Category Archives: Post Human

Is Labour being punished for flip-flopping?

On a campaign stop during the 2010 UK election an elderly woman named Gillian Duffy, later identified as a lifelong Labour voter, complained to then-Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown about high immigration from Eastern Europe into the UK.

Following the interaction with Duffy, Gordon Brown -- while still wired to a live microphone -- complained to a staffer and called the woman a bigot.

The live microphone picked up the comment, a media maelstrom ensued, and Browns floundering hopes of winning the 2010 election were dashed once and for all.

Boris Johnsons resounding win over Jeremy Corbyn last week reminded me of that incident 10 years ago. To say that Boris Johnson won seats in Labour strongholds would be an understatement.

Constituencies that had only elected Labour MPs for 70-80 years switched to the Tories, as the Conservative Party is known in the UK.

The reality is that Browns Labour bigot became a Brexiteer, and then, a Tory. This may come as a shock to the wider public but it is no surprise to most political pundits and party functionaries.

Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour party campaigned against Brexit during the 2016 referendum. The Leave campaign won the referendum with strong support from Labour voters in traditionally Labour constituencies.

The Labour party seemingly got the message and voted for the parliamentary bill invoking Article 50, a procedural requirement for the UK to leave the European Union.

However, earlier this year, Corbyn did another backflip and decided to oppose Brexit, calling for a second referendum where Labour would campaign to keep the UK in the EU.

In three years, Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour party was against Brexit, then for it and again, against it. It is hardly a surprise that Labour voters who strongly favoured Brexit punished the Labour party for flip-flopping.

Political expediency and flip-flopping aside, the question of why working-class voters in Labour heartlands wanted Brexit requires deeper analysis.

The signs of working-class grief and disenchantment with Labour politics was evident as early as 2010 in Gillian Duffys sentiments and Browns insulting dismissal.

Western advanced countries with ageing populations have seen labour force participation and employment numbers either stagnate or, even worse, decline.

Relatively older populations understandably feel anxious about their future and care deeply about issues of economic security.

Centre-left parties have not only failed to address the concerns of older voters but have also been tone-deaf in their economic policy posturing.

They have placed too much rhetorical emphasis on economic opportunities for the future to attract younger, urban voters, while largely ignoring issues of economic security that affect suburban and regional voters.

Centre-right parties have stepped in to fill that political void. The conservative message of trying to preserve the socio-economic status quo, or at least attempting to slow down the pace of change, resonates with older voters.

Immigration and multiculturalism is another such issue where the stars have aligned for the right, both in terms of economics and politics.

Older voters see immigration as an issue of economic security. Immigrants will either take away jobs from native job-seekers and/or lead to lower wages and lower standards of living.

And while there is no denying that the topic of immigration triggers xenophobic hysteria amongst some segments of the population, the vast majority of the voting public perceive immigration as a jobs issue.

Economic rationalists -- and I count myself as one -- wax lyrical all day about the wider economic benefits of immigration as if it were a self-evident truth that transcends politics.

The liberal, rationalist literati have been complacent and dismissive of working-class anxieties and have failed to grasp how demographic and economic structural change is shaping the political discourse of our time.

Injecting identity politics into that conversation through condescension and ridicule, be it Gordon Browns bigot or Hilary Clintons basket of deplorables, only fans the flames of discontent and disenchantment.

To be fair, right-wing politicians say equally bad things too, if not worse. But trying to find equivalence, or the lack thereof, between what the right and the left says completely misses the point.

Taking a majoritarian position in favour of preserving the status quo is always going to be more of a vote-winner than trying to give voice to the upwardly-aspirational, minority class.

Boris Johnsons honeymoon period following this thumping win will end at some point and the hard job of governing and winning the hearts and minds of the voting public will overwhelm his government too, as it does every government.

UK Labour will probably bounce back too, perhaps with a better leader, perhaps sooner rather than later.

But the underlying forces of demographic and economic structural change that ageing, western societies are experiencing will endure and continue to shape the politics of our time.

In the midst of all this disruption and evolution -- politicians of both hues have the unenviable task of setting policy agendas that will inevitably lead to winners and losers.

In the democratic interplay between actual and perceived winners and losers, centre-left parties need to acknowledge that their brand of progressive politics resonates less and less with an older, majority voting bloc.

The politics of change and reform that disenfranchises the ageing, struggling majority is a recipe for political oblivion.

Nofel Wahid is an economist.

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From Brown's bigot to Brexit and Boris - Dhaka Tribune

Former Knesset MemberGeulah Cohenpassed away today. In 1964 she had ayechiduswith the Rebbe, and published an account of it in the Israeli daily Maariv. Read her report here.

Geula Cohen passed away today at the age of 93. She was a well-known public figure from the right-wing camp in Israel, who previously served as Deputy Minister in the Israeli government, a Knesset member and journalist.

Cohen worked extensively in the public arena in the struggle for shleimus haaretz. Cohen was also one of the main opponents of Prime Minister Menachem Begins decision to hand over the Sinai to Egypt.

Thanks to her many roles, she gained a special connection with the Rebbe, including a sequence of correspondence. While serving as a senior journalist in the Maariv newspaper, she also had a unique yechidus with the Rebbe during which she interviewed the Rebbe. She later published an account of her yechidus in the Israeli daily, Maariv. A translation of her account is published below.

Courtesy of Chabad.org

The Believer

I have been in the company of wise men, men of great learning and intelligence, men who were superior artists. But sitting opposite a true believer is quite a different matter. After having met a wise man you remain the same as before you have become neither less of a fool nor more of a sage. The education of the man of learning hardly rubs off on you, nor does the artist endow you with any of his talents or inspiration. Not so with a believer. After having met him you are no longer the same. Though you may not have accepted his faith, you have nevertheless been embraced by it. For the true believer believes in you as well.

TheLubavitcher Rebbe, RabbiMenachem Mendel Schneerson, of Brooklyn, the spiritual leader of the WorldChabadMovement, is both wise and learned, but above all he is a man of faith. And if faith be the art of truth, he is also an artist whose creation is the army of believers that he commands, the army of the Jewish faith, of theGdofIsraeland the people of Israel.

What about the belief in the Land of Israel?

To ask the Rebbe this question I first had to get to him. Jewish legend says nothng about how exactly the angels were received in audience by the L-rd, but had it wanted to it might well have taken its inspiration from the manner in which I managed to be received by the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

First of all, as with every ordinary mortal, there is, of course, the secretary with fixed reception hours and a long waiting list, except that here the secretary does not ask you what you intend to discuss with his boss. That is a matter between you and the Rebbe himself. Here, even if you may sometimes have to wait for days on end, anybody and everybody is eventually admitted. And the reception hours are not in daytime, but at night all the night through. The day is for learning, the night for talking.

At 11 oclock at night? I repeated, when told by Rabbi Hodakov, the Lubavitcher Rebbes secretary, that this was the time of my appointment, for I was sure I had not heard right.

Tomorrow, at 11 p.m., came the laconic reply over the line connecting me with the Rebbes court in Brooklyn.

