Armed men attacked an army camp in Mali near the border with Mauritania, killing 19 soldiers Sunday, the armed forces said.
The camp in Sokolo in the Segou region remains under control by Malian Armed Forces, and the provisional toll includes five injured, the armed forces said in a statement on Twitter.
Souleymane Maiga, a resident of Sokolo, said the attackers temporarily had taken control of the camp.
“The army camp was attacked this morning by gunmen,” he said. “The attackers temporarily took control of the camp and destroyed everything before leaving. Many of the soldiers who were in the camp took refuge in the village.”
The attack wasn’t claimed but bears the hallmarks of jihadi groups linked to al-Qaida that are based in the Wagadu forest, located about 50 kilometers (30 miles) from the attacked village.
Усі школи та позашкільні заклади у Бердянську Запорізької області закрили на карантин до кінця січня, повідомляє Запорізький обласний лабораторний центр МОЗ України.
«Через високий рівень захворюваності учнів на гострі респіраторні вірусні інфекції 24.01.2020 року на засіданні комісії з питань ТБНС м. Бердянська прийнято рішення про тимчасове припинення функціонування шкіл та позашкільних закладів м. Бердянська з 25 січня по 31 січня 2020 року. Крім того, повністю припинено навчання дітей ще у 4-х школах області (Тимошівська ЗОШ Михайлівського району, Молочанська ЗОШ Токмацького району, Новоолексіївський НВК Приморського району та Владівська ЗОШ Чернігівського району). Також за наказами керівників територіальних відділів освіти (31 наказ ТВО) частково припинено навчальний процес в 51 класі 27-ми шкіл області (з них: 23 навчальні заклади міста Запоріжжя, а також школи Василівського, Вільнянського, Запорізького та Чернігівського районів)», – зазначається на сайті установи.
За даними МОЗ, з 30 вересня 2019 року до 19 січня 2020 року на грип та гострі респіраторні вірусні інфекції перехворіло майже 6,2% населення країни. З початку епідемічного сезону зареєстровано 11 летальних випадків внаслідок грипу, що підтверджено методом ПЛР.
ГРІ – гостра респіраторна інфекція – найширше поняття, що включає респіраторні інфекції, спровоковані як вірусами (ГРВІ – переважна більшість випадків), так і бактеріями (бактеріальні ГРІ – виникають значно рідше).
Основна різниця у симптомах грипу і ГРВІ полягає у тому, що грип розпочинається раптово і гостро, а впродовж періоду хвороби різко виражені ломота в тілі, озноб, головний біль і біль у м’язах, а ГРВІ – зазвичай починається поступово і супроводжується відчуттям «розбитості» та загального нездужання.
У Санкт-Петербурзі затримали учасника одиночного пікету проти змін до російської конституції Євгена Козлова: той стояв із плакатом із зображенням російського президента Володимира Путіна і написом «Кащей бессменный», повідомляє російське видання «МБХ медиа».
За повідомленням «МБХ медиа», цього ж дня було затримано ще двох осіб: Марія Малишева стояла з плакатом «Новое кино: Шариковы и Маньки-облигации переписывают Конституцию, чтобы Путин был у власти до гроба», а інший затриманий – Дмитро Гусєв – не мав ніякого плаката взагалі.
Затримання Козлова і Малишевої також підтверджує проєкт Радіо Свобода «Настоящее время».
Президент Росії Володимир Путін, виступаючи 15 січня з посланням перед російським парламентом, запропонував внести поправки до конституції країни.
Зокрема, він запропонував обговорити виключення слова «поспіль» у положенні конституції про можливість обиратися президентом Росії не більше ніж на два терміни. За словами Путіна, він не вважає це принциповою зміною. Хоча саме слово «поспіль» у конституції дозволило Путіну в 2012 році знову стати президентом – після двох термінів в 2000-2008 роках.
67-річний Володимир Путін домінує в російській політиці впродовж двох десятиліть, обіймаючи посаду президента або прем’єр-міністра з 1999 року. У 2018 році Путін був переобраний на новий шестирічний термін. …
The World Food Program reports it is scaling up its operation to provide emergency food to tens of thousands of homeless, hungry people in Syria’s war-torn province of Idlib.
Humanitarian officials say conditions for some three million civilians in Idlib have become intolerable since Syria and its Russian allies launched a major offensive in mid-December to seize this last rebel stronghold.
Since then, the United Nations reports more than 300,000 people, 80 percent of them women and children, have fled their homes in a desperate bid to protect themselves from heavy bombing and shelling.
Last year, the World Food Program nearly doubled its food assistance from 550,000 beneficiaries to one million in northwest Syria. Given the increasing conflict and displacement, WFP spokeswoman Elizabeth Byrs says her agency is scaling up its operation to provide emergency food aid to more than 126,000 displaced.
“WFP and its partners are now pre-positioning life-saving food for more than one million people in northwest Syria for six weeks. It is — I can just say it is vital we continue to be able to reach these desperately vulnerable people whose lives are being torn apart by fighting.”
Idlib is under siege, so WFP only can bring food into the territory from Turkey. Byrs says this cross-border operation from Turkey has made it possible for WFP to feed hundreds of thousands of destitute people in Idlib last year and will continue to do so this year.
The United Nations reports more than eight years of brutal civil conflict has pushed millions of Syrians into hunger and poverty. It reports the war has displaced more than six million people within the country and created a food crisis for more than seven million who suffer from chronic food shortages.
U.S. President Donald Trump poked fun at North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s alleged golfing prowess during a private dinner in April 2018, joking that golfing legend Jack Nicklaus is “a beginner” by comparison.
Trump also questioned U.S. involvement in the 1950s Korean War, according to a recording of the dinner first published by ABC News.
“You know that Kim Jon Ung is a great golfer,” Trump told his dinner guests, mispronouncing the name of the North Korean leader he would meet for the first time in Singapore six weeks later. “He would make Jack Nicklaus look like a beginner.”
Trump continued, apparently mocking the cult of personality that North Korean state media have cultivated for the three generations of the ruling Kim family.
“Did you ever hear that? He shot an 18,” Trump said amid roars of laughter from the guests, before adding: “It’s actually his father, you know who they said shot an 18.”
“It’s just one weird deal,” Trump added.
The comments came as Trump was shifting his approach toward the young North Korean leader.
In 2017, Trump routinely mocked Kim, calling him “Little Rocket Man” and insinuating in a tweet that he was “short and fat.” Trump also threatened North Korea with “fire and fury like the world has never seen” and warned he could “totally destroy” the country.
But in early 2018, Trump drastically changed course, announcing he would meet Kim face to face. The two men met for the first time that June, signing a vague statement about the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula. The talks have since stalled.
