Jewish community hosts iftar banquet for Muslim neighbors

Great Edirne Synagogue brought together Muslims, Jews and Christians together for the interfaith event. (AA Photo)

A mufti joined a Jewish chazzan for prayers---Chief rabbi of Jewish community İsak Haleva (below,center) accompanied muftis and a Christian priest at an iftar table.

Against the backdrop of a restored synagogue in the northwestern city of Edirne, the country's Jewish community hosted hundreds of locals and Muslim clerics for an iftar (fast-breaking) dinner, more than 80 years after they were forced to flee the city

 ISTANBUL - June 10, 2016

Edirne, a city on Turkey's European border, on Thursday hosted an outdoor iftar (fast-breaking meal) for the Muslim faithful observing the fasting month of Ramadan. What distinguished this event from other outdoor iftars was its host and location. The Turkish Jewish community, whose members were forced to leave the city in the1930s during the infamous Trakya incidents, held a banquet for Edirne Muslims outside the Great Edirne Synagogue. The synagogue, restored by the government and opened last year, has revived Jewish culture in the city, where only one Jewish family lives, hosting frequent visits from community members from other cities and a lavish wedding last month, the first in decades.

The iftar on Thursday evening was an occasion to promote interfaith dialogue with the Christian community, represented by Rev. Alexander Çıkrık of the Sveti Georgi Bulgarian Orthodox Church who was also in attendance at the event.

Chief Rabbi İsak Haleva, İbrahim Şerif, a Muslim mufti from Komotini, Greece, neighboring Edirne, Çıkrık and Edirne Mufti Emrullah Üzüm raised their hands together as Muslims did when Üzüm accompanied Jewish chazzan Nesim Beruhiel in the recitation of Muslim and Jewish prayers prior to the dinner. Other high-profile guests at the dinner included the Edirne governor and mayor, lawmakers from the ruling party and the opposition including Justice and Development Party (AK Party) lawmaker and Parliament's human rights committee head Mustafa Yeneroğlu and Turkish Jewish community leader İshak İbrahimzadeh.

Hundreds of people sat around tables placed on the street in front of the synagogue, which was adorned with Turkish flags for the event and posters reading "Brotherhood On The Street." The faithful broke their fast as a Muslim cleric recited the adhan, the Muslim call to prayer, which marked the end of daily fasting, from a pulpit on the street.

Speaking to reporters before the dinner, İsak Haleva said Ramadan was a glorious gift from God for the people, "a sacred month."

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan also sent a message to the dinner organizers and his message, underlining the peaceful coexistence of the peoples in Turkey, was read out at the event.

Haleva said the Jewish community in Turkey lived comfortably and in peace and "this magnificent synagogue is a symbol of this." The synagogue, also known as Kal Kadoş ha Gadol, was built in 1905 upon orders from Ottoman Sultan Abdülhamid II to replace 13 separate synagogues destroyed by a fire that devastated the city. The building was designed by French architect France Depre and opened in 1907 to serve as a house of worship until 1983, by which time the city's Jewish community had dwindled to almost zero. A sizeable Jewish population lived in Edirne up until 1934, the year when the Trakya (the name of the region where Edirne is located) riots erupted. The community faced rampant discrimination after an anti-Semitic campaign fueled by ultranationalist columnists and attacks on Jewish-run shops and looting of houses forced Jews to flee en masse to Istanbul and other cities. Ankara ordered a comprehensive restoration of the site and the synagogue was reopened last year after restoration work that saw its lead domes and splendid interior as well as Torah scrolls restored to their former glory.

The chief rabbi, whose parents hail from Edirne, said the city has been one of the finest examples of the multi-cultural society in the Ottoman era when it once served as the empire's capital. "It has been an exceptional place for existing together in peace and this synagogue and other historical structures showcase this legacy. Sharing our bread together in this iftar is perhaps the best example of how the coexistence fares well today," he said.

Authorities plan to do more to further revive the Jewish presence in the city. The city's mayor Recep Gürkan said at the dinner that the municipality would buy three old houses once owned by Jewish families and restore them with the assistance of the Jewish community, adding that houses would serve as museums.

Mustafa Yeneroğlu said the iftar was the "embodiment of the repeating of history" and that the Turkish Jewish community is a main element pf the Turkish nation regardless of the "policies of other countries." He emphasized that Turkey would continue its fight against anti-Semitism. "Our struggle against the hatred, hate speech and hostility toward a community will not cease as we have an approach that sees different communities as elements enriching these lands," he said.

Diplomats’ Dissent Bolsters Calls for U.S. Assault on Assad

A leaked memo reflects deep frustration inside the State Department over Obama’s Syria policy. Will the next president be more open to military action against Assad?
BY JOHN HUDSON, DAN DE LUCE
JUNE 17, 2016
Long-festering discontent inside the State Department over the White House’s Syria policy finally boiled over in a leaked memo signed by 51 officials calling for military strikes against Damascus. U.S. officials said the dissent of midlevel diplomats was unlikely to sway the White House, but the blistering missive could lay the groundwork for the next president to take a more hawkish approach to the 5-year-old civil war.

