Month: January 2017

President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence began their first full day in charge of the U.S. government by attending an interfaith prayer service at Washington National Cathedral on Saturday, where the clergy spoke of compassion and diversity.

The service began with calls to prayer by the cathedral’s canon, the Reverend Rosemarie Duncan; a Jewish cantor, Mikhail Manevich; and Muslim Imam Mohamed Magid.

The cathedral’s dean, the Very Reverend Marshall Hollerith, then read from the Book of Common Prayer: “Look with compassion on the whole human family; take away the arrogance and hatred which infect our hearts; break down the walls that separate us; unite us in bonds of love.”

Leaders of about two dozen religious faiths took part in the service, a U.S. tradition dating back to the country’s first president, George Washington. Trump and Pence were joined by their families, as well.

Washington National Cathedral, a spacious Episcopal house of worship, is a landmark in the capital, standing on one of the highest points in the city, and has hosted prayer services at the beginning of new administrations since before World War II.

“It was a fantastic gathering of all the religions that are part of our lives in America, with beautiful music and beautiful prayers,” Alistair Jessiman told VOA as he left the service afterward.

Jessiman said he attended the service as a patriotic gesture and to support the new president, whom he said he had never seen in person before.

Political campaign

Given the harsh exchanges that marked so much of the U.S. political campaign, about “building a wall [on the Mexican border] … banning Muslims from entering the United States” and other controversial issues, Jessiman said he felt everyone could benefit from some spiritual reflection.

“People getting together [and] spending time thinking about other things than what’s personal for them makes a big difference and will help as the country moves on,” he said.

Starr Karavellas, whose husband is an orthodox priest, said they came to the service to honor the new president, whom she and her husband “love.” She added that all Americans should give Trump and his team “a chance” to show what their programs can accomplish.

Michael Raphael was proud to be part of the service because his company worked on the extensive and difficult campaign to repair $34 million in damage the cathedral suffered after an earthquake in 2011.

The iconic Washington church is the sixth-largest cathedral in the world and the second-largest in the United States. It took 83 years to build, from 1907 to 1990.

As a small-business owner, Raphael said he’s neutral when it comes to politics but was pleased to see so many religious faiths represented during Saturday’s prayers. Trump “needs to hear that,” he said.

While he wishes the president the best of luck in his new job, Raphael added, “It’s very unlikely that anything will affect the way that Mr. Trump views the world in terms of religion. Although it would be interesting to see if he does take away anything from today, with a comment of some sort.”

Hayley Ringenberg, another member of the congregation, told VOA that just being together with leaders of so many different faiths emphasized to her the need to “stop the arguing and fighting. … Simply love each other.”

Joel Pollak said many of the congregants in the cathedral had tears in their eyes during the moving service. He said the hymns and scriptural readings were very appropriate, in particular a selection from the Bible (1 Kings 3:5-12) where Solomon asks God not for riches and long life, but for wisdom.

“I felt in many ways this was the heart of the inauguration,” Pollak said. “It was the nation coming together in humility, praying together and asking God for help.”

Political divisions

Political divisions among Americans are part of life, and perhaps they will be felt more intensely in the coming months, Pollak added, “but hopefully those who were present [at the cathedral] and those who watched throughout the country will remember how joyful it was to be together, because it’s moments like these that will guide us through the difficult times.”

Mythili Bachu, chairperson of the Council of Hindu Temples of North America, told VOA “it’s very important to us” that Hindus were represented at a national prayer breakfast for the first time.

“This was a representation of the United States, and showed that everyone felt they belong to the same country, regardless of their religious beliefs,” Bachu said.

Neither Trump nor Pence spoke during the ceremony, but images beamed from the cathedral suggest they enjoyed taking part.

Ironically, at the same time the cathedral service got underway, hundreds of thousands of Trump’s opponents were gathering near the U.S. Capitol for a huge protest demonstration denouncing the new administration’s policies.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says he plans to meet with newly installed U.S. President Donald Trump soon to discuss what he sees as the dangers from Iran and its “cruel” government.
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Iranian rescuers on January 21 removed three more bodies from the rubble of a 17-story commercial building that collapsed in Tehran two days earlier.
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U.S. President Donald Trump has visited the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia — pledging his support for the agency and telling about 400 employees there that “I am with you 1,000 percent.”
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A look at more than 50 years of marches in Washington, by the numbers:

1995 — Organized and hosted by Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, an estimated 850,000 to 1 million* African-American men came together for the Million Man March to rally for unity and revitalization of African-American communities.

2000 — More than 750,000 people gathered on the mall for the Million Mom March, which sought tighter gun control.

2013 — About 650,000 people participated in the March for Life, a rally protesting abortion.

1997 — More than 650,000 people filled the mall for the Promise Keepers march for evangelical Christian men.

2004 — An estimated 500,000 to 800,000 people attended the March for Women’s Lives, which supported women’s rights and reproductive rights.

2004 — An estimated 500,000 to 800,000 people marched on the National Mall rallying for women’s reproductive rights.

1969 — More than 500,000 people marched on Washington to protest U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War.

1993 — About 300,000 people turned out for the March on Washington for Lesbian, Gay and Bi Equal Rights and Liberation.

