Trump must be impeached. Here’s why.

President Trump in the East Room of the White House on Friday. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)

By Laurence H. Tribe May 13

Laurence H. Tribe is Carl M. Loeb University Professor and Professor of Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School.

The time has come for Congress to launch an impeachment investigation of President Trump for obstruction of justice.

The remedy of impeachment was designed to create a last-resort mechanism for preserving our constitutional system. It operates by removing executive-branch officials who have so abused power through what the framers called “high crimes and misdemeanors” that they cannot be trusted to continue in office.

The Washington Post's Bob Woodward weighs in on President Trump's decision to fire FBI Director James Comey, and remembers the Saturday Night Massacre and the Watergate scandal. (Peter Stevenson/The Washington Post)

No American president has ever been removed for such abuses, although Andrew Johnson was impeached and came within a single vote of being convicted by the Senate and removed, and Richard Nixon resigned to avoid that fate.

Now the country is faced with a president whose conduct strongly suggests that he poses a danger to our system of government.

Ample reasons existed to worry about this president, and to ponder the extraordinary remedy of impeachment, even before he fired FBI Director James B. Comey and shockingly admitted on national television that the action was provoked by the FBI’s intensifying investigation into his campaign’s ties with Russia.

Even without getting to the bottom of what Trump dismissed as “this Russia thing,” impeachable offenses could theoretically have been charged from the outset of this presidency. One important example is Trump’s brazen defiance of the foreign emoluments clause, which is designed to prevent foreign powers from pressuring U.S. officials to stray from undivided loyalty to the United States. Political reality made impeachment and removal on that and other grounds seem premature.

No longer. To wait for the results of the multiple investigations underway is to risk tying our nation’s fate to the whims of an authoritarian leader.

Comey’s summary firing will not stop the inquiry, yet it represented an obvious effort to interfere with a probe involving national security matters vastly more serious than the “third-rate burglary” that Nixon tried to cover up in Watergate. The question of Russian interference in the presidential election and possible collusion with the Trump campaign go to the heart of our system and ability to conduct free and fair elections.

Consider, too, how Trump embroiled Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, despite Sessions’s recusal from involvement in the Russia investigation, in preparing admittedly phony justifications for the firing on which Trump had already decided. Consider how Trump used the vice president and White House staff to propagate a set of blatant untruths — before giving an interview to NBC’s Lester Holt that exposed his true motivation.

President Trump said former FBI Director James Comey told him he was not under investigation during an exclusive interview with NBC News on May 11. (NBC News)

Trump accompanied that confession with self-serving — and manifestly false — assertions about having been assured by Comey that Trump himself was not under investigation. By Trump’s own account, he asked Comey about his investigative status even as he was conducting the equivalent of a job interview in which Comey sought to retain his position as director.

Further reporting suggests that the encounter was even more sinister, with Trump insisting that Comey pledge “loyalty” to him in order to retain his job. Publicly saying he saw nothing wrong with demanding such loyalty, the president turned to Twitter with a none-too-subtle threat that Comey would regret any decision to disseminate his version of his conversations with Trump — something that Comey has every right, and indeed a civic duty, to do.

To say that this does not in itself rise to the level of “obstruction of justice” is to empty that concept of all meaning. Obstruction of justice was the first count in the articles of impeachment against Nixon and, years later, a count against Bill Clinton. In Clinton’s case, the ostensible obstruction consisted solely in lying under oath about a sordid sexual affair that may have sullied the Oval Office but involved no abuse of presidential power as such.

But in Nixon’s case, the list of actions that together were deemed to constitute impeachable obstruction reads like a forecast of what Trump would do decades later — making misleading statements to, or withholding material evidence from, federal investigators or other federal employees; trying to interfere with FBI or congressional investigations; trying to break through the FBI’s shield surrounding ongoing criminal investigations; dangling carrots in front of people who might otherwise pose trouble for one’s hold on power.

It will require serious commitment to constitutional principle, and courageous willingness to put devotion to the national interest above self-interest and party loyalty, for a Congress of the president’s own party to initiate an impeachment inquiry. It would be a terrible shame if only the mounting prospect of being voted out of office in November 2018 would sufficiently concentrate the minds of representatives and senators today.