At the dinner, which took place on April 30, Trump can be heard telling his guests about the plans for the upcoming Singapore summit.
“The North Korea thing is moving along very well. We have a site now. You know, we picked a site. They announce pretty soon. And a location, plus a date,” Trump said. “And he really wants to do something, I tell you. Part of the reason he wants to do two things – I mean maybe the rhetoric and maybe we put sanctions like you wouldn’t believe.”
One of the guests can be heard asking whether Trump would consider hosting the meeting at Songdo, a so-called “smart city” just outside Seoul. Trump said he would consider Songdo, but that plans for the Kim summit were already “very far down the line.”
The recording was released by a lawyer for Lev Parnas, an associate of Trump’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani. Parnas was indicted last year on campaign finance-related charges, and released the tape amid Trump’s impeachment.
On the tape, Trump calls for the firing of U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. Democrats have pointed to Trump’s firing of Yovanovitch as one of the reasons he should be removed from office.
The dinner, which was attended by Trump donors, took place at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, DC.
Trump targets South Korea
During the dinner, Trump also took aim at South Korea on trade, after one of the dinner guests complained that South Korea was exporting Chinese steel to the United States.
“We’re doing a big number for them. Can you believe it?” Trump said, apparently referencing the U.S. military presence in Korea. “I could write a book on that.”
After one of the guests mentioned that the U.S. spends “billions of dollars to save [South Korea] from North Korea,” Trump reflected on the history of the U.S.-South Korea alliance.
“How we ever got involved in South Korea in the first place, you know, tell me about it. How we ended up in a Korean war,” Trump said as his guests laughed.
FILE – A U.S. soldier stands guard in front of their Air F-16 fighter jet at Osan Air Base in Pyeongtaek, South Korea, Jan. 10, 2016.
The U.S. has 28,500 troops in South Korea, a remnant of the 1950s era Korean War, which ended in a truce, not a peace treaty. The Pentagon says the troops are meant to deter North Korea.
Trump has long complained that Seoul is not paying enough for the cost of the U.S. military presence.
For a second consecutive year, negotiators failed to reach an agreement before the military cost-sharing deal expired on December 31. Officials have said the talks have made progress, but that gaps remain.
Trump has at times dismissed the need for U.S. troops in Korea. Asked last month if it was in the U.S. security interest to keep troops in South Korea and the region, Trump said he could go “either way.”
Iraqi security forces, seeking to disperse protesters, used live bullets Sunday, wounding demonstrators in the capital, Baghdad, and the southern city of Nassiriya.
Prominent cleric Muqafa al-Sadr withdrew his support Saturday for the four-month-long sit-ins and rallies in Iraq that have threatened the status quo. Within hours of dropping his support, Sadr’s followers, who were some of the staunchest supporters of the protesters, packed their tents and left the camps.
Protesters have called for new leadership, jobs, healthcare, security and an end to widespread corruption and extreme poverty.
Without Sadr’s support, protesters had predicted Iraq’s many militias and divisions of security forces would attack the demonstrators.
It is estimated at least 600 people have been killed and 20,000 people have been wounded in the protests across Iraq since October.
The U.S. Border Patrol, reacting to a breach it discovered in a steel-pole border wall believed to be used by smugglers, gave activists no warning this month when it bulldozed the U.S. side of a cross-border garden on an iconic bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean.
On Saturday, after a public apology for “the unintentional destruction,” the agency allowed the activists into a highly restricted area to plant sticky monkey-flowers, seaside daisies and other native species in Friendship Park, which was inaugurated by first lady Pat Nixon in 1971 as a symbol of bilateral bonds. The half-acre plaza separating San Diego and Tijuana has hosted cross-border yoga classes, festivals and religious services.
The garden’s rebirth is the latest twist in a sometimes adversarial, sometimes conciliatory relationship between security-minded border agents and activists who consider the park a special place to exercise rights to free expression.
“It’s hard to reconcile because we have two different agendas, but we’re both in the same place, so we’re trying our best,” said Daniel Watman, a Spanish teacher who spearheads the garden for the volunteer group, Friends of Friendship Park.
During an art festival in 2005, David Smith Jr., known as “The Human Cannonball,” flashed his passport, lowered himself into a barrel and was shot over the wall on the nearby beach, landing on a net with U.S. Border Patrol agents nearby. In 2017, professional swimmers crossed the border from the U.S. in the Pacific Ocean and landed on the same beach, where a Mexican official greeted them with stamped passports and schoolchildren cheered.
Some events rejected
The Border Patrol has been less receptive to events that carry an overtly political message or that, in its view, take things too far. In 2017, it rejected the Dresdner Symphony Orchestra’s plans for a cross-border concert named “Tear Down This Wall.” It also nixed a “Let Them Hug” signature campaign to allow “touch time” across the border on weekends.
Agents briefly opened a heavy steel gate several times a year but ended the practice after an American man and Mexican woman wed in a cross-border ceremony in 2017. They were furious to learn later that the groom was a convicted drug smuggler whose criminal record prohibited him from entering Mexico.
Smugglers allegedly cut an opening in part of a border wall, since repaired, a breach that the U.S. Border Patrol said led to the “unintentional destruction” of a cross-border garden this month in San Diego’s Friendship Park, Jan. 25, 2020.
Friends of Friendship Park, which advocates for “unrestricted access to this historic meeting place,” said the garden was created in 2007, shortly before a second barrier created a buffer enforcement zone that the Border Patrol opens to the public on weekends only. People can barely touch fingertips through a steel mesh screen during those weekend encounters.
The Border Patrol said in a statement after the garden was bulldozed that it was being used “as cover to hide smuggling activities.” It released photos that showed a padlock on the Mexican side, which smugglers apparently used to keep the roughly 18-inch (46-centimeter) opening to themselves.
Walls are often breached. Manny Bayon, president of the National Border Patrol Council union local that represents San Diego-area agents, said some have cut through President Donald Trump’s new wall of high, concrete-filled steel bollards. Smugglers use cordless grinders that cost about $100.
Friends of Friendship Park met January 15 with Douglas Harrison, the Border Patrol’s interim San Diego chief, and settled on a plan to resurrect the garden. Harrison said the intent was to trim it, not destroy it.
“We take full responsibility, are investigating the event, & look forward to working with [Friends of Friendship Park] on the path forward,” Harrison said on Twitter.
Compromise
A compromise called for the garden to be set back 4 feet (1.2 meters) from the wall to give agents better visibility, with minimal planting on the next 4 feet to better facilitate temporary removal when construction crews replace the existing barrier with Trump’s wall.