1981 — About 260,000 people gathered for the Solidarity March, which was held in response to then-President Ronald Reagan’s firing of 12,000 air traffic controllers who had gone on strike.

1963 — Between 200,000 and 300,000 people gathered in Washington to rally in support of civil and economic rights for African-Americans and other disenfranchised groups. On the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. gave his now-legendary “I Have a Dream” speech.

*Crowd sizes for protests on the National Mall used to be estimated by the National Park Service. But after estimates for the Million Man March proved controversial, the service stopped offering attendance figures.
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Thousands of people protested Saturday in the Kosovo capital of Pristina to urge France to release their former prime minister who was detained there on a Serbian arrest warrant.

The protesters — mostly opposition party members and former guerrilla fighters of the 1998-1999 war for independence from Serbia — consider Ramush Haradinaj’s detention illegal.

Haradinaj, also a former guerrilla commander, was released by a French court, but he must stay in France under judicial supervision, pending a decision on whether to extradite him to Serbia.

Kosovo considers Haradinaj’s detention a political move from Belgrade, given that he has been twice cleared of war crimes charges by a U.N. tribunal.

Fatmir Limaj of the opposition Initiative for Kosovo party also said at the protest that Pristina should cancel talks with Belgrade brokered by the European Union to normalize their relations. Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008, but Belgrade has not recognized the move.

Haradinaj hailed the protest Saturday in his Facebook page.

“I understand your great unsparing support, all around the world, as a support for Kosovo’s freedom and existence,” he wrote.

Haradinaj’s detention in early January and Serbia’s effort days later to send a nationalist train to Kosovo’s northern Mitrovica region, where most of its Serb ethnic minority lives, have sparked a bilateral crisis and concern from the EU and the United States.

The train, with the slogan “Kosovo is Serbia” and decorated in the colors of the Serbian flag and with Christian Orthodox symbols, was turned back from the border with Kosovo.

Next week, the leaders of Kosovo and Serbia are expected to meet in Brussels, invited by the EU’s foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini.

Serbia, backed by Russia, has sought to maintain influence in Kosovo. NATO-led troops have controlled Kosovo’s territory since a three-month air war in 1999 to stop a bloody Serbian crackdown against ethnic Albanian separatists.
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A bus carrying school children crashed in northern Italy overnight and burst into flames, killing 14 of the young passengers, Italian media reported Saturday.

The bus was carrying students, mostly boys from Hungary between the ages of 14 and 18, when it struck a pylon and caught fire on a motorway near Verona shortly before midnight.

The vehicle came from France and was passing through Italy to return to Hungary, according to emergency workers cited in the reports.

The French bus driver may also have been killed.

Dozens of injured were rushed to hospital following the accident.

 
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Hundreds of thousands of people at the National Mall in Washington looked on Friday as Donald Trump became the 45th U.S. president, and a far larger audience around the country and throughout the world witnessed the event through live broadcasts. VOA reporters talked to people around the globe who said they are looking at the transition of American power with a mix of admiration and apprehension.

Russia

In Moscow, a “Russian Army”-brand clothing store flashed Trump’s image on an electronic billboard and offered discounts to American citizens. On the streets, reactions were mixed.

“We hope that relations between our Russia and America will improve, that they’ll find a common language in relation to Syria, that they will find a common language to get rid of what is going on there,” said Lidiya Voronova, a retiree.

A young editor at a newspaper who gave his name only as Sergey said Trump “is quite a controversial president in the history of the United States, but I hope he will gain the trust of Americans.”

Trump’s inaugural address signaled a new “America first” policy for the country:

“For many decades, we’ve enriched foreign industry at the expense of American industry; subsidized the armies of other countries while allowing for the very sad depletion of our military; we’ve defended other nation’s borders while refusing to defend our own,” he declared at the U.S. Capitol.

Mexico

That attitude has unnerved some in Mexico, where the respected weekly magazine Proceso warns, “The war is coming.”

José Luis López Aguirre, a media expert at the Pan American University in Mexico City, says Trump’s use of Twitter and other social media to proclaim his views has widened divisions in America.

“He [Trump] is creating a community that is very adept at his aggressive, confrontational speech that tries to polarize American society,” Aguirre said, adding, “Because not everything he says is true.”

His university colleague, communication specialist María López Gutiérrez, has a different point of view: “I think that this possible threat of Trump has been greatly exaggerated. … We should be waiting, we are dedicated to communication, to give reality and not just the show.”

West Africa

In West Africa, VOA spoke with residents of both Nigeria and Niger, who for the most part seemed encouraged by the new administration.

Muhammad Uba Musa of Maiduguri, Nigeria, said, “Americans have so much to write about Barack Obama’s administration. We are praying for him … [and] also praying for President Donald Trump to succeed in his government.”

Alhaji Bello Musa of Birnin Konni in Niger also was hopeful: “Despite President Trump’s heated campaign in the past year … our prayers to him are that he should try to unify the world. … We also hope he’ll help Third World nations reach their potential.”

