Trump rally in Ohio Sept 17 where Qanon song was theme song. Credit...David Maxwell/EPA, via Shutterstock Trump Uses QAnon Song at Rally. Trump wears Q pin on his lapel with QAnon slogan on his Truth Social site NY Times September 18, 2022 By Alan Feuer and Maggie Haberman In Ohio, a dark address by the former president featured music that was all but identical to a theme song for the conspiracy theory movement. Former President Donald J. Trump appeared to more fully embrace QAnon on Saturday, playing a song at a political rally in Ohio that prompted attendees to respond with a salute in reference to the cultlike conspiracy theory’s theme song. While speaking in Youngstown in support of J.D. Vance, whom he has endorsed as Ohio’s Republican nominee for the Senate, Mr. Trump delivered a dark address about the decline of America over music that was all but identical to a song called “Wwg1wga” — an abbreviation for the QAnon slogan, “Where we go one, we go all.” As Mr. Trump spoke, scores of people in the crowd raised fingers in the air in an apparent reference to the “1” in what they thought was the song’s title. It was the first time in the memory of some Trump aides that such a display had occurred at one of his rallies. Aides to Mr. Trump said the song played at the rally was called “Mirrors,” and it was selected for use in a video that Mr. Trump played at the conservative meeting CPAC and posted on his social media site, Truth Social. But it sounds strikingly like the QAnon theme song. As president, Mr. Trump often had a winking relationship with QAnon, amplifying social media posts related to the conspiracy theory movement, which holds that when he was in the White House he was locked in a war against satanic, child-trafficking liberals and Democrats. A chief tenet of the movement, which has gradually spread from the fringes of the far right closer to the center of the Republican Party, is that Mr. Trump will ultimately be returned to power. But what was once a flirtation with a movement that the F.B.I. has warned could increasingly turn violent now appears to be a full embrace. Last week, for example, Mr. Trump posted an image of himself on Truth Social, wearing a Q pin on his lapel and under a slogan reading “The Storm is Coming.” Adherents to QAnon believe that the “storm” is the moment when Mr. Trump will retake power after vanquishing his enemies, having them arrested and potentially executed on live TV. Mr. Trump’s speech in Ohio had an apocalyptic tone and seemed intended to delegitimize officials in the F.B.I. and Justice Department who are involved in investigations into both his handling of sensitive government documents removed from the White House and the role that he and allies played in trying to overturn the 2020 election. The Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol drew Trump supporters and QAnon conspiracy theorists. Credit...Manuel Balce Ceneta/Associated Press “We are a nation that has weaponized its law enforcement against the opposing political party like never ever before,” Mr. Trump told the crowd. “We’ve got a Federal Bureau of Investigation that won’t allow bad, election-changing facts to be presented to the public.” Addressing the conflict in Ukraine, Mr. Trump also warned that the United States “may end up in World War III.” Assailing reporters, as he often does, he said that there was “no fair press any longer” and repeated his frequent refrain that the news media is “truly the enemy of the people.” Those complaints were followed by series of other false claims. Mr. Trump said that “free speech is no longer allowed” in the United States, a country, he went on to claim, “where crime is rampant like never before, where the economy has been collapsing.” Alan Feuer covers extremism and political violence. He joined The Times in 1999. @alanfeuer Maggie Haberman is a White House correspondent. She joined The Times in 2015 as a campaign correspondent and was part of a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in 2018 for reporting on President Trump’s advisers and their connections to Russia. @maggieNYT A version of this article appears in print on Sept. 19, 2022, Section A, Page 14 of the New York edition with the headline: At Trump Rally, Crowd Reacts to QAnon-Like Music. Copyright 2022 The New York Times Company

By Tom Balmforth and Gleb Garanich A soldier walks among the graves found in the forest. Reuters Oleg Kotenko, the commissioner for issues of missing persons under special circumstances, uses his smartphone to film the grave a Ukrainian soldier in the recently retaken area of Izium, Ukraine, Sept. 15, 2022. Evgeniy Maloletka/AP KYIV/IZIUM, Ukraine, Sept 16 (Reuters) - Ukrainian officials said on Friday they had found hundreds of bodies, some with their hands tied behind their backs, buried in territory recaptured from Russian forces, in what President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called proof of war crimes by the invaders. Zelenskiy told Reuters in an interview many corpses were also interred in other sites in the northeast and appealed for foreign powers to step up weapons supplies, saying the outcome of the war hinged on their swift delivery. "As of today, there are 450 dead people, buried. But there are others, separate burials of many people. Tortured people. Entire families in certain territories," Zelenskiy said in his presidential office on Friday. read more The head of the pro-Russian administration which abandoned the area last week accused Ukrainians of staging the atrocities at the city of Izium. "I have not heard anything about burials," Vitaly Ganchev told Rossiya-24 state television. Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba urged the West to ramp up weapon deliveries. "One can only imagine the hell that people in other Russia-occupied territories still go through. We urgently need more weapons to liberate them and save their lives!" he wrote on Twitter. Outside Izium on Friday, officials wearing masks and protective suits were digging out bodies at the site in a forest where around 200 makeshift wooden crosses were planted among trees. "We are at the site of the mass burial of people, civilians who were buried here, and now according to our information they all have the signs of violent death," Kharkiv Governor Oleh Synehubov said at the site. "There are bodies with hands tied behind (their backs). Each fact will be investigated and will be properly and legally evaluated," Synehubov said. Officials laid the exhumed bodies out in white body bags. Some were wrapped in rags. One was in military fatigues. In a separate video address on Izium, Zelenskiy said authorities had found a mass grave containing the bodies of 17 soldiers, some of which bore signs of torture. If the number of bodies is confirmed, the site in Izium, a former Russian front-line stronghold, would be the biggest mass burial found in Europe since the aftermath of the 1990s Balkan wars. U.S Secretary of State Antony Blinken wrote on Twitter that the reports from Izium were "heartbreaking and should galvanize our support to the brave Ukrainians seeking to liberate their homeland." White House national security spokesman John Kirby called the accounts "horrifying". read more BLOOD ON THE FLOOR Russian President Vladimir Putin did not immediately respond to the accusations, but brushed off Ukraine's lightning counter-offensive and warned that Moscow would respond more forcefully if its troops were put under further pressure. Speaking after a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in the Uzbek city of Samarkand, Putin cast the invasion as a necessary step to prevent what he said was a Western plot to break Russia apart. read more "The Kyiv authorities announced that they have launched and are conducting an active counter-offensive operation. Well, let's see how it develops, how it ends up," Putin said with a grin. Russia regularly denies targeting civilians during what it calls its "special military operation" in Ukraine and has said in the past that accusations of human rights abuses are a smear campaign. In Kupiansk, a northeastern railway junction city whose partial capture by Kyiv's forces on Saturday cut Russia's supply lines and led to the swift collapse at the front, small units of Ukrainian troops were securing a nearly deserted ghost town. A formerly Russian-occupied police station had been hastily abandoned. Russian flags and a portrait of Putin lay on the floor amid broken glass. Records had been torched. Behind the steel doors of the station's jail cells there was blood on the floor and stains on the mattresses. Three piglets on the loose from an abandoned sty were foraging in a city street. Serhiy, a middle-aged man in a thin jacket, was hungry for news. "There's no electricity, no phones. If there were electricity, at least we could have watched TV. If there were phones, we could have called our relatives," he said. 'LONG HAUL' After a week of rapid gains in the northeast, Ukrainian officials have sought to dampen expectations that they could continue to advance at that pace. They say Russian troops who fled the Kharkiv region are now digging in and planning to defend territory in neighbouring Luhansk and Donetsk provinces. "It is of course extremely encouraging to see that Ukrainian armed forces have been able to take back territory and also strike behind Russian lines," NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told BBC radio. "At the same time, we need to understand that this is not the beginning of the end of the war. We need to be prepared for the long haul." Ukraine has also launched a major offensive to recapture territory in the south, where it aims to trap thousands of Russian troops cut off from supplies on the west bank of the Dnipro river, and retake Kherson, the only large Ukrainian city Russia has captured intact since the start of the war. Russia's state-run RIA news agency released video showing smoke billowing from Kherson's Russian-occupied administration building after apparent Ukrainian rocket attacks that it said had killed three people and wounded 13. In the east, the chief prosecutor of the pro-Russian separatist administration in Luhansk was killed by an explosion in his office, along with his deputy, according to Russian news agencies. Pro-Russian authorities said a husband and wife working to arrange a referendum on joining the southern city of Berdiansk to Russia had also been killed overnight. Russia also reported strikes across the border in its Belgorod region. © 2022 Reuters.

By Jasko Rust Published by DW on September 13, 2022 A group of people in Windhoek, Namibia's capital city, protesting against the Genocide agreement with Germany (Sakeus Likela/DW) "For a long time, we thought the Greens were our friends," said Nandiuasora Mazeingo, chairperson of the Ovaherero Genocide Foundation (OGF), shrugging his shoulders at news from Germany that the Berlin government sees no need to renegotiate the Joint Declaration with Namibia. The deal was thought to have brought an end to years of negotiations to recognize the genocide of Herero and Nama people during the German colonial period in what is now Namibia. However, the agreement led to heated debates in the Namibian parliament in September 2021. "It seems like this issue in Germany is only about gaining political power," Mazeingo said in an interview with DW. "But we will outlast these governments because we are on the right side of history!" Still, the leader of the official opposition in Namibia, McHenry Venaani, has hope in the environmentalist Green Party, part of the Germany's governing coalition with the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) and the neoliberal Free Democrats (FDP) . The president of the country's largest opposition party, Popular Democratic Movement (PDM), has written an open letter to German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, a member of the Greens, which DW has obtained. In it, he called for the agreement to be "renegotiated" and "restructured." "Frau Baerbock had shown credibility while she was a candidate," Venaani told DW. "Now