There was a last-minute misunderstanding Saturday when Watman said the group’s willingness to set the garden back came with permission to plant over a larger space, which the agents on duty wouldn’t allow. Watman agreed to shrink his blueprint and take it up later.
“Things are always up in the air somewhat,” he said. “There’s a little bit of playing it by ear.”
The Border Patrol released a statement Saturday that said it values “the friendships we have built over the years with the community.”
“We are confident that this relationship will continue as we move into a new era of the bi-national garden,” it said.
Hundreds of former prisoners will return Monday to the Nazi concentration and extermination camp at Auschwitz, Poland, alongside several world leaders, to mark the 75th anniversary of its liberation by Soviet troops.
At least 1.1 million people – mostly Jews – were murdered at Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest of the Nazi death camps, between 1940 and 1945.
Stanislaw Zalewski, 94, is among the former prisoners who will return for the anniversary. He says he keeps his memories locked away – “occasionally letting them out to share the horrors of the past.”
Zalewski was 18 when he was arrested for painting Polish resistance symbols on walls in Nazi-occupied Warsaw. After a brutal interrogation, he was imprisoned in Waraw’s Pawiak prison.
“About 37,000 of these prisoners were killed and about 60,000 were taken from Pawiak prison to concentration camps,” Zalewski told VOA in a recent interview. “I was among these 60,000. I was taken to Auschwitz-Birkenau on October 6, 1943.”
“The arrival procedure was as follows: registration in Auschwitz 1 camp, which involved taking personal information; taking off all our civilian clothes, cutting off hair, shaving, tattooing, putting on prison-striped uniforms — we got only a cap, a shirt, a jacket, underwear, pants and wooden clogs.”
Saved by his strength
Zalewski was tattooed with the number 156569. Guards referred to prisoners only by number. Many new arrivals were taken directly to the gas chambers. Stronger men and women were used as forced labor, which helped Zalewski survive his time at Auschwitz.
“If one of the prisoners did not look fit enough for further work, the SS [Nazi paramilitaries] pointed him out with a stick to the camp ‘writer,’ who would write down the prisoner’s number. Afterwards, these prisoners were called out and taken on foot to the crematorium.
“One day, lorries arrived at the barracks, and women were led out, ordered to strip naked, and they were loaded as though they were some commodity. These trucks were followed by a soldier on a motorbike as they moved toward the crematorium. I still remember today the screams of these women. The transportation lasted several hours until they emptied the barracks.”
Zalewski was imprisoned for his political activities. Most prisoners were Jews sent to Auschwitz to their deaths – the Nazis’ so-called “Final Solution” to wipe out the Jews. Zalewski recalls Jewish prisoners arriving on trains, wearing bands bearing the Star of David.
“One SS soldier ordered them in one long line, with him standing at the front of the line and leading them forward. They followed this one soldier with no signs of worry or anxiety. They were heading toward the crematorium. But only we were aware of this, not them.”
FILE – Stanislaw Zalewski, pictured at Auschwitz-Birkenau a year ago, is president of the Polish Union of Former Political Prisoners of Nazi Prisons and Concentration Camps. Seventy-five years on, he still struggles to reconcile what happened.
As Soviet soldiers began to approach from the east, the Nazis transferred hundreds of thousands of prisoners to other camps on so-called “death marches” or in railroad cattle trucks. Tens of thousands died on the journey. Zalewski was taken to the Mauthausen-Guzen camp in Austria. In May 1945, rumors spread of the Allied advance — and German guards fled.
“On May 5, American military vehicles arrived,” Zalewski says, tears welling in his eyes. “Two American soldiers got off. One of them knew some Polish and shouted, ‘You are free!’ It took me 78 days to get from Nuremberg to Warsaw. I arrived in Warsaw on July 22, 1945, wearing USA Army fatigues.”
Zalewski is now president of the Polish Union of Former Political Prisoners of Nazi Prisons and Concentration Camps. Seventy-five years on, he still struggles to reconcile what happened.
“When I say the Lord’s Prayer, there is a phrase: ‘Give us our daily bread, and forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who have sinned against us.’ I face a dilemma at this point. Can I forgive those who had an inscription that read, ‘God is with us,’ on their belt buckles, who killed people with cold premeditation?”
“I put my memories of Auschwitz into a box, I tied it with a string, and threw it into the water,” Zalewski says. “I worked, I started a family, I have a son and grandchildren. When I visit the camp or when we are talking like we are today, I pull out this box, I present its contents to you, and afterwards, I throw it back into the water. There are moments, however, when these memories break into my psyche, causing reflections and questions with no answers.
‘World has not learned’
“I am sad because of what is happening in other parts of the world, where people for their own purposes commit armed, violent acts that take the lives of thousands of innocent people. The world has not learned the lesson of what had happened. The world has come full circle, so to speak. This history, this circularity, is powered by people who do not respect the dignity of another human being.”
Zalewski and about 200 fellow survivors will return to the so-called “gates of hell” for the 75th anniversary of the camp’s liberation, still determined to teach the world the lessons of Auschwitz.
President Donald Trump inquired how long Ukraine would be able to resist Russian aggression without U.S. assistance during a 2018 meeting with donors that included the indicted associates of his personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani.
“How long would they last in a fight with Russia?” Trump is heard asking in the audio portion of a video recording, moments before he calls for the firing of U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. She was removed a year later after a campaign to discredit her by Giuliani and others, an action that is part of Democrats’ case arguing for the removal of the president in his Senate impeachment trial.
A video recording of the entire 80-minute dinner at the Trump Hotel in Washington was obtained Saturday by The Associated Press. Excerpts were first published Friday by ABC News. People can be seen in only some portions of the recording.
The recording contradicts the president’s statements that he did not know the Giuliani associates Lev Parnas or Igor Fruman, key figures in the investigation who were indicted last year on campaign finance charges. The recording came to light as Democrats continued to press for witnesses and other evidence to be considered during the impeachment trial.
FILE – Former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch testifies before the House Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, Nov. 15, 2019.
On the recording, a voice that appears to be Parnas’ can be heard saying, “The biggest problem there, I think where we need to start is we got to get rid of the ambassador.” He later can be heard telling Trump: “She’s basically walking around telling everybody, ‘Wait, he’s gonna get impeached. Just wait.’ ”
Trump responds: “Get rid of her! Get her out tomorrow. I don’t care. Get her out tomorrow. Take her out. OK? Do it.”
Ukraine came up during the dinner in the context of a discussion of energy markets, with the voice appearing to be Parnas’ describing his involvement in the purchase of a Ukrainian energy company.