And why not in the daytime? When I posed this question to one of the Rebbes followers, he looked at me as ifI had come from the moon.

During the day the Rebbe studies, came the answer, in a tone that left no room for further questions.

And indeed I found myself wondering whether this was not as it should be; whether at night the heavens and the hearts of men might not be more open, more disposed to listen; at night when the barriers are down and man is closer to the truth.

Perhaps the very fact that my thoughts were turning this way was already due to the incipient effect of the secret drug that begins to work on you, whether you want it or not, long before you actually meet the Rebbe; possibly from the moment that you decide you want to see him. However rationalistic you may be, all your skeptical questions begin to blush with shame

The Rebbes Court

I dont remember a single preface in any book I have read that I did not skip. But from the long preliminaries I had to go through until I actually met the Rebbe, I learned that there are some preambles one cannot do without for the simple reason that they already constitute the beginning of the story. What the Rebbe has to say may be important, but still more important, perhaps also for the Rebbe himself and the Chassidic lore of the Chabad school, is to whom, when and where he said what he did. The atmosphere around him is no less relevant than what he actually says. The how may matter no less and perhaps even more than the what. The Rebbe starts off where his court begins. His parlor begins at the porch. His followers are no less part of his personality than, as the Chassidim believe, all human beings form part of Gd. My interview therefore began the moment I entered the Rebbes court and met his disciples.

The young men who crowded the premises, studying theTalmud, can hardly be referred to as students or disciples. Although they were sitting in front of an open book they did not look like people learning something they did not know before. They seemed more like people in a laboratory who are experimenting with the spirit and its manifestations just as others experiment with matter: combining and decomposing, designing and synthesizing. And all this is accompanied by their melodious humming. Much has been written about the Chassidic melodies, and much more will still be written about them. For they are tunes which have no end and no beginning. They seem to perpetuate the song which you sing so that someone else may continue it after you. Hearing that tune, it occurred to me that the Ten Commandments, the foundation of mankind, could never have been written and spoken according to a Chassidic melody. But it also occurred to me that mankind may not have been able to comply with this severe code had it not been for this softening melody.

Those who were not leaning over their books were standing about and talking among themselves. Perhaps they were talking about everyday things, but the expression on their faces was enough to indicate that they were like frontline soldiers exchanging a few whispered words before going into action. The commander might have been invisible, but his presence made itself felt through and through. No orders were being issued, but they might be at any moment; and everybody was ready to listen and obey.

The Rebbes Peace Corps

I, too, was waiting, for my orders to go in to the Rebbe. The time was a quarter past eleven, half past eleven when will it be my turn to be called in? I was just about to ask one of the young men in the court office when a well-dressed young woman came in, with a patter of high heels, her blonde hair streaming out beneath her kerchief. Before I could see her face I could hear her half-choking voice: Have you got an answer yet? Instead of answering her the young man she had addressed went over to a pile of letters, pulled out the one she had written, and told her that the Rebbes answer was right in there. The woman snatched it away, opened it and read it on the spot. For a moment her eyes froze over. There might have been tears as well of joy or of sorrow, who can tell? Leaving without a goodbye, she was back again as soon as she had gone.

I have another question. May I ask the Rebbe another question?

Of course, she is told. At any time and about anything you may wish.

Her face lights up with happiness.

Poor woman, says the man to me after she has left. All her life shes been going to psychiatrists, and they didnt help her at all. How could they help her if all they have is knowledge and no faith? They dont love her; they love only their books. How can one help without love? I became curious about this young man.

He was about twenty-five, and it transpired that he had only recently returned from a trip to Australia undertaken on the Rebbes behalf. What am I doing here? What do you mean? I have a wife and a family but one day the Rebbe told me to go on a trip and I asked no questions about where and why. Nobody questions the Rebbe. His every word is an order. He doesnt say things that might have remained unsaid or could have been said otherwise. So I took my family and went. What did I do in Australia? Whatever I was told. There are people being sent round the world to distribute food and money among the Jews, but what the Jews really need is spiritual food, a bit of love, of Yidishkeit. The Rebbes orders were for me to go and give them love, to encourage them, to bring a little Jewishness into their souls. There is social assistance and there is First Aid for physical ailments, but we are concerned with First Aid for spiritual ills. Of course we are concerned with peoples physical well-being, too. Have you heard about the Maccabees who organized the defense of the Brooklyn Jews during the riots? The man who organized them, Rabbi Shraga, is one of ours. It was a great honor for me to have been sent on a mission by the Rebbe but I am only one of many hundreds and thousands. We have a whole army here, our Peace Corps. This is our headquarters. From here the Rebbe dispatches his soldiers to the various fronts. Wherever there is a single Jew there is a front for us to fight on, with the Holy Scriptures in our hands and the love of Israel in our hearts. These are our weapons. If there is some Jewish corner in the world that is inaccessible by car, we go there on donkeys. There is nothing that can stop us. All we have in mind is that the Rebbes orders should be carried out to the full, that we should be able to come back and report to him: Mission accomplished.'

But the Peace Corps, as I am informed by the office manager, is only one of the many ramifications of the Lubavitcher Court.

The Sun Never Sets Over theLubavitchEmpire

People used to say that the sun never sets over the British Empire, but it is already going down. Not so with the Lubavitch Empire. We are growing stronger from day to day, he said. Have you heard about our publishing house? It is the biggest publisher of Jewish writings in the world, issuing books in over ten languages. We also have hundreds ofyeshivoswith some 30,000 students. Do you know our village in Israel? Therell be many more such communities. Once a week we publish an information bulletin, circulated by the ITA News Agency.

Who are the people who come to see the Rebbe? Well, who doesnt? Chassidim andMisnagdim, men and women, tradesmen and scholars, young and old, Jews and Gentiles, leaders and statesmen; including the present President of Israel did you know he was one of ours? As for his correspondence again, with whom doesnt he correspond? Even withBenGurion. What about? That is the Rebbes own affair. Nobody opens the letters that are addressed to him. He himself opens them all, and answers them, too.

What do Jews ask about as a rule? About matters of religion and how to make a living; about their personal affairs and about politics. In short about everything. There is no question he cannot answer. Where there is faith, one is able to answer every question. For him there are no important and unimportant questions. Every question calls for a true answer. Excuse me a minute.

I hadnt heard the bell ringing, but the secretary jumped over to the phone and immediately left the room. Unwittingly I found myself adjusting the kerchief I had tied over my head in anticipation of my interview with the Rebbe. I was just in time, for the next moment the secretary was back to tell me, with the air of one presenting a most marvelous gift: Thats it now; come along with me.

He may have said some more, but I no longer heard him because I was too busy covering up for my sudden palpitations, telling myself not to be a fool, that there was no need to get excited, that this wasnt my first midnight appointment

Midnight Appointment

When the door closed behind me and I remained alone with the Rebbe the time was twelve midnight, but the Rebbe rose from behind his desk to receive me with a smile that spelled noon rather than midnight.

