WATCH HERE: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/watch-live-survivors-of-russian-war-crimes-in-ukraine-testify-in-house-hearing Survivors of Russian war crimes in Ukraine will testify Wednesday morning before the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. The hearing is scheduled to begin at 10 a.m. ET. Watch the event live in the player above. READ MORE: Putin visits Russian troops in Ukraine as Kyiv preps counteroffensive Last week, Ukraine launched an investigation into a gruesome video that purportedly shows the beheading of a Ukrainian soldier, in the latest accusation of atrocities said to have been committed by Russia since it invaded in February 2022. The video spread quickly online and drew outrage from officials in Kyiv, including President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as well as international organizations. The Kremlin called the footage “horrible” but said it needed to be verified. © 1996 - 2023 NewsHour Productions LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Indian Americans condemn Hindu extremist violence against Muslims across India during Ram Navami Washington, DC (April 3, 2023) – The Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC) today strongly condemned Hindu extremist violence against Muslims in various Indian states over the last week. Since March 29th, extremist mobs participating in processions for the Hindu festival of Ram Navami have systematically attacked Muslims, along with their homes, businesses, and places of worship in at least six Indian states, including Maharashtra, West Bengal, Delhi, Gujarat, Telangana and Uttar Pradesh. “It is unacceptable that some extremists in India are using Hindu festivals to terrorize Indian Muslims. It is profoundly alarming that these acts of large-scale violence are premeditated, organized and committed in the presence and full knowledge of the police, who according to numerous video reports, are doing nothing to stop them,” said Rasheed Ahmed, Executive Director of IAMC. News reports and videos circulating on different social media platforms indicate that the violence has been orchestrated by the militant affiliates of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), including Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP). A newly released report from the Citizens and Lawyers Initiative, “Routes of Wrath: Weaponising Religious Processions'' provides deeply researched documentation of the weaponization of Ram Navami and Hanuman riots in 2022, which resulted in two deaths and more than a hundred injuries that year. The report, featuring an introduction from retired Indian Supreme Court Justice Rohinton F. Nariman, highlights consistent collusion on the part of the Hindu far-right groups and the authorities in choosing procession routes. “Religious processions in state after state have been granted licenses or permissions to pass through the most congested and sensitive areas,” it states. In the town of Bihar Sharif in Bihar state, a young man was shot dead during a Ram Navami procession this year, according to police reports. Muslim women allege that police robbed their homes and threatened rape during a chaotic Ram Navami procession. “Police abused us and gave us rape threats. We were forced to open the doors, and then they were free to get into our houses. They put ladders in the balcony and entered,” a woman alleged. Participants in a March 30 Ram Navami procession also vandalized a mosque and set it on fire. A day later, on April 1, teenagers participating in a different Ram Navami procession in Bihar beat a Muslim woman and smashed a Muslim teenager in the head with a rifle butt. In West Bengal, a Hindu extremist mob chanting "Jai Shri Ram" set fire to Muslim shops and vehicles. In Gujarat state’s Vadodara, Hindu supremacists stoned Muslim properties and a mosque. In Telangana, Hindu extremist leader T Raja Singh exhorted crowds to kill Muslims, calling out, “You [Muslims] are half cut (circumcised). We will cut you fully.” In Gir Somnath, Gujarat, far-right leader Kajal Singhala delivered an Islamophobic speech at a Ram Navami festival, which led to tensions in the area. In Vadodara, Gujarat, a Hindu extremist mob attacked a Muslim locality during the Ram Navami procession. Locals allege that police have disproportionately targeted Muslims in the crackdown after the violence. In one media report, Gujarat police forced down the door of a Muslim woman’s house during Iftar, tore off her clothes, and attempted to sexually abuse her, while also beating her husband. Hindu extremists in Mathura, Uttar Pradesh, raised saffron flags over the Jama Masjid as part of Ram Navami celebrations, claiming the mosque as their own. Instead of holding Hindu extremists accountable, the police in states ruled by the BJP continues to arrest Muslims on fabricated charges of violence. “We should not need to provide encyclopedic documentation of clear bias and genocidal threats to Muslim lives in India. Any given day furnishes hundreds of examples of a rising existential threat,” said IAMC Executive Director Ahmed. “If the international community