25-10-2025

Month: February 2023

US judge releases partial report on Trump election probe

A US judge on Thursday released parts of the report from a special grand jury investigating potential interference by Donald Trump in the 2020 election — making public its allegations that witnesses may have lied under oath.

Prosecutors in Georgia have spent two years looking into whether Trump and his allies committed crimes in a bid to overturn his defeat in the southern state to Joe Biden by fewer than 12,000 votes.

“A majority of the grand jury believes that perjury may have been committed by one or more witnesses testifying before it,” the jurors said, adding that they had found no evidence for Trump’s claims of widespread fraud in the election.

“The grand jury recommends that the district attorney seek appropriate indictments for such crimes where the evidence is compelling.”

The investigative panel of 23 jurors, which cannot issue indictments, took testimony from some of Trump’s closest allies, including his fourth chief of staff Mark Meadows, his former attorney Rudy Giuliani and Republican South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham.

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered on Monday that the introduction and conclusion of the report be made public along with the section about potential perjury.

Its full charging recommendations, including the identities of those in its crosshairs, are being kept secret for now because some of the targets may not yet have had a chance to appear in grand jury proceedings.

Democratic District Attorney Fani Willis will make the ultimate charging decision after presenting the panel’s findings to one of the criminal grand juries regularly empaneled in Fulton County, a process that may already have started.

The panel probed Trump’s January 2, 2021 phone call with Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, when he infamously asked election officials to “find” the 11,780 votes that would put him one vote ahead of Biden.

It also scrutinized efforts by top Trump allies to deputize Republican activists to pose as presidential “electors” at the Georgia Capitol in Atlanta in December 2020 and sign certificates falsely claiming Trump had won the state’s election.

Other lines of inquiry took in allegations of false claims of election fraud to state lawmakers, illegal efforts to access voting machines, threats and harassment against Georgia election workers.

Legal experts have speculated that Trump might be charged under Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute, allowing prosecutors to argue that Trump and his allies were part of a criminal enterprise.

The investigation, described repeatedly by Trump as a “witch hunt,” comes amid multiple probes into alleged actions by the former president and his lieutenants following his election defeat.

A congressional committee investigating the 2021 assault on the US Capitol argued in its final report last year that Trump’s team was behind a multi-step scheme to cling to power despite his election loss.

And a semi-independent prosecutor appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland has issued subpoenas to Trump administration officials and election officials in Georgia and other swing states as part of a criminal probe of the same effort.

Trump’s vice president Mike Pence is among those to have received a summons, and CNN reported Thursday that Meadows was also subpoenaed in January.

UN launches $1 bn appeal for Turkey quake victims

The United Nations launched an appeal for $1 billion Thursday to help Turkey’s victims of the catastrophic earthquake that killed thousands of people and left millions more in desperate need of aid.

UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in a statement that the funds would provide humanitarian relief for three months to 5.2 million people.

The money would “allow aid organizations to rapidly scale up vital support,” including in the areas of food security, protection, education, water and shelter, he added.

“The needs are enormous, people are suffering and there’s no time to lose,” Guterres implored.

“I urge the international community to step up and fully fund this critical effort in response to one of the biggest natural disasters of our times.”

The 7.8-magnitude tremor on February 6 has killed more than 35,000 people in southeast Turkey, with several thousand more losing their lives across the border in Syria.

More than nine million people in Turkey have been directly impacted by the disaster, according to Ankara.

Many of them are Syrian refugees. According to UN figures, 1.74 million Syrians are living under temporary refugee protection status in the 11 provinces in Turkey impacted by the quake.

Turkey is “home to the largest number of refugees in the world and has shown enormous generosity to its Syrian neighbours for years,” Guterres said in his statement.

“Now is the time for the world to support the people of Turkey — just as they have stood in solidarity with others seeking assistance.”

Turkey’s people have experienced “unspeakable heartache,” the UN’s Emergency Relief Coordinator Martin Griffiths said in a separate statement announcing the flash appeal.

“We must stand with them in their darkest hour and ensure they receive the support they need,” added Griffiths, who heads the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

OCHA said in its statement that hundreds of thousands of people, including small children and elderly people, are suffering in freezing temperatures without access to shelter, food, water, heaters and medical care.

It added that some 47,000 buildings have been destroyed or damaged across Turkey, with thousands of people having sought refuge in temporary shelters.

