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135 injured, 1,723 arrests as new ‘yellow vest’ protests hit Paris

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Some 89,000 police were being mobilized nationwide, with a dozen armored vehicles deployed in Paris for the first time in decades. (AP)
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Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said he expected “only a few thousand people” to descend on Paris after the 8,000 protesters counted last weekend, “but among them are ultraviolent individuals.” (AP)
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The protesters began blocking roads, fuel depots and shopping centers around France on November 17 over soaring petrol prices that have hit people in the provinces who get around by car. (AP)
Updated 09 December 2018
AFP
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135 injured, 1,723 arrests as new ‘yellow vest’ protests hit Paris

  • Clad in their luminous road safety jackets, dozens of demonstrators gathered at dawn on the Champs-Elysees
  • Some 8,000 police were deployed, carrying out checks on people arriving at train stations and at protest hotspots
Updated 09 December 2018
AFP

PARIS: A total of 1,723 people were arrested across France during the latest round of "yellow vest" protests, in which demonstrators clashed with riot police, the interior ministry said Sunday.
Of these, 1,220 were ordered held in custody, it said. Some 136,000 people took part Saturday's protests, around the same number as on December 1.

France’s Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said Saturday evening that the “yellow vest” demonstrations are now under control, and that a high level of police presence will continue on Sunday if necessary. 

Earlier on Saturday, police fired tear gas and arrested hundreds of people in Paris as the French capital went on lockdown for the latest “yellow vest” protests against President Emmanuel Macron.
Shouts of “Macron, resign” mingled with the tear gas near the famous Champs-Elysees avenue, the scene last Saturday of the worst rioting in Paris for decades.
A forklift truck driver who gave his name as Denis said he was planning, like others, to march on Macron’s presidential palace in anger against a leader who they say only looks out for the rich.
“I’m here for my son,” said the 30-year-old, who had traveled down to Paris from the Normandy port of Caen.
“I can’t let him live in a country where the poor are exploited.”
The protests began on November 17 with road blockades against rising fuel prices but have since ballooned into a mass movement against Macron’s policies and top-down style of governing.

Coordinated “yellow vest” protests were taking place across the country on Saturday, including on numerous motorways, causing havoc on the national road network.
Prime Minister Edouard Philippe said 481 people had been detained in Paris as police carried out checks on people arriving at train stations and at protest hotspots such as the Champs-Elysees and Bastille monument.
Among them were dozens arrested for carrying masks, hammers, slingshots and rocks that could be used to attack police.

Shops, museums, the Eiffel Tower and many metro stations were closed, while top-flight football matches and concerts have been canceled.
Last weekend’s violence, which saw some 200 cars torched and the Arc de Triomphe vandalized, shook France and plunged Macron’s government into its deepest crisis so far.
“These past three weeks have produced a monster that its creators no longer control,” Interior Minister Castaner said on Friday, vowing “zero tolerance” toward those aiming to wreak further destruction.
Philippe on Friday evening met a delegation of self-described “moderate” yellow vests who urged people not to join the protests.
A spokesman from the movement, Christophe Chalencon, said Philippe had “listened to us and promised to take our demands to the president.”
“Now we await Mr.Macron. I hope he will speak to the people of France as a father, with love and respect and that he will take strong decisions,” he said.
Philippe said some 89,000 police were being mobilized for protests nationwide, including 8,000 police in Paris, where a dozen armored vehicles were being deployed for the first time in decades.

Shops around the Champs-Elysees boarded up their windows and emptied them of merchandise on Friday, while the Louvre, Musee d’Orsay and other museums were shut.
Department stores were also closed due to the risk of looting on what would normally be a busy shopping weekend in the run-up to Christmas.
Foreign governments are watching developments closely in one of the world’s most visited cities.
The US embassy issued a warning to Americans in Paris to “keep a low profile and avoid crowds,” while Belgium, Portugal and the Czech Republic advised citizens to postpone any planned visits.