Umma Issaka of the same region in Niger was more cautious: “Donald Trump’s statement [that he may] ban Muslims from entering the country, is our major problem. … Most importantly, one cannot distinguish between Muslims and Christians; the relationship between the two has a long history, which has been since the era of the prophets. He should be very careful with his words as a leader of a great nation.”

Afghanistan

In Afghanistan’s capital, Kabul, Abdul Hadi Arez, a retired attorney, says he believes that Trump will face some grave challenges in foreign policy. “Over the past 30 years, Afghanistan has been torn apart in a regional proxy war,” he said, and this trend has become even more pronounced recently, “Because we see Russia, China and Iran interfering in Afghanistan against the U.S.”

Emran Khan, a student in Kabul, is “concerned that with the arrival of the new president, Afghanistan will lose the aid we receive.” He hopes the United States will not shift away from efforts to eliminate the Taliban, because “U.S. commitment is necessary for our security.”

South Korea

“We have been hearing about [Trump’s] America First’ policies since his campaign, and his extreme attitude makes us worry about what the future holds,” said Choi Seowoo, 22, who works at a finance company in Seoul.

“However, I am hopeful — or at least I want to believe — that rather than simply abandoning the traditional U.S.-South Korea alliance, President Trump will open a new chapter in the alliance by making it into a more modern relationship that fits the ever-volatile global society and politics.”

North Korea

A 50-year-old North Korean defector who lives in Chicago, and asked to remain anonymous for security reasons, told VOA he hopes “Trump revitalizes the nation’s economy, so that people here can have a better life.”

And along with strengthening U.S. national security to protect Americans, the defector added, “he should increase pressure on Pyongyang by slapping tougher sanctions against North Korea.”

Another defector, 50-year-old Kim Chang Ho of Los Angeles, said, “There are scores of North Korean defectors who have arrived here through third countries, and they do not have legal status. … I wish the U.S. would give them a chance to settle here permanently.”

Other nations

The inauguration attracted people of many different nationalities to Washington, both visitors and those who now live here permanently.

Nem Chhoeung is a Cambodian who lives in Clayton, Georgia. He told VOA he is very happy “because in our country we rarely see this kind of event.” He felt honored and privileged to be in the U.S. capital to watch the transition from one U.S. president to another.

Sen Son, a Buddhist monk who now lives in Stone Mountain, Georgia, shared the same joyous feeling of witnessing history.

“For me, as a Buddhist monk living in this country, I am happy to be participating in this event. This does not mean that I support [Trump], but I am enjoying this inauguration.”

Yehuda Glick, a visiting Jewish rabbi who also is a member of the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, told VOA he strongly hopes and prays — “that’s what I’m here for, to strengthen the relationship between Israel and the United States.”

 
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Signaling a new era in Washington, D.C., Donald Trump takes the reins of power with the intent to undo much of his predecessor’s legacy. He vowed to act on behalf of “forgotten” Americans, in a speech that sounded the themes of last year’s election campaign. VOA’s National correspondent Jim Malone looks at the transfer of power from Barack Obama to Trump, and what it means.
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Afghanistan’s first all-girl orchestra performed a concert in front of world leaders at the closing of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland on January 20.
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As one of his first acts in office, U.S. President Donald Trump imposed a government-wide freeze on new regulations on January 20, putting a halt to rules that his predecessor Barack Obama started.
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A chocolate maker owned by Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced on January 20 that it is planning to shut its factory in Russia for “economic and political reasons” and lay off 700 workers.
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Among the huge crowds expected in Washington for Donald Trump’s inauguration will be many planning to protest against his election and his plans for the nation. While hundreds of thousands of joyful Trump supporters thronged central Washington to celebrate Friday’s events, a similarly large crowd is expected Saturday for the anti-Trump Women’s March on Washington. Erika Celeste caught up with a group as they prepared to make their voices heard in Angola, Indiana.
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Ukraine has arrested a relative of Uzbekistan’s late President Islam Karimov who is wanted by Tashkent for the alleged embezzlement of hundreds of millions of dollars.
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After eight years of an on-again, off-again courtship of the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims in what he called a “new beginning” between America and Islam, President Barack Obama is leaving office with dashed hopes and disappointed fans in much of the Muslim world.

Obama remains popular around the world, with notable foreign policy achievements: the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the historic resumption of relations with Cuba and the landmark Paris climate change accord.

But as he hands over power Friday to President-elect Donald Trump, Obama’s image in the greater Middle East leaves much to be desired, with a once-enthusiastic Muslim public increasingly disillusioned by the unfulfillment of lofty promises made eight years ago.

“I have never seen such disillusionment with an American president and his policies expressed by people in the region, ordinary citizens as well as public figures,” Hisham Melhem, a prominent analyst for the Al Arabiya news channel, wrote in the Cairo Review.  

Obama offered an olive branch to Muslims around the world when he came into office after a controversial Republican presidency.

“To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward based on mutual interest and mutual respect,” he declared in his first inaugural address.

Within a couple of months, he traveled to Turkey “to send a message to the world” and hailed that country’s legacy of a “strong, vibrant, secular democracy.”

“The United States is not, and will never be, at war with Islam,” he told the country’s parliament.

The pinnacle of Obama’s Muslim diplomacy came two months later in Cairo.

