LONDON: The British government on Saturday launched a campaign to help domestic violence victims during the coronavirus lockdown following an increase in the number seeking assistance, while figures showed that the number of people in the UK dying after testing positive for COVID-19 neared 10,000.
Home Secretary Priti Patel also said that Prime Minister Boris Johnson needs to take time to rest and recuperate following his three-day stint in intensive care with COVID-19. Patel said it was “vital” that the prime minister, who remains in a London hospital for a seventh night, returned to full health.
Johnson “continues to make very good progress” at St. Thomas' hospital, his office at 10 Downing Street said in a statement. Johnson was hospitalized on April 5 and was transferred to the intensive care unit the following day where he received oxygen, but wasn't put on a ventilator. He spent three nights there before moving back to a regular ward on Thursday evening.
Patel, who was hosting her first daily government coronavirus media briefing, also said she was “sorry if people feel that there have been failings” regarding the supply of personal protective equipment, or PPE, to staff in the National Health Service. The government has faced mounting criticism over PPE following sustained reports of some nurses using garbage bags to protect themselves. Health Secretary Matt Hancock said earlier that 19 front-line NHS staff have died after testing positive for COVID-19.
Patel said the government will bolster online support services and hotlines for domestic violence and launched a national communications campaign that aims to “signpost victims” to where they can access help.
“For the victims of these crimes, home is not the safe haven that it should be," she said.
Though there hasn't yet been a sustained rise in reports of domestic abuse during the lockdown to police, Patel said that there has been an “extremely concerning” increase in those seeking help.
She noted that last week Britain's national domestic violence hotline reported a 120% increase in the number of calls it received in just one 24-hour period. She also said the government's “stay at home” message didn't apply to victims of domestic abuse and that authorities will work to ensure there is refuge for victims and their children if they need to escape their home.
Martin Hewitt, chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council, warned abusers to “not think that this is a time where you can get away with this.”
Overall, he said there had been a 21% fall in overall crime in the last four weeks compared to the same period last year and that as of Thursday, police had issued 1,084 fines for breaches of coronavirus regulations in England and Wales. He said a “small minority of people” have failed to follow the government’s guidance and that police will publish enforcement data every two weeks during the crisis.
“In those few cases where police forces have made mistakes with those new regulations, they have quickly sought to correct them and provide clarity,” he said.
Earlier, the government reported 917 more people died in the hospital after testing positive for the coronavirus, taking the total to 9,875. The increase was slightly lower than the daily high of 980 recorded in the previous 24-hour period. That increase was higher than the daily peaks recorded in Italy and Spain, the two European countries with the highest total number of coronavirus-related deaths. Comparisons may not be precise. The UK deaths reported each day occurred over several days or even weeks, and the total only includes deaths in hospitals.
For most people, the coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. But for others, especially older adults and people with health problems, it can cause severe symptoms like pneumonia.
Queen Elizabeth II, meanwhile, stressed the need for the British people to continue to abide with lockdown restrictions over the rest of the Easter weekend.
In a two-minute audio broadcast from Windsor Castle, the queen said that by “keeping apart, we keep others safe” and that the coronavirus “will not overcome us.”
Social distancing rules were observed, with the queen delivering the address alone into a microphone from the castle’s White Drawing room while the sound engineer was in a nearby room.
Though inevitably different this year, the queen said “Easter isn’t canceled; indeed, we need Easter as much as ever.”
UK boosts help for abuse victims during virus lockdown
https://arab.news/92w3j
UK boosts help for abuse victims during virus lockdown
- Last week Britain's national domestic violence hotline reported a 120% increase in the number of calls it received in just one 24-hour period
- The Home Secretary said that authorities will work to ensure there is refuge for victims and their children if they need to escape their home
Egyptian teenagers ‘left to die’ by Bulgarian border police: Report
- 3 boys crossed into Europe via Turkiye late last month and were later found dead
- Authorities concealed evidence that they obstructed rescue efforts, humanitarian groups say
LONDON: Authorities in Bulgaria have been accused of letting three Egyptian teenagers die by ignoring emergency calls and delaying attempts to rescue them, The Guardian reported.
The incident took place in sub-zero temperatures near the Bulgarian-Turkish border late last month.
Evidence of the authorities’ failure to save the boys was collected in a dossier produced by two humanitarian organizations, No Name Kitchen and Collettivo Rotte Balcaniche.
The dossier, seen by The Guardian, contains photos, geolocations and personal testimonies, and reveals a wider pattern of brutality against migrants on the borders of Europe.