does not quickly intervene, it will be impossible to reverse India’s violent decline.” IAMC urges international human rights organizations & civil society groups to take note of the deteriorating situation in India, which has the potential to turn into a full-blown Muslim and Christian genocide. IAMC also calls on the US State Department to ask the Indian government to stop stoking the anti-Muslim sentiment, punish the Hindu extremists involved in anti-Muslim violence, and accept the recommendation of the United States Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) to designate India as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). Indian American Muslim Council is the largest advocacy organization of Indian Muslims in the United States with chapters across the nation. For more information, please visit our website at: www.iamc.com

The fire in March left 40 people dead. Nobody expected them back so soon. Last week, the remains of 17 Guatemalan men killed in a fire at a migration center near the U.S. border were flown back home, where three days of national mourning have been declared. They were among 40 people who died in March at the migration center in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, near the border with Texas. It is not the first time the Guatemalan president has had occasion to declare such a period of mourning. He has done so at least twice before: in December 2021, when at least 40 Guatemalans died in a vehicular crash in Chiapas, Mexico, and in March of that same year, when more than a dozen migrants were shot and burned in Tamaulipas, Mexico. So far this year, the Guatemalan authorities have helped repatriate 58 dead nationals. In 2022, they brought back 427 people, 361 of whom had died in the United States. Many had been migrants trying to cross the American border. Mexico has detained five people in connection with the fire in March. The prosecutor’s office is also expected to press criminal charges against the leader of the National Institute of Migration. Below, the remains of the migrants arriving at an air force base in Guatemala City on Tuesday night. Francisco Gaspar Rojche Chiquival, 24, and Miguel Rojché Zapalu, 40, were two of the men laid to rest in Chicacao, a predominantly Indigenous community in southwest Guatemala. They were uncle and nephew and had left for the United States on March 19. Two of Mr. Rojché Zapalu’s daughters attended his wake. Their relatives said they had taken out loans to cover payments to the coyotes — human traffickers — who demanded around $15,000 to $19,000 for each migrant. The men had been detained near the U.S. border and were expected to be deported back to Guatemala. “He didn’t think he’d be back in a coffin,” said Rosa Elvira Chiquival, 37, Mr. Rojché Zapalu’s widow. She recalled the family going out to hug him the morning he left. She has six children, ages 3 to 15. “He said, ‘I have to go for you, to get ahead.’” Mr. Rojché Zapalu’s burial in San Pedro Cutzán. Mr. Rojche Chiquival’s burial. “The president of Mexico has to look for the people responsible,” said Aurelia Gutiérrez, 50, a relative of Mr. Rojche Chiquival, while a funeral band played. “They’re not thieves. They look for a way to support the family because everything in Guatemala is expensive.” The wake of Marcos Abdón Tziquin Cuc, 21, in the village of Paquilá. Relatives and friends carrying the coffin of Gaspar Josué Cuc Tziquín. Mr. Cuc Tziquín’s coffin was lowered into the ground at the cemetery. Friends and relatives during Mr. Cuc Tziquín’s funeral. Jody García contributed reporting. A correction was made on April 17, 2023: Because of an editing error, four picture captions misidentified one of the people being buried. He was Gaspar Josué Cuc Tziquín, not Francisco Gaspar Rojche Chiquival. Photographs by Daniele Volpe By Elda Cantú and Daniele Volpe

Cuarenta personas murieron en el incendio en Ciudad Juárez el mes pasado. El martes, los restos de 17 de las víctimas fueron transportadas a su país. “Él no pensaba volver en ataúd”, dijo la viuda de uno de los fallecidos. Nadie esperaba que regresaran tan rápido. La semana pasada, los restos de 17 guatemaltecos que murieron en un incendio en un centro de migración cerca de la frontera con Estados Unidos fueron trasladados a casa, donde se declararon tres días de duelo nacional. Estaban entre las 40 personas que fallecieron en marzo en Ciudad Juárez, México, cerca de la frontera con Texas. No es la primera vez que el presidente de Guatemala declara un periodo de luto similar. Lo ha hecho al menos dos veces antes: en diciembre de 2021, cuando al menos 40 guatemaltecos murieron en un accidente de tránsito en Chiapas, México, y en marzo de ese mismo año, cuando más de una decena de migrantes fueron asesinados a tiros y quemados en Tamaulipas, México. En lo que va del año, las autoridades guatemaltecas han ayudado a repatriar a 58 ciudadanos fallecidos. En 2022, trajeron de vuelta los cuerpos de 427 personas, 361 de los cuales habían muerto en Estados Unidos. Muchos de ellos eran migrantes que intentaban cruzar la frontera estadounidense. México ha detenido a cinco personas