But whether it is devotion to principle or hunger for political survival that puts the prospect of impeachment and removal on the table, the crucial thing is that the prospect now be taken seriously, that the machinery of removal be reactivated, and that the need to use it become the focus of political discourse going into 2018.

North Korea fires missile that lands in sea near Russia

By Ju-min Park and Idrees Ali | SEOUL/WASHINGTON

North Korea, defying calls to rein in its weapons programme, fired a ballistic missile that landed in the sea near Russia on Sunday, days after a new leader came to power in South Korea pledging to engage Pyongyang in dialogue.

The U.S. military's Pacific Command said it was assessing the type of missile that was fired but it was "not consistent with an intercontinental ballistic missile". The U.S. threat assessment has not changed from a national security standpoint, a U.S. official said.

Japanese Defence Minister Tomomi Inada said the missile could be a new type. It flew for 30 minutes before dropping into the sea between North Korea's east coast and Japan. North Korea has consistently test-fired missiles in that direction.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the missile landed 97 km (60 miles) south of Russia's Vladivostok region.

U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley called the launch a message by Pyongyang to South Korea after the election of President Moon Jae-in, who took office on Wednesday.

"You first have to get into Kim Jong Un's head - which is, he's in a state of paranoia, he's incredibly concerned about anything and everything around him," Haley told ABC's "This Week" program, referring to North Korea's leader.

Haley added that the United States will "continue to tighten the screws," referring to sanctions and working with the international community to put pressure on Pyongyang.

The White House mentioned Russia in its earlier statement about the launch. "With the missile impacting so close to Russian soil – in fact, closer to Russia than to Japan – the President cannot imagine that Russia is pleased," the White House said, referring to U.S. President Donald Trump.

The launch served as a call for all nations to implement stronger sanctions against North Korea, it added.

The missile flew 700 km (430 miles) and reached an altitude of more than 2,000 km (1,245 miles), according to officials in South Korea and Japan, further and higher than an intermediate-range missile North Korea successfully tested in February from the same region of Kusong, northwest of its capital, Pyongyang.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un visits the exhibition of utensils and tools, finishing building materials and sci-tech achievements organised by the Ministry of the People's Armed Forces in this undated photo released by North Korea's Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) May... REUTERS

An intercontinental ballistic missile is considered to have a range of more than 6,000 km (3,700 miles).
North Korea is widely believed to be developing an intercontinental missile tipped with a nuclear weapon that is capable of reaching the United States. Trump has vowed not to let that happen.

Experts said the altitude reached by the missile tested on Sunday meant it was launched at a high trajectory, which would limit the lateral distance it travelled. But if it was fired at a standard trajectory, it would have a range of at least 4,000 km (2,500 miles), experts said.

Kim Dong-yub of Kyungnam University's Institute of Far Eastern Studies in Seoul said he estimated a standard trajectory would give it a range of 6,000 km (3,700 miles).

"The launch may indeed represent a new missile with a long range," said Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, referring to the estimated altitude of more than 2,000 km (1,240 miles). "It is definitely concerning."

Speaking in Beijing, Dmitry Peskov, Russian President Vladimir Putin's spokesman, told reporters Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping had discussed the situation on the Korean peninsula, including the latest missile launch, and expressed "mutual concerns" about growing tensions.

Putin is in Beijing for a conference on a plan for a new Silk Road. Delegations from the United States, South Korea and North Korea are also there.

The launch, at 5:27 a.m. Seoul time (2027 GMT Saturday), came two weeks after North Korea fired a missile that disintegrated minutes into flight, marking its fourth consecutive failure since March.
'CLEAR VIOLATION'

South Korea's new president Moon held his first National Security Council in response to the launch, which he called a "clear violation" of U.N. Security Council resolutions, his office said.

"The president said while South Korea remains open to the possibility of dialogue with North Korea, it is only possible when the North shows a change in attitude," Yoon Young-chan, Moon's press secretary, told a briefing.

Moon won Tuesday's election on a platform of a moderate approach to North Korea and has said he would be willing to go to Pyongyang under the right circumstances, arguing dialogue must be used in parallel with sanctions.

China, North Korea's sole main ally which nevertheless objects to its weapons programmes, called for restraint and for no one to exacerbate tensions.

