<p>A Russian schoolboy stumbled over the remains of a&nbsp;250 million years old dinosaur called&nbsp;ichthyosaur, a reptile&nbsp;considered to be among the largest animals to ever have lived on Earth.</p>

<p>Dmitry Sirenko, a seven-year-old boy was playing along with his sister on the coast of Russky Island, located in the far east of Russia, when he came across a few unusual stones.</p>

<p>Sirenko said ''I love dinosaurs a lot, and have always dreamed of finding the bones of a real dinosaur.''</p>

<p>The boy's miraculous discovery was confirmed by a team of local paleontologists who were dispatched to the site. They believe the peculiar markings on the stones were the traces of an ichthyosaur, a massive prehistoric marine reptile.</p>

<p>The&nbsp;stone plate with the fossil was transported to the Primorsky Aquarium for further study.</p>

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<p style=" margin:8px 0 0 0; padding:0 4px;"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CG_hVeEBJhZ/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none; word-wrap:break-word;" target="_blank">Конечно нет! Пост посвящен не Хеллоуину. Это всё о нем, о рыбоящере, который жил на нашей планете около 250 млн. лет назад. Мы непременно сделаем фильм. Мы расскажем вам всё, что узнают палеонтологи, слой за слоем разбирая породу и "освобождая" ихтиозавра из каменной плиты. А пока давайте поговорим о том, кто же такие ихтиозавры? 🔸Ихтиозавры (Ichthyosauria), или «рыбоящеры» — вымерший отряд крупных морских рептилий с характерным «рыбообразным» телом. 🔸Считают, что предки ихтиозавров обитали на мелководьях и довольно рано обособились от основного ствола рептилий. 🔸Ластообразные конечности ихтиозавры использовали для поддержания равновесия, а плавали с помощью вертикального двулопастного хвоста, в нижнюю лопасть которого заходил позвоночник. 🔸 Кожа была лишена чешуи и покрыта слизью для лучшего скольжения в воде. Ихтиозавры имели длинные узкие челюсти и зубы, неоднократно сменяющиеся в течение жизни. 🔸 Особенность этих рептилий — очень большие глаза, достигавшие 20 см в диаметре, что говорит о возможности ночной активности. 🔸 Эти живородящие рептилии населяли все мезозойские моря и океаны.</a></p>

<p style=" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px; margin-bottom:0; margin-top:8px; overflow:hidden; padding:8px 0 7px; text-align:center; text-overflow:ellipsis; white-space:nowrap;">A post shared by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/primocean_aquarium/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" style=" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px;" target="_blank"> Жизнь Приморского океанариума</a> (@primocean_aquarium) on <time datetime="2020-10-31T03:17:17+00:00" style=" font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px;">Oct 30, 2020 at 8:17pm PDT</time></p>
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<p>Paleontologist Yury Bolotsky said ''There is still intrigue as to whether any skull fragments are in the rocks. That would have been absolutely awesome!''</p>

<p>“Although, this ichthyosaur could have lost its head 250 million years ago,” he added.</p>

<p>The scientists plan to carefully cut it apart, layer by layer, to check whether it contains a skull inside and to determine the dinosaur’s exact class.</p>

<p>The ichthyosaur has been described as one of the largest animals to ever have lived on Earth. Its body is believed to have measured up to 85-feet long.</p>


A Russian schoolboy stumbled over the remains of a 250 million years old dinosaur called ichthyosaur, a reptile considered to be among the largest animals to ever have lived on Earth.

A Russian schoolboy stumbled over the remains of a 250 million years old dinosaur called ichthyosaur, a reptile considered to be among the largest animals to ever have lived on Earth. Dmitry Sirenko, a seven-year-old boy was playing along with his sister on the coast of Russky Island, located in the far east of Russia, when he came across a few unusual stones. Sirenko said ''I love dinosaurs a lot, and have always dreamed of finding the bones of a real dinosaur.'' The boy's miraculous discovery was confirmed by a team of local paleontologists who were dispatched to the site. They believe the peculiar markings on the stones were the traces of an ichthyosaur, a massive prehistoric marine reptile. The stone plate with the fossil was transported to the Primorsky Aquarium for further study. View this post on Instagram Конечно нет! Пост посвящен не Хеллоуину. Это всё о нем, о рыбоящере, который жил на нашей планете около 250 млн. лет назад. Мы непременно сделаем фильм. Мы расскажем вам всё, что узнают палеонтологи, слой за слоем разбирая породу и "освобождая" ихтиозавра из каменной плиты. А пока давайте поговорим о том, кто же такие ихтиозавры? 🔸Ихтиозавры (Ichthyosauria), или «рыбоящеры» — вымерший отряд крупных морских рептилий с характерным «рыбообразным» телом. 🔸Считают, что предки ихтиозавров обитали на мелководьях и довольно рано обособились от основного ствола рептилий. 🔸Ластообразные конечности ихтиозавры использовали для поддержания равновесия, а плавали с помощью вертикального двулопастного хвоста, в нижнюю лопасть которого заходил позвоночник. 🔸 Кожа была лишена чешуи и покрыта слизью для лучшего скольжения в воде. Ихтиозавры имели длинные узкие челюсти и зубы, неоднократно сменяющиеся в течение жизни. 🔸 Особенность этих рептилий — очень большие глаза, достигавшие 20 см в диаметре, что говорит о возможности ночной активности. 🔸 Эти живородящие рептилии населяли все мезозойские моря и океаны. A post shared by Жизнь Приморского океанариума (@primocean_aquarium) on Oct 30, 2020 at 8:17pm PDT Paleontologist Yury Bolotsky said ''There is still intrigue as to whether any skull fragments are in the rocks. That would have been absolutely awesome!'' “Although, this ichthyosaur could have lost its head 250 million years ago,” he added. The scientists plan to carefully cut it apart, layer by layer, to check whether it contains a skull inside and to determine the dinosaur’s exact class. The ichthyosaur has been described as one of the largest animals to ever have lived on Earth. Its body is believed to have measured up to 85-feet long.

Schoolboy stumbles on remains of 250 million years old dinosaur

<p>Assam has become the first Indian state to add "transgender" as an identity category for people seeking civil service jobs, allowing 42 trans candidates to apply to sit an entry exam, an official and a campaigner said on Friday.</p>

<p>The application form for the exam, which recruits for state roles such as administrative officials, magistrates, and police officers, now lets applicants tick male, female or transgender, a move welcomed by local trans rights advocates.</p>

<p>"Forty-two (applicants) is not a small number... It is a historic decision. Assam has become the first state in India to have included us," said Swati Bidhan Baruah of the Assam Transgender Welfare Board, which sought the change.</p>

<p>Calling the decision a "big victory", she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation her group had also urged Assam's state government to reserve a quota of civil service jobs for trans candidates.</p>

<p>"We are confident our demand will be met soon," she said.</p>

<p>Pallab Bhattacharya, chairman of the Assam Public Service Commission, which conducts the test, said about 76,000 candidates had applied to sit this year's examination, which will be held in December.</p>

<p>In April, India's federal government instructed all ministries and departments to modify forms for recruitment tests to include "transgender" as a separate category to conform with a trans rights law passed last year.</p>

<p>The law set out to improve the lives of about two million trans-Indians, who face discrimination in the largely conservative nation and mostly survive through begging, performing at weddings, or selling sex.</p>

<p>Still, campaigners have expressed concern about the limits on self-determining their gender, with the law stating they must obtain an identity certificate from a district magistrate to be declared transgender.</p>

<p>They also have to give proof of having undergone sex reassignment surgery if they then want to be listed as male or female.</p>

<p>India's Supreme Court ruled in 2014 that trans people had equal rights but they are still often rejected by their families and denied jobs, education and healthcare.</p>

<p>Assam, which lies in northeast India, has a trans population of about 11,500, according to the last census of 2011.</p>

<p>One trans woman who filled out the state application form said sitting the entry examination could change her life, adding that she hoped to join the local police force.</p>

<p>"It's a matter of pride and self respect to have a category where we can boldly mention ourselves as transgender," the 24-year-old said, asking not to give her name.</p>

<p>"I want to change the system and do away with discrimination faced by the transgender community."</p>


Assam has become the first Indian state to add "transgender" as an identity category for people seeking civil service jobs, allowing 42 trans candidates to apply to sit an entry exam, an official and a campaigner said on Friday.

Assam has become the first Indian state to add "transgender" as an identity category for people seeking civil service jobs, allowing 42 trans candidates to apply to sit an entry exam, an official and a campaigner said on Friday. The application form for the exam, which recruits for state roles such as administrative officials, magistrates, and police officers, now lets applicants tick male, female or transgender, a move welcomed by local trans rights advocates. "Forty-two (applicants) is not a small number... It is a historic decision. Assam has become the first state in India to have included us," said Swati Bidhan Baruah of the Assam Transgender Welfare Board, which sought the change. Calling the decision a "big victory", she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation her group had also urged Assam's state government to reserve a quota of civil service jobs for trans candidates. "We are confident our demand will be met soon," she said. Pallab Bhattacharya, chairman of the Assam Public Service Commission, which conducts the test, said about 76,000 candidates had applied to sit this year's examination, which will be held in December. In April, India's federal government instructed all ministries and departments to modify forms for recruitment tests to include "transgender" as a separate category to conform with a trans rights law passed last year. The law set out to improve the lives of about two million trans-Indians, who face discrimination in the largely conservative nation and mostly survive through begging, performing at weddings, or selling sex. Still, campaigners have expressed concern about the limits on self-determining their gender, with the law stating they must obtain an identity certificate from a district magistrate to be declared transgender. They also have to give proof of having undergone sex reassignment surgery if they then want to be listed as male or female. India's Supreme Court ruled in 2014 that trans people had equal rights but they are still often rejected by their families and denied jobs, education and healthcare. Assam, which lies in northeast India, has a trans population of about 11,500, according to the last census of 2011. One trans woman who filled out the state application form said sitting the entry examination could change her life, adding that she hoped to join the local police force. "It's a matter of pride and self respect to have a category where we can boldly mention ourselves as transgender," the 24-year-old said, asking not to give her name. "I want to change the system and do away with discrimination faced by the transgender community."