we have to see if she brings the same understanding as a minister." Botswana and South Africa should join negotiations Venaani is particularly concerned about the diaspora communities. "There are descendants of genocide victims living in Botswana and South Africa — and they are left to fend for themselves," he said. He wants their representatives to be included in the renegotiation process, but told DW that the German government could perhaps begin talks with the government of Botswana. Venaani's statements have been met with mixed feelings in Namibia. OGF chairperson Mazeingo rejected the politician's call for more government participation. While agreeing with the demand to include the Herero and Nama in the diaspora, he criticized a possible participation of more governments as a "perpetuation of the exclusion." He refered to the fact that the Ovaherero Traditional Authority (OTA) and the Nama Traditional Leaders Association (NTLA) — which see themselves as the official representatives of the diaspora communities — were not part of the negotiations between Germany and Namibia. However, Ileni Henguva, a traditional councillor for the Ovambanderu, said that the affected communities had actually been considered in the original negotiations with the German government, therefore he sees no need for further talks. The German Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not want to comment on the demands when contacted by DW. As a matter of principal, Berlin does not respond to open letters, a spokesperson told DW. "We respect the difficult decision making process and the discussions within the Namibian society and politics," the spokesperson said. 'We will shame them' The ministry also referred to discussions about the implementation of the joint declaration that took place in March 2022 between Namibian and German delegations in Windhoek. Ultimately, renegotiating how the terms of the deal would be implemented seemed like a possibility, though this might not appease the critics in Namibia, where the OTA is demanding a completely fresh start to talks. "We are not going to sign a sham agreement that makes Germany look good on the international stage," OTA representative Mazeingo emphasized to DW. Wording in dispute He demanded an admission of guilt by the German government. In the eyes of the OTA, the biggest stumbling block lies within the wording of the Joint Declaration, which calls the atrocities committed between 1904-1908 a genocide "from today's perspective." Opposition leader McHenry Venaani also wants a clear, legal recognition of the genocide. In his open letter to Baerbock, he wrote that the atrocities "cannot only be recognised in a moral and political sense." In his interview with DW, he referenced reparations again, describing the aid deal — worth €1.1 billion ($1.34 billion) to be paid out over 30 years under the Joint Declaration — as an insult. "It's not about extracting the largest possible sum. We are only asking for a package that will sustainably improve the socio-economic conditions of the affected communities," Venaani said. The PDM party leader argued that even the Namibian government has come to understand that the people of Namibia are not ready to accept this agreement. This also applies to a possible apology by the German government. A "half-baked apology" would only lead to boos in the Namibian parliament, he said. OGF chairperson Mazeingo shared these sentiments. "We are going to organize protests. We would make sure that whoever comes here to offer an apology is shamed, shamed to know that it is the biggest mistake that they have done to come to the people whom they have brutalized and to come here and pretend to offer an apology that is not genuine, " he told DW. © 2022 Deutsche Welle

Abdullah Öcalan's equalitarian doctrines guide the Kurdish autonomous region of Rojava in NE Syria. He has been a political prisoner in Turkey since 2009. credit: Medya News Genocide Watch Country Report: Türkiye (Turkey) August 2022 Following the failed coup d’état in 2016, the Turkish government imposed anti-terrorism laws to legitimize the suppression of civil liberties and human rights. It has also repeatedly invaded Syria and bombed Iraq. Since 2016, the Turkish government has prosecuted journalists and activists in Türkiye for “defamation, insulting the president or spreading terrorist propaganda.” Thousands of opponents of Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) have been arrested, tortured, murdered, and "disappeared."  In June 2022, 20 Kurdish journalists were detained on charges of terrorism. Öztürk Türkdoğan, the co-chair of the Human Rights Association, was detained on June 25 at a vigil to protest suspicious "disappearances." In July 2021, Türkiye withdrew from the Council of Europe’s treaty for the protection of women against violence, the Istanbul Convention. We Will Stop Femicide, the largest women’s rights NGO in Türkiye, is on trial. The NGO reported 497 murders of women in 2021. Türkiye bans Women’s Day marches and uses tear gas against marchers. Türkiye validates its withdrawal from the Istanbul Convention by claiming it normalizes homosexuality which is “incompatible with Türkiye’s social and family values”. Homosexuality is legal in Türkiye, but LGBTQI+ persons are frequently arrested. All LGBTQI+ activities were banned in Ankara in 2018. Turkish leaders commonly use anti-LGBTQI+ hate speech and justify discrimination against LGBTQI+ people. Turkey has persecuted its Kurdish minority since 1924 through mass murders, deportations, and denial of Kurdish ethnic identity. Abdullah Öcalan, leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), was abducted, tried, sentenced to death, and since 2009 has been imprisoned at Imralı prison in the Sea of Marmara. His equalitarian political theories guide Rojava, an autonomous Kurdish region of northeastern Syria. He strongly supports the equality of women and has renounced violence in the Kurdish quest for autonomy. President Tayyip Erdoğan’s invasion of Afrin and Northern Syria in 2019 left