"China opposes relevant launch activities by North Korea that are contrary to Security Council resolutions," China's foreign ministry said in a statement.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said North Korea's missile launches were a "grave threat to our country and a clear violation of U.N. resolutions".

Ambassador Haley said the launch was not the way for North Korea to earn a meeting with Trump, who has said he would be "honoured" to meet Kim Jong Un under the right circumstances.

Trump said in an interview with Reuters in April that a "major, major conflict" with North Korea was possible but he would prefer a diplomatic outcome. On Saturday, a top North Korean diplomat said Pyongyang was open to dialogue with the Trump administration under the right conditions.

Bonnie Glaser, an Asia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington, said among the responses expected from the Trump administration would be further pressure on all countries to fully implement U.N. Security Council sanctions resolutions against North Korea.

North Korean attempted but failed to test-launch ballistic missiles four times in the past two months. It has conducted various tests since the beginning of last year at an unprecedented pace. It also conducted its fourth and fifth nuclear tests last year.

(Additional reporting by Dustin Volz and Matt Spetalnick in WASHINGTON, Linda Sieg and Nobuhiro Kubo in TOKYO, Christine Kim in SEOUL, and Ben Blanchard and Denis Dyomkin in BEIJING; Writing by Jack Kim and Soyoung Kim; Editing by Neil Fullick, Robert Birsel and Will Dunham)

The Forever Chancellor

Angela Merkel was supposed to face a serious threat to her leadership this year. It turns out she knows Germans better than they know themselves.

• BY CAMERON ABADI-
MAY 9, 2017

It’s time to admit there’s a chance Angela Merkel will be chancellor of Germany forever. Her only real rival in terms of political longevity on the world stage is Russian President Vladimir Putin, who of course isn’t subject to democratic laws of gravity. But Merkel has defied so many such laws over the course of her career that it’s hard to know if there are any that still apply to her, including the most basic — that power plus time equals public fatigue.

With a dozen years under her belt in Germany’s highest political office and a national election approaching in September, this was supposed to be the year that Merkel’s leadership came under threat.Her rivals in the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) overcame their recent pattern of bumbling by nominating a candidate, Martin Schulz, widely considered a plausible head of government. That was in January. Since then, Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has decisively won two state elections and is threatening to win a third next Sunday, in North Rhine-Westphalia — Germany’s most populous state, a traditional SPD stronghold. Germans are already whispering Schulz’s candidacy may not survive next weekend. Either way, Merkel seems to have little to fear in her reelection bid: The most recent national poll gives her a lead of 11 points.

What’s strange about Merkel’s record of electoral success is how consistently she has confirmed the adage that policy failures are an unavoidable part of politics, while avoiding its corollary: that erosions of public support are inevitable, too. The mystery, however, lies less with Merkel than the German public — or, rather, with Merkel’s assessment of what the public wants and expects from politics. That assessment speaks well of Merkel’s intuition. It speaks less well of Germany’s political maturity.

Consider Merkel’s handling of the euro crisis. In contrast to France’s newly elected president, Emmanuel Macron, who campaigned with an impassioned endorsement of the European project and specific plans for permanently reforming it — including a joint EU finance minister and common euro bonds — Merkel has never offered anything of the sort. When Merkel has been obliged to discuss Europe’s economic future, she has typically relied on hollow phrases about the need for “more Europe” and vague warnings about how “the failure of the euro would mean the failure of Europe.” Her lack of vision even prompted rare criticism from Germany’s recent former president, Joachim Gauck, who publicly blamed her for “a lack of energy to tell the population very openly what is really happening.”

Merkel’s reticence is partly a matter of her personality. But chalking up Merkel’s hesitance in the euro crisis to her temperament or biography fails to appreciate the strategy informing it.

Merkel has long believed that Germans, above all, want prudence from their politicians.

Merkel has long believed that Germans, above all, want prudence from their politicians. An object lesson arrived in 2005, after her first run to become chancellor. Merkel received only 35 percent of the vote — enough to take office, but only by forming a coalition with the rival SPD. That disappointing showing was widely attributed to her detailed plans for tax cuts, which her opponents portrayed as a radical plan to redistribute wealth to the rich.