The group then praises Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, to which the president says: “Pompeo’s going to be good. He’s doing a good job. Already he’s doing a good job.”
At the beginning of the video, Trump is seen posing for photos before entering the blue-walled dining room. A voice that appears to be Fruman’s is heard saying that “it’s a great room” before a chuckle. “I couldn’t believe myself.”
Also visible in the video are the president’s son Donald Trump Jr. and former counselor to the president Johnny DeStefano. Jack Nicklaus III, the grandson of the golf icon, and New York real estate developer Stanley Gale also attended the event for a pro-Trump group.
President’s complaints
Just a few minutes into the conversation, Trump can be heard railing against former President George W. Bush, China, the World Trade Organization and the European Union. “Bush, he gets us into the war, he gets us into the Middle East, that was a beauty,” Trump says. “We’re in the Middle East right now for $7 trillion.” He later says: “China rips us off for years and we owe them $2 trillion.” The president blames the WTO because it “allowed China to do what they’re doing.”
“The WTO is worse” than China, he declares. “China didn’t become great until the WTO.”
Trump also seemed to question the U.S. involvement in the Korean War: “How we ever got involved in South Korea in the first place, tell me about it. How we ended up in a Korean War.”
FILE – North Korea’s leader Kim Jong Un walks with U.S. President Donald Trump at the Capella Hotel on Sentosa island in Singapore, in this picture taken June 12, 2018, and released from North Korea’s Korean Central News Agency.
Trump provided the guests with an update ahead of his first meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, revealing that he’d settled on a date and location. One of the people in attendance sought to pitch a different location: Songdo, South Korea, which is 70% owned by Gale International and features a Nicklaus-designed golf course.
“You know that Kim Jong Un is a great golfer,” Trump is heard telling the guests, who roar with laughter.
Trump also discussed the border crisis and plans for a border wall with Mexico, insisting that he wants to build a concrete wall but had heard from law enforcement officials that it wasn’t viable. “You do have to be able to see through the wall, I think,” Trump says. He says drug dealers would throw heavy bundles of drugs over the wall, which could kill Border Patrol agents.
“They have a catapult and they throw it over the wall, and it lands on the other side of the wall and it can hit people. Can you imagine you get hit with 100 pounds?” the president says. “The whole thing is preposterous. I would’ve loved to have seen to see a concrete wall, but you just can’t do that.”
Election, media
Toward the end of the dinner, the discussion turns to the upcoming election and media.
“Magazines are dead,” Trump says.
“I think cable TV is OK. If we ever lost an election, cable TV is dead,” he says, the partygoers laughing. “Can you imagine if they had a normal candidate? It’s all they talk about. If they had Hillary, crooked Hillary, their ratings would be one-fifth.”
Trump says that he believes he would have had a harder time in 2016 if Bernie Sanders had been the Democratic nominee.
Near the end of the dinner Parnas can be heard presenting what he says is a gift to Trump from “the head rabbi in Ukraine” and rabbis in Israel drawing a parallel between Trump and the messiah. “It’s like messiah is the person that’s come to save the whole world. So it’s like you’re the savior of the Ukraine.”
“All Jew people of Ukraine, they are praying for you,” Fruman says, as Parnas tells Trump to show the gift to Jared Kushner, the president’s Jewish son-in-law and senior adviser, to explain its meaning. In the video, it appears Fruman is seated across the narrow part of the rectangular table and one seat over from the president.
Trump also tells the assembled guests that it is “ridiculous” and “wrong” that he can’t hold political fundraisers inside the White House, saying it would save the government money compared to driving him the four blocks to his hotel.
Уряд України буде працювати задля практичного дотримання в країні норм Стамбульської конвенції проти насильства щодо жіноцтва і в родині, заявив віцепрем’єр-міністр із питань європейської і євроатлантичної інтеграції Дмитро Кулеба в програмі «Суботнє інтерв’ю» на Радіо Свобода.
За його словами, «з парламентом будемо працювати над тим, щоб навіть якщо так станеться, що ратифікація Стамбульської конвенції буде неможливою, щоб норми Стамбульської конвенції якраз щодо боротьби з домашнім насильством, з насильством проти жінок, чоловіків, так званим гендерно зумовленим насильством були належним чином врегульовані в українському законодавстві».
Кулеба звернув увагу, що «сама конвенція присвячена боротьбі з домашнім насильством, але там є питання визначення терміну «гендер», який викликає, скажімо так, певні суперечності в українському суспільстві».
«Нинішня ситуація зі Стамбульською конвенцією була такою ж минулого року і позаминулого року, і позапозаминулого року. У цьому плані жодних змін немає. Є дуже серйозні різночитання в українському суспільстві щодо її змісту», – заявив Кулеба.
Україна ще 2011 року підписала, але досі не ратифікувала Стамбульську конвенцію, офіційна назва якої – Конвенція Ради Європи про запобігання і боротьбу з насильством проти жінок і домашнім насильством. В усіх дотеперішніх складах українського парламенту з цього огляду переважали вкрай консервативні і хибні погляди на зміст цієї конвенції.
Її єдине завдання – запобігати всім формам насильства проти жінок, підтримувати рівність між жінками й чоловіками. Але в її тексті є слово «гендер», яке помилково або свідомо неправдиво пов’язують із пропагандою гомосексуалізму, одностатевими шлюбами тощо.
За текстом конвенції, «гендер» у її розумінні означає «соціально виниклі ролі, способи поведінки, діяльності чи атрибути, які дане суспільство вважає належними для чоловіків і жінок». Таким чином, запровадження в документі цього поняття ніяк не загрожує традиціям і цінностям кожного даного суспільства.
Також конвенція не містить і не може призвести до загрози концепції родини – вона взагалі ніяк не стосується цього питання і не регулює його, а відтак через ратифікацію конвенції не може виникнути вимога визнавати одностатеві шлюби.
Поняття «гендеру» не замінює термінів «жінка» й «чоловік», конвенція не просуває ніякої особливої «гендерної ідеології»: єдиний сенс цього слова в документі – наголосити, що жінка з більшою ймовірністю може зазнати насильства саме через те, що вона жінка.
Документ не передбачає створення поняття «третьої статі» чи вимог визнавати її, як і не вимагає запровадження якоїсь окремої «гендерної освіти».
І, крім того, попри назву конвенції, вона також містить положення про захист від домашнього насильства також чоловіків чи хлопців.
Але супротивники конвенції, нерідко з гомофобних чи ультрарелігійних кіл, продовжують повторювати ці щойно спростовані твердження. …
U.S. President Donald Trump’s legal team began presenting counterarguments Saturday in the Senate after House impeachment managers wrapped up three days of closing arguments in Trump’s historic Senate impeachment trial.