For the past several years, the Obama administration has tried to avoid directly intervening in the conflict by either using force against Syrian strongman Bashar al-Assad or dramatically ramping up aid to the moderate rebels working to unseat him. The White House has justified the inaction by pointing to the disarray among the Syrian opposition, fears that U.S. weapons would wind up in the hands of the Islamic State, and questions about what punitive strikes on the Syrian government would actually achieve.

During her time as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton was a vocal advocate for arming the rebels. Now, as the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, Clinton has advocated a much more aggressive response to Assad that would include the creation of a no-fly zone in northern Syria to shield civilians from the Damascus regime.


The widely publicized leak of the “dissent channel cable,” which presses for the use of “standoff” weapons to force Assad to make concessions in peace talks, could provide ammunition for her case inside and outside Washington.

As the top U.S. diplomat during President Barack Obama’s first term, Clinton and the rest of Obama’s war cabinet favored arming the rebels while they had a battlefield advantage over Assad. Obama rejected the idea in 2012 and it was only taken up again two years later with the emergence of the Islamic State. Today, the United States has 50 Special Operations forces on the ground and plans to deploy an additional 250 troops, while weighing the provision of more powerful arms to rebel forces beyond the anti-tank weapons and small arms already given to opposition fighters.

As a candidate, Clinton has embraced the bulk of Obama’s legacy while subtly distancing herself from his Syrian policy. “Nobody stood up to Assad and removed him,” she said in a televised April debate when asked about the war-torn country.

On the campaign trail, she has repeatedly urged creating a no-fly zone in northern Syria to protect civilians against regime air power and barrel bombs, though she has offered few details on what she has in mind or how she would avoid potential dangers like the downing of an American plane over Islamic State-held territory or an altercation between U.S. and Russian aircraft.

In potential fodder for Clinton’s stance, the memo argues for expanding support for opposition fighters, saying a stronger rebel force would turn “the tide of the conflict against the regime” and “increase the chances for peace by sending a clear signal to the regime and its backers that there will be no military solution to the conflict.” The existence of the memo was first reported by the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

It’s unclear if presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump, a proud Washington outsider, would take heed of a memo drafted by bureaucrats deep within the bowels of the State Department. But the real estate tycoon’s Syria policy, such as it is, has emphasized collaboration with Russian President Vladimir Putin in an effort to defeat the Islamic State. Trump has also hinted that he would be ready to accept Assad’s staying in power rather than pursue the riskier and costlier goal of unseating him.

In a speech Monday, Trump specifically said the United States shouldn’t push for regime change in Syria. “No more nation-building. It’s never going to work,” he said.

For now, the Obama administration seems inclined to agree. A U.S. official who did not sign the memo but read it told Foreign Policy that the document was unlikely to influence Oval Office policy due to the relatively low rank of the signatories. None of the officials have reached the level of assistant secretary and some are not directly involved in Syria issues on a daily basis — though the list does include the consul general in Istanbul and a Syria desk officer.

The Obama administration has also repeatedly made clear that it believes strikes would merely add to the bloodshed without improving the political situation on the ground, while potentially getting ensnared in a decades-long conflict. Despite stinging criticisms from Arab and European allies, Obama has expressed no regrets about his handling of Syria in public comments and there was no sign Friday that the White House was ready to radically alter its strategy or tactics.

In a briefing with reporters on Air Force One, White House Deputy Secretary Jennifer Friedman said Obama “has been clear and continues to be clear that he doesn’t see a military solution to the crisis in Syria.”
“That doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be discussions or a variety of conversations and a variety of opinions,” she added, “but that fundamental principle still remains.”

Still, Robert Ford, the former ambassador to Syria who resigned in protest over White House policy, said the dissent shows that “there’s a very broad consensus among working-level people that are trying to address different pieces of the Syria crisis that … the policy is not succeeding and will not succeed, and that the administration needs to change course.” He noted that it is “remarkable” to see 51 signatures on a cable that rarely gets more than four.

The memo is also a vivid reminder that Secretary of State John Kerry and the diplomats who work for him have consistently pushed for a more militaristic approach to the conflict than their colleagues at the Pentagon. During closed-door meetings in the past year and a half, Kerry has repeatedly pushed Obama to launch airstrikes at Syrian government targets — calls the White House rejected. His pleas were so routine that Obama reportedly announced at a National Security Council meeting last December that only the defense secretary would be allowed to offer proposals for military strikes.

Obama and Kerry clashed in 2013 when the president pulled back at the last moment from threatened military strikes against the Assad regime over its use of chemical weapons, even though Obama had declared a “red line” over the issue. Kerry’s aides were miffed because the secretary of state just a few days earlier had given a muscular speech virtually promising a military response to Assad’s use of the weapons.

The protest memo appeared aimed not at the secretary of state but at the president and his aides who have remained steadfastly opposed to any direct confrontation with the Assad regime.

“The White House will make the final decision, but this looks to me like a complaint not about John Kerry’s approach but a complaint to John Kerry about the approach,” Ford said.