'Matter of pride': Indian state lets transgender to register for civil services exam

<p>Eating jellyfish is a more sustainable alternative to fish, according to scientists at the University of Queensland.</p>

<p>The study, published in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-18505-6">Nature</a>, states that&nbsp;in order to protect threatened fish species and safeguard marine conservation efforts, the consumption of jellyfish should be increased worldwide.</p>

<p>According to the&nbsp;International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species (<a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/">IUCN</a>), fishing is a threat to 96 per cent of the aquatic species.&nbsp;Thirteen of the species are traded internationally and predominantly consumed in European nations.</p>

<p>The study aims to highlight that given the development of new fisheries monitoring technologies and the current push for stronger international mechanisms for biodiversity management, industrial fishing of threatened fish and invertebrates should no longer be neglected in conservation and sustainability commitments.</p>

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<p style=" margin:8px 0 0 0; padding:0 4px;"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/_PFQrQM1Re/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none; word-wrap:break-word;" target="_blank">水母刺身 #jellyfishsashimi</a></p>

<p style=" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px; margin-bottom:0; margin-top:8px; overflow:hidden; padding:8px 0 7px; text-align:center; text-overflow:ellipsis; white-space:nowrap;">A post shared by <a href="https://www.instagram.com/juliaaalam/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" style=" color:#c9c8cd; font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px;" target="_blank"> ♡ ᴊᴜʟɪᴀ ♡</a> (@juliaaalam) on <time datetime="2015-12-13T14:39:26+00:00" style=" font-family:Arial,sans-serif; font-size:14px; line-height:17px;">Dec 13, 2015 at 6:39am PST</time></p>
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<p>Numerous global and regional-scale initiatives address fishing pressure on marine species, including regional fisheries management bodies, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and its subsequent agreements, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS).</p>

<p><strong>A renewable species</strong></p>

<p>According to&nbsp;Marine biologist Lisa-ann Gershwin, ''the lifecycle of jellyfish is&nbsp;renewable, that is, there is far less concern about overfishing or depleting fish stocks. Jellyfish are also very healthy for a human diet, with next-to-no calories but an ample supply of protein.</p>

<p>In one 75 gram serving, there are only 36 calories, about the same as iceberg lettuce but nearly four grams of protein.</p>

<p>Cannonball jellyfish and blue blubber jellyfish are two of the many edible species of jellyfish. Blue blubber jellyfish are abundant in Australian waters, often appearing in swarms along Australia’s east coast.</p>


Eating jellyfish is a more sustainable alternative to fish, according to scientists at the University of Queensland. The study, published in the journal Nature, states that in order to protect threatened fish species and safeguard marine conservation efforts, the consumption of jellyfish should be increased worldwide.

Eating jellyfish is a more sustainable alternative to fish, according to scientists at the University of Queensland. The study, published in the journal Nature, states that in order to protect threatened fish species and safeguard marine conservation efforts, the consumption of jellyfish should be increased worldwide. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species (IUCN), fishing is a threat to 96 per cent of the aquatic species. Thirteen of the species are traded internationally and predominantly consumed in European nations. The study aims to highlight that given the development of new fisheries monitoring technologies and the current push for stronger international mechanisms for biodiversity management, industrial fishing of threatened fish and invertebrates should no longer be neglected in conservation and sustainability commitments. View this post on Instagram 水母刺身 #jellyfishsashimi A post shared by ♡ ᴊᴜʟɪᴀ ♡ (@juliaaalam) on Dec 13, 2015 at 6:39am PST Numerous global and regional-scale initiatives address fishing pressure on marine species, including regional fisheries management bodies, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and its subsequent agreements, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS). A renewable species According to Marine biologist Lisa-ann Gershwin, ''the lifecycle of jellyfish is renewable, that is, there is far less concern about overfishing or depleting fish stocks. Jellyfish are also very healthy for a human diet, with next-to-no calories but an ample supply of protein. In one 75 gram serving, there are only 36 calories, about the same as iceberg lettuce but nearly four grams of protein. Cannonball jellyfish and blue blubber jellyfish are two of the many edible species of jellyfish. Blue blubber jellyfish are abundant in Australian waters, often appearing in swarms along Australia’s east coast.

Consuming jellyfish more sustainable alternative to fish: Study

<p>It was a party Aya Khamees has tried hard to forget.</p>

<p>One evening in May, the 18-year-old woman met up with a few friends, and a few of their friends, at a seedy hotel outside Cairo, not far from the majestic pyramids of Giza. They brought chicken and rice, beer and hash, and rented a few rooms to hang out, flouting Egypt’s strict social rules prohibiting unmarried men and women from mixing in private.</p>

<p>Around 1 a.m., a quarrel broke out. According to prosecutors, a young man, pretending to console Khamees, walked her into a room, held a razor to her face and raped her.</p>

<p>She went to a police station, battered and bruised, and was turned away, told to go to a different one. With no family to look to for support, she said, she felt abandoned and alone.</p>

<p>So she turned to her virtual world. Looking directly into a phone, her eyes blackened, her face cut, she broadcast an account of her attack on TikTok, on which she had hundreds of thousands of followers.</p>

<p>“If the government is watching, I want them to get out and get me my rights,” she demanded.</p>

<p>The video went viral, and within days police had rounded up the entire group — the accused rapist, the other party guests and Khamees. She was charged with prostitution, drug use and a crime recently added to Egypt’s penal code: violation of family values.</p>

<p>Blaming the victim for a sex crime is not unusual in Egypt.</p>

<p>But as the video continued to garner views online, a hashtag campaign arose demanding justice, and her case became the subject of the TV news and talk shows. After a three-month probation, during which she was required to complete a rehabilitation program, the charges were dropped.</p>

<p>“At first the government wasn’t going to help me,” Khamees said in an interview. “But when people spoke up, when my story became a public case, things changed.”</p>

<p>While dropping charges against the victim may seem like scant progress, the case was a harbinger of big changes rocking Egypt’s traditional male-dominated culture. A generation of young women who have found new freedoms online and a voice on social media are challenging the old guard of a socially conservative, patriarchal state that policed the morality of women while allowing crimes against them to go unpunished.</p>

<p>Her case was the leading edge of a moment that seemed to burst out of nowhere all at once.</p>

<p>In July, dozens of women went public with accusations in a serial assault case, leading to an arrest and prosecution. In another high-profile case, a woman testified against a group of wealthy young men, accusing them of gang-raping her years ago in a five-star hotel. And hundreds of reports poured into the National Council for Women with accusations of assaults.</p>

<p>But the groundswell didn’t come out of nowhere. It had been brewing quietly on social media, one of the few remaining precincts of free expression under the rule of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, whose government tightly controls traditional media like television and newspapers.</p>

<p>Now the state is pushing back against what some argue amounts to the unraveling of the country’s fundamental values.</p>

<p>A cybercrime law passed two years ago, partly in an effort to regulate social media, created the crime of violating “Egyptian family values.” The values were not defined, leaving it to judges and prosecutors, most of whom are men, to decide what constitutes a violation.</p>

<p>This year, the law took on the wildly popular TikTok app, a network for posting brief videos that young Egyptian women have seized on to flaunt their sexuality in ways they can’t do in real life. The women often wear trendy clothes that push the boundaries of what most Egyptian women can wear in public, and the most popular accounts have amassed millions of followers.</p>

<p>Egyptian prosecutors convicted at least nine TikTok stars this year, all women, of violating family values, sentencing them to at least two years in prison.</p>

<p>“Look at this!” said Mohammad el-Sehemy, a lawyer whose complaint helped send one of the women to jail, furiously pointing to a picture on his phone of a woman sitting in the back seat of a car, fully clothed, her legs wide apart. “It’s suggestive in ways that don’t fit our society.”</p>

<p>Such pictures rob society of its “innocence, chastity and purity,” he said, and would lead other young women down the same sinful road.</p>

<p>Asked why this type of moral policing targets women more than men, he gave a quizzical look. “What indecent thing can a guy do?” he asked.</p>

<p>Khamees has an answer for him.</p>

<p>Prosecutors say she was raped twice that night in May. Two other guests filmed her trying to get dressed after the attack, visibly shaken and gasping for air. A man is heard making an obscene comment about her, then a hard slap lands on her face. The video was posted online the next day.</p>

<p>“They wanted to break me,” Khamees said. “It looked like I was caught red-handed, doing something wrong, like a prostitute.”</p>

<p>There are no official numbers for the incidence of sexual assault in Egypt, but experts say the number reported is a fraction of those committed. Women are terrified of reporting the crimes for fear they will be blamed and end up in jail.</p>

<p>The investigation usually entails scrutiny of the victim’s sexual history, with an emphasis on her virginity status. If she wasn’t a virgin, women’s advocates say, police and prosecutors conclude she had it coming.</p>

<p>“If a girl had sex in previous relationships, there’s this sense of why not him as well?” said Hoda Nasralla, Khamees’ lawyer. “She’ll be perceived as a whore who encouraged the man to rape her. In the public imagination, for it to be considered rape, a woman has to be this innocent virgin who gets kidnapped before she’s assaulted.”</p>

<p>Even as the state moved to drop charges against Khamees, prosecutors mandated a three-month rehabilitation program to “reform her” and “correct her concepts.” The prosecutor’s statement conceded that she was a victim, deprived of her parents, who were dead, and “fooled by the fame that she achieved in a virtual environment, especially social media sites that delivered her to the wrong crowd.”</p>

<p>Lobna Darwish, the gender and human rights officer at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, an independent human rights group, applauded the decision to drop the charges but criticized the public prosecutor’s disciplinary tone.</p>

<p>“It’s like saying this woman needs to behave,” she said. “So the question becomes what is moral without establishing that women are free to live as they wish and still have a right to be safe.”</p>

<p>Khamees’ posts on TikTok, where she uses the handle Menna Abdel Aziz, were standard fare for the medium, with lots of dancing and posing in sexy outfits. For her generation, online at least, this is the new normal.</p>

<p>“What’s different is they’re not hiding, they’re wearing crop tops and dancing in the street,” Darwish said. “The idea that these women, who are not privileged, could have their own sense of self-worth and freedom drives people crazy. There’s an atmosphere of panic that society is changing.”</p>

<p>In many ways it is, with young women in the vanguard.</p>

<p>There’s Nadine Abdel Hamid, 22, a music technology student at one of Egypt’s elite universities who outed a young man in June who had harassed and blackmailed her for years. The revelation encouraged other women to speak out, producing an avalanche of harrowing testimonies including dozens who said they had been assaulted. The case led to a law protecting the identity of the accuser in sexual assault cases.</p>

<p>There’s Nour Imam, 28, who works as a doula, a woman who assists with childbirth, and is a growing Instagram phenomenon, who has made it her mission to normalize discussion of a woman’s body. One of her latest posts, an illustration of a woman holding up a mirror to her vagina, drove away hundreds of followers. Her response, in another post: “Bye.”</p>