hundreds of civilians dead and over 100,000 displaced. Turkish forces used white phosphorous munitions against Kurdish civilians. These war crimes have gone uninvestigated and unpunished. In June 2022, President Erdoğan threatened another invasion of Northern Syria and the Turkish Airforce bombed Iraqi Kurdistan. Türkiye justifies invading Syria under the guise of creating a resettlement zone for Syrian refugees. In fact, Syrian refugees are being forcibly deported to the region. Türkiye is targeting the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) of Rojava based on purported links with the PKK. President Erdoğan’s goal is forced deportation of Kurds from the Syrian-Turkish border. Türkiye denies the genocides committed by the Ottoman Empire from 1914-1923 against Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontic Greeks. The Turkish Foreign Ministry hosts a website dedicated to denying the Armenian Genocide. Türkiye names streets celebrating Armenian and Assyrian Genocide perpetrators. Türkiye is at Stage 8: Persecution of Kurds. It is at stages Organization (5) and Polarization (6), against journalists and human rights advocates. It is at stages Discrimination (3) and Dehumanization (4) against LGBTQI+ people. Türkiye is at stage Denial (10) concerning the Ottoman Empire’s genocides against Armenians, Assyrians, and Pontic Greeks. Genocide Watch recommends: Türkiye should pass legislation forbidding discrimination against LGBTQI+ persons. NATO allies should continue their arms embargo on Türkiye, and the USA should deny Türkiye’s request for new F-16 fighter jets and upgrades on existing jets. Türkiye should withdraw all of its troops from northern Syria. The US, EU and UN Human Rights Council should demand the release of thousands of persons arrested under Erdoğan’s "anti-terrorism" laws, including Abdullah Öcalan. ·

'We're still in this process of truth telling ... it's so important for our young people to be there' Ka’nhehsí:io Deer · CBC News · Posted: Sep 14, 2022 2:57 PM ET | Last Updated: September 14 Benjamin Kucher is a member of the Métis Nation of Alberta and an anthropology student at the University of Alberta.(Ka’nhehsí:io Deer/CBC) The search for unmarked burials associated with former residential schools is not easy, but it's important for Métis youth Benjamin Kucher to be a part of it. "There's a heaviness that comes with this work," said Kucher, who is a member of the Métis Nation of Alberta. "But for me, these searches are a way of healing and reconciling with the past." Kucher is attending the inaugural National Gathering on Unmarked Burials associated with residential schools this week in Edmonton. Over 150,000 First Nations, Métis and Inuit children were forced to attend the government-funded schools between the 1870s and 1997. The National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation, which is the archival repository for all of the material collected by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), has documented over 4,000 deaths of children at the schools to date as a part of the TRC's Call to Action 72 to create a national death register and public-facing memorial register. Not all the deaths listed on the registry include burial records. Kucher is an anthropology student at the University of Alberta and a research assistant at the Institute of Prairie and Indigenous Archeology. The institute is one of the organizations doing ground-penetrating radar searches at former residential school sites. Over the past summer, he's visited multiple communities and participated in the searches. He was one of two youth to address the gathering, which is hosted by the Office of the Independent Special Interlocutor For Missing Children, Unmarked Graves and Burial Sites associated with Indian Residential Schools. 1st national gathering on residential school unmarked burials begins in Edmonton Why it's difficult to put a number on how many children died at residential schools Over 300 First Nations, Inuit and Métis governments, representative organizations, communities, survivors and families are in attendance. For Kucher, the issue comes down to finding the truth. "We're committed to this work and committed to finding the truth, finding the answers of what happened to these children, how it happened and who was responsible," he said. Taylor Behn-Tsakoza, from Fort Nelson First Nation in B.C., was part of the Assembly of First Nations delegation who travelled to the Vatican to speak with Pope Francis. (Ka’nhehsí:io Deer/CBC) Taylor Behn-Tsakoza, 26, from Fort Nelson First Nation in B.C., expressed similar sentiments. She was a part of the Assembly of First Nations delegation who travelled to the Vatican to speak with Pope Francis. "We're still in this process of truth telling…. Our communities are also still learning that truth," said Behn-Tsakoza. "I think that's why it's so important for our young people to be there. I think this is just one truth of many that is still going to come to light in my lifetime." Behn-Tsakoza was born in 1996, as the last residential schools were closing. She said it's also important for youth to be a part of dialogue and the process of recovering missing children, as intergenerational survivors. "As a youth, I don't want to take up space from a survivor," said Behn-Tsakoza. "Although I only know of a life without residential schools… I still feel the effects and suffer the effects of what happened to my family and my community." The two-day gathering ends Wednesday. Support is available for anyone affected by their experience at residential schools or by the latest reports. A national Indian Residential School Crisis Line has been set up to provide support for former students and those affected. People can access emotional and crisis referral services by calling the 24-hour national crisis line: 1-866-925-4419. Mental health counselling and crisis support is also available 24 hours a day, seven days a week through the Hope for Wellness hotline at 1-855-242-3310 or by online chat at www.hopeforwellness.ca.