“I’ve come here … to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world, one based on mutual interest and mutual respect, and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive and need not be in competition,” he declared.

He pledged to pull American troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, support the creation of a Palestinian state, close the controversial military prison at Guantanamo Bay, recognize Iran’s right to peaceful nuclear power and back democratic change in the region.

The speech was compared to Bush’s “freedom agenda.” But unlike Bush’s widely reviled plan for transforming the Middle East, Obama’s empathetic call for “partnership between America and Islam” won many Muslim supporters.

‘New and fresh’

Mohammed Baharoon, director general of the Dubai Public Policy Research Center, remembers watching the speech and being struck by its fresh language and tone.  

“[People] hadn’t seen this kind of a president” before, Baharoon said.”They saw a president who was down to earth, someone who was extending a hand. All of this was quite new and fresh.”

Akbar Ahmed, a leading scholar of Islam at American University in Washington, also watched the speech, but said “it created a lot of problems in my mind because I realized how eloquent, how visionary and how compassionate that speech was.”

“As a Muslim scholar, I knew that across the Muslim world … people would have very high expectations of the new president,” Ahmed said.

Muslim enthusiasm for Obama’s presidency proved short-lived as he struggled to enact most of his promises, and along the way soured on engagement with the region.

Obama was an enthusiastic early supporter of the 2011 pro-democracy Arab Spring movement, but he threw his support behind Egypt’s military regime two years later. His support of a military intervention in Libya in 2011 was hailed by some for preventing civilian casualties, but blamed by many in the region for igniting a civil war that continued years after the fall of Moammar Gadhafi.  

In 2011, Obama pulled American troops from Iraq, and in 2014 he ordered an end to combat operations in Afghanistan, but the conflicts intensified and he was blamed for a premature withdrawal from Iraq that led to the rise of Islamic State. Creating a Palestinian state proved stubbornly elusive, despite the appointment of a special envoy and repeated efforts to restart peace talks. The Guantanamo prison remained open even as the U.S. transferred out hundreds of detainees. And across the region, new wars flared up — from Syria in 2011 to Yemen in 2015.

“The outcomes of the eight years … are not very positive,” Baharoon said.

Popularity dipped

With the region engulfed in war, Obama’s popularity among Muslims dipped even as it soared elsewhere. A June 2015 Pew Research Center survey found that less than 50 percent of Turks, 36 percent of Lebanese, 15 percent of Palestinians, and 14 percent of Jordanians and Pakistanis approved of Obama’s handling of global affairs. There were some notable exceptions, including several Muslim majority African nations as well as Malaysia and Indonesia, where Obama spent his early childhood and remains popular.  

As an activist, Obama had called Saudi Arabia and Egypt “so-called allies,” and he never came to embrace them as genuine partners. In later years, Obama privately criticized Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries for exporting extremism to Indonesia. In Egypt, his initial support of the Arab Spring protests was seen as tantamount to an embrace of the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood and a betrayal of a key American ally.

“In private, I have heard Arab officials express critical views of Obama and his style of leadership bordering on utter contempt,” Melhem said.

Ahmed said the Libyan intervention “burned” Obama, and he called the Syrian conflict “the worst moment” of Obama’s presidency.

“That’s one of the big problems of being the president of the United States,” Ahmed said.  “Anything that happens in the world, positive or negative, people trace it to the president and say he’s responsible.”
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Editor’s note:  Story compiled with Ramon Taylor in Jacumba, CA, Aru Pande in York, PA, Aline Barros in Lumberton, NC, Kane Farabaugh in Ottawa, IL, Mohamed Olad Hassan in Minneapolis, MN.

On a rocky hill outside Jacumba, California — almost within earshot of the U.S.-Mexico border — two rival gas stations duel beneath a towering American flag.

It is a quintessential American scene: Locals and out-of-towners fill up with gas and drive into the open desert. But this waypoint is in the shadow of the border wall, both the part that is built and the part that isn’t.

“People come from Mexico and take jobs that people here in the U.S. could be doing,” argued Patrick, a supporter of President-elect Donald Trump and second-time Republican voter from El Centro, a nearby border town.

Jairo Carcamo, an independent who referred to former presidential candidate Hillary Clinton as a “sellout” and Trump “a racist,” is willing to give the 45th president a chance to deliver on his do-good promises for the economy, but doubts the border wall is part of the answer.

“If [Trump] wants to secure the border to keep the drug dealers out, to keep bad people out, good. But let in the good people,” he said. “We need hardworking people, we need immigrants, because an American isn’t going to go to the field and pick up apples for $4 a basket.”

Patti Myers Wiseman, a lifelong Democrat, thinks there’s no point in giving Trump a chance. Trump’s failure to release his tax returns and his lack of political experience are enough to deter her from considering her president “qualified.”

“He hasn’t paid taxes in however many years because of loopholes,” Wiseman said. “He is already trying to say that within the next few months or 120 days, he’ll repeal Obamacare and this and the other, and I think he’s going to wind up getting himself impeached.”

As Wiseman takes one last drag of a cigarette, she reveals her greatest fear involves not the economy, nor the tax returns, but the prospect of a sudden war. “That red button,” she said.