The Bulgarian border with Turkiye is a common crossing point for asylum-seekers but contains treacherous terrain, as well as freezing winter weather.
The two humanitarian organizations said that they were first alerted that an appeal for help had been made on Dec. 27 by the Egyptian trio.
Calls had been made to an emergency charity hotline, referring to three teenagers “at immediate risk of death.”
The GPS location of the three Egyptians, who were lost in the forests of southeastern Bulgaria, was sent to the hotline.
Charity workers then forwarded the information to the official 112 emergency number and attempted to locate the boys themselves.
But Bulgarian border police allegedly hindered the charity rescue attempts even after being shown a video of one of the Egyptian teenagers in the snow.
The boys were later identified as Ahmed Samra, 17, Ahmed El-Awdan, 16, and 15-year-old Seifalla El-Beltagy.
They were later found dead, with the former having “dog paw prints and boot prints around his body.”
This “indicates that the border police had already found him, maybe still alive or dead, but had chosen to leave him there in the cold,” the dossier said.
After charity staff later returned to the scene, they discovered that all traces of the prints had been removed.
One of the bodies of the deceased was found to have been partly eaten by an animal.
The dossier released by the two organizations also details harassment of charity rescue teams as well as vandalism of one of their cars.
Staff belonging to one rescue team had their passports and phones seized by Bulgarian police.
Human rights organizations have warned that authorities in European border countries are deploying tactics to target humanitarian groups helping asylum-seekers.
No Name Kitchen and Collettivo Rotte Balcaniche called for an “independent, formal investigation” into “systemic violence and negligence by Bulgarian authorities” and “degrading treatment of people on the move.”
Bulgaria’s Interior Ministry rejected the allegations and said that investigations into the case continued.
“In 2024, there were 515 search-and-rescue operations conducted by (the) general directorate border police of Bulgaria with the purpose (of providing) medical assistance to third-country nationals who managed to enter the country irregularly,” the ministry said.
“Our patrols reacted to all of those signals in a timely manner, considering how crucial this is when a person is exposed to extreme weather conditions.”
One activist described the reaction of Bulgarian border police to the three Egyptian teenagers as “utterly shocking.”
They said: “It should not be the responsibility of worried activists to reach people in the forest — border police are trained and paid to do so.
“It is utterly shocking that three minors froze to death in the forest even though multiple alerts to 112 had been placed. This is a huge failure for everyone.”
Jakarta NGO to rebuild Indonesian hospital as Palestinians return to north Gaza
- Indonesia Hospital in North Gaza was opened in 2015, built from donations of the Indonesian people
- It was a frequent target of Israeli forces, who accused the facility of sheltering Palestinian armed groups
JAKARTA: A Jakarta-based nongovernmental organization has committed to rebuilding the Indonesia Hospital in northern Gaza as Palestinians began returning to the area on Monday.
The Indonesia Hospital in Beit Lahiya, funded by the Indonesian NGO Medical Emergency Rescue Committee, was one of the first targets hit when Israel began its assault on Gaza in October 2023.
As relentless Israeli attacks pushed the enclave’s healthcare system to the brink of collapse, the Indonesia Hospital had stood as one of the last functioning health facilities in the north.
“Since the war started, the Indonesia Hospital has served as one of the main healthcare centers for residents of Gaza in the north. It has been attacked multiple times, damaging parts of the building itself and also various health equipment,” Sarbini Abdul Murad, chairman of MER-C’s board of trustees in Jakarta, told Arab News on Monday.
“We need to rebuild and fill it up with all the necessary health equipment … It is our moral commitment to rebuilding the hospital.”
Israel has frequently targeted medical facilities in the Gaza Strip, saying that they are used by Palestinian armed groups.
The Indonesia Hospital opened in 2015 and was officially inaugurated by the country’s then-Vice President Jusuf Kalla in 2016.
The four-story general hospital stands on a 16,200 sq. meter plot of land near the Jabalia refugee camp in North Gaza, donated by the local government in 2009.
The hospital’s construction and equipment were financed from donations of the Asia nation’s people, as well as organizations including the Indonesian Red Cross Society.
Since it opened almost a decade ago, MER-C continued to send volunteers to help. A couple of them stayed in Gaza until late last year, as MER-C also sent medical volunteers to the besieged enclave since March as part of a larger emergency deployment led by the World Health Organization.
The Indonesia Hospital was treating about 1,000 people at one point during Israel’s war on Gaza, which has killed more than 47,300 people and injured over 111,000.