Yurok Chairman Joseph L. James speaks about the importance of the Yurok Lands Act at a hearing of the U.S. Natural Resources’ Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States on Wednesday. The act would return 1,229 acres of land to the tribe. (Screenshot) By SONIA WARAICH | swaraich@times-standard.com | Eureka Times-Standard PUBLISHED: September 14, 2022 at 1:38 p.m. | UPDATED: September 14, 2022 at 1:39 p.m. North Coast tribes have been working for years on restoring their ancestral land, and the federal government seems poised to return some of that land to the Yurok and Karuk tribes in the near future. At a hearing of the U.S. Natural Resources’ Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States on Wednesday, Yurok Chairman Joseph L. James and Karuk Chairman Russell “Buster” Attebery spoke about the ecological and cultural significance of the U.S. Forest Service land that would be returned to their tribes through the Yurok Lands Act and Katimiîn and Ameekyáaraam Sacred Lands Act, introduced by North Coast Rep. Jared Huffman (D-San Rafael). “Congressman Huffman and staff have held countless meetings with us, other tribes and local entities to thoroughly vet this bill,” James said. ” … This bill has won wide support and we’ll continue to work on the passage of this bill because the future of the Yurok people depends on it. We will also continue to support land restoration for all tribes.” “The seizing of these lands by the United States was done without the free, prior, informed consent of the Karuk Tribe,” Attebery said, “nor did the establishment of the National Forest System specify its direct effects on our people. Our people have lived and conducted ceremonies in these sacred lands since time began and the stewardship and management of these lands are vital to the preservation and continuation of Karuk culture, language, religion and identity.” Karuk Chairman Russell “Buster” Attebery speaks about the importance of the Katimiîn and Ameekyáaraam Sacred Lands Act at a hearing of the U.S. Natural Resources’ Subcommittee for Indigenous Peoples of the United States on Wednesday. The act would return 1,031 acres of land to the tribe. (Screenshot) The Yurok Lands Act would transfer 1,229 acres of land in the Yurok Experimental Forest and Six Rivers National Forest into a trust held by the Secretary of the Interior for the benefit of the Yurok Tribe. The act would also adjust the boundaries of the Yurok Reservation and would allow the U.S. Forest Service to continue research activities in the forest in perpetuity. The Katimiîn and Ameekyáaraam Sacred Lands Act would place 1,031 acres of federal land in Humboldt and Siskiyou counties into a trust, also held by the Secretary of the Interior, for the benefit of the Karuk Tribe. James and Attebery testified on a panel alongside chairs of mostly West Coast tribes, who also spoke in favor of bills that, among other things, would place land for their tribes into a trust. Bringing land into federal trust makes it an official part of the tribe’s sovereign boundaries, which the federal government has had a policy of encouraging for almost a hundred years. Both James and Attebery thanked the past tribal leadership and elders who kept their respective traditions alive, while preserving their sacred sites, in the face of difficult times. Discussions with other area tribes, including the Trinidad Rancheria and the Hoopa Valley Tribe, resulted in some meaningful changes that fostered a broader consensus for the Yurok Lands Act. Huffman said, “The wonderful thing about both of these bills and the wide array of local support that we have is that they are involving really special sacred places, doing important things to improve the lives of tribal communities and, frankly, correcting historic injustices.” Sonia Waraich can be reached at 707-441-0504.

Ukrainian soldiers ride a BMP-1 infantry fighting vehicle near the recently liberated town of Izyum, on September 14. The Uzbek Embassy in Kyiv has urged Ukrainian authorities to provide detailed information about two men in Russian uniform detained by Ukrainian armed forces in recent days after introducing themselves as Uzbek citizens. The embassy said in a statement that it had sent a note to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry asking for "detailed and proven" information about two men shown in a video that circulated online in recent days. In the video, Ukrainian soldiers are seen questioning two captured men who say they are Uzbek nationals and who had joined Russian troops taking part in Moscow’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. "On this issue, we call not to distribute unconfirmed information about this video until all circumstances are fully investigated," the statement says. The video in question was part of a September 10 report by Ukrainian journalist Yuriy Butusov about Ukraine's counteroffensive against Russian troops. The two were part of a group of Russian soldiers captured by Ukrainian troops. They say in the video that they are Uzbek nationals who resided in Moscow before joining a private paramilitary group in Russia. Last month, the Uzbek Embassy in Moscow warned Uzbek citizens residing in Russia of serious repercussions for joining Russia's invasion of Ukraine, emphasizing that any form of participation in military activities on the territory of foreign countries is considered to be a mercenary activity that can be punished by up to 10 years in prison. The Uzbek statement came after a television channel in Russia's Perm region broadcast a report in which the leader of the Uzbek diaspora in the region, Jahongir Jalolov, called on Uzbeks residing in Perm to create an Uzbek battalion named after the 14th century Turkic ruler Amir Timur. Jalolov said the proposed Uzbek battalion will join Russian military forces to fight against Ukrainians. Russian media reported earlier that more than 40 military units of volunteers have been created in Russia's regions and ethnic republics.