York, Pennsylvania  

“That guy [Trump], he knows a lot of tricks. He is smart, he is a businessman. And if you want to do something great for this country, he will do it,” said Greek-American Yani Pripas, who came to the U.S. in 1975. Owner of Greek Super Foods at the York Central Market, he voted for President Barack Obama twice, but this year he went for Trump.

What he wants is for Trump to make life in America like it was in the 1970s. “People, they used to be happy. They had money. It was not as many strangers in this country,” he said.

On the day before the inauguration, a daily lunch group convened at the market in downtown York. The group was a mixture of Republicans and Democrats and included attorneys, a sheriff and business owners. They meet and talk about their lives, their community — and today, for VOA, their politics.

“I still can’t wrap my head around this election. I am going to the inauguration tomorrow and I am excited for it. It’s my first one,” said Louis Rivera, who moved to York a year ago with his husband. Rivera has voted straight Democratic since 2008.

But he is less excited by the prospect of the next four years. “I am expecting the worst right now because of what [Trump] has said, but we are giving him the opportunity to change what he has said, and reach out to everyone,” Rivera said.

Jenna Geesey sees the Trump administration as a way out of a stalemate.

“I hope he keeps good on the promises of building up our national security and reforming our health care system,” Geesey said. “For far too long, there has just been a stalemate of inactivity and no real legislation that has been helping the middle class.”

“In order to make me feel better about him as a leader, [Trump] would have to become a more thoughtful speaker and more of a diplomat,” said staunch Democrat and attorney Audrey Woloshin. She said she was “diametrically opposed” to the philosophical and ideological positions of Trump and his Cabinet selections, “so I am fearful, fearful.”

Lumberton, North Carolina

Lumberton has an unemployment rate about 2.5 percent higher than the national average.

“Between 1996 until 2001, we lost close to about 8,000 jobs,” said Gregory Cummings, director of the North Carolina Industrial Development Commission. “We were losing metalworking. We were losing textile markets. … We were primarily made up of textile operations. … We got hit very hard.”

The year 1996 was about two years after the enactment of NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement.

“When Trump says NAFTA was not true free trade, when it is only free trade one way — that got people’s attention here,” said Phillip Stephens, chairman of the Robeson County Republican Party.

Small-business owner Tanner Smith has lived in Lumberton all his life, and all his life he has been a Democrat. But this fall, he voted Republican.

What does he want from Trump? “Keep his promises and take action before he takes office with some of these jobs,” Smith said.

India Lowry, a Democrat, who did not vote for Trump, moonlights in a deli to supplement her job with the county. “When we get the majority of our goods from China, it’s very concerning,” she conceded.

Business owner Alton Locklear, a Trump voter, said he thanked God that the new president would be taking the country in a new direction. “I’ve spoken to several people in my community about adding on workers, because they’re excited,” he said.

Lumberton is real Bible belt, he said — churches on every corner.

“Quite honestly, Trump just said all the things we’ve all been thinking all this time about what we should do about Islamic extremism, immigration, the taxes we’re paying,” Locklear said.

Ottawa, Illinois

The corn will not be planted in the flatlands of Illinois until April, so there is a lot of time now to think and talk about the change in administrations.

Farmer Monty Whipple tills fields that were once worked by his father and uncle about 12 miles (19 kilometers) from Ottawa. But the game has changed in recent years and depends more on trade.

So while Whipple voted for Trump, he did so as a last resort: “We export a lot of our produce, whether it’s grain or even the meats, and [the] livestock industry relies a lot on exports. He’s come down heavily against some of our trade agreements that we’ve put together in the past — NAFTA and so on.”

Farm insurance agent Robert Hasty described himself as more Republican than Democrat but could not bring himself to vote for Trump.

Hasty said he was politically conservative but found himself becoming socially liberal. “I’m concerned about … the moral fabric … the things that he’s said and done. I have two little daughters, and the things that he’s said when he’s up on the podium I find unsettling.”

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Somalis started coming to Minneapolis in the 1980s. By 2013, the community had grown to 25,000 people, owning hundreds of businesses.

Somalis skew Democratic but are active in both parties and, as VOA’s Somali service learned, they are comfortable switching parties.

Faduma Yusuf is a proud Republican who ran for the Minneapolis City Council in 2013. But she voted for Obama in 2008, then Mitt Romney in 2012. This year, she did not vote.

“Once I saw Trump actually insulting my own Somali community, the immigrant community, and he labeled the people who came here to survive and have a better life for themselves and for their kids as terrorists,” Yusuf said. “I decided not to vote for him.”

Social activist Faisal Derie voted for Obama twice, but this year, he went for Trump.

“I believe he would be one of the best presidents of the United States history, if not the best. I am expecting him to really do well as a president and get along with the world and the Democratic leaders,” Derie said, adding, “Since he is [a] businessman and not from [a] political background … I think he would feel the pain of the poor people.”

Samsam Aden, a Somali-American student who came to Minneapolis four years ago as a refugee, voted for Clinton because she said her future under the Trump administration seemed uncertain.

