Chinese authorities have warned Australia not to interfere in the case of a Chinese-Australian writer who has been formally arrested in China on suspicion of spying.  Yang Hengjun, who was born in China but is an Australian citizen, has been held in Beijing since January.  Australia has become increasingly critical of China’s treatment of him in recent months. 

Yang Hengjun has been under investigation for allegedly harming China’s national security, but Australian officials have been told he is now suspected of espionage.  The former Chinese diplomat has been detained in Beijing without access to family or lawyers since January.

In a strongly worded statement, the Australian government says the writer is being held in “harsh conditions” and it has “serious concerns for his welfare.”  Foreign minister Marise Payne said that if the Sydney-based academic was “being held for his political beliefs, he should be released.”

Australian Writer Arrested in China Facing Espionage Charge

Yang Hengjun, a former Chinese diplomat turned online journalist and blogger, detained in the southern city of Guangzhou while waiting for a transfer to Shanghai, after flying in from New York

Alex Joske, from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, says other western powers should intervene on his behalf .

“Countries like the UK, Canada, the U.S. and the E.U.  all have a stake in this.  They all have a duty to try to protect the rights of the people who are being oppressed by totalitarian states and trying to make sure that the rule of law is being upheld,” said Joske.

It’s thought Yang migrated to Australia in the early 2000s.  The writer has been a vocal critic of Chinese authorities, and was arrested earlier this year on a rare trip back home.

Yang’s wife Yang Ruijian has been granted permanent residency by Australia, but China has prevented her leaving the country.

A Chinese foreign ministry spokesman insisted the writer was being processed in accordance with the law.  He said Beijing was strongly dissatisfied with Australia’s comments on his detention and called on it not to interfere in the case.

Media reports have suggested that if convicted Yang could face a long prison term or perhaps the death penalty.

…

A new koala-tracking app and a marsupial hospital are the latest moves to protect one of Australia’s most famous native animals.  The furry, tree-dwelling marsupials are in decline in eastern Australia, and authorities hope a multi-million dollar rescue plan will help to save them. 

The app will help authorities map and track koala populations in New South Wales state, where the furry marsupials are in decline.  Members of the public as well as researchers are encouraged to report koala sightings using the technology.

The koala faces  various threats, including loss of habitat, disease, road traffic accidents and attacks by dogs.  There are also susceptible to the impact of drought and climate change.

Australia Steps up Effort to Save Vulnerable Koalas

A koala hospital and new wildlife reserves are the focus of one of Australia’s boldest plans to protect the vulnerable marsupial. Almost 25,000 hectares of state forest will be set aside for koalas in New South Wales state, which will also set up a new clinic north of Sydney to provide specialist care for sick and injured animals.

Koalas are officially listed as vulnerable to extinction in New South Wales.

In New South Wales and Queensland the famous, and distinctive, animals are listed as vulnerable under national environment laws.  In some areas it is estimated that numbers have fallen by a quarter in the last 20 years.

How it works

New South Wales Environment Minister Matt Kean hopes the app will provide an accurate picture of where the koalas are.

“We are calling on the community to download the ‘I Spy Koala’ app on their phones,” said Kean. “That is about getting the community to go out in the wild, in our national parks, identify where koalas are, record it in their app so that we are better placed to protect them into the future.  This is all about ensuring that the koalas can continue to thrive so that future generations can enjoy them.  This is all part of the New South Wales government’s koala strategy, a AUD$44 (US$29.6m) investment in koalas.  (It is) the biggest single investment of any government ever to ensure that koalas are protected and grow into the future.”

Health threats

A new koala hospital is being built in Port Stephens, 180 kilometers north of Sydney, and will be part of a wildlife sanctuary that will open next year.

There will also be more research into chlamydia, a sexually transmitted disease that has infected many koalas. 

Fences to channel marsupials and other animals away from busy roads and into specially-made wildlife tunnels will also be built.

In parts of southern Australia officials say there are too many koalas, and that ‘overabundant’ populations are damaging valuable types of trees.  In some areas there are programs that seek to reduce marsupial numbers.  But further north, conservationists warn that the decline of the koala is an environmental emergency.

…

President Donald Trump’s path to re-election next year seems to be getting more complicated. Trump continues to boast about a strong economy despite warnings from a number of economists that the U.S. may be headed for a recession in 2020. And the president must now fend off a primary challenge from within his own party from conservative radio talk show host and former congressman, Joe Walsh.  VOA National correspondent Jim Malone has more on the president’s re-election prospects from Washington.

…

Almost two dozen Polish former ambassadors are telling U.S. President Donald Trump that Poland’s democracy is at risk, and urging him to use an upcoming visit to pressure the country’s populist government to respect human rights and stop flouting the constitution.

“Mr. President, you are coming to a country where the rule of law is no longer respected,” the Conference of Ambassadors of the Republic of Poland wrote in an open letter posted on its website late Monday.

Trump is to arrive Saturday in Warsaw to attend ceremonies Sunday marking the 80th anniversary of the start of World War II, which began with Nazi Germany’s invasion of Poland on Sept. 1, 1939. More than 40 other world leaders will also attend.

The 23 former ambassadors, some of whom have had multiple postings abroad and also held government positions at home, are also urging Trump to stop sowing divisions within the European Union and NATO, reminding him that Poland — a country in a difficult geographic position — depends on those alliances for its security and long-term survival. 

“An isolated Poland, surrounded by enemies, conflicted with its neighbors and, as was the case before World War II, reliant solely on geographically distant alliances, is on course to another catastrophe,” they say.

Several critics hit back at the ex-diplomats, depicting them as frustrated former elites who cannot accept their loss of privilege and are disloyal to the nation.

One commentator, sociologist and diplomat Ryszard Zoltaniecki, told the right-wing news portal wPolityce that “they cannot accept the fact that other, new people have the right to create Polish foreign policy” and that they “slander Poland in the international arena.”