Sophia Ankel Sep 14, 2022, 6:51 AM Humanitarian aid is distributed to citizens after the Ukrainian army recaptured the town of Balakliya, Ukraine, on September 11, 2022. Metin Aktas/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images Balakliya, a town in the eastern Kharkiv region, was recaptured by Ukraine on September 8. A regional official said the town's police station was used as a "torture camp" by Russians. Troops would keep locals captive for weeks and torture them with electricity, the official said. A Ukrainian official said Tuesday that Russian soldiers used a police station in a recently recaptured town as a "torture camp" where they tormented people with electric shocks. Balakliya, a town in the eastern Kharkiv region with a population of around 25,000 people, had been occupied by Russian forces for more than six months, the Associated Press reported. It was recaptured by Ukraine on September 8 as part of a lightning counteroffensive that prompted Russian troops to flee as fast as they could. In a Facebook post on Tuesday, Serhii Bolvinov, the deputy police chief of the Kharkiv region, said that the town's police headquarters were used as "torture camps" by occupying Russian soldiers for months. "During the occupation, the racists always held at least 40 people captive, feeding them twice a day with porridge without anything," Bolvinov said in the post. "According to witnesses, they were tortured in different ways," Bolvinov added. "I will not describe all the tortures, I will only say that the 'easiest' was when they received electric shocks." Insider was unable to independently verify his claim. But a Balakliya local, identified only as Artem, told the BBC that he was among the residents who were held in the police station. He said he was detained after the Russians found a picture of his brother, who is a soldier. He told the BBC that he was kept at the station for more than 40 days and was tortured with electricity. "They made me hold two wires. There was an electric generator. The faster it went, the higher the voltage. They said, 'if you let it go, you are finished,'" Artem told the BBC. "Then they started asking questions. They said I was lying, and they started spinning it even more and the voltage increased," he added. Tatiana, a school principal who was also held at the police station for three days, told the BBC that she regularly heard screams from other cells. Officials told the BBC that locals were scared to even pass the station, in case they were grabbed by Russian soldiers. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly address on Tuesday that Ukraine had retaken around 4,000 square kilometers of territory in the region. He also called on officials to restore normalcy in these areas, adding: "Remnants of occupiers and sabotage groups are being detected, collaborators are being detained and full security is being restored." Copyright © 2022 Insider Inc.

IRPT members have been the object of mass arrests and sham trials since 2015. Sep 15, 2022 Empty chambers: Russia's Supreme Court ruling on the IRPT will change little in practice. (Photo: Russian government website) Russia’s Supreme Court has ruled to designate a banned opposition party from Tajikistan as a terrorist organization, thereby handing the authoritarian government in Dushanbe even more powers to hunt down its critics abroad. Media in Russia reported on September 14 that the ruling was passed behind closed doors and that the request for the designation had been filed by the Russian General Prosecutor’s Office. This development marks a triumph, albeit a largely symbolic one, for the regime of President Emomali Rahmon, which has been engaged in the arbitrary mass arrest of members of the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan, or IRPT, since 2015. The IRPT was the only genuine opposition party to have any foothold in parliament until 2015. A violation-ridden election in March of that year, however, saw it lose its only two seats. Matters worsened in September, when the government accused it, without ever bothering to produce any credible public evidence, of plotting to seize power in a violent uprising. Arrests duly followed. Around June 2016, the Tajik Supreme Court sentenced almost the entire leadership of the party, which had by then been banned and labelled an extremist organization, to lengthy prison terms. David Kaye, a UN special rapporteur on the right to freedom of opinion and expression, was highly critical following a visit to Tajikistan in March 2016 of the secretive nature of the IRPT trial. “The government accuses the IRPT and its members of serious crimes, but it has refused to give public access to the trial and evidence,” Kaye said. That the Russian authorities have now aligned their position on the IRPT with that of the Tajik government will ostensibly simplify efforts of Dushanbe authorities in crushing exiled dissident movements by easing extradition procedures. In reality, though, Tajik security services have been allowed by Moscow to act freely in kidnapping Tajik nationals and spiriting them to their home country without any semblance of legal procedure. The targets for this policy have in recent history mainly been Pamiri supporters of the cause of autonomy in Tajikistan’s Gorno-Badakhshan Autonomous Region. That the Russian Supreme Court ruling has come now is likely motivated by the Kremlin’s desire to bolster the reliability of an often-fickle partner at a time when even normally steadfast allies like Kazakhstan are straining to put some diplomatic distance between themselves and their querulous neighbor. In practical terms, the dismal lot of Tajikistan’s dissident community abroad will not be changed. Any of them left in Russia can and should expect to be rendered abroad without ceremony and then to be sentenced to long terms in prison.