<p>Fadila Elkarrany, 21, created Teen Times, an online magazine for teenage girls. Some of its content mirrors that of old-school teen magazines with tips on how to lose weight and prevent ingrown hairs. More surprising, however, are articles that offer advice on how to “sext” safely “if your reputation is important to you but so is your sexual health.”</p>

<p>And then there is Khamees, who set a precedent by exposing her identity and confronting her rapist and his accomplices online. Because she had shared her story widely, The New York Times, with her permission, used her name and photographs in this article.</p>

<p>The suspect in her case, Bassam Hanna, a 25-year-old liquor store owner, has denied the charges. His trial has begun, and he is expected to appear in court in December.</p>

<p>Khamees has taken her fate with a mix of acceptance and cynicism. In rehab a social worker helped her discern “right from wrong,” she said, and sounded like she meant it.</p>

<p>She lives with her older brother, who acts as her guardian and lets her go out one night a week. Otherwise, her social life is mostly on TikTok and Instagram.</p>

<p>But she has deactivated her old accounts and started new ones to revamp her image. She still sings and dances, but in a T-shirt covering her chest and shoulders.</p>

<p>“It’s backward,” she said, sitting in a coffee shop in a sleeveless shirt, smoking a cigarette. “But I have to get in line and be backward. We’re not in America.”</p>

<p>She had scars running up the insides of her arms where she’d cut herself. She described them as cries for help, not suicide attempts, and most were reactions to two shattering events: Some she made after her mother died four years ago, others after she said she was raped.</p>

<p>She is still waiting for justice.</p>

<p>“I want to see the people who hurt me go to jail,” she said. “I will walk with my head held high, or I will unleash all hell on this country. Just look what I managed to do with a five-minute video.”</p>


It was a party Aya Khamees has tried hard to forget. One evening in May, the 18-year-old woman met up with a few friends, and a few of their friends, at a seedy hotel outside Cairo, not far from the majestic pyramids of Giza.

It was a party Aya Khamees has tried hard to forget. One evening in May, the 18-year-old woman met up with a few friends, and a few of their friends, at a seedy hotel outside Cairo, not far from the majestic pyramids of Giza. They brought chicken and rice, beer and hash, and rented a few rooms to hang out, flouting Egypt’s strict social rules prohibiting unmarried men and women from mixing in private. Around 1 a.m., a quarrel broke out. According to prosecutors, a young man, pretending to console Khamees, walked her into a room, held a razor to her face and raped her. She went to a police station, battered and bruised, and was turned away, told to go to a different one. With no family to look to for support, she said, she felt abandoned and alone. So she turned to her virtual world. Looking directly into a phone, her eyes blackened, her face cut, she broadcast an account of her attack on TikTok, on which she had hundreds of thousands of followers. “If the government is watching, I want them to get out and get me my rights,” she demanded. The video went viral, and within days police had rounded up the entire group — the accused rapist, the other party guests and Khamees. She was charged with prostitution, drug use and a crime recently added to Egypt’s penal code: violation of family values. Blaming the victim for a sex crime is not unusual in Egypt. But as the video continued to garner views online, a hashtag campaign arose demanding justice, and her case became the subject of the TV news and talk shows. After a three-month probation, during which she was required to complete a rehabilitation program, the charges were dropped. “At first the government wasn’t going to help me,” Khamees said in an interview. “But when people spoke up, when my story became a public case, things changed.” While dropping charges against the victim may seem like scant progress, the case was a harbinger of big changes rocking Egypt’s traditional male-dominated culture. A generation of young women who have found new freedoms online and a voice on social media are challenging the old guard of a socially conservative, patriarchal state that policed the morality of women while allowing crimes against them to go unpunished. Her case was the leading edge of a moment that seemed to burst out of nowhere all at once. In July, dozens of women went public with accusations in a serial assault case, leading to an arrest and prosecution. In another high-profile case, a woman testified against a group of wealthy young men, accusing them of gang-raping her years ago in a five-star hotel. And hundreds of reports poured into the National Council for Women with accusations of assaults. But the groundswell didn’t come out of nowhere. It had been brewing quietly on social media, one of the few remaining precincts of free expression under the rule of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, whose government tightly controls traditional media like television and newspapers. Now the state is pushing back against what some argue amounts to the unraveling of the country’s fundamental values. A cybercrime law passed two years ago, partly in an effort to regulate social media, created the crime of violating “Egyptian family values.” The values were not defined, leaving it to judges and prosecutors, most of whom are men, to decide what constitutes a violation. This year, the law took on the wildly popular TikTok app, a network for posting brief videos that young Egyptian women have seized on to flaunt their sexuality in ways they can’t do in real life. The women often wear trendy clothes that push the boundaries of what most Egyptian women can wear in public, and the most popular accounts have amassed millions of followers. Egyptian prosecutors convicted at least nine TikTok stars this year, all women, of violating family values, sentencing them to at least two years in prison. “Look at this!” said Mohammad el-Sehemy, a lawyer whose complaint helped send one of the women to jail, furiously pointing to a picture on his phone of a woman sitting in the back seat of a car, fully clothed, her legs wide apart. “It’s suggestive in ways that don’t fit our society.” Such pictures rob society of its “innocence, chastity and purity,” he said, and would lead other young women down the same sinful road. Asked why this type of moral policing targets women more than men, he gave a quizzical look. “What indecent thing can a guy do?” he asked. Khamees has an answer for him. Prosecutors say she was raped twice that night in May. Two other guests filmed her trying to get dressed after the attack, visibly shaken and gasping for air. A man is heard making an obscene comment about her, then a hard slap lands on her face. The video was posted online the next day. “They wanted to break me,” Khamees said. “It looked like I was caught red-handed, doing something wrong, like a prostitute.” There are no official numbers for the incidence of sexual assault in Egypt, but experts say the number reported is a fraction of those committed. Women are terrified of reporting the crimes for fear they will be blamed and end up in jail. The investigation usually entails scrutiny of the victim’s sexual history, with an emphasis on her virginity status. If she wasn’t a virgin, women’s advocates say, police and prosecutors conclude she had it coming. “If a girl had sex in previous relationships, there’s this sense of why not him as well?” said Hoda Nasralla, Khamees’ lawyer. “She’ll be perceived as a whore who encouraged the man to rape her. In the public imagination, for it to be considered rape, a woman has to be this innocent virgin who gets kidnapped before she’s assaulted.” Even as the state moved to drop charges against Khamees, prosecutors mandated a three-month rehabilitation program to “reform her” and “correct her concepts.” The prosecutor’s statement conceded that she was a victim, deprived of her parents, who were dead, and “fooled by the fame that she achieved in a virtual environment, especially social media sites that delivered her to the wrong crowd.” Lobna Darwish, the gender and human rights officer at the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, an independent human rights group, applauded the decision to drop the charges but criticized the public prosecutor’s disciplinary tone. “It’s like saying this woman needs to behave,” she said. “So the question becomes what is moral without establishing that women are free to live as they wish and still have a right to be safe.” Khamees’ posts on TikTok, where she uses the handle Menna Abdel Aziz, were standard fare for the medium, with lots of dancing and posing in sexy outfits. For her generation, online at least, this is the new normal. “What’s different is they’re not hiding, they’re wearing crop tops and dancing in the street,” Darwish said. “The idea that these women, who are not privileged, could have their own sense of self-worth and freedom drives people crazy. There’s an atmosphere of panic that society is changing.” In many ways it is, with young women in the vanguard. There’s Nadine Abdel Hamid, 22, a music technology student at one of Egypt’s elite universities who outed a young man in June who had harassed and blackmailed her for years. The revelation encouraged other women to speak out, producing an avalanche of harrowing testimonies including dozens who said they had been assaulted. The case led to a law protecting the identity of the accuser in sexual assault cases. There’s Nour Imam, 28, who works as a doula, a woman who assists with childbirth, and is a growing Instagram phenomenon, who has made it her mission to normalize discussion of a woman’s body. One of her latest posts, an illustration of a woman holding up a mirror to her vagina, drove away hundreds of followers. Her response, in another post: “Bye.” Fadila Elkarrany, 21, created Teen Times, an online magazine for teenage girls. Some of its content mirrors that of old-school teen magazines with tips on how to lose weight and prevent ingrown hairs. More surprising, however, are articles that offer advice on how to “sext” safely “if your reputation is important to you but so is your sexual health.” And then there is Khamees, who set a precedent by exposing her identity and confronting her rapist and his accomplices online. Because she had shared her story widely, The New York Times, with her permission, used her name and photographs in this article. The suspect in her case, Bassam Hanna, a 25-year-old liquor store owner, has denied the charges. His trial has begun, and he is expected to appear in court in December. Khamees has taken her fate with a mix of acceptance and cynicism. In rehab a social worker helped her discern “right from wrong,” she said, and sounded like she meant it. She lives with her older brother, who acts as her guardian and lets her go out one night a week. Otherwise, her social life is mostly on TikTok and Instagram. But she has deactivated her old accounts and started new ones to revamp her image. She still sings and dances, but in a T-shirt covering her chest and shoulders. “It’s backward,” she said, sitting in a coffee shop in a sleeveless shirt, smoking a cigarette. “But I have to get in line and be backward. We’re not in America.” She had scars running up the insides of her arms where she’d cut herself. She described them as cries for help, not suicide attempts, and most were reactions to two shattering events: Some she made after her mother died four years ago, others after she said she was raped. She is still waiting for justice. “I want to see the people who hurt me go to jail,” she said. “I will walk with my head held high, or I will unleash all hell on this country. Just look what I managed to do with a five-minute video.”