vinculadas al incendio de marzo. También se espera que la Fiscalía General de México proceda penalmente contra el jefe del Instituto Nacional de Migración. Abajo, los restos de los migrantes llegaron a una base de la fuerza área en Ciudad de Guatemala el martes por la noche. Francisco Gaspar Rojche Chiquival, de 24 años, y Miguel Rojché Zapalu, de 40, fueron dos de los hombres sepultados en Chicacao, una comunidad predominantemente indígena en el suroeste de Guatemala. Eran tío y sobrino y habían salido rumbo a Estados Unidos el 19 de marzo. Dos de las hijas de Miguel atendieron a su velorio. Sus familiares dijeron que habían tenido que recurrir a préstamos para cubrir las tarifas de los coyotes —contrabandistas de personas— que pedían entre 15.000 a 19.000 dólares por cada migrante. Los hombres habían sido detenidos cerca de la frontera con Estados Unidos y se tenía previsto que fueran deportados a Guatemala. “Él no pensaba volver en ataúd”, dijo Rosa Elvira Chiquival, la viuda de Miguel, de 37 años. Recordó que la familia salió a abrazarlo la mañana que se fue. Chiquival tiene seis hijos, con edades de entre los 3 y los 15 años. También recordó que les dijo: ‘Tengo que ir por ustedes, para salir adelante’”. El entierro de Miguel en San Pedro Cutzán. El entierro de Francisco. “El presidente de México tiene que buscar a la gente con responsabilidad”, dijo Aurelia Gutiérrez, familiar de Francisco, de 50 años, mientras una banda funeraria tocaba. “Ellos no son ladrones, buscan la manera de sostener a la familia porque aquí, en Guatemala, todas las cosas están caras”. El velorio de Marcos Abdón Tziquin Cuc, de 21 años, en la aldea de Paquilá. Familiares y amigos cargando el ataúd de Francisco. El ataúd de Francisco fue sepultado en el cementerio. Familiares y amigos durante el funeral de Francisco. Jody García colaboró con este reportaje. Elda Cantú es editora de la sección Internacional radicada en Ciudad de México y escribe El Times, un boletín en español. Antes de unirse al diario en 2018 como editora adjunta de The New York Times en Español, vivía en Perú, donde editaba revistas. Proviene de la ciudad fronteriza de Reynosa, México. @eldacantu A correction was made on 17 de abril de 2023 : Debido a un error de edición, cuatro pies de foto identificaron de manera incorrecta el entierro de una de las personas que fueron sepultadas. Se trataba del entierro de Gaspar Josué Cuc Tziquín, no de Francisco Gaspar Rojche Chiquival.

France Country Report August 2022 For decades, France has hosted the largest Muslim populations in Europe, due to immigration from North and West African and Middle Eastern countries. However, Islamophobia remains pervasive in France, both in legal rulings and socio-cultural discrimination. French Muslims face difficulties integrating into French society due to perceived cultural differences and anti-Muslim prejudices. Since the late 19th century, France has embraced the ideal of ‘laïcité,’ which calls for the separation of religion from socio-economic life. This secularist policy has fostered ‘neo-laïcité,’ which discriminates against religious minorities. 74% of French Muslims say they experience conflict between religious devotion and active participation in their Western, secular society. Studies show French Muslims are four times more likely to face discrimination than other religious people. The government has passed Islamophobic legislation in recent years. President Emmanuel Macron outlined a new law against religious radicalism in February 2021. This law would ‘free Islam in France from foreign influences’ by monitoring online hate speech and promoting secularism in public life. However, critics say it stigmatizes the French Muslim community. In April 2021, the French senate approved an amendment that would effectively ban Muslim women under the age of 18 from wearing a hijab in public. The senate also voted in January 2022 to ban wearing hijabs and other religious symbols during sports events. This law has had a devastating impact on French Muslim female athletes. Anti-Roma attitudes in France have also increased in recent years. Over two-thirds of French people hold unfavorable views of the country’s Romani population, with 54% of the ideological left and 76% of the ideological right holding anti-Roma sentiments. Thousands of French Roma have been forcibly evicted from their communities as part of a crackdown on illegal camps by the French police. These expulsions have affected over 60% of Roma families and left tens of thousands of French Romani homeless. Anti-Roma propaganda has incited violence against Romani populations. Due to the legal and social targeting of the Muslim and Roma communities, Genocide Watch considers France to be at Stage 3: Discrimination and Stage 6: Polarization. Genocide Watch recommends the following: French citizens of all religions should peacefully protest against Islamophobic laws. The French government should provide financial and housing assistance to homeless Romani. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights should investigate the forced displacement of Romanis and Islamophobic laws in France.