Since then, Angela Merkel has had a rather disillusioned understanding of German political culture. A recent Merkel biography by the German journalist Nikolaus Blome described a study commissioned by the SPD in 2006, which seemed to confirm that theory. It presented two findings: First, the German public didn’t like the reforms passed by Merkel’s government in its first year; second, when the public was presented with arguments and data justifying the reforms, it liked them even less. “Even if there were a revolution underway, Germans would only want to be told about it afterwards,” she told her advisors afterward, according to Blome.

In domestic politics, her signature political method has been an expression of that cynical assessment. Call it leading-from-behind on steroids. Rather than initiate political discussions, she generally allows other politicians to debate issues of their own choosing; Merkel steps in only when a consensus has formed among the public that a particular reform is indispensable. Germans have come to accept this as Merkel’s style in domestic politics on matters ranging from mandatory military conscription (she was for it before she was against it), nuclear power (ditto), and a national minimum wage (against it before she was for it). In instances like her decision not to intervene in Libya, and to resist calls from the United States for more troops in Afghanistan, Merkel’s decision-making was simplified by the fact that German society had already reached a firm consensus on matters of national sovereignty. In all these cases, she’s gotten credit for pushing popular measures, while managing to keep her fingerprints off any positions with even the slightest potential of alienating the public.

It’s gone less remarked upon that she has handled European politics in precisely the same fashion.

Invited to give a speech in 2009 setting out her vision for Europe’s future, she admitted that her vagueness about her intentions was a deliberate strategy, not an accidental oversight. “I don’t think much of these debates,” she said. “I think they contribute to citizens losing trust in the EU of the present.” From Merkel’s perspective, high-flying proposals to fundamentally restructure the European economy are nothing more than fantasies — a psychological balm for Europe’s economic victims, and an invitation for the Continent’s would-be revolutionary politicians to indulge in vanity. There’s a political calculus at work here, too: She intuitively understands that these aggressive positions alienate the German public that is her country’s ultimate decision-maker.

Merkel appreciates that Germany has become the de facto leader of the European Union. But she also thinks that most Germans sooner privilege the comforts of security — in terms of economic well-being and psychological peace of mind — over the responsibilities that come with power. Rahm Emanuel, Barack Obama’s former chief of staff, famously said, “you never want a serious crisis to go to waste.”

In German culture, a crisis is by definition a waste of one’s own energy.

In German culture, a crisis is by definition a waste of one’s own energy.
Merkel’s insistence on austerity in exchange for economic assistance has never just been a defense of German interests or a stubborn insistence on enforcing moral hazard. (Though it has also been those things.) It’s also been her method for slowly educating the German public about — or, perhaps more accurately, coercing them into appreciating — the need for further intervention and deeper integration into the EU.

For Merkel, Europe’s worsening economic crisis has been a critical lever to simultaneously extract concessions from governments on the European periphery and from a parochial German public. It should be no surprise that, while Merkel officially greeted Macron’s victory in France, she has permitted her political allies to aim a barrage of criticism at his program for the EU. Macron has said he hopes to pool liability for various kinds of debt: A completed banking union would ensure bailout costs for individual financial institutions be distributed across the continent rather than borne by individual countries, and the so-called Eurobonds would allow national governments to borrow money against a joint continental credit rating. German conservatives have responded coolly to these ideas. “Neither the eurozone nor France suffer from too little debt,” Deputy Finance Minister Jens Spahn said this week.

One staff member of the Bundestag told me that many German politicians believe Merkel’s long-term strategy toward Europe has always been to play good cop to the dual-headed bad cop of Germany’s Bundesbank and its Constitutional Court. Though she has warned repeatedly that the German Constitutional Court could declare various European bailout measures to be unconstitutional, that’s usually meant that she was waiting for street protests on the European periphery to elicit her endorsement for the proposals on behalf of reluctant Germans.

There’s no reason to think Merkel’s modus operandi will change now.

There’s no reason to think Merkel’s modus operandi will change now. Economic and political logic demand that Merkel eventually initiate changes to how the EU works. But she won’t be rushed, because she doesn’t believe Germans will abide the drama. And that’s precisely why the German electorate will continue to reward her.

