Daily Archives: May 9, 2021

Dr. Williams is Professor of Islamic History at the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth and formerly worked for the CIAs Counter Terrorism Center and U.S. Army in Afghanistan. He is author of the field research-based Counter Jihad. The American Military Experience in Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria which provides the first historical overview of Americas largely unchronicled wars in the Islamic world from 2001 to 2016.

On May 1, the Pentagon officially began withdrawing troops from Afghanistan, thus ending an extraordinary, two decade long war fought under four presidents (a departure I have criticized from the strategic perspective). I know this land well from my journeys across more than half of its provinces as a professor of Afghan history and as an employee of the CIAs Counter-Terrorism Center (see HNN article on my journey to the Agency here). I was tasked by the CTC with tracking the movement of Taliban and Al Qaeda suicide bombers, who I discovered were being dispatched into our teams zone from neighboring Pakistans North Waziristan tribal agency as part of a terroristic effort to shatter the democratic institutions we were attempting to build there. I also worked at a Forward Operations Base in Regional Command East as a S.M.E. (Subject Matter Expert) for legendary insurgent-hunter, General Stanley McChrystals, U.S. Army Information Operations team.

During the course of my journeys over more than half of Afghanistans war-torn provinces, I came to love the ancient, almost timeless people of this land, many of whom dreamed of a building a better world with American help. While carrying out my independent scholarly fieldwork, and on my solo missions for the CIA and US Army beyond the safety of our bases walls in what my team described as the Afghan Red Zone, I also did something that none of my US Army comrades---who traveled in convoys and were restricted by ROEs (Rules of Engagement)---could do. I freely photographed the fascinating Afghan people around me as they went about their lives in an active war zone.

Sadly, my rare photos are images of a world that is, in many ways, already fading as the Taliban continue their relentless march from the half of the country that they have already conquered in recent years. I fear these photos may be some of the final record of a threatened way of life---like those photographs taken of Afghanistan in the 1960s when Western tourists visited this relatively stable kingdom and found Westernized Afghan women wearing miniskirts---that will soon disappear. When our final support troops depart by September 11th, the increasingly confident Taliban are expected to launch a nationwide assault on an embattled Afghan democratic government ally that, like our former South Vietnamese allies, will be left to fend for itself without its American big brothers.

1. The Warlord. In this photograph, that could have almost come from the Middle Ages, my friend and focus of my book The Last Warlord. The Afghan Warrior who Led US Special Forces to Topple the Taliban Regime, the legendary Uzbek Mongol cavalry commander General Dostum, is pictured riding his prized war stallion Surkun. He rode Surkun into combat alongside horse-mounted U.S. Special Forces Green Berets to overthrow the ethnic Pashtun-dominated Taliban regime in 2001. Hundreds of his riders were killed in the desperate mountain campaign against their Taliban blood enemies that was won in just two months with only 300 US troops. These allied proxy fighters are the unsung heroes of the war on the Taliban and, under Dostum, Mongol horsemen boldly rode into war to change the course of history for the first time in hundreds of years (see my video of this remarkable campaign here).

Led by the larger-than-life secular warlord Dostum---who was brilliantly portrayed in the movie 12 Strong. The True, Declassified Story of the Horsesoldiers by Iranian actor Navid Negahban---the northern Persian-Tajik, Uzbek-Mongol and Hazara-Shiite Mongol tribes joined with a Green Beret A Team led by Captain Mark Nutsch (portrayed as a modern day Lawrence of Arabia by Thor actor Chris Hemsworth) in breaking out of their remote mountain base to topple the hated Taliban regime by December 2001. See my article on the making of 12 Strong and my efforts to bring authenticity to the remote New Mexico mountain movie set where this movie, whose Afghan half was based on my book, was filmed here.

2. The Girl. I photographed this girl in a roadside tent babysitting little brother while her parents worked in the fields. At nine years old she was charged with protecting him and the family tent by herself. While American children grow up safely in kindergartens, learning with technology in advanced schools, partaking in school sports, dating, having access to orthodontics and other medical care, books, computers, baby seats, and internet, Afghan children do not have such unimaginable luxuries. Many die as infants from disease and lack of access to medical help. I have no idea what became of this curious and welcoming girls fate, but in Afghanistan many impoverished children like her do not get the opportunity to learn how to read and write.

3. The Chicken Fighters. My weekly visit to the Friday afternoon chicken fights in Kabul, a favorite past-time for men who bet on winners in a hillside garden beloved by Kabuli families known as the Bagh e Babur. The famous Garden of Babur was built around the marble tomb of the 16th Turkic-Mongol Muslim warlord Babur The Tiger. This warlord marched out of Kabul with his cannon-equipped Central Asian warriors and fought his way across Hindustan to forge the legendary Moghul dynasty, famous for the Taj Mahal.

Many Afghans enjoy timeless recreational activities of the sort their ancestors did hundreds of years ago. Such past-times include two-humped Bactrian camel fighting in the Uzbek north, kite flying, and chess. Among the Afghans most cherished sports is the ancient horse-mounted Afghan polo game of buzkashi played by whip-wielding horse warrior-heroes known as chapanzades. These predominately Turkic-Mongol Uzbek and Hazara riders---who are feted as heroes in the same way Americans hero worship their baseball or football players---play a game first introduced to the Eurasian nomads by Genghis Khan the Jehanger (World Conqueror) in the 13th century to teach his warriors how to be tough.

4. The Hosts. Me (in sunglasses) in the middle of a smiling crowd of curious Afghans, of the sort that often gather around a Westerner when he or she appears in their midst. I was always amazed at the warm welcome I received while traveling across this land. I was regularly invited into Afghans simple homes as an honored American guest. There, my impoverished, but thrilled, hosts would eagerly offer me lamb or goat, often after slaughtering their only source of meat, to honor me. The warmth I experienced in my travels compared drastically to the stereotypical images many Americans have of this as a uniformly hostile land. I wish many of my fellow Army teammates who were confined to our base could have had this sort of experience to get to know the Afghans.

Hospitality to honored guests like myself is an ancient tradition all of Afghanistans ethnic groups cherish. For them offering panagah (sanctuary in Persian) or melmastiia (hospitality to guest in need in Pashto) is almost a religious duty. So protective of me was the Uzbek leader General Dostum in my visits to his northern realm, that he had armed fighters sleep outside my door and follow me around (much to my annoyance) to keep me safe. But the most famous recipient of melmastiia was the Saudi Arabian terrorist Osama bin Laden who was granted sanctuary by the Taliban of the south in 1996.

5. The Burger and Pizza Chef. In the bustling capital of Kabul, I found Western-inspired sights that would have been unimaginable under the grim Taliban masters. For example, I found previously-banned beauty shops, internet cafes that brought the world to previously isolated Afghans, a few (now closed due to Taliban attacks) bars for foreign aid workers and military contractors, a shopping mall (whose entrance was protected by armed guards with metal detectors to protect it from suicide bombers), TV studios, and even American-style restaurants, including one of my favorites KFC, Kabul Fried Chicken.

The restaurant pictured above was run by an Afghan who had, like tens of thousands of his people worked on a U.S. base. There he learned how to make such popular dishes as pizza and hamburgers. Two decades of American cultural influence and exposure to the modern West has radically transformed many Afghans, especially those who are better off and live in the cities. This influence, in the form of women on such Afghan channels as Tolo, young men wearing American-style clothes, women in university, and young people on Facebook, will be hard for the provincial Taliban to completely eradicate should they re-conquer Kabul and other comparatively cosmopolitan, liberal cities.

6. The School Girls. A group of middle school girls who were, after five years of being denied the right to be educated by the Taliban, excited to be attending school. The girl in the middle was crying as she told the story of how her parents were killed by the Taliban. She worriedly told me the day the Americans leave the Taliban will return and execute us if we try to learn to read and write which is forbidden by their law. Girls like her told me horror stories of the Taliban misogynists draconian brutality against women. One teenager told me of a girl in her village who was stopped by the Talibans dreaded, whip-wielding moral police, the Committee for the Prevention of Vice and Promotion of Virtue, and discovered upon investigation to have had forbidden finger nail polish on her fingers. She was then dragged screaming to the town square. There, she had her fingers cut off in public with a sword as a Taliban mullah or priest read passages from the holy Koran condemning her as a prostitute.