White House Counsel Pat Cipollone began presenting Trump’s defense by declaring the Democratic House managers failed to achieve their objective.“
We don’t believe that they have come anywhere close to meeting their burden for what they’re asking you to do,” Cipollone said.
Cipollone also reiterated an often-repeated criticism of the Democratic-led impeachment proceedings that they would nullify Trump’s 2016 election win and reduce choices for voters before the upcoming November presidential election.“
They’re here to perpetrate the most massive interference in an election in American history and we cannot allow that to happen,” Cipollone said. “It would violate our Constitution. It would violate our history. It would violate our obligations to the future. And, most importantly, it would violate the sacred trust that the American people have placed in you.”
Saturday’s defense of Trump amounts to a preview of the arguments that will be laid out in further detail next week.
During his presentation, White House deputy counsel Michael Purpura played a video clip of lead House manager Adam Schiff embellishing the conversation Trump had with Ukraine’s president on July 25 phone call that is central to the impeachment probe.“
That’s fake. That’s not the real call, that’s not the evidence,” Purpura said in an attempt to discredit Schiff and other Democrats.
Schiff acknowledged after the hearing, during which he recounted the phone call, that his comments were “in character with what the president was trying to communicate.”
Trump Legal Team Mounts Aggressive Defense Against Impeachment
Trump is accused of pressuring Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy during the July 25 call to open a corruption investigation into former Vice President Joe Biden — a major Democratic challenger to Trump’s re-election bid this year — and Biden’s son, who worked for a Ukrainian energy company.
The president allegedly withheld military aid to Ukraine unless Zelenskiy publicly announced a probe into Biden and his son Hunter’s lucrative position with the Ukrainian company. No evidence against the Bidens has ever surfaced.
During the prescheduled call, Zelenskiy told Trump that Ukraine sought more U.S. military assistance. Trump responded, “I would like you to do us a favor, though,” and then asks Zelenskiy to investigate the Biden’s and an unfounded claim that Ukraine, and not Russia, interfered in the 2016 U.S. election.
The U.S. assistance for Ukraine was formally frozen on July 25 under a legal provision known as an apportionment.
The aid embargo was lifted in September and Jason Crow said during the House impeachment managers’ closing arguments Friday, “It was only lifted because President Trump had gotten caught.”
But Purpura said Saturday that Ukraine did not become aware of Trump’s hold on the military aid until the latter part of August, well after the fateful July 25 call.“
There can’t be a threat without a person knowing he’s being threatened,” Purpura said. “There can’t be quid pro quo without the quo.”
The House of Representatives impeached Trump in December and he now faces two articles of impeachment that accuse him of abusing the office of the presidency and obstructing congressional efforts to investigate his actions related to Ukraine.
Democratic Representative Adam Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee and lead House manager in the impeachment trial said earlier this week all Trump cared about was investigating Biden, especially after early polls showed the former vice president would soundly beat Trump in the election.
Trump and his lawyers were invited to appear before the House Judiciary Committee during the impeachment inquiry, but declined.
U.S. Democratic lawmakers closed out their final arguments against the president Friday, arguing that if Trump is not removed from office he will continue to abuse power.“
At the heart of Article Two, obstruction of Congress, is a simple troubling reality: President Trump tried to cheat, he got caught, and then he worked hard to cover it up,” said Hakeem Jeffries, one of seven House Democrats serving as managers of the trial.
Jeffries said Trump administration officials were aware of the president’s alleged misconduct last year and called the situation in the White House a “toxic mess.”
Schiff told lawmakers, “You cannot leave a man like that in office.” He argued that the president will not change and his actions will remain the same. “You know it’s not going to stop. It’s not going to stop unless the Congress does something about it.”
“He has shown neither remorse nor acknowledgment of wrongdoing,” said Schiff. “Do you think if we do nothing, it’s going to stop now?”
In his final argument, Schiff urged senators to “give America a fair trial,” saying, “she’s worth it.”
Trump is only the third U.S. president to be impeached and tried before the Senate. Andrew Johnson was impeached in 1868 because of a post-Civil War dispute over states that seceded from the union.
Bill Clinton was impeached in 1998 for lying to a grand jury over a sex scandal. Both Johnson and Clinton were acquitted and remained in office until the end of their terms.
A blueprint the White House is rolling out to resolve the decades-long conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians is as much about politics as it is about peace.
President Donald Trump said he would likely release his long-awaited Mideast peace plan a little before he meets Tuesday with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his main political rival Benny Gantz. The Washington get-together offers political bonuses for Trump and the prime minister, but Trump’s opponents are doubting the viability of any plan since there’s been little-to-no input from the Palestinians, who have rejected it before its release.
“It’s entirely about politics,” Michael Koplow, policy director of the Israel Policy Forum, said about Tuesday’s meeting. “You simply can’t have a serious discussion about an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan and only invite one side to come talk about it. This is more about the politics inside Israel and inside the U.S. than it is about any real efforts to get these two sides to an agreement.”
Jared Kushner, a Trump adviser and the president’s son-in-law, has been the architect for the plan for nearly three years. He’s tried to persuade academics, lawmakers, former Mideast negotiators, Arab governments and special interest groups not to reject his fresh approach outright.
People familiar with the administration’s thinking believe the release will have benefits even if it never gets Palestinian buy-in and ultimately fails. According to these people, the peace team believes that if Israeli officials are open to the plan and Arab nations do not outright reject it, the proposal could help improve broader Israeli-Arab relations.
For years, the prospect of improved ties between Israel and its Arab neighbors had been conditioned on a resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But the administration believes that a change in regional dynamics – due mainly to rising antipathy to Iran – will boost Israel’s standing with not only Egypt and Jordan, which already have peace deals with the Jewish state, but also Saudi Arabia and the smaller Gulf nations, these people say.
There have been signs of warming between Israel and the Gulf states, including both public displays and secret contacts, and the administration sees an opening for even greater cooperation after the plan is released, according to these people.
Trump, for his part, told reporters on Air Force One this week that “It’s a plan that really would work.” He said he spoke to the Palestinians “briefly,” without elaborating.
Nabil Abu Rdeneh, a spokesman for the Western-backed Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, says that’s not true.
“There were no talks with the U.S. administration — neither briefly nor in detail,” he said. “The Palestinian position is clear and consistent in its rejection of Trump’s decisions regarding Jerusalem and other issues, and everything related to the rejected deal.”
Abbas ended contacts with the administration after it recognized disputed Jerusalem as Israel’s capital two years ago. The Palestinians’ anger mounted as Trump repeatedly broken with the international consensus around solving the conflict and took actions seen as biased toward Israel’s right-wing government.