It will be Trump’s second visit to Poland, where a nationalist right-wing government that shares his anti-migrant views welcomed him enthusiastically in 2017. Then, Trump gave a speech praising Poland as a defender of Western civilization, without mentioning democracy or concerns voiced often by the European Union that the young democracy was veering off course.

At the time, the government was moving to restrict judicial independence, a process that picked up speed after Trump’s visit. His forthcoming visit follows recent revelations that the justice ministry encouraged an online hate campaign against judges who have been critical of the government.

It also comes as the ruling party, Law and Justice, and the country’s powerful Catholic church have been depicting gays and lesbians as threats to Polish society and to families.

That appears to be a campaign ploy ahead of parliamentary elections on Oct. 13 to appeal to the conservative heartland in a country where many people cling to their traditional Catholic values and feel that they are under attack from EU membership and liberal Western mores.

“The division of powers is being dismantled and the independent judiciary is being destroyed. Human rights are curtailed, and the growing repression of political opponents and various minorities, be they ethnic, religious or sexual, is not only tolerated by the government, but even inspired by it,” the ex-ambassadors wrote. “Your powerful voice calling for tolerance and mutual respect, as well as compliance with the provisions of the Constitution and other laws, may have historical significance.”

The ruling party has repeatedly denied accusations of violating democracy, noting that it came to power in free elections and that it still enjoys the approval of many Poles. It is by far the most popular party in the country, approval that is partly explained by generous welfare policies for families and farmers.

The Conference of Ambassadors is made up of 41 ex-ambassadors who are concerned the current government is eroding democracy and hurting the country’s position on the global stage. It was formed in 2017, two years after Law and Justice took power, and some of its members were fired by the party.

…

Consumer confidence dipped slightly in August after a big rebound in July.

The Conference Board, a business research group, said Tuesday that its consumer confidence index edged down to 135.1 in August, slightly below a July reading of 135.8, which had been the highest since November. Economists had been looking for a bigger drop in August.

The reading on consumers’ assessment of current conditions improved and now stands at its highest level in nearly 19 years.

Conference Board economists say that while other parts of the economy have shown some weakness, consumers have remained confident and willing to spend. The hope is that consumer spending can cushion the adverse effects to the U.S. economy from trade wars and a global slowdown.

But Lynn Franco, senior economic director at the Conference Board, said, “If the recent escalation in trade and tariff tensions persists, it could potentially dampen consumers’ optimism regarding the short-term economic outlook.”

The overall economy, as measured by the gross domestic product, slowed to growth at an annual rate of 2.1% in the April-June quarter, compared to 3.1% GDP growth in the first quarter.

However, the drop would have been much more severe except consumer spending surged to a growth rate of 4.3% in the second quarter. Economists are looking for consumer to keep spending at slightly slower rates in the second half of this year.

For August, consumers’ assessment of current business and labor market conditions increased from 170.9 in July to 177.2 in August, the highest reading since November 2000.

…

More than 800 Namibian refugees in Botswana have vowed to stay put despite a court ruling saying they must return to their country, 20 years after fleeing following a secessionist uprising.

Felix Kalula and hundreds of other Namibian refugees fled to Botswana in 1999, after violent clashes with Namibian government forces broke out over the disputed Caprivi strip, which wanted to secede from the rest of the country.

The Namibian and Botswana governments say it is safe for the refugees to return home, and the migrants have until Aug. 31 to leave. But Kalula says the issues that made them flee have not been resolved.

“Some of our colleagues are still in prison since 1999, and many of them died in prison,” he said, adding that refugees have been asking for dialogue with the Namibian government, but the opportunity has not been afforded.

Kalula was a member of the secessionist party, the United Democratic Party, which remains banned in Namibia as the Caprivi residents were willing to use force to gain independence.

He says they are not prepared to return, and the Botswana government will have to forcibly remove them.

“We have informed the government of Botswana that we are not going to surrender through voluntary repatriation back to Caprivi, or Namibia as they call it, but we would rather be deported,” he said.

Another Namibian refugee, John Shamdo, agrees the situation back home remains unsafe.

“We live in fear that once we are repatriated back home, we shall be killed because of our political beliefs,” Shamdo said.

There should be a referendum to resolve the Caprivi strip dispute, he added, urging the international community to intervene.

Annette Toyano has been living at the Dukwi Refugee Camp in Botswana since 1998, and dreads going back home. 

“Now we are saying, if it is to die, we are going to die. We are not going to opt for repatriation to go back home, because at home, it is not safe,” she said.

Rights group Amnesty International has urged the Botswana government not to repatriate the refugees, and instead is calling for dialogue.

Botswana’s President Mokgweetsi Masisi recently told his Namibian counterpart, Hage Geingob, that Botswana revoked the refugees’ status, as the country deemed it fit for their return.

…

U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton says there is no need for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to “rush” into any course of action regarding Russia’s involvement with separatist forces in eastern Ukraine.

“I think, from the perspective of a new government in Ukraine, President Zelenskiy would be well-advised to look at how to unfold a strategy of dealing with the Russians very carefully,” Bolton told RFE/RL in a wide-ranging interview on August 27 in Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv.

“I don’t think there is any reason to rush it into one course of action or another…. I think working this through over a period of time makes sense for the new government in Ukraine.”

“I don’t suppose that the Europeans are going to have a solution that is readily apparent,” he added in reference to the so-called Normandy format of negations aimed at ending the Ukraine conflict.

Bolton Arrives in Ukraine to ‘Underscore US Support’

It is the first visit to Ukraine by a top US official since the election of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in April

More than 13,000 people have been killed in eastern Ukraine after Russia-backed separatists took up arms against government forces in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions in April 2014.

After being elected in April this year, Zelenskiy called for a four-way meeting with fellow Normandy format participants Russia, Germany, and France to revive peace talks with Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin.

Moscow has said there is interest in renewing peace discussions, but it did not specify a time frame.

On August 26, French President Emmanuel Macron said the Normandy format leaders will hold a summit next month.

