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Dujuan brings flooding to eastern China

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The former typhoon which brought death and destruction to Taiwan has now hit the mainland.

Dujuan weakened as it moved across the cooler waters of the Taiwan Strait [AFP]

Dujuan weakened as it moved across the cooler waters of the Taiwan Strait [AFP]

by Al Jazeera

Typhoon Dujuan has begun to disintegrate over eastern China after unleashing its full force on the neighbouring island of Taiwan.

At least two people were killed and more than 300 injured as the typhoon tore across central Taiwan on Monday night.

Dujuan struck Taiwan as the equivalent of a Category 4 storm (on the five point Saffir-Simpson scale).The highest gust recorded on the island was 246km/h, 30km south of Yilan City.

Torrential rain, with as much as 750mm in some areas, resulted in flash flooding and mudslides.

At least 1.8 million homes were without power, although 1.3 million of those have since been reconnected.

Around 12,000 people were evacuated from their homes in advance of Dujuan’s arrival and this may have contributed to the very low death toll.

The track of Dujuan was slightly further to the south than predicted, meaning that Taipei missed the very worst of the weather, although the city’s famous Taipei 101 skyscraper suffered some damage.

Dujuan weakened as it moved across the cooler waters of the Taiwan Strait before making landfall between Putian and Xiamen, China, at 00:00 GMT on Tuesday.

Dujuan’s track and strength is very similar to that of August’s Typhoon Soudelor, which caused at least 26 deaths in China and estimated damage and financial losses of $3bn.

Although Dujuan’s winds are weakening rapidly, it is likely that flooding rain will cause disruption and a threat to life for the next few days.

CAR’s Bangui tense as communal strife kills scores

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Sporadic gunfire and looting reported in the capital as government says clashes are aimed at derailing elections.

Voters are due to elect a new president and parliament in October to replace an interim government [EPA]

Voters are due to elect a new president and parliament in October to replace an interim government [EPA]

by Al Jazeera

Renewed violence between Muslim and Christian communities in the Central African Republic has killed at least 36 people and wounded at least 80 more, according to hospital workers.

Sporadic gunfire could be heard in the capital, Bangui, on Monday, with journalists also citing multiple reports of widespread looting in the city, suggesting that tensions that began on Saturday had yet to subside.

On Sunday, Doctors without Borders (MSF) said in a statement that their teams working in the city’s Mpoko camp, Castor hospital and Hopital General had been pressed to activate mass-casualty plans to cope with an influx of the injured.

“In total MSF received 75 wounded patients, and the teams stabilised patients and performed 15 surgeries,” MSF said.

Emmanuel Lampaert, MSF head of mission in Central African Republic, said: “It’s very sad to see violence of such a scale occur once again, as we haven’t experienced anything like this since October last year.

“All our teams in Bangui were mobilised and have worked intensively to provide care to those who were wounded. We continue to monitor the situation closely in case violence would erupt again.”

Ousmane Abakar, a Muslim community leader, said fighting began early on Saturday as Muslims attacked a Christian neighbourhood in Bangui after the body of a Muslim man was left near a mosque.

The government on Sunday announced a 6pm to 6am curfew to curtail the violence.

Earlier on Sunday, Christian anti-Balaka militia members were on the streets, retaliating for the previous day’s violence.

Tear gas used

Sunday’s clashes were aimed at derailing elections scheduled to take place next month, the government said.

Angry young men used tree trunks to block Bangui’s main arteries early on Sunday.

Soldiers from the UN peacekeeping mission, MINUSCA, fired tear gas at crowds in an unsuccessful attempt to clear the roads.

Thousands of Central Africans have died and hundreds of thousands remain displaced after two years of violence that erupted after mainly Muslim Seleka rebels seized power in the majority Christian country in 2013.

Seleka abuses prompted reprisals by anti-Balaka fighters that drove most Muslims from the south in a de-facto partition of the country.

Protesters alleged that UN and French forces did little to intervene in Saturday’s violence and called for the sidelined Central African army, the FACA, to assume responsibility for security.

“We are calling for a civil disobedience movement starting now and we demand the immediate redeployment, without conditions, of the FACA,” Gervais Lakossa, a civil society leader, said.

Anti-Balaka fighters armed with assault rifles and machetes were seen on Bangui’s streets on Sunday as many city residents fled their homes for protected displacement camps.

“The government asks the population not to cede to the manipulation of extremists who are seeking to set the country on fire to satisfy their selfish political ambitions,” Dominique Said Paguindji, CAR’s security minister, said on state radio.