The New York Times By Jason Gutierrez Sept. 8, 2022 The Marcos government rejected a request to let prosecutors resume an inquiry into former President Rodrigo Duterte’s drive against crime, which left thousands dead. Former President Rodrigo Duterte, who left office in June, faced broad accusations of brutality in his war on drugs. Credit...Eloisa Lopez/Reuters MANILA — The Philippine government on Thursday officially rejected a request by the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court to resume an investigation into former President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs, which left thousands of people dead. The statement was the clearest indication yet that President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who took office in June with Mr. Duterte’s daughter as the vice president, would try to shield his predecessor from any independent investigation in the war on drugs. Rights groups had feared that the alliance between the Marcoses and the Dutertes would mean that no one would be held accountable for the deaths of thousands of victims. Last September the International Criminal Court authorized a full investigation into Mr. Duterte’s bloody war on drugs, saying it had preliminary evidence to show “crimes against humanity” had been committed. It later suspended the inquiry after the Philippines said it would conduct its own. Last month, the court asked Manila to respond to its prosecutor’s request to reopen the investigation. But the Office of the Solicitor General, which is the chief lawyer for the Philippine government, argued that the international court in The Hague “has no jurisdiction” over the Philippines. “The alleged murder incidents that happened during the relevant period do not constitute ‘crimes against humanity,’” the agency said in a statement. During Mr. Duterte’s presidential campaign in 2016, he pledged to deploy the police and the military in an all-out assault on criminals to “kill them all.” Activists say the vast majority killed were poor Filipinos, some of whom were young boys or had nothing to do with the drug trade. The Philippine National Police said roughly 8,000 people had been killed in the violence, but rights groups have reported higher numbers. The solicitor general said Manila police were already investigating the killings, including those committed by state forces. The office argued that the state-level investigation should “take precedence.” Mr. Marcos has said he will continue fighting drug crimes but with a focus on prevention and rehabilitation. Carlos Conde, a senior Philippines researcher for Human Rights Watch, said the rights group has “found no compelling evidence” that the government was seriously investigating the drug-related deaths. “In fact, the killings are continuing,” Mr. Conde said. “And impunity for police officers and others implicated in these abuses by all accounts remains intact.” Cristina Palabay, secretary general of the rights group Karapatan, which provides support to families of drug war victims, said the Philippine government’s response “indicates its inability to acknowledge the injustices experienced by the victims and their families.” “Considering the political coalition of the Marcoses and the Dutertes, we know that they won’t prosecute Duterte for the alleged crimes against humanity,” Ms. Palabay said. “For the next six years, no police investigation is deemed independent. Which is why we believe that an international independent investigation is needed.” Last month, Mr. Marcos, whose father led the country for more than two decades, said that the Philippines had no intention of rejoining the I.C.C. Mr. Duterte pulled the Philippines out of court in 2018, and Mr. Marcos has said any investigators seeking to visit could do so only as tourists. Only three people have been convicted in the government’s often-indiscriminate campaign against crime: They were three police officers found guilty of murdering a 17-year-old student, who was shot after the officers claimed that he had fought back. But a CCTV camera showed the men led the boy away, generating an outcry among the public. A separate internal investigation into 52 drug war deaths showed that police officers did not follow protocol, and often used excessive, deadly force. @2022 The New York Times. All rights reseved.

The Guardian By Rebecca Ratcliffe Aug 24, 2022 Surprise move by constitutional court throws Thai politics into confusion Prayuth Chan-ocha, who staged a coup when he was army chief in 2014, has 15 days to respond to the court’s ruling. Photograph: Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters Thailand’s prime minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha, has been suspended from office by the constitutional court while it considers whether he has overstayed the limits of his term. The court agreed to hear a case brought by opposition MPs, who say Prayuth, who came to power in a coup in 2014, should have left office this week. Under Thailand’s constitution, prime ministers are barred from ruling for more than eight years. The court said in a statement that Prayuth would be suspended until a verdict was reached. “The court considered the petition and supporting documents and deems the facts according to the request indicate reasonable grounds to suspect that there is a case as requested,” the court said in a statement. “Thus, a majority vote (five against four) for (Prayuth) to be suspended as prime minister, effective 24 August 2022, until the court issues a verdict.” The deputy prime minister, Prawit Wongsuwan, 77, a former army chief and close ally of Prayuth, will act as interim leader, according to the government spokesperson Anucha Burapachaisri. Prayuth has been given 15 days to respond to the petition. It is not clear when a verdict will be issued. Prayuth’s supporters argue that he has not yet reached his term limit because the constitution was not introduced until 2017 and therefore should not be applied retrospectively. Others argue the time limit should be counted from 2019, when he was named prime minister following democratic elections. If the court rules in Prayuth’s favour, this could allow him to remain in office until 2025 or 2027 – depending on next year’s elections, which are due to be held before May 2023. However, polling found that almost two-thirds of people in Thailand want Prayuth to leave office this month. Over recent days, protest groups have gathered in Bangkok, calling for him to stand down. “We’re not just content with suspending Prayuth from duty. We want parliament dissolved and a snap election,” an activist who identified herself as Manee told Reuters. “We’re not happy. Prayuth stole power from a woman and became prime minister in a coup,” she said, referring to the prime minister ousted in 2014, Yingluck Shinawatra, the sister of the former prime minister and telecoms tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra. Yingluck and Thaksin live abroad in self-exile. On Sunday, 38 protest groups released a joint statement describing his rule as “the darkest and most bitter times” and warning the court: “To allow this tyrant to remain in office would be a catalyst for anger and a major uprising that would jeopardise your sacred institution.” Prayuth has survived numerous no-confidence votes and was also targeted by mass pro-democracy protests during 2020. However, protests, which also called for monarchy reform, have dwindled as the authorities crack down on rallies. At least 1,843 people have been charged in relation to political protests since July 2020 according to Thai Lawyers for Human Rights. @2022 The Guardian. All rights reserved.