“We think that the conditions exist for a useful summit,” Macron said at the end of a Group of Seven (G7) meeting in the southwestern French coastal resort of Biarritz.

Asked if Washington would want to join in Normandy format talks, Bolton did not answer directly, but said there is “significant American interest” in existing issues between Kyiv and Moscow.

“I think that is why we should consider, if President Zelenskiy wants us to be involved [in talks with Russia], whether we should do it.”

Black Sea buildup

Bolton also voiced U.S. concern about Russia’s military buildup in the Black Sea, including in Crimea, which has been unlawfully annexed by Moscow from Ukraine.

“The Black Sea has a number of NATO allies that also are part of it,” Bolton said, adding, “We expect to see access across the Black Sea maintained for all the littoral states and other traders who use the Black Sea.”

He said the United States was monitoring Russian activities in other parts of the world as well.

“The same is true of the Baltic; the same is true in the Arctic. And these are issues that we have had some difficult discussions with the Russians on, as in many other areas where they are trying to intrude beyond where they have a legitimate interest to be.”

Bolton’s visit is the first to Ukraine by a top U.S. official since Zelenskiy’s election in April. He is scheduled to meet with the Ukrainian leader on August 28, according to local media reports.

Upon his arrival, Bolton told reporters that “for me, this is an opportunity to talk about some priorities we have and really also, because of the new administration here, to hear their priorities.”

Bolton added that a meeting between President Donald Trump and Zelenskiy could happen when the U.S. leader travels to Poland early next month.

Minsk Trip

Meanwhile, the presidential administration in neighboring Belarus said on August 27 that Bolton will travel to Minsk for talks with President Alyaksandr Lukashenka later in the week, without giving an exact date.

Bolton’s trip to Minsk, which has not been confirmed by U.S. officials, would mark the highest-level U.S. government visit to Belarus in the past 20 years.

The government of another former Soviet republic, Moldova, said earlier that Bolton would visit its capital, Chisinau on August 29.

Bolton’s Eastern European tour will most likely irritate Moscow, which has been trying to restore its influence over former Soviet republics in recent years.

…

President Donald Trump is fuming over mainstream U.S. news coverage of his attendance at the G-7 in France and defending his preference to host the leaders’ summit next year at one of his private resorts in the state of Florida.

Much of the news and editorial coverage of the U.S. president at the summit in Biarritz, which ended Monday, has not cast Trump in a good light, spotlighting misstatements, perceived gaffes and lack of cooperation with the other world leaders on critical issues such as the environment.

“The pity of the entire Group of 7 show was that it was part of a new normal in which the world’s major liberal democracies basically accept that they are out of sync with the president of the nation that should be leading their efforts to manage the world and its resources wisely and responsibly, but isn’t,” according to the editorial board of The New York Times, one of the newspapers delivered every morning to Trump’s desk.

Washington Post fact-checker Glenn Kessler wrote that during the president’s lengthy news conference at the conclusion of the G-7 meeting, Trump “made numerous false, misleading or inaccurate statements on a variety of issues.”

Trump, who has repeatedly criticized both leading newspapers for its coverage of him, declared Tuesday morning on Twitter, “The G-7 was a great success for the USA and all. LameStream Media coverage bore NO relationship to what actually happened in France – FAKE NEWS. It was GREAT!.”

The G-7 was a great success for the USA and all. LameStream Media coverage bore NO relationship to what actually happened in France – FAKE NEWS. It was GREAT!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 27, 2019

Former Vice President Joe Biden, one of the leading Democratic Party candidates to challenge Trump in next year’s general election, has issued a statement characterizing the president’s performance at the G-7 as “more evidence of how President Trump’s disastrous foreign policy has left the United States isolated while the world moves on without us.”

Biden added, “There is no more telling metaphor for this administration’s abdication of American global leadership than the empty chair at the G-7 climate meeting. When it comes to meeting the existential crisis of our time, Trump has walked away from the table — literally.”

Trump is also facing criticism for calling for Russia to be readmitted to the leaders’ summit without pre-conditions.

“No other members of the group have proposed bringing Russia back into the fold, and as he suggested it — and they resisted — Trump underlined his isolated status,” Michael D’Antonio, author of the book “The Truth about Trump,” wrote in an opinion piece published on the website of CNN, another media entity Trump has frequently labeled “fake news.”  

Four Democratic Party senators on Tuesday sent Trump a letter expressing their strong opposition to having Russian President Vladimir Putin sitting along with the leaders of the group of industrialized democracies.

“Readmitting Putin’s Russia to the G-7 would be contrary to our values and a clear abdication of the United States’ responsibilities as the world’s leading democracy,” concludes the letter signed by Jack Reed, Charles Schumer, Robert Menendez and Mark Warner.

Trump told reporters Monday in Biarritz that next year’s G-7 summit, hosted by the United States, might be held at his private resort in Doral, Florida.

The president noted, among other attributes, the resort’s closeness to Miami’s international airport and its ample ballrooms and parking.

Walter Shaub, former director of the U.S. Office of Government Ethics, said the president pushing his own property for the event “raises the very real possibility that a corrupting influence tainted the procurement process.”

Former Republican senator and presidential candidate Rick Santorum called the president’s promotion of one of his private properties “inappropriate.”

Trump “doesn’t do himself any good by doing things like this,” Santorum said on CNN. “Please, Mr. President. Stop. Please.”

Subsequent media reports about the resort being a potential summit site pointed to a January 2017 Miami Heraldarticle about a settlement between the Trump National Doral Miami golf resort and a business traveler who had sued, alleging his upper body was devoured by voracious bedbugs.

Trump also had a response to that on Tuesday.

“No bedbugs at Doral. The Radical Left Democrats, upon hearing that the perfectly located (for the next G-7) Doral National MIAMI was under consideration for the next G-7, spread that false and nasty rumor. Not nice!” Trump tweeted.