The White House has cut off nearly all U.S. aid to the Palestinians and closed the Palestinian diplomatic mission in Washington. In November, the Trump administration said it no longer views Jewish settlements in the occupied territories as a violation of international law, reversing four decades of American policy. The Palestinians view the settlements as illegal and a major obstacle to peace, a position shared by most of the international community.
Tuesday’s meeting offers benefits to both leaders while they are under fire at home.
The meeting allows Trump to address a high-profile foreign policy issue during his impeachment trial, while Democrats are arguing for his ouster. Moreover, if the plan is pro-Israel as expected, Trump hopes it will be popular with his large base of evangelicals and maybe sway a few anti-Trump Jewish voters his way.
According to AP VoteCast, a nationwide survey of the American electorate, 79% of white evangelical voters in the 2018 midterms approved of the job Trump was doing as president, while 74% of Jewish voters disapproved.
Pastor John Hagee, founder and chairman of the 8 million-member Christians United for Israel, said in a statement that Trump “has shown himself to be the most pro-Israel president in U.S. history, and I fully expect his peace proposal will be in line with that tradition.”
For Netanyahu, the meeting allows him to shift press coverage Tuesday when Israel’s parliament convenes a committee that is expected to reject his request for legal immunity from charges of fraud, breach of trust and accepting bribes.
“The ‘Trump peace plan’ is a blatant attempt to hijack Israel’s March 2 election in Netanyahu’s favor,” tweeted Anshel Pfeffer, a columnist for Israel’s Haaretz newspaper and the author of a biography of Netanyahu.
Netanyahu is fighting for his political survival ahead of the election. The decision to bring Gantz along is likely aimed at forestalling any criticism that the U.S. administration is meddling in the election. But in Israel, the meeting and the unveiling of the plan will be widely seen as a gift to the prime minister. The prime minister has noted that it was his idea to invite Gantz, putting his rival in a position where he could not say no to a meeting that could make him look like a bystander at the White House event.
In Congress, Trump’s announced release of his Mideast plan has caused hardly a ripple against the backdrop of the impeachment drama.
Asked on Friday what he thought about the expected rollout, Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said: “I’m on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and we’ve not heard anything about it.”
Sen. Jim Risch, R-Idaho, the committee chairman, defended the administration’s work on a plan.
“I think the people who are working on this are working on this in good faith,” Risch said in the halls of Congress, shortly before Trump’s impeachment trial resumed. “I think the people who are trying to do it really are acting in good faith, hoping they can come up with a solution.”
Свобода слова в России стремительно погибает. Но разумеется закон у нас не для всех. Например: в словах Кадырова полиция не нашла нарушений, а вот за «сказочного президента» будут судить уже второй раз. Комик Долгополов вынужден был покинуть Россию, а чекист и Володин набросились на Водонаеву, которая высказала свое мнение при чем оно соответствует действительности.
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Россия между Гондурасом и Гвинеей – достижение Путина за 20 лет.
Россия заняла 137 место в Индексе восприятия коррупции. России вновь получила 28 баллов из 100 возможных. Больше всего баллов — 87 — набрали Дания и Новая Зеландия, за ними следует Финляндия (86 баллов).
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The anniversary of Egypt’s January 25 revolution, which swept veteran Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak from power in 2011, is being observed in a fairly low-key manner. Most Egyptians were given that day off and the government celebrated the role of the country’s police in maintaining order.
Opponents of the Egyptian government, particularly Islamists, had harsh words for general-turned-President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi in social media and on TV channels originating from Qatar and Turkey — which support them — but in the Egyptian capital, Cairo, and most of the rest of the country, there were no significant protests and most people stayed home after being given the day off.
Cairo’s iconic Tahrir Square — where most of the major protests against former President Hosni Mubarak took place in 2011 — remained eerily quiet, except for some light traffic, and police were on heightened alert along the major arteries leading into the city center.
A number of government-organized events took place to mark the event, including one at Cairo stadium with music to entertain the crowd.
Egyptian TV played music to honor the country’s police and President Sissi attended a number of events in recent days to hand out awards and personally thank top officers and commanders. The day originally marked the anniversary of a police insurrection against British toops in Ismailiya in 1952, which was seminal in the country’s military coup that toppled King Farouq.
Well-known political sociologist Said Sadek tells VOA that the 2011 revolution left a mark on the country in many ways, despite the fact some analysts outside the country have negative words for the ultimate outcome.
“We have to remember that revolutions do not produce immediate results. It takes time. We have some results and maybe we’ll get more,” he said. “For the first time, Egypt began to talk about reforming the educational system … reforming religious discourse. This never happened before, so a lot of taboo topics began to be raised.”
Sadek also notes that both women and Copts, who were previously marginalized, began to play a major role in politics after the revolution, due to their first-hand encounter with “repression and violence under the Islamists” who ruled the country from 2012 to 2013.
Egypt’s military, led by then Defense Minister General Sissi, overthrew Egypt’s first democratically elected civilian president, Mohammed Morsi, in 2013.
Egypt has witnessed an unprecedented crackdown on dissent since general-tuned-president Sissi came to power in 2014 – jailing Islamists as well as secular activists – while his government has put through austerity measures badly hitting the country’s poor and middle classes.
Khattar Abou Diab, who teaches political science at the University of Paris, tells VOA that Egypt’s unhappy period of Islamist rule, put a damper on efforts to democratize the country.
He says the big problem with the Egyptian revolution is that it wasn’t carried out by democratic forces that would have been able to effect veritable transformations.
Abou Diab notes the Egyptian revolution “was a historic phenomenon, given the massive mobilization of crowds in a peaceful manner,” and that there have “always been conflicts between military forces and Islamists in the Arab world, which clouds the horizon and makes democratization a difficult process.”
Given the recent wave of protest movements, Abou Diab insists he sees some reason for optimism in Iraq and Lebanon, with efforts to “create a national discourse,” but that the process is “mired in regional an international rivalries between Iran, the U.S., Israel, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.”
У словеньскій Поклюці на шостому етапі Кубка світу з біатлону одиночна змішана естафета завершилася для України п’ятим місцем.
«Перемогу здобула команда Франції, на другому місці розташувалась команда Естонії, яка творить історію, а бронза – у команди Австрії. Збірна України у складі Дмитро Підручний і Анастасія Меркушина посіли п’яте місце. На жаль, Анастасія знову зайшла на штрафне коло, як у естефеті в Естерсунді, тим самим позбавила Україну шансів на медалі», – йдеться в повідомленні Федерації біатлону.
