Mahmoud Abbas decrees sweeping internet speech restrictions

Decree by PA leader Mahmoud Abbas imposes fines, prison and hard labor on Palestinians who violate “public manners” or harm “social harmony” with online comments.Wisam HashlamounAPA images

Charlotte Silver-9 August 2017

Palestinian media and human rights groups are calling on the Palestinian Authority to suspend the new “Electronic Crimes” law that critics say is a sweeping attack on the right to free expression and privacy.

Meanwhile, an Israeli minister is facing difficulties in his effort to shut down Al Jazeera.
The law was approved in secrecy by PA leader Mahmoud Abbas on 24 June. Without any public discussion, it reportedly went into effect just two weeks later.

Groups including the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, the Independent Committee for Human Rights and the Palestinian Center for Development and Media Freedoms (MADA), have all denounced the law, warning it will further erode Palestinians’ rights.

Social Media Exchange, a group that monitors laws that affect digital rights in the Arab world, translated the most troubling parts of Abbas’ decree.

It stipulates that acts online that harm “national unity” or “social harmony” will be punishable by hard labor for three to 15 years.

The law allows for anyone to be imprisoned for one year and fined up to $7,000 for violating “public manners” online.

It requires internet service providers to cooperate with Palestinian intelligence agencies, and collect, store and share user information.

It also empowers the PA attorney general to block any website and allows the public prosecutor “to monitor and record online communications” deemed “necessary for investigations.”

Writing for Global Voices, digital rights researcher Marwa Fatafta reports that the law extends to Palestinians living abroad, though it is not clear how it would be enforced on people outside the occupied West Bank.

PA crackdown on journalists

Both Israel and the Palestinian Authority, which work together closely to control the Palestinian population under military occupation, already jail Palestinians for their postings on social media.

The decree’s enactment comes as the PA oversees a wave of press violations including arrests for statements made on social media.

At the beginning of June, the Palestinian Authority arrested 23-year-old Nassar Jaradat for posting on his Facebook page a call for a “people’s revolution” against the Fatah leadership – Abbas’ political faction.

This week, PA intelligence agencies in the occupied West Bank arrested four journalists from several local outlets, accusing them of “leaking sensitive information.”

Speaking at a recent forum of groups concerned about the new decree, Mousa Rimawi, the director of MADA, noted that the PA’s press violations exceeded Israel’s in June and that authorities have blocked access to 29 news websites that belong to political critics.

Trouble with Al Jazeera

Meanwhile, Israel’s communications minister Ayoub Kara is running into difficulties as he moves forward with his promise to shut down Al Jazeera’s Jerusalem bureau.

Following in the footsteps of Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states that have mounted a campaign against Qatar and its media network, Kara and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have accused Al Jazeera of “incitement” and vowed to shut it down.

Amnesty International has called Israel’s attempt to shut down Al Jazeera a “chilling message that Israeli authorities will not tolerate critical coverage.”

“This is a brazen attack on media freedom in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories,” Magdalena Mughrabi, Amnesty’s deputy Middle East and North Africa director, said in a statement on Monday.

But the Tel Aviv newspaper Haaretz reports that Kara is meeting resistance as he attempts to shutter the network in Israel, starting with his request that the Government Press Office revoke the credentials of Al Jazeera journalists.

According to Haaretz, the Government Press Office does not have the authority to revoke press credentials. Israeli security agencies would have to first make the recommendation on the basis that Al Jazeera would “endanger national security.”

“I have contacted these agencies, asking for a professional opinion regarding Al Jazeera,” said Government Press Office director Nitzan Chen, who noted that credentials will not be revoked without an “an orderly hearing, as specified by regulations.”

Kara has asked broadcast companies for help, but they have so far failed to express any willingness to remove Al Jazeera from their service.

He has also asked public security minister Gilad Erdan for assistance, but Erdan referred him to the Israeli police, who sent Kara back to the public security ministry.

This leaves Kara with the option to try to pass an amendment to the law, a process that would not begin until the fall.

Bending over backwards

During Israel’s regular attacks on Gaza, including the last major one three years ago that killed more than 2,200 Palestinians, Al Jazeera has regularly provided Israeli officials with air time to justify their lethal attacks on Palestinians.

Amid the recent increase in tension around the al-Aqsa mosque compound in Jerusalem, Al Jazeera’s Arabic channel interviewed Yoav Mordechai, the Israeli military officer who governs the occupied West Bank.

Despite the network extensively providing Israel with a platform, Kara remains committed to shutting Al Jazeera down, stating: “The safety of our citizens and their well-being supersedes freedom of expression during times of terror.”


“The freedom of expression is not the freedom to incite and foment strife,” he added. “Even democracy has its limits.”