President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi calls for “dialogue” with critics Jul 18th 2022 It was hard to believe. At an annual breakfast gala in April near the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi suddenly wanted to hold talks with his downtrodden opponents. “The homeland is big enough for all of us,” he said. “Differences of opinion need not spoil it.” To show goodwill he revived a presidential pardons committee. Several thousand ordinary prisoners were freed but very few political ones. All the same, not since toppling an Islamist government in a coup in 2013 has the former general struck so conciliatory a tone. In any event, the national dialogue officially set to begin this month is unlikely to reverse Egypt’s slide into despotism. The outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, which ran the previous government and has the largest contingent of political prisoners, has been excluded from the talks. Opposition parties taking part are doing so to get their members freed. Hamdeen Sabahi, a moderate left-wing opposition leader, was shown on television embracing Mr Sisi after the dialogue was announced. Two days later a close comrade was freed. When Mr Sisi took power, he at first cracked down on his Islamist foes, especially the Muslim Brothers. But in recent years the repression has been aimed more widely—at anybody who, for instance, criticises the president’s economic policy, or complains of sexual harassment (especially by someone well-connected), or offends conservative mores. All such critics risk going to jail. Fair trials are rare. Least accountable for abuses are the security services. In January a leaked video appeared to show torture at a Cairo police station. Rather than investigate the police, state prosecutor put the alleged victims on trial, accusing them of undermining the police by fabricating a tale of torture. Public speech is controlled ever more rigorously. After Mr Sisi came to power, the intelligence services bought several of the main television channels. Officials feed talking points into current-affairs programmes and approve the scripts of soap operas. Even novelists must kowtow. The only Egyptians who publicly denigrate Mr Sisi live abroad. To silence them the security services often arrest their relatives. Human-rights defenders are hit with travel bans, their assets often frozen to make life miserable at home. Hundreds of websites deemed critical are blocked. Despite the talk of reconciliation and some token releases of political prisoners, the pace of arrests for political reasons, including simply making Egypt look bad, has not abated. In recent weeks Egyptians have been arrested for panning the government on Facebook, for posting videos on TikTok of people dancing in a mosque, and even for encouraging people to meet at midnight dressed as Batman. “It’s a machine of repression and it’s difficult to stop it,” says a rights researcher. The number of people behind bars for non-violent opposition is impossible to calculate but must number in the tens of thousands. A main reason for the imprecision is that much of the justice system has come under the control of Egypt’s shadowy Supreme State Security Prosecution (sssp). Its caseload under Mr Sisis has exploded from 529 new cases in 2013 to 2,800 last year. Suspects are usually accused of joining a terrorist organisation or spreading false information. Often they are not told which militant group they are accused of joining—”for reasons of national security”. Where have they gone? In the year after Mr Sisi’s coup rights groups counted about 45,000 dissidents who had been taken to court. The tally of cases was even uploaded onto a widely shared open-source document called Wiki Thawra (Wiki Revolution). But it soon became harder to track the numbers. Once a critic deemed worthy of silencing is accused of being a terrorist, his or her case is handled by the sssp, which often denies access to lawyers for the defence and keeps the evidence and case files secret—once again, on national security grounds. Prisoners then become harder, sometimes impossible, to count or trace. Another difficulty in totting up the numbers is that a single case can embrace a multiplicity of defendants. A rights group that scrutinises the sssp found that it opened 2,800 cases last year. As of June 7th, only nine of them had been referred to trials, encompassing 336 defendants. In 2016 the Arabic Network for Human Rights Information, an Egyptian rights group that was forced to close down this year, estimated that the number of political prisoners had ballooned to 60,000. Its researchers’ latest reckoning is 65,000. Some speculate it is higher, others lower. Many thousands of unknown prisoners are thought to be stuck in pre-trial detention, where prisoners often languish for months and sometimes years. Egyptian law sets a two-year limit before suspects should be tried or freed. But prosecutors get around this simply by reassigning suspects to new cases, a device so common that it is known as “rotation”. The sssp can thereby reset the clock and hold suspects indefinitely without trial, even if their only initial offence is to have posted a flippant remark on the internet. Egypt’s most prominent political prisoner, Alaa Abd el-Fattah, a blogger and computer programmer, was arrested in 2013 for allegedly inciting a protest against Mr Sisi’s draconian ban on protests, which are now exceedingly rare. After serving five years, he was rearrested and spent over two years in pre-trial detention. In December a court sentenced him to another five years, this time for sharing a Facebook post about abuse in prison. Since April, he has been on hunger strike in a bid for freedom. Interrogators regularly torture suspects with electric shocks or hang them by their limbs in the hope that they will confess. Sentencing has become more severe. Egyptian courts condemned at least 356 people to death last year, the highest number in the world after China and Iran. Prisons themselves are houses of horrors. Inmates are often beaten and denied visits, fresh air and urgent medical care. Cells for solitary confinement can be too small to lie down in. More than 1,000 people have died in detention since 2013, including the president Mr Sisi toppled, Muhammad Morsi, a leading Muslim Brother. He died of a heart attack in court in 2019 after being denied treatment in prison for high blood pressure and diabetes. When Ayman Hadhoud, a 48-year-old economist critical of the government, died in police custody in March, his family was not notified until over a month later. The public prosecutor called it a heart attack and denied that there were signs of torture, as claimed by rights defenders. It is reckoned that last year a detainee died from medical complications on average once a week. Mr Sisi has said there are no political prisoners. Officials say that instances of torture are very rare, attributing them to bad policemen. But the regime is twitchy about such allegations. This year jails were relabelled “reform and rehabilitation centres.” Prison wardens have been renamed “directors”. Some inmates are being transferred to two new prison complexes with supposedly better conditions. Mr Abd el-Fattah was moved to one in May. His sister has reported that it was the first time in years that he had slept on a mattress. Copyright 2022