Voters are due to elect a new president and parliament on October 18 to replace an interim government led by acting President Catherine Samba-Panza.

Despite lagging preparations and the renewed violence in the capital, Paguindji said the polls would go ahead as scheduled.

Burkina Faso president ‘back in charge’ after coup

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President Michel Kafando, who was taken hostage during last week’s coup, says civilian transitional government restored.

The elite presidential guard last Wednesday took the president, prime minister, and several other officials captive [AFP]

The elite presidential guard last Wednesday took the president, prime minister, and several other officials captive [AFP]

by Al Jazeera

Burkina Faso’s interim President Michel Kafando, who was taken hostage during a coup a week ago, said he was back in power and had restored a civilian transitional government.

“I have returned to work,” he said in a brief speech to journalists at the foreign ministry in the capital on Wednesday. “The transition is back and at this very minute is exercising the power of the state.”

Burkina Faso coup leaders agreed to return to their barracks, signing a deal with the army that apparently defused the standoff sparked by last week’s coup.

The breakthrough came on Tuesday night after marathon talks in Nigeria’s Abuja, where West African heads of state had sought to break the impasse fuelled by angry threats on both sides.

The deal was signed a day after troops entered Burkina’s capital of Ouagadougou, turning up the pressure on the elite presidential guards (RSP), who staged the coup.

Under its terms, the RSP agreed to step down from the positions they had taken up in Ouagadougou, while the army also agreed to withdraw its troops 50km from the capital and guarantee the safety of the RSP members as well as their families.

The deal was presented to the Mogho Naba, or “king” of Burkina Faso’s leading Mossi tribe, in front of the media early Wednesday.

Burkina Faso plunged into crisis last Wednesday when the powerful RSP detained the interim leaders who had been running the country since a popular uprising deposed iron-fisted President Blaise Compaore last October.

The elite unit of 1,300 men loyal to Compaore officially declared a coup on Thursday and installed rebel leader General Gilbert Diendere, Compaore’s former chief of staff, as the country’s new leader.

In a statement on Tuesday, the Economic Community of West African States said it planned to reinstate and demonstrate solidarity with Kafando, who was released on Friday.

Russia opens huge new mosque ahead of Eid holiday

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Moscow’s new main mosque opens doors after 10 years of construction work, offering prayer space to 10,000 Muslim.

An estimated two million Muslims live in Moscow [Maxim Shemetov/Reuters]

An estimated two million Muslims live in Moscow [Maxim Shemetov/Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Russian President Vladimir Putin has been joined by the Turkish and Palestinian leaders at the ceremonial opening of the Russian capital’s new main mosque after 10 years of construction work.

The $170m mosque – entirely funded by private donations – unveiled on Wednesday, the eve of Muslim holiday of Eid al-Adha that is known as Kurban Bairam in Russia.

Putin, who has been fighting Muslim rebels in south Russia since coming to power in 1999, used his speech to emphasize the challenge of preventing Muslim radicalisation, praising the collaboration of the religious leaders of the country.

“Muslim leaders of Russia are courageously using their authority to resist the extremist propaganda. I’d like to express huge respect to these people who are carrying out a really heroic work…” he said.

Islam is the second largest religion in Russia, home to 23 million Muslims. The majority of them live in the country’s North Caucasian republics.

An estimated two million Muslims live in Moscow, which has seen an influx of people from the North Caucasus, Azerbaijan and the former Soviet states in Central Asia.

The new mosque – built on the site of a smaller, more than 100-year-old mosque destroyed in 2011 – can accommodate 10,000 worshippers, but it is still one of only six mosques in the city.

Calls from Muslim religious leaders to build more mosques have met with opposition from city officials and residents.

Muslim boy arrested over clock withdraws from US school

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Ahmed Mohamed and his siblings have yet to decide which school to enrol in after father withdraws them.

Ahmed Mohamed's father wants to take his son on a pilgrimage to the Muslim holy city of Mecca [AP]

Ahmed Mohamed’s father wants to take his son on a pilgrimage to the Muslim holy city of Mecca [AP]

by Al Jazeera

A 14-year-old Muslim boy has withdrawn from the Dallas high school that got him arrested for a homemade clock mistaken for a possible bomb.

Mohamed El-Hassan Mohamed, Ahmed Mohamed’s father, said on Monday that he pulled all of his children from schools in the Irving Independent School District.