If that is what you are interested in, you may see a handsome face with a kind and gracious expression, a black hat above and a gray beard below. Alternatively you may see nothing but a pair of eyes fixed upon you not in order to see but in order to discover and reveal. Then it wont be so pleasant for you if you have something to hide, if your intention was to deceive. You try to button yourself up anew, because you feel some of your buttons may have suddenly burst. Is it because the Rebbe really has magic eyes or is it because you have brought the magic along with you as a result of your nighttime experience and the purge administered by the Rebbes disciples? But the question of cause and effect no longer matters. What matters is to try and remember why one has come in the first place. And so I start by introducing myself.

Except that it isnt necessary. He knows more about me than I might be able to tell him. He knows not only what I have done but what I ought to have done, not only what I am doing now but what I am not doing and should do. His disciples had told me that he reads the papers every day and took a lively interest in Israel, but it was a little frightening nevertheless.

I understand that you are writing for the press now. Well, thats all right, but it isnt the main thing. The young generation, that is the main thing. One has to talk to youngsters, not write for them. Why arent you talking to them? Why is nobody talking to them? They are waiting for someone to talk with but nobody does. They are being addressed in lofty speeches, but nobody talks to them, and then people are surprised that they remain indifferent.

The Rebbe does not speak with me inYiddishbut in Hebrew. His accent may not be the purestSephardi, but his language is the language of the Bible. And however exciting his words, his voice remains level and calm.

What the youth is waiting for is an order which must be given in the same voice and tone in which all the great commands were issued to the people of Israel. They may obey or they may not, but that is what they are waiting for. But there is no commander to issue that order. Where are they all? No salvation can come from those who walk in the beaten path, but only from those who break new ground. What has happened to all those who were once burning with the holy fire of a holy war that they are now dealing with such bagatelles as whether people should pay a little more or a little less income tax instead of thinking about the urgent concerns of the Jewish people as a whole? Where are those who at one time knew how to issue commands? I believe physics: that energy can never disappear. Forces that have once existed will exist forever. Therefore I believe in the everlasting force of the Jewish people. Whatever forces there may once have been in its youth still exist and need only be evoked. Once there were those who knew how to evoke them where have they gone?

Everybody is in a rut, following a course of dull mediocrity. And, as you know, there is nothing worse than conformity. To be carried away by the current is very much like dying. Creativity begins by swimming against the current. What is needed is someone to start swimming against the current. I am not preaching, Gd forbid, revolt, only protest against the set pattern of conformity. If the present set-up has turned into a prison, one must find ways to break away from it. That does not mean breaking the law, but fighting against the law. Yet everybody, the entire Jewish nation, is conforming to the set pattern, and there is no one to lead the way out

The Rebbes voice is filled with deep despair, but without pathos. Have you ever calculated how many precious youth-hours are going to waste every day? The use of every such hour could work wonders. Instead of giving orders the leaders make speeches and the young people go to cafsand waste their precious irretrievable time. Do you remember them during the Sinai campaign, how they rose like one man because there was a commander whose orders were such as they had been waiting for, even if they did not know it beforehand? Just give them an order as was done during the Sinai campaign never mind the particulars, all that matters is that it should ignite some spark as it did then and you will see how all the latent forces will rise up again

It would hardly matter if everything were as it should be in the Land of Israel and in the Diaspora. But it isnt. All the ideals and all the panaceas have failed and only very, very little has so far been accomplished. Never in the 3,500-year history of the Jewish nation was there a period without any prospects; sometimes the chances were used and at other times they were allowed to escape. But never in the whole history of the Jewish people has there been a period which offered as many opportunities as the present, and never has there been a period when so few were utilized.

TheTorahAlso Needs a Commander

Until I suddenly heard the sharp ringing of a bell I had not realized the vast silence that dwelt in this room. The ringing came from outside; from the office, presumably. I gathered that my time had run out. But it did not occur to me to get up, and I went on sitting there as if there had been no ringing. Despite the repeated exhortation of the bell, the sound of the Rebbes voice assured me that this was not yet the end.

Every day that goes by is a tremendous loss. What it takes ten years to do in the Diaspora can be done in ten days in the Land of Israel, provided one gets down to the latent spark. A fire can go out, but a spark never. Our youth are asleep without knowing it, and those who address it with speeches are surprised at their not hearing. Unless they hear their own words, they are not aroused.

What exactly are the words of our youth? I cannot tell. The words will follow with the inner force of the imperative. They must come from deep inside. The main thing is the awakening, the pioneering spirit. Once the vanguard is there, the banner may follow. Now there are many banners, but what are they all worth without anybody to walk ahead of them and carry them? Take those boys in Israel who throw stones on people who desecrate theSabbath I believe they have the spirit, there is something they really care about. I am not suggesting that they should throw stones, Gd forbid, but I feel that they care, that there is something burning inside them, and that is the main thing. Then I can try to convince them that they are using the wrong means, to divert their fire into the right channels

On the other hand the young people who are coming from the Land of Israel to study at foreign universities they are not pioneers. What can they learn abroad that they cannot learn in the Holy Land? If a man leaves his home to go to the North Pole or climb a mountain at the risk of his life to satisfy his thirst for knowledge one may call him a pioneer. A young man who goes from Brooklyn to theNegevand risks his life on the border may be called a pioneer. But leaving Israel to study at a university in Brooklyn that is mere hankering after comfort, not pioneering.

Take ouryeshivahstudents they study, too. But in order to teach they go everywhere in the world where there are Jews, not to sit there in a yeshivah but to open new academies. They knock on every door. They find their way to non-religious kibbutzim in Israel and to assimilated homes in the Diaspora. The spirit of Judaism is the one ideal that has not failed like all the rest. Only the values of religion persist unscathed and unaltered. So far nothing has been found to replace them. And that is precisely why no compromise is possible in this respect. Everything may be done to facilitate its teaching, but nothing to facilitate its observance. Attempts to compromise will only alienate our youth rather than bring them closer to our religion. Israels youth want no compromises. But here, too, no leader has been found, no commander who will issue the order, as in the Sinai campaign.

I Shall Come when theMessiahArrives

It is getting close to two oclock. The bell has stopped ringing. It has probably given up. But ringing in my own ears was the redoubled sound of my question:

Why wont you come and give the order?

My place is where my words are likely to be obeyed. Here I am being listened to, but in the Land of Israel I wont be heard. There, our youth will follow only somebody who has sprung up from its own ranks and speaks its own language. The Messiah will be a man of flesh and blood, visible and tangible, a man whom others may follow. And he will come.

He has been on his way for quite a while, I found myself saying.

But he is very near and we must be prepared for him at any moment, because he may have come just one moment before.

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Israeli Journalist who Interviewed the Rebbe Passed Away - Anash.org - Good News

Civil Society, Development & Aid, Environment, Global, Headlines, Human Rights, Migration & Refugees, TerraViva United Nations

Opinion

Lasse Juhl Morthorst* is a freelance writer and researcher. He mainly works on international politics, development, refugee- and human rights issues.