Egyptian teen seeks justice in rape case, and a battle erupts over women’s rights

<p>Poland is a largely conservative country compared to much of Europe, a place where churches fill up on Sundays and Roman Catholicism is deeply interwoven with the national identity.</p>

<p>So why has a court ruling restricting abortion sparked more than a week of angry protests across the central European nation of 38 million?</p>

<p>Hundreds of thousands have been pouring into the streets for days, defying the risk of contagion amid a spike in COVID-19 infections that have been hitting new records each day, reaching nearly 22,000 on Friday.</p>

<p>Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki appealed to abortion rights activists to halt mass protests, saying they would fuel more coronavirus infections and threaten the elderly.</p>

<p>With a mass march scheduled for Friday evening in Warsaw, let's take&nbsp;a look at some of the key issues.</p>

<p><strong>TOP COURT RULES</strong></p>

<p>The immediate trigger of the protests was an October 22 decision by the constitutional court that had been asked to rule on a provision of a 27-year-old law that allows abortions in cases of severe fetal deformity, including Down syndrome.</p>

<p>The latter is one of the main reasons cited for the roughly 1,000 legal terminations performed in Poland each year.</p>

<p>Lawmakers with the ruling Law and Justice party were among those who sought the court's review. They say they want to ensure fetuses with Down syndrome are allowed to be born.</p>

<p><strong>POLAND IN THE BIGGER PICTURE</strong></p>

<p>Klementyna Suchanow, one of the main organisers with the initiative Women's Strike, the key force behind the protests, said Poland is just one element in a global struggle where democracies face a challenge from fundamentalist and authoritarian forces.</p>

<p>Whatever happens now in Poland will be crucial for democracy worldwide, says Suchanow, the author of 'This is War: Women, Fundamentalists, and the new Middle Ages,'&nbsp;a book on international ultra-conservative groups that want to ban all abortions.<br />
The groups say they are fighting to preserve traditional families, and also fight same-sex marriage.</p>

<p>The slogan 'This is War'&nbsp;has been repeated often on banners carried at the protests in Poland.</p>

<p><strong>COMPROMISE BROKEN</strong></p>

<p>Poland already had one of Europe's most restrictive laws, hammered out in 1993 between political and Catholic church leaders.<br />
It allowed abortions only in the cases of fetal defects, risk to the woman's health and incest or rape.</p>

<p>It was born from difficult negotiations after the fall of communism, when the Soviet bloc countries had liberal abortion laws.<br />
The church, long repressed by the communist regime, sought a full ban in line with its view that all life must be protected from the moment of conception.</p>

<p>Aleksander Kwasniewski, a former left-wing president, said this week: ''It seems to me that in 1993, it was the only possible compromise.''&nbsp;However, neither side has ever been satisfied with the 1993 law.</p>

<p>Earlier attempts by the conservative ruling party to replace it with a blanket ban on abortions were met with enormous street protests in 2016 and 2017 and shelved.</p>

<p><strong>POLITICAL CALCULATIONS</strong></p>

<p>The government appears to have calculated that it could change the law with less of a backlash by getting a court under its political control to do the job during the pandemic. If so, the plan has backfired.</p>

<p>The ruling Law and Justice party won a second term in 2019 and President Andrzej Duda, a party ally, was re-elected this summer.<br />
With three years to go before the next elections, it seemed the right time to push through an unpopular move that is widely understood as a reward to the church and ultraconservative groups for their political support.</p>

<p>While a large majority of Poles disapprove of the court ruling, some of the protesters' methods have also met with disapproval, including vulgar language, vandalizing churches, and disrupting Masses.</p>

<p>''If they continue that way, they will lose support,''&nbsp;said Marcin Zaborowski, a political analyst and author with Visegrad Insight, a policy journal focused on Central Europe.</p>

<p><strong>THE COURT'S AUTHORITY</strong></p>

<p>The Constitutional Tribunal, which ruled to restrict abortion, is itself the product of a separate controversy: the ruling party's takeover of the courts, an issue at the heart of a 5-year standoff with the European Union.<br />
Of 15 judges on the court, 14 were picked by Law and Justice for nine-year terms, three of them chosen in a manner that violates Polish law.<br />
This has led some legal scholars to declare that the court itself is illegitimate and that the abortion ruling has no legal validity. Many critics now refer to the court as 'Julia Przylebska's tribunal',&nbsp;a reference to the court president who is a Law and Justice party loyalist.</p>

<p>''This is an ineffective ruling from the constitutional court. It has no legal consequences,''&nbsp;said Michal Wawrykiewicz, a lawyer with Free Courts, an initiative fighting for rule of law.</p>

<p>Wawrykiewicz said the ruling is likely to unleash legal chaos because the government will treat it as legally binding but many doctors will not.</p>

<p>If doctors are sued for performing abortions of damaged fetuses, they will be sued in lower courts, where judges have maintained a large degree of independence and can be expected to rule in their favour.</p>

<p>Ultimately the issue will need to be resolved by the EU's Court of Justice.</p>

<p><strong>A YOUTH REVOLT</strong></p>

<p>While traditionally conservative, Poland has also been undergoing massive social changes under the influence of EU membership, which has led many Poles to travel and study abroad, and of popular culture influences such as Netflix.</p>

<p>The protests of the past week have been dominated by young people, who believe that the abortion ruling infringes on their liberties.<br />
Dominika Stankiewicz, a 26-year-old who was handing out protest stickers and posters in Warsaw's Mokotow district on Thursday, said abortion is the only issue that has ever brought her to the streets to protests.<br />
&nbsp;</p>


Poland is a largely conservative country compared to much of Europe, a place where churches fill up on Sundays and Roman Catholicism is deeply interwoven with the national identity.

Poland is a largely conservative country compared to much of Europe, a place where churches fill up on Sundays and Roman Catholicism is deeply interwoven with the national identity. So why has a court ruling restricting abortion sparked more than a week of angry protests across the central European nation of 38 million? Hundreds of thousands have been pouring into the streets for days, defying the risk of contagion amid a spike in COVID-19 infections that have been hitting new records each day, reaching nearly 22,000 on Friday. Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki appealed to abortion rights activists to halt mass protests, saying they would fuel more coronavirus infections and threaten the elderly. With a mass march scheduled for Friday evening in Warsaw, let's take a look at some of the key issues. TOP COURT RULES The immediate trigger of the protests was an October 22 decision by the constitutional court that had been asked to rule on a provision of a 27-year-old law that allows abortions in cases of severe fetal deformity, including Down syndrome. The latter is one of the main reasons cited for the roughly 1,000 legal terminations performed in Poland each year. Lawmakers with the ruling Law and Justice party were among those who sought the court's review. They say they want to ensure fetuses with Down syndrome are allowed to be born. POLAND IN THE BIGGER PICTURE Klementyna Suchanow, one of the main organisers with the initiative Women's Strike, the key force behind the protests, said Poland is just one element in a global struggle where democracies face a challenge from fundamentalist and authoritarian forces. Whatever happens now in Poland will be crucial for democracy worldwide, says Suchanow, the author of 'This is War: Women, Fundamentalists, and the new Middle Ages,' a book on international ultra-conservative groups that want to ban all abortions. The groups say they are fighting to preserve traditional families, and also fight same-sex marriage. The slogan 'This is War' has been repeated often on banners carried at the protests in Poland. COMPROMISE BROKEN Poland already had one of Europe's most restrictive laws, hammered out in 1993 between political and Catholic church leaders. It allowed abortions only in the cases of fetal defects, risk to the woman's health and incest or rape. It was born from difficult negotiations after the fall of communism, when the Soviet bloc countries had liberal abortion laws. The church, long repressed by the communist regime, sought a full ban in line with its view that all life must be protected from the moment of conception. Aleksander Kwasniewski, a former left-wing president, said this week: ''It seems to me that in 1993, it was the only possible compromise.'' However, neither side has ever been satisfied with the 1993 law. Earlier attempts by the conservative ruling party to replace it with a blanket ban on abortions were met with enormous street protests in 2016 and 2017 and shelved. POLITICAL CALCULATIONS The government appears to have calculated that it could change the law with less of a backlash by getting a court under its political control to do the job during the pandemic. If so, the plan has backfired. The ruling Law and Justice party won a second term in 2019 and President Andrzej Duda, a party ally, was re-elected this summer. With three years to go before the next elections, it seemed the right time to push through an unpopular move that is widely understood as a reward to the church and ultraconservative groups for their political support. While a large majority of Poles disapprove of the court ruling, some of the protesters' methods have also met with disapproval, including vulgar language, vandalizing churches, and disrupting Masses. ''If they continue that way, they will lose support,'' said Marcin Zaborowski, a political analyst and author with Visegrad Insight, a policy journal focused on Central Europe. THE COURT'S AUTHORITY The Constitutional Tribunal, which ruled to restrict abortion, is itself the product of a separate controversy: the ruling party's takeover of the courts, an issue at the heart of a 5-year standoff with the European Union. Of 15 judges on the court, 14 were picked by Law and Justice for nine-year terms, three of them chosen in a manner that violates Polish law. This has led some legal scholars to declare that the court itself is illegitimate and that the abortion ruling has no legal validity. Many critics now refer to the court as 'Julia Przylebska's tribunal', a reference to the court president who is a Law and Justice party loyalist. ''This is an ineffective ruling from the constitutional court. It has no legal consequences,'' said Michal Wawrykiewicz, a lawyer with Free Courts, an initiative fighting for rule of law. Wawrykiewicz said the ruling is likely to unleash legal chaos because the government will treat it as legally binding but many doctors will not. If doctors are sued for performing abortions of damaged fetuses, they will be sued in lower courts, where judges have maintained a large degree of independence and can be expected to rule in their favour. Ultimately the issue will need to be resolved by the EU's Court of Justice. A YOUTH REVOLT While traditionally conservative, Poland has also been undergoing massive social changes under the influence of EU membership, which has led many Poles to travel and study abroad, and of popular culture influences such as Netflix. The protests of the past week have been dominated by young people, who believe that the abortion ruling infringes on their liberties. Dominika Stankiewicz, a 26-year-old who was handing out protest stickers and posters in Warsaw's Mokotow district on Thursday, said abortion is the only issue that has ever brought her to the streets to protests.