In a warning of impending violence, an MP for Macron’s party, Benoit Potterie, received a bullet in the post on Friday with the words: “Next time it will be between your eyes.”
Macron this week gave in to some of the protesters’ demands for measures to help the poor and struggling middle classes, including scrapping a planned increase in fuel taxes and freezing electricity and gas prices in 2019.
But the “yellow vests,” some of whom who have become increasingly radicalized, are holding out for more.
Protests at dozens of schools over university reforms, and a call by farmers for demonstrations next week, have added to a sense of general revolt.
The hard-line CGT union, hoping to capitalize on the movement, has called for rail and metro strikes next Friday to demand immediate wage and pension increases.
Macron’s decision early in his presidency to slash taxes on France’s wealthiest is particularly unpopular with the protesters.
Arguing that such a move was necessary in order to boost investment and create jobs, the former investment banker has so far ruled out re-imposing the “fortune tax.”
But the policy, along with hikes on pensioners’ taxes, cuts in housing allowances and a string of comments deemed insensitive to ordinary workers, has led critics to label him a “president of the rich.”
Macron had previously vowed to stay the course in his bid to shake up the French economy and not be swayed by mass protests that have forced previous presidents to back down.
The climbdown on higher fuel taxes — which were intended to help France transition to a greener economy — marked a major departure for the centrist president.

 

Topics: Paris France yellow vest

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COP29 draft deal would have rich nations pay $300 billion in climate finance

Updated 4 sec ago
Reuters
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COP29 draft deal would have rich nations pay $300 billion in climate finance

  • EU, US, others raised their offer after earlier draft rejected
  • Climate talks run into overtime. Talks reach deal on carbon credits
Updated 4 sec ago
Reuters

BAKU, Azerbaijan: Developed nations should pay $300 billion a year by 2035 to help poorer countries deal with climate change, according to a new draft deal from UN climate talks published early on Sunday, after an earlier target of $250 billion was rejected.
Reuters previously reported that the European Union, the United States and others wealthy countries would support the $300 billion annual global finance target in an effort to end a deadlock at the two-week summit.
The document, described as a draft decision rather than a draft negotiating text like previous iterations, said nations had decided to set a goal “of at least $300 billion per year by 2035 for developing country Parties for climate action.”
The decision would need to be adopted by consensus before becoming final.
The COP29 climate conference in the Azerbaijan capital Baku had been due to finish on Friday, but ran into overtime as negotiators from nearly 200 countries struggled to reach consensus on the climate funding plan for the next decade.
At one point delegates from poor and small island nations walked out of talks in frustration over what they called a lack of inclusion, and amid concerns fossil fuel producing countries were seeking to water down aspects of the deal.
The summit cut to the heart of the debate over the financial responsibility of industrialized countries, whose historical use of fossil fuels has caused the bulk of greenhouse gas emissions, to compensate others for the damage wrought by climate change.
It also laid bare the divisions between wealthy governments constrained by tight domestic budgets and developing nations reeling from the costs of worsening storms, floods and droughts.
Fiji’s Deputy Prime Minister Biman Prasad told Reuters he was optimistic for an eventual agreement in Baku.
“When it comes to money it’s always controversial but we are expecting a deal tonight,” he said.
The new goal is intended to replace developed countries’ previous commitment to provide $100 billion per year in climate finance for poorer nations by 2020. That goal was met two years late, in 2022, and expires in 2025.
A previous $250 billion proposal drawn up by Azerbaijan’s COP29 presidency was rejected as too low by poorer countries, which have warned a weak deal would hinder their ability to set more ambitious greenhouse gas emissions cutting targets.
Countries also agreed Saturday evening on rules for a global market to buy and sell carbon credits that proponents say could mobilize billions of dollars into new projects to help fight global warming.

What counts as developed nation?
Negotiators have been working to address other questions on the finance target, including who is asked to contribute and how much of the funding is provided as grants, rather than loans.
The roster of countries required to contribute — about two dozen industrialized countries, including the US, European nations and Canada — dates back to a list decided during UN climate talks in 1992.
European governments have demanded others join them in paying in, including China, the world’s second-biggest economy, and oil-rich Gulf states.
Donald Trump’s US presidential election victory this month has also cast a cloud over the Baku talks.
Trump, who takes office in January, has promised to again remove the US from international climate cooperation, so negotiators from other wealthy nations expect that under his administration the world’s largest economy will not pay into the climate finance goal.
A broader goal of raising $1.3 trillion in climate finance annually by 2035 — which would include funding from all public and private sources and which economists say matches the sum needed — was included in the draft deal.

Topics: COP29

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Warrants of ICC are binding, Borrell says

Updated 50 min 31 sec ago
Reuters
AFP
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Warrants of ICC are binding, Borrell says

  • I have the right to criticize the decisions of the Israeli government without being accused of antisemitism
Updated 50 min 31 sec ago
Reuters AFP

NICOSIA: EU governments cannot pick and choose whether to execute arrest warrants issued by the International Criminal Court against two Israeli leaders and a Hamas commander, the EU’s foreign policy chief said on Saturday.