“I and my three siblings had a dream to pursue education and determine what we can be in our new home country, but now, as a man threatening my community is leading the nation, we are uncertain what the future might hold for us,” Aden said, adding, “In general, I am not optimistic about the future of Muslims in the U.S.”

Abdi Mahamud Mascade contributed to this report from Minneapolis.
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The views expressed in this commentary do not necessarily reflect the views of RFE/RL.
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The U.N. refugee agency, International Organization for Migration and 72 other partners are appealing for $691 million to implement a new plan to relocate and help ease the plight of tens of thousands of refugees and migrants in Europe this year.

More than 1.3 million refugees and migrants from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, the Horn of Africa and elsewhere have arrived in Europe over the past two years. They have met with resistance from European nations reluctant to receive them;  tens of thousands continue to languish in sub-standard camps and makeshift accommodations, with inadequate assistance and little hope for their future.  

The plan being launched by the U.N. refugee agency and International Organization for Migration sets out a new strategy to ensure safe access to asylum and protection of these individuals.

UNHCR spokeswoman Cecile Pouilly calls this a very pragmatic plan – one that will be reviewed throughout the year and adjusted to the reality on the ground,” said Pouilly. “She tells VOA the plan aims to support long-term solutions and an orderly and dignified way of managing migration.

“We have been constantly advocating for instance for European countries to offer more legal pathways for refugees and migrants to come to Europe, the reason being that if we do not offer such legal pathways, people resort to human smuggling with the deadly consequences that we have been witnessing over the past two years,” said Pouilly.  

The United Nations says some 5,000 people lost their lives in 2016 while making the perilous crossing in flimsy smuggler boats across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.

Aid agencies hope to prevent such tragedies from occurring by presenting safer alternatives to refugees and migrants. Pouilly says the plan emphasizes the specific needs of refugee and migrant children, as well as those of women and girls.

She says efforts will be made to meet the needs of unaccompanied and separated children in Europe and that more than 25,000 of the children arrived by sea in Italy alone last year.
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Editors’ note: As Donald Trump prepares to take the oath of office, the prospect of his presidency inspires the hopes of millions of Americans, the doubts and fears of millions of others. In effect, Trump will inherit leadership of many Americas, each sharing pride in country but conflicted in expectations of where we are headed and how the next president should govern. Those views are rooted in personal experiences as well as politics.

To glimpse the country Trump will lead as the 45th president, Associated Press journalists traveled to four corners of the U.S., each unique in its own right. Their stories offer a window into what people are thinking at this pivot point in the nation’s history.

A block from Nebraska’s Capitol, with its unique one-chamber, nonpartisan Legislature, is the lobbying office of Bill Mueller and Kim Robak, who embody the make-it-work spirit of this city: They’re husband and wife, Republican and Democrat.

And though neither was a Donald Trump booster, they are trying to remain positive about his presidency and even hope it might make hyperpartisan Washington, D.C., a bit more like Lincoln.

“Wouldn’t it be cool if it could actually work?” says Robak, with a trace of the peppy small-town girl she once was before rising through the political ranks to serve as her state’s lieutenant governor. “I’m not holding my breath, but if we could actually break the gridlock? That’s what the voters want.”

“It’s not starting off in that direction,” says her less-optimistic-sounding husband, as Republicans in Congress gear up to repeal the Affordable Care Act. “You should have listened to MSNBC this morning. It’s white and black, good and bad, God and the devil — and if you’re in the other party, you’re the devil.”

Lancaster County, home to Lincoln as well as the politically diverse Mueller-Robak family, is among the most evenly split on political lines of any major county in the nation. Hillary Clinton won here by only 310 votes out of 132,569 cast.

And yet, in the polarized America that Donald Trump takes the helm of, this place has somehow risen above the divisiveness, or at least learned how to live peacefully in opposition. Democrats and Republicans reside amiably side-by-side in farmhouses on gravel roads, old brick buildings converted to condos in the city center, or subdivisions of prairie-style houses in between.

They speak cautiously about their expectations for the Trump administration. Maybe it’s their low-key Midwestern attitude, or that people are simply exhausted after the grueling campaign of 2016.

“A lot of the quiet is because no one is exactly sure what’s going to happen,” says Ari Kohen, a political science professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, who contrasts the ideological diversity of his students with the blanket liberalism of those he taught on the East Coast. “People keep asking me what’s going to happen, and I keep telling them no one knows.”

That uncertainty crosses party lines.

“We’ll find out pretty soon if it’s going to work or not,” says Eddie Kramer, 29, before tucking into eggs and hash browns with his wife, Abby, at a firehouse-themed cafe in town.

If it works, the Kramers, who both work for insurance companies and voted for Trump, hope their health insurance bills shrink. The monthly premiums for them and their two children increased about $50 last year, and they had to pay $80 for required medications after their 7-year-old’s tonsils were removed.

Still, they’ve tried to keep the Trump talk down since Election Day.

“We have a lot of friends on both sides,” Abby Kramer says. “We try to keep our opinions to ourselves because we don’t want to offend anyone.”

With its population of 277,000, Lincoln is a big city for Austin Wendt, a computer science major at the university. He’s from the agricultural town of Columbus, Nebraska, 78 miles to the north. “It would be an understatement to say I was raised Republican,” he says.