Why an abortion law ruling trigged mass protests in Poland

<p>A knife-wielding attacker shouting "Allahu Akbar" beheaded a woman and killed two other people in a suspected terrorist act at a church in the French city of Nice on Thursday, while a gunman was shot dead by police in a separate incident.</p>

<p><strong>Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/france-knife-attack-live-update-woman-beheaded-3-killed-suspect-apprehended-338782" hreflang="en">France knife attack live update: Woman beheaded, 3 killed; suspect apprehended</a></strong></p>

<p>Nice&nbsp;mayor, Christian Estrosi said it was a terrorist attack that took place near the Notre Dame church.</p>

<p>Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to Twitter to condemn the ''heinous attack'' and offer his&nbsp;heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I strongly condemn the recent terrorist attacks in France, including today's heinous attack in Nice inside a church. Our deepest and heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and the people of France. India stands with France in the fight against terrorism.</p>
— Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) <a href="https://twitter.com/narendramodi/status/1321814517651787776?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>"I condemn the odious and brutal attack that has just taken place in Nice and I am with France with all my heart," European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen tweeted.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="fr">Je condamne l'attaque odieuse et brutale qui vient de se dérouler à Nice et suis de tout cœur avec la France. Mes pensées vont aux victimes de cet acte haineux.<br />
<br />
L’Europe tout entière est solidaire avec la France. Nous restons unis et déterminés face à la barbarie et au fanatisme</p>
— Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) <a href="https://twitter.com/vonderleyen/status/1321774485297647616?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>British Prime Minister Boris Johnson&nbsp;condemned the ''barbaric attack''&nbsp;pledging solidarity with France in the fight against extremism.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I am appalled to hear the news from Nice this morning of a barbaric attack at the Notre-Dame Basilica. Our thoughts are with the victims and their families, and the UK stands steadfastly with France against terror and intolerance.</p>
— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) <a href="https://twitter.com/BorisJohnson/status/1321780350322954240?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany stood with France after the&nbsp;"brutal" knife.</p>

<p>"I am deeply shaken by the brutal murders in the church in Nice. My thoughts are with the relatives of those murdered and injured. Germany stands with France at this difficult time," she said, in a tweet posted by her spokesman Steffen Seibert.</p>

<p>The&nbsp;Kremlin, commenting on recent beheading incidents in France, said&nbsp;it was unacceptable to kill people, but also wrong to insult the feelings of religious believers.</p>

<p>Pope Francis prayed for the victims of the&nbsp;attack by a knifeman saying&nbsp;"terrorism and violence can never be accepted".</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I am close to the Catholic community of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Nice?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Nice</a>, mourning the attack that sowed death in a place of prayer and consolation. I pray for the victims, for their families and for the beloved French people, that they may respond to evil with good.</p>
— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) <a href="https://twitter.com/Pontifex/status/1321791394432847873?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>"Today's attack has sown death in a place of love and consolation. The Pope is aware of the situation and is close to the mourning Catholic community," Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said in a statement.</p>

<p>"He prays for the victims and their loved ones, so that the violence may cease, so that we may return to look upon ourselves as brothers and sisters and not as enemies, so that the beloved French people may unite to combat evil with good", he said.</p>

<p>Saudi Arabia's foreign ministry issued&nbsp; a statement saying ''We strongly condemn and denounce the terrorist attack that occurred near the Notre Dame church in Nice, France, which resulted in the death and injury of several people.''</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Statement?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Statement</a> | We reiterate the Kingdom's utter rejection of such extremist acts that are inconsistent with all religions, human beliefs and common sense. We affirm the importance of rejecting practices that generate hatred, violence and extremism.</p>
— Foreign Ministry 🇸🇦 (@KSAmofaEN) <a href="https://twitter.com/KSAmofaEN/status/1321821390845214720?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>Taiwan's President,&nbsp;Tsai Ing-wen, also took to Twitter to offer her condolences for the tragic incident. "I’m deeply saddened by the news of the attack at the Notre Dame Basilica in Nice. Taiwan stands with the people of France at this trying time, &amp; supports their values of freedom &amp; diversity," she said.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I’m deeply saddened by the news of the attack at the Notre Dame Basilica in Nice. Taiwan stands with the people of France at this trying time, &amp; supports their values of freedom &amp; diversity.</p>
— 蔡英文 Tsai Ing-wen (@iingwen) <a href="https://twitter.com/iingwen/status/1322021197463212034?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 30, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>&nbsp;Turkey, while offering condolences to the victims' relatives, said&nbsp;"We strongly condemn the attack committed today inside the Notre-Dame church in Nice.''</p>

<p>Earlier,&nbsp;Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan&nbsp;Monday called on his countrymen&nbsp;to boycott French goods as relations between the NATO allies deteriorated over Paris's hardened stance against radical Islam.</p>

<p>"As it has been said in France, 'don't buy Turkish-labelled goods', I call on my people here. Never give credit to French-labelled goods, don't buy them," Erdogan said during a televised speech in Ankara.</p>


A knife-wielding attacker shouting "Allahu Akbar" beheaded a woman and killed two other people in a suspected terrorist act at a church in the French city of Nice on Thursday, while a gunman was shot dead by police in a separate incident.

A knife-wielding attacker shouting "Allahu Akbar" beheaded a woman and killed two other people in a suspected terrorist act at a church in the French city of Nice on Thursday, while a gunman was shot dead by police in a separate incident. Also read: France knife attack live update: Woman beheaded, 3 killed; suspect apprehended Nice mayor, Christian Estrosi said it was a terrorist attack that took place near the Notre Dame church. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to Twitter to condemn the ''heinous attack'' and offer his heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims. I strongly condemn the recent terrorist attacks in France, including today's heinous attack in Nice inside a church. Our deepest and heartfelt condolences to the families of the victims and the people of France. India stands with France in the fight against terrorism. — Narendra Modi (@narendramodi) October 29, 2020 × "I condemn the odious and brutal attack that has just taken place in Nice and I am with France with all my heart," European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen tweeted. Je condamne l'attaque odieuse et brutale qui vient de se dérouler à Nice et suis de tout cœur avec la France. Mes pensées vont aux victimes de cet acte haineux. L’Europe tout entière est solidaire avec la France. Nous restons unis et déterminés face à la barbarie et au fanatisme — Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) October 29, 2020 × British Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the ''barbaric attack'' pledging solidarity with France in the fight against extremism. I am appalled to hear the news from Nice this morning of a barbaric attack at the Notre-Dame Basilica. Our thoughts are with the victims and their families, and the UK stands steadfastly with France against terror and intolerance. — Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) October 29, 2020 × German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Germany stood with France after the "brutal" knife. "I am deeply shaken by the brutal murders in the church in Nice. My thoughts are with the relatives of those murdered and injured. Germany stands with France at this difficult time," she said, in a tweet posted by her spokesman Steffen Seibert. The Kremlin, commenting on recent beheading incidents in France, said it was unacceptable to kill people, but also wrong to insult the feelings of religious believers. Pope Francis prayed for the victims of the attack by a knifeman saying "terrorism and violence can never be accepted". I am close to the Catholic community of #Nice, mourning the attack that sowed death in a place of prayer and consolation. I pray for the victims, for their families and for the beloved French people, that they may respond to evil with good. — Pope Francis (@Pontifex) October 29, 2020 × "Today's attack has sown death in a place of love and consolation. The Pope is aware of the situation and is close to the mourning Catholic community," Vatican spokesman Matteo Bruni said in a statement. "He prays for the victims and their loved ones, so that the violence may cease, so that we may return to look upon ourselves as brothers and sisters and not as enemies, so that the beloved French people may unite to combat evil with good", he said. Saudi Arabia's foreign ministry issued a statement saying ''We strongly condemn and denounce the terrorist attack that occurred near the Notre Dame church in Nice, France, which resulted in the death and injury of several people.'' #Statement | We reiterate the Kingdom's utter rejection of such extremist acts that are inconsistent with all religions, human beliefs and common sense. We affirm the importance of rejecting practices that generate hatred, violence and extremism. — Foreign Ministry 🇸🇦 (@KSAmofaEN) October 29, 2020 × Taiwan's President, Tsai Ing-wen, also took to Twitter to offer her condolences for the tragic incident. "I’m deeply saddened by the news of the attack at the Notre Dame Basilica in Nice. Taiwan stands with the people of France at this trying time, & supports their values of freedom & diversity," she said. I’m deeply saddened by the news of the attack at the Notre Dame Basilica in Nice. Taiwan stands with the people of France at this trying time, & supports their values of freedom & diversity. — 蔡英文 Tsai Ing-wen (@iingwen) October 30, 2020 × Turkey, while offering condolences to the victims' relatives, said "We strongly condemn the attack committed today inside the Notre-Dame church in Nice.'' Earlier, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Monday called on his countrymen to boycott French goods as relations between the NATO allies deteriorated over Paris's hardened stance against radical Islam. "As it has been said in France, 'don't buy Turkish-labelled goods', I call on my people here. Never give credit to French-labelled goods, don't buy them," Erdogan said during a televised speech in Ankara.

France knife attack: World leaders condemn deadly stabbings

<p>Social networking platform Twitter on Thursday&nbsp;labelled&nbsp;Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's tweets on the France knife attack&nbsp;as glorifying violence.</p>

<p>French Minister&nbsp;of State for digital and telecommunications,&nbsp;Cédric O, in a conversation with Twitter's managing director in France, said that Mahathir's account must be immediately suspended.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I just spoke with the MD of <a href="https://twitter.com/TwitterFrance?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@TwitterFrance</a>. The account of <a href="https://twitter.com/chedetofficial?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@chedetofficial</a> must be immediately suspended. If not, <a href="https://twitter.com/Twitter?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@twitter</a> would be an accomplice to a formal call for murder.</p>
— Cédric O (@cedric_o) <a href="https://twitter.com/cedric_o/status/1321814434340360194?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>It comes after&nbsp;Mahathir&nbsp;made a bizarre assertion saying that Muslims had the right to be angry and to "kill millions of French people".</p>

<p><strong>Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/muslims-have-right-to-be-angry-and-kill-millions-of-french-people-former-malaysian-pm-mahathir-mohamad-338808" hreflang="en">Muslims have right to be angry and kill millions of French people: Former Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad</a></strong></p>

<p>In an apparent reference to the colonial times, Mohamad justified this 'right' by mentioning ''massacres of the past".</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">12. Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past.</p>
— Dr Mahathir Mohamad (@chedetofficial) <a href="https://twitter.com/chedetofficial/status/1321765587530338304?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>He&nbsp;posted a series of 13 tweets from his personal Twitter handle and aired his opinions on issues ranging from women's clothing in western countries, West's adherence to their 'own religion', gender equality among other things and lashed out at French President Emmanuel Macron for not being "civilised" and for being "primitive" for targetting Muslims and Islam.</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">But irrespective of the religion professed, angry people kill. The French in the course of their history has killed millions of people. Many were Muslims.</p>
— Dr Mahathir Mohamad (@chedetofficial) <a href="https://twitter.com/chedetofficial/status/1321765585756192771?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>Following which, Twitter issued a warning that the tweets violated its guidelines about ''glorifying violence''.</p>

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<p>Several Muslim-majority countries have denounced remarks by French officials, including President Emmanuel Macron, defending the use of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a French school classroom. The caricatures are seen as blasphemous by Muslims.</p>

<p>The dispute flared after a French teacher who showed his pupils satirical cartoons of the Prophet during a civics lesson was later beheaded in the street by an attacker of Chechen origin.</p>

<p>French officials said the killing was an attack on the core French value of freedom of expression and defended the right to publish the cartoons. Macron has also said he would redouble efforts to stop conservative Islamic beliefs subverting French values.</p>

<p><a href="https://www.wionews.com/videos/ex-malaysian-pm-justifies-france-knife-attack-french-govt-asks-twitter-to-block-mahathirs-account-338900"><strong>Also watch|</strong></a></p>

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Social networking platform Twitter on Thursday labelled Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's tweets on the France knife attack as glorifying violence.