The United Nations is delivering hot meals, food, tents, warm winter clothing, blankets, mattresses, kitchen sets and medical supplies to affected areas, OCHA said.

On Tuesday, the global body launched a $397 million appeal to help quake victims in Syria.

The UN earlier provided $50 million towards relief efforts through its central emergency response fund.

For its part, global steel manufacturing giant ArcelorMittal, citing the “heart-breaking” devastation in Turkey and Syria, announced Thursday it has donated $5 million to help quake victims via two humanitarian organizations: Disasters Emergency Committee and Doctors Without Borders.

69 Rohingya refugees land on Indonesia’s west coast

The vessel came ashore at a beach in Indonesia’s westernmost province of Aceh, according to UNHCR official Oktina Hafanti, with one passenger saying some on board died during the voyage.

It was the sixth Rohingya boat to land in Indonesia since November.

Nearly one million Rohingya currently live in crowded conditions in Bangladesh, including many of the hundreds of thousands who fled a deadly crackdown in 2017 by Myanmar’s military, which denies committing crimes against humanity.

Thousands risk their lives each year on long and expensive sea journeys — often in poor-quality boats — attempting to reach Malaysia or Indonesia.

“We currently count 69 of them, including men, women and children,” Hafanti said.

Several died due to a lack of food and the captain abandoned them in the middle of the journey

The refugees were being transported to a temporary shelter nearby, the official added.

Hafanti said authorities would double-check the headcount after they arrived at the refuge.

Miftah Cut Ade, a senior member of the area’s traditional fishing community, told the group had arrived from Bangladesh, many in a state of exhaustion. Local residents had offered them food, he said.

According to a passenger who gave his name as Shorifuddin, the boat departed Bangladesh two weeks ago. Several people died due to a lack of food and the captain abandoned the passengers in the middle of the journey, he said.

“We have been suffering in the ocean for 15 days and all this time, we didn’t have enough food,” the 15-year-old told.

He said he fled Bangladesh with seven family members including his parents hoping for a better life in Indonesia.

“We were strongly persecuted in Bangladesh by the local people. We also didn’t have the opportunity to study and achieve higher education,” he said.

Five other vessels carrying Rohingya refugees landed in Indonesia in November and December last year, carrying a total of nearly 700 passengers.

More than 2,000 are believed to have attempted the risky journey in 2022, according to the UNHCR, a number similar to that in 2020.

The agency estimated nearly 200 Rohingya died or went missing last year attempting hazardous sea crossings.

Pakistan nuclear power plants’ safety ‘world-class’: IAEA chief

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi has said that Pakistan’s nuclear safety is “world-class” as he lauded the nation’s technical and engineering capacity, reported state-broadcaster Radio Pakistan.

The IAEA chief is in Pakistan on a two-day trip to discuss matters related to the Pakistan-IAEA collaboration. This is Grossi’s maiden visit to Pakistan after assuming office in 2019.

Addressing a seminar in Islamabad on Thursday, the IAEA DG said Pakistan’s capacity to establish “new nuclear power plants indicates a promising future” for nuclear energy and achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

According to the director-general, there is strong political support for new nuclear power plants in Pakistan. Lauding Pakistan’s nuclear safety, Grossi termed safety measures at nuclear plants as “world-class”.

During his stay, IAEA chief Grossi called on Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari, wherein cooperation between the agency and Pakistan in several areas — health, agriculture, industry, nuclear medicine and power generation — was discussed.

During the huddles, the top officials expressed full support for various projects and programmes of the agency and “conveyed our desire to expand cooperation and support for the IAEA’s work”.

Speaking at the Islamabad seminar, Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal said Pakistan had a mutually beneficial relationship with the IAEA that includes all areas of nuclear technology.

“Nuclear power provides clean and cheap energy and currently contributes to 8% of Pakistan’s energy mix with six operational nuclear power plants,” he also said.

Pakistan, he also said, has an impeccable nuclear safety and security record and plans to develop more power plants.

In her weekly press briefing earlier in the day, Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch rejected that the IAEA chief was not in the country for a “deal” over Pakistan’s nuclear programme.

“I can categorically state here that this issue is not on the agenda of DG IAEA’s visit and will not be discussed and there will be no agreement in the context you are referring to,” the spokesperson said, responding to a reporter.

PM Shehbaz in Turkey to express solidarity with quake-hit nation

LAHORE: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Thursday reached Turkey to express solidarity and support with the Turkish people following the massive earthquake that claimed more than 36,000 lives and left the country reeling.