In part, administration officials fear that strikes on Assad would put the United States on a collision course with Russia, which is deeply entrenched in Syria, providing training, equipment, advice, and airstrikes for the regime. On Friday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said “calls for the violent overthrow of authorities in another country are unlikely to be accepted in Moscow.”

“The liquidation of this or some other regime is hardly what is needed to aid the successful continuation of the battle against terrorism,” Peskov said. “Such a move is capable of plunging the region into complete chaos.”

The cable argues that only limited military action — and ramped-up support for opposition rebels — can ensure sufficient pressure on the Assad regime to persuade it to pursue a political settlement. Since Iran expanded its military support of Damascus and Russia began carrying out bombing raids in support of the regime last year, the Syrian regime has regained some ground on the battlefield against opposition forces — giving it little incentive to cut a deal at the negotiating table. Assad also has struck a more confident tone in his rhetoric, vowing this month to take back “every inch” of the country.

For months, the United States and other Western powers have tried to establish a cease-fire in Syria between the rebels and Damascus, but the Assad regime, bolstered by Russian air power, has repeatedly violated the truce. The authors of the dissent cable argue that imposing a military cost on the Assad regime would help enforce the cease-fire and improve the prospects for the beleaguered U.N.-brokered peace talks.

The cable was transmitted through the State Department’s “dissent channel,” a conduit for diplomats to vent grievances and provide alternative viewpoints without reprisal. Established in the 1960s during the Vietnam War, the channel was designed to give rank-and-file officials a chance to express dissent to senior leadership.

Over the years, the channel’s relevance has ebbed and flowed.

The dissent over Syria resembles internal protests in the State Department in the 1990s, when a number of midlevel diplomats resigned in protest over Washington’s decision not to intervene in the war in the former Yugoslavia. In that case, officials grew disillusioned with then-Secretary of State Warren Christopher, accusing of him of passivity in the face of a genocidal campaign against Bosnia’s Muslim population. President Bill Clinton eventually opted for military action in 1995.

The union that represents U.S. diplomats — the American Foreign Service Association — has long prized the dissent channel as a means of cutting through bureaucracy. On Friday, AFSA President Barbara Stephenson said she was pleased that the channel “has, once again, become a vehicle for the thoughtful professionals of the State Department to take a principled stand on a vitally important foreign policy issue.”

“We applaud the individuals who had the intellectual courage to express their dissent,” she told FP.

FP‘s Molly O’Toole contributed to this report.

U.S. will seek billions more to support Afghan military efforts

By Tim Craig June 18 at 5:00 PM

Afghan border police take their positions following clashes with Pakistani forces on the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan in eastern Nangarhar province on Wednesday. (Noorullah Shirzada/AFP/Getty Images)

KABUL — America’s longest war is about to include more cash for Afghanistan’s army and police force — without any new conditions to try to ensure it doesn’t get gobbled up before making it to the battlefield.

At a NATO summit in Warsaw that begins July 8, the United States and its allies will try to raise $15 billion to fund Afghan security forces through 2020. About $10.5 billion of that is expected to come from the United States, a continuation of commitments to pay and clothe Afghan security forces while supplying them with fuel, weapons and ammunition to fight Taliban insurgents.

But even though billions of dollars have been wasted or stolen here over the past 15 years, NATO leaders will probably not link the money to new benchmarks or anti-corruption standards for the Afghan military, said Maj. Gen. Gordon “Skip” Davis Jr., commander of Combined Security Transition Command-Afghanistan, which oversees coalition support for Afghan security forces.

The U.S.-led coalition, for example, will still seek to fund 352,000 Afghan soldiers and police, even though auditors have repeatedly questioned whether Afghanistan has that many security personnel.

“There was discussion last year about having some specific benchmarks before the Warsaw summit, but I think the allies felt it was impractical,” said Davis, adding that it would have taken months to agree on what new strings should be placed on the money. “There just wasn’t enough time.”

 

Davis said NATO leaders have confidence in Afghan President Ashraf Ghani to safeguard the international community’s money. He also thinks that Afghan security forces can operate effectively under existing performance goals.

But the coming NATO summit is a reflection of increasingly hawkish political leaders in the United States and Europe as it relates to the war.

When NATO last met to consider Afghanistan funding in 2014, President Obama was still insisting that all but 1,000 U.S. troops would be withdrawn from the country by the end of this year. At the time, Congress also appeared to be growing frustrated with reports that vast sums had been lost or stolen under former Afghan president Hamid Karzai.

But Obama, who was elected in 2008 on a pledge that he would end the war, has since backtracked on his troop withdrawal plan, agreeing to keep 9,800 soldiers here this year.

NATO leaders will most likely recommend keeping 9,000 foreign troops in Afghanistan into next year, although it’s unclear how many of them will be American, Davis said.

Earlier this month, Obama gave troops more authority to take offensive action against the Taliban.

The rise of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria has also reinvigorated international support for Afghanistan, both in Congress and in European capitals.

 

“There is much more consensus that stemming extremism here, in the region, is a direct contribution to security in the homeland, be it in the U.S. or Europe,” Davis said.

Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, American taxpayers have spent $68 billion to support Afghanistan’s army and police force. An additional $45 billion has been spent on direct humanitarian assistance, according to the special inspector general for Afghan Reconstruction.

But the total cost of the Afghan war is far greater than that, said Neta Crawford, a professor of political science at Boston University and co-director of the Cost of War Project.

Since 2001, Crawford estimates, the Pentagon and the U.S. State Department have spent a total of $783 billion on Afghanistan, factoring in the costs of deploying troops and diplomats. That figure balloons to $1.8 trillion if future interest on the national debt, veterans’ care and other long-term spending is considered, she estimates.

In an interview, Crawford said it was “absurdity” to keep “throwing resources” into the conflict. She noted that both Afghan civilian and military causalities are at record highs.

“It’s clear you cannot kill your way out of this conflict,” Crawford said. “And guess what — we don’t have the money for this.”

Brig. Gen. Charles H. Cleveland, chief spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition, said Afghan forces are making progress to justify the continued financial support.

After being repeatedly overrun by Taliban insurgents last year, Cleveland said, Afghan forces have become far more aggressive this year, so far avoiding embarrassing setbacks on the battlefield.

“Right now, they do have some momentum against the Taliban, and we are cautiously optimistic,” 

Cleveland said. “That is not to say everything is going to be fine in a month and there won’t be bad days . . . but overall, they have made an improvement.”

Coalition commanders expect that the Taliban will face even more pressure in coming months. Under the expanded authority recently approved by Obama, U.S. troops will now be able to work with conventional Afghan forces to call in coalition airstrikes against Taliban positions.

But Afghanistan will continue to provide just a fraction of those costs, despite past predictions that the country would eventually be moving closer to self-sustainment.

At a donor summit in 2012, NATO leaders agreed that Afghanistan would put up at least $500 million toward its security needs by 2015, “with the aim that it can assume, no later than 2024, full financial responsibility for its own security forces.” NATO reaffirmed that time frame at a summit two years ago.

But the Afghan government has yet to reach even the $500 million target, and coalition commanders now say they operate under no illusion that the international support for the Afghan military will be scaled back anytime soon.

Afghanistan currently pays about 10 percent — $430 million — of its annual security costs, Davis said.

According to the World Bank, Afghanistan’s gross domestic product is projected to grow by 1.9 percent this year, suggesting that it could take decades for it to afford its own security.

Yet international donors are far more comfortable working with Ghani than they were with Karzai.

Since taking office, Ghani has made tackling corruption a key priority, one reason NATO is unlikely to seek additional concessions in exchange for the new funding, Davis said.

In September, Ghani issued a document pledging “self-reliance though mutual accountability,” calling for governance, anti-corruption and human rights reforms within the military. He also recently launched an anti-corruption council, Davis noted.

But John F. Sopko, special inspector general for Afghanistan Reconstruction, has noted that neither Afghan nor coalition leaders have been able to verify how many soldiers and police officers make up Afghan security forces.

Earlier this year, an Associated Press investigation found that official Afghan army enlistment numbers probably include thousands of “ghost soldiers” who do not regularly report for duty or who have retired, defected to the Taliban or been killed.

Systems currently being implemented will link soldiers’ paychecks to biometrically-certified cash cards, Davis said.

Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, said NATO leaders “face a conundrum” because “they realize they need to keep money going to Afghanistan” but understand that “the war is not popular at home.”

“Most Americans, and people in other countries, don’t want billions going to Afghanistan,” he said.

Even Brig. Gen. Dawlat Waziri, chief spokesman for the Afghan Defense Ministry, was uncertain about what the long-term strategy is for ending the war.

Asked whether he thought the Afghan military could ever be self-sufficient, Waziri said that question is better asked in Washington.

“Afghanistan has rich minerals and natural resources that we can exploit and will be able to use when the war against terrorism stops,” Waziri said. “But only [the United States] can answer that question” on timing.

Al-Jazeera employees among six sentenced to death in Egypt

Journalists allegedly passed sensitive documents to Qatar and the Doha-based TV network during Mohamed Morsi’s rule

The headquarters of the Qatar-based al-Jazeera English-language channel in Doha. Photograph: Fadi Al-Assaad/Reuters

Associated Press in Cairo-Saturday 18 June 2016

An Egyptian court sentenced six people, including two al-Jazeera employees, to death for allegedly passing documents related to national security to Qatar and the Doha-based TV network during the rule of Mohamed Morsi, the former president.

Morsi, the top defendant, and two of his aides were sentenced to 25 years in prison for membership of the now-banned Muslim Brotherhood but were acquitted of espionage, a capital offence. Morsi and his secretary, Amin el-Sirafy, each received an additional 15-year sentence for leaking official documents. Sirafy’s daughter, Karima, was also sentenced to 15 years on the same charge.

Morsi, Egypt’s first freely elected leader, was ousted by the military in July 2013 and has already been sentenced to death in another case. That death sentence and another two – life and 20 years in prison – are under appeal. The Brotherhood was banned and declared a terrorist organisation after his overthrow. Khalid Radwan, a producer at a Brotherhood-linked TV channel, received a 15-year prison sentence.