Jerusalem for sale: Christians fight transfer of church land to settlers

The Greek Orthodox Church is facing Palestinian anger for selling land to far-right Israeli groups in the east of the city

Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem Theophilos III (C) at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem's Old City (AFP)

Will Horner-Wednesday 9 August 2017 

Palestinian Christians have pledged to fight against the sale of church land in East Jerusalem to Israeli settlers in a dispute that has pitted Greek church leaders against Palestinian worshippers.

Church members told MEE that protest action and, if necessary, occupation of the sites were the last options available to prevent the transfer of three properties in East Jerusalem’s Old City from going ahead, after a court ruled the sale was legal.

A Jerusalem district court ruled last week that the controversial 2004 deal, which faced allegations of bribery and fraud, was legal.

Ateret Cohanim, a far-right Israeli settler group, which aims to create a Jewish majority in the Old City, are the buyers of the three properties.

Their involvement caused intense anger among Palestinians when news of the deal broke in 2005.

Patriarch Theophilos III has sought to distance himself from the deal, which was signed during the reign of his predecessor Irenaios. Irenaios was deposed from his position and demoted to the rank of monk when the deal was revealed in 2005. 

In an advert published in the Palestinian Al-Quds newspaper, Patriarch Theophilos condemned the court's decision and pledged to appeal it. He will “exert all the efforts and legal and financial means to cancel this deal”, it said.

Allegations of Greek dominance

However, the ad has failed to placate the church’s angry worshippers, the majority of whom are Palestinian Arabs and are unhappy over Greek dominance of the church.

“All the Orthodox churches in the world are national ones,” Alif Sabbagh, a member of the Central Orthodox Council in Israel, told MEE.

“The Bulgarian church, for example, has Bulgarian leadership, the Greek one in Greece has Greek leadership, the same in Russia, Romania... except us, our church has Greek leadership.”

Theophilos’s critics also point to other recently disclosed land sales as evidence against the patriarch. In recent months Arab Christians have held sit-ins and marches against him, carrying banners calling him "unworthy".

“This man [Theophilos] has come to sell and give up our properties,” said Sabbagh.

In July, 14 local orthodox institutions decided to boycott Theophilos and the church synod.

“All the counsels and the committees declared a complete boycott of the patriarch at all levels and all occasions whether they are private or public,” said Sabbagh.

After the court’s ruling, Sabbagh said that the Christians must mobilise and take action to prevent settlers from taking over the properties.

We are completely against and refuse this suspicious deal. It will have very dangerous consequences for the character of the Old City

- Father Atallah Hanna, Archbishop of Sebasteia

“The only thing that can make a change is if we take action and hold protests,” he said. “We have to mobilise the people, the young people, against this.”

Father Atallah Hanna, Archbishop of Sebasteia, a village near Nablus, in the occupied West Bank, and one of the church’s few Palestinian archbishops, told MEE that “those who are selling our properties and orthodox works don’t represent the church”.

“We are completely against and refuse this suspicious deal. It will have very dangerous consequences for the character of the Old City.”

Two of the properties sold to Ateret Cohanim are located at the Jaffa Gate, the main entrance into the Christian quarter of the Old City. Those two properties, the Imperial and Petra hotels, are large, well-located properties and would allow Ateret Cohanim to expand its activities greatly in the Old City. The group is now expected to file eviction orders against the current tenants.

“It is not enough to just speak against the deal, we must take action against it. We have to physically stop the settlers from taking the hotels,” said Hanna, who called on Christians to occupy the sites if necessary.

The Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Palestinian Christians protest against Patriarch Irenaios over the sale of church land to Israeli settlers, April 2005 (AFP)

Secret groups of developers cause concern in Israel

The sale of the properties, which first came to light in 2005, was mired in controversy and allegations of bribery and fraud. The sitting patriarch claimed it was done without his knowledge and blamed an elusive Greek financial adviser, Nikos Papadimas, for forging his signature and accepting bribes from Ateret Cohanim.

Papadimas, who had been based in Jerusalem, left without warning in 2005 after the deal came to light.

He reappeared in 2013 when he was arrested at Athens airport under an international arrest warrant.

Irenaios bore the brunt of the outrage and was forced from his position, despite patriarchs normally serving until death. Irenaios vehemently denied involvement in the deal, claiming instead he had been framed by his opponents and continues to maintain that he is the legitimate patriarch.

Since then Irenaios has been shut up in an apartment in one of the patriarchate's buildings with limited contact with the outside world. He claims his rival in the church, and in particular, Theophilos, forbade him from receiving guests and he refuses to leave as he believes he will not be allowed back in.

Theophilos and the patriarchate say that Irenaios's isolation is voluntary and that he has refused to recognise the legitimate procedures that removed him from his position.

Irenaios's main contact with the outside world is a daily delivery of food, brought to him by a Palestinian Muslim man and hoisted up to his window in a plastic bag.