In a sign of things to come, and stark warning to girls who might have hopes for continuing to get the sort of education they have been able to receive for 20 years,on May 8thterrorists slaughtered 30 people, mainly school girls, and wounded another 52with a massive bomb outside a girls school.

7. The Guardians of the Buddhas. High in the remote fastness of the mighty Hindu Kush Mountains live the Shiite Mongol Hazaras who have been terribly repressed by the Sunni Muslim extremist Taliban from the southern lowlands. The Hazara highlanders villages were burned in the late 1990s and their people continue to be slaughtered even in their weddings by the Sunni Taliban and ISIS fanatics who considered them to be Shiite heretics. Under the influence of their notorious Al Qaeda Saudi guest Osama bin Laden, the Taliban iconoclasts also blew up the magnificent stone Buddhas carved into the wall of one of Afghanistans most scenic valleys, the 8,000 foot high Vale of Bamiyan, by the ancient Aryan Tokharians in the 6th century.

Approximately 800 years after they were carved by the Buddhists inhabitants of the valley, Mongol garrisons settled in the heights of the Hindu Kush (the name Hazara signifies a Unit of One Thousand Troops) and gradually came to see themselves as protectors of Afghanistans most prized archeological treasure. The Talibans senseless culturecide destruction of the locally cherished Buddhas that appeared on the Afghan currency was a calculated blow to the Hazaras pride and spirit.

Here I am photographed standing with Hazara kids with beautiful Vale of Bamiyan behind me and the empty dark niche carved into its rock wall where the 180 foot, larger of the two Buddha carvings guarded the secluded valley for a millennia and half. I was led by a local guide through Taliban landmines to the mournful, rubbleized ruins of the massive Buddhas. He told me that his people believe that when evil is approaching their lands, the ghosts of people in nearby ruins who were slain by Genghis Khan scream in warning. My Hazara friends on Facebook tell me their elders claim them the voices are now screaming again as the Taliban once again approach their mountains from the south.

8. The Orphans. During my visit to this home for war orphans run by a wonderfully compassionate Afghan woman, I encountered this angel who sang an Afghan song for me. I wanted to take her, and all of them, home with me when I found they were sleeping three to a bunk bed and living on a simple, twice-daily meal of porridge and bread. When I asked about their future, the kind woman who ran the shelter told me the girls might get lucky and be married off as a second, third, or fourth wife to an older man and the boys might get lucky and be adopted to serve as laborers. As grim as these fates seemed, they were far better than the fate of hundreds of thousands of Pashtun war orphans in the 1980s and 1990s who were adopted by fundamentalist madrassas (religious seminaries) where they were indoctrinated by Saudi-funded mullahs to become fanatical, misogynistic Taliban.

9. The Nomads. As you drive around Afghanistans south, you encounter wandering Pashtun sheep and goat herders who have nomadized on these lands since the dawn of time. These primordial nomads known as Kuchis live disconnected from settled villagers, except when they wander into their markets to sell sheep skins, beautiful hand-woven carpets, milk, or meat. The Pashtun Taliban rarely interfere with the migrating Kuchi tribes who live by their own ancient rules. For this reason, they were, and hopefully will be, less impacted by the Talibans harsh enforcement of shariah Islamic law and their relatively free women rarely wear the all-encompassing burqa veil. The elder on my right welcomed me to his encampment with the famous hospitality of his people and I was given insights into a timeless world of a people who do not have cell phones (of the sort many Afghans now have) or even electricity, running water, or heating.

10. The Americans. I chose not to share a typical combat mission photo, but to instead include this image, of the sort few non-military people see, of my base members enjoying rare down-time from the strains of war to celebrate July 4th. Here two of our base members who were famous for their Scottish-rock songs (hence the kilt and bag pipes) entertain the base during an Independence Day barbecue. While life as a Fobbit on a F.O.B. (Forward Operations Base) could be stressfulwe had a car-borne suicide bomber detonate at our heavily guarded gate killing several soldiers, some mortar shelling, and a PTSD suicide that summerwe were far better off behind our walls and blast barriers than troops living in much smaller, remote, exposed C.O.P.s (Command Outposts).

Almost 800,000 American troops served in Afghanistan and they drastically transformed this land that time forgot on many levels. I remember making the long drive from the town of Jalalabad near the Pakistani border, over the mighty Hindu Kush Mountains, and across the burning deserts of the north to the Uzbekistan border on a beautiful ribbon of black tarmac and being proud we had built it (this road was far smoother than those found in my hometown of Boston!). American troops also built schools, hospitals, and wells, de-mined fields, trained a police force of 116,000 and army of 180,000 troops, and helped prevent the Taliban insurgents from taking a single regional capital or town of any size for twenty years.

History shows that more aid was pumped into the building of Afghanistans democracy than was spent to rebuild post-World War II Europe in the Marshall Plan (when factoring in inflation). These efforts brought much, but certainly not all of this un-developed land (that was never colonized or modernized the way say Russian-Soviet Uzbekistan was), from the Middle Ages into the 21st century. They also gave Afghanistan a government in a box that included mandatory seats for women, ended the Taliban repression of the northern Uzbek Mongol, Tajik Persian and Hazara Shiite Mongol ethnic groups, gave girls a chance to be educated, and gave all those who dreamed of an escape from the medieval cruelty of the Taliban a breathing space to try to forge a pluralistic democracy where womens and minorities rights were respected. It remains to be seen how permanent these fragile gains are.

11. The Taliban. I took this photograph in a fortress-like prison in the northern deserts where thousands of Taliban prisoners of war were being held by General Dostum. I was given the rare chance to sit down with the notorious Taliban and talk with them while my glowering Uzbek guards looked on. The captives ranged from hardcore fanatics, including one who said he would kill me as an infidel if he was not handcuffed, to less extreme village Taliban who had been paid to fight. I also met Pakistani Taliban who had been lured into Afghanistan in 2001 to defend it from the American infidels. As I took in the despair in the prisoners eyes, like the one I captured here, part of me felt sorry for them.

But when I remembered the stories of school girls who had had disfiguring battery acid thrown in their face by Taliban to punish them for daring to get an education and the shredded bodies of victims of one of their senseless suicide bombings I encountered, I forgot such emotions. Should they conquer post-American Afghanistan, girls will once again be forbidden from sitting in a classroom with boys to learn to read and write, Western-style restaurants and beauty salons will be banned (along with buzkashi and chicken fighting), and the repressed Shiite Hazaras of the Hindu Kush Mountains will once again be repressed. I am still haunted by one Taliban prisoners bold boast of the Talibans famously defiant mantra to me back in 2003 You Americans may have the watches, but we have the timeWe will outlast you.

Sadly for the Afghan people, it appears he was right.

For more of Dr. Williams photos from Afghanistan and Islamic Eurasia, articles, videos and his books see his website at: brianglynwilliams.com

I would like to thank Carol Hansen and my wife Miriam Braz Williams for their assistance with this article

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A CIA Historian's Photos of the Afghan War Tell the Story of Those Being Left Behind in Afghanistan - History News Network (HNN)

The results of last week's counting of votes cast in the crucial West Bengal elections seemed to bear this out.

Not only had the combined Left parties drawn a blank in polls to the assembly which they had run with an overwhelming majority for 34 long years, their vote share had dwindled to a mere 5.47 per cent in 2021, down from 30.1 per cent in 2011 when they lost the elections to Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee's juggernaut.

In the clash of the titans where the TMC was in a straight fight with the BJP in most constituencies, the once all-powerful Left seems to have been squeezed into oblivion.

Even in the 2016 assembly elections, the Left parties had managed to get 25.69 per cent of the votes polled.

"We lost because other factors like anti-incumbency were overridden by people's anxiety to halt the BJP from capturing Bengal," admitted Nilotpal Basu, CPI(M) Politburo member and former Rajya Sabha MP.

Analysts said that the TMC's win was in part powered by a gain of at least five per cent of the popular votes which normally go to the Left, as electors decided to ignore issues like corruption to exercise their franchise against the BJP.

"In 2019, when the BJP won 18 Lok Sabha seats and bagged about 40 per cent of the votes cast, the Left and the Congress had ceded grounds to the rightist party, this time the Left votes went to the TMC," said Dipankar Bhattacharya, General Secretary of the CPI(ML)- Liberation party which came out with a 'No Vote to BJP' campaign.