Carine Kaneza Nantulya 4 April 2023 A television shows the cut signal of the France 24 channel, hours after Burkina Faso’s military government suspended the channel on March 27, 2023.© 2023 OLYMPIA DE MAISMONT/AFP via Getty Images In the latest blow to media freedom in Burkina Faso, the country’s transitional military authorities have expelled Agnès Faivre and Sophie Douce, two female journalists working for the French newspapers Libération and Le Monde. Both journalists possessed valid visas and accreditation. According to the two news organizations, national intelligence officers summoned and questioned both journalists about their work on March 31 in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital, and gave them 24 hours to leave the country without providing any reasons for their expulsion. In its statement, Libération said the decision to expel its correspondent is “unjustified” and linked to its March 27report on a video allegedly filmed at a military base in Ouahigouya, Yatenga province, showing bodies of children on the ground with men at the scene wearing apparent Burkinabé military uniforms. Le Monde described the evictions as “unacceptable” and condemned “in the strongest terms this arbitrary decision.” The expulsion of the two journalists is only the latest assault on speech and media freedoms in Burkina Faso. It follows the March 27 suspension of the French international television news network, France 24, and the December 3, 2022 suspension of French international radio news network Radio France Internationale (RFI), accused by the Burkinabé government of airing false reports. “The junta is doing irreparable damage to freedom of expression in the country,” said Daouda Diallo, a prominent Burkinabe human rights activist and winner of the 2022 Martin Ennals human rights award. “Journalism is not a crime and should stop being a risky job in Burkina Faso.” Journalists and media organizations in Burkina Faso, both local and international, face increasing harassment, threats, and arbitrary arrests, in an undisguised effort by the military junta to muzzle independent and critical reporting in the country. As Burkina Faso grapples with armed conflict with Islamist armed groups, journalists should be able to work freely, without fear of reprisals. Transitional military authorities should reverse their decision and allow Faivre and Douce back into the country. More importantly, they should remove barriers that hinder the important work of journalists to inform and educate the Burkinabe people. © 2023 Human Rights Watch

A soldier checks the identification of youths on the main street of La Campanera neighborhood in Soyapango, El Salvador, Sunday, March 5, 2023. Here in La Campanera, once one of the most bloody neighborhoods of the country, police and soldiers demand men strip off their shirts to examine their bodies for tattoos, and flip through deeds or energy bills for any evidence to show they weren’t part of Barrio 18, the gang that once dominated the zone. (AP Photo/Salvador Melendez) SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador (AP) — The Inter American Commission on Human Rights has called on El Salvador to restore all the rights suspended under an “emergency” anti-gang decree, which the government said Wednesday it wants to extend for yet another month. The commission, an arm of the Organization of American States, expressed concern about special powers to tap phones and detain people for extended periods. It also expressed concern about thousands of reported rights abuses, many related to arbitrary arrest. Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele asked the country’s congress Wednesday to again extend the emergency decree to continue the crackdown on gangs, which is widely popular among Salvadorans. Congress has voted to renew the emergency powers a dozen times, bringing the crackdown into its second year. It was originally imposed on March 27, 2022, and more than 67,000 people have been imprisoned under the crackdown on street gangs. “This security measure has helped transform the country,” Security Minister Gustavo Villatoro said in a request for the extension. “Homicides have dropped significantly ... Without doubt, we are on the right track.” For decades, street gangs like Mara Salvatrucha and Barrio 18 essentially ruled poor neighborhoods in El Salvador, killing and extorting money from people of all walks of life. Villatoro said the measures would remain in place until “the last gang member” is arrested. The anti-gang emergency measures were originally supposed to last only a month, following a surge in gang violence in which 62 people were killed in a single day. In the year since, a total of about 67,000 people have been arrested, and 4,304 have been released. Rights groups say there have been 111 deaths in custody and 5,802 suspected cases of rights violations. Polls suggest over eight of every 10 Salvadorans support the measures. Under the special powers, police don’t have to tell someone being arrested the reason or inform them of their rights. Someone arrested does not have a right to a lawyer and can be held for 15 days without seeing a judge rather than the previous 72 hours. Telephone lines can be tapped more easily. The government has used controversial tactics like locking up thousands of gang suspects in a huge new prison built especially for gang members. At other prisons, inmates were crowded together and have seen their food rations reduced. A recent government video posted on social media showed prisoners forced to run barefoot and handcuffed down stairways and over bare ground, clad only in regulation white shorts. They were then forced to sit with their legs locked in closely clumped groups in cells. All contents © copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

