Cincunri Sakia

Kamis, 19 Desember 2019

India protests: Internet shut down, protesters detained in Delhi - The - The Washington Post

Adnan Abidi Reuters Demonstrators gather for a protest against a new citizenship law, in New Delhi on Thursday.

NEW DELHI — Indian authorities clamped down Thursday on demonstrations against a contentious citizenship law, prohibiting public gatherings in two major states and parts of the nation’s capital that are together home to more than 260 million people.

A coalition of civil society groups called for rallies across the country on Thursday to voice opposition to the law, which opponents say is discriminatory and violates India’s constitution. The law creates a fast-track to citizenship for migrants from six religions who arrived in India by 2014, but excludes Muslims.

In Delhi, hundreds of peaceful protesters gathered near one of the city’s major monuments to begin a march, but police invoked a measure that forbids gatherings of four or more people, effectively making protests illegal. Police detained protesters and took them away in buses.

[Why protests are erupting over India’s new citizenship law]

Internet and phone service was also suspended in some parts of the city. A police order reviewed by The Washington Post instructed cellular companies to shut down service in five areas on Thursday, including the locations of planned protests. India leads the world in the number of Internet shutdowns, which authorities say are a way to prevent violence and unrest.

Pavan Duggal, an attorney and cyberlaw expert, said he could not recall a previous instance when Internet service was cut in India’s capital. Resorting to such severe tactics to control protests is “counterproductive” and sends a signal of panic, he said.

The Delhi police also restricted movement in the capital. More than 15 metro stations were shuttered, and vehicles were prevented from entering the city on several roads from the neighboring suburb of Gurgaon, leading to monumental traffic jams.

Protests against the citizenship law have roiled India in recent days, and some have turned violent. On Sunday, police stormed a university campus in Delhi, striking unarmed students and firing tear gas into the library. The protests are the most sustained show of opposition to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi since he came to power in 2014.

Adnan Abidi

Reuters

Police officers detain a demonstrator during a protest against a new citizenship law at the Red Fort in Delhi on Thursday.

In Bangalore, capital of the state of Karnataka, protesters holding signs were taken into custody by police after authorities invoked the same measure, known as Section 144, to disallow public gatherings. Among those detained was Ramachandra Guha, one of India’s most distinguished historians.

“This is totally wrong,” he said in a video from the scene. “Our paranoid rulers in Delhi are scared” of a peaceful protest.

All of Uttar Pradesh, India’s largest state and home to 200 million people, was placed under Section 144 restrictions on Thursday. The state’s director general of police, O.P. Singh, told reporters that no protest would be permitted in the state.

[India passes controversial citizenship law excluding Muslim migrants]

“Parents are advised to counsel their kids and ask them not to participate in any kind of protest, and if they do, police will take action against them,” he said.

Despite the warning, hundreds of protesters took to the streets Thursday afternoon in the old city area of Lucknow, capital of Uttar Pradesh. They threw stones at officers, burned several vehicles and torched two police outposts. Police responded by firing tear gas and smoke grenades.

In Delhi, the demonstrations were peaceful through Thursday afternoon, but police in riot gear were present in large numbers. Police detained hundreds of protesters from several locations, including the city’s renowned Red Fort.

The citizenship law is “unconstitutional,” said 24-year-old student Swati Khanna before she was taken away by police officers. “India is becoming a police state, but we will reclaim it.”

Protests took place Thursday in at least six other cities. A large march was expected in the financial capital of Mumbai later in the day. The government of the state of Maharashtra, where Mumbai is located, is not controlled by Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, and authorities there have allowed the demonstration to proceed.

Tania Dutta in New Delhi and Saurabh Sharma in Lucknow contributed to this report.

Why protests are erupting over India’s new citizenship law

India’s Internet shutdown in Kashmir is the longest ever in a democracy

Today’s coverage from Post correspondents around the world

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2019-12-19 11:16:00Z
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Citizenship Act protests: Thousands held across India for defying ban - BBC News

Indian police have detained thousands who defied a ban on protests against a controversial new citizenship law.