Israeli media have reported that insiders close to the patriarch say the church, which is the second biggest land owner in Israel, and even owns the land under the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, has come under enormous pressure from Israeli authorities to sell its real estate.

Much of the land is already administered by the Jewish National Fund, which leased it in the 1950s, and church insiders have said that the church retains little actual control over the real estate. The Jewish National Fund is a Zionist organisation established in 1901 to buy land for Jewish settlement of Palestine.

We’re still likely to discover that countries such as Iran and Qatar may be behind these secret groups of developers

- Rachel Azaria, Israeli MP

Other land deals involving the church and secretive buyers have also come to light recently, undermining the church’s claim that it is against the sale of church land.

The church has sold properties and large tracts of land to private investors in West Jerusalem, Jaffa - near Tel Aviv - and Caesarea on the Mediterranean coast, often in secret and without consultation with the current tenants who fear eviction when their leases expire.

The identity of the buyer in one deal has not been disclosed, causing concern in Israel.

“We’re still likely to discover that countries such as Iran and Qatar may be behind these secret groups of developers, which would be contrary to the whole Zionist ethos,” said Rachel Azaria, an Israeli MP at a Knesset committee meeting in July.

The former Jerusalem deputy mayor is drafting legislation that would require sales of church land to be approved by a Knesset committee and that buyers must be Israeli citizens or companies. 

Additional reporting by Lubna Masarwa

US-China Dialogue: A Good Start to Solve Trade Imbalances

Currently, the United States lacks effective measures to solve the trade imbalance problem. For example, on the issue of the transfer of civilian high-tech to China, successive administrations of the United States always seem to be more “verbal” than “action” oriented. During eight years, former President Obama never transferred civilian high-tech items to China.

by Michael R. Czinkota- Aug 9, 2017

( August 9, 2017, Washington DC, Sri Lanka Guardian) The first round of the US-China Comprehensive Economic Dialogue was held in Washington DC. The U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross and China’s Vice Premier Wang Yang co-hosted the dialogue.

This new dialogue was established by Presidents Xi Jinping and Donald Trump at the Mar-a-Lago April meeting in Palm Beach. Since then, the 100-day economic plan for cooperation between the world’s two largest economies has achieved results. The low-hanging fruit harvest addressed agricultural products, agricultural cooperation, financial cooperation, and infrastructure investment cooperation. In addition, China abolished restrictions on imports of American beef. The U.S. delegation in turn attended the international cooperation forum held in May in Beijing, as a signal of support for China’s “Belt and Road” initiative. (The Belt and Road Initiative is a development strategy proposed by China’s president Xi Jinping that focuses on connectivity and cooperation between Eurasian countries, including the land-based Silk Belt and the Maritime Silk Road.)

The first round of the US-China dialogue focused mostly on the bilateral trade imbalance. Any change requires efforts on both sides. From 2001 to 2016, the annual US trade deficit in goooods with China jumped from $83 billion to $347 billion, which is 46% of the total US goods trade deficit. For trade in services, the U.S. bilateral trade surplus was $37 billion in 2016. Two major structural reasons account for the growth expansion of Sino-US bilateral trade imbalances:

First, the substantial growth in imports from China is mainly due to supply chain changes in East Asia since the end of the 1990s. Due to a good infrastructure, many multinational companies moved production from other Asian countries to China. As a result, traditional trade statistics exaggerate China’s export value, all goods shipped out of China are fully counted as Chinese export even though China is only produces only a fraction of the international production chain. Using global input-output data, the OECD found that in 2011, the bilateral trade deficit between the United States and China would be reduced by 1/3 if measured by value added in China. A recent study updated the OECD data, indicated that by value added, China only accounted for 33.4% of the total US trade deficit.

With the US dollar as global reserve currency and the attractiveness of US financial markets to global investors, China experienced massive net capital outflows which leads to major net purchases of dollar assets. This led to capital inflows into the United States, partially raising the value of the dollar and increasing the US current account deficit.

Currently, the United States lacks effective measures to solve the trade imbalance problem. For example, on the issue of the transfer of civilian high-tech to China, successive administrations of the United States always seem to be more “verbal” than “action” oriented. During eight years, former President Obama never transferred civilian high-tech items to China. The former US ambassador to China, Gary Locke (known in China as Luo Jiahui) said that the United States had permitted more than 40 technology exports to China, but none of them consisted of restricted American high-tech products. Some experts estimate that if the United States would open up areas like clean energy, alternative energy saving and energy saving technology to China, the United States would ring up hundreds of billions of dollars of business opportunities, and at the same time significantly reduce the U.S. deficit with China. Perhaps one needs more optimism and courage to solve the problem. But addressed it must be!