The premier, who is on a two-day trip, was welcomed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the presidency in Ankara.

At the presidential palace, the premier “expressed his condolences over the loss of life and infrastructure as a result of the historic earthquake in Türkiye,” a statement by the official Twitter account of the government stated.

Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Marriyum Aurangzeb, Special Assistant to the PM Tariq Fatemi and National Disaster Management Authority Chairman Lt Gen Inam Haider accompanied the prime minister.

Turkish ambassador to Pakistan Mehmet Pacaci bid adieu to the premier as he departed from the Lahore Airport for the quake-hit country, where he was welcomed by Turkish officials at Ankara Esenboğa Airport.

Before his departure, PM Shehbaz took to Twitter to share his condolences: “I am leaving for Turkiye with a message of unwavering solidarity and support for our Turkish brothers and sisters from the people and government of Pakistan.

“True to the spirit of one nation living in two states, we consider their loss as ours,” he said.

During his two-day stay in Ankara, the prime minister will meet President Erdogan to personally convey heartfelt condolences on behalf of the entire Pakistani nation over the loss of lives and the widespread damage.

In another tweet, the premier expressed his grief over the massive losses and noted that no matter how resourceful the country was, it could not fight such devastation without any help.

He stated: “Natural disasters as the earthquake in [Turkey and] Syria are beyond the capacity of any single government to handle. No country, howsoever resourceful, can deal with devastation of this magnitude. It is time the world came forward [and] extended support to the suffering humanity.”

During his visit to Turkey, the prime minister will reiterate Pakistan’s firm commitment to stand by the Turkish people during difficult times and to continue extending all possible support to the ongoing relief effort.

He will also visit earthquake-affected areas in southern Turkey, and interact with the Pakistani search-and-rescue teams deployed in the area, as well as survivors of the earthquake.

In the wake of the devastating earthquake in southern Turkey, the prime minister had spoken with President Erdogan on February 6 and assured him of all possible assistance for the rescue and relief effort.

All available resources have been fully mobilised to help the Turkish people, and the Turkish prime minister is personally overseeing the relief effort.

Pakistan and Turkey enjoy deep fraternal ties. The two countries have resolutely stood by each other during every trial and tribulation.

It should be noted on February 7, Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb had announced that Shehbaz Shehbaz would be travelling to Turkey to condole President Erdogan on the devastating earthquake that hit the country.

Pak-Russia IGC deals to help reduce oil, gas prices: Ayaz Sadiq

ISLAMABAD: Federal Minister for Economic Affairs Sardar Ayaz Sadiq said Wednesday that the finalisation and implementation of deals under the Pakistan-Russia Inter-Government Commission (IGC) would result in a significant reduction in the prices of oil and gas in the country.

According to a press release issued by the Economic Affairs Division, the federal minister was called on by the Ambassador of Russia to Pakistan, Danila Ganich.

Last year, Pakistan’s government sent officials to Russia, after which the Pakistani state minister for petroleum said Russia would sell crude oil to Pakistan at a discounted rate.

In today’s meeting, the minister appreciated the progress achieved during IGC and shared that these deals were in the interest of both countries.

He also highlighted the bilateral, economic and historic ties between Pakistan and Russia and said both sides have always enjoyed outstanding bilateral relations based on mutual respect, trust and interest.

On the occasion, the ambassador expressed his deepest gratitude to the minister and the government of Pakistan for facilitating the Russian delegation during IGC and shared that Russia aims to utilize the full potential of trade with Pakistan.

Both sides reaffirmed their commitment to augmenting advanced collaborations for the good of economies, cultural exchange and mutual assistance to achieve a significant comparative advantage.

Russian oil import starts in March

Following the conclusion of the annual IGC held between Pakistan and Russia, the two sides agreed on late March as the timeline for crude oil export.

Confirming the news, Minister of State for Petroleum Musadik Malik revealed that Pakistan wants to import 35% of its total crude oil requirement from Russia.

Russia’s Energy Minister Nikolay Shulginov, who visited the country, said that Pakistan would pay for energy purchases in currencies of friendly countries.

PM Shehbaz to depart for Turkiye today on 2-day visit

In a press release, the FO said the premier — during his stay in the capital Ankara — will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to “personally convey heartfelt condolences on behalf of the entire Pakistani nation over the loss of precious lives and the widespread damage caused by the earthquake”.