Social networking platform Twitter on Thursday labelled Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad's tweets on the France knife attack as glorifying violence. French Minister of State for digital and telecommunications, Cédric O, in a conversation with Twitter's managing director in France, said that Mahathir's account must be immediately suspended. I just spoke with the MD of @TwitterFrance. The account of @chedetofficial must be immediately suspended. If not, @twitter would be an accomplice to a formal call for murder. — Cédric O (@cedric_o) October 29, 2020 × It comes after Mahathir made a bizarre assertion saying that Muslims had the right to be angry and to "kill millions of French people". Also read: Muslims have right to be angry and kill millions of French people: Former Malaysian PM Mahathir Mohamad In an apparent reference to the colonial times, Mohamad justified this 'right' by mentioning ''massacres of the past". 12. Muslims have a right to be angry and to kill millions of French people for the massacres of the past. — Dr Mahathir Mohamad (@chedetofficial) October 29, 2020 × He posted a series of 13 tweets from his personal Twitter handle and aired his opinions on issues ranging from women's clothing in western countries, West's adherence to their 'own religion', gender equality among other things and lashed out at French President Emmanuel Macron for not being "civilised" and for being "primitive" for targetting Muslims and Islam. But irrespective of the religion professed, angry people kill. The French in the course of their history has killed millions of people. Many were Muslims. — Dr Mahathir Mohamad (@chedetofficial) October 29, 2020 × Following which, Twitter issued a warning that the tweets violated its guidelines about ''glorifying violence''. Several Muslim-majority countries have denounced remarks by French officials, including President Emmanuel Macron, defending the use of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in a French school classroom. The caricatures are seen as blasphemous by Muslims. The dispute flared after a French teacher who showed his pupils satirical cartoons of the Prophet during a civics lesson was later beheaded in the street by an attacker of Chechen origin. French officials said the killing was an attack on the core French value of freedom of expression and defended the right to publish the cartoons. Macron has also said he would redouble efforts to stop conservative Islamic beliefs subverting French values. Also watch| ×

Twitter labels Mahathir's tweet on France for violating rules and 'glorifying violence'

<p>Britain's main opposition Labour party on Friday urged shocked members to stand united against anti-Semitism, appealing against a renewal of internecine "civil war" following the suspension of its left-wing former leader&nbsp;Jeremy&nbsp;Corbyn.</p>

<p>Corbyn was exiled after he downplayed a report that detailed serious failings in the party's handling of persistent anti-Semitism complaints during his 2015-2019 leadership.</p>

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<p>The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said it had found evidence of failure to adequately train people investigating alleged anti-Semitism, political interference in the processing of complaints, and harassment of individuals.</p>

<p>New leader Keir Starmer, calling the report a "day of shame" for Labour, said he was "deeply disappointed" in Corbyn for blaming party critics as well as the media for exaggerating the scale of anti-Semitism.</p>

<p><strong>Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/pro-european-centrist-keir-starmer-elected-new-uk-labour-leader-290578">Pro-European centrist Keir Starmer elected new UK Labour leader</a></strong></p>

<p>Starmer has won strong backing from Jewish groups which, in evidence to the EHRC, detailed a deluge of anti-Semitic abuse online and in party meetings during Corbyn's leadership, including death threats at the hands of left-wingers.</p>

<p>Jewish Labour Movement chair Mike Katz said the decision to suspend Corbyn was "brave and correct", vowing to work with Starmer "and put this shameful period behind us".</p>

<p>But Starmer acknowledged&nbsp;that the suspension had overwhelmed his efforts to "recognise the hurt, draw a line and move on", even as he wages increasingly effective attacks on the Conservative government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic.</p>

<p>Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservatives are trying to exploit Labour's divisions, noting Starmer had continued to serve in Corbyn's shadow cabinet when anti-Semitic incidents were on the rise.</p>

<p>Veteran socialist Corbyn vowed to fight the suspension and his supporters are mobilising, with the radical group Momentum planning an online rally later Friday against Starmer's "naked attack on the left".</p>

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<p dir="ltr" lang="en">I will strongly contest the political intervention to suspend me.<br />
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I’ve made absolutely clear those who deny there has been an antisemitism problem in the Labour Party are wrong.<br />
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I will continue to support a zero tolerance policy towards all forms of racism.</p>
— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) <a href="https://twitter.com/jeremycorbyn/status/1321812345857941511?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 29, 2020</a></blockquote>
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<p>Corbyn ally Len McCluskey, the head of the Unite union, one of Labour's biggest financial backers, said the suspension would "create chaos within the party and in doing so compromise Labour's chances of a general election victory".</p>

<p><strong>'Utter disgrace'&nbsp;</strong></p>

<p>However, voters turned against Corbyn in droves at the last election in December, with Johnson profiting from Labour infighting over Brexit.</p>

<p>Snap polls meanwhile suggested strong public backing for the moderate Starmer's confrontation with his more radical predecessor and attempts to bury the recent past.&nbsp;</p>

<p>"I don't want a split in the Labour party. I stood as the leader of the Labour party on the basis that I would unite the party, but also that I would tackle anti-Semitism," Starmer&nbsp;told Sky News.</p>

<p>"Both of those can be done. There's no reason for a civil war in our party."</p>

<p>Corbyn was propelled from the backbenches to become Labour leader in 2015 after decades of socialist activism, including for Palestinian causes.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Among his supporters, criticism of Israel veered often into anti-Jewish tropes and conspiracies.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The EHRC found damning instances where Corbyn's leadership team underplayed, belittled or ignored complaints by Jewish members, and sometimes actively interfered to support favoured allies.</p>

<p>The charge of political interference means Starmer must tread a fine line between condemning his predecessor's actions and allowing internal party procedures to play out, now that Corbyn is under investigation.</p>

<p>"The leader of the Labour party should now not comment any further, let the process take its course," Starmer said while stressing he opposed "purging" anyone.</p>

<p>Some are showing no such reticence in calling for Corbyn's outright expulsion from Labour.</p>

<p>"A political party founded on the principles of equality and justice, with a proud record of fighting racism, has now been found guilty of breaking the law in its treatment of Jewish people," former Labour MP Ian Austin wrote in the Daily Telegraph.</p>

<p>"What a complete and utter disgrace," said Austin, whose father's family was wiped out in the Holocaust and who urged his constituents to vote for the Conservatives last December.</p>


Britain's main opposition Labour party on Friday urged shocked members to stand united against anti-Semitism, appealing against a renewal of internecine "civil war" following the suspension of its left-wing former leader Jeremy Corbyn.

Britain's main opposition Labour party on Friday urged shocked members to stand united against anti-Semitism, appealing against a renewal of internecine "civil war" following the suspension of its left-wing former leader Jeremy Corbyn. Corbyn was exiled after he downplayed a report that detailed serious failings in the party's handling of persistent anti-Semitism complaints during his 2015-2019 leadership. The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) said it had found evidence of failure to adequately train people investigating alleged anti-Semitism, political interference in the processing of complaints, and harassment of individuals. New leader Keir Starmer, calling the report a "day of shame" for Labour, said he was "deeply disappointed" in Corbyn for blaming party critics as well as the media for exaggerating the scale of anti-Semitism. Also read: Pro-European centrist Keir Starmer elected new UK Labour leader Starmer has won strong backing from Jewish groups which, in evidence to the EHRC, detailed a deluge of anti-Semitic abuse online and in party meetings during Corbyn's leadership, including death threats at the hands of left-wingers. Jewish Labour Movement chair Mike Katz said the decision to suspend Corbyn was "brave and correct", vowing to work with Starmer "and put this shameful period behind us". But Starmer acknowledged that the suspension had overwhelmed his efforts to "recognise the hurt, draw a line and move on", even as he wages increasingly effective attacks on the Conservative government's handling of the coronavirus pandemic. Prime Minister Boris Johnson's Conservatives are trying to exploit Labour's divisions, noting Starmer had continued to serve in Corbyn's shadow cabinet when anti-Semitic incidents were on the rise. Veteran socialist Corbyn vowed to fight the suspension and his supporters are mobilising, with the radical group Momentum planning an online rally later Friday against Starmer's "naked attack on the left". I will strongly contest the political intervention to suspend me. I’ve made absolutely clear those who deny there has been an antisemitism problem in the Labour Party are wrong. I will continue to support a zero tolerance policy towards all forms of racism. — Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) October 29, 2020 × Corbyn ally Len McCluskey, the head of the Unite union, one of Labour's biggest financial backers, said the suspension would "create chaos within the party and in doing so compromise Labour's chances of a general election victory". 'Utter disgrace' However, voters turned against Corbyn in droves at the last election in December, with Johnson profiting from Labour infighting over Brexit. Snap polls meanwhile suggested strong public backing for the moderate Starmer's confrontation with his more radical predecessor and attempts to bury the recent past. "I don't want a split in the Labour party. I stood as the leader of the Labour party on the basis that I would unite the party, but also that I would tackle anti-Semitism," Starmer told Sky News. "Both of those can be done. There's no reason for a civil war in our party." Corbyn was propelled from the backbenches to become Labour leader in 2015 after decades of socialist activism, including for Palestinian causes. Among his supporters, criticism of Israel veered often into anti-Jewish tropes and conspiracies. The EHRC found damning instances where Corbyn's leadership team underplayed, belittled or ignored complaints by Jewish members, and sometimes actively interfered to support favoured allies. The charge of political interference means Starmer must tread a fine line between condemning his predecessor's actions and allowing internal party procedures to play out, now that Corbyn is under investigation. "The leader of the Labour party should now not comment any further, let the process take its course," Starmer said while stressing he opposed "purging" anyone. Some are showing no such reticence in calling for Corbyn's outright expulsion from Labour. "A political party founded on the principles of equality and justice, with a proud record of fighting racism, has now been found guilty of breaking the law in its treatment of Jewish people," former Labour MP Ian Austin wrote in the Daily Telegraph. "What a complete and utter disgrace," said Austin, whose father's family was wiped out in the Holocaust and who urged his constituents to vote for the Conservatives last December.