No bedbugs at Doral. The Radical Left Democrats, upon hearing that the perfectly located (for the next G-7) Doral National MIAMI was under consideration for the next G-7, spread that false and nasty rumor. Not nice!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 27, 2019

…

A collection of 27 outfits worn by Hollywood legend Olivia de Havilland is going up for auction next month, some of which she  wore on screen during her acting career more than 50 years ago.

The Sept. 17 online auction at Chicago-based Hindman also includes haute couture designs by Christian Dior that de Havilland, who turned 103 in July, wore at movie premieres and galas between 1954-1989.

De Havilland, a double Oscar winner who is best known for playing Melanie Wilkes in “Gone with the Wind,” sold the bulk of her Dior collection at a London auction in 1993.

The items up for sale next month are being sold by her family, Hindman auctions said on Monday.

They include a green Dior dress the actress wore in the 1964 movie “Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte,” a belted day dress she was photographed in the day before her 1954 wedding to her second husband, Pierre Galante, and eight evening gowns.

Prices for the outfits, some of which include shoes, range from $300-$5,000.

De Havilland made her last screen appearance in the 1988 TV movie “The Woman He Loved” and now lives quietly in France.

…

The U.S. government plans to launch a program in roughly one month that narrowly focuses on protecting voter registration databases and systems ahead of the 2020 presidential election.

These systems, which are widely used to validate the eligibility of voters before they cast ballots, were compromised in 2016 by Russian hackers seeking to collect information.

Intelligence officials are concerned that foreign hackers in 2020 not only will target the databases but attempt to manipulate, disrupt or destroy the data, according to current and former U.S. officials.

“We assess these systems as high risk,” said a senior U.S. official, because they are one of the few pieces of election technology regularly connected to the internet. 

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, or CISA, a division of the Homeland Security Department, fears the databases could be targeted by ransomware, a type of virus that has crippled city computer networks across the United States, including recently in Texas, Baltimore and Atlanta.

“Recent history has shown that state and county governments and those who support them are targets for ransomware attacks,” said Christopher Krebs, CISA’s director. “That is why we are working alongside election officials and their private sector partners to help protect their databases and respond to possible ransomware attacks.”

Demands for payment

A ransomware attack typically locks an infected computer system until payment, usually in the form of cryptocurrency, is sent to the hacker.

The effort to counter ransomware-style cyberattacks aimed at the election runs parallel to a larger intelligence community directive to determine the most likely vectors of digital attack in the November 2020 election, according to current and former U.S. officials.

“It is imperative that states and municipalities limit the availability of information about electoral systems or administrative processes and secure their websites and databases that could be exploited,” the FBI said in a statement, supporting the Homeland Security initiative.

CISA’s program will reach out to state election officials to prepare for such a ransomware scenario. It will provide educational material, remote computer penetration testing, and vulnerability scans as well as a list of recommendations on how to prevent and recover from ransomware.

These guidelines, however, will not offer advice on whether a state should ultimately pay or refuse to pay ransom to a hacker if one of its systems is already infected.

“Our thought is we don’t want the states to have to be in that situation,” said a Homeland Security official. “We’re focused on preventing it from happening.”

Over the last two years, cyber criminals and nation state hacking groups have used ransomware to extort victims and create chaos. In one incident in 2017, which has since been attributed to Russian hackers, a ransomware virus was used to mask a data deletion technique, rendering victim computers totally unusable.

That attack, dubbed “NotPetya,” went on to damage global corporations, including FedEx and Maersk, which had offices in Ukraine where the malware first spread.

Threat ‘far from over’

The threat is concerning because of its potential impact on voting results, experts say.

“A pre-election undetected attack could tamper with voter lists, creating huge confusion and delays, disenfranchisement, and at large enough scale could compromise the validity of the election,” said John Sebes, chief technology officer of the ESET Institute, an election technology policy think tank.

The databases are also “particularly susceptible to this kind of attack because local jurisdictions and states actively add, remove, and change the data year-round,” said Maurice Turner, a senior technologist with the Center for Democracy and Technology. “If the malicious actor doesn’t provide the key, the data is lost forever unless the victim has a recent backup.”

Nationwide, the local governments that store and update voter registration data are typically ill-equipped to defend themselves against elite hackers.

State election officials told Reuters they have improved their cyber defenses since 2016, including in some cases preparing backups for voter registration databases in case of an attack. But there is no common standard for how often local governments should create backups, said a senior Homeland Security official.

“We have to remember that this threat to our democracy will not go away, and concern about ransomware attacks on voter registration databases is one clear example,” said Vermont Secretary of State Jim Condos. “We’re sure the threat is far from over.”

…

A Brazilian Supreme Court justice believes jailed ex-President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva deserves a retrial after leaked social media conversations appeared to show the judge hearing Brazil’s largest-ever corruption case collaborated with prosecutors.

Justice Gilmar Mendes said in an interview with Reuters that the so-called Car Wash investigation was a success in battling the “metastasis of corruption” in Brazil but it became politicized and prosecutors went too far.

Lula is serving a 12-year prison sentence for taking bribes, and the judge who convicted him, Sergio Moro, is now Brazil’s justice minister in right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro’s cabinet.

Mendes’ views could influence other judges on the 11-member Supreme Court, which has postponed a politically charged ruling on whether Moro was impartial when trying Lula. If it rules he was not, Lula would face retrial and could be exonerated. The Bolsonaro government and its supporters fiercely oppose any move by the court that could result in Lula’s freedom.

Mendes said there are doubts about whether due process was followed in Lula’s trial and whether he was actually complicit in the huge corruption scheme uncovered by Car Wash that involved bribes and political kickbacks on contracts with oil company Petrobras and other state-run companies.

“We owe Lula a fair trial,” Mendes said in the interview on Thursday in his Supreme Court offices.

Mendes has been a main critic of the excessive use of plea bargains and provisional detentions of suspects in the sprawling Car Wash investigation that led to the jailing of high-profile politicians and construction executives. He has previously been vocal about perceived irregularities in the prosecution of Lula.