The ICC issued the warrants on Thursday against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader Ibrahim Al-Masri for alleged crimes against humanity.
All EU member states signed the ICC’s founding treaty, the Rome Statute.
Several EU states have said they will meet their commitments under the statute if needed, but Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has invited Netanyahu to visit his country, assuring him he would face no risks if he did so.
“The states that signed the Rome convention must implement the court’s decision. It’s not optional,” Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat, said during a visit to Cyprus for a workshop of Israeli and Palestinian peace activists.
Those same obligations were also binding on countries aspiring to join the EU, he said.
“It would be very funny that the newcomers have an obligation that current members don’t fulfill,” he said.
The US rejected the ICC’s decision and Israel said the ICC move was antisemitic.
“Every time someone disagrees with the policy of one Israeli government — (they are) being accused of antisemitism,” said Borrell, whose term as EU foreign policy chief ends this month.
“I have the right to criticize the decisions of the Israeli government, be it Mr. Netanyahu or someone else, without being accused of antisemitism. This is not acceptable. That’s enough.”
In their decision, the ICC judges said there were reasonable grounds to believe Netanyahu and Gallant were criminally responsible for acts including murder, persecution, and starvation as a weapon of war as part of a “widespread and systematic attack against the civilian population of Gaza.”
The warrant for Al-Masri lists charges of mass killings during the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks. Israel says it has killed Al-Masri.
Turkiye’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has praised the “courageous decision” of the International Criminal Court to seek the arrest of Netanyahu and Gallant.
“We support the arrest warrant. We consider it important that this courageous decision be carried out by all country members of the accord to renew the trust of humanity in the international system,” Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul.
“It is imperative that Western countries — who for years have given the world lessons on law, justice, and human rights — keep their promises at this stage,” added Erdogan, whose country is not a state party in the ICC accord.
Erdogan has become a fierce critic of Israel since the start of its military offensive on Gaza in October 2023.
He has vowed several times to make sure that Israel’s prime minister is “brought to account” over the Israeli military campaign in the Palestinian territory.
Turkiye and 52 other countries this month sent a letter to the UN demanding an end to arms sales and deliveries to Israel.

 

Topics: War on Gaza International Criminal Court (ICC) Gaza Palestine US Lebanon

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Mozambique opposition leader Mondlane sets conditions for post-election talks

Updated 23 November 2024
AFP
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Mozambique opposition leader Mondlane sets conditions for post-election talks

  • We are open to dialogue. It has to be a genuine dialogue. It cannot be full of traps
Updated 23 November 2024
AFP

MAPUTO: Mozambique’s opposition leader said he would accept the president’s offer of talks after deadly post-election unrest on terms including their being held virtually and legal proceedings against him being dropped.
President Filipe Nyusi invited Venancio Mondlane to his office in Maputo on Nov. 26 after the killing of dozens of people in a police crackdown on demonstrations against the results of the Oct. 9 election.
Mondlane, who says the election was rigged in favor of Nyusi’s Frelimo party, is believed to have left the country for fear of arrest or attack, but his whereabouts are unknown.
“We are open to dialogue,” Mondlane said in a Facebook live address. “It has to be a genuine dialogue. It cannot be full of traps.”
A written reply to Nyusi’s invitation lists as one condition for the meeting: “That the participation of the elected candidate Venancio Mondlane is virtual.”
Authorities have laid criminal and civil charges against him, including for damages caused during protests by his supporters, which has led to his bank accounts being frozen.
Another condition in the document made public by Mondlane’s office is that “the judicial proceedings in question must be immediately terminated.” It also lays out 20 points that Mondlane wants on the agenda for talks, including “restoring electoral truth” and prosecuting anyone involved in vote-rigging.
Others are a public apology and compensation for the deaths during the demonstrations, as well as constitutional, economic, and electoral reforms.
Rights groups have accused Mozambique authorities of using live ammunition on demonstrators in the country, which has been governed since independence from Portugal in 1975 by Frelimo.
The Center for Democracy and Human Rights civil society group says around 65 people have been killed. Mondlane on Friday gave a toll of more than 60.
Nyusi said Tuesday 19 people had died, including five police officers.
The president is meant to hand over to Frelimo candidate Daniel Chapo in January, whom the election authority says won 71 percent of votes against 20 percent for Mondlane.
The unrest was discussed Wednesday by regional leaders at a summit of the 16-nation Southern Africa grouping Southern African Development Community, or SADC, which said in a statement afterward that it “extended condolences to the government and people” for the lives lost.
Human Rights Watch criticized the SADC, for failing to denounce Mozambique for excessive use of force.
“SADC has squandered an opportunity to condemn human rights abuses against post-election protesters in Mozambique publicly,” it said in a statement.
The rights watchdog urged the grouping to tell Nyusi’s government to respect the right to peaceful protest and cease using unnecessary and excessive force.