Britain's opposition party warns against 'civil war' after Corbyn suspension

<p>With four days to go for the US election 2020, President&nbsp;Donald Trump has been dumped by a very famous wax&nbsp;museum called&nbsp;Madame Tussauds.</p>

<p>The waxwork museum Madame Tussauds in Berlin loaded its effigy of TV star-turned Republican presidential candidate into a dumpster on Friday, a move apparently intended to reflect its expectations of next Tuesday's presidential&nbsp;election.</p>

<p><strong>Also read|&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/us-election-2020-president-donald-trumps-wildest-prediction-till-date-338554" hreflang="en">US election 2020: President Donald Trump's wildest prediction till date</a></strong></p>

<p>In what seemed a further calculated insult, the statue of his predecessor and nemesis Barack Obama, who counted Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel among his closest allies, remained in place, beaming and besuited.</p>

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/political-heat-stirs-up-ahead-of-the-us-election-trump-bidens-final-appeal-to-voters-338897/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

<p>"Today's activity is rather of a symbolic character ahead of the&nbsp;elections in the United States," said the museum's marketing manager Orkide Yalcindag. "We here at Madame Tussauds Berlin removed Donald Trump's waxwork as a preparatory measure."</p>

<p>Trump has trailed his Democratic challenger Joe Biden in national opinion polls for months, partly because of widespread disapproval of his handling of the coronavirus&nbsp;pandemic sweeping Europe and the United States, though recent polls have shown him gaining ground in a handful of key states.</p>

<p>Madame Tussauds's display also includes former US&nbsp;presidents: regardless of the outcome, Trump and his dumpster are likely to be wheeled back before long.</p>


With four days to go for the US election 2020, President Donald Trump has been dumped by a very famous wax museum called Madame Tussauds. The waxwork museum Madame Tussauds in Berlin loaded its effigy of TV star-turned Republican presidential candidate into a dumpster on Friday, a move apparently intended to reflect its expectations of next Tuesday's presidential election.

With four days to go for the US election 2020, President Donald Trump has been dumped by a very famous wax museum called Madame Tussauds. The waxwork museum Madame Tussauds in Berlin loaded its effigy of TV star-turned Republican presidential candidate into a dumpster on Friday, a move apparently intended to reflect its expectations of next Tuesday's presidential election. Also read| US election 2020: President Donald Trump's wildest prediction till date In what seemed a further calculated insult, the statue of his predecessor and nemesis Barack Obama, who counted Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel among his closest allies, remained in place, beaming and besuited. "Today's activity is rather of a symbolic character ahead of the elections in the United States," said the museum's marketing manager Orkide Yalcindag. "We here at Madame Tussauds Berlin removed Donald Trump's waxwork as a preparatory measure." Trump has trailed his Democratic challenger Joe Biden in national opinion polls for months, partly because of widespread disapproval of his handling of the coronavirus pandemic sweeping Europe and the United States, though recent polls have shown him gaining ground in a handful of key states. Madame Tussauds's display also includes former US presidents: regardless of the outcome, Trump and his dumpster are likely to be wheeled back before long.

This Madame Tussauds museum dumped US President Donald Trump before the election

<p>The World Health Organization (WHO) should be quickly overhauled, get more powers to handle pandemics and expose its member states' shortfalls in health emergencies, European Union officials said on Friday.</p>

<p>The comments were made at a video conference of EU health ministers that endorsed an EU document on the reform of the U.N. agency which for the first time outlines a series of sweeping changes needed to boost WHO's powers and resources, as exclusively reported by Reuters in September.</p>

<p>The moves followed criticisms that China and other countries did not share information on the COVID-19 pandemic in a timely fashion at its onset.</p>

<p>"The current pandemic challenges us very acutely ... but it is very important that the (WHO) reform debate is held in parallel," German Health Minister Jens Spahn told a news conference.</p>

<p>He did not say when the reform process should begin, but stressed that as a result of the overhaul the WHO should become faster in its reaction to health crises, while its member states should share more information in emergencies.</p>

<p>WHO officials did not immediately respond to an email request for comment.</p>

<p>"It is extremely important we move ahead with this reform," EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides told the same news conference.</p>

<p>After months of international pressure, an independent panel was set up in September to review the global handling of the pandemic. The process to reform the WHO would begin after that, officials had said.</p>

<p>The EU draft document, which will represent the EU's position at a WHO assembly in mid-November, urges the UN&nbsp;agency to make public more quickly how and whether its member states respect their obligations on sharing information on health crises.</p>

<p>The United States has accused the WHO of being too close to China in the first phase of the pandemic, when critics say Beijing was slow in sharing crucial information on the new coronavirus which first appeared in the city of Wuhan.</p>

<p>The WHO has repeatedly dismissed these accusations.</p>

<p>"Transparency on who complies with the rules is fundamental," Kyriakides told ministers at the video conference, according to her speaking notes.</p>

<p>The draft document also says WHO countries should allow independent epidemiological assessments on-site in high risk zones during health crises.</p>


The World Health Organization (WHO) should be quickly overhauled, get more powers to handle pandemics and expose its member states' shortfalls in health emergencies, European Union officials said on Friday.

The World Health Organization (WHO) should be quickly overhauled, get more powers to handle pandemics and expose its member states' shortfalls in health emergencies, European Union officials said on Friday. The comments were made at a video conference of EU health ministers that endorsed an EU document on the reform of the U.N. agency which for the first time outlines a series of sweeping changes needed to boost WHO's powers and resources, as exclusively reported by Reuters in September. The moves followed criticisms that China and other countries did not share information on the COVID-19 pandemic in a timely fashion at its onset. "The current pandemic challenges us very acutely ... but it is very important that the (WHO) reform debate is held in parallel," German Health Minister Jens Spahn told a news conference. He did not say when the reform process should begin, but stressed that as a result of the overhaul the WHO should become faster in its reaction to health crises, while its member states should share more information in emergencies. WHO officials did not immediately respond to an email request for comment. "It is extremely important we move ahead with this reform," EU Health Commissioner Stella Kyriakides told the same news conference. After months of international pressure, an independent panel was set up in September to review the global handling of the pandemic. The process to reform the WHO would begin after that, officials had said. The EU draft document, which will represent the EU's position at a WHO assembly in mid-November, urges the UN agency to make public more quickly how and whether its member states respect their obligations on sharing information on health crises. The United States has accused the WHO of being too close to China in the first phase of the pandemic, when critics say Beijing was slow in sharing crucial information on the new coronavirus which first appeared in the city of Wuhan. The WHO has repeatedly dismissed these accusations. "Transparency on who complies with the rules is fundamental," Kyriakides told ministers at the video conference, according to her speaking notes. The draft document also says WHO countries should allow independent epidemiological assessments on-site in high risk zones during health crises.

EU urges quick WHO reform, asks for more transparency in pandemics

<p>As nationalism, misinformation and the pandemic have emerged as threats to democracy — and a presidential election has roiled the United States — the relatively small nation of Bolivia, in political upheaval for most of its 195-year history, managed a free and fair vote.</p>

<p>It did this amid extreme polarization and racial division, on the back of violent protests, while battling voter distrust and fighting one of the worst coronavirus outbreaks in the world.</p>

<p>Luis Arce, a former economy minister, won with 55% of the vote, a clear sign that much of the country embraced his party’s socialist project. The feared mass protests and violence never happened. And voter turnout hit a historic high at nearly 90%.</p>

<p>Political analysts say Bolivia’s improbable achievement is rooted partly in exhaustion with uncertainty, a well-received government plan for voting, and a pledge by the trailing candidate to respect the outcome. Even with far fewer resources and more challenges than many nations, has Bolivia offered the world a teachable moment?</p>

<p><strong>What was the source of the country’s deep divisions?</strong></p>

<p>Approaching its Oct. 18 election, Bolivia was intensely divided between supporters and critics of Evo Morales, a larger-than-life former leader who had been the country’s first Indigenous president.</p>

<p>For 14 years, Morales had run Bolivia, transforming the country by lifting hundreds of thousands out of poverty, including many Indigenous Bolivians who for centuries had been relegated to the margins of society. Morales’ election was historic, but he lost supporters as he persecuted opponents, harassed journalists, and stacked the judiciary in his favor.</p>

<p>In late 2019, his attempt to run for a fourth term ended in allegations of electoral fraud and in demands from protesters that he step down. The police and armed forces soon joined the call, and he fled the country. Supporters called his ouster a coup.</p>

<p>In the turbulent year that followed, the country was run by a temporary president, Jeanine Añez, who persecuted Morales’ allies and terrified much of the Indigenous population with harsh anti-Morales rhetoric.</p>

<p>After Añez took power, at least 23 Indigenous civilians were killed during pro-Morales demonstrations. State agents were responsible, according to a recent report by the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School and the University Network for Human Rights. No one has been held accountable.</p>

<p>Many Indigenous Bolivians feared that a future with Añez — or any conservative candidate — meant a return to the past.</p>

<p><strong>How did Bolivians feel, going into the elections?</strong></p>

<p>Election Day pitted Morales’ chosen successor, Arce, against a former president, Carlos Mesa.</p>

<p>As the country approached the vote, many on both sides were boiling with anger. There was limited trust in the election system and widespread concern that the result — in any direction — would lead to violence from furious voters.</p>

<p>“All of us are scared,” Aida Pérez, 27, a Mesa supporter, said in the run-up to the vote. After the last election, she said, angry Morales supporters had thrown rocks at her.</p>

<p><strong>How did the country pull off a calm vote?</strong></p>

<p>Electoral observers who had come from around the world, as well as Bolivian experts and voters, attributed the successful vote to several factors.</p>

<p>First, in the aftermath of the 2019 crisis and the mistrust it engendered in the electoral system, Bolivia worked to patch the failures and loopholes in its institutions and processes that had led to problems.</p>

<p>The country overhauled its electoral tribunal, previously filled with Morales loyalists. This was done with input from various stakeholders: The tribunal’s new president, Salvador Romero, was appointed by Añez but only after a negotiation between members of the main parties.</p>

<p>Then, in the months leading up to the election, the tribunal undertook a wide-scale voter education campaign, including television, radio, newspaper, and social media advertisements that sought to repair faith in the voting system by informing the public of changes.</p>

<p>The campaign assured Bolivians of the security of electoral materials, explained how to check registration, and demonstrated Election Day safety measures meant to protect against the virus. A series of videos promoted the idea of voting as a chance to unite the country.</p>

<p>“This generated trust,” said Naledi Lester, an expert working with The Carter Center, an election monitoring group, to assess the vote.</p>

<p>Second, the approach of the underdog candidate helped assure a smooth result. Mesa said repeatedly in the run-up to the election that he would accept the count even if he lost — and he conceded the day after the election, once it was clear from exit polling data that his opponent held a significant lead.</p>

<p>“There wasn’t violence in Bolivia,” said Fernanda Wanderley, who runs the socio-economic institute at the Universidad Católica Boliviana, because Mesa and his followers lost “and they accepted that they lost.”</p>

<p>Añez also accepted the result immediately, as did governments as varied as the United States and Venezuela.</p>