Lula, a popular leftist leader, was tried for receiving a beachside apartment and a country house from engineering firms in return for their winning lucrative state contracts under his Workers Party’s government.

The leaking of conversations between Moro and prosecutors by the news website The Intercept was a positive step, according to Mendes, as it could be the nail in the coffin of the Car Wash investigation that had come to “monopolize” Brazil’s war on corruption.

“Car Wash had become a sort of Holy Trinity: They investigated, they judged, they convicted and they made the laws,” Mendes said.

Moro and lead Car Wash prosecutor Deltan Dalagnol have denied any wrongdoing in their communications.

Mendes said the leaked conversations suggest Moro and prosecutors behaved improperly without oversight from other institutions.

The leaks revealed that prosecutors went as far as planning to investigate Mendes, his family and the Supreme Court’s current Chief Justice Dias Toffoli for tax irregularities.

“But things are being put back in their place,” Mendes said, referring to pushback from politicians in Congress, where lawmakers – many of whom have been probed for graft – passed a bill that curtails the investigative powers of prosecutors and judges.

Congress also blocked Moro’s plan to move to his ministry the Council for Control over Financial Activities Control (COAF), a key tool for flagging suspicious funds moving through the banking system. It has now been put under the Central Bank’s responsibility.

Mendes said the attempt to move the COAF was part of a political plan to gain access to tax and other information that could be leaked or used against critics, even to blackmail them.

Whoever controls such information has “immense political power,” he said.

He provided no evidence to support this. The Justice Ministry did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

…

Putting on a pair of jeans or drinking a beer has a cost beyond the price tag, with billions of tonnes of water used globally each year to manufacture them and other consumer goods, companies said at an international water conference on Monday.

But with population growth and climate change making water a scarcer and more precious resource, using water wisely is now a key to remaining profitable, they said.

From growing cotton for textiles to manufacturing drinks and ensuring consumers have enough water as well, efficient water use is high on the agenda, representatives of popular brands said during opening events at World Water Week in Stockholm.

“Gap Inc. sees water as a human right,” Lisa Hook who works on sustainable innovation for Gap Inc. told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “We can’t do business where there is no water.”

Cotton is a thirsty crop and it takes about 1,000 gallons of water to make one pair of jeans, Hook said.

The global apparel industry also contributes about 20% of the pollution in fresh water sources around the world from its laundries, mills and other facilities, she added.

Many businesses now operate in regions facing high water stress, from India to Vietnam and California, company representatives said.

By 2025, half of the world’s population will be living in water-stressed areas, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).

Brewing change 

For Dutch brewer Heineken, water is obviously a vital ingredient, said Jan-Willem Vosmeer, corporate social responsibility manager for the firm.

But many breweries are located in increasingly water-stressed areas, and limited or irregular supplies could impact both communities and corporate bottom lines, he said.

Finding ways to conserve water and use it responsibly “makes absolute business sense”, Vosmeer said.

“Diminishing availability of water poses operational, social, reputational and legal risks for all businesses. It should be high on the agenda” for companies, he said.

Like many other food and beverage businesses, the largest part of Heineken’s water “footprint” comes from agriculture, as it grows key ingredients such as barley, he said.

To save water, Coca-Cola is turning to new technology such as using air rather than water to clean bottles, said Liz Lowe, the company’s British sustainability manager.

It is also better monitoring water use in factories and harvesting rainwater for toilet flushing at its plants — one way to act as a better water steward, she said.

As well, in an effort to replenish natural water supplies, the global drinks giant is creating new wetlands and working with communities internationally to try to put the equivalent of all the water it uses in manufacturing back into nature and communities by 2020, Lowe said.

“Water is the absolute heart of our business. If we don’t have water, we don’t have a business — full stop,” she said.

Population growth, climate change, economic and agricultural expansion and deforestation are all placing greater pressures on the world’s limited supplies of water, scientists say.

For Swedish furniture store Ikea, consumer choice is also an important motivation for improving water practices.

“There is a clear customer demand” for greener products, said Kajsa-Stina Kalin, Ikea’s “healthy and sustainable living” leader.

The reality, she said, is that “climate change is no longer a distant threat” and “as a big global brand we know we are part of the problem but we really want to be part of the solution.”

The company, which had a billion visits to its stores in 52 countries last year, aims to reduce and reuse water in all its operations in a bid to attract environmentally aware customers.

“We know that people are increasingly choosing to not shop at companies and brands that have no active sustainability work,” said Kalin.

…

A team from the International Monetary Fund met on Monday with opposition candidate Alberto Fernandez, the front-runner for October’s presidential election, according to a spokesman for Fernandez.

A three-man IMF team sat down with three representatives from Fernandez’s center-left “Frente de Todos” coalition as well as the candidate himself, according to a statement from Fernandez’s office.

Fernandez, a critic of Argentina’s $57 billion IMF standby agreement negotiated in 2018 by pro-reform President Mauricio Macri, has pledged to “rework” the program if elected, with his advisers telling Treasury Minister Hernan Lacunza last week he would seek an “alternative economic model” to the current administration’s policies.

The statement said Frente de Todos shared none of the policy priorities of the current government, nor agreed with the recommendations of the IMF.

“The loan received by the country and the raft of conditions associated with it has not generated any of the hoped-for results: The economy has not stopped constricting, employment and the situation for enterprises and families has continued to get worse, inflation has not shown any sustained reduction, and public debt has only grown,” said a statement from Fernandez’s office.

“During the meeting, (Fernandez) reiterated his concern that the credit extended by the IMF to the national government has been used, in large part, to finance capital outflows.

“Those who have generated this crisis, the government and the IMF, have the responsibility of putting an end to and reversing it.”

A statement from the IMF on Monday night confirmed the meeting with Fernandez and his team and said it was “a productive exchange of opinions.”

On Saturday, IMF officials met with Lacunza, who was appointed last week, and central bank President Guido Sandleris.

The IMF said in its statement that meetings with Argentine government had been “constructive.”