Bhattacharya, an alumnus of the Indian Statistical Institute and his team have been researching on the just- concluded elections at their office in Creek Row area.

The sharp drop in votes polled has dismayed CPI(M) cadres, and the central leadership of the party will review the election results to analyse what went wrong and to chart out a future course of action.

Even Jadavpur, long dubbed 'Leningrad of the East' which has elected a Left candidate in every election since 1967, except once, fell before the Trinamool onslaught.

To rub in the humiliation, veteran CPI(M) leader Sujan Chakraborty lost by a margin of nearly 40,000 votes to a little-known TMC debutante in a seat, where it was said that the Left "would win even if the party fielded a lamp post with the hammer and sickle sign on it".

"The Kolkata city voting patterns show that people decided to stop the BJP and they chose to gravitate towards the TMC it is a limited mandate from the Left-liberal- secular opinion against the BJP," Basu said, adding "the ruling party should not consider this as their vote. As Leftist forces consolidate, it will regain this vote share".

However, independent analysts do not believe getting back vote shares will be a simple task for the Left parties led by the CPI(M).

"The crisis the Left is facing is deep rooted. Its falling vote share is just an indicator of a deeper malaise," said Rajat Roy, political analyst and member of the think tank Calcutta Research Group.

The fall of the Left is underlined by the fact that just 17 years ago it was the third-largest party with 59 MPs of the 543-strong Lok Sabha, with 35 seats coming from West Bengal alone.

Since then, its sway over the electorate has dwindled to a situation where it has no MPs from West Bengal in the Lok Sabha.

CPI(M)'s vote share alone has fallen in recent years from 19.75 per cent in the 2016 assembly polls to 6.34 per cent in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections when a whispering campaign "chup chap padma phoole chaap" (secretly vote for BJP) saw a section of its voters swung to the BJP as a reaction to TMCs attitude towards the Left.

In 2021, the CPI(M) managed to garner just 4.73 per cent of votes polled as the pendulum shifted towards the TMC.

"The once revolutionary party which rode to popularity on the back of peasants' movements and trade union militancy has been living in a cocoon for long. Since the 1990s, instead of mass contact movements, it has depended on party apparatchiks like Laksman Seth of Haldia and Anil Basu of Hooghly to deliver votes. Their decline now defines the Left's hold over voters," Roy said.

The CPI(M), which stormed into power in 1977 following a popular upsurge against then chief minister Siddhartha Shankar Ray's brutal suppression of the Naxal movement, industrial stagnation and emergency excesses, had also failed to live up to people's expectations with its inability to create jobs, encourage industry and by lowering public education and healthcare standards.

However, insulated from the two major political upheavals that shook India in 1990s the Mandal agitation and the Ram Mandir stir and bereft of strong opposition, Bengal remained a unique Left citadel, even as the Communism crumbled in Eastern Europe and embraced capitalism in China.

The rise of Mamata Banerjee's strident street-smart politics in the late 1990s and 2000s, which used people's movements against eviction of hawkers in Kolkata, agitations against land acquisition in Singur and Nandigram, severely challenged the Left.

"The connect with ordinary people, which was their (Leftists) hallmark snapped...CPI(M) leaders were living in a world of doctrinaire, while the lower cadres were reaping the gains of office," Roy explained.

By 2011, Banerjee had breached the 'Red fortress' and by 2021, the Left was misreading its voters' mind, Bhattacharya claimed.

"The traditional Left completely misread the situation in this election ...they should have seen the significance of the battle for Bengal. Here, we had a party backed by RSS, a 'fascist' organisation, out to capture Bengal. Yet they concocted slogans that equated the BJP and the TMC, and called them 'two sides of the same coin'. This did not convince even their own people," he said.

The CPI(ML)-Liberation leader felt that class concerns where the "poor saw the BJP as a rich man's party", gender concerns raised by comments on "love Jihad and Romeo squads" and "issues of Bengali identity" united voters against "attempts to polarise them communally".

The Left's electoral alliance with the newly-floated Indian Secular Front led by a conservative Islamic cleric, known for controversial comments, too did not go down well with Leftist liberals. "The tie-up with Abbas Siddique simply backfired on them," said Bhattacharya.

The Left, analysts believe, now has to reinvent itself and go back to mass contact movements to stay relevant.

Cadres of Leftist students' unions, who fanned out in districts of south Bengal to campaign for CPI(M)'s new faces such as JNU Students Union president Aishe Ghosh and party's youth wing state president Minakshi Mukherjee, are expected to lead the mobilisation needed to bring back it into reckoning.

"Our young candidates have got relatively good vote share...they are our hope," Basu said.

According to collated data based on Election Commission figures, the Left had registered its best-show in south-east Bengal where it received nearly nine per cent of the popular votes. This is also the region where most of the young faces were fielded.

"Let us see what lessons the Left draws from its rout. We have to step up our role," said Bhattacharya. While Roy added, "...the key is mass connects, no party can survive without mass movements."

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West Bengal: Is the Left on its deathbed? - Mint

Ruling Bharatiya Janata Party created history in the north eastern Indian state of Assam by becoming the first non-Congress party to win two successive terms in the state assembly elections there.

Staving off a spirited fightback from its main challenger Congress, the saffron party, along with its regional allies like Asom Gana Parishad (AGP), won 75 out of the total 126 seats, 11 less than the previous assembly elections five years ago. The Congress-led 10-party alliance including All India United Democratic Front (AIDUF) of perfume baron Badruddin Ajmal, finished runners up with a total of 50 seats this time. The Congress-led United Progressive Alliance, which did not have AIDUF in it in 2016 but had Left parties, got 26 seats in the 2016 poll.

There were two firsts in the election this time. For the BJP, the assembly election in Assam in 2021 stood apart from the other four states of Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Puducherry as the north eastern state was the only place among them where the party was eyeing to retain power. On the other hand, Congress went into this poll with AIDUF for the first time.

Leading the National Democratic Alliance with AGP, United People's Party Liberal (UPPL) and the Gana Suraksha Party (GSP), which mainly represent the Bodo and Sarania communities respectively, BJP faced challenges from two fronts this yearone from Congress-led Grand Alliance of which AIDUF, Bodoland People's Front (BPF) which has pockets of influence in Bodoland area, and small regional groupings Anchalik Gana Morcha, Communist Party of India (Marxist), CPI and CPI (Marxist-Leninist) and second from two nascent regional parties Assam Jatiya Parishad (AJP) and Raijor Dal which were born out of the widespread violent street protests against the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act in 2019 when five people were killed in police firing. It had at that time appeared that anti-CAA protests would dent BJP's electoral prospects by stoking fresh fears about a fresh influx of undocumented migrants into Assam, particularly in upper Assam. It may be noted that the Indian government is yet to notify the rules to implement CAA.

How did BJP manage to retain power in Assam? More importantly, how did the party manage to deflect public attention from CAA? Victory in any poll has to be won by a strategy that takes into account various factors. In Assam, the party used polarisation, implementation of a series of welfare schemes like income support for housewives and land rights for indigenous people and, above all, by a very fine balancing act to navigate the minefield of CAA and NRC issues. Over the years, BJP has raked up the issue of influx in Assam from across the border with Bangladesh, accusing the previous Congress governments of encouraging illegal immigrants in return for their support. This had helped the party come to power in Assam for the first time 2016. Five years down the line, the same strategy remained in place. What provided more fodder for BJP's polarising narrative this time was Congress' tie-up with AIUDF as the ruling party projected Ajmal's party, which has a huge hold mainly among Bangla-speaking Muslims in Assam. BJP projected Congress-AIDUF alliance as detrimental to the interests of Assam's indigenous people and "the culture and civilisation of Assam." Anti-CAA activists, particularly in upper Assam, have always opposed the influx of migrants irrespective of their religion. The BJP established its sway in upper Assam, which has the largest chunk of 28 assembly seats, and this propelled the party to power for the first time in 2016.

According to Congress insiders, the alliance with AIUDF hurt Congress' bid to recapture power in Assam and resulted in the party's poor showing especially in upper Assam where AIUDF does not have any significant presence. The results show Congress-led UPA got just three out of the total 28 seats in upper Assam as against NDA's 23 this time. Congress had hoped to cash in on the opposition to CAA, which aims to give Indian citizenship to religious minorities from Bangladesh, Pakistan and Afghanistan who have come to India till 2014. The party had even promised that if voted back to power, it would bring a law to nullify CAA. But the issue, as evident by the results, failed to cut ice with voters in upper Assam.