Merkel’s leadership style has often raised the costs of the crisis across Europe (including Germany), but it’s hard to argue with her effectiveness in winning over the German public. The major opposition parties, aside from the fringe right-wing upstart Alternative for Germany, have basically ceased attacking Merkel’s EU policies, and the euro crisis seems unlikely to figure much in the pending election campaign at all.

If Merkel again wins reelection this September, it will partly be because of her anodyne affect in the face of Europe’s prolonged economic calamity, and for her patent refusal to say how she envisions the crisis ever ending. That same affect has provoked anger, even disgust, in those parts of Europe suffering economic pain, and, one imagines, among the various leaders on the European stage she has seen come and go. But both sides have managed to drastically misunderstand Merkel’s leadership. If she enters the history books for her achievements, it will be to the extent she has won favor with Germans by making it seem she was never interested in the history books to begin with.

Photo credit: SEAN GALLUP/Getty Images/Foreign Policy illustration

Anti-corruption police investigate UK firm over ex-Nigerian warlord deal

Cas-Global allegedly paid bribe in multimillion pound sale of naval vessels involving UK, US, Nigeria and Norway

One of the disputed ships. It is alleged that Cas-Global paid a bribe to a Norwegian official as part of the sale of seven decommissioned naval vessels. Photograph: Web

Rob Evans-Sunday 14 May 2017

Anti-corruption investigators in four countries are examining a British firm’s links to a multimillion-pound defence deal involving a former Nigerian warlord.

Investigators in the UK, the US, Nigeria, and Norway are scrutinising Cas-Global after it was alleged that the firm paid a bribe to a Norwegian official as part of the sale of seven decommissioned naval vessels. 

The case has not yet been resolved but is set to take a significant turn on Tuesday when the verdict in the first court case arising out of the allegations is due to be announced in Oslo.

In the UK, Cas-Global has been the subject of an investigation since 2014 by the City of London police’s specialist anti-corruption unit.

The investigation is part of an effort by the UK to improve its record on prosecuting companies who are said to pay bribes to foreign officials and politicians to land contracts overseas. For many years, the UK has been castigated for failing to prosecute firms for this type of corruption.

In a report to be published on Monday, campaigners from the UK anti-bribery group, Corruption Watch, also criticise the British government for failing to spot what they believe are signs of potential corruption when Cas-Global was given an export licence in the deal – claims rejected by ministers.

The nature of Cas-Global’s business is not apparent from its accounts filed at Companies House since it was set up in 2008. Last month, Companies House declared that it was intending to dissolve the firm as it appeared to be moribund. The firm could not be reached for comment.

The Norwegian authorities are prosecuting a civil servant, Bjørn Stavrum, over allegations that he was paid $154,000 by Cas-Global to help secure the sale of the naval vessels. Stavrum denies the claims.

According to the indictment, Stavrum, who was responsible for the sale, was paid the money directly into his bank account in two instalments in 2013.

“The payments were improper, among other things because of Stavrum’s position, the amounts involved, and because they were kept hidden from his employer,” the indictment alleges.

Prosecutors allege that the payments were designed to disguise how the vessels were being sold to a former Nigerian warlord, Government Ekpemupolo – a purchase that would have needed an export licence from the Nordic authorities. Ekpemupolo has denied being involved in corruption.

The City of London police said its detectives “continue to actively investigate the suspected bribery of a Norwegian public official in connection with the purchase of ex-naval vessels from 2012 onwards. The joint investigation with the Norwegian authorities has led to the arrest of four men.”

The City of London police added its detectives “are also liaising with the American and Nigerian authorities in respect of enquiries connected to financial transfers”.

The export of the vessels has been investigated by Corruption Watch which has used the freedom of information act to obtain documents about the case. The campaigners say that the case demonstrates the need to strengthen anti-corruption measures when export licences are being awarded.

Paul Holden, Corruption Watch’s investigations director, said: “The UK government is clearly open to charges of hypocrisy if, on the one hand, it urges countries like Nigeria to fight corruption, while making no effort to prevent corruption in its own export licence process.”

Mark Garnier, junior minister at the Department for International Trade, rejected the claims, saying: “The government does not think that it is appropriate to base an assessment merely on the perception of corruption in the destination country.”