Professor Michael Czinkota (czinkotm@georgetown.edu) teaches international marketing at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business in Washington D.C. and the University of Kent at Canterbury, U.K. His key book (with Ilkka Ronkainen) is International Marketing, 10th ed., CENGAGE

FBI raided Manafort home as part of Russia probe

By Daniella Diaz and Evan Perez, CNN- Wed August 9, 2017

Washington (CNN)FBI agents raided a home of President Donald Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort last month, a source familiar with the matter told CNN.

The agents seized materials in Manafort's home as part of the ongoing Russia investigation led by Justice Department Special Counsel Robert Mueller, the source said.

"FBI agents executed a search warrant at one of Mr. Manafort's residences. Mr. Manafort has consistently cooperated with law enforcement and other serious inquiries and did so on this occasion as well," Jason Maloni, a spokesman for Manafort, told CNN. He declined to provide further details.

The so-called no-knock warrant, which was first reported by The Washington Post, was served at Manafort's home in Washington's northern Virginia suburbs on July 26, the day after Manafort met with Senate intelligence committee investigators.

The tactic appears unusual for a case that has been under investigation for months and for which Manafort has already turned over hundreds of pages of documents to Senate investigators. The source told CNN the documents seized included financial and tax records and at least some of the information had already been provided to Senate investigators.

Since his appointment in May, Mueller has quietly gathered a team of more than three dozen attorneys, investigators and other staff in a nondescript office in Washington. Officials familiar with the probe describe it as akin to a small US attorney's office, with FBI agents and prosecutors assigned to separate groups looking into various aspects of the investigation.

These include groups of investigators and lawyers focused separately on Russian collusion and obstruction of justice, as well as the investigations focused on Manafort and former national security adviser Michael Flynn, a US official briefed on the investigation has told CNN.

So far, Trump's campaign has turned over approximately 20,000 pages to the Senate judiciary committee, which is investigating Russia's interference in the election, while Manafort turned over approximately 400 pages and Donald Trump Jr. turned over about 250 pages.

Fusion GPS, the firm that compiled a dossier at the center of the federal Russia probe, has not yet turned over any documents, according to the committee's spokesperson, though a source told CNN the firm plans to provide the committee with "thousands" of pages of documents Wednesday.

The spokesperson declined to provide details about the specific contents of the documents.

CNN's Manu Raju and Tom LoBianco contributed to this report.

On North Korea, Tillerson Plays Good Cop to Trump’s Bad Cop 

Trump’s provocative statements could drown out Tillerson’s appeal for calm, as thousands of U.S. troops stationed in Guam are in the crosshairs.

BY ROBBIE GRAMER, PAUL MCLEARY-AUGUST 9, 2017

While President Donald Trump rattled the nuclear saber at North Korea, his secretary of state urged calm as he wrapped up a diplomatic sortie in east Asia.

“I think Americans should sleep well at night, [and] have no concerns about this particular rhetoric of the last few days,” he told reporters en route to Guam for a refueling stop. “Nothing I have seen and nothing i know of would indicate that situation has dramatically changed in the last 24 hours.”

(Though reports of North Korea producing miniaturized nuclear warheads, crossing an important threshold for nuclear powers, may say otherwise.)

That toned-down talk was a stark shift from Trump, who just hours earlier issued perhaps the most incendiary statement from a U.S. president on North Korea yet.

“North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States. They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen,” Trump said Tuesday from his Bedminster golf resort in New Jersey.

The specter of a U.S.-North Korea confrontation over nuclear weapons carried extra symbolic clout: It came just as Japan marked the 72nd anniversary of the atomic bombing of Nagasaki.

Hours after Trump’s remarks, Pyongyang responded by signaling it was considering strikes against Guam, a strategic U.S. military outpost in the middle of the Pacific Ocean — which happened to be where Tillerson was stopping over on his way back to Washington.

Tillerson said he didn’t consider steering clear of Guam after Pyongyang’s threat. “The North Korean missile capability can point at many directions. So Guam is not the only place that can be under threat. No, I never considered rerouting the trip back,” he said.

“And I do not believe that there is any imminent threat, in my own view.”
But while Tillerson urged calm, the U.S. military has quietly heightened its posture as tensions between the Hermit Kingdom and Washington have gone from a simmer to a boil.

Pentagon officials say they have not been ordered to shift any troops or materiel in the region since Tuesday, but earlier in the week, some critical assets were already in action. On Monday, Guam-based U.S. Air Force B-1B bombers overflew Japan and South Korea in a marathon 10-hour mission which saw them partner with Japanese and South Korean fighter jets. The bombers also overflew the peninsula in July after North Korean missile tests in a show of force.

Situated about 4,000 miles west of Hawaii, Guam has since the middle of World War II been a hub of American military activity in the Pacific. It houses a joint Navy and Air Force base, which is home to nuclear submarines, strategic bombers, and fighter planes that regularly work with countries in the region and monitor North Korean activities. About 6,000 U.S. troops are stationed on the island — and more are on the way. About 5,000 Marines will likely relocate to Guam from Okinawa.