By John Q.Barrett I am deeply sad and truly sorry to report that Benjamin Ferencz died last evening, April 7, 2023, at his apartment in Boynton Beach, Florida. Ben officially was age 103—or, as he preferred to put it, he was 104, i.e., in his 104th year. Berrel Ferencz was born around March 11, 1920 (there is no birth certificate), in Transylvania, then part of Romania. His parents brought him as a baby to the United States. He became Benjamin. He grew up in New York City’s “Hell’s Kitchen.” He knew poverty, rampant crime, and suffering. He became, moving quickly, a public-school student, a college graduate, a Harvard Law School graduate, a World War II U.S. Army infantryman serving in combat in Europe, a soldier investigating German war crimes at atrocity sites, a liberator of Nazi concentration camp survivors, and a civilian prosecuting Nazi mass murder. 1947: Benjamin Ferencz at the podium, in Courtroom 600, Palace of Justice, Nuremberg. Beginning in Spring 1946, Ben Ferencz served as a prosecutor in Nuremberg, in the U.S. occupation zone of what had been Nazi Germany. During 1947 and 1948, Ben was chief prosecutor of the Einsatzgruppen case (United States v. Otto Ohlendorf, et al.). It was his first case as a lawyer. He charged the defendants, leaders of Nazi killing operations in Eastern Europe, with crimes against humanity (“a systematic program of genocide”), war crimes, and membership in criminal Nazi organizations. Circa 1947: Benjamin Ferencz and counsel for Einsatzgruppen trial defendants, Nuremberg. (For details, including a link to video of Ben’s opening statement at the Einsatzgruppen trial, click here.) Ben’s cases against those defendants, built on the documents that they sent contemporaneously from “the field” to Berlin, were brief, horrifying, and irrefutable. More than twenty Einsatzgruppen defendants were convicted of killing almost one million people. The Einsatzgruppen case was and is the biggest murder trial in human history. Ben Ferencz returned to the United States in the 1950s. For the rest of his life, Ben was a lawyer for Holocaust survivors, a law teacher, a writer, a lecturer around the world, a lobbyist for and a builder of international legal institutions, a force for world progress toward peace through law, and a moral exemplar to millions. November 19, 2010: Ben Ferencz in Courtroom 600, Palace of Justice, Nuremberg. From the first time that I met Ben, in 1999, I knew that he would be the longest-living Nuremberg podium prosecutor. I knew this because of the math—Ben had been so young (age 26, or close enough) at Nuremberg. I knew this because Ben, though less than tall, was physically very strong—he did rigorous calisthenics every day, including standing on his head and lots of swimming. I knew this because Ben was so driven—“Never give up” was his main message, and he lived it. August 24, 2010: Ben Ferencz at Chautauqua Institution. And I knew this because Ben told me explicitly that he would not die—"I’ve got no time to die,” he said. “Luckily, I’m immortal. I’ve got too much work to do.” Alas, Ben turned out to be wrong about that one small thing. But he was oh so right about everything that he stood for and worked to address, including the value of every human life, the supreme evil of war, and the need to build law to protect people from that man-made disaster. I will always be grateful that Ben Ferencz was my teacher and my dear, generous friend. He was great to me, and to all, in every way. And luckily Ben Ferencz—the memory; the example; the lessons—is permanent, because there is so much work to do. So honor him by heeding his injunction: Keep working. Never give up! February 28, 2022: Ben Ferencz at his home in Delray Beach, Florida. As always, thank you very much for your interest, and please share this with others. Sincerely, John Q. Barrett Benjamin N. Cardozo Professor of Law, St. John’s University, New York City Elizabeth S. Lenna Fellow, Robert H. Jackson Center, Jamestown, NY St. John's University School of Law 8000 Utopia Parkway Queens NY 11439 United States of America