Future of Pak-Afghan Relations

by Ali Sukhanver-May 13, 2017

( May 13, 2017, Islamabad, Sri Lanka Guardian) The so-called Durand Line frontier between Pakistan and Afghanistan was drawn by the British in 1896. This frontier line has been witnessing unpleasant reaction of the Afghan government since Pakistan began patrolling along it last year. This 2,600 km long border line has ever been under severe tension. Recently Pakistan has closed its border with Afghanistan after the increasing tension between the two countries. The situation along this border became more tense when on 5th of this May Afghan border forces opened fire on Pakistan’s security personnel guarding a census team in Balochistan’s Chaman area. At least nine people were killed and over 40 others injured as a result of this firing. Pakistan’s military’s media wing said narrating the details that Afghan Border Police had been creating hurdles in conduct of census in divided villages of Killi Luqman and Killi Jahangir in Chaman area on Pakistani side of the border since April 30. After this grave loss the security forces of Pakistan had to pay back in the same coin. Media says more than 50 Afghan security personnel were killed and another 100 injured. However, the Inspector General Frontier Corps Balochistan Maj. Gen Nadeem Anjum said, “We are not happy over their losses since they are our Muslim brothers”. A senior officer of the Pakistan Army General Amir Riaz said talking to the media reporters on the same issue that the situation will remain the same “until Afghanistan changes its behaviour”. He further said that Afghanistan would not benefit from such attacks in any way and that the Afghan government should be ashamed of such acts.

Practically there had been two different incidents along the Durand Line; one of unprovoked firing on innocent Pakistani civilians and second of Pakistan’s response to this injustice; but it is something very unfair that Indian patronized Afghan media is trying to tell the world a one-sided story in which Afghanistan is being portrayed as a helpless and voiceless country which is in serious trouble at the hands of Pakistan. The Indian patronized Afghan media is trying to show the world that picture of Afghanistan which actually never belonged to Afghanistan. The land red poppies, the safe haven of suicide bombers and a paradise of across the borders miscreants is being painted as a very peaceful and safe country where all people are very happy with the Ashraf Ghani government; where the people have no reservations regarding Indian interference in the country; and where the Taliban have comfortably adjusted them with the present political scenario of Afghanistan with US sending more troops. But the realities are altogether otherwise there in Afghanistan. If Afghanistan were really such a beautiful land of peace and prosperity, millions of Afghans living in Pakistan would not have flatly refused to go back to their own country. For the last many decades Afghanistan has simply been a battle-field, a land of war-lords. No institution, no production, no system; Pakistan knows it very well that its own political, social and economic stability is directly linked with the peace and prosperity of Afghanistan; same thing is also to the knowledge of all hostile forces active in Afghanistan. They know it very well that by destabilizing Afghanistan, Pakistan shall be directly affected.

Earlier these hostile forces had been trying to play the same game in Pakistan but Pakistan’s security forces and the government did not let them play. So now they are trying to kill two birds with one stone. Blaming Pakistan for Mazar-e-Sharif suicide attack and for other terrorist activities in Afghanistan is also a part of the same game. Sometimes it seems a hobby or a technical compulsion or an instinct of some people that they don’t feel satisfied unless they drag Pakistan and its Army into the affairs which in no way belong to both of them. Just cast a look at the recent suicide attack in Mazar-e-Shareef Afghanistan in which a group of disguised suicide attackers manning national army vehicles targeted an army base. In this deadly attack more than 140 Afghan soldiers were killed and countless injured. US military sources confirmed the presence of some important coalition personnel inside the Mazar-i-Sharif base but they all remained safe and there were no reports of casualties among their number. Just after the attacks a senior American military official in Kabul said that it appears likely the attack was either carried out by or planned by a Pakistan-based Taliban faction known as the Haqqani network which is a U.S. government-designated terrorist organization. The official added that the assault likely took four to six months to plan and that it was also likely the attackers had help in advance from Afghan troops on the base. The same story was narrated by a spokesman of the Afghan Ministry of External Affairs but in different words. He said, “The terrorist attack is a stark reminder of the need to immediately dismantle the safe havens and sanctuaries that support and sustain terrorism in Afghanistan from outside its borders.” All these statements and analysis prove that the actual motive behind this ready-made attack on Mazar-e-Shareef base was to fix and frame Pakistan and to prepare ground for the recent bombing on innocent Pakistani citizens.