On the other hand, BJP successfully diverted the issue of CAA away from the political discourse by arguing that a "corrected" NRC would address the sensitive issue of "illegal" immigrants. Secondly, BJP President JP Nadda, while releasing the party's manifesto in Assam, countered Congress by saying CAA cannot be changed through a state-level legislation but did not commit to its implementation. Thirdly, votaries of anti-CAA agitation have always had reservations about AIDUF which they think is a supporter of illegal migrants. This is the chord BJP successfully struck in upper Assam by repeatedly pointing at AIDUF's presence in the company of Congress. Fourthly, BJP managed to mollify the people belonging to different anti-CAA indigenous communities in upper Assam by giving them positions not only in local administrative bodies created for them, but also in the party. All these factors cumulatively helped BJP blunt the resentment against CAA and National Register of Citizens and reassert its dominance in upper Assam, electorally the most crucial part of the state.

BJP lost a key ally in the form of BPF this time as the latter joined the Congress-led alliance in the run up to the election. But it meant little for the saffron party which roped in another Bodoland outfit, United People's Party Liberal, which helped it make substantial gains in Bodoland area where NDA got eight out of the 12 seats. Assam's Barak Valley, predominantly inhabited by Bangla-speaking Hindus and Muslims, gave BJP-led NDA nine seats and six to Congress-led alliance.

BJP's polarising narrative led to a massive consolidation of Muslim votes in favour of Congress and AIUDF which together managed to get 31 legislators belonging to the minority community to Assam assembly this time, even though the treasury bench of the House would not have any Muslim member for the first time in half a century. The presence of 31 Muslim legislators16 of Congress and 15 of AIDUFthis time is the second-highest in 38 years in a state where, as per the Census of 2011, Muslims account for 34.22 percent of the population, while Hindus and other religious groups account for the rest of the 3.12 crore total population. Of the 126 assembly seats, religious minorities decide the electoral fate in 23 seats, mostly in western and southern Assam and play a crucial role in about seven other seats.

Pallab Bhattacharya is a special correspondent of The Daily Star. He writes from New Delhi, India.

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How BJP ducked CAA and retained Assam - The Daily Star

coronavirus, astrazeneca

Three repatriation flights from India will land in Darwin by the end of May, Prime Minister Scott Morrison confirmed after a National Cabinet meeting on Friday. Travel from India to Australia was banned until May 15 amid record-breaking coronavirus cases in that country. Each flight will have about 150 passengers and they will complete their mandatory quarantine period at the Howard Springs facility. The government-chartered flights will prioritise vulnerable Australian citizens and residents, and their families, who are registered with the high commission and consular offices in India. "The charters will be undertaken by Australian crews, and they will require rapid antigen testing prior to departure," Mr Morrison said. There is a possibility an extra three repatriation flights will go ahead this month after Queensland, NSW and Victoria flagged they're open to taking in more flights from India. NSW has recorded zero new local COVID-19 cases as authorities continue to search for a link between an infected eastern Sydney man and an international traveller with the same strain of the virus. Premier Gladys Berejiklian said she was "pleased" with the state of the current outbreak. More than 13,000 coronavirus tests were conducted in the 24 hours to 8pm on Thursday. Restrictions including mandatory mask-wearing and gathering gaps have been implemented in Greater Sydney. In non-covid news, Queensland Coroner Nerida Wilson handed down her findings into the disappearance of Jayden Penno-Tompsett. What happened to Jayden has been a mystery for his family since December 2017 when he failed to return from a summer road trip to Cairns. You can read more about what happened to Jayden from Newcastle Herald reporter Donna Page. Did you know you can receive this daily digest by email? Sign up here THE NEWS YOU NEED TO KNOW:

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DIGEST

May 7 2021 - 6:00PM

Three repatriation flights from India will land in Darwin by the end of May, Prime Minister Scott Morrison confirmed after a National Cabinet meeting on Friday.

Travel from India to Australia was banned until May 15 amid record-breaking coronavirus cases in that country.

The government-chartered flights will prioritise vulnerable Australian citizens and residents, and their families, who are registered with the high commission and consular offices in India.

"The charters will be undertaken by Australian crews, and they will require rapid antigen testing prior to departure," Mr Morrison said.

There is a possibility an extra three repatriation flights will go ahead this month after Queensland, NSW and Victoria flagged they're open to taking in more flights from India.

NSW has recorded zero new local COVID-19 cases as authorities continue to search for a link between an infected eastern Sydney man and an international traveller with the same strain of the virus.

More than 13,000 coronavirus tests were conducted in the 24 hours to 8pm on Thursday.

Restrictions including mandatory mask-wearing and gathering gaps have been implemented in Greater Sydney.

In non-covid news, Queensland Coroner Nerida Wilson handed down her findings into the disappearance of Jayden Penno-Tompsett.

What happened to Jayden has been a mystery for his family since December 2017 when he failed to return from a summer road trip to Cairns.

Did you know you can receive this daily digest by email? Sign up here

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Continued here:

The Informer: Travel to Australia from India to restart in May - Daily Liberal

When Brian Clowdus, now a candidate for the Florida House, founded theSerenbe Playhouse near Atlanta, it was known for revolutionary productions, but amidaccusations of overt racism dating back toClowdus leadership, officials last year shut down the theater, suspended operations and laid off the staff.

Clowdus has since redefined himself as a prominent voice in the MAGA movement, including volunteering with Gays For Trump.

Its been an interesting year, first with COVID and also with being canceled as an out and proud Republican who vocally supports President [Donald] Trump, Clowdus said.

Clowdus also was questioned for posing in a photo with Jake Angeli, a conspiracy theorist known as the QAnon Shaman, days before Angeli was arrested at the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.

Clowdus, an Alabama native, now lives in Panama City and on Monday announced his candidacy for House District 6, about two weeks after he opened a campaign account within the Division of Elections. The only other candidate running in the race is Bay County Commissioner Philip Griff Griffitts, who filed in March.

The winner of the election will succeed Rep. Jay Trumbull, who cannot run again because of term limits.

But it remains to be seen if the scandal that impacted Clowdus reputation as a pioneering visionary in the Southern theater community will impact his candidacy for public office.

A celebrated artist

Any analysis of Clowdus fall from grace in Atlantas cultural scene must acknowledge the heights from which he fell. Under his artistic direction, Clowdus drew national attention for immersive experiences that redefined what it meant to attend the theater.

Serenbe Playhouse, located in a sustainable community 30 miles outside Atlanta proper, developed a reputation for shows not contained by actual housing at all. The company staged a production of Titanic on a lake in the Chattahoochee Hills community in south Fulton County. Every night a replica of the luxury liner appeared to sink. An outdoor staging of Miss Saigon included the landing of an era-appropriate Huey helicopter in the distance.

The regional theater has made a name for itself through theatrical spectacle and nature-bound immersive productions that never show up on the same plot of its 1,000 acres of land, reads a 2019 profile on Clowdus in Playbill.

The buzz and attention around the theater turned negative in 2020, as a number of theater professionals came forward with accusations against Clowdus and his team.

A lead actress in a production of The True Story of Pocahontas broke an ankle well after a director raised safety concerns about the cast climbing a large, artificial tree. Black actors came forward with concerns White wardrobing staff inappropriately dressed their characters like slaves. Stories emerged of actors adding extra n-words to the script of Ragtime.

As the Black Lives Matter movement reached new heights in 2020 after the death of George Floyd, new introspection about race arose within a number of industries, including the arts. While Clowdus had resigned in 2019 to launch his own Brian Clowdus Experiences company, many of the public accusations stemmed back to his leadership of the theater. Last June, the Serenbe Institute, the umbrella group in control of the playhouse, fired the remaining staff.

Its clear that the culture was pretty toxic for actors, Institute chair Deborah Griffin told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Clowdus feels frustrated by insinuations made in art blogs, and especially the timing of complaints.

The allegations are completely not true. Even at face value, they are based on feelings and not facts, he said. The funny thing is a lot of people worked for me for years and years and years, and nobody said anything until I left Atlanta. I left almost two years ago and everybody loved me until I left.

