”

France backs no-fly zone, calls for Assad regime to be “smashed fast”

France has suggested that they would participate in enforcing a no-fly zone in Syria, as the French Foreign Minister called for the Syrian regime to be "smashed fast".

France’s Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, speaking on French television, called on the international community to consider imposing a no-fly zone in Syria, a move that he claimed france would participate in backing.

His remarks came as Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said last week,
"The Syrian regime should be smashed fast"

"After hearing the refugees and their account of the massacres of the regime, Mr Bashar al-Assad doesn't deserve to be on this earth."

"It is an operation of destruction of an entire people that he is trying to accomplish"

"The sooner this regime leaves, the better... Every single day gives Bashar Assad regime time to use for bombing his own people."

Morsi passes law against press detention

Egypt’s President, Mohamed Morsi, has passed a law banning the pre-trial detention of those accused of media crimes, in his first use of legislative powers seized from the country’s military.

The move has led to the freeing of one of Morsi’s harshest critics, newspaper editor Islam Afifi, who was arrested mere hours before the declaration. Afifi faced charges of various charges including “insulting the President”, a crime under Egyptian law.

Commenting on the arrest of Afifi, US State Department Spokesperson Victoria Nuland said,
"We did express concerns quite strongly that one of the cornerstones of a vibrant democracy is a free press and respect for freedom of expression and called on Egypt to ensure that it is protecting those freedoms moving forward."
The Egyptian Government was very much aware and has been aware that we made some comments here about media freedom and took note of those.

Israel anger at South African labelling of West Bank goods

Israel has reacted angrily to a move by South Africa which will see all goods produced in Israeli settlements to be labelled as from the “Occupied Palestinian Territories”, and has summoned the South African ambassador to explain decision.

The move was slammed as "totally unacceptable" and "blatant discrimination" by Israel, who said,
"Such exclusion and discrimination bring to mind ideas of racist nature which the government of South Africa, more than any other, should have wholly rejected."
But South Africa defended the step, stating it conformed with their existing policy on the issue, with government spokesman Jimmy Manyi stating,
"This is in line with South Africa's stance that recognises the 1948 borders delineated by the United Nations and does not recognise occupied territories beyond these borders as being part of the state of Israel".
South African trade and industry minister, Rob Davies also added that the labelling would help "South Africans who do not support Israel, but who do support the Palestinians, to identify those products".