Fernandez’s landslide victory in an Aug. 11 primary vote prompted the peso currency to fall by nearly 18% amid fears of a return to the interventionist economic policies of former President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, who is Fernandez’s vice presidential candidate.

The volatility calmed last week as both camps sought to reassure Argentines they were united in stabilizing the economy.

The peso opened 0.29% weaker on Monday at 55.35 per U.S. dollar, traders said.

The Fund’s next scheduled review of Argentina’s lending program is on Sept. 15.

…

It might not be obvious at the supermarket, but the banana industry is fighting to protect the most popular variety of the fruit from a destructive fungus.

A disease that ravages banana crops has made its long-dreaded arrival in Latin America, the biggest exporter of the crop. That’s reigniting worries about the global market’s dependence on a single type of banana, the Cavendish, which is known for its durability in shipping.

For years, scientists have said big banana companies like Chiquita and Dole would eventually need to find new banana varieties as the disease spread in countries in Asia and elsewhere. Then this month, the fungus was confirmed in Colombia, one of the top exporters in Latin America, prompting officials in the country to declare a state of emergency.

Banana industry watchers say it’s more proof the Cavendish’s days are numbered, but that there’s still plenty of time to find alternatives.

“I don’t think it’s going to impact the availability of the Cavenidsh in supermarkets anytime soon,” said Randy Ploetz, a retired scientist from the University of Florida who studied tropical plant diseases.

While all sorts of bananas are grown around the world for domestic consumption, the ones shipped to places including the United States and the European Union are mostly Cavendishes. It may seem odd that the world banana market would hitch its fortunes to a single variety, but mass producing just one kind is a way to keep costs down, which also helps make bananas so widely available.

Bananas are also hard to breed, and finding varieties suited to global commerce isn’t easy. In addition to being productive, Cavendish plants yield bananas that can survive the trip from warm climates to far-flung supermarkets, without ripening too quickly.

Still, history has shown the risks of relying on a single banana variety. Not that long ago, the world market was ruled by another banana, the Gros Michel, aka the Big Mike. Experts say it was even easier to ship than the Cavendish, and sweeter (though others contend it tasted similar). Either way, the Gros Michel was ravaged by the 1950s by an earlier strain of the disease now stalking the Cavendish.

This time, there’s no obvious backup banana waiting in the wings to take over.

In Asian countries hit by the Tropical Race 4 disease, coping strategies have included planting less susceptible Cavendish varieties or moving to uninfected farmland, according to Ploetz. But those varieties aren’t as productive and still eventually succumb to the fungus, which can survive in soil for decades. Growers will also eventually run out of uninfected land.

In Colombia, special measures being taken to stop the disease from spreading include sanitary controls at the entrance to plantations and roadblocks where trucks traveling between banana farms and ports are disinfected by government workers in scrubs and rubber boots.

The fungus travels on small particles of soil that can stick to truck tires, farm equipment or workers’ shoes. And in Colombia, farmers fear that thieves who sneak into plantations to steal bananas could accidentally spread the disease. Some farms in Colombia are only lightly guarded and are separated from interstate roads by small fences. The situation has prompted police and Colombia’s military to step up presence around banana plantations since the disease was detected.

“We are trying to make people understand that stealing bananas nowadays can have greater repercussions,” said Francisco Zuniga, the president of Asbama, a Colombian banana farmers association.

So far, the fungus has been detected on six farms in Colombia. All are located in La Guajira, a province near the border with Venezuela. Officials say the affected area is still small at 490 acres (200 hectares), and is not making a dent on the country’s exports. But there are concerns that the arrival of the disease will change Colombia’s banana  industry forever, forcing farms and the government to spend more on sanitary measures.

In La Guajira, officials have uprooted plants where the fungus has been detected and covered the soil with black plastic sheets that raise the temperatures to levels that could stop the disease from spreading. Healthy plants within a 60 foot (20 meter) radius of the affected areas are also killed with chemicals as a preventive measure.

 “We will continue to work towards stopping this disease from spreading to the rest of Colombia,” Agriculture Minister Andres Valencia told The Associated Press during a visit to La Guajira. “But eventually we have to make the transition to other varieties of banana that will resist this disease.”

Gert Kema, a plant scientist who studies bananas, also said the industry needs to diversify.  He said there are many types of tomatoes and peppers, and that bananas should be no different.

“We have collectively accepted that we have just one banana,” Kema said.

Banana diversity means higher costs, however, and it’s not clear that people would be willing to pay more for the fruit.

Another challenge is that the fungus is lethal to a wide array of bananas. That’s also a problem for places where starchier, cooked bananas are a food staple, including some countries in Africa and Latin America.

But even with the disease’s appearance in Colombia, banana companies say there’s no need to panic. Whether the solution is a new breed or a genetically modified banana, the new option will likely look and taste a lot like the Cavendish.

For now, government and industry officials say they’re taking security measures to contain the fungus wherever it appears.

“We can significantly slow the spread and have decades more of the Cavendish,” said Caoimhe Buckley, a spokeswoman for Fyffes, a major banana exporter based in Ireland.

…

Stock markets in Asia traded down Monday as investors processed the latest round of reciprocal tariffs imposed by the United States and China.

The slump hit major markets in Japan, China and Hong Kong.

China’s top trade negotiator Vice Premier Liu He said Monday that China is willing to negotiate with the United States to end the ongoing trade battle, and that China opposes “the escalation of the trade war.”

His comments follow those Sunday from Trump, who said he had “second thoughts” about the rising tariffs the two countries have imposed on each other’s goods.  But the White House quickly clarified that he meant that was because he did not raise the taxes even more than he did.

Last week, before heading to France for the Group of 7 summit of the leaders of some of the world’s leading economies, Trump boosted tariffs on $550 billion worth of Chinese products shipped to the United States after Beijing said it would raise tariffs on $75 billion worth of U.S. exports to China, which itself was in retaliation to an earlier Trump tariff hike.

On Sunday, as he sat down to a breakfast meeting with new British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, a reporter asked Trump whether he regretted the tit-for-tat tariff war with China.