All of Saturday’s verdicts can be appealed against. Of the case’s 11 defendants, seven, including Morsi, are in custody.

Amnesty International called for the death sentences to be immediately thrown out and for the “ludicrous charges against the journalists to be dropped”.

The two al-Jazeera employees – identified by the judge as news producer Alaa Omar Mohammed Sablan and news editor Ibrahim Mohammed Helal – were sentenced to death in absentia along with Asmaa al-Khateib, who worked for Rassd, a media network widely suspected of links to Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood.

Al-Jazeera condemned the verdicts, saying they were part of a “ruthless” campaign against freedom of expression, and called on the international community to show solidarity with the journalists. “This sentence is only one of many politicised sentences that target al-Jazeera and its employees,” said the network’s acting director, Mostefa Souag. “They are illogical convictions and legally baseless. Al-Jazeera strongly denounces targeting its journalists and stands by the other journalists who have also been sentenced.”

A news story that appeared earlier on the al-Jazeera English website identified Helal as a former director of news at al-Jazeera’s Arabic channel and said Alaa Omar Mohammed Sablan was an al-Jazeera employee until last year. The network’s statement confirmed Helal’s status, but only said that Sablan was “identified by the prosecution as an al-Jazeera journalist”.

The three other defendants sentenced to death on Saturday are documentary producer Ahmed Afify, EgyptAir cabin crew member Mohammed Keilany and academic Ahmed Ismail.

Judge Mohammed Shirin Fahmy recommended the death sentence for the six last month. Under standard procedure in cases of capital punishment, his recommendation went to the office of Egypt’s Grand Mufti, the nation’s top Muslim theological authority, for endorsement.

Fahmy quoted the Mufti’s office as saying the six had sought to harm the country when they passed to a foreign nation details of the army’s deployment as well as reports prepared by intelligence agencies.

“They are more dangerous than spies, because spies are usually foreigners, but these are, regrettably, Egyptians who betrayed the trust,” the judge said. “No ideology can ever justify the betrayal of one’s country.”

Egypt’s relations with Qatar have been fraught with tension since the ousting of Morsi, who enjoyed the support of the tiny but wealthy Gulf state. Cairo also maintains that al-Jazeera’s news coverage of Egypt and elsewhere in the Middle East is biased in favour of militant Islamic groups.

Last year, President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi pardoned two imprisoned journalists from the al-Jazeera English news network. Mohamed Fahmy, an Egyptian-born Canadian, and Egyptian Baher Mohamed were arrested in December 2013. They had been sentenced to three years in prison for airing what a court described as “false news” and coverage biased in favour of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The prosecution of the two, along with Australian Peter Greste – another al-Jazeera English reporter who was deported in February last year – drew strong international condemnation.

Egypt was ranked 158 out of 180 countries in the 2015 Press Freedom Index, according to Reporters Without Borders. In December, the Committee to Protect Journalists said Egypt was second only to China as the world’s worst jailer of journalists in 2015.

Bank of Canada Explores Bitcoin’s Technology

Central bank says it has no plans to issue a digitized Canadian dollar

Carolyn Wilkins, senior deputy governor at the Bank of Canada, at a news conference in Ottawa in April. PHOTO: PATRICK DOYLE/BLOOMBERG NEWS

By PAUL VIEIRA and

PAUL VIGNA-June 16, 2016

The Bank of Canada said it is studying the technology underlying the digital currency bitcoin, conducting one of the first known tests by a major central bank about how it could use the nascent system known as blockchain.

The central bank confirmed the experiment dealing in interbank payments in a statement from Senior Deputy Gov. Carolyn Wilkins. It stressed, however, that it has no plans to issue a digitized Canadian dollar or conduct tests dealing with public money.

The Bank of Canada, in conjunction with New York-based startup R3 CEV, said it has taken part in a “proof of concept” experiment using blockchain technology, which is a so-called distributed-ledger system that is billed as being more open, transparent and flexible than existing databases widely used in banking.

Others involved in the project included Payments Canada, which owns and operates the country’s payment-clearing and settlement infrastructure, and Canadian commercial banks.

“The Bank’s goal in these projects is solely to better understand the technology firsthand,” Ms. Wilkins said. “Other frameworks need to be investigated, and there are many hurdles that need to be cleared before such a system would ever be ready for prime time.” She added that many central banks are investigating similar questions.

Indeed, many central banks in recent months have been exploring blockchain technology, in particular the Bank of England. A March speech by the bank’s deputy governor, Ben Broadbent, explored the likely ramifications of a digital pound.

Ms. Wilkins is scheduled to give a speech Friday to Payments Canada.

The U.S. Federal Reserve doesn’t have an official stance on blockchain technology, but it has taken note of it. A conference earlier this month for central bankers at the Fed’s Washington headquarters focused on blockchain. Chairwoman Janet Yellen addressed the conference and encouraged the participants to learn as much as they can about the new technology.