March 30, 2023 Indigenous communities have long called on the Vatican rescind the concept, which had been used over the centuries to seize land from people in the Americas, Africa and elsewhere. Pope Francis meeting with Indigenous leaders during his trip in Canada, last year. Credit: Ian Willms for The New York Times By Elisabetta Povoledo The Vatican formally repudiated on Thursday the “Doctrine of Discovery,” a legal concept based on 15th-century papal documents that European colonial powers used to legitimize the seizure and exploitation of Indigenous lands in Africa and the Americas, among other places. The decision comes after decades of demands from Indigenous people to rescind the doctrine, which was used for centuries to “expropriate Indigenous lands and facilitate their transfer to colonizing or dominating nations,” according to one United Nations forum. The Roman Catholic Church “repudiates those concepts that fail to recognize the inherent human rights of Indigenous peoples, including what has become known as the legal and political ‘Doctrine of Discovery,’” a joint statement from the Vatican’s development and education offices said. The doctrine is “not part of the teaching of the Catholic Church,” it said, and the documents in question “have never been considered expressions of the Catholic faith.” Demands that the doctrine be discredited grew last summer when Pope Francis, the first pope from Latin America, visited Canada to apologize to Indigenous communities for the church’s role in ​the country’s notorious residential school system, ​​where thousands of Indigenous children were physically and sexually abused, and in some cases, died. Suspected unmarked graves are still being found. The Vatican said that the text, issued eight months after the pope’s “penitential journey to Canada,” reaffirmed the church’s “rejection of the colonizing mentality.” In Canada, the pope and other Vatican officials were “confronted by Indigenous leaders who insisted that the ‘Doctrine of Discovery’ remains an issue of contention,” said the Rev. David McCallum, a Jesuit priest who has been working with Indigenous people in the United States. Those conversations and reassessment led to Thursday’s statement, he said, adding that some people had been waiting for decades “for papal attention” to the issue. “It’s not so much about the legal implications, which scholars understand are very complex,” he said. “But it’s about the rejection of the mind-set that gave rise to the colonial impulse and even to the missionary impulse of those times.” He added, “That’s really what’s being repudiated, and it’s a big step, it acknowledges that Indigenous voices have been heard, it acknowledges the evil that was done.” In past centuries, the rulers of Spain, Portugal and other countries used the papal bulls, or official decrees, to justify their seizure of Indigenous lands in Africa and the Americas, saying that they were spreading Christianity. Robert J. Miller, a professor at Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University, called the doctrine “one of the earliest forms of international law,” that went on to influence the first U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1823 regarding the “Indian nation and the rights of Indigenous peoples in the United States.” That ruling — which cited the doctrine — became a “legal claim” for the expropriation of Indigenous lands. “So it’s time for that hypocrisy to be exposed and done away with as much as we can,” he said. The Vatican statement said colonial powers had “manipulated” the content of the papal documents “to justify immoral acts against Indigenous peoples that were carried out, at times, without opposition from ecclesial authorities.” It was only right, the Vatican said, “to recognize these errors, acknowledge the terrible effects of assimilation policies and the pain experienced by Indigenous peoples, and ask for pardon.” Indigenous groups in Canada say that while the theories of racial superiority that underlie the doctrine have long been discredited, the concept continued to surface in legal disputes over land. Some opponents of the doctrine had a chance to deliver their message to Pope Francis during his visit to Canada, including Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, his office said. Just before Francis led a Mass during the visit, Sarain Fox, an Anishinaabe activist and filmmaker, and her cousin unfurled a banner with the words “Rescind the Doctrine” in a demonstration at the Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré basilica near Quebec City. Sarain Fox, right, and Chelsea Brunelle demonstrating at the Sainte-Anne-de-Beaupré basilica near Quebec City last July. Credit...John Locher/Associated Press “I’ve done a lot of really important activism, but this one felt especially meaningful because my family — all the harm that’s been caused, all of the songs that have been lost, the teachings, the language — they are a direct result of that institution, and quite frankly, of the Doctrine of Discovery,” Ms. Fox said. Ms. Fox, of the Batchewana First Nation in Northern Ontario, said that she was still coming to grips with her feelings on Thursday, but that she felt more at ease now that the Vatican acknowledged the “truth in the history as we know it.” She added, “My hope