On Election Day, Wendt watched the returns with friends, some Trump supporters, some Clinton supporters. He expected to have a nice drink while watching his candidate, Trump, lose. Instead, his Clinton friends melted down.

Wendt wants Trump to follow through on his promise to stop illegal immigration to help Americans reclaim jobs he believes have been taken by immigrants.

“We have these laws in place and they’re not being carried out,” he says.

But he’s conflicted: One of his closest friends at the university is a student from Brazil who’s gotten a job with Microsoft but fears losing his work visa if Trump follows through on his campaign promises. Wendt himself has a programming job lined up after he graduates this spring.

Across town, Suliman Bandas teaches English as a second language, his students immigrants and refugees from Iraq who say they feel safe in a town that, so far, tolerates difference. But Bandas, a refugee from the Sudan, worries about America’s reputation as “a country of refuge, a country of protection” under Trump.

“It should not be up to a president to change a country’s value and principle,” he says.

Vincent Powers is also looking ahead warily. The outgoing chairman of the Nebraska Democratic Party, he thinks “it’s going to be worse than anyone imagines.”

He’s not worried for himself; he’s a successful plaintiff’s attorney and expects to benefit from Trump’s proposed tax cuts tilted toward the wealthy. He is concerned for immigrants and those who depend on the Affordable Care Act or government aid.

But Powers finds solace in his hometown and his friends and neighbors, many of whom voted for Trump. “The thing about Nebraska is, we don’t have mountains, we don’t have any oceans. All we have is people,” he says.

“We have a great quality of life, and I’m not going to let politics sap the way I approach life.”
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Technocrats from three NATO states wrapped up meetings on Thursday focused on security arrangements in Cyprus, seeking to break an impasse in talks over the ethnically split island, a U.N. envoy said.

“The working group… successfully completed the mandate entrusted to it. Namely identifying specific questions related to the issue of security and guarantees and the instruments needed to address them,” U.N. envoy for Cyprus Espen Barth Eide said in a statement about the consultations, which were launched on Wednesday.

The sides had agreed not to disclose details about deliberations since the process had not yet ended, he said. It was not immediately clear when the sides would meet again.

Officials from Britain, Turkey and Greece as well as representatives of Cyprus’s Greeks and Turks had been considering how to address security concerns in a post-settlement Cyprus if the now estranged Greek and Turkish Cypriot sides ever reach a deal to co-govern.

The meetings of the working group started on Wednesday after an inconclusive meeting of foreign ministers from Britain, Greece and Turkey in Geneva last week.

Cyprus’s two main ethnic groups have lived divided since a Turkish invasion in 1974 triggered by a brief Greek inspired coup.

The conflict on the former British colony spans decades and is a key source of tension between Greece and Turkey, which have come to the brink of war over the east Mediterranean island in the past.
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With hundreds of thousands descending on Washington to celebrate — and protest — Donald Trump’s presidential inauguration, the U.S. capital is bracing for a ceremony whose pomp has been overshadowed by extraordinary tensions.
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When Barack Obama leaves office, will the restaurant named after him close its doors? The manager of the Obama Bar & Grill in the Kyrgyz capital says definitely not, because just like Obama, the eatery has earned its place in history. (RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service)
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Russian Orthodox Christians took the plunge in icy Siberian waters to mark the holy day of Epiphany. Meanwhile, the faithful in Serbia celebrated with a swimming race in Belgrade. (RFE/RL’s Russian and Balkan services)
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Former Beatle Paul McCartney sued Sony’s music publishing arm Wednesday in federal court in New York, seeking to get back the copyrights to music of his former band, court records show.

Starting in October 2008, McCartney sent notices to Sony/ATV Music Publishing stating his desire to reclaim the copyrights to numerous songs, including Beatles hits “Across the Universe,” “Love Me Do” and “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” the suit said.

Sony/ATV holds copyrights to the works, which were jointly composed by McCartney and John Lennon between September 1962 and June 1971. The suit said the singer-songwriter would be able to begin to reclaim his rights to the music as of next October under the U.S. Copyright Act.

McCartney’s lawyers have repeatedly asked Sony/ATV to acknowledge the musician’s rights to terminate copyright transfers of the music, and the company has declined to do so, the suit said.

“Because the earliest of Paul McCartney’s terminations will take effect in 2018, a judicial declaration is necessary and appropriate at this time so that Paul McCartney can rely on quiet, unclouded title to his rights,” the suit said.

‘Premature’ lawsuit

Sony/ATV Music Publishing was critical of the lawsuit in an emailed statement.

“Sony/ATV has the highest respect for Sir Paul McCartney with whom we have enjoyed a long and mutually rewarding relationship with respect to the treasured Lennon & McCartney song catalog,” Sony/ATV said. “We are disappointed that they have filed this lawsuit, which we believe is both unnecessary and premature.”

The lawsuit said Sony/ATV attempted to stall talks with McCartney until the conclusion of a lawsuit involving similar claims by British pop band Duran Duran that was playing out in an English court. Duran Duran lost the legal battle to a Sony/ATV subsidiary in December.