“Ahmed said, ‘I don’t want to go to MacArthur,'” Ahmed’s father told The Dallas Morning News. “These kids aren’t going to be happy there.”

Mohamed said the family was still deciding where to send the children to school.

Numerous schools have offered to enrol Ahmed, his father said. But Mohamed said he wants to give his son a breather before making a decision.

The turmoil surrounding Ahmed’s case has had a harmful effect on the teen, Mohamed said, adding that his son has lost his appetite and is not sleeping well.

“It’s torn the family and makes us very confused,” Mohamed said.

On Wednesday, his entire family plans to fly to New York, Mohamed said, where United Nations dignitaries were due to meet his son.

Then Mohamed wants to take his son on a pilgrimage to the Muslim holy city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia if the appropriate visas can be obtained.

“I ask Allah to bless this time. After that, we’ll see,” Mohamed said.

When they return, a visit to the White House and a meeting with President Barack Obama is being planned, he said.

Ahmed has said he brought the clock he made to MacArthur High School in Irving last week to show a teacher.

Officials say he was arrested after another teacher saw it and became concerned. Ahmed wasn’t charged, but he was suspended from school for three days.

Nepal passes secular constitution amid protests

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President announces adoption of the charter despite protests against plans to divide the country into seven provinces.

nepal constitution

by Al Jazeera

Nepal has adopted a new constitution aimed at bolstering its transformation from a Hindu monarchy to a secular democracy, as violent protests raged against some of the terms of the charter.

Firecrackers went off on Sunday in celebration in Kathmandu as President Ram Baran Yadav announced the adoption of the constitution, the first to be drafted by elected representatives.

“I announce the presented constitution of Nepal, passed by the Constituent Assembly and authenticated by the chairman of the Constituent Assembly, effective from today, 20 September 2015, before the people of Nepal,” he said.

Members of the parliament approved the charter on Wednesday despite weeks of violent protests against plans to divide the Himalayan nation of 28 million people into seven provinces.

More than 40 people have been killed in clashes between protesters and police, among them two children, and a police officer lynched as he was driven to hospital in an ambulance, according to the AFP news agency.

One protester was killed on Sunday when police fired into a crowd of people who had defied a curfew in the southern district of Parsa to demonstrate against the charter.

Criticism

The move to create a new federal structure that will devolve power from the centre has widespread support, but critics say the planned internal borders will leave some historically marginalised groups under-represented in parliament.

They include the Madhesi and Tharu ethnic minorities, mainly from Nepal’s southern plains along the border with India.

India has expressed concern at the violence, which has seen some parts of southern Nepal shut down for weeks.

The new constitution is the final stage in a peace process that began when the Maoists laid down their arms in 2006 after a decade-long civil war with the state and turned to politics, winning parliamentary elections two years later and abolishing the monarchy.

As crisis intensifies, Kerry says US will take 100,000 refugees in 2017

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Many, though not all, of the additional refugees would be Syrian, US officials have said

Migrants wait at the Austria-Hungaria border in Nickelsdorf, Austria, on September 20, 2015. (Photo: Reuters/David W. Cerny)

Migrants wait at the Austria-Hungaria border in Nickelsdorf, Austria, on September 20, 2015. (Photo: Reuters/David W. Cerny)

by Deirdre Fulton, Common Dreams

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry announced Sunday that the U.S. will accept 85,000 refugees from around the world next year—up from 70,000—and the number will rise to 100,000 in 2017.

Many, though not all, of the additional refugees would be Syrian, American officials have said. The United States has taken in just 1,500 refugees since the start of the Syrian war in 2011, and President Barack Obama last week committed to accepting 10,000 more over the coming year.

The New York Times reports:

Still, the steps that Mr. Kerry announced are much less than that some former American officials and refugee experts have recommended.

Last Thursday, more than 20 former senior officials, including some who served in the State Department and Pentagon during the Obama administration, urged the White House to accept 100,000 Syrian refugees.

“We urge that you announce support for a refugees admissions goal of 100,000 Syrian refugees on an extraordinary basis, over and above the current worldwide refugee ceiling of 70,000,” they wrote in a letter to President Obama and congressional leaders. “With some four million Syrian refugees in neighboring countries and hundreds of thousands of Syrian asylum seekers in Europe, this would be a responsible exercise in burden sharing.”

That letter also called on the U.S. to put in place special rules to speed the resettlement process.

As NBC News explains:

U.S. officials have recognized the process for admitting Syrian refugees can take up to 18 months, largely because of vetting to make sure they do not pose a security threat.