Bank of Canada officials told Canadian lawmakers in 2014 that digital currency was a “strategic priority” for the bank, and at the time it planned to beef up research efforts to understand the use of digital currency and its implications.

The Bank of Canada outlined its latest project at a conference this week. The discussion was reported in the Financial Times.

Write to Paul Vieira at paul.vieira@wsj.com and Paul Vigna at paul.vigna@wsj.com

Indian central bank chief to step down in surprise move

BY DEVIDUTTA TRIPATHY AND SUVASHREE CHOUDHURY-Sun Jun 19, 2016

India's "rock star" central bank governor Raghuram Rajan, feted by foreign investors but under pressure from political opponents at home, stunned government officials and colleagues on Saturday by announcing he would step down after just one three-year term.

Rajan, a former chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, is held in high esteem by policymakers and investors at home and abroad for overhauling the way the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) operates.

But he has faced mounting criticism from a faction within Prime Minister Narendra Modi's ruling party for keeping interest rates high and over a perception that he had begun to stray into politics.

In a letter to RBI staff, Rajan said he planned to return to academia, even as he noted two of his actions - the creation of a monetary policy committee to set interest rates and the clean-up of the heavily indebted banking sector - remained unfinished.

"While I was open to seeing these developments through, on due reflection, and after consultation with the government, I want to share with you that I will be returning to academia when my term as Governor ends on Sept. 4, 2016," Rajan wrote.

"I will, of course, always be available to serve my country when needed."

It will be the first time since 1992 that an RBI governor has departed after a single three-year term.

A senior government official told Reuters there were seven candidates on an initial long list to replace Rajan.

"REXIT"

While there had been some speculation Rajan might not stay for a second term - dubbed "Rexit" in a nod to Britain's vote on European Union membership - government officials said they were surprised by the timing and manner of the announcement.

"Rajan put this in an open letter. It's his decision and we will do what best can be done," said one senior aide to Modi.

Hailed as a "rock star" and "James Bond" by India's media when he was appointed by the previous Congress government in September 2013, Rajan won praise for his sure-footed handling of the country's worst currency crisis in more than two decades.

"The government appreciates the good work done by him and respects his decision. A decision on his successor would be announced shortly," Finance Minister Arun Jaitley said in a tweet on Saturday.

P. Chidambaram, the Congress finance minister who appointed Rajan, said he was profoundly saddened by the decision.

"I am not surprised at all. The government had invited this development through a craftily planned campaign of insinuations, baseless allegation and puerile attacks on a distinguished academic and economist," he said in a tweet.

"SAY GOODBYE!"

Rajan, who is on leave from the University of Chicago, had faced strident criticism from right-wing members of Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party, including parliament member Subramanian Swamy, who has waged a campaign against his economic policies.

Swamy, a Hindu nationalist and former Harvard economist, tweeted his delight that Rajan "has said he will go back to U.S. Whatever fig leaf he wants for hiding the reality we should not grudge it. Say goodbye!"

Swamy had described Rajan as "mentally not fully Indian".

Another senior official said Rajan's criticism of rising intolerance in India was seen as direct interference in politics, complicating a decision on whether to re-appoint him.

"I wasn't aware of this and I don't think any of us were," said a senior policymaker who works closely with Rajan. "Looks like the government has taken a decision and he (Rajan) came to know about it and then sent this letter."

Still, Rajan was known to have a good working relationship with Modi, who called the RBI governor a "good teacher" on economic matters, and officials had previously told Reuters that Modi's administration would re-appoint the governor, should he wish to stay on.

Many of Rajan's key accomplishments have come in close collaboration with the Modi government. Rajan pushed for inflation targeting to tackle India's history of volatile prices, which was then made law by the government last year.

LONG LIST

Rajan's departure was likely to roil markets on Monday, analysts said, at a time when global factors such as Britain's referendum on European Union membership are already weighing.

"It's a volatile period and as an investor I feel this was unnecessary. His term was ending in September anyway, they could have waited until then," Salman Ahmed, chief investment strategist at Lombard Odier Asset Management in London, said.

"What Mr Rajan wanted was to build a stronger institution and that cannot be one person, the market understands that. What's unnerving is the timing," he said, adding he expected at least a 1.5-2.0 percent fall in the rupee INR=D2.

"My recommendation to the government is to appoint a successor as soon as possible. Mr Rajan brought a lot of credibility to that post and if we have a name with a similar CV, that will go a long way to reassure markets."

In a move to pre-empt concerns the government lacked a credible field of replacements, the senior official said the candidates on the long list to succeed Rajan included RBI Deputy Governor Urjit Patel and Arundhati Bhattacharya, who is chair of State Bank of India (SBI.NS), the country's largest bank.

The others are Vijay Kelkar, Rakesh Mohan, Ashok Lahiri, Subir Gokarn and Ashok Chawla, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter.

They are mostly veterans of the RBI, the Indian civil service or the two major global financial bodies, the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.

The official played down concerns that Indian markets might swoon on Monday.

"I'll be very frank with you – that is not our assessment," he said. "Our assessment is that, if at all, there would be some mild tremors."