Clowdus has not spoken with the actors and theater professional who made public accusations against him since the accusations emerged. But those still connected to Serenbe continue to evoke his name.

In an interview with an Atlanta NPR affiliate in March, executive director Jennifer Bauer-Lyons continued to tie problems directly to Clowdus leadership.

Last summer, it came to light that there were several issues of unfair work practices, unsafe work practices, gender discrimination and racial discrimination under the leadership of the previous artistic director Brian Clowdus. The Serenbe Institute Board made the really tough decision of really needing to reset with the Serenbe Playhouse, she said.

In a Facebook post last June, the Brian Clowdus Experiences Facebook page spoke to the accusations.

We admit that we have not set issues of race and inclusion as a priority in our company mission statement and values and that we have not adequately engaged Black voices in telling our stories, the post read. As a young and developing company, we commit to making diversity a core facet of our experiences, integrating inclusion into our mission and core values.

While the Atlanta newspaper stated his company supported Black Lives Matter, Clowdus makes clear he agrees with the statement Black Lives Matter and not the associated political movement.

He characterizes the fallout of accusations as a political canceling at a time when driving people out of the entertainment industry particularly came into vogue.

I am in an extremely woke industry, but I will not apologize for something I have not done, he said.

In the coming months, the one-time rising talent in a hyper-progressive community working in a field known for its liberal bent began an unexpected evolution of his public image.

A MAGA rebrand

Clowdus said he has been a conservative his entire life but became active politically only in the last year. In April, Clowdus posted a video on Twitter from the steps of the Florida Historic Capitol.

If you would have told me a year ago this is where I would be, in a blazer talking to lobbyists, meeting with other House Representatives and getting to know the lay of the land, I would say you had lost your marbles, he said. But here I am. Im loving this new chapter. Im loving all the people Im meeting. Just a reminder I am running because I am here to support the people of District 6. I am not here to support the machine or the powers who be.

Hes now a Republican candidate running to represent a historically conservative part of Florida.

If you want to see a Patriot for the People in the Legislature here in Florida, support me, he said in his video.

The Sunshine State has been home to Clowdus for only around a year but the state has been the location of a political transformation. From a lakeside home in the Big Bend, he has posted pictures, while often wearing a Lions Not Sheep trucker hat.

I am excited the past year happened to me, Clowdus said to Florida Politics.

In many ways, the experience drove him to run for political office, putting his full views on display for the first time, unlike those hiding behind the keyboard being a social justice warrior.

He tweeted at the end of 2020 that it was the year he officially woke up and left the woke. So thankful for my red pill!

Over the course of the year, he became particularly fond of promoting the tweets and work of Candace Owens, a Black conservative encouraging minority groups to walk away from the Democratic Party.

Through the year, Clowdus has increasingly shared posts promoting the Log Cabin Republicans, an LGBTQ conservative caucus. In March he posted a photograph in Palm Springs with former acting Director of National Intelligence Richard Grenell, the highest-ranking gay member of Trumps administration. He has also decried pandemic lockdown measures, denounced gay throuples (a relationship between three people), campaigned for Trump, and shared images of George Orwell novels while decrying big government.

He also waded into another controversy. In the period between the election and the Jan. 6 Capitol riots, he regularly spread the widely debunked lie that the presidential election was stolen from Trump. He encouraged Vice President Mike Pence to do the right thing and reject the slates of electors from several states won by Democrat Joe Biden. He bashed a decision by the Supreme Court to reject a Texas-originated challenge of Pennsylvanias election results. To this day, Clowdus questions the integrity of the 2020 election.

I do think the election was stolen and I stand by that, he said.

But he pushes back at another accusation. At various times on social media, he used terminology widely associated with the QAnon conspiracy, such as Trusting The Plan. He also traveled to Georgia to campaign for two Republican senators who ultimately lost their elections, which flipped the Senate to Democratic control. At rallies, he wore Trump gear and once excitedly shared a picture of Angeli with the caption Q Shaman is here!

But he has never believed in the QAnon conspiracy theory, he insisted to Florida Politics.

I am not QAnon, he said. I do think the election was very fraudulent. I dont understand how someone wins Ohio and Florida and loses this badly. The use of mass mail-in ballots in states like Georgia serves as an explanation, and Clowdus believes that process is rife with problems.

He did not go to the pro-Trump rally in Washington the day the Electoral College votes were certified, but tweeted quotes from Trumps speech, including We will never give up, we will never concede. Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore.

When the riot began, Clowdus decried violence but also quickly blamed antifa without any evidence leftist groups had sparked the chaos.

I do NOT support violence. I dont care if you are dressed in all black or wearing a MAGA hat, he wrote. So now we are hearing there are non-Trump agitators posing as MAGA. I cant keep up. Lord help us all.

It was after the riots that the photo of Clowdus with Angeli became widely circulated on Georgia social media.

I randomly got a picture with this Q Shaman guy who of course now has infamously stormed the Capitol, Clowdus said in a post-riot video. I was at the Dalton rally working it a couple days ago and he was there out front. I snapped a picture with him the same way everyone snapped a picture because randomly seeing a shaman shirtless in January in Dalton, Georgia, is not something normal.

So I snapped a picture with him, didnt know him. That now led to that being blasted everywhere. People screenshot it. Theyve put it on all social media. I mean for people to hate me so much. Its pretty astounding the amount of time and energy they spend obsessing over me.

Still in the arts

Clowdus still runs his professional theater company. While Brian Clowdus Experiences is an apolitical entity, it has launched a division, GOProductions, which specializes in theatrical productions for Republican events and conservative communities.

Even right-wingers love and need theater. Everyone is welcome under this tent, he tweeted last year.

While there remain frictions between himself and many in the Atlanta arts community, he said the disruption around Serenbe ended up opening communication lines between himself and many conservatives who often felt they had to keep views to themselves to work in a liberal field.

And he said conservative audiences have started to push back on woke artists as well. He noted low ratings for the Academy Awards this year, and criticism of a Disney decision to cut ties with conservative actress Gina Carano over controversial tweets.

More people are speaking up with their pocketbooks and not supporting woke industries like they used to, he said.

He also believes in the House District where he is running there will be judgment for the accusations of racism, his belief that the election was stolen or any liberal attacks. He characterizes questioning about the matters as combative and bringing a liberal agenda.

Im very excited to be on this new chapter, he said. Im able to say thank you, and with every canceling there is a great new chapter.

___

Here are the tweets cited in the above report.

Post Views: 2,847

Read more:

Professionals in the art and theater community accused Brian Clowdus of racism. Now he's running for Florida House - Florida Politics

Liberal Democrat candidate Denis Rixson.

On the eve of the Scottish Parliamentary elections, the Scottish Liberal Democrats' Denis Rixson offers his answers in brief to some of the most significant issues facing the north ranging from fuel poverty to delivering healthcare after the pandemic to the housing crisis that is de-populating many areas and the problem of transport.

Denis Rixson:

Fuel Poverty

Our network for the supply and distribution of electricity was never designed to cope with the issues and opportunities of 2021. The existing system suffers from constraints which mean it cannot take advantage of all the new sources of supply.

The second part of the equation is what we do with that energy once we have produced it and can distribute it. Export depends upon a market existing for it at the price we can profitably supply it.

Can we produce it cheaply enough to reduce fuel poverty? Parts of the Highlands suffer severe weather conditions particularly in winter. People here spend a high proportion of their income on fuel and for those on low incomes fuel poverty is a major issue. Can we produce cheap renewable energy that could be used to alleviate household heating bills, either by grid supply or via district heating systems? But this wont happen by itself. It will require market intervention.

Healthcare

Im not a medical person so write from the point of view of a consumer a distant, rural consumer, 40 miles from a small general hospital, 100 miles from a big one. Ive had operations and out-patient clinics in each. What am I, and most other consumers, looking for? We want the expertise, yes, but we want it local. Are these two irreconcilable? No!

We all understand that for major interventions it is impractical to have lots of expensive equipment duplicated throughout the Highlands. But much Healthcare is not critical or emergency. In those situations we do not want to have all patients travelling. Patients dont want that. They want services to be accessible. Our healthcare model should suit our environment. We are not Glasgow or London.