is that my children live in a world where they’re not fighting for their truth, like I’ve had to.” Francis’s apology last year was not the first time he admitted the church’s shortcomings when it came to Indigenous communities. In 2015, while in Bolivia, he apologized for the “grave sins” that were “committed against the native people of America in the name of God.” Archbishop Paul S. Coakley of Oklahoma City, the secretary for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, issued a statement Thursday that admitted past shortcomings of those church authorities who had not fully opposed the “immoral actions” of colonial powers. But he added that “the centuries of history at issue are complex,” and that there existed “various legal and political interpretations” of the term “Doctrine of Discovery” that merited further study. In its response to the Vatican statement, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops noted that over the centuries the church and pope had issued numerous statements upholding “the rights and freedoms of Indigenous Peoples,” specifically a 1537 decree issued by Paul III, Sublimis Deus, which it said “upheld the rights and freedoms of Indigenous Peoples.” But scholars have pointed out that barely a year later, the pope issued another decree that effectively nullified Sublimis Deus. Philip P. Arnold, a professor of religious studies at Syracuse University and the founding director of Skä·noñh — Great Law of Peace Center, said that while the document was a “good first step,” the Vatican still had not “owned up to a worldview” underpinning the doctrine, which upheld the superiority of Christianity. “It’s not just a legalistic formulation that we’re trying to get clarity on, it’s a worldview that is set in motion during the age of discovery, that we’re still having to cope with in these urgent times of climate change and so on,” he said. “There is not much of an emphasis on self-reflection” on how that worldview “is still active in the church,” he said. He said that it was “heartening” to see the document as “the highest-level statement from the Vatican to date, “but much more needs to be done.” The announcement is likely to open fresh debate in many places. Cody Groat, an assistant professor in history and Indigenous studies at Western University in London, Ontario, and a member of the Six Nations of the Grand River, said it might spark discussions on Indigenous sovereignty, for instance. “This is not just going to be something that shapes what happens in Canada,” said Professor Groat, who is Mohawk and whose grandparents attended the Mohawk Institute Residential School. “It will call out the structural systems that have been imposed saying that we were not sovereign peoples, we do not have independent nations,” he said, “just because they weren’t inherently associated with Christianity.” Professor Miller said the repudiation would not change property law in Canada or the United States. “But still, it’s a wonderful thing,” with lessons “on what colonization was and what it did,” he said. © 2023 The New York Times Company

Peruvian prosecutors are investigating President Dina Boluarte and former president Pedro Castillo for allegedly laundering money as part of a criminal organization, the attorney general's office said on Twitter on Tuesday. The probe into the alleged crimes by Boluarte and Castillo is part of an ongoing investigation into alleged campaign finance crimes committed during Peru's 2021 presidential race. The announcement comes after a former adviser to Castillo told local media that he had financed part of Castillo's presidential campaign in 2021, as well as trips for Boluarte when she was running to be Castillo's vice president. "The alleged commission of these crimes would have occurred during the electoral campaign of Peru Libre," the attorney general's office said, referencing the Marxist party that led Castillo to the presidency of the Andean country. Castillo was removed from office in December after attempting to dissolve Congress before an impeachment vote. Boluarte ascended to the presidency in the wake of his removal and arrest. Boluarte over the weekend denied receiving illegal campaign contributions and said corruption accusations were a "political maneuver" seeking to undermine her government. Boluarte is also currently under investigation for her alleged role in the deaths of protesters killed in clashes with security forces in the months after she took office. Reporting by Marco Aquino in Lima and Brendan O'Boyle in Mexico City; Editing by Clarence Fernandez and Michael Perry March 29, 202312:38 AM EDT

Here is the link to the Twitter Spaces podcast episode on the following platforms: Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/episode/3BHaIInOhefEa7MPcegE5s Apple podcast: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/human-rights-talks/id1483243995?i=1000606785764 Podbean: https://migsinstitute.podbean.com/e/humanitarian-crisis-in-nagorono-karabakh/