Credit: United Nations

COPENHAGEN, Dec 17 2019 (IPS) - According to political scientist Zaki Ladis La tyrannie de lurgence (The tyranny of emergency) from 1999, crisis and emergency situations leave no time for analysis, prevention or forecasting. As an immediate protective reflex, they prevent long-term solutions and pose a serious risk of jeopardising the future.

In emergency situations, participants lack perspective, and durable solutions to human problems are treated according to the logic of immediate results and expectations of direct outcomes.

The effects of globalisations deepening and fragmenting landscape highlights how governance with short-term efficiency has become normative when dealing with contemporary challenges.

The so-called European refugee crisis from late 2014 and, if we buy its premise, its aftermath have come to symbolise such an emergency situation.

Contemporary political responses expose the electorate and the parties, who respectively gain and lose in the processes of globalisation.

This socio-political cleavage has allowed centre-right parties to take advantage of nationalistic values, with migration viewed through the lens of security limitation of migration flows and the fight against terrorist groups law and order, while the centre-left have had to bridge the working classs fear of cheap labour and economic competition with the middle-classs liberal socio-cultural preferences.

The European Unions reaction towards the crisis and its aftermath cannot be seen as a political crisis reaction per se, since the solutions it initiated to manage migration built on existing legislation and practices, helping to consolidate these as routinising emergency in order to naturalise migration politics.

There is a clear political red line between addressing so-called root causes and managing migration by securing external borders and preventing movement of third-country nationals.

This is anchored in the European Commissions comprehensive approach in the 1994 Communication to the Council, reconfirmed through the integrated approach at the 1999 European Council meeting in Tampere, and developed at the 2002 Seville meeting, where combating illegal migration and addressing root causes were top of the agenda.

What we are witnessing is rather a political crisis, which has lasted for more than a quarter of a century.

Lasse Juhl Morthorst

As a result of a sceptical post-1973 oil crisis scenario, addressing root causes of migration emerged in the 1980s, with the aim of improving socio-economic conditions in the countries of migrants origin, to prevent unwanted migration towards Europe.

When the European Community was developing the single market, with the fluidity of the EUs internal national borders to facilitate free internal mobility as an outcome, the fear of losing control of external migration became an increasing concern for member states.

The EUs migration policies have, with their primary focus on securitisation, come to symbolise a harmful politicisation of humanitarianism, which seems to persist into the new Commissions 2019-2024 period and very like beyond.

In the following years, little progress was made towards a unified European migration policy. As a result, the Commission proposed the idea of a comprehensive approach to migration in 1994.

This consisted of a threefold focus: action on migration pressure through third-country cooperation, controlling immigration to make it manageable and optimisation of integration policies for legal migrants.

The root cause approach was to be seen as a long-term humanitarian development solution to the migration problem. The ideas of cooperation and addressing root causes have become the popular political take on the EUs migration challenges, which rhetorically attempt to circumvent the negative connotations of strict migration control and hostility.

Credit: United Nations

During the last decades, the EU has been searching for a new strategic rationalist raison dtre for its common asylum policy, through harmonisation of the EU asylum legal acts, the Common European Asylum System and attempting to solve the stalemate between member states and intra-institutionally, regarding the Dublin systems tightening Gordian knot.

The EU has failed to solve the structural and systemic impasse in approaching migration flows, which will not end by continuing harshened border controls and security measures, earmarked development aid, externalisation processes or dubious bilateral agreements.

The EUs migration policies have, with their primary focus on securitisation, come to symbolise a harmful politicisation of humanitarianism, which seems to persist into the new Commissions 2019-2024 period and very like beyond.

Nothing new from Brussels?

Ursula von der Leyens new Commission is taking office in a situation shaped by vast global challenges of geopolitical turbulence and internal fragmentation, towards which she has proposed a rather pragmatic and strategic approach.

Through her manifesto and mission letters to the designated Commissioners, von der Leyens new geopolitical Commission will focus on making the EU an outward-looking politically influential global powerhouse, which must protect the Union from omnipresent geopolitical and external value-based challenges.

She has proposed a fresh start on European migration policy, via a new pact on migration and asylum, a relaunch of the Dublin reform and a new way of burden sharing (the Achilles heel of the Dublin reform).

In charge of this agenda will be Commission Vice-President for Promoting the European Way of Life Margaritis Schinas (Greece), who will work closely with Ylva Johansson (Sweden), the Commissioner for Home Affairs, and Development Commissioner Jutta Urpilainen (Finland).

There are clear tensions and ambiguity in von der Leyens agenda towards migration and development, which has toxically been coined with security politics, as it has to find a common ground on migration by working towards a genuine European security union.

The external dimensions of migration management are explicitly present in the mission letters to both Schinas and Johansson. In these letters, they are instructed to cooperate with the new High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy (Josep Borrell, Spain), to develop a stronger cooperation with countries of origin and transit in the case of Johansson and ensure the coherence of the external and internal dimensions of migration for Schinas.

The EUs interaction with third countries and partnerships of border control are narrow and ultimately self-eroding.

Beyond the initial internal focus against the backdrop of the eurozone and financial crises, this aligns closely with the Juncker Commissions focus on the external dimensions of migration.

In 2015, the European Union Emergency Trust Fund for Africa was founded to intensify cooperation with third countries. Migration is also, beyond the Trust Fund, a central element in EU foreign policy and it has further come to divide views in the debate regarding development policy.

It appears that the Union is proposing to work even more closely with partner countries to tackle human trafficking, secure borders, optimise effective returns and tackle root causes of migration through development initiatives. Schinas confirmed this at his hearing on 3 October 2019.

A reminder from the field

The collaboration with third countries regarding externalisation of borders is vastly problematic, since in some cases, as a trade-off through the funding of development aid earmarked for increased border control, it comes to support militias and authoritarian and hybrid governments.

A large amount of the support often ends up in quasi security organs of rebel groups, which have been seen continuously abusing human rights.

This can presently be witnessed in nations in the Sahel, Maghreb and MENA regions where tight border control has led to the diversification of pre-colonial circular and reciprocal migrant routes into increasingly perilous areas and methods, along with the risk of promoting economic stagnation, recession and militia isolation.

The diversification of migration routes ultimately creates a favourable environment for the human smugglers that the Union is trying to eliminate.

The EUs interaction with third countries and partnerships of border control are narrow and ultimately self-eroding. These policies do not tackle any root causes of migration; by aiding regional security units and military forces, they risk limiting democratic accountability and aggravating repression some of the actual root causes of migration.

Agreements of principles and statements of intention do not compensate for the deflection of focus of an international communitys failure to get to grips with the need of todays migrants for protection and recognition.

Von der Leyens agenda seems like an anachronistic reverberation of the unsuccessful policies introduced more than three decades ago, despite the opportunity to begin abolishing the tyranny of emergency.

*This article first appeared in International Politics and Society (IPS) published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin.

