Buddha and Monkey

Tens of thousands protest against India cash ban

Tens of thousands protest against India cash ban

2016-11-28 19:54:55.0

KOLKATA, Nov. 28: (AFP) - Tens of thousands of people turned out Monday for nationwide protests against India's controversial ban on high-value banknotes, which opposition party organisers say has caused a "financial emergency".

India is still reeling from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's shock decision nearly three weeks ago to pull 86 percent of the currency from circulation overnight, triggering a chronic shortage of notes in an economy that operates almost entirely on cash.

Around 25,000 people took to the streets of the eastern city of Kolkata, capital of West Bengal state, whose left-wing Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has warned of "riots and epidemics" if the ban continues.

An estimated 6,000 more turned out to protest in Mumbai, India's western commercial hub, police said.

But many ordinary Indians say they support the scheme if it forces the rich to pay their taxes by making them bank undeclared income. Only a handful of states observed a call for a nationwide protest strike.

"We are protesting against the undeclared financial emergency imposed by the government and the hardships people across the country are facing because of this illegal decision," said Manish Tiwari of the opposition Congress party.

"The decision to demonetise high-value currency was done without any authority and legislation and is clearly illegal."

Owners of the banned 500 and 1,000 rupee ($7.30, $14.60) notes have until the end of the year to deposit them in a bank, and can only directly exchange a small number for new currency.

But authorities have struggled to print enough new notes to meet demand and economists say the ensuing cash crunch will hit growth.

Former prime minister Manmohan Singh, a respected economist, said last week it would shave at least two percentage points off growth, which topped seven percent in the first half of the financial year.

"I do not disagree with the objectives but it is a monumental case of mismanagement," the Congress party lawmaker told parliament.

"The way demonetisation has been implemented, it will hurt agricultural growth and all those people working in the informal sector."

Over 90 percent of transactions in India are conducted in cash and many of the country's poorest have no access to banking.

Many have been left without enough cash to buy food or daily essentials, while farmers have been unable to buy seeds and small traders say business has fallen off a cliff.

Nonetheless Modi has repeatedly defended the scheme, accusing its detractors of being tax evaders and urging all Indians to switch to non-cash payment methods.RSS

Rohingya fleeing Myanmar turned back by Bangladesh

Rohingya fleeing Myanmar turned back by Bangladesh

2016-11-28 19:54:25.0

DHAKA, Nov. 28: (AFP) - Multiple boats packed with Rohingya refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar were turned back by Bangladesh border guards Monday, despite appeals by the country's opposition to provide shelter to the persecuted Muslim minority.

Thousands of desperate Rohingya from Myanmar's western Rakhine state have flooded over the border into Bangladesh in the last week, bringing with them horrifying claims of gang rape, torture and murder at the hands of Myanmar's security forces.

Eight boats attempting to cross the Naf River separating Rakhine from southern Bangladesh were pushed back on Monday after six were refused entry on Sunday, head of the board guards in the Bangladeshi frontier town of Teknaf, Colonel Abuzar Al Zahid, told AFP.

"There were 12 to 13 Rohingya in each of the boats," Zahid said.

Dhaka says thousands more are massed on the border, but has refused urgent international appeals to let them in, instead calling on Myanmar to do more to stop people fleeing.

In the past two weeks, Bangladeshi border guards have prevented more than 1,000 Rohingya, including many women and children, from entering the country by boat, officials told AFP.

Bangladesh's main opposition leader Khaleda Zia late Sunday joined a growing chorus of political parties and hardline Islamist groups in the Muslim majority country calling for the Rohingya to be given shelter.

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At least 30,000 have been internally displaced in Rakhine and many have tried to reach Bangladesh over the last month despite heightened border patrols, and sought refugee amongst the Rohingya refugee population that already live on the Bangladesh side.

Samira Akhter told AFP by phone that she reached an unofficial refugee camp in Bangladesh on Monday, after fleeing her village in Rakhine state with her three children and 49 others.

"The military killed my husband and torched our home. I fled to a hill along with my three children and neighbours. We hid there for a week," said Akhter, 27.

Dudu Mia, a Rohingya leader in the camp, said at least 1,338 had arrived in the community since mid October.

Violence in Rakhine -- home to the stateless ethnic group loathed by many of Myanmar's Buddhist majority -- has surged in the last month after security forces poured into the area following a series of attacks on police posts blamed on local militants.

A UN official said last week Myanmar is engaged in "ethnic cleansing" of Rohingya Muslims, as reports emerged of troops shooting at villagers as they tried to flee.

But Myanmar's new civilian government, led by Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, has rejected the allegations.

Sikh militant commander recaptured after India jailbreak

Sikh militant commander recaptured after India jailbreak

2016-11-28 19:54:04.0

NEW DELHI, Nov. 28: (AFP) - A top Sikh militant commander was recaptured by police in the Indian capital Delhi on Monday, a day after he was freed in a dramatic jailbreak by a gang wearing police uniforms.

Harminder Singh Mintoo, who heads a Sikh separatist group, was arrested on the outskirts of Delhi some 200 kilometres (124 miles) from the high-security prison in Punjab where he had been remanded on terror charges.

"He was caught near Delhi early Monday and will be brought to Punjab," A S Chahal, a senior local police official, told AFP.

Four other inmates who also escaped during the breakout -- members of a local criminal gang jailed for murder -- are still at large, Chahal added.

Mintoo, leader of the Khalistan Liberation Force (KLF) -- a militant group fighting for a Sikh homeland in Punjab -- was arrested in 2014 and was in jail awaiting trial for terrorism offences.

He was freed in an early morning raid on Sunday by at least 10 armed men wearing police uniforms. They stabbed one guard and opened fire before fleeing with the prisoners in cars.

Three policemen were injured in the assault, which prompted a massive hunt for the fugitives.

A woman was killed on a highway a few miles from the prison when police opened fire on her car after the driver allegedly failed to stop at a checkpoint.

Police later said she had no connection with the escapees.

A 2.5 million rupee ($36,000) reward was offered for information on Mintoo's whereabouts. It was not clear if the bounty had played any part in his recapture Monday.

Three top prison officers were sacked or suspended following the jailbreak.

Sunday's raid was the second major prison break in India in less than a month.

In October eight Islamist militants escaped from a jail in central Madhya Pradesh state. They were gunned down hours later