Refugee applications referred to the United States by the U.N. refugee agency undergo multiple security checks by several federal agencies.

“[W]e can make a home for many, many refugees in the United States. I’m convinced of it,” Anne Richard, the U.S. assistant secretary of state for population, refugees, and migration, told NPR on Saturday. “But the tricky part is running a process that scrutinizes the backgrounds of the refugees before they come here to make sure we’re bringing people who are legitimate refugees and who do not pose any kind of security threat to the United States.”

A separate letter sent Friday from a coalition of U.S. faith-based and civil society groups to President Obama called for increasing the refugee resettlement cap to 200,000 for the upcoming fiscal year, including 100,000 Syrians.

According to ABC News, “Kerry did not address why the U.S. proposal is well short of what the former officials advocated, but in London on Saturday, he said the migrant crisis must be solved by ending Syria’s civil war and replacing President Bashar Assad.”

Meanwhile, the refugee crisis only worsens, creating a devastating new reality marked for too many by terror, violence, and injustice.

The Guardian reported Sunday on one group of refugees, numbering in the hundreds, who “fear they are to be deported back to Syria after their boat was intercepted by the Turkish coastguard.”

One female among the crowd, detained at a refugee center and not identified for her protection, said she feared being killed if this happened. “They are threatening us that Syrians will be deported to Syria, Iraqis to Iraq,” she said. “If they send us back to Syria we will die.”

Reporters Without Borders founder: Schools should reject Syrians

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The founder of Reporters Without Borders and current mayor of Beziers refuse to help educate Syrian refugees.

Founder of Reporters Without Borders Robert Menard | Photo: AFP

Founder of Reporters Without Borders Robert Menard | Photo: AFP

by teleSUR

The founder of Reporters Without Borders, Robert Menard, has sparked outrage after refusing on Wednesday to allow Syrian children to study in public schools in the city of Beziers, where he is the mayor.

“There are a certain number of Syrian families that arrived, that broke doors, that installed themselves here … and now I have a certain number of associations … (that demand) I allow the children (of the Syrian families) in our schools, of course I won’t!” said the mayor during a televised interview.

Menard’s latest remarks come after he himself took up the task of evicting Syrian migrants in his city last week. A video of him carrying door-to-door evictions with a translator and a handful of armed policemen was posted by the mayor’s office on Youtube.

“You are not welcome in this city,” he tells a Syrian refugee, who entered an abandoned apartment.

The mayor, accompanied by armed policemen, aggressively tells another refugee that he has to leave immediately and if he refuses, the police will take him out.

“We cannot accept that people behave this way … They exploit (these people) politically,” he explains to other local government authorities accompanying him at the end of the video.

Menard has also been widely criticized for using a picture of Syrian refugees boarding a train in Macedonia for the front cover of the local government’s magazine, with the title “They are here!”

The misuse of the photograph elicited the news agency AFP and its photographer to sue Menard for 60,000 Euros (US$68,517).

The organization he founded, Reporters Without Borders, has become famous for its freedom of the press reports which specifically targets countries such as Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia.

Since 2008, the United Nations’ Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has twice sanctioned the organization for its lack of ethics.

Donald Trump: ‘We’re gonna be looking into’ How we can get rid of all the Muslims

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The racial politics of the current GOP frontrunner, warns one critic, are ‘just vague enough to be popular with enough people to earn him a serious following, but specific enough for us to know the atrocities this type of talk can lead to.’

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is being criticized for his response to a question about Muslim and their "training camps," asked during a town hall event in New Hampshire on Thursday. (Image: Screenshot)

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is being criticized for his response to a question about Muslim and their “training camps,” asked during a town hall event in New Hampshire on Thursday. (Image: Screenshot)

by Jon Queally, Common Dreams

In a week that has already seen collective outrage in response to the treatment of a Muslim teenager in Texas who was handcuffed and arrested simply for bringing a homemade clock to school, the pervasiveness of Islamaphobic sentiment was on display once again overnight after Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump fielded a question in New Hampshire about what he planned to do “about getting rid of” all the nation’s Muslims.

And though no candidate can be held responsible for the statements made or questions directed at them during an open Q&A session, it is Trump’s response that has set off a firestorm of condemnation.

As the Washington Post reports:

The exchange came during a post-debate rally in Rochester, N.H., during which Trump asked the audience for questions rather than giving a speech. To kick things off, Trump pointed at a man in the audience: “Okay, this man. I like this guy.”