Водночас о 16:00 стартує класична змішана естафета, Україну представлятимуть Артем Тищенко, Артем Прима, Юлія Джима та Олена Підгрушна.
У неділю програму змагань у Поклюці завершать гонки з масовим стартом, до яких пробилися четверо українців – Дмитро Підручний, Артем Прима, Юлія Джима та Олена Підгрушна. …
Серед жертв та постраждалих внаслідок землетрусу на сході Туреччини українців немає, повідомив агенції УНІАН директор Департаменту консульської служби МЗС України Сергій Погорельцев.
«Звернень з повідомленнями на «гарячу» телефонну лінію Департаменту консульської служби МЗС України та Посольства України в Турецькій Республіці щодо загрози життю чи здоров’ю українських громадян внаслідок землетрусу не надходило», – сказав Погорельцев.
Він зазначив, що також немає даних про постраждалих іноземців в Туреччині.
25 січня на сході Туреччини в провінції Елязиг стався землетрус магнітудою 6,8, в результаті якого щонайменше 21 людина загинула і понад тисячу постраждали. Зруйновані будівлі, є перебої із зв’язком. За даними Геологічної служби США, землетрус відчули близько пів мільйона людей в Туреччині, а також в сусідніх Іраку, Сирії та Лівані.
ELAZIG, TURKEY — A powerful earthquake has killed at least 20 people and injured more than 1,000 in eastern Turkey, as rescue teams searched through the rubble of collapsed buildings for survivors Saturday.
At least 30 people were missing following the magnitude 6.8 quake Friday night, which had its epicenter in the small lakeside town of Sivrice in the eastern province of Elazig.
“It was very scary, furniture fell on top of us. We rushed outside,” 47-year-old Melahat Can, who lives in the provincial capital of Elazig, told AFP.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said all steps were being taken to aid people affected by the quake, which caused widespread fear.
“We stand by our people,” Erdogan said on Twitter.
Some of the damage to the village Cevrimtas near the lakeside town of Sivrice where the 6.8 magnitude quake was centered in the province of Elazig. (Mahmut Bozarslan/VOA Turkish)
The Turkish government’s disaster and emergency management agency (AFAD) said the quake hit Sivrice around 8:55 p.m. (1755 GMT). Turkey lies on major fault lines and is prone to frequent earthquakes.
Turkish television showed images of people rushing outside in panic, as well as a fire on the roof of a building.
Interior, environment and health ministers, who were in the quake zone, said the casualties were in Elazig province and in the neighboring province of Malatya to the southwest.
At least 20 people died and 1,015 others were wounded, according to AFAD.
“There is nobody trapped under the rubble in Malatya, but in Elazig search and rescue efforts are currently under way to find 30 citizens,” Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said Friday.
Rescue teams were searching for survivors trapped in a five-story collapsed building in a village about 30 kilometers from Elazig, according to AFP journalists at the scene. One person was pulled alive from the rubble.
Turkish officials and police try to keep warm at the scene of a collapsed building following a 6.8 magnitude earthquake in Elazig, eastern Turkey, Jan. 24, 2020.
Emergency staff and people waiting at the scene lit fires in the streets to stay warm in freezing temperatures.
Sports centers, schools and guest houses had been opened to accommodate quake victims in Malatya.
Sivrice, a town with a population of about 4,000 people, is situated south of Elazig city on the shores of Hazar lake, one of the most popular tourist spots in the region and the source of the Tigris River.
The lake is home to a sunken city with archaeological traces dating back 4,000 years in its waters.
The tremor was felt in several parts of eastern Turkey near the Iraqi and Syrian borders, the Turkish broadcaster NTV reported, adding that neighboring cities had mobilized rescue teams for the quake area.
Ramazan Emek surveys the damage in Cevrimtas, near Sivrice, where the quake struck just before 9 p.m. Friday local time. (Mahmut Bozarslan/VOA Turkish)
“Everybody is in the street, it was very powerful, very scary,” said Zekeriya Gunes, 68, from Elazig city, after the quakes caused a building to collapse on her street.
“It lasted quite long, maybe 30 seconds,” added Ferda, 39. “I panicked and was undecided whether to go out in this cold or remain inside.”
Greece offers aid
The U.S. Geological Survey assessed the magnitude as 6.7, slightly lower than AFAD, adding that it struck near the East Anatolian Fault in an area that has suffered no documented large ruptures since an earthquake in 1875.
“My wholehearted sympathy to President @RTErdogan and the Turkish people following the devastating earthquake that has hit Turkey. Our search and rescue teams stand ready to assist,” Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis wrote on Twitter.
In Athens, the Greek premier’s office said later that Mitsotakis had spoken by phone to Erdogan.
“The Turkish president … said Turkish teams had the situation under control for now and that it would be re-evaluated in the morning,” his office added.
A calf stands next to its mother, which has a broken leg, in the village of Cevrimtas, near Sivrice, Elazig, Turkey, Jan. 25, 2020. (Mahmut Bozarslan/VOA Turkish)
Quake-prone Turkey
In 1999, a devastating 7.4 magnitude earthquake hit Izmit in western Turkey, leaving more than 17,000 people dead including about 1,000 in the country’s largest city Istanbul.
Last September, a 5.7-magnitude earthquake shook Istanbul, causing residents to flee buildings.
Experts have long warned a large quake could devastate the city of 15 million people, which has allowed widespread building without safety precautions.
A Zimbabwean judge on Friday described as “frightening” the use of soldiers by the country’s vice president in a divorce-related dispute, and ruled that his wife should regain custody of their children and be allowed to access the family’s luxury home.
The ruling is the latest twist in a case that has gripped the southern African nation with allegations of black magic, attempted murder and drug addiction. The case has provided a glimpse of the luxurious lives of Zimbabwe’s ruling elite as the rest of the country grapples with economic collapse, hyperinflation and hunger.
The wife of Vice President Constantino Chiwenga, Marry, had approached the court seeking custody of the children and access to the house, a farm and vehicles. She said they were taken from her by Chiwenga when she was detained for more than three weeks on accusations of trying to kill him and money laundering.
After his wife was released from prison on bail earlier this month, Chiwenga refused to give her custody of the children and vehicles, and used soldiers to block her from entering their house in a wealthy suburb of the capital, Harare.
“It is unacceptable and anathema to the constitutional values of this jurisdiction that the military may be used to settle a matrimonial dispute,” said Judge Christopher Dube-Banda.
“This is frightening. What happened to the applicant (Marry) must be a cause of fear and concern to all law-abiding citizens,” he said. He ordered Chiwenga to return the children as well as three Mercedes-Benz vehicles and a Lexus to his estranged wife “forthwith.” He also said soldiers should not block Marry from accessing their home and farm.