 

The prime minister will visit earthquake-affected areas in southern Turkiye and interact with the Pakistani search and rescue teams deployed in the area as well as survivors of the earthquake.

Terming the trip a “special gesture of solidarity and support with the people of Turkiye”, the FO said the premier would “reiterate Pakistan’s firm commitment to stand by the Turkish people during these difficult times and to continue extending all possible support to the ongoing relief effort”.

Recalling aid provided by Pakistan in the form of relief items and rescue teams, the FO said the premier had assured Erdogan “of all possible assistance for the rescue and relief effort”.

“All available resources have been fully mobilized to help our Turkish brothers and sisters. The prime minister is personally overseeing the relief effort,” it added.

The FO asserted: “Pakistan and Türkiye enjoy deep fraternal ties. Our two countries have resolutely stood by each other during every trial and tribulation.”

The premier announced his visit in a tweet today as well, saying: “True to the spirit of one nation living in two states, we consider their loss as ours.”

In an apparent reference to the catastrophic floods that Pakistan experienced last year during the monsoon season, Shehbaz said, “Natural disasters, [such] as the earthquake in Turkiye & Syria, are beyond the capacity of any single government to handle.

“No country, howsoever resourceful, can deal with devastation of this magnitude. It is time the world came forward & extended support to the suffering humanity.”

 

Prime Minister Shehbaz’s visit had been scheduled for Feb 8 previously but was postponed on the day of departure, citing the ongoing relief efforts in Turkiye as the reason.

In a grand gesture of support, he had set up a relief fund for the quake-devastated country along with sending a 51-member rescue team a day after the quake hit Turkiye.

 

Following the initial support, more aid has been sent as well, including relief goods, tents and a team of doctors.

Israeli firm meddled in over 30 elections worldwide

It adds to a growing body of evidence that shadowy private firms across the world are profiting from invasive hacking tools and the power of social media platforms to manipulate public opinion.

The firm was dubbed “Team Jorge” by investigating journalists who posed as potential clients in order to gather information on its methods and capabilities.

Its boss, Tal Hanan, is a former Israeli special forces operative who boasted of being able to control supposedly secure Telegram accounts and thousands of fake social media profiles, as well as planting news stories, the reports say.

The investigation was carried out by a consortium of journalists from 30 outlets, including the Guardian in Britain, Le Monde in France, Der Spiegel in Germany and El Pais in Spain, under the direction of the France-based non-profit Forbidden Stories.

“The methods and techniques described by Team Jorge raise new challenges for big tech platforms,” the Guardian wrote. “Evidence of a global private market in disinformation aimed at elections will also ring alarm bells for democracies around the world.”

Hanan did not respond to detailed questions, saying only: “I deny any wrongdoing.”

Fake profiles

The 50-year-old told three undercover reporters that his services, often called “black ops” in the industry, were available to intelligence agencies, political campaigns and private companies. “We are now involved in one election in Africa… We have a team in Greece and a team in [the] Emirates… [We have completed] 33 presidential-level campaigns, 27 of which were successful,” the Guardian quoted him as saying.

Most of the campaigns — two-thirds — were in Africa, he claimed.

While demonstrating his technology to reporters, he appeared to hack into the Gmail inbox and Telegram account of political operatives in Kenya days before a presidential election there. Forbidden Stories named the targets as two aides to William Ruto, who ended up winning the August 2022 ballot.

Online public influence campaigns were carried out via a software platform, known as Advanced Impact Media Solutions, that allegedly controlled nearly 40,000 social media profiles across Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn, the reports say.

Hanan also claimed that his firm had planted a report on France’s biggest television news channel BFM about the impact of sanctions against Russia on the yachting industry in Monaco. A senior presenter on the channel, Rachid M’Barki, 54, has been suspended and is being investigated.

Public influence

Other similar companies have been named in media reports or sanctioned by Western governments in recent years over their role in trying to influence elections and public opinion.

Notorious British consulting firm Cambridge Analytica — since shut down — was allegedly used to develop software steering voters towards Donald Trump in the 2016 US presidential election.

The group collected and exploited the personal data of 87 million Facebook users to which the platform had given it access, leading to major fines and lawsuits.

India to raise seven new battalions for China border

The undemarcated 3,800-km frontier between the nuclear-armed countries stayed largely peaceful since a war in 1962, before the clashes nearly three years ago sent relations nosediving.