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EU Policies Dont Tackle Root Causes of Migration They Risk Aggravating Them - Inter Press Service

From truthers and birthers, and from Flat Earthers to QAnon, so-called conspiracy theorists have been garnering more and more attention, especially because President Donald Trump himself has been known to promote this kind of baseless speculation. While it is hard to find evidence that more people than usual have been engaging in such speculation, this doesnt make the phenomenon, or its effect on the level of rational discourse, any less of a concern.

I have been a critic of conspiracy mongering in various forums. Ive argued that one flaw with the practice is that it explains events by reference to hidden agendas of nefarious agents when appealing to the conventional motives of ordinary public figures can do the job. But Ive often been asked, how can we tell when theres something irrational about a given conspiracy theory? Dont conspiracies sometimes really happen? How can we know when were dealing with conspiracy mongers?

These are good questions, and Ive wanted for some time to answer them by doing an in-depth case study of a single, prominent case of baseless speculation about conspiracies. But often the cases are so wacky that it would insult peoples intelligence to dwell on them. So I wanted to find a seemingly plausible example, preferably one about a recent, well-known event. It would be even better if we could watch the speculation happen in real-time as the event unfolded.

Unfortunately, I knew I would have the right case study when the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris caught fire six months ago, on April 15, 2019. An iconic landmark was burning, and immediately I myself wondered if it would turn out to be terrorism. Especially because Paris has been the target of some brutal Islamist terrorist attacks in the last seven years (notably including the 2015 attacks on Charlie Hebdo and the Bataclan), I knew that some people would leap to the conclusion that this was another such case.

Indeed, as I watched commentary about the event pour in on social media, I began to see some posters conclude that it was not only possibly but even probably or certainly an act of Islamist terrorism. Their commentary, which spread as quickly as the fire itself, displayed all the hallmarks of the conspiracist mindset. In what follows Ill illustrate how people with this mindset fixated on one imagined scenario, and how they twisted logic to do it. Ill also draw some general lessons about how to avoid this mindset.

Breitbart.coms first article reporting on the fire became a repository of commentary on the event by readers, racking up a total of almost 24,000 comments. There are many other sites I could have looked at, but after many dispiriting months of reading Breitbart comment sections, I knew this would be a tinder-dry environment for conspiracist sparks to catch.

The intellectual monstrosities constructed without attention to the evidence that are often dubbed conspiracy theories are nothing of the sort. They dont even qualify as valid hypotheses.

Even now, six months after the event, no one is in a position to be certain about how this fire started. But French investigators have been working diligently and have not found evidence of foul play.4 A recent in-depth piece by the New York Times brings us up to date: we now know that a security guard paid to check fire alarms rushed to the wrong section of the building, giving the fire nearly 30 minutes to spread in the main attic of the church where it had actually started. The main possibilities being considered are an electrical short in the bell tower or in an elevator for workers, or cigarettes from workers. Even Breitbart has now reported this much, but the conspiracists in the comment section are unimpressed.

I want to be very clear: I am not claiming that the fire was an accident. The investigation is still ongoing. Evidence of foul play can sometimes emerge only late in an investigation. But such evidence has not yet emerged. Even if it eventually does, this will not validate the breathless claims about Islamist terrorism that emerged immediately after the fire.

It is important to distinguish real theories and real hypotheses from what are commonly called conspiracy theories. A theory is a sophisticated, systematic organization of evidence, a real intellectual achievement. Even to form a valid hypothesis about a matter, you first need to know a lot. The intellectual monstrosities constructed without attention to the evidence that are often dubbed conspiracy theories are nothing of the sort. They dont even qualify as valid hypotheses.

READ ALSO: An Alternative to Conspiracism's Foolish Illusions

But baseless claims about conspiracies tend to attract crackpots precisely because they are claims about secret plots. It is all too easy to claim that the reason there is no evidence for a conspiracy is that the conspirators have worked to cover it up. When claims about secret plots or coverups spread quickly, before there is time for the evidence to come in, its a good early sign like smoke where theres fire that the claims spreading are mere conspiracism. This is the proper pejorative term to describe the phenomenon of asserting baseless claims about the existence of conspiracies.

Conspiracism thrives on mysteries. It posits explanations for events that are actually difficult to explain, but it does not actually engage in the painstaking effort of gathering evidence in the way that scientists do. Case in point: Notre Dame conspiracists have failed to offer a scintilla of evidence that is actually relevant to establishing the claim that the fire was due to Islamist terrorism or even just arson.

When claims about secret plots or coverups spread quickly, before there is time for the evidence to come in, its a good early sign that the claims spreading are mere conspiracism.

Whats more, if the French government knows that there was arson and is lying about it, this is an allegation that itself would need evidence. There have in fact been crimes by Muslims that various European police agencies have suppressed, as in the 20152016 New Years Eve sexual assaults in Germany. We know about that because evidence of conflicting internal reports emerged. No such evidence has emerged in connection with Notre Dame. Until specific evidence of distortion or equivocation on behalf of the French police arises, this speculation is baseless.

Very typically, conspiracists will take the difficulty of explaining an event as a sign of foul play. They cant understand how an iconic structure could burn by accident: wouldnt authorities have taken precautions against this? But the absence of an explanation is simply ignorance, and ignorance per se isnt evidence of anything. Usually, conspiracists lack context and understanding because they dont have the relevant expertise, or they dont realize that certain kinds of knowledge even require expertise. Conspiracism all too often results from an indefensible antipathy to the very idea of specialized knowledge.

Conspiracists will often point to real facts and claim that these form evidence for their views. But evidence for a claim is a fact that in logic tends to support that claim. The facts conspiracists point to tend to bear only an illusion of relevance to their conclusions, an illusion driven by wishful thinking.

An elegant example of this conspiracist habit is the widely circulated claim that a mysterious figure in Muslim garb could be seen in grainy video footage moving through the Notre Dame bell tower as the fire raged.5 The claim is odd enough for assuming that a terrorist would stay on the scene of the crime dressed for evening prayers even as firefighters were swarming about. As usual, a much better explanation turned out to be available: Americans are unfamiliar with the uniform of French firefighters. Later, less grainy footage revealed it to be exactly that.6

Usually, conspiracists lack context and understanding because they dont have the relevant expertise, or they dont realize that certain kinds of knowledge even require expertise.

Most of the apparent evidence that Notre Dame conspiracists mustered in the first place concerned not specific facts about the scene of the fire, but facts about the surrounding context of European life. They point to the indisputable fact that there is a problem with Islamist terrorism in Europe. And there have been real incidents of Muslim attacks, and other planned attacks, on French churches. But there are many fires in France, and doubtless many accidental ones at old churches especially at those that lack fire suppression systems and are having to lay off security staff due to budget problems.7,8 What do such general facts help prove about the fire at Notre Dame?

