NAIROBI: Three human rights groups called Tuesday for the immediate unconditional release of five Burundian activists charged with rebellion and undermining state security.
Burundian intelligence agents arrested the five, four of whom were about to fly to Uganda from the economic capital Bujumbura, last month.
They were later charged with rebellion and undermining the domestic security of the state as well as the functioning of public finances, before being detained in Bujumbura’s central prison.
Under Burundian law, they face up to 30 years in prison.
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch (HRW) and the Burundi Human Rights Initiative said the charges were “baseless” and demanded they be dropped.
“Burundian authorities should immediately and unconditionally release five human rights defenders arbitrarily arrested,” they said in a joint statement.
“The arrests... and the serious charges brought against them signal a worsening climate for independent civil society in Burundi,” said Clementine de Montjoye, Africa researcher at HRW.
The jailed activists include Sonia Ndikumasabo, president of the Association of Women Lawyers of Burundi, who was arrested at the airport.
Another was Prosper Runyange, a member of the Association for Peace and the Promotion of Human Rights (APDH), arrested the same day in the northern town of Ngozi.
“If working in partnership with or receiving funding from international groups is treated as a criminal offense and a threat to state security, what little space was left for civil society to operate in Burundi will be closed,” HRW’s Montjoye warned.
Despite ongoing concerns about the rights situation, both the European Union and the United States last year resumed aid flows to the deeply impoverished landlocked nation, citing political progress under President Evariste Ndayishimiye.
Ndayishimiye has been praised for slowly ending years of Burundi’s isolationism under former leader Pierre Nkurunziza’s chaotic and bloody rule.
But he has failed to improve its wretched record on human rights and the African Great Lakes nation of 12 million people remains one of the poorest on the planet.
Burundi had been under US and EU sanctions over a bloody crisis that erupted in 2015 when Nkurunziza made a controversial bid for a third term in office.
The turmoil claimed the lives of 1,200 Burundians and led to 400,000 fleeing the country.
NGOs urge the release of Burundi rights campaigners
https://arab.news/846hw
NGOs urge the release of Burundi rights campaigners
Growing numbers of people worldwide unhappy with Israeli state and Netanyahu, survey finds
- Poll of 32,000 people in 24 countries finds numbers holding unfavorable views on Israel have risen significantly in many places, including the US and UK
- ‘Majorities across all 24 countries show a lack of confidence that (Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu will “do the right thing,”’ researcher says
CHICAGO: The results of a survey published this week by the Pew Research Center in Washington reveal a significant increase in the proportions of people in the US, UK and other nations, mostly in the West, who hold unfavorable views on the Israeli state and its prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu.
Researchers polled 32,000 people in 24 countries. Previous surveys had been carried out in 11 of them, 13 were being surveyed for the first time. Maria Smerkovich, a research associate with Pew, told Arab News on Wednesday that the results showed conclusively that public attitudes toward Israel and the country’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, were increasingly negative, especially in America, traditionally one of the strongest advocates for Israel, and in the UK.
“The median is 62 percent have unfavorable views of the country of Israel, compared with a 29 percent median that have favorable views,” she said of the overall results.
“In about 20 of these countries, half of the population or more have unfavorable views of the country. We find that younger people and people on the left are more likely to have negative views of the country.
“In the US, views on Israel have turned more negative. The last time we asked about the favorability of Israel in the US was in 2022, before the current war (in Gaza). And at that time, a slight majority had favorable views of Israel. A smaller share had unfavorable views of Israel.
“Now (since the start of the conflict in Gaza) we’ve seen the tide turn, where just over half have unfavorable views of Israel and 45 percent have favorable views. So that’s a leap in terms of unfavorability; it’s a jump from 42 percent to 53 percent in just three years.”
She continued: “In about 10 other countries, the last time we asked about favorability of Israel was in 2013. And we have seen, in most of the countries, we have seen views turn more negative. For example in the UK in 2013, unfavorability was at 44 percent. Today, it’s at 61 percent. So that’s quite a jump.
“Israel’s unfavorability has increased in seven countries of the 10 where we have trends,” she said adding that the proportions of unfavorable views had remained “about the same since 2013” in France, Germany and Greece.
In addition to the “striking” increase in unfavorable views in the UK, Smerkovich said: “In Indonesia, it’s gone up from 71 percent to 80 percent. In Turkey, from 85 percent to 93 percent. In Nigeria, 25 percent to 32 percent.”