Blaming Pakistan for all that goes wrong in Afghanistan is not the solution; the Afghan government must try to search for the facilitators of such terrorist activities from within Afghanistan. These facilitators might be among the US troops or among those local Afghans who are playing in the hands of Indian intelligence agencies and might be hidden in the ranks and files of Afghan police and army. Reports say that there are more than 30000 ghost soldiers in ANSF and many more aligned to warlords with tribal loyalties. Even Taliban are also not happy with the Ashraf Ghani government. Ashraf Ghani government must not waste it time and resources in defaming Pakistan for the things Pakistan has nothing to do with. This behaviour of the Afghan government would simply add more miseries to the millions of Afghan refugees in Pakistan.

How Mongolia Is Tackling Violence in the Home, After Years of Neglect

One in five women in Mongolia is subject to domestic abuse. Now a new law gives the police more power and responsibility to combat the problem, and bring perpetrators to justice.

Women in Mongolia have traditionally been left to deal with domestic violence alone, without the help of police or the courts. But with a new law, that’s beginning to change. Joel Saget

Terrence Edwards-May. 4, 2017

ULAANBAATAR, MONGOLIA – In the sparsely populated steppe of Mongolia, where there are not always governing authorities to maintain law and order, nomadic families take care of their own affairs, and have done so for centuries. For some women and children, that means living with abusive husbands and fathers.

That was Amar’s life, before she finally mustered the courage to escape a hellish relationship filled with regular beatings and psychological abuse.

“It was torture,” Amar says, as she tugs a pearl ring back and forth on her finger. “He hit me until my face was flattened.” He would sometimes rape her at night, she adds.

Sometimes she’d have her children stay with family members so they would not have to witness the abuse.

“We’d sometimes bring our children to his sister’s, and when [he and I] got home, he’d tie me up in a chair and beat me,” she says.

It’s now been five years since Amar left home in the dead of night dressed only in her pajamas with her children. By then, she had put up with the abuse for three-quarters of her 27-year marriage.

She first went to a friend’s house, but has been constantly on the move since to avoid her husband finding her. She spent time in a domestic violence shelter and once lived at a construction site.

“Ever since, I’ve lived like a stray, going from place to place,” she says. One of her children is still with her; the others have grown up and left.

When Amar first told her parents and in-laws about the attacks, she said they had a hard time believing it and even suggested that the punishments were because she was failing as a housewife. “Now people blame me for marrying a bad man,” she says with tears in her eyes. And she can’t help but place some of that guilt on herself. “All in all, it was my bad luck for marrying a bad man.”

It took Amar 27 years to leave her abusive husband. (Terrence Edwards)

The U.N. estimates that one in five Mongolian women is subject to domestic abuse, but in the past, women’s advocates say, the police have been reluctant to get involved. When they did, there was nothing to stop the men from returning home and offending again.

But law enforcement in Mongolia is now better prepared to take on cases of domestic violence. A new law that took effect last year has made protecting people from their relatives part of a police officer’s job, and the police are now held accountable for ignoring complaints.

A police officer, who asked not to be named, says responding to domestic violence against women and children is a chief focus of changes within the police force, and that a special unit had been established for responding to domestic abuse.

“We rallied for change in the criminal code,” says Tsedevdamba Oyungerel, a former M.P. who made the law a cornerstone of her career.

In the past, abusers were given light penalties and were quickly out of prison after being sentenced. “There was a circle of violence to break,” Oyungerel says.

This isn’t the first time Mongolia has tried to tackle domestic abuse. Nordogjav Ariuntaria, a lawyer and a coordinator for legal reform at the National Center Against Violence (NCAV) in Mongolia, says a 2004 law that criminalized domestic violence didn’t have the teeth to punish offenders, nor to protect victims.

As a result, since 2010, over 100 people have been murdered and about 4,000 injuries inflicted as a result of domestic abuse, according to documents shown to News Deeply by NCAV. And those are just the cases that were reported.