I can see the efficiencies achievable by increasing centralisation. But every step towards centralisation is a step further away from the people you serve. (NB the present Scottish Government)! This is not an economic service that is on offer; its a health service.

Housing

We can and do charge council tax on second homes. That tax is then recycled to help with infrastructure for new housing. However, it is not a sufficient disincentive. We could increase the council tax element but that might not be popular with Highland property owners and it would have to increase dramatically to have a real effect.

We cant tackle Highlands housing crisis without comprehensive Land Reform and some type of Land Value Tax. Land, wealth and power have always been hopelessly imbalanced in the Highlands. My preference is a form of Land Value Tax that is a disincentive to leaving land underused.

We dont want to place undue taxes on land that is used productively for agriculture or forestry. But we cant let the Highlands become a refuge for the rich.

Transport

The Highlands cover about one-third of Scotland. We have thousands of kilometres of road and hundreds of bridges. To bring them up to scratch requires almost 200 million now. We need a real cash injection for our roads not for new ones, merely to fix the potholes. I favour strategic bridges to improve connectivity and reduce journey times, think Skye and Ballachulish.

For the railways I dont argue new lines just improved rolling-stock and better use of the existing infrastructure. Our network could do with more passing places and more commuter services to and from centres like Inverness and Fort William. The Jacobite Steam Train on the West Highland Line shows how we can fill the trains. I favour active travel but we have to be realistic in gales and horizontal rain.

Hydrogen-powered buses and trains, electric planes and ferries the green transport future is bright for Highland. Not, unfortunately, for the present Scottish Government which has two half-built ferries sitting in Fergusons yard.

Read more:

In Brief: Denis Rixson running for the Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch seat in his own words addressing some of the key problems faced by the constituency...

Canada is home to 75 percent of the worlds mining companies. Firms based or listed in Canada operate approximately four thousand mineral projects abroad. And, as you might expect, many of those projects involve shady corporate practices and violations of human rights.

There have been an astounding number of conflicts at Canadian-run mines. Pick almost any country in the Global South, from Papua New Guinea to Ghana, Ecuador to the Philippines, and you will find a Canadian-run mine that has caused environmental devastation or been the scene of violent confrontations.

Stephen Harper, Canadas prime minister from 2006 to 2015, faced frequent criticism for his unapologetic promotion of Canadian mining interests. His successor, Justin Trudeau, was supposed to be a breath of fresh air. But there has been far more continuity than change since Trudeau replaced Harper. While Trudeau and his party might pay lip service to environmental and labor rights, in practice, they have served to prop up Canadas predatory, globe-trotting mining industry.

Mexican president Andrs Manuel Lpez Obrador (AMLO) has recently criticized Americas Gold and Silver Corporation for their disregard of Mexican labor laws. Mexican activists accuse the Toronto-based company of preventing its workers from unionizing at the company mine in northern Mexico. AMLO has also condemned the failure of Canadian mining companies to pay outstanding taxes.

For their part, Canadian diplomats have gone to bat for several companies embroiled in a tax dispute with the Mexican government. Seventy percent of foreign-owned mining companies operating in Mexico have their headquarters in Canada, and the Canadian embassy in Mexico City has repeatedly backed controversial mining projects.

Canadian firms dominate mining in Guatemala as well. Last month, a Canadian legal academic brought a case before Canadas Federal Court, alleging that the minister of foreign affairs improperly withheld information about the governments support for Goldcorp. This comes after multiple accusations of human rights abuses directed against the Vancouver-based company, stretching back years.

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has called for the closure of Goldcorps Guatemalan Marlin Mine due to the companys failure to consult with indigenous communities. The Canadian government has thus far refused to release any details about its communications with Goldcorp, Guatemala, or the commission itself.

Another Canadian court is currently hearing a separate case about a mining firm in Guatemala. Eleven indigenous women are suing the company Hudbay Minerals (previously Skye Resources), accusing it of complicity in their gang rape, allegedly by security personal at Fenix mine in 2007.

The women first brought the suit to the Superior Court of Ontario in 2011. The Intercept recently published a damning article drawing on internal corporate documents that were released because of this precedent-setting lawsuit. The files paint a picture of overbearing corporate influence, political interference, and widespread intimidation and abuse.

In Brazil, Toronto-based Belo Sun Mining is moving forward with a highly contentious gold mine in one of the most biodiverse regions on Earth. According to Rosana Miranda of the So Paulobased Amazon Watch, the companys use of heavy metals and cyanide in the Amazons Xingu River will prompt the last stages of ecocide in the region. Mining in Brazil has benefited from far-right president Jair Bolsonaros hostility to indigenous rights and the environment.

At the beginning of March, protesters pelted Argentinian president Alberto Fernndezs bus over his support for mining in Patagonia. Local and indigenous communities in the southernmost part of the hemisphere strongly oppose the mining projects of Canadian firms Pan American Silver, Yamana Gold, and Eldorado Gold.

Tensions resulting from mining projects are running high in the country. Mining and real estate interests have been pressing the authorities to lift mining bans in the region. A wave of fires, which local people believe were the result of arson, have destroyed land that indigenous communities had protected from miners and developers.

All over the world, Canadian-run mines habitually destroy farmland, harm endangered species, and contaminate drinking water. The mining firms are also responsible for beatings, kidnappings, arbitrary arrests, and killings in local communities. They frequently undermine indigenous self-determination, as national and regional governments give them permission to operate in spite of overwhelming local opposition.

Over the past two decades, thousands of articles, reports, documentaries, and books have detailed Canadian mining abuses abroad. At least four UN bodies have urged Ottawa to hold its companies accountable for their international operations. As the UN Human Rights Committee noted in 2015:

The State party should (a) enhance the effectiveness of existing mechanisms to ensure that all Canadian corporations under its jurisdiction, in particular mining corporations, respect human rights standards when operating abroad; (b) consider establishing an independent mechanism with powers to investigate human rights abuses by such corporations abroad; and (c) develop a legal framework that affords legal remedies to people who have been victims of activities of such corporations operating abroad.

Before Trudeau became prime minister, the Liberals promised to establish an independent ombudsperson on mining. But Trudeaus government waited nearly four years before creating the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE). After a delay of two more years, CORE has finally started taking cases. But it is unable to compel firms to hand over information, putting its effectiveness into question.

By the spring of 2019, all fourteen of the union and NGO representatives advising on COREs work resigned, complaining that the government had ignored everything they said. In March of this year, Liberal MP John McKay reportedly confronted Mary Ng, minister of Small Business, Export Promotion and International Trade, over the governments failure to provide CORE with sufficient investigative powers.

As Emily Dwyer of the Canadian Network on Corporate Accountability observes, Trudeau and the Liberals have created a watchdog that can only function if companies agree to voluntarily provide information that it requires in order to do an investigation. CORE is certainly not the kind of robust, independent regulator that was promised.

Theres an obvious explanation for this failure. As a report by the Justice and Corporate Accountability Project has revealed, the countrys two main mining industry associations played a significant part in shaping the development of CORE.

Between January 2018 and April 2019, representatives from the Mining Association of Canada (MAC) and Prospector & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) met government officials on no fewer than 530 separate occasions. Lobbyists met officials in the prime ministers office alone thirty-three times.

Justin Trudeau has lined up Canadian foreign policy behind the mining industry. Canadian diplomats regularly accompany mining company representatives to meetings with government officials and lobby on their behalf.

Mineral sector companies are major beneficiaries of Export Development Canadas (EDC) services. The crown corporation has provided tens of billions of dollars $28 billion in 2014 alone in financing and insurance to the extractive sector, including many controversial international projects. The Liberals have shown little interest in laying down human rights and environmental standards for EDC.

Trudeaus party has been keen to boost Canadas Trade Commissioner Service (TCS), which supports many mining projects. TCS officials based at Canadian diplomatic outposts assist firms with market assessments, problem-solving, and introductions to local officials. The TCS plays a pretty big role, according to Ben Chalmers, senior vice president of the Mining Association of Canada since 2018. Trade commissioners stand behind us and give us the additional credibility that being associated with the Government of Canada abroad brings.

The Liberals also seem happy to rubber-stamp Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreements (FIPAs), which are designed to protect Canadian mining investments. A March 2017 news release promoting Canadas mining sector at an industry convention offers one example:

The Canada-Mongolia Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPA) is now in force. This agreement provides substantial protections for Canadian investors in Mongolia, where there are already significant Canadian-owned mining assets.