The ban has been imposed in parts of the capital Delhi, and throughout the states of Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka.

Mobile data services are suspended in some parts of Delhi close to protest sites. There have been days of protests across India, some violent.

The new law offers citizenship to non-Muslim illegal immigrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.

Among those detained are Ramachandra Guha, a prominent historian and outspoken critic of the government, in the southern city of Bangalore; and political activist in Yogendra Yadav in Delhi.

But tens of thousands of people have still taken to the streets in Uttar Pradesh, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Patna, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Delhi and other cities - civil society groups, political parties, students, activists and ordinary citizens took to social media platforms such as Instagram and Twitter, asking people to turn up and protest peacefully.

The law - known as the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) - has sharply divided opinions in India.

The federal government, led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), says it will protect people from persecution, but critics say it's part of a "Hindu nationalist" agenda to marginalise India's more than 200 million Muslims.

The police chief of Uttar Pradesh, OP Singh, has asked people to stay away from protests. The police order, based on a severely restrictive law, prohibits more than four people from gathering in a place.

Police in other places - such as Chennai (formerly Madras) - denied permission for marches, rallies or any other demonstration. Officials say the restrictions have been imposed to avoid violence.

Police also put up barricades on a major highway connecting Delhi and the city of Jaipur and are checking all vehicles entering the capital. This has led to massive gridlock and many commuters have missed their flights.

A number of metro stations in Delhi have also been shut.

What is the law about?

It expedites the path to Indian citizenship for members of six religious minority communities - Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Jain, Parsi and Christian - if they can prove that they are from Muslim-majority Pakistan, Afghanistan or Bangladesh. They will now only have to live or work in India for six years - instead of 11 years - before becoming eligible to apply for citizenship.

The government says this will give sanctuary to people fleeing religious persecution. But critics say its actual agenda is to marginalise India's Muslim minority.

The fears are compounded by the government's plan to conduct a nationwide register of citizens to ensure that "each and every infiltrator is identified and expelled from India" by 2024. The National Register of Citizens (NRC) has already been carried out in the north-eastern state of Assam and saw 1.9 million people effectively made stateless.

The NRC and the Citizenship Amendment Act are closely linked as the latter will help protect non-Muslims who are excluded from the register and face the threat of deportation or internment.

Why are people protesting against it?

Given that the exercise relies on extensive documentation to prove that their ancestors lived in India, many Muslim citizens fear that they could be made stateless.

Critics also say the law is exclusionary and violates the secular principles enshrined in India's constitution. They say faith should not be made a condition of citizenship.

However, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the law "will have no effect on citizens of India, including Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Christians and Buddhists".

The prime minister also told his supporters at a rally on Tuesday that the opposition was "spreading lies and rumours", "instigating violence" and "used its full force to create an atmosphere of illusion and falsehood".

Home Minister Amit Shah told media that "both my government and I are firm like a rock that we will not budge or go back on the citizenship protests".

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2019-12-19 09:33:45Z
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Citizenship Act protests: Thousands held across India for defying ban - BBC News

Indian police have detained thousands who defied a ban on protests against a controversial new citizenship law.

The ban has been imposed in parts of the capital Delhi, and throughout the states of Uttar Pradesh and Karnataka.

Mobile data services are suspended in some parts of Delhi close to protest sites. There have been days of protests across India, some violent.

The new law offers citizenship to non-Muslim illegal immigrants from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan.

Among those detained are Ramachandra Guha, a prominent historian and outspoken critic of the government, in the southern city of Bangalore; and political activist in Yogendra Yadav in Delhi.

The law - known as the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) - has sharply divided opinions in India.

Police in other places - such as Chennai (formerly Madras) - denied permission for marches, rallies or any other demonstration. Officials say the restrictions have been imposed to avoid violence.

A number of metro stations in Delhi have also been shut.

What is the law about?

The government says this will give sanctuary to people fleeing religious persecution. But critics say its actual agenda is to marginalise India's Muslim minority.

The NRC and the Citizenship Amendment Act are closely linked as the latter will help protect non-Muslims who are excluded from the register and face the threat of deportation or internment.