By Natalie Impraim, Genocide Watch War crimes by Russian Wagner mercenaries in C.A.R. | credits for videos in MP4 movie: Vice, France24, VPro Country Report: The Central African Republic March 2023 Since 2004, the Central African Republic (CAR) has been in a perpetual cycle of civil war. While CAR’s conflicts have historically been blamed on religion, classifying CAR's current conflict as a religious war overlooks its complexities and contributes to simplistic peacebuilding responses. CAR's civil war has been driven by extreme poverty, socioeconomic inequality, unemployment, lack of education, and a struggle to control CAR's rich resources, which include diamonds, uranium, oil, gold, cobalt, and lumber. Despite its natural wealth, the CAR had the world's third lowest per capita GDP in 2022 according to the IMF. The current conflict began in 2013 and was mainly fought between Séléka rebels from the marginalized Muslim community and Anti-Balaka militias claiming to defend their Christian communities. 80% of the persecuted Muslim community was driven from the country. While the conflict has subsided in the capital city of Bangui, its dynamics have shifted to unlikely alliances, including one between the Séléka and Anti-Balaka. In 2020 they established several anti-government alliances, including the Front Populaire pour la Renaissance de la Centrafrique, Coalition des Patriotes pour le Changement (CPC) and Unité pour la Paix en Centrafrique (UPC). In response to new attacks by rebels, the CAR government hired the Russian "private" military Wagner Group, to provide “security” for CAR's diamond and other mines. In fact, the Wagner Group is a criminal gang financed by Russian billionaires who support Putin. Wagner mercenaries have perpetrated war crimes and widespread crimes against humanity against civilians. Since 2017, the Russian military has donated large shipments of arms and sent an increasing number of Russian “military instructors” to support the CAR military. As of 2022, there are an estimated 2,000+ Russian mercenaries in the CAR. In return for its "services", the Wagner Group receives huge profits from its control of diamond, gold, uranium, and cobalt mines. The Central African government credits the Wagner Group with providing military training and helping the government push back rebel forces. Credible reports reveal that these Russian mercenaries have been involved in active combat, execution, torture, and beating of civilians. Some of their attacks have even targeted members of CAR government forces under the justification of “disciplinary action,” including the torture and murder of government soldiers for "drunkenness." The Wagner group has carried out bloody massacres in the mining areas on the border of the CAR and Sudan, in their effort to take over CAR's valuable gold trade. In the Western grasslands of the country, the Wagner Group has targeted Muslim Fulani herders. Known as “Mbororo” in Sango, the trade language of the CAR, the Fulani are a predominantly Muslim pastoralist group with Chadian origins. Given their nomadic livelihoods, the Fulani are often referred to as ‘foreigners’. They are suspected of disloyalty to the CAR though many have resided in the CAR for generations and have CAR citizenship. The Wagner Group considers all Muslims, particularly Fulani, to be enemy insurgents. This classification has put Fulani civilians at risk of genocidal massacres. The Front Populaire pour la Renaissance de la Centrafrique (FPRC) and the UPC, which are closely affiliated with the CPC, have been identified in United Nations reports as the perpetrators of massacres, crimes against humanity, and sexual violence against over 200 victims in the Mbomou and Haute-Kotto prefectures. Most of the target victims, aged between age eight and 55 years old, were gang raped. The Special Criminal Court in the Central African Republic issued its first verdict on October 31, 2022. The Court is staffed by international and national judges and prosecutors. It is supported by the United Nations and international donors. It has jurisdiction over grave crimes committed in the Central African Republic since 2003. The International Support Mission to the Central African Republic (MISCA) – was authorized in December 2013, following a series of UN and AU peacekeeping operations since 1997. This African Union force of 6,000 personnel was accompanied by the French Operation Sangaris from 2013 - 2016. The UN replaced the peacekeeping operation with MINUSCA. It has 14,000 troops as of 30 September 2022. Due to the atrocities committed against numerous civilians during its civil wars, Genocide Watch considers the CAR to be at Stage 5: Organization, Stage 6: Polarization, Stage 8: Persecution, and Stage 9: Extermination. Genocide Watch recommends that: The government must control the CAR military and totally expel the Wagner Group from the CAR. MINUSCA's mandate must be renewed and its troop strength maintained. The Special Criminal Court should try perpetrators of crimes against humanity and sexual violence. Donor countries should increase funding to resettle internally displaced persons and refugees.