Chiwenga, who as army commander led a coup against former president Robert Mugabe in 2017, separated from his wife, a former model, after he returned from four months of medical treatment in China in December.
He claimed his wife tried to kill him while he was on a hospital bed in neighboring South Africa before he was airlifted to China. He described her in court papers as “violent” and a drug addict who used black magic.
On her part, Marry accused her husband of being a “dangerous” man who “can summon the army when it suits him … to deal with perceived opponents” and suffering from “acute paranoia brought about by his poor health” and “his being under heavy doses of drugs, including un-prescribed opiates.’’
The divorce case has not started, but even in its preliminary stages the bitter wrangle has “gone a long way to expose the depth of moral decay that has pervaded our national leaders,” the privately owned The Standard newspaper said.
“The divorce case presents our national leaders as completely out of touch with the reality that the citizens of this country are among the poorest in the region and the continent,” the weekly newspaper said in an editorial this week.
U.S. President Donald Trump became the first president ever to attend the annual March for Life rally, which is for the opponents of abortion. The event is held annually on or near the anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court case that legalized abortion. The president’s appearance before a friendly conservative crowd was especially notable because of what was taking place at the same time at the U.S. Capitol – his impeachment trial. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti explains.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is accusing Libyan militia leader General Khalifa Haftar of violating a cease-fire agreement. Despite deploying Turkish forces to back the Libyan Government of National Accord (GNA), though, Erdogan seems to be increasingly looking to diplomacy rather than force.
“He [Haftar] says he agreed to a cease-fire, but two days subsequent, he bombed the [Tripoli] airport. So how can we trust him?” Erdogan said Friday in Istanbul with German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Haftar’s forces control most of Libya in their war against the U.N.-recognized GNA.
Merkel on Sunday hosted an international summit in Berlin aimed at resolving the Libyan civil war. A 55-article road map to end the conflict was drawn up at the meeting, which Erdogan attended.
Erdogan challenged Merkel at the news conference, however, to confirm whether Haftar had signed the Berlin agreement. A visibly uncomfortable Merkel confirmed he only orally agreed to it, noting that officials were still waiting for his signature.
FILE – Libyan Prime Minister Fayez al-Sarraj leaves after an international conference on Libya at the Elysee Palace in Paris, May 29, 2018.
Support for Sarraj
Despite the Berlin agreement’s reaffirmation of the Libyan international arms embargo, the Turkish president said he would continue supporting the GNA’s prime minister, Fayez al-Sarraj.
“We sent them a [military] delegation and continue to do so. We won’t abandon Sarraj. We will give the support we can,” Erdogan said.
“Our soldiers are there to assist in the training [of GNA forces]. We have a history of 500 years, and we have an invitation [from the GNA] that gives us our right,” he added.
But Erdogan, several times during the news conference, said the forces were purely for training.
Earlier this week, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Aktar also stressed the training purpose of the Libyan deployment. The Turkish force reportedly still only numbers in the dozens.
The downplaying of the military deployment contrasts with Erdogan’s recent sharp rhetoric. Last week, the Turkish president, while announcing to Parliament soldiers’ deployment, said Ankara would not hesitate about “teaching a lesson” to Haftar if his forces continued attacking.
Fears of wider war
Such language reportedly has set off alarm bells in the region over fears that Turkish forces in Libya could end up triggering a wider regional conflict with Haftar’s military backers, including Egypt.
Given that Libya is 2,000 kilometers from Turkey, though, a military expert questioned whether Ankara was capable of sustaining a hot conflict.
“The logistic challenge is enormous, and these challenges, as they look now, are insurmountable. It’s far away. It’s not like Syria is just across the border,” said former Turkish General Haldun Solmazturk, a veteran of cross-border military operations.
“If fighting gets tough, casualties would be inevitable. Returning dead persons and wounded would also be a major challenge. Apart from the fuel, the ammunition, spare parts, there are thousands of items needed to be provided in such an environment,” added Solmazturk, who heads the 21st Century Turkey Institute, an Ankara-based research organization.
FILE – Khalifa Haftar, the military commander who dominates eastern Libya, arrives at an international conference on Libya at the Elysee Palace in Paris, May 29, 2018.
Turkish forces are already stretched, being deployed in Iraq and Syria, while analysts point out Haftar is in a strong military position.
“At the moment the situation seems to be working on the side of Haftar. He has better weapons. He has jet fighters. He has superiority of the air and in the field,” said international relations professor Huseyin Bagci of Ankara’s Middle East Technical University.
Further complicating Ankara’s situation is its international isolation over Libya’s military deployment. Erdogan’s shuttle diplomacy this month drew a blank, failing to win backing from Libya’s neighbors, Algeria and Tunisia.
Erdogan also reportedly failed at the Berlin summit to secure backing for an international peacekeeping force, including the Turkish military, to be deployed to enforce a cease-fire in Libya.
Military challenges for Turkey
Analysts suggest Ankara’s isolation only compounds the military challenges it faces in Libya. “The Mediterranean, in terms of naval transportation, is controlled by not too friendly forces. And neighboring countries Tunisia, Algeria and Italy are less than willing to help or to provide any logistic bases or any other logistic support. They seem determined to stay out of this,” said Solmazturk.
FILE – Turkish lawmakers vote on a bill that allows troop deployment to Libya, at the Parliament in Ankara, Jan. 2, 2020.
“Libya threatens to be another Syria, where countless lives and many treasures will be wasted to defend a very ill-defined ‘national objective,’ ” warned analyst Atilla Yesilada of GlobalSource Partners, an economic and security research group based in New York.
Erdogan appears increasingly to be looking to diplomacy in a bid to isolate Haftar. In a speech Thursday in the presence of Merkel, the Turkish president called for “pressure” to put on Haftar.
Erdogan challenged the international community over its courting of Haftar, despite the general’s failure so far to sign on to a cease-fire. “It doesn’t make sense such support is continued,” he said at Friday’s news conference with Merkel, “if such a person is constantly so spoiled.”
Migrant issue
The Turkish president also is seeking to play the migrant card against Europe, warning of “chaos” if Haftar remains unchecked.
Some analysts are warning, however, that Ankara needs to face the reality that the region has little appetite for a Turkish role in Libya.
“The region wants neither Turkey nor Russia seeking to extend its hegemony to Libya and the wider region. This is the reality,” said Bagci.
But for now, Ankara is likely figuring on having a limited military presence in Libya while continuing to push for international deliberations on a resolution to Libya’s civil war and its future.