Why are people protesting against it?

Given that the exercise relies on extensive documentation to prove that their ancestors lived in India, many Muslim citizens fear that they could be made stateless.

Critics also say the law is exclusionary and violates the secular principles enshrined in India's constitution. They say faith should not be made a condition of citizenship.

However, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the law "will have no effect on citizens of India, including Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Christians and Buddhists".

Home Minister Amit Shah told media that "both my government and I are firm like a rock that we will not budge or go back on the citizenship protests".

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Rabu, 18 Desember 2019

Brexit bill to give new powers to British judges - BBC News

The government's Brexit bill will enable more British judges to depart from previous rulings of the EU's top court, Downing Street says.

The PM's spokesman said the Withdrawal Agreement Bill would expand this power to courts below the Supreme Court.

He added this would ensure judges at lower courts would not be "inadvertently" tied to the rulings "for years to come".

But others warned the move would cause legal uncertainty.

MPs are set for an initial vote on the withdrawal bill on Friday, after the Conservatives won an 80-seat majority at last week's general election.

Previous rulings of the European Court of Justice (ECJ) are set to be incorporated into the case law followed by British courts after Brexit.

The provision is contained in a separate EU withdrawal law passed in June last year under the premiership of Theresa May.

Previously, only the Supreme Court and the High Court of Justiciary in Scotland would be allowed to depart from these rulings.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson's spokesman said enabling lower courts to do the same was an "important change" to ensure they do not face a "legal bottleneck".

"We will take back control of our laws and disentangle ourselves from the EU's legal order just as was promised to the British people," he said.

There is no real detail in the government's pledge - but it marks a potentially really significant development.

It means that UK civil courts below the Supreme Court, for example the Court of Appeal, High Court, county courts, and tribunals such as the Employment Appeal Tribunal could depart from ECJ rulings in areas such as workers' rights.

Take for instance the right to paid holidays. The ECJ has interpreted this right more generously than the UK courts: for example, on the inclusion of overtime in holiday pay, and currently its interpretation binds the UK courts.

Following the 11 month transition period after Brexit, the way is open, for example, for an employer to take a case to one of the UK's lower civil courts and invite a judge to apply a more restrictive interpretation to the right to paid holidays.

This would create plenty of work for lawyers, but it opens a can of worms and could affect many workers.

The government's move was welcomed by former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith, a leading figure in the pro-Brexit European Research Group.

"This is a critical pledge that puts sovereign rights back in the hands of the UK government and of course the British people," he said.

However, crossbench peer Lord Pannick QC, who acted for businesswoman Gina Millar in two cases against the government over its handling of Brexit, cautioned against the measure.

He told the Times, which first reported on the move, that allowing lower courts to depart from ECJ rulings would "cause very considerable legal uncertainty".

The government is hoping to get its Brexit deal through Parliament in the new year, enabling the UK to leave the EU by the end of January.

If passed, the UK would then follow EU rules during an 11-month transition period due to conclude at the end of December 2020.

MPs in the previous Parliament gave initial backing to the PM's Brexit bill but rejected his plan to fast-track the legislation through Parliament in three days in order to leave the EU by the then Brexit deadline of 31 October.

The government has already said the amended version of the withdrawal bill that will come back before MPs on Friday will include a new clause to rule out any extension to the transition period beyond the end of next year.

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2019-12-18 16:01:57Z
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It's sizzling: Australia experiences hottest day on record - NBCNews.com

SYDNEY — Australia experienced its hottest day on record on Wednesday and temperatures are expected to soar even higher as heatwave conditions embrace most of the country.

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology said the average temperature across the country of 40.9 degrees Celsius (105 Fahrenheit) Tuesday beat the record of 40.3 Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) from Jan. 7, 2013.

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“This hot air mass is so extensive, the preliminary figures show that yesterday was the hottest day on record in Australia, beating out the previous record from 2013 and this heat will only intensify,” bureau meteorologist Diana Eadie said in a video statement.

The weather bureau said temperatures in southern and central Australia on Thursday may reach between 8 and 16 degrees higher than normal.