These investors rights accords limit the ability of governments to regulate corporations operating on their soil. If the rules interfere with the profits of Canadian mining interests, they can sue the local administration and have their suits heard before private, investor-friendly international tribunals.

The Trudeau government has channeled more than $100 million in assistance for international projects whose real purpose is to support mining. Those projects often come with sanitizing, euphemistic titles such as West Africa Governance and Economic Sustainability in Extractive Areas, Enhanced Oversight of the Extractive Industries in Francophone Africa, and Enhancing Resource Management through Institutional Transformation in Mongolia.

It all adds up to a damning picture. While Trudeau and the Liberals may have put forward some nice rhetoric on the campaign trail to burnish their progressive image and deflect international criticism, their practice in government has been largely the same as Stephen Harpers, putting the profits of mining companies above human rights and protection of the environment.

Excerpt from:

Canada's Mining Industry Is Spreading Havoc Around the World With Justin Trudeau's Support - Jacobin magazine

The 1.9% increase covers a range of charges, including conveyancing fees, land valuations, motor vehicle registration and administration fees.

For example, the cost to register a motorbike will increase $1 to $46, a drivers licence annual fee will increase by $1 to $48, registration for a 4-cylinder vehicle will increase by $3 to $138, registration for a trailer will increase by $2 to $83, and issuing or renewing a learners permit will increase by $1 to $48.

Due to rounding issues, the actual percentage increases in some cases might be slightly different to 1.9%.

In other cases, the independent Heavy Vehicle National Regulator administers annual fee increases determined by a nationally calculated indexation factor for heavy vehicle penalty and infringement notices, which in 2021-22 will be 0.9%. Heavy vehicle registration increases, which are recommended by the National Transport Council, will be 2.5% in 2021-22.

Treasurer Rob Lucas said the Government had limited fee increases to the standard indexation rate, which had been used by previous governments over many years, as the Government strives to keep costs low for South Australians.

The fee schedule for 2021-22 reflects a standard, or normal, increase despite significant budget challenges as a result of COVID-19, said Mr Lucas.

The former Labor government took the very same approach over 16 years.

The Marshall Liberal Government is delivering significantly lower costs for South Australians, with the average* household now approximately $930 better off under our lower-cost policies.

The huge hip-pocket savings include massive reductions in average household water and sewerage bills (an average $200 a year saving), cheaper ESL bills ($163.60), cheaper electricity ($269), reduced car rego costs through lower CTP Insurance premiums for a 2 car family ($200) and a doubling of sports vouchers for primary school-aged childrens swimming and other sports lessons (from $50 to $100).

*For a typical Adelaide household with two children and two cars, this equates to around $933 in annual budget relief.

The standard indexation rate takes into account annual public sector wages growth and the Consumer Price Index, which currently sits at 1.2%.

Other fees, fines and charge rises including public transport fares, traffic fines and expiation notices will be gazetted early next month.

Read the original here:

Fees and charges to rise by standard 1.9 per cent - Premier of South Australia

Voters in Elmbridge have multiple selections to make in the local elections on May 6 with seats being contested at borough and county level as well as for the role of Surrey Police and Crime Commissioner.

On Elmbridge Borough Council, there are 16 wards set to elect councillors with 63 candidates fighting for the seats. On Surrey County Council (SCC) there are nine seats up for grabs in the Elmbridge divisions.

The post of Surrey Police and Crime Commissioner (PCC) is being contested by five candidates.

We gave each of Elmbridge's borough and county council candidates 100 words to use as they wish to put forward their pitch for why you should vote for them, which can be read below. Where a candidate has exceeded the word limit, their bio has been cut at the 100th word.

For the full list of PCC candidates, see our article here.

There are 63 candidates vying for your vote in 16 borough wards across Elmbridge.

Wael Aleji, Conservative Party

Wael is a psychologist and a researcher on human rights issues. He is a proud local resident and values Claygate's history, its independent businesses and community organisations. He describes himself as an "experienced listener and communicator" - qualities which are essential in a local councillor.

If elected, his priorities are to champion vulnerable residents and the local shops, to defend the Green Belt and to make Claygate cleaner and greener.

Bruce McDonald, Liberal Democrats

Bruce has lived in Claygate since 1968 and spent his career in local government, serving as Chief Executive of the Royal Borough of Kingston from 2000 until his retirement in 2015. Bruce is standing as a candidate because he wants our community to build back better after Covid and to create a more local, more mutual and more sustainable future.

He believes passionately in local democracy and has been appalled by Surrey County Council's recent plans to wipe out local district councils, given that decisions are best made close to, and with, the people they affect.

Hadleigh Felix Moon, Labour Party

I am a proud resident of Claygate with my wife and a daughter on the way. I am a health & safety officer for a charity who provide social care for adults with dementia and learning difficulties.

If elected I promise to advocate for more, affordable social housing to help hardworking families get out from under extortionate private rents that make home ownership increasingly difficult. I also aim to bring more council services in-house, to ensure they are efficient and serving the people of Claygate, instead of serving private greed. Vote Moon to keep Claygate green and clean.

Mike Bennison, Reform UK

No bio supplied.

Steven John Gray, Labour Party

No bio supplied.

Elaine Linda Kingston, UK Independence Party (UKIP)

The UK Independence Party (UKIP) will be contesting three of the Elmbridge council wards on the 6th May. The candidates are: Elaine Kingston (Cobham & Downside), Donald Anderson (Molesey East) and Samantha Fry (Long Ditton).

The party's policies include defending the Green Belt and agricultural land from overdevelopment; only building on brownfield sites; more police on the streets to combat crime; and pressing the county council for more action on potholes and rough surfaces on our roads. UKIP deplores the high cost of Business Rates which cause so many small shops and businesses to close.

Alistair David Mann, Conservative Party

Alistair is Chairman of Cobham Chamber of Commerce and led their campaign against proposals for Pay and Display in the High Street. He is involved with a number of other local organisations including the Cobham Green Belt Group.

Alistair believes Elmbridge Council can be a strong partner to support local shops, including by establishing a Business Improvement District. Alistair is campaigning for a review of car parking charges and improving pavements.

Zelda Eloise Pitman, Liberal Democrats

Zelda grew up in Surrey and has lived in Cobham since 2010 with her family. She works as a solicitor in Windsor and has long been active in her local community. Zelda is standing as a Borough candidate to ensure that sound, practical decisions are made in the interests of the whole community.

She is concerned about the increasing reliance by hard-working local families on food banks, as well as rising incidents of homelessness. Traffic congestion, air pollution, local housing and access to good school places are also key local concerns.

Susan Elizabeth Dennis, Labour Party

No bio supplied.

Laura Jayne Harmour, Green Party

I joined the Green Party when green belt meadows behind my house were razed to build a school despite Elmbridge Councils opposition. Environmental issues are my major concern as well as ensuring that local peoples voices are heard.

There are 80 Green Party Councillors in the South East fighting for the environment and for social justice. The May elections offer people in East Molesey and Esher the opportunity to start making a real difference locally by voting Green.

Jeremy Christian Larsson, Conservative Party

Jeremy wants to protect green spaces and ensure that Elmbridge Council is run more efficiently with lower taxes and better services. He has a background in senior leadership roles, including as Managing Director for a financial tech firm.

Jeremy has two daughters at local schools and is a governor of Esher Church School. He currently advises small businesses and charities. He says: "The Resident Association and Liberal Democrat coalition running Elmbridge Council has lost control of the Council's finances and this has led to Council Tax rises and local services under the threat of cuts. Only the Conservatives can get...(cut at the 100th word as it exceeded the limit).

David James Young, Esher Residents Association

I am the only candidate who lives in the Esher Ward so I understand the concerns of Esher and Hersham Riverside/Longmore residents. Nationally, these issues are overlooked. We need independent, local Councillors who are not following a party line and who will consult with residents, not overrule them from Westminster.

I want to ensure a clean, green and vibrant local area by protecting the Green Belt, stopping excessive development, revitalising the High Street, tackling pollution, improving pedestrian safety and strengthening our sense of community.

These are big challenges but I will work hard on behalf of all our residents.