To defend the claim that there is reason to think the Notre Dame fire was an Islamist attack, the web site Jihad Watch pointed to a story at Breitbart claiming that there is an average of three church attacks per day in France. Within a certain timeframe, that was true. But in a display of the conspiracist mentalitys lack of concern for the facts, one commenter on the Jihad Watch post jumps from this statistic (which included many cases of mundane vandalism) to the claim that there were as many attacks on churches in France due to the religion of peace [i.e., Islam]. In point of fact, nowhere in the Breitbart story or its French source are the perpetrators of these acts of vandalism identified.9

Perhaps sensing the need for some specific evidence, web sites like Alex Joness conspiracy-mongering Infowars relayed the news that a journalist had tweeted that a friend of his who works at Notre Dame had told him that other staff at the cathedral told him that the fire was intentional.10 Aside from the fact that this does not specify who is supposed to have set it intentionally, it is readily classifiable as hearsay about hearsay, so it is no surprise that the journalist eventually deleted the unreliably sourced tweet.

The closest thing there is to specific evidence of anything like foul play at Notre Dame is a fact very few of the conspiracist commenters saw fit to reference. It is true that several Muslims were arrested in 2016 on the suspicion of plotting an attack against Notre Dame. One of them, a woman who aspired to join ISIS, was sentenced just days before the Notre Dame fire itself.11

READ ALSO: Bayer and Ghate Chat on Rands View of Conspiracy Theories

In the meantime, without such evidence, looking at statistics about attacks by Muslims in France and seeing a case for Islamist terrorism at Notre Dame is little better than squinting at grainy footage and seeing the vague outlines of a mysterious figure in Muslim garb.

One additional hallmark of conspiracists disregard for the pursuit of the truth is that their claims have no clear identity. The content of their assertions shifts as new evidence comes in, sometimes in a way that blatantly contradicts their previous claims.

For instance, consider the idea that the French authorities would not disclose the fact that Muslim terrorists were responsible for the fire even if they actually did discover indisputable evidence of an Islamist attack. At the same time, when conspiracists want to show that some Muslims have planned or executed church attacks in France, they appeal to the reports of French authorities.12

The facts conspiracists point to tend to bear only an illusion of relevance to their conclusions, an illusion driven by wishful thinking.

The standards shift and the claims contradict because their source is not evidence, but imagination. It is easy to hear the reports of an investigator and simply imagine, what if theyre lying? A similar use of the imagination is the attempt to explain how a proposed arson might have occurred. How was the fire started? It could have been workers, they say, because we can imagine workers starting fires. Were any of the workers Muslims? We can imagine the companies being pressured to hire a group of diverse workers, they say.14 What if all of the workers claim to be Catholics? We can imagine they are lying, and they are secretly Muslim.15 How could the arson have been carried out if the workers werent present? We can imagine it was incendiary balloons!16 Or even better, we can imagine an improvised incendiary drone!17

The use of arbitrary possibilities is one of the most classic hallmarks of conspiracism. Even to say maybe with a serious face, in the manner that a detective identifies and investigates the suspect of a crime, requires at least a little bit of specific evidence, otherwise it too is arbitrary. Arbitrary possibilities devised by the imagination in defiance of the need for evidence are the stock-in-trade of the conspiracist. They are what allow any fact to be evidence of anything the conspiracist would like, allowing their claims to shift with the wind. They are, in particular, what allows the conspiracist to insulate his case from refutation. The authorities say there is no evidence of terrorism? Maybe they are lying. But this is the argumentation of a shyster lawyer, not an investigator who is serious about the truth.

What creates the conditions for conspiracism to spread? There are many factors, but one should be highlighted in particular.

In the case of the Notre Dame fire, we have already seen how some European authorities have been less than transparent about the challenge of the recent influx of Muslim immigrants into the region after the Syrian civil war. Much of the Western press has aided and abetted this reticence: it has under-covered the extent of the problem with Islamist terrorism both in Europe and around the world. Several publications even insisted that French authorities had ruled out arson and terrorism.18 But the most the Paris prosecutor Rmi Heitz said was: There is no indication that this was a deliberate act.19 This only means that no specific evidence was found pointing to terrorism or arson, not that these had been ruled out.

Arbitrary possibilities devised by the imagination in defiance of the need for evidence are the stock-in-trade of the conspiracist. This is the argumentation of a shyster lawyer, not an investigator who is serious about the truth.

But as one commentator recently put it:

Progressive bias in the mainstream media is quite real and has been getting markedly worse in recent years. . . . But this does not justify claiming that the New York Times or CNN are just as bad as Alex Joness conspiracy site, Infowars, or embracing the pro-Trump camps assertions that mainstream coverage of the Trump/Russia story amounted to a hoax.

Even as we must be willing to identify non-objective reporting, we must not fall for the siren song of conspiracism as the alternative. The only acceptable alternative is to be objective about our interpretation of the news.

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Footnotes

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Analyzing the Conspiracist Firestorm over Notre Dame - New Ideal

Spectrum Project Space will host an exhibition by artist Dan Gladden this September, featuring works that explore the idea of the posthuman from a romanticised and imagined queer perspective.

Gladdens work primarily focuses on body image and masculine beauty, exploring merging, diving and mirrored forms from the idea of a gay clone the idealised, muscle-bound visage of a Western male body.

Gladden explores this notion of the posthuman by taking contemporary media representations of masculinity and projecting an imagined future of superhumans based on these ideals of beauty.

We caught up with Gladden to find out more about what motivated the work, the Western image of the ideal man and the notion of the posthuman.

Was there a particular moment or scenario that inspired this series?

There was no particular moment that kick started the works in the exhibition, however I have been addressing similar themes in my practice since uni, where i examined gay male identity and body image as a marketable commodity.

The works in frag/men/t further elaborate on this theme but have merged into a much stranger space where bodies and forms morph, merge and melt into new bodily creations and beings, like some bad cloning experiments gone wrong.

I guess what also influenced me is the insanely increasing technological advances especially in terms of designer genetics.

Why did you choose to represent this idea of the posthuman?

The post-human is a concept of what the next state of being human could or will be. I think we are entering into strange, uncertain and interesting times and Im often overwhelmed by the idea of an apocalypse, especially considering the state of the world at the moment.

I wanted to explore the idea of a not-too-distant imagined yet romanticised world where humans have become explicitly designed for pleasure. There is a definite Margaret Atwood/Oryx and Crake influence.

Im conscious that the types of bodies gay men in particular are consistently exposed to in the media are the same, white, muscular perfect symmetrical men so I wanted to develop ideas of this gay clone further into weirdly grotesque yet supposedly beautiful ideals.

You mention the notion of the gay clone also the idealised Western male Ive seen this first hand at Mardi Gras. Do you think this is an issue our community doesnt address thoroughly enough?

Absolutely although I would hope that given the increasing interconnectedness of online social spaces it has become a bit easier to find groups you may align yourself with, however I still see the dominant media representation as being a Eurocentric image of ripped muscular clones.

Some people can look like that, but its unrealistic for many, which can lead to feelings of isolation, anguish and insecurity.

What can we do to dispel this idea of the perfect Western man?

I dont really have the answer to what we can do but I would hope that we can just further embrace difference as beautiful (by difference i mean different to the medias representation of the male body).

The works Ive created have really pushed the boundaries of perfection by exaggerating typical representations and morphing into something grotesque.