“Many Indonesians are looking forward for the Indonesia Hospital to return to normal operations again, and this is the trust that MER-C keeps close because the hospital is a symbol of unity between Indonesians and Palestinians,” Murad said.
“Healthcare is an urgent need for Palestinians, so we want to offer our support here in our field of expertise.”
Tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians began returning to the remains of their destroyed homes in north Gaza on Monday, after Israel opened the Netzarim corridor, a 7 km strip of land controlled by Israeli forces that cuts off the enclave’s north from the rest of the territory.
“We hope Israel will continue to give access for Gaza residents to return to their homes in the north peacefully and not breach the ceasefire agreement in any way,” Murad said.
‘Tidal wave of Islamophobia’ in UK, says outgoing MCB chief
- Zara Mohammed’s 4-year tenure involved responses to nationwide rioting, COVID-19 pandemic
- ‘There has been such a normalization of Islamophobic rhetoric without it being challenged or condemned,’ she tells BBC
LONDON: The UK is suffering from a “tidal wave of Islamophobia,” the outgoing leader of one of the country’s largest Muslim bodies has warned.
Zara Mohammed has served as the first female leader of the Muslim Council of Britain since 2021, and through her tenure tackled nationwide riots last year, the COVID-19 pandemic, and being frozen out of government contact.
Ahead of her departure as MCB general secretary on Saturday, Mohammed spoke to the BBC about the difficulties she has faced over the last four years.
“It was the Southport riots for us that made it really quite alarming,” she said, referring to nationwide disorder last year in the wake of a stabbing attack in Southport.
“It was so visceral. We were watching on our screens: People breaking doors down, stopping cars, attacking taxi drivers, smashing windows, smashing mosques,” she told the BBC. “The kind of evil we saw was really terrifying and I felt like, am I even making a difference?”
The rioting was partly triggered by false online rumors that the attacker was a Muslim asylum-seeker.
Yet the government at the time had refused to engage with Mohammed, and the largest umbrella Muslim organization in Britain “wasn’t being talked to,” she said.
“The justification was there, the urgency, the necessity of engagement was there, British Muslims were under attack, mosques were under attack.”
In the year since the war in Gaza began, monitoring group Tell Mama UK recorded 4,971 instances of Islamophobic hate in Britain — the highest figure in 14 years.
The MCB had done “a lot of community building and political advocacy” in a bid to tackle the problem, yet this had failed to shift mainstream narratives surrounding British Muslims, Mohammed said.
“There has been such a normalization of Islamophobic rhetoric without it being challenged or condemned,” she added.
“We could say we’re making a difference but then what is being seen in national discourse does not seem to translate.”
Abuse of Muslim politicians across the UK, including former Scottish First Minister Humza Yousaf and London Mayor Sadiq Khan, demonstrates a broader trend of rising Islamophobia, Mohammed said.
“You’re constantly firefighting. Did we make British Muslims’ lives better? On one hand, yes, because we raised these issues, we took them to a national platform. But with Islamophobia, we’re still having the same conversation,” she added.
“We still haven’t been able to break through, whether it’s government engagement, Islamophobia or social mobility.”
Pakistan ex-PM Imran Khan, wife appeal graft convictions: lawyer
- Imran Khan was sentenced to 14 years and his wife to seven earlier this month
- A special graft court found the pair guilty of ‘corruption and corrupt practices’
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s jailed former prime minister Imran Khan and his wife Bushra Bibi on Monday appealed their convictions for graft, his lawyer said.
Khan was sentenced to 14 years and his wife to seven earlier this month in the latest case to be brought against them.
“We have filed appeals today and in the next few days it will go through clerical processes and then it will be fixed for a hearing,” Khan’s lawyer Khalid Yousaf Chaudhry said.
The papers were filed at the Islamabad High Court.
A special graft court found the pair guilty of “corruption and corrupt practices” over a welfare foundation they established together called the Al-Qadir Trust.
Khan, 72, has been held in custody since August 2023 charged in around 200 cases which he claims are politically motivated.
Kremlin says it has yet to hear from US about a possible Putin-Trump meeting
MOSCOW: The Kremlin said on Monday it had yet to receive any signals from the United States about arranging a possible meeting between President Vladimir Putin and President Donald Trump, but remained ready to organize such an encounter.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said it appeared a “certain amount of time” was needed before a meeting between the two leaders could take place. He said Russia understood that Washington was still interested in organizing such a meeting.
Putin said on Friday that he and Trump should meet to talk about the Ukraine war and energy prices, issues that the US president has highlighted in the first days of his new administration.