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Jeremy Daniel Brown, Labour Party

I've been lucky enough to grow up in Hersham where I live now. With your vote, Id be campaigning for a Hersham 'citizen's assembly'. This would give you more of a direct say on local decisions, especially on the bypass, climate change, and ideas for a new footbridge over the Mole.

The assembly would involve a fair, randomised selection of Hersham residents from varied ages and backgrounds to listen and debate, while also hearing from technical experts. I would be keen to debate how we can cut food poverty.

Chester Robert Chandler, Liberal Democrats

Chester has lived in Elmbridge all his life and works in the financial sector, championing ethical and sustainable finance. Chester is standing as a Borough candidate to protect and enhance Hershams green spaces for the benefit of both the local environment and for residents physical and mental wellbeing. He wants to ensure Hershams residents have a clear voice at the table when making decisions that affect them something that is being stripped away by the Conservatives attempts to centralise power away from local communities. He also wants to get more young people involved in local politics.

Paul Wood, Conservative Party

Paul believes the past year has presented huge challenges and local government must rise to the challenge of helping society to recover. He believes that local services will always be under finance pressure, so councillors must focus on delivering excellence and efficiency.

Before retiring, Paul held senior roles within major businesses, and if elected he will work closely with Hersham's Conservative councillors and our MP to provide a joined-up service for residents. His priorities are Hersham's shops, local environment, listening to residents and delivering value for money.

Liz Ambekar, Liberal Democrats

Liz has lived with her husband and teenage daughters in Hinchley Wood since 2014. She is a Charity Finance Director and trustee of Claygate Youth and Community Hub. Liz is standing to represent her local community, where she has been an active volunteer and political campaigner for many years.

During the pandemic, she runs a food bank collection point at her home, collecting 100s of items donated by local residents. She will work towards a fair and equal society, climate action, and community support for local businesses as they recover from the impacts of the pandemic and Brexit.

Gill Coates, Hinchley Wood/Weston Green Residents' Associations

I am honoured to represent the Residents Associations of Hinchley Wood & Weston Green. Living in Weston Green for 21 years, as a commuter, mum, dog owner, carer and community volunteer (Citizens Advice, Meals-on-Wheels), Ive experienced firsthand the commitment of our Residents Associations to improving local services, protecting green spaces, supporting local business and preserving the special character of Weston Green and Hinchley Wood, unhindered by national party politics.

I want to continue that good work. I believe in 'think globally, act locally' and feel strongly that local councils have a valuable role in our democracy.

Geoff Herbert, Conservative Party

Geoff has lived and worked locally his whole life and knows Elmbridge issues very well. He is determined to preserve the Green Belt and the local environment, while resisting intensification.

Geoff believes local communities should decide where new housing goes. His priorities also include support for the voluntary sector, more visible policing and working as part of a Conservative team to tackle potholes.

James William Samuel, Labour Party

No bio supplied.

Samantha Fry, UK Independence Party (UKIP)

The UK Independence Party (UKIP) will be contesting three of the Elmbridge council wards on the 6th May. The candidates are: Elaine Kingston (Cobham & Downside), Donald Anderson (Molesey East) and Samantha Fry (Long Ditton).

The party's policies include defending the Green Belt and agricultural land from overdevelopment; only building on brownfield sites; more police on the streets to combat crime; and pressing the county council for more action on potholes and rough surfaces on our roads. UKIP deplores the high cost of Business Rates which cause so many small shops and businesses to close.

Greg Knowles, Green Party

I, Greg Knowles, believe that now, more than ever, the result of this election will significantly impact the way we live in Elmbridge and Surrey. If elected, I will, therefore, ensure the voice of local residents is heard loud and clear in council decisions on planning, climate action, social care and other important issues by listening to community assemblies, interest groups and grass roots organisations like the AERC.

The community of Elmbridge deserves action and while the pace of change cannot be halted, it can be directed, and you can do it.

Jeremy Langham, Liberal Democrats

Originally from Lancashire, Jeremy (Jez) has lived in Elmbridge with his wife since 1997. He has three children and works as a business development director in the creative industries.

Jez is standing as a Borough candidate in order to improve support for families and young people in the area, address failures in education, welfare and social provision, protect the Green Belt and improve the lack of affordable housing. He has led the recent Elmbridge Lib Dem campaign to provide laptops for schools, raising over 5,000 and providing 40 laptops to families at our local schools.

Jake Coltrane Lewis, Labour Party

No bio supplied.

Claudia Riley-Hards, Conservative Party

Claudia's top priority is to preserve the Long Ditton Green Belt. Previously, Elmbridge Council under Liberal Democrat/Resident Association control has consulted residents on using releasing this Green Belt to meet housing demand.

As part of a Conservative Council, Claudia will resist excessive annual housing targets to preserve the character of Long Ditton, while using her background in economic development to promote council policies that support our local shops and businesses, and apprenticeships for young people.

Donald Peter Anderson, UK Independence Party (UKIP)

The UK Independence Party (UKIP) will be contesting three of the Elmbridge council wards on the 6th May. The candidates are: Elaine Kingston (Cobham & Downside), Donald Anderson (Molesey East) and Samantha Fry (Long Ditton).

The party's policies include defending the Green Belt and agricultural land from overdevelopment; only building on brownfield sites; more police on the streets to combat crime; and pressing the county council for more action on potholes and rough surfaces on our roads. UKIP deplores the high cost of Business Rates which cause so many small shops and businesses to close.

Richard Percival Flatau , Liberal Democrats

Richard is a retired Accountant who spent his career in the leisure industry. He first moved to East Molesey in 2005 and is active in the local campaign to resist the proposed development at Hampton Court Station.

Richard is standing as a Borough candidate because he wants more action on climate change, better housing and planning provision to improve affordable housing while protecting the local character of East Molesey, and better coordination of road repairs. He will also address the increase in the number of dilapidated boats along the river at Molesey.

Lisa Howard, Green Party

Hello, I am Lisa Howard, the Green Party borough candidate in Molesey East. I feel incredibly lucky to live in such a beautiful part of the country and I will work hard to ensure that we hold on to our vital green spaces.

In my professional career within the charity sector and the creative industries I have consistently fostered a culture of inclusivity and opportunities for all. And I am standing for election in order to shape positive change for our entire community.

Peter Ronald Pope, The Molesey Residents Association

Peter has been a Molesey resident for 30 years. He comes from a military family where his father was a Sergeant-Major in the Kings Royal Rifles. Peter trained in management at London Transport and later worked in civilian support for the Metropolitan Police. Later he served as an RSCPA officer and now runs his own gardening services business.

His prime hobby, after taking a steam engineering course, is as assistant Chief Engineer on the Flying Scotsman steam locomotive project. He comes as a new boy in Council matters and is strongly interested in what the Council can do for local...(cut at the 100th word as it exceeded the limit).

Rosie Rendall, Labour Party

No bio supplied.

Xingang Wang, Conservative Party

Xingang is a part-time magistrate - a role he took on to set an example of community service to his young daughters - and has previously worked in engineering and accounting. He grew up in China but became a British citizen after studying for a master's degree in London.

Xingang's priorities are to resist the overdevelopment of Molesey, protecting and enhancing our riverside, and supporting the high streets in Walton Road and Bridge Road. He supports keeping Vine Hall open and opposes the Jolly Boatman development.

Mike Axton, The Molesey Residents Association

Mike is a lifelong resident of Molesey and has served as Secretary of the Molesey Residents Association and as councillor for Molesey West for some 20 years. He is often the first point of call for council or other queries on Molesey matters.

His wife Fiona is a teacher and manager at a Molesey Nursery School and secretary of 1 St Molesey Scout Group. Mike and Fionas three children all went to Molesey schools and education remains a main interest. Mike worked for Thames Water, then for a builder of the Oxford University racing boats. He later did legal training...(cut at the 100th word as it exceeded the limit).

David George Sheldrake, Labour Party

I have lived in Molesey all my adult life, and am well known in the community, I have been a Labour Party member and supporter all my life and believe in the core values of looking out for the many not the few.

I am a strong believer in also protecting the environment and do my best to make the buses more accessible so it's easier to travel to Kingston by bus than take a car. I believe Molesey is a great place to live and will really enjoy looking out for ALL its residents if elected.

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Elmbridge local election candidates 2021: Meet the people vying for your vote in May - Surrey Live