“We have a problem in this country, it’s called Muslims,” the man said. “We know our current president is one. You know, he’s not even an American. Birth certificate, man.”

“Right,” Trump said, then adding with a shake of his head: “We need this question? This first question.”

“But any way,” the man said. “We have training camps… where they want to kill us.”

“Uh huh,” Trump said.

“That’s my question: When can we get rid of them?” the man said.

Trump responded: “We’re going to be looking at a lot of different things. You know, a lot of people are saying that, and a lot of people are saying that bad things are happening out there. We’re going to look at that and plenty of other things.”

Watch:

In response, Kevin Drum wondered at Mother Jones whether the latest comment would be enough to damage his campaign. “If there’s any justice,” wrote Drum, “this might finally do him in.”

However, Trump has so far seen his poll numbers rise in the wake of derogatory comments made about other groups, including Mexican immigrants and women. By targeting the Muslim community, Trump is contributing to what critics see as a growing and troubling atmosphere of anti-Islamic sentiment that has taken hold of the nation in recent years. Not spoken in a vacuum, wrote journalist Glenn Greenwald of Trump’s latest comments, they follow a “continuous, sustained demonization of a small minority group” in this country that has become part of the right-wing ethos in the post-9/11 era. Such demonization, “sooner or later,” said Greenwald, has consequences.

Since Trump entered the presidential race many have brushed off his early success as flash-in-the-pan politics that result largely from his celebrity status and flamboyant (if noxious) media persona. However, other observers on these pages (here and here) have warned that beneath his bravado lurks a deeply troubling—and quite modern form—of fascism that should trouble the minds of those who care about fundamental principles of tolerance, human rights, and civil decency.

“In every way that matters, [Trump] is a fascist,” wrote Roger White, a senior research analyst for SEIU, at Common Dreams last month. “He reminds one of Mussolini—a corporatist buffoon with a huge ego and a mean streak. He is a first rate demagogue. His brand of racial politics is just vague enough to be popular with enough people to earn him a serious following, but specific enough for us to know the atrocities this type of talk can lead to.”

And, White continued, “This is not the phony so called ‘liberal’ fascism invented by the right. This is the real deal, and its popularity is growing among GOP voters right now. Republicans are standing on the edge of the abyss.”

The question is, he asked in conclusion: “Will they jump?”

Military claims control of Burkina Faso amid unrest

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Military takes to airwaves and declares it now controls West African nation, just weeks before planned elections.

Burkina Faso was due to hold elections on October 11 that many hoped would strengthen democracy [Reuters]

Burkina Faso was due to hold elections on October 11 that many hoped would strengthen democracy [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

The military in Burkina Faso has taken to the airwaves to declare it now controls the country, confirming that a coup has taken place – just weeks before national elections.

In the announcement aired early on Thursday on national television and radio, the statement said that the transitional government in the West African country had been dissolved.

The statement came a day after members of the elite presidential guard unit of the military arrested the transitional president and prime minister.

The communique read by Lieutenant Colonel Mamadou Bamba criticised the electoral code, which blocked members of the ex-president’s party from taking part in the October 11 elections.

Anyone who supported the ex-president’s bid to amend the
constitution so he could seek another term is also banned from running.

Bamba on Thursday announced the beginning of a “coherent, fair and equitable process” that would lead to inclusive elections. The power grab violates the country’s constitution.

Fanny Noaro, a journalist based in the capital Ouagadougou, told Al Jazeera gunfire could be heard on the streets of the city.

“There is a lot of military on the street […] there is also no information about the transitional president and prime minister and there is no information if they are dead or alive,” she said.

A Reuters witness said that soldiers had fired warning shots to disperse a crowd gathered in Independence Square to protest against an apparent seizure of power by the presidential guard. More than 100 people had gathered in the square to demand the release of the interim government, detained by the elite military unit since Wednesday.

Burkina Faso was due to hold elections on October 11 that many hoped would strengthen democracy.

Cynthia Ohayon, West Africa analyst with International Crisis Group (ICG), described the turn of events as “unsurprising”.

“It is still very unclear how this crisis will now resolve itself […] the only outcome will come through negotiation and compromise [but] I don’t see what sort of of compromise will be acceptable to both sides, considering both sides have gone all in so far,” Ohayon told Al Jazeera from Paris.

The transitional government came to power after the president for 27 years, Blaise Compaore, was toppled late last year in a public uprising.

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