In the other 13 countries with no previous survey results, majorities also held strongly unfavorable views of both Israel and Netanyahu.
The survey reveals “majorities across all 24 countries show a lack of confidence that Netanyahu will ‘do the right thing,’” Smerkovich said.
Many people the US “have no confidence in Netanyahu,” she added, and there “has been an increase in the share that say they have no confidence in him … about a 10 percent jump, whereas the share that say they do have confidence in him has stayed fairly stable.”
This pattern is repeated in other countries, she said, where “we have seen an increase in no confidence in Netanyahu. But the share that say they do have confidence in him hasn’t really changed much in the US.”
The Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan “fact tank” that says it aims to inform the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. It conducts opinion polls, demographic research, content analysis and other data-driven social science research and does not adopt any positions on policies.
Prestigious Irish university to cut links with Israel over Gaza war
- Trinity College Dublin will sever institutional links with the Israeli state, universities and companies headquartered there
- University said the action was a protest against 'violations of international and humanitarian law'
DUBLIN: Ireland’s prestigious Trinity College Dublin said on Wednesday that it would cut all links with Israel in protest at “ongoing violations of international and humanitarian law.”
The university’s board informed students by email that it had accepted the recommendations of a taskforce to sever “institutional links with the State of Israel, Israeli universities and companies headquartered in Israel.”
The recommendations would be “enacted for the duration of the ongoing violations of international and humanitarian law,” said the email sent by the board’s chairman Paul Farrell, and seen by AFP.
The taskforce was set up after part of the university’s campus in central Dublin was blockaded by students for five days last year in protest at Israel’s actions in Gaza.
Among the taskforce’s recommendations approved by the board were pledges to divest “from all companies headquartered in Israel” and to “enter into no future supply contracts with Israeli firms” and “no new commercial relationships with Israeli entities.”
The university also said that it would “enter into no further mobility agreements with Israeli universities.”
Trinity has two current Erasmus+ exchange agreements with Israeli universities: Bar Ilan University, an agreement that ends in July 2026, and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, which ends in July 2025, the university told AFP in an email.
The board also said that the university “should not submit for approval or agree to participate in any new institutional research agreements involving Israeli participation.”
It “should seek to align itself with like-minded universities and bodies in an effort to influence EU policy concerning Israel’s participation in such collaborations,” it added.
Ireland has been among the most outspoken critics of Israel’s response to the October 7, 2023 attacks on southern Israel by Hamas militants that sparked the war in Gaza.
Polls since the start of the war have shown overwhelming pro-Palestinian sympathy in Ireland.
In May 2024, Dublin joined several other European countries in recognizing Palestine as a “sovereign and independent state.”
It then joined South Africa in bringing a case before the International Court of Justice in The Hague accusing Israel of committing genocide in Gaza — charges angrily denied by Israeli leaders.
In December, Israel’s Foreign Minister Gideon Saar ordered the closure of the country’s embassy in Dublin, blaming Ireland’s “extreme anti-Israel policies.”
The University of Geneva also announced Wednesday that it has ended its partnership with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem following student protests, saying it no longer reflected the institution’s “strategic priorities.”
Moscow security chief discusses Ukraine with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un
- “Sergei Shoigu was received by the Chairman of State Affairs of the DPRK, Kim Jong Un,” the embassy said
- It said talks took place “in an atmosphere of friendly mutual understanding“
MOSCOW: Russia’s security chief Sergei Shoigu discussed the Ukraine conflict with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un on a visit to Pyongyang on Wednesday, Moscow’s embassy in the reclusive state said.
North Korea has become one of Russia’s main allies during Moscow’s more than three-year-long Ukraine offensive, sending thousands of troops to help the Kremlin oust Ukrainian forces from its Kursk border region.
Pyongyang is also largely believed to be arming Russia.
“Sergei Shoigu was received by the Chairman of State Affairs of the DPRK, Kim Jong Un,” the embassy said, adding that they “exchanged views on the situation around the Ukrainian crisis and the Korean peninsula.”
It said talks took place “in an atmosphere of friendly mutual understanding.”
Shoigu also met with North Korean military official Pak Jong-chon, the embassy said.
Russia’s TASS news agency said earlier that Shoigu had arrived on the orders of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
Wednesday’s visit is Shoigu’s second to Pyongyang in less than three months.
Pyongyang has defended its military cooperation with Russia, saying on Monday that ties were aimed at “ensuring peace and stability” in Europe and Asia.