<p><strong>How did Election Day play out?</strong></p>

<p>On Oct. 18, about 7 million Bolivians walked to their polling stations — most businesses shut and driving was prohibited — standing 6 feet apart and wearing medical masks as they waited to cast ballots.</p>

<p>Poll workers sprayed them with disinfectant as they entered voting stations, which were mostly schools with large outdoor patios.</p>

<p>After a painstaking hand count, Arce emerged victorious, with 55% of the vote, 26 points ahead of Mesa.</p>

<p>Days later, Arce held an enormous celebration rally in his stronghold of El Alto, just outside La Paz, the country’s administrative capital, and thousands danced for hours, with no incident. “My heart is happy!” yelled one voter, Nicolasa Balboa, 60.</p>

<p>The Organization of the American States, which had harshly criticized the 2019 vote, called this year’s election “exemplary.”</p>

<p><strong>What part did ordinary Bolivians have in all this?</strong></p>

<p>First, the enormous margin in Arce’s favor made it difficult for his opponents to question the results.</p>

<p>But more important, many in Bolivia attributed the high voter turnout and relative calm to an overwhelming desire to return to democratic norms after a year of, particularly acute upheaval.</p>

<p>Standing in line to vote, many Bolivians described the act — and respect for the result — as a moral duty.</p>

<p>“We never should have arrived at this moment,” Verónica Rocha, 38, a Mesa supporter in La Paz, speaking of the year’s sometimes violent polarization.</p>

<p>“But unfortunately we have. And although the path forward may be difficult, it’s time to begin rebuilding institutions — and our social fabric.”</p>


As nationalism, misinformation and the pandemic have emerged as threats to democracy — and a presidential election has roiled the United States — the relatively small nation of Bolivia, in political upheaval for most of its 195-year history, managed a free and fair vote.

As nationalism, misinformation and the pandemic have emerged as threats to democracy — and a presidential election has roiled the United States — the relatively small nation of Bolivia, in political upheaval for most of its 195-year history, managed a free and fair vote. It did this amid extreme polarization and racial division, on the back of violent protests, while battling voter distrust and fighting one of the worst coronavirus outbreaks in the world. Luis Arce, a former economy minister, won with 55% of the vote, a clear sign that much of the country embraced his party’s socialist project. The feared mass protests and violence never happened. And voter turnout hit a historic high at nearly 90%. Political analysts say Bolivia’s improbable achievement is rooted partly in exhaustion with uncertainty, a well-received government plan for voting, and a pledge by the trailing candidate to respect the outcome. Even with far fewer resources and more challenges than many nations, has Bolivia offered the world a teachable moment? What was the source of the country’s deep divisions? Approaching its Oct. 18 election, Bolivia was intensely divided between supporters and critics of Evo Morales, a larger-than-life former leader who had been the country’s first Indigenous president. For 14 years, Morales had run Bolivia, transforming the country by lifting hundreds of thousands out of poverty, including many Indigenous Bolivians who for centuries had been relegated to the margins of society. Morales’ election was historic, but he lost supporters as he persecuted opponents, harassed journalists, and stacked the judiciary in his favor. In late 2019, his attempt to run for a fourth term ended in allegations of electoral fraud and in demands from protesters that he step down. The police and armed forces soon joined the call, and he fled the country. Supporters called his ouster a coup. In the turbulent year that followed, the country was run by a temporary president, Jeanine Añez, who persecuted Morales’ allies and terrified much of the Indigenous population with harsh anti-Morales rhetoric. After Añez took power, at least 23 Indigenous civilians were killed during pro-Morales demonstrations. State agents were responsible, according to a recent report by the International Human Rights Clinic at Harvard Law School and the University Network for Human Rights. No one has been held accountable. Many Indigenous Bolivians feared that a future with Añez — or any conservative candidate — meant a return to the past. How did Bolivians feel, going into the elections? Election Day pitted Morales’ chosen successor, Arce, against a former president, Carlos Mesa. As the country approached the vote, many on both sides were boiling with anger. There was limited trust in the election system and widespread concern that the result — in any direction — would lead to violence from furious voters. “All of us are scared,” Aida Pérez, 27, a Mesa supporter, said in the run-up to the vote. After the last election, she said, angry Morales supporters had thrown rocks at her. How did the country pull off a calm vote? Electoral observers who had come from around the world, as well as Bolivian experts and voters, attributed the successful vote to several factors. First, in the aftermath of the 2019 crisis and the mistrust it engendered in the electoral system, Bolivia worked to patch the failures and loopholes in its institutions and processes that had led to problems. The country overhauled its electoral tribunal, previously filled with Morales loyalists. This was done with input from various stakeholders: The tribunal’s new president, Salvador Romero, was appointed by Añez but only after a negotiation between members of the main parties. Then, in the months leading up to the election, the tribunal undertook a wide-scale voter education campaign, including television, radio, newspaper, and social media advertisements that sought to repair faith in the voting system by informing the public of changes. The campaign assured Bolivians of the security of electoral materials, explained how to check registration, and demonstrated Election Day safety measures meant to protect against the virus. A series of videos promoted the idea of voting as a chance to unite the country. “This generated trust,” said Naledi Lester, an expert working with The Carter Center, an election monitoring group, to assess the vote. Second, the approach of the underdog candidate helped assure a smooth result. Mesa said repeatedly in the run-up to the election that he would accept the count even if he lost — and he conceded the day after the election, once it was clear from exit polling data that his opponent held a significant lead. “There wasn’t violence in Bolivia,” said Fernanda Wanderley, who runs the socio-economic institute at the Universidad Católica Boliviana, because Mesa and his followers lost “and they accepted that they lost.” Añez also accepted the result immediately, as did governments as varied as the United States and Venezuela. How did Election Day play out? On Oct. 18, about 7 million Bolivians walked to their polling stations — most businesses shut and driving was prohibited — standing 6 feet apart and wearing medical masks as they waited to cast ballots. Poll workers sprayed them with disinfectant as they entered voting stations, which were mostly schools with large outdoor patios. After a painstaking hand count, Arce emerged victorious, with 55% of the vote, 26 points ahead of Mesa. Days later, Arce held an enormous celebration rally in his stronghold of El Alto, just outside La Paz, the country’s administrative capital, and thousands danced for hours, with no incident. “My heart is happy!” yelled one voter, Nicolasa Balboa, 60. The Organization of the American States, which had harshly criticized the 2019 vote, called this year’s election “exemplary.” What part did ordinary Bolivians have in all this? First, the enormous margin in Arce’s favor made it difficult for his opponents to question the results. But more important, many in Bolivia attributed the high voter turnout and relative calm to an overwhelming desire to return to democratic norms after a year of, particularly acute upheaval. Standing in line to vote, many Bolivians described the act — and respect for the result — as a moral duty. “We never should have arrived at this moment,” Verónica Rocha, 38, a Mesa supporter in La Paz, speaking of the year’s sometimes violent polarization. “But unfortunately we have. And although the path forward may be difficult, it’s time to begin rebuilding institutions — and our social fabric.”

From Bolivia, lessons for a successful election

<p>Danish far-right party on Friday announced a&nbsp;campaign to republish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed that a French teacher showed students before being killed, but local media were hesitant.</p>

<p>Pernille Vermund, leader of Nye Borgerlige (The New Right) said&nbsp;"The killing of Samuel Paty triggered the campaign, we want to show our support for his family and for freedom of speech."</p>

<p>On its website, the party launched a fundraiser to "publish advertisements with the drawings of Charlie Hebdo in Danish newspapers."</p>

<p><strong>Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/we-are-in-a-war-french-minister-says-country-must-brace-itself-for-attacks-fueled-by-islamist-ideology-339015">'War against Islamist ideology' means more attacks: French minister</a></strong></p>

<p>The anti-immigration party holds four out of the 179 seats in the Danish parliament.</p>

<p>In Danish media circles, the initiative was greeted with mixed responses.</p>

<p><strong>Also read:&nbsp;<a href="https://www.wionews.com/world/suspect-in-new-charlie-hebdo-attack-wanted-to-avenge-prophet-cartoons-330935">Suspect in new Charlie Hebdo attack wanted to avenge Prophet cartoons</a></strong></p>

<p>Poul Madsen, editor of tabloid Extrabladet said they would only decide on the advertisements when they saw them and "not before."</p>

<p>"We condemn Muslim terrorism and 100 percent support France, the murdered and freedom of speech but always with careful regard to our employees and those especially vulnerable," Madsen posted on Twitter.</p>

<p>Vermund said she was "not at all certain it will be possible" to publish the drawings.</p>

<p>"But as a politician, my obligation is that the development of society goes towards more freedom of speech not less," she said.</p>

<p>Cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed were published by Danish daily Jyllands-Posten in 2005, leading to widespread protests and anger among many Muslim communities, to whom depictions of the prophet are forbidden.</p>

<p>The French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, like other European newspapers, then republished them in 2006 in defence of freedom of speech.</p>

<p>In 2015, the newspaper was the target of a jihadist attack that killed 12 people, among them journalists and cartoonists.</p>


Danish far-right party on Friday announced a campaign to republish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed that a French teacher showed students before being killed, but local media were hesitant.

Danish far-right party on Friday announced a campaign to republish cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed that a French teacher showed students before being killed, but local media were hesitant. Pernille Vermund, leader of Nye Borgerlige (The New Right) said "The killing of Samuel Paty triggered the campaign, we want to show our support for his family and for freedom of speech." On its website, the party launched a fundraiser to "publish advertisements with the drawings of Charlie Hebdo in Danish newspapers." Also read: 'War against Islamist ideology' means more attacks: French minister The anti-immigration party holds four out of the 179 seats in the Danish parliament. In Danish media circles, the initiative was greeted with mixed responses. Also read: Suspect in new Charlie Hebdo attack wanted to avenge Prophet cartoons Poul Madsen, editor of tabloid Extrabladet said they would only decide on the advertisements when they saw them and "not before." "We condemn Muslim terrorism and 100 percent support France, the murdered and freedom of speech but always with careful regard to our employees and those especially vulnerable," Madsen posted on Twitter. Vermund said she was "not at all certain it will be possible" to publish the drawings. "But as a politician, my obligation is that the development of society goes towards more freedom of speech not less," she said. Cartoons depicting the prophet Mohammed were published by Danish daily Jyllands-Posten in 2005, leading to widespread protests and anger among many Muslim communities, to whom depictions of the prophet are forbidden. The French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, like other European newspapers, then republished them in 2006 in defence of freedom of speech. In 2015, the newspaper was the target of a jihadist attack that killed 12 people, among them journalists and cartoonists.

Danish far-right party announces campaign to republish Prophet Mohammed cartoons

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