Despite his calming words, Tillerson defended Trump’s provocative remarks, saying they would get through to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in a way past diplomatic signals didn’t.

“What the president is doing is sending a strong message to North Korea in language that Kim Jong Un would understand, because he doesn’t seem to understand diplomatic language,” he said.
“The pressure is starting to show,” he added. “I think that’s why the rhetoric coming out of Pyongyang has gotten louder and more threatening.”

The uptick in tensions came after the United Nations Security Council slapped sweeping new sanctions on Pyongyang, with the support of China and Russia. Both Tillerson and his North Korean counterpart then attended a southeast Asian diplomatic summit in Manila. Though the two never crossed paths, top diplomats from other countries in the region used the forum to rally behind the United States and ratchet up pressure on North Korea.

Tillerson said it’s important to keep a diplomatic off-ramp open to Pyongyang to ease tensions.
“Whether we’ve got them backed into a corner or not is difficult to say,” Tillerson said. “But diplomatically you never like to have someone in a corner without a way for them to get out.”
Meanwhile, back in Washington, Trump’s top aides sang a different tune.

The president “is saying don’t test America and don’t test Donald J. Trump,” Seb Gorka, one of Trump’s top national security aides, told Fox and Friends Wednesday morning. “The message is very clear: Don’t test this White House, Pyongyang.”

Photo credit: MANAN VATSYAYANA/AFP/Getty Images

China prepared to pay the price of North Korea sanctions – foreign minister


North Korean soldiers march during a military parade marking the 105th birth anniversary of the country's founding father Kim Il Sung in Pyongyang, North Korea, April 15, 2017. Source: Reuters/Damir Sagolj

9th August 2017

CHINA’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Monday the country will pay the greatest price of sanctions on North Korea due to its economic ties with the pariah state, but will abide by the United Nations resolution in the interest of world peace.

During the Asean Regional Forum in Manila, Wang said sanctions highlighted the international community’s opposition to the North’s nuclear weapons programme and continued missile tests.

“Owing to China’s traditional economic ties with North Korea, it will mainly be China paying the price for implementing the resolution,” a statement from the Foreign Ministry cited Wang as saying.

SEE ALSO: Asean adopts South China Sea framework, urges peace in Korean Peninsula

“But in order to protect the international non-proliferation system and regional peace and stability, China will as before fully and strictly properly implement the entire contents of the relevant resolution.”

China has repeatedly said it was committed to enforcing increasingly tough UN resolutions on North Korea, though it has also said what it terms “normal” trade and ordinary North Koreans should not be affected.

 North Korea’s Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho (back) arrives with Wang Yi to attend the closing ceremony of the 50th Asean Regional Forum in Manila, Philippines, on Aug 8, 2017. Source: Reuters/Erik De Castro


 The latest UN resolution bans North Korean exports of coal, iron, iron ore, lead, lead ore and seafood. They are likely to slash the country’s US$3 billion annual export revenue by a third.

It also prohibits countries from increasing the numbers of North Korean labourers currently working abroad, bans new joint ventures with North Korea and any new investment in current joint ventures.

SEE ALSO: North Korea criticises United States travel ban as ‘sordid’

“We can certainly air our views, but meanwhile, we also could listen to the DPRK’s [North Korea’s] opinions. I think it’s fair and helpful,” Wang said on Monday, as quoted by Chinese state media outlet Xinhua.

The minister also praised the remarks of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, after the US made a series of guarantees including it did not seek a regime change in North Korea or an accelerated reunification of the Korean peninsula.

“Our stand is clear. That is to realise denuclearisation in the Korean Peninsula, safeguard peace and stability and solve problems through dialogue and negotiations,” Wang said.

Additional reporting by Reuters

Eighteen people found guilty over Newcastle sex grooming network

Four trials find 17 men and one woman guilty of nearly 100 offences including rape and human trafficking of vulnerable women and girls
 
 First row: Nashir Uddin, Taherul Alam, Mohammed Hassan Ali, Mohammed Azram, Monjur Choudhury, Saiful Islam. Second row: Abdulhamid Minoyee, Jahanger Zaman, Mohibur Rahman, Prabhat Nelli, Nadeem Aslam, Eisa Mousavi. Third row: Habibur Rahim, Badrul Hussain, Carolann Gallon, Abdul Sabe, Redwan Siddquee, Yassar Hussain Photograph: Northumbria Police/PA

Frances Perraudin-Wednesday 9 August 2017

Seventeen men and one woman have been found guilty of involvement in a sex grooming network in Newcastle that plied vulnerable women and girls with drink and drugs before assaulting them.
In a series of four trials at Newcastle crown court, juries found the men guilty of a catalogue of nearly 100 offences – ranging from rape, human trafficking, conspiracy to incite prostitution and drug supply – between 2011 and 2014.