 

Topics: Mozambique

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EU recalls its ambassador from Niger

Niger's General Abdourahamane Tiani. (AFP file photo)
Updated 23 November 2024
Reuters
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EU recalls its ambassador from Niger

  • The EU expresses its profound disagreement with the allegations
Updated 23 November 2024
Reuters

NIAMEY: The EU will recall its ambassador from Niger after the country’s ruling military questioned an EU delegation’s management of humanitarian aid meant for flood victims, the European External Action Service, or EEAS, said on Saturday. Niger’s junta issued a statement on Friday accusing the EU ambassador in the West African country of dividing a 1.3 million euro fund to assist flood victims between several international NGOs in a non-transparent manner, and without collaborating with the authorities.
It ordered an audit into the fund’s management as a result.
The EU “expresses its profound disagreement with the allegations and justifications put forward by the transitional authorities,” the EEAS said in a statement.
“Consequently, the EU has decided to recall its ambassador from Niamey for consultations in Brussels.”
Niger has been under military rule since the junta seized power in a 2023 coup.

 

Topics: European Union Niger

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Afghanistan bets on ‘red gold’ for global market presence

Updated 23 November 2024
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Afghanistan bets on ‘red gold’ for global market presence

  • Afghanistan is the world’s second-largest saffron producer, after Iran
  • Afghan saffron has been for years recognized as the world’s best
Updated 23 November 2024
MODASER ISLAMI

Kabul: As the saffron harvest season is underway in Afghanistan, traders are expecting better yields than in previous years, sparking hopes that exports of the precious crop, known locally as “red gold,” will help uplift the country’s battered economy and livelihoods.
Afghanistan is the world’s second-largest saffron producer, after Iran, but it ranks first in terms of quality. In June, the Belgium-based International Taste Institute for the ninth consecutive year recognized Afghan saffron as the world’s best.
Saffron is the world’s most expensive spice, selling for about $2,000 per kilogram. Its exports provide critical foreign currency to Afghanistan, where US-imposed sanctions have severely affected the fragile economy since the Taliban took control in 2021.

With this year’s production expected to exceed 50 tons — about double that of the 2023 and 2022 seasons — the government and the Afghanistan National Saffron Union are trying to boost exports abroad.
“The harvest of saffron this year is good. During the first nine months (of 2024), Afghanistan exported around 46 tons of saffron to different countries,” Abdulsalam Jawad Akhundzada, spokesperson at the Ministry of Industry and Commerce, told Arab News.
“Everywhere our traders want to export saffron, we support them in any part of the world through air corridors and facilitating the participation of Afghan traders in national and international exhibitions.”
Known to have been cultivated for at least 2,000 years, saffron is well suited to Afghanistan’s dry climate, especially in Herat, where 90 percent of it is produced. Most of the spice’s trade is also centered in the province, which last weekend inaugurated its International Saffron Trade Center to facilitate exports.
“The new international saffron trade center is established with global standards and will bring major processing and trade companies to one place providing a single venue for farmers to trade their products with the best possible conditions,” Mohammad Ibrahim Adil, head of the Afghanistan National Saffron Union, told Arab News.

The union’s main export market is India, where saffron is a common ingredient in food, followed by Gulf countries — especially Saudi Arabia and the UAE.
“Saffron exports bring the much-needed foreign currency to Afghanistan contributing significantly to stabilization of the financial cycle in the country,” said Qudratullah Rahmati, the saffron union’s deputy head.
The union estimates that saffron contributes about $100 million to the Afghan economy a year.
Most, or 95 percent, of the workers are women, according to the saffron union.
“Saffron production is supporting many families, especially women, during the harvest and processing phase through short-term and long-term employment opportunities. There are around 80-85 registered small and big saffron companies in Herat and the small ones employ four to five people while the bigger ones have up to 80 permanent staff,” said Qudratullah Rahmati, the saffron union’s deputy head.
Harvesting the little purple saffron crocus flowers is heavily labor intensive, as each of them needs to be picked by hand. Once the flowers are picked, their tiny orange stigmas are separated for drying. About 440,000 stigmas are needed to produce one kilogram of the fragrant spice.
The harvest season usually begins between October and November are lasts just a few weeks before the flowers wilt.

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