The ITBP primarily guards the India-China border, stretching from the Karakoram Pass in Ladakh in India’s north to Jachep La in Arunachal Pradesh state in the east. Indian and Chinese troops have been involved in hand-to-hand clashes at some areas of the frontier in the past few years.

The new battalions, approved in a cabinet meeting and to come up by 2025/26, will cover 47 new border outposts and 12 staging camps of the ITBP, Information and Broadcasting Minister Anurag Thakur told a news conference.

Indian and Chinese troops had minor border scuffles in December in the Tawang sector of Arunachal Pradesh, also claimed by Beijing.

The clashes were the first since troops were involved in hand-to-hand combat in the Galwan valley of Ladakh, abutting the Chinese-held Tibetan plateau. That incident led to the death of 20 Indian soldiers and four Chinese troops.

Crowds of retirees in China have again taken to the streets to protest against cuts to their medical benefits.

They gathered on Wednesday for a second time in Wuhan, where Covid was first detected, and also in the north-eastern city of Dalian.

The second round of protests in seven days puts pressure on President Xi Jinping’s administration just weeks before the annual National People’s Congress, which will usher in a new leadership team.

Protests first took place in Wuhan on 8 February after provincial authorities said they were cutting the level of medical expenses which retirees can claim back from the government.

Social media footage shows the protesters to be largely elderly retirees, who say this comes at a time of soaring healthcare costs.

Although such health insurance matters are handled at a provincial level, protests have spread to different parts of the country in what appears to be a renewed belief in the power of demonstrating in China.

At the end of last year, thousands of young Chinese took part in protests that eventually forced the government to overturn its strict zero-Covid measures – people had grown weary of the mass testing and sudden, sweeping lockdowns that had been smashing the economy.

But the abrupt change in policy placed China’s medical system under enormous strain, as the coronavirus quickly spread through the country. It led to an unknown number of deaths and reporting by the BBC appeared to show that a vast majority of those who died were elderly.

The changes to health benefits for retirees, which officials have described as reforms, come just as China emerges from that brutal Covid wave.

The plan has been sold as a means of trading off reimbursement levels to increase the scope of coverage to include more areas. However criticism of plan on social media has included the widely held view that Chinese officials are trying to recoup the vast amounts of money spent on compulsory Covid testing and other pandemic measures.

Officials in both Wuhan and Dalian said they had no knowledge of the most recent protests and, as such, had no comment to make. Calls to local police stations went unanswered.

Radio Free Asia reported that retired iron and steel workers made up a significant proportion of the original protest group in Wuhan.

The use of existing social network links could help to explain how these gatherings have been coordinated in a country where organising dissent against the government in any form is difficult and can lead to severe punishment, including prison sentences.

Video clips shared on social media showed elderly protestors singing the global Communist anthem, the Internationale. In the past, this song has been used as a means of indicating that demonstrators are not against the government or the Communist Party but merely want their grievances resolved.

A shopkeeper who witnessed this Wednesday’s protest in Wuhan told the BBC that police on both sides of a nearby road had blocked access to the area in order to prevent more people joining the hundreds of elderly demonstrators who were already chanting slogans.

Three years of the pandemic crisis followed by a tumultuous exit from zero-Covid have generated considerable public discontent over China’s health policies.

China’s zero-Covid measures involved mass testing

Mr Xi had given the country’s Covid amelioration policies his personal stamp of approval and the Party has struggled to explain why such a sudden about-face was necessary.

The Chinese government had also publicly ridiculed other countries for opening up too early, claiming they had unnecessarily sacrificed their people as a result.

It then turned around and abandoned its own restrictions at an even greater speed than other nations had done, and did so after maintaining lockdowns and other harsh measures for much longer than anywhere else in the world.

Many here now believe that, as a result, livelihoods were unnecessarily destroyed.

On China’s Twitter-like Weibo social media platform, the hashtag #healthinsurance – in Chinese – has attracted millions of hits but was removed from the site’s “hot topics” section.

The hashtag matching the site of the most recent protests in Wuhan – Zhongshan Park – was censored and photos claiming to be of the demonstration have been removed.

However, even with China’s vast censorship apparatus swinging into action, a large amount of support is still being expressed for the protesting retirees on social media.

Beijing will need to find a way to resolve the issue if it wants to avoid further public agitation.

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