On Wednesday temperatures soared to 47.7 Celsius (118 Fahrenheit) in Birdsville, Queensland, 46.9 Celsius (116 Fahrenheit) in Mandora, Western Australia and similar levels in southern and central Australia.

The highest temperature reliably recorded in any location in Australia was 50.7 Celsius (123 Fahrenheit) in January 1960, at Oodnadatta, a desert settlement in outback South Australia .

High temperatures and strong winds are also fanning bushfires around Australia, including more than 100 in New South Wales state where heat and smoke have caused an increase in hospital admissions.

Cooler conditions are forecast from Friday.

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2019-12-18 10:58:00Z
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Labour leadership: Emily Thornberry to run for Labour leadership - BBC News

Shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry has become the first MP to officially enter the race to replace Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.

Writing in the Guardian, she said the next leader needed to have "the political nous and strategic vision to reunite our party".

Sir Keir Starmer, Yvette Cooper, Lisa Nandy have said they are also considering standing in the election.

Meanwhile Tony Blair has accused Labour of "letting the country down".

He also attacked the Labour leadership for going into the election with a "strategy for defeat".

Jeremy Corbyn has said he will stand down as leader "early next year" and the race to replace him could start on 7 January.

In an article announcing her candidacy, Ms Thornberry criticised Labour's decision to back an election earlier this year saying it was like "crackers voting for Christmas".

She said she had written to the leader's office warning "it would be 'an act of catastrophic political folly' to vote for the election".

"Instead, I said we should insist on a referendum on his proposed deal, to get the issue of Brexit out of the way before any general election."

"We wilfully went into a single-issue election with no clear position on that issue ."

Underlining her own leadership credentials, Ms Thornberry said she "took the fight" to Boris Johnson when he was foreign secretary and "pummelled him every week".

She said those wanting to be Labour leader needed to answer the question: "Do you have the political nous and strategic vision to reunite our party, rebuild our machine, gain the trust of the public, give hope to our declining towns and smaller cities, and never again waste the opportunity to take back power?".

Ms Thornberry has been the MP for Islington South and Finsbury since 2005.

We're off - Emily Thornberry is the first to formally say she's definitely going to stand to replace Jeremy Corbyn as Labour leader.

There's been an awful lot of huffing and puffing without people putting their heads above the parapet, and I think she's decided she might as well get on with it.

She's the shadow foreign secretary and was was highly critical of Mr Corbyn for his neutral stance over the UK's membership of the EU.

The fact that the party membership is still overwhelmingly Remain will help her cause, as will the fact that she was seen to have done pretty well when she stood in for Jeremy Corbyn at Prime Minister's Questions.

She's been loyal to Mr Corbyn but, at the same time, she doesn't identify closely with Mr Corbyn's team.

I suspect her difficulty, maybe, is that she will be fishing in similar waters to a number of other female MPs who may enter the leadership race such as Jess Phillips, Lisa Nandy and Yvette Cooper.

They've got to get 22 Labour MPs to back them if they want to get on the ballot paper - so that is the first hurdle they've got to get over.

Meanwhile Sir Keir Starmer has told the BBC he is "seriously considering" standing to be the next Labour leader.

The shadow Brexit secretary said Labour has "a mountain to climb" following its general election defeat.

Another potential contender Yvette Cooper said she would "decide over Christmas" about whether to stand.

Reflecting on Labour's defeat, Sir Keir - who was calling for another EU referendum - said the party had failed to "knock back" the Conservatives' "get Brexit done" slogan.

He also attacked the Labour's manifesto arguing it "had too much in it" adding "we couldn't see the wood for the trees".

Looking to the party's future, he said: "What Corbyn bought to the Labour party was a change of emphasis - radicalism that really matters - we need to build on that, not oversteer and go back to a bygone age."

Asked whether he considered himself to be a Corbynite, Sir Keir said: "I don't need someone else's name tattooed on my head to make decisions."

Labour's defeats in the North of England constituencies has led some to say the next leader should not come from London.

However Sir Keir said the Labour leader needed to "be able to talk to everyone" in the UK.