Trump responded, “Yeah, sure. Why not.”

“Might as well,” he said. “Might as well. I have second thoughts about everything.”

When asked if he would declare a national emergency to block U.S. companies from buying Chinese goods, Trump said, “I have the right to, if I want.”

But Trump then claimed that trade talks were going well with China and that he planned to walk back some of his recent threats, such as seeking to force American companies to leave China. 

News stories from the site of the summit in the Atlantic coastal town of Biarritz quickly interpreted Trump’s “second thoughts” remark as having regrets about boosting tariffs on Chinese exports.

The international attention the remark drew came in part because Trump has been defiant in confronting China’s trade practices and its wide trade surplus with the U.S., which totaled $419 billion in 2018, and partly because Trump rarely publicly regrets any pronouncement he has made.

But not long after, White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said, “His answer has been greatly misinterpreted. President Trump responded in the affirmative — because he regrets not raising the tariffs higher.”

The U.S.-China tariff war has roiled world stock markets for weeks, with wild gyrations in market performance, depending on the tariff announcements coming out of Washington and Beijing and then regaining ground when some hopeful signs surface that the world’s two biggest economies might yet reach a trade agreement in the coming months. 

On Friday, U.S. stock indexes plummeted more than 2% after China first announced the tariff hike on the $75 billion worth of U.S. exports, followed hours later by Trump saying he would increase existing tariffs on $250 billion of Chinese goods from 25% to 30% as of Oct. 1. In addition, he said a new round of tariffs on another $300 billion in Chinese exports would be increased from 10% to 15%. The first batch of those tariffs are set to take effect Sept. 1.

Whatever Trump’s intentions on the tariff war, China said it expects worsening economic conflict with the U.S.

Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of the state-run People’s Daily newspaper, wrote on Twitter, “Regardless of his specific expression each time, we’re seriously making preparations for scenario in which China-U.S. trade relations deteriorate further, even much worse than now.

Trump was also asked whether world leaders at the summit have asked him to curb his trade war with China, and he responded, “No, not at all. I haven’t heard that at all.”

But Johnson nudged Trump in that direction, saying, “Just to register the faint, sheep-like note of our view on the trade war, we’re in favor of trade peace on the whole, and dialing it down a beat.”

…

Nigeria’s agency for combating human trafficking is repatriating and re-settling women who have been subjected to forced labor and prostitution after being smuggled into Europe on false promises of working at well-paying jobs.  Thousands of Nigerian women have been trafficked in recent years, though some were lucky enough to be able to return to their country.  

For 35-year-old Beatrice, it was an offer she couldn’t resist.  A job, the traffickers told her in 2013, on a large Italian farm.

She took the bait, thinking she could help pull her father and mother out of poverty by working abroad.

Instead, after being smuggled into Italy under extremely dire traveling conditions, she was forced into prostitution to earn money for her traffickers.

“A friend of mine introduced me, he said, ‘look at this place, you’re going to work there on the farm.’ He did not tell me I’m going to do prostitution, so I said it’s very nice let me try. At the end of the day we passed through Libya, took a ship, a lot of people died,” Beatrice said.

Beatrice was there for four years. She’s from Nigeria’s southern State of Edo, known to contribute the highest number of trafficked women from Nigeria.

More than 11,000 of them are estimated to be working as sex slaves in Italy alone.

Beatrice says her suffering was unbearable.

“If you don’t come back with money, they’ll beat you up, do different things. They give you fresh pepper, you know how it is if it got to your eyes. They’ll tell you to put it in your vagina. Even if you’re menstruating you’ll still go out to work,” Beatrice said.

The United Nations says women represent more than half of the thousands smuggled from Africa into Europe every year.

But Nigerian men also are victims of human trafficking and forced labor.

Forty-five-year-old Chukwuemeka Asiegbu spent six years in Libya and narrowly escaped alive. Upon his return to Nigeria, he started an advocacy group for the rights of trafficked victims.

“As a human trafficker you are meeting needs … your own needs. Is it detrimental to others? And actually we find out that human trafficking is quite detrimental, it’s an epidemic, it’s a disaster because you are meeting needs at the expense of the lives of others,” Asiegbu said.

Nigeria’s anti-human trafficking agency, NAPTIP was set up in 2003 to address the problem.  

Over the years, it has made some progress repatriating and resettling victims back home, says Arinze Orakwe, a director at NAPTIP.

“It’s a crime that brought so much shame to Nigeria. It’s a crime that we’re not proud of, the record and status … which government felt it’s important and critical that we have to do something about it,” Orakwe said.

With the help of NAPTIP, victims like Beatrice are starting again after being trained in various vocations. Beatrice now runs her own food cafe back home.

…

Nigeria’s agency for combating human trafficking is repatriating and re-settling women who have been subjected to forced labor and prostitution after being smuggled into Europe on false promises of working at well-paying jobs.  Thousands of Nigerian women have been trafficked in recent years, though some were lucky enough to be able to return to their country.  Timothy Obiezu takes a closer look at the story of some human trafficking victims who are now back in Nigeria rebuilding their lives.

…

Opera legend Placido Domingo was greeted with a standing ovation in Salzburg, Austria, at his first appearance on stage since nine women accused him of sexual harassment dating back three decades.

Even before he sang a single note, Domingo was greeted with a thunderous applause that grew to a crescendo until most of the house was on its feet.

“Wonderful public, good performance all,” the Spanish-born singer said as he signed autographs after the performance of Verdi’s tragic opera Luisa Miller.  “I mean, so much love from the public.”

The Associated Press reported last week that nine women accused Domingo of using his position as general director at the Los Angeles Opera and elsewhere to try to pressure them into sexual relationships. Several of the woman said he offered them  jobs and then punished them professionally if they refused his advances. Allegations included repeated phone calls, invitations to hotel rooms and his apartment, and unwanted touching and kisses.

In a statement to the AP, Domingo called the allegations “deeply troubling and, as presented inaccurate” and that he believed his interactions with the women were consensual.