“Rather than provide clear assurances to Paul McCartney that defendants will not challenge his exercise of his termination rights, defendants are clearly reserving their rights pending the final outcome of the Duran Duran litigation,” McCartney’s lawsuit said.

The suit is seeking a declaration from the court that McCartney can reclaim his copyright interests in the songs, as well as attorneys’ fees.
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An ice storm shut down parts of major highways and interstates Wednesday in Oregon and Washington state and paralyzed towns along the Columbia River Gorge, with up to 2 inches of ice coating the ground in some places.

As temperatures hovered around freezing, Interstate 84 was shut down for a 45-mile stretch in Oregon. Transportation officials had no immediate plans to reopen the highway connecting Oregon and Idaho.

Dozens of semitrailer-trucks with no place to go were lined up and double-parked along ramps near the point of the closure.

‘Back to the truck stop’

“They just towed me out because they want to clear the road, but I don’t think I-84 is back open,” said Brad Cottle, a trucker who got stuck in the mess and spent the night in his cab. “I’m going to have to go back to the truck stop.”

Bonneville, on the Washington state side of the Columbia River, had 2 inches of ice, and Hood River, on the Oregon side, got 1.5 inches, said Andy Bryant, a hydrologist at the National Weather Service office in Portland.

The agency doesn’t keep detailed statistics on ice storms, he said, but meteorologists compared the scene to severe storms in 1996 and 2004.

“That kind of ice accumulation is pretty unusual,” Bryant said. “This is a big one.”

Flooding risk in Portland

Meanwhile, in Portland, rising temperatures and rain after days of freezing weather, snow and ice raised the risk of flooding.

Nearly 10 inches of snow fell in Portland last week, and some areas saw up to a foot. Freezing temperatures kept the snow on the ground until Wednesday, when it began to melt.

Emergency officials urged residents living along creeks and streams to watch for flooding and stockpile sandbags.

To the east, the ice storm paralyzed small towns in the gorge.

There was little relief in sight as a low-pressure system pulled cold air from the eastern part of the state into the gorge.

Billy Graham, 57, was trying to visit friends and family in the area after driving from Texas but was stranded at a Motel 6 along Interstate 84 in Troutdale. He hadn’t been able to get out of his room, even on foot, because of the slick pavement, he said in a telephone interview.

“I tried to get out yesterday, and I couldn’t even get out of the parking lot. I haven’t eaten in a couple of days,” he said. “You can’t even walk. If you do, you fall down.”

In eastern Oregon, I-84 was also closed near Ontario, and Interstate 82 was also shut down between I-84 and the Washington border.

The cities of La Grande and Baker City could get more than a foot of snow by Thursday, Bryant said.

I-90 shut over Snoqualmie Pass

In Washington state, Interstate 90, the main highway connecting western and eastern Washington, was to remain closed over Snoqualmie Pass because of hazardous winter conditions. Crews will re-evaluate the roadway Thursday morning.

Charles McCaskill, a trucker heading to Nebraska to deliver frozen salmon, was pulled over along the shoulder of I-90 Wednesday afternoon, waiting for the highway to reopen.

“It’s just one of those things we’ve got to deal with. If it’s not the snow, it’s avalanches. That’s the way it goes,” said the Florida trucker who slept in his cab overnight.

The Washington State Patrol said troopers responded to 67 collisions overnight because roads were covered with layers of snow, sleet and freezing rain.
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An al-Qaida-linked extremist group is claiming responsibility for Wednesday’s suicide attack on a military camp in northern Mali, killing at least 60 soldiers and former rebels and wounding 115.

A car packed with explosives penetrated the camp in Gao as hundreds of solders gathered for a morning meeting.

They belong to the Joint Operational Mechanism, which brings together government forces and former Taureg rebels who form patrols to enforce the 2015 Malian peace agreement.

Three days of mourning

Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop called the bombing “criminal, cowardly and barbaric.”

“This attack should not distract us from our will to move forward to promote peace and to act against those who are trying to sabotage the peace process,” Diop said during a scheduled meeting on Mali at the United Nations Security Council.

He said Mali will observe three days of mourning for the victims and vowed that those who carried out the bombing will be found and punished.

U.S. ‘strongly condemns’ bombing 

U.N. peacekeeping chief Herve Ladsous appealed to all sides to do what they can to preserve the peace deal in Mali, warning that “if the security situation continues to deteriorate, then soon there won’t be any peace to keep in Mali.”

The U.S. also says it “strongly condemns the cowardly attack” in Mali. State Department spokesman John Kirby said “we also denounce in the strongest terms all efforts to derail implementation of the peace agreement.”

A very shaky peace

Taureg separatists took advantage of a 2012 military coup in Mali to briefly seize control of the north before al-Qaida-linked militants drove them out.

A French force took back the region from the Islamists. Thousands of U.N. peacekeepers and Malian soldiers are overseeing a very shaky peace agreement between the Malian government and the Tauregs.

Human Rights Watch says Islamists killed 29 U.N. peacekeepers last year and still threaten to impose strict Sharia law in northern and central Mali.

Margaret Besheer contributed to this report.

 
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