The former director of public prosecutions also insisted that "my background isn't what people think it is", adding that he had "never been in any other workplace than a factory" before he went to university.

Former Work and Pensions Secretary Yvette Cooper -who was defeated by Mr Corbyn in the 2015 Labour leadership contest - has also said she is considering another bid, saying she would "reflect over Christmas" on it.

Speaking to Radio 4's Today programme, she said Labour had "a long road to travel" adding that the party needed to tackle anti-Semitism, restore "kindness to our politics" and be more "inclusive".

Other candidates believed to be considering running to be leader include:

Tottenham MP and ex-Business Minister David Lammy,
MP for Norwich South and ex-shadow Treasury minister Clive Lewis,
Salford and Eccles MPs and shadow business secretary Rebecca Long Bailey,
MP for Birmingham Yardley Jess Phillips
Wigan MP and former shadow environment secretary Lisa Nandy

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2019-12-18 09:39:38Z
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Australia Records Its Hottest Day. At Least for Now. - The New York Times

It is so hot, birds are abandoning the sky.

Hours after Australia set a record for its warmest day across the continent, with even hotter temperatures in the near forecast, Greg Marshall, a garden designer in Adelaide, said he had found birds of different species gathered on the ground Wednesday, under the shade of trees.

It was 106 degrees.

“I’ve been walking around the parklands, turning on the taps at the bottom of the trees,” he said. The birds — “with their beaks open, all gasping for air,” he said — huddled around the faucets, trying to get a drink.

A national heat wave, triggered by a confluence of meteorological factors that extends well beyond Australia’s shores, pushed high temperatures across the country on Tuesday to an average of 105.6 degrees, or 40.9 degrees Celsius, breaking the record of 104.5, or 40.3 Celsius, set on Jan. 7, 2013.

On Thursday, said Dean Narramore of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology, the heat will spread even farther across the central and southern parts of the country, like an inkblot blooming and growing on a page.

As the temperatures have risen, so has the threat of fires, which have ravaged large swathes of the country and shrouded Sydney in smoke.

Late monsoons in India, an imbalance in sea temperatures in the Indian Ocean and strong winds have hampered rainfall in Australia. The country was already in the grip of a yearslong drought.

“Friday looks like it will be a very bad day,” Mr. Narramore said, adding that lightning strikes in bush land could start even more fires.

For weeks, Australians on the eastern coast have been living under a total fire ban as bush fires have raged unabated, burning through houses, killing wildlife and making the air dangerous to breathe. The Air Quality Index, which measures pollution, has exceeded 400 in some parts of Sydney. Readings of 100 and above are considered “poor.”

“All of this is connected,” Mr. Narramore said. “A record-late monsoon in India means the rain will be late coming to Australia, it’s the worst fire season we’ve seen across Australia, it’s warming through climate change, and it’s only the third week of summer.”

Forecasters have said that the heat wave could bring temperatures never before seen in Australia.

The highest temperature ever recorded in the country was 123 degrees on Jan. 2, 1960, in Oodnadatta, a remote outback town in South Australia. On Wednesday, the hottest place on the continent was Birdsville, Queensland, which reached 117 degrees.

Nine of Australia’s 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 2005, with last year the third hottest. As the country bakes and burns, the government has come under criticism for refusing to actively address climate change through sharper emissions cuts.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison generated disapproving headlines on Wednesday after it was reported that he had left Australia for a Hawaii vacation as the authorities raised emergency warnings across the country, fires continued to burn and Australians sweltered.

In Perth, a man drew wide attention on social media after roasting pork inside his old Datsun car, whose interior he said reached 178 degrees.

In Adelaide, people were still outside working, delivering parcels and laboring on building sites, Mr. Marshall said. He normally tours one or two of his gardens during a workday, largely for maintenance. On Wednesday, he visited 12.

“Some of the larger ones are really suffering,” he said. “Right now, we’re waiting for the fire. It’s a tinderbox, and everything’s aligning for Friday. It’s pretty bad.”

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2019-12-18 09:38:00Z
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