Around 600 North Korean soldiers have been killed and thousands more wounded fighting for Russia, according to South Korean lawmaker Lee Seong-kweun, citing the country’s intelligence service.
Russia and North Korea signed a sweeping military deal last year, including a mutual defense clause, during a rare visit by Putin to the nuclear-armed North.
Shoigu hailed the deal as “fully meeting the interests of both countries” during a visit in March.
UN Security Council will vote on a resolution demanding a Gaza ceasefire, with US veto expected
- The US vetoed the last resolution on Gaza in November, under the Biden administration
- Several UN diplomats from different countries, speaking on condition of anonymity because discussions have been private, said they expect the United States to veto the resolution
UNITED NATIONS: The UN Security Council will vote Wednesday on a resolution demanding an immediate and permanent ceasefire in Gaza, and the Trump administration is expected to veto it because it does not link the ceasefire to the release of all the hostages held by Hamas.
The resolution before the UN’s most powerful body also does not condemn Hamas’ deadly attack in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, which ignited the war, or say the militant group must disarm and withdraw from Gaza — two other US demands.
The US vetoed the last resolution on Gaza in November, under the Biden administration, because the ceasefire demand was not directly linked to the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages. Similarly, the current resolution demands those taken by Hamas and other groups be released, but it does not make it a condition for a truce.
Calling the humanitarian situation in Gaza “catastrophic,” the resolution, put forth by the 15-member council’s 10 elected members, also calls for “the immediate and unconditional lifting of all restrictions on the entry of humanitarian aid into Gaza and its safe and unhindered distribution at scale, including by the UN and humanitarian partners.”
President Donald Trump’s administration has tried to ramp up its efforts to broker peace in Gaza after 20 months of war. However, Hamas has sought amendments to a US proposal that special envoy Steve Witkoff has called “totally unacceptable.”
The vote follows a decision by an Israeli and US-backed foundation to pause food delivery at its three distribution sites in the Gaza Strip after health officials said dozens of Palestinians were killed in a series of shootings near the sites this week. Israel and the United States say they supported the establishment of the new aid system to prevent Hamas from stealing aid previously distributed by the UN
The United Nations has rejected the new system, saying it doesn’t address Gaza’s mounting hunger crisis, allows Israel to use aid as a weapon and doesn’t comply with the humanitarian principles of neutrality, impartiality and independence. The UN says its distribution system throughout Gaza worked very well during the March ceasefire and is carefully monitored.
The resolution demands the restoration of all essential humanitarian services in line with humanitarian principles, international humanitarian law and UN Security Council resolutions.
Several UN diplomats from different countries, speaking on condition of anonymity because discussions have been private, said they expect the United States to veto the resolution. They also said they expect a similar vote to the one in November, when the 14 other council members supported the resolution.
Israel’s UN Mission said Ambassador Danny Danon, who will speak after the vote, will say the resolution undermines humanitarian relief efforts and ignores Hamas, which is still endangering civilians in Gaza. He also will say the resolution disregards the ceasefire negotiations that are already underway, the mission said.
Gaza’s roughly 2 million people are almost completely reliant on international aid because Israel’s offensive has destroyed nearly all food production capabilities. Israel imposed a blockade on supplies into Gaza on March 2, and limited aid began to enter again late last month after pressure from allies and warnings of famine.
“The world is watching, day after day, horrifying scenes of Palestinians being shot, wounded or killed in Gaza while simply trying to eat,” UN humanitarian chief Tom Fletcher said in a statement Wednesday. He called for a flood of aid to be let in and for the world body to be the one delivering it.
The Security Council has voted on 14 Gaza-related resolutions and approved four since the war began. That is when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting 251.
They are still holding 58 hostages, a third of them believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
Israel’s military campaign has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which doesn’t say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants.
The ministry is led by medical professionals but reports to the Hamas-run government. Its toll is seen as generally reliable by UN agencies and independent experts, though Israel has challenged its numbers.
Trump says Putin told him that Russia will respond to Ukrainian attack on airfields
- Trump said “It was a good conversation, but not a conversation that will lead to immediate Peace”
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump said that Russian President Vladimir Putin told him “very strongly” in a phone call Wednesday that he will respond to Ukraine’s weekend drone attack on Russian airfields.
The US president said in a social media post that “It was a good conversation, but not a conversation that will lead to immediate Peace.”
The call that lasted for an hour and 15 minutes was Trump’s first known with Putin since May 19.
Trump said he and Putin also discussed Iran’s nuclear program.