“The police weren’t on board,” says Ariuntaria of the 2004 law. “It’s still a problem now, but things are better than before.”

NCAV says it has assisted 19,000 people – mostly women and children – since the organization was established in 1995. It runs three domestic violence shelters and provides counseling and legal support for women and children escaping abuse at home.

Ariuntaria says the new law is definitely an improvement, but the group and others think it can still be better. “There’s still work to be done,” says Oyungerel. “There’s still not a strong enough mechanism to protect women.”

Oyungerel and Ariuntaria say parliament has not yet voted on provisions that would enforce restraining orders and give some lenience for women who kill their spouses in self-defense. There are currently 36 women currently in prison for killing their spouses, and the NCAV believes they are facing unjust sentences. Around a quarter of the provinces outside the capital still don’t have any shelters for women and children.

Amar says the new law doesn’t do enough to help traumatized victims who have already lost everything. “I’ve spent half of my life running away,” she says, adding that she’s still on the run from her husband. “Now I’m 53 and retirement is coming, but I have no support, except medical insurance.”

“What about my youth and home?” she asks. “There’s still no support for women who start over.”

Philippines: Greenpeace unfurls ‘beached’ plastic whale to raise awareness

A boy looks at a whale shaped art installation that is made of plastic and trash made by environmental activist group Greenpeace Philippines, lying along the shore in Naic, Cavite, in the Philippines May 12, 2017. Source: Reuters/Erik De Castro

12th May 2017

GREENPEACE Philippines has installed a giant whale artwork made entirely out of plastic at the Sea Side Beach Resort in Naic, Civate.

“Listen to the dead whale’s wake-up call, look closer and see what plastic pollution does to the ocean,” Greenpeace Philippines posted in its Facebook page.

“We hope that this installation encourages the public to take action and #RefusePlastic. Let us tell Asean Countries to end the scourge of plastics,” it said providing the link to a petition. The installation is part of Greenpeace’s #RefusePlastic campaign.

Shah A Farhad‏ @BeingFarhad

RT gpph: Join the #RefusePlastic Twitter conversation: A discussion on the dead whale's wake-up call, 10am. #Clima…

As host to this year’s Asean forum, environmentalists are urging the Philippines to take leadership on addressing plastic pollution.

Greenpeace this week expressed concern about President Rodrigo Duterte’s decision to replace environment minister Regina Lopez with ex-army general Roy Cimatu, questioning whether Cimatu would continue with meaningful environmental reform.

SEE ALSO: Philippines: Miners triumph as eco-warrior Regina Lopez booted from office

“We are confident that Secretary Cimatu shall faithfully serve the interest of the country and the Filipino people in his capacity as the new Department of Environment and Natural Resources Secretary,” Duterte’s spokesman Ernesto Abella said in a statement on Monday.

Residents walk past a whale-shaped art installation that is made of plastic and trash made by environmental activist group Greenpeace Philippines, lying along the shore in Naic, Cavite in the Philippines May 12, 2017. Source: Reuters / Erik De Castro

In December last year, a sperm whale washed up on a beach in Samal, Philippines, which was fo

und to have plastic, fishnet, wood and steel wire inside its stomach which lead to its death.

abi aguilar‏ @abibu1218

Whales swallow hundreds of tons of water & can't tell the difference with plastic. No wonder they are slowly being poisoned #RefusePlastic

At that time, cetacean expert Darrell Dean Blatchley said, “Among the 53 whales and dolphins recovered in the last seven years in Davao Gulf, only four died due to natural causes.”

“The rest of them died because of plastic waste, were caught by nets or killed through dynamite fishing or were unable to feed in the sea.”

SEE ALSO: Asian Correspondent 2017 CSR 50 Index

“A majority of them died because of humans,” he said.

The world’s oceans are filled with roughly 250 million tonnes of plastic, with an additional eight million tonnes of plastic dumped into the seas each year.

According to a study released by the Ocean Conservancy and the McKinsey Center for Business and Environment, just five countries – China, Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam and the Philippines – are accountable for 60 percent of this waste.

Asean countries are some of the primary sources of marine plastics globally due to their long coastlines and high rates of plastic usage.

The plastic whale display will be shown until Sunday May 14.