Hyper-masculinity is something Ive seen discussed more in queer circles, but still too often dismissed. Have you seen real examples of its effects?

Absolutely. Its a tough road being gay already with society telling gay men they are not real men. I think of online profiles and all the cliches of masc4masc and the casual (sometimes blatant) racism and internalised homophobia. Its bullshit. Its damaging. It can completely destroy peoples confidence, ability to relate or be themselves.

I say be who you are, embrace it, push it, work it. Just be true to yourself, whether youre masc, femme, large, skinny, green hair, no hair, or anywhere in between. We are a diverse community of so many incredible types of people and this is where our strengths lie.

Dan Gladdens frag/men/t will be at Spectrum Project Space at Edith Cowan University Mount Lawley from Thursday August 31st Wednesday September 13th.

Leigh Andrew Hill

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frag/men/t: Artist Dan Gladden explores the queer posthuman form - OUTinPerth

West Nile virus found in human-biting mosquito, detected in 20 towns

NEW HAVEN >> The risk of people contracting West Nile virus may be rising, as a mosquito species that is more likely to bite humans has been found to carry the disease, according to Philip Armstrong, medical entomologist at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station.

As of last week, mosquitoes carrying the virus had been found in 20 towns, more than at this point in 2016, including six in Greater New Haven and seven in Fairfield County. But the West Nile-carrying mosquitoes have been found farther afield, in Hartford and New London counties, Armstrong said Thursday.

The most common species to carry West Nile is the northern house mosquito, Culex pipiens, which feeds mainly on birds, Armstrong said. However, whats really most alarming, he said, is that were also detecting the virus in human-biting mosquitoes. That species is Culex salinarius, a common mosquito, but whats unusual is that its picking up the virus, Armstrong said.

This is the peak period of risk right now, Armstrong said, although no human cases have been reported this year.

The virus will amplify or will peak in the mosquito population usually before we have human cases, he said. There often are delays in diagnosis and reporting of these cases oftentimes weeks after the date of onset.

There was just one human case of West Nile reported in 2016, compared with 21 in 2012, according to the state Department of Public Health. There have been 131 human cases of West Nile, including three fatalities, since 2000, according to Agricultural Experiment Station.

Armstrong said hot weather increases the mosquito population, so with West Nile virus, typically when you have these prolonged heat waves . the population will increase and biting will increase, Armstrong said.

The bottom line is we are seeing a substantial increase in the risk just in the last week or two and hopefully this is the peak, he said. However, the risk for acquiring West Nile virus will still extend until the first hard frost.

Dr. Richard Martinello, medical director for infection prevention at Yale New Haven Hospital, said, Most people who get exposed to West Nile virus dont have any symptoms at all. It may be 10 to 20 percent who get infected [who] may experience signs and symptoms.

Those include headache, body ache, joint pain, fatigue, vomiting and diarrhea. Theres a whole multitude of different infections that may present the same way, including enterovirus, said Martinello, who is also associate professor of internal medicine and infectious diseases at the Yale School of Medicine. Less than 1 percent can have a serious infection due to West Nile, such as meningitis and encephalitis.

As of Tuesday, the Agricultural Experiment Station had tested 148,154 mosquitoes from 91 trapping sites throughout the state and had found 55 mosquitoes carrying West Nile virus. The towns where West Nile-carrying mosquitoes have been found are Branford, Bridgeport, Darien, Farmington, Glastonbury, Greenwich, Guilford, Middlefield, New Canaan, New Haven, North Branford, North Stonington, Orange, Plainfield, South Windsor, Stamford, Stratford, West Hartford, West Haven and Westport.

The mosquito-trapping program had also identified 21 mosquitoes with Jamestown Canyon virus in the towns of Canaan, East Haven, Meriden, Milford, New Britain, North Haven, North Stonington, Plainfield, Ridgefield, Shelton, Wethersfield and Willington.

We pick it up every year, Armstrong said of Jamestown Canyon virus. Its not really a significant public health concern. Theres been one documented human case of James Canyon virus in the state of Connecticut since the mosquito program began, he said. The symptoms are mild.

There have been no reports of the more serious Eastern equine encephalitis virus found in mosquitoes this year, according to the Agricultural Experiment Station.

Man dies of babesiosis

A tick-borne disease caused by a parasite, babesiosis, was responsible for the death of Michael Yoder, 55, of New Milford on Aug. 8, according to the Associated Press.

Babesiosis symptoms are similar to the flu, although severe cases can cause anemia that leads to organ failure. There was one death each from the disease in 2015 and 2016, the AP reported.

The Centers for Disease Control reported an increase in babesiosis cases in Connecticut from 74 in 2011 to 205 in 2014.

Call Ed Stannard at 203-680-9382.

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West Nile virus found in human-biting mosquito, detected in 20 towns - New Haven Register

LAWRENCE The Hall Center for the Humanities Fall Faculty Colloquium is designed to enliven the intellectual atmosphere of the University of Kansas and contribute to the interdisciplinary training of faculty. This fall, four KU faculty members and four graduate students will convene under the leadership of directors Allan Hanson, professor emeritus of anthropology, and John Symons, professor of philosophy, to explore the topic of The Posthuman?

The faculty participants in the colloquium are Jennifer Foster, lecturer inSpanish & Portuguese; James Gunn, professor emeritus of English; Christopher Ramey, assistant professor of psychology, and Paul Scott, associate professor of French. The graduate student participants are Ramon Alvarado, philosophy; Anthony Boynton, English; Aaron Long, English, and Christina Lord, French & Italian.

The group will explore the question of whether we are morphing into something beyond the human. Today's bewildering onslaught of technology supplements and often replaces what were once defining features of humanity. Or is the whole idea of the posthuman misguided? Artificial intelligence may be fundamentally different from human intelligence, a supplement rather than a competitor. All current technological developments may signal nothing other than an unfolding actualization of what it is to be human.In a word, this colloquium raises the question of whether a posthuman condition exists. If not, why not? If so, what is it (or will it be) like?

The colloquium directors determine the theme, provide intellectual leadership and guidance, act as coordinators and facilitate feedback to participants on their presentations. The participants each present a paper and contribute to the discussion. Past colloquia have covered topics on global citizenship, colonizing knowledge, imagining the modern and future city, and consciousness.

Although the colloquium participants will guide the readings and responses, faculty and staff interested in the topic are invited to attend meetings. Starting Aug. 25, the Posthuman colloquium will meet at 10 a.m. most Fridays in the Hall Center Seminar Room. A detailed schedule of each meeting is available on the Hall Center website calendar and in the weekly e-bulletins.

In addition to the regular meetings, the colloquium will host guest speaker Katherine Hayles, James B. Duke Professor of Literature at Duke University. She teaches and writes on the relations of literature, science and technology in the 20th and 21st centuries. She will present a public lecture at 7:30 p.m. Nov. 13 in the Adams Alumni Center. Her talk is titled A New Mode of Orientation: Planetary Cognitive Ecologies. The next day, Nov. 14, she will meet with a special session of the colloquium.