(Additional reporting by Rafael Nam and Euan Rocha in Mumbai, Neha Dasgupta, Rupam Jain, Rajesh Kumar Singh, Manoj Kumar and Douglas Busvine in New Delhi, and Sujata Rao in London; Writing by Alex Richardson; Editing by Rafael Nam and David Clarke)

Researchers find new ways to make clean hydrogen and rechargable zinc batteries

Stanford engineers created arrays of silicon nanocones to trap sunlight and improve the performance of solar cells made of bismuth vanadate (1μm=1,000 nanometers). Credit: Wei Chen and Yongcai Qiu, Stanford

 17, 2016 

A Stanford University research lab has developed new technologies to tackle two of the world's biggest energy challenges - clean fuel for transportation and grid-scale energy storage.

The researchers described their findings in two studies published this month in the journals Science Advances and Nature Communications.

Hydrogen fuel

Hydrogen fuel has long been touted as a clean alternative to gasoline. Automakers began offering hydrogen-powered cars to American consumers last year, but only a handful have sold, mainly because hydrogen refueling stations are few and far between.

"Millions of cars could be powered by clean hydrogen fuel if it were cheap and widely available," said Yi Cui, an associate professor of materials science and engineering at Stanford.

Unlike gasoline-powered vehicles, which emit carbon dioxide (CO2), hydrogen cars themselves are emissions free. Making hydrogen fuel, however, is not emission free: today, making most hydrogen fuelinvolves natural gas in a process that releases CO2 into the atmosphere.

To address the problem, Cui and his colleagues have focused on photovoltaic water splitting. This emerging technology consists of a solar-powered electrode immersed in water. When sunlight hits the electrode, it generates an electric current that splits the water into its constituent parts, hydrogen and oxygen.

Finding an affordable way to produce clean hydrogen from water has been a challenge. Conventional solar electrodes made of silicon quickly corrode when exposed to oxygen, a key byproduct of water splitting. Several research teams have reduced corrosion by coating the silicon with iridium and other precious metals.

Writing in the June 17 edition of Science Advances, Cui and his colleagues presented a new approach using bismuth vanadate, an inexpensive compound that absorbs sunlight and generates modest amounts of electricity.

"Bismuth vanadate has been widely regarded as a promising material for photoelectrochemical water splitting, in part because of its low cost and high stability against corrosion," said Cui, an associate professor of photon science at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory. "However, the performance of this material remains well below its theoretical solar-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency."

Bismuth vanadate absorbs light but is a poor conductor of electricity. To carry a current, a solar cell made of bismuth vanadate must be sliced very thin, 200 nanometers or less, making it virtually transparent. As a result, visible light that could be used to generate electricity simply passes through the cell.

To capture sunlight before it escapes, Cui's team turned to nanotechnology. The researchers created microscopic arrays containing thousands of silicon nanocones, each about 600 nanometers tall.

Left (a): A conventional zinc (Zn) battery short circuits when dendrites growing on the zinc anode make contact with the metal cathode. Right (b): Stanford scientists redesigned the battery using plastic and carbon insulators to prevent zinc dendrites from reaching the cathode. Credit: Shougo Higashi

"Nanocone structures have shown a promising light-trapping capability over a broad range of wavelengths," Cui explained. "Each cone is optimally shaped to capture sunlight that would otherwise pass through the thin solar cell."

In the experiment, Cui and his colleagues deposited the nanocone arrays on a thin film of bismuth vanadate. Both layers were then placed on a solar cell made of perovskite, another promising photovoltaic material.

When submerged, the three-layer tandem device immediately began splitting water at a solar-to-hydrogen conversion efficiency of 6.2 percent, already matching the theoretical maximum rate for a bismuth vanadate cell.

"The tandem solar cell continued generating hydrogen for more than 10 hours, an indication of good stability," said Cui, a principal investigator at the Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences. "Although the efficiency we demonstrated was only 6.2 percent, our tandem device has room for significant improvement in the future."

Rechargeable zinc battery

In a second study published in the June 6 edition of Nature Communications, Cui and Shougo Higashi, a visiting scientist from Toyota Central R&D Labs Inc., proposed a new battery design that could help solve the problem of grid-scale energy storage.

"Solar and wind farms should be able to provide around-the-clock energy for the electric grid, even when there's no sunlight or wind," Cui said. "That will require inexpensive batteries and other low-cost technologies big enough to store surplus clean energy for use on demand."

In the study, Cui, Higashi and their co-workers designed a novel battery with electrodes made of zinc and nickel, inexpensive metals with the potential for grid-scale storage.

A variety of zinc-metal batteries are available commercially, but few are rechargeable, because of tiny fibers called dendrites that form on the zinc electrode during charging. Theses dendrites can grow until they finally reach the nickel electrode, causing the battery to short circuit and fail.

The research team solved the dendrite problem by simply redesigning the battery. Instead of having the zinc and nickel electrodes face one another, as in a conventional battery, the researchers separated them with a plastic insulator and wrapped a carbon insulator around the edges of the zinc electrode.