The men befriended more than 20 victims and invited them to “sessions” at properties, mostly in the west end of the city. The girls were lured by the offer of alcohol and drugs, in particular mephedrone (“Mkat”) and cannabis, and were expected to offer sexual services in return for the substances.
The victims, all females between the ages of 13 and 25, were targeted because they were vulnerable and because they were “less likely to complain because of their circumstances”, the prosecution argued. The court heard accounts of young women who were drugged before waking up to find themselves undressed, having been sexually assaulted.

The men – some of whom were related or friends since childhood – were convicted in four interlinked trials that have run over more than two years. The trials were the result of police investigation Operation Shelter, which fell under the umbrella of Operation Sanctuary – Northumbria police’s probe into the sexual exploitation of children and adults with vulnerabilities. Police identified as many as 108 potential victims in Operation Shelter.

Operation Shelter has clear similarities to grooming scandals in Rotherham and Rochdale, which featured gangs of British Asian men abusing white girls. The men in operation Shelter are from a wider range of backgrounds, including Bangladeshi, Pakistani, Indian, Iraqi, Iranian and Turkish.
The trials, the first of which finished in October 2015, could not be reported until all were concluded for fear that they would be prejudiced.

During the trials, the court also heard how Northumbria police paid a convicted child rapist £9,680 over 21 months to spy on the network of men, attending the parties where victims were suspected of being abused. The jury did not hear evidence from the informant, a British-Asian man in his 30s with links to the defendants, and a judge described him as “inherently unreliable”.

In the final trial, which concluded on Wednesday, Habibur Rahim, 34, was found guilty of rape, the trafficking of seven victims, conspiracy to incite prostitution against seven victims, as well as drugs offences.

Abdul Sabe, 40, was found guilty of conspiracy to commit sexual assault against two victims, trafficking for the purpose of sexual assault against four victims, and conspiracy to incite prostitution against four victims, as well as drugs offences

Badrul Hussain, 37, was found guilty of providing premises for the supply of cocaine, mephedrone and cannabis. Mohibur Rahman, 44, pleaded guilty conspiracy to incite prostitution for gain, three counts of providing mephedrone, and two counts of providing premises for the supply of mephedrone.

In the final trial, Newcastle crown court heard how girls came to trust the defendants, particularly Habibur Rahim – known as Sham – who introduced them to other men in the group.

The court heard that on April 2014, an 18-year-old victim fell asleep while intoxicated by mephedrone, a drug also known on the street as Mcat. She awoke to her find herself on a bed with her trousers down, Rahim next to her and a wardrobe against the door. She said Rahim told her: “We just done it.” He was convicted of rape.

The court heard that Rahim attempted to persuade victims to have sex with his friends, with one complainant saying she did it “out of loyalty to him”. Rahim argued that all of the witnesses testifying against him were liars, that the police were racist and that he was a victim.

Giving evidence, an off-duty probation officer described how she was on a night out in Tynemouth, North Tyneside, when she saw Abdul Sabe, 40, ushering a group of young girls into the back of a black 4x4. She called the police as she knew Sabe to be on the sex offenders register.

Following the report, police visited Sabe and Rahim at Sabe’s flat in Walker, Newcastle. The pair were given warnings for cannabis possession and an entry was put on the police log to say “nothing untoward” had happened.

On another occasion, 7 February 2011, police arrived to speak to Sabe while he was drinking with young girls at the derelict Ship in the Hole pub in Wallsend, North Tyneside.

One girl, then 19, who alleged that she was sexually assaulted by the gang, told the court that police attended whilst she and two other girls were in Rahim’s car with another, unknown man. The victim told how she and the other girls had been drinking cans of lager and smoking cannabis when the police arrived. She said everyone in the car was searched but Rahim was then allowed to drive away.

The court was told how on one occasion a father was called to collect his daughter from a house on Northcote Street, where a number of the crimes were committed, at 12.15am on 27 March 2014. He described how he saw her coming towards him barefoot carrying a glass of orange liquid, “clothing in disarray, highly intoxicated”.

He said her condition worsened and she could not stand. “Her head was flopping and she was unable to control her movements. She was in no fit state to look after herself or control herself.”

The jury was told that the men had no respect for their victims and that they chose them because they were “easy targets”. The court heard that in April 2014, Badrul Hussain – who was found guilty of providing premises for drug supply – was caught traveling on public transport without a ticket. The female ticket inspector claimed that he shouted at her: “All white women are only good for one thing.

For men like me to fuck and use like trash. That’s all women like you are worth.”

The allegations against the men in Operation Shelter came to light in December 2013 following two separate allegations made near the same time – one of a serious sexual assault made to police by a young women and the other by a child speaking to a social worker. The first charges were brought in February 2015.

\

After media coverage of arrests made as part of the investigation, two more complainants attended Byker police station on 17 February 2014 to report crimes.

A woman, Carolann Gallon, 23, also pleaded guilty to three counts of trafficking for sexual exploitation. The majority of those convicted in the trials are due to be sentenced on 4 September this year.

Although many of the defendants were charged with conspiracy to incite prostitution for gain, there is no suggestion that any of the victims were sex workers.

Like other prominent child sex grooming cases, Shelter involves the “boyfriend model” of sexual exploitation, where a vulnerable person is encouraged to believe they are in a loving relationship with their abuser.

In a parliamentary report published in November 2014 into child sexual exploitation in Rotherham, MPs said they had reached “the alarming conclusion” that Rotherham was not an outlier and that there was a widespread problem of organised child sexual exploitation in England.

A spokesperson for Pace, Parents against child sexual exploitation, said: “Sadly we know that child sexual exploitation has been widespread throughout the country and it can affect any child or family. It is good that the perpetrators have finally been brought to justice. There has been immense trauma inflicted on those young people and their families. There will be lessons to be learned.”

A serious case review into Operation Shelter was commissioned by Newcastle safeguarding children’s board and Newcastle safeguarding adult’s board in May 2015. It will be authored by retired barrister David Spicer and is expected to report in December this year.

Stop and search outcomes still vary by ethnicity

By Martin Williams-9 AUG 2017

The claim

“Our outcome rate – one in three positive – is the same, whether you’re black or white … We find the same rate amongst the people of colour and the people not of colour that we stop.” – Cressida Dick, Metropolitan Police Commissioner, 8 August 2017

The background

The Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Cressida Dick, has defended the force’s stop and search tactics.

The practice has been frequently criticised for disproportionately targeting black people; some have argued it is evidence of institutional racism in the police.

There is no dispute that black Londoners are stopped and searched proportionally more often than white people. But yesterday, the Commissioner claimed this was not due to unfairness.

She said that the higher rates of stops and searches among black people were justified because the proportion of positive outcomes were the same, regardless of ethnicity. In other words, the results prove that the police are not biased.

Dick said: “I think that shows – in terms of our activity – fairness.”

The analysis

Police figures confirm that nearly a third of all stops and searches in London lead to some form of further action (police call this a “positive outcome”).

But 68 per cent of the time, officers decide to take no further action (NFA), which suggests their search found no evidence of any wrongdoing.

However, if we break this down by ethnic appearance, a slightly different picture emerges.
Among white people, 36 per cent of cases result in a positive outcome. But among black people, the figure is lower at just 30 per cent.

This suggests that a higher proportion of black people are needlessly stopped and searched, despite not having done anything wrong.

(This is according to the latest figures, but it has fluctuated over time).

But this is just the broad picture. If we look at the specific reasons that police give for conducting a search, there is even more disparity between outcomes.

For instance, half of white people who are stopped on suspicion of having a gun turn out not to have one.

But among Asian people, that figure is far higher – three quarters are let off with no further action.

There are also differences between areas of London.

In Lambeth, which sees the highest volume of stop and searches, further action is brought against more than a third of white people, compared to a quarter of black people.

And in Camden, action is brought against 39 per cent of white people but only 27 per cent of black people.

It’s worth noting, too, that the initial outcome of stops and searches is not an ideal method for measuring the potential for ethnicity bias. After all, even after being stopped, it is possible that police could treat people with different degrees of leniency.

For instance, carrying suspicious items could result in an arrest for “going equipped”, but could equally well be dismissed if police are convinced by the person’s explanation for carrying them. What’s more, even if someone is charged, they may later be found innocent in court.

The verdict

Cressida Dick was broadly correct to say that around a third of all stops and searches result in a so-called “positive outcome”. But there are still differences between ethnicities.


It could perhaps be argued that overall difference is fairly small – six percentage points. But given the sensitivity and importance of this issue, many people will think this difference is worth acknowledging – something that Dick did not do.

Huge protest rally disrupts traffic in Mumbai

People gather to take part in a protest, organised by Maharashtra state's Maratha community, to press their demands for reserved quotas in government jobs and college places for students, in Mumbai, India, August 9, 2017.

Rajendra Jadhav -AUGUST 9, 2017 

MUMBAI (Reuters) - At least half a million protesters brought Mumbai, India's financial capital, to a standstill on Wednesday as they pressed their demands for reserved quotas in government jobs and college places amid a slumping rural economy.

Organisers put the number of protesters at more than two million and said it was the largest rally ever staged in the city of 20 million. Indian media estimated the number of people at the rally between 600,000 and about one million.

Rising unemployment and falling farm incomes are driving farming communities across India, from the state of Haryana in the north to Gujarat in the west, to redouble their calls for reservations in jobs and education.

"Farming is no longer profitable and jobs are not available," said one protester, Pradip Munde, a farmer from Osmanabad, a town more than 400 km (250 miles) southeast of Mumbai. "Reservation can ensure us better education and jobs."