For more information about the Fall Faculty Colloquium, please contact the Hall Center at hallcenter@ku.edu or call (785) 864-4798.

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Hall Center for the Humanities events to explore the posthuman condition - KU Today

Hundreds of people allegedly confessed to eating human flesh given to them by one of four men facing cannibalism charges in South Africa, reports say.

The four accused cannibals Nino Mbatha, 32; Lindokuhle Masondo, 32; Sthembiso Sithole, 31, and 30-year-old Lungisani Magubane appeared in court on Monday in Estcourt to face charges of murder and conspiracy for allegedly raping, killing, mutilating and then eating the body of a woman, The Witness reports.

One of the suspects allegedly walked into a police station in the central South African town on Friday while holding human body parts, including a leg and a hand, and confessed to being tired of eating human flesh, according to the newspaper.

Police found more body parts at a home in the Rensburgdrift section of Estcourt, a town in the countrys KwaZulu-Natal province.

Col. Thembeka Mbhele, a police spokesman, said Mbatha one of the accused cannibals who also acts as a traditional healer known as a nyanga was arrested in Amangwe, where more body parts were found.

Meanwhile, ward councilor Mthembeni Majola, who held a community meeting Monday after the suspects appeared in court, said roughly 300 residents confessed to visiting Mbatha and knowingly eating human flesh.

Majola said the practice was not limited to Estcourt and that Mbatha had links across Uthukela, one of the 11 districts of the larger KwaZulu-Natal province.

Mbatha had apparently worked as a practicing healer in Ladysmith before fleeing to Rensburgdrift earlier this year after another nyanga was reportedly attacked and killed, Majola said, although that killing has not be confirmed.

We dont know what to do or who to trust, Majola told the newspaper. This has happened within our community. Families, people we know and live with, have now confessed to eating this woman.

Some residents even confessed to personally digging up graves at Mbathas direction before giving him the recovered remains.

Villagers said during the meeting that Mbatha told them that exhuming the graves would protect them from harm, make them stronger and bring them wealth if they handed them over to the nyanga.

The provincial Occult-Related Crime Unit is now investigating the claims, Mbhele said.

Here is the original post:
Hundreds confess to eating human flesh in South Africa - New York Post

The State Department is withholding $195 million in military aid for Egypt and has completely withdrawn almost $96 million in other aid for the impoverished country as a sign of displeasure over human rights concerns and a new law placing strict restrictions on aid groups working in the country.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who signed papers related to the funding this week, notified Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry of the decision in a phone call Tuesday, according to State Department officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity about the internal discussion.

The largest chunk of funding is $195 million in military aid, which is supposed to help Egypt fight domestic security threats and terrorism. That unspent money would be returned to Congress at the end of the fiscal year next month. Instead, Tillerson authorized it to be put in a separate account and held in reserve until Egypt shows some progress on key priorities such as human rights abuses and the new law that many nongovernmental organizations say makes their charity work illegal. Egypt should get the money eventually, the officials said.

In separate action authorized by Tillerson, the administration decided to take away from Egypt another $65.7 million in military aid and $30 million in economic aid, and give it to other countries instead. The new recipients have not been determined.

We wanted to send the message were not happy at the lack of progress in human rights and the NGO law, a State Department official said. We want to see improvements.

U.S. officials, whenever they have met with their Egyptian counterparts, have for a long time made a point of mentioning their concerns about human rights abuses in Egypt. They were particularly worried about the impact of the NGO law passed by parliament late last year and ratified in late May by President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi.

The new law gives the government the power to decide who can establish an NGO and what kind of work they do. It also requires that donations of more than about $550 be preapproved. Failure to inform the government in a timely fashion potentially carries penalties of up to five years in jail and $55,000.

Many rights groups say the law in effect prohibits them from doing their job, because it bans them from engaging in anything deemed harmful to national security, public order or morals a vague definition that they say is intended to stifle dissent.

The government has accused human rights groups of trying to undermine the social order, and some are being investigated over the source of their funds.

A State Department official said the United States thought Egypt had in effect made a promise this year that the law would never take effect. When Sissi signed it, diplomats thought they had been misled.

Egypt has been the second-largest recipient of U.S. aid since it signed a peace treaty with Israel in 1979. It has received $80 billion in military and economic aid over the past 30years. In 2013, President Barack Obama froze the supply of military equipment after the Egyptian army overthrew President Mohamed Morsi. When aid was resumed, Congress required that the secretary of state certify that Egypt was making progress in governing democratically.

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US holds up military aid to Egypt over human rights concerns - Washington Post

While Mr. Sisi approved the new law almost two months after his meeting with Mr. Trump, concerns over Egypts human rights record and its relationship with North Korea have been percolating for years.

Robert Satloff, the executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the conflicting messages from the Trump administration were surprising.

It is unusual that the Trump administration would take a punitive measure against Egypt, given the presidents outreach to President Sisi and his general embrace of this Egyptian government, Mr. Satloff said. I would not say reports of difficulties with Egypts human rights situation or its connection with North Korea are new.

Secretary of State Rex W. Tillersons top priority has been to increase North Koreas economic and diplomatic isolation, and he has asked foreign leaders in almost every meeting that they cut ties with Pyongyang.

Egypt has been close with North Korea since at least the 1970s. North Korean pilots trained Egyptian fighter pilots before the 1973 war with Israel, and Egypt was later accused of supplying Scud missiles to North Korea, said Daniel Leone of the Project on Middle East Democracy.

This year, United Nations investigators said they acquired evidence of North Korean trade in hitherto unreported items such as encrypted military communications, man-portable air defense systems, air defense systems and satellite-guided missiles in the Middle East and Africa, among other locations.

In 2015, a United Nations panel said that Egypts Port Said was being used by North Korean front companies and shipping agents engaged in weapons smuggling.

Successive American administrations have privately raised the issue of North Korea in talks with Cairo, but with little success. The United States may be pressuring Egypt over its civilian and military links to North Korea. One of Egypts richest men, Naguib Sawiris, owns Orascom Telecom Media and Technology, the telecommunications company that helped set up North Koreas main cellular telephone network in 2008.

Another factor in the decision to limit funding to Egypt is the draconian law regulating aid agencies particularly those funded by Western governments and organizations which was signed into law by Mr. Sisi in late May. Several Egyptian groups, including those working with victims of police torture, said the law will make it impossible for them to continue their work and may force them to shut down.

The Trump administration has proposed significant cutbacks in foreign aid and has promised to demand greater accountability from aid recipients.

But Tuesdays actions were not as tough as they might have been. By pausing the provision of $195 million in military funding, the Trump administration saved the money from expiring entirely on Sept. 30. This way, Egypt could eventually get the money if its record on human rights improves.

Gardiner Harris reported from Washington, and Declan Walsh from London.

A version of this article appears in print on August 23, 2017, on Page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: U.S. Curbs Aid to Egypt, Citing Human Rights Record and North Korean Ties.

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US Slaps Egypt on Human Rights Record and Ties to North Korea - New York Times