"With our design, zinc ions are reduced and deposited on the exposed back surface of the zinc electrode during charging," said Higashi, lead author of the study. "Therefore, even if zinc dendrites form, they will grow away from the nickel electrode and will not short the battery."

To demonstrate stability, the researchers successfully charged and discharged the battery more than 800 times without shorting.

"Our design is very simple and could be applied to a wide range of metal batteries," Cui said.
More information: Efficient solar-driven water splitting by nanocone BiVO4-perovskite tandem cells, Science Advances, DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1501764

Provided by Stanford University

Thailand: Justice Ministry seeking to remove ‘ya ba’ from ‘most-dangerous drugs’ list

'Ya ba' pills, which are a mixture of methamphetamine and caffeine. Pic: Wikimedia Commons.

17th June 2016

THAILAND’S Justice Ministry is currently looking into a proposal to exclude ‘ya ba’, or pills containing a mixture of methamphetamine and caffeine, from the list of narcotics and to instead treat it as a normal drug in order to encourage drug addicts to seek help.

At a meeting to discuss narcotics issues on a global scale, Justice Minister Paiboon Koomchaya said even after 28 years of fighting against drugs and drug abuse, the world had yet to see any large strides towards victory, and the number of drug addicts is only increasing.

He said that governments were now changing tack and trying to find ways to “co-exist” with drugs, and called for Thailand to overhaul its narcotics laws, including allowing courts to sentence convicted drug addicts to treatment and rehabilitation rather than a prison term.

Thai PBS quoted Paiboon saying that methamphetamines are less hazardous to one’s health compared to cigarettes and liquor, but that society at large accepts cigarettes and liquor as the norm, as opposed to meth.

SEE ALSO: Asia’s war on meth has failed; now it’s time to look at the alternatives

However, local health experts have voiced their concerns over the proposal, as they believe that leniency will not help reduce the number of drug users.

A professor at Chulalongkorn University’s Faculty of Medicine, Dr. Pisonthi Chongtrakul, told theBangkok Post that de-listing ‘ya ba’ may result in improper use of the drug.

“A new approach is to provide rehab treatment for drug users instead of criminalizing them, which is a better way to tackle the problem,” he said.

In response to criticisms of the move to de-list ‘ya ba’ as a narcotic, Paiboon said allowing people to legally possess the drug was actually part of the government’s “secret and well-advanced” drug reforms.

On Thursday, 800,000 ‘ya ba’ pills – which means “mad drug” or “crazy drug” in Thai – were confiscated in Suphan Buri following a car chase, reported the Bangkok Post.

According to 2014 statistics from the Office of the Narcotics Control Board and the Narcotics Suppression Bureau, there are 1.3 million people in Thailand who are addicted to drugs, which is approximately 2 percent of the Southeast Asian nation’s population.

Yellow fever vaccine: UN backs lower doses amid shortage

Angola has been hit hard by a yellow fever outbreak

17 June 2016

UN health experts have recommended cutting the standard dose of yellow fever vaccine by 80% in emergencies, amid a global vaccine shortage.

A smaller dose would provide immunity for at least 12 months, they said.

Emergency stocks have been depleted by a mass immunisation programme in Angola, where the disease has killed more than 300 people since December.

A surge of cases in the Democratic Republic of Congo has raised fears of a crisis situation.

The current outbreak of the disease has seen 18 million vaccine doses distributed in Angola, DR Congo and Uganda.

The global stockpile of the vaccine has already been depleted twice since February.

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In a statement, the World Health Organization (WHO) cautioned that so-called "fractional dosing" would only be used as a short-term measure in emergency situations where a shortage exists.

A regular dose of the vaccine provides immunity for life. The WHO said it remained unclear whether fractional doses would work for young children.

It said that current vaccine stocks were adequate but an outbreak in DR Congo's populous capital, Kinshasa, meant the strategy was being seriously considered "to prevent transmission through large-scale vaccination campaigns".

DR Congo has reported 1,044 suspected cases of yellow fever since March, including 71 deaths, according to the WHO.

Of 61 confirmed cases, 53 were linked to travel to Angola.

Angola has reported 3,137 suspected cases since December, with 345 deaths reported.

Studies have shown that even vaccine doses of one 10th the regular amount can produce an immune response in healthy adults, Jacqueline Weyer of South Africa's National Institute for Communicable Diseases told the BBC.

"The fear is that yellow fever outbreaks may occur in other locations, or continue to spread, with the consequent need for more vaccine, which cannot be produced in good time," she said.

What is yellow fever?

• Caused by a virus that is transmitted to humans by mosquitoes.
• Difficult to diagnose and often confused with other diseases or fevers.
• Presence of yellow fever antibodies can be detected by blood tests.
• Most people recover after the first phase of infection that usually involves fever, muscle and back pain, headache, shivers, loss of appetite, and nausea or vomiting.
• About 15% of people face a second, more serious phase involving high fever, jaundice, bleeding and deteriorating kidney function.
• Half of those who enter the 'toxic' phase usually die within 10 to 14 days. The rest recover.

Source: WHO