Two U.S. opera houses, in Philadelphia and San Francisco cancelled performances by Domingo after the allegations surfaced, while others, including New York’s Metropolitan Opera, took a wait-and-see attitude pending an investigation.

As of Sunday, Domingo was still booked to star in Macbeth at the Met in New York next month.

…

Africans and African Americans participating in events marking 400 years since the start of slavery in the United States say everyone must work harder to unite societies divided along racial and economic lines. VOA reporter Kennes Bwire reports from Norfolk, Virginia, where people gathered Saturday to observe the anniversary of the beginning of more than two centuries of slavery in English-speaking America.  *For more on the anniversary, check out our Special Page.

…

SAINT-JEAN-DE-LUZ, FRANCE – U.S. President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau touted their trilateral trade agreement in their meeting at the sidelines of the G-7 summit in Biarritz, France.

“Quite frankly, around the table there’s a lot of people wanting to make trade deals with each other,” Trudeau said, adding that the U.S. and Canada have a deal that’s “good for our workers, good for our citizens, good for the middle class.”

My focus at the #G7 is working with our allies to strengthen the middle class – not just in Canada but around the world as well. We just wrapped up a productive first day in France, tackling some of the world’s biggest challenges. More to come tomorrow. pic.twitter.com/55pIiguuNO

— Justin Trudeau (@JustinTrudeau) August 25, 2019

Trump said that the two countries will be “significantly expanding” trade relations once the USMCA (U.S. – Mexico – Canada Agreement) is done.

Negotiations are final but the agreement has not yet been ratified by the U.S. Congress. The White House is pushing for an immediate ratification but Democrats and organized labor said certain provisions must first be improved.

The USMCA replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), signed by President Bill Clinton in 1994, which Trump at the meeting again called “the worst trade agreements ever done”. 

Trump added that the only thing worse than NAFTA is the World Trade Organization. “The WTO, that’s a beauty.” he said.

Climate change

Trudeau is pushing for action on climate change at the summit, in line with his Liberal government’s agenda to highlight its achievement on this issue ahead of Canada’s October election.

French President Emmanuel Macron, host of the summit has put climate issues high on the agenda for discussion, particularly focusing on the wildfires in the Amazon rainforest.

The leaders’ focus on climate change have put them at odds with an American president known for his anti-climate stance. In June 2017, Trump pulled the U.S. out of the Paris Accord, a multilateral climate pact championed by the Obama administration. 

The New York Times reported that senior Trump administration officials have accused Macron’s aides of ignoring requests by White House officials to keep the focus on security and the threat of a recession, and emphasizing instead on climate change, gender equality, and African development, which highlight disagreements the Trump administration.
 

…

The leaders of the world’s major industrialized countries are holding their annual summit.

 The Group of Seven, or G-7, is meeting in Biarritz, France. 

U.S. President Donald Trump’s threat to impose tariffs on French wine, one of the most iconic industries of the host country, ahead of the summit has added to the tension among the leaders who remain at odds over issues ranging from climate change, how to deal with China and Iran, whether to bring Russia back into the fold, and Britain’s exit from the European Union. 

With these deep divisions, consensus seems unlikely. After Sunday’s first session the leaders failed to come to an agreement on readmitting Russia to the group in 2020.  Russia was ousted after its invasion of Ukraine and seizure of Crimea in 2014.  

The French government announced after the first working session on the global economy, foreign policy and security affairs that the G-7 leaders had agreed to have French President Emmanuel Macron send a message to Iran and hold talks with Iranian officials.  No details were released about the message, and Trump said he had not discussed anything about a message or talks with Iran.  However, later Trump said he is not stopping anybody from talking with Iran.

Donald Tusk, president of the European Council, has acknowledged that “it has been increasingly difficult for us to find common language.”  

No joint communique planned

French President Emmanuel Macron already has declared that there will be no joint communique at the end of the summit, citing disagreements involving Trump and other leaders on the key issues as one of the reasons.

It will be the first time in G-7 history that a summit will end without a communique. 

The summit marks the first meeting between Trump and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson since Johnson took over from his predecessor Theresa May who failed to deliver on Brexit. 

The members of the G-7 are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain and the United States. 

…

U.S. President Donald Trump and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe met on the sidelines of the G-7 summit in Biarritz, France but did not announce they have reached a trade deal.

“We’re working on one and we’re fairly close,” said Trump.

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer, who has been leading the negotiations with Japan added, “We’ve worked very intensively and probably as a result of this meeting will be able to come to agreement on core principle.” Prior to the Trump-Abe meeting, Lighthizer held talks with Japan’s Economic Revitalization Minister Toshimitsu Motegi in Washington.

Japanese media have reported that a deal is close, with Tokyo agreeing to lower tariffs on American beef and pork to levels set by the Trans-Pacific Partnership, while letting Washington maintain its 2.5% levy on Japanese autos for now.

Earlier Sunday during his meeting with British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Trump said that he was “very close to a major deal with Japan”.

“Prime Minister Abe and I are very good friends,” he added.

The two leaders enjoy close ties but Trump often complains that Tokyo has an unfair advantage in bilateral trade.

In January 2017, very early in his presidency Trump withdrew from the Trans Pacific Partnership, a signature multilateral trade deal of the Obama administration.

After the U.S. withdrawal, in 2018, the 11 remaining TPP countries, including Japan, signed a version of the trade deal, championed as an antidote to growing American protectionism under Trump.

North Korea missile tests

Asked about recent North Korean missile tests, Trump said he is “not happy” about it but that he doesn’t consider Pyongyang to be violating agreements.

When Trump offered Abe to give his thoughts, the Japanese leader repeated his stance that the tests were a clear violation of U.N. Security Council resolutions.

Trump responded, “I can understand how the Prime Minister of Japan feels” but said that the North Korean leader is not the only one testing those missiles.

“We’re in the world of missiles, folks, whether you like it or not,” said Trump.

…