Protesters dismissed as insufficient a proposal by the chief minister of Maharashtra state, Devendra Fadnavis, to consider granting reservations to the Maratha community, which is mainly dependent on farming.

"We are not satisfied with the government's promises. The Chief Minister hasn't given any concrete assurances to solve farmers' problems," said Bhaiya Patil, one of the rally organisers.

People gather to take part in a protest, organised by Maharashtra state's Maratha community, to press their demands for reserved quotas in government jobs and college places for students, in Mumbai, India, August 9, 2017.

The protest rally seriously disrupted road and rail traffic in Mumbai and a city park where protesters gathered could not accommodate all those trying to enter, but police said there was no violence.

"Many people couldn't enter the (park) venue as it was packed. We had made arrangements for 2 million people, but we ran out of supplies," said Patil.

Young people and senior citizens of western India's Maratha community waved saffron flags while more than 10,000 policemen helped to maintain order.

The city's famed 'dabbawalas', who deliver packed lunches to people working in offices across Mumbai, suspended operations for the day, as did schools in the affected area.

Wednesday's rally was the concluding protest of a series of 57 marches staged over the past year in Maharashtra by the Maratha community to press its demands.

Two-thirds of India's population of 1.3 billion depend on farming for their livelihood, but the sector makes up just 14 percent of gross domestic product and there is a growing divide between the countryside and increasingly well-off cities.

Additional Reporting by Radhika Bajaj; Writing by Swati Bhat; Editing by Gareth Jones

A woman had stomach pains. Doctors discovered it was something she swallowed — a decade ago.

By Kristine Phillips August 8 at 5:13 PM

Doctors at a hospital in Australia were bewildered when a 30-year-old woman showed up with intense stomach pains.

Her heart rate was faster than normal, and the membrane lining her abdominal wall was inflamed, one of her doctors wrote in a medical article published Monday by BMJ Case Reports. But her vital signs, laboratory tests, ultrasound and a scan of her liver, gallbladder and bile ducts were all normal.
The woman also had not had surgery recently, which eliminated the possibility that a surgeon accidentally left a foreign object inside  her, according to Popular Science. But a CT scan revealed that a thin, metallic wire was lodged in her intestines.

And it had been there for at least a decade.

That object, a little more than 2½ inches long, was a dental brace wire that the woman used to wear, according to her doctors. It caused her intestine “to twist around on itself — a condition known as volvulus,” according to a news release from BMJ Case Reports, an online collection of articles and case reports submitted by health-care professionals and researchers.

[A child swallows a battery every 3 hours. This remarkable pill-sized origami robot could remove them.]

The woman told doctors that she wore braces 10 years ago and has had them removed since. She also said she does not remember ingesting the wire or losing part of her braces, wrote Talia Shepherd, one of the doctors who treated the woman at Sir Charles Gairdner Hospital in Nedlands in Western Australia.

A thin metallic wire is lodged in a woman's intestines. (BMJ Case Reports)

“The case is so unique is because normally if you swallow something like that, it presents earlier,” Shepherd told Popular Science.

More typically, people unknowingly ingest things like fish bones instead of metallic objects, Shepherd said. And they usually realize it shortly after. In the woman's case, she didn't experience any pain until recently.

“We were all a bit dumbfounded,” Shepherd told the magazine. “It wasn't what I was expecting to find at all.”

Accidentally ingesting foreign objects is not unheard of.

Last May, Live Science published a list of "11 Weird Things People Have Swallowed.” It includes small and pointed objects like a bobby pin and a dental instrument, as well as larger ones like a cellphone, a pen, a lighter and a toothbrush.

In a 2015 medical case from Saudi Arabia, doctors examining an X-Ray of a 16-month-old boy's esophagus came face-to-face with an image of a smiling SpongeBob SquarePants. Ghofran Ageely, a radiology resident at King Abdulaziz University Hospital in Jiddah, Saudi Arabia, told Live Science that the toddler had swallowed his older sister's SpongeBob pendant.

[A dentist lost a barbed tool during a root canal. It was later found in her patient’s stomach.]

Ageely said she initially thought it was a pin or a hair accessory because an X-ray of the child's body from the side showed a thin object in his esophagus. She was shocked after looking at the frontal view.

"' SpongeBob,' I screamed!!!" Ageely told Live Science in an email. “I was amazed by the visible details. You can see the freckles, shoes and fingers … AMAZING.”

Last May, a Texas mother warned other parents after her daughter accidentally swallowed a fidget spinner. They were in a car when she noticed her daughter choking, Kelly Rose Joniec wrote on her Facebook page, according to USA Today.

A recent report by a consumer watchdog group warned parents of the dangers of the popular toy, which it said has “the potential to lead to tragic or deadly consequences.”

As for the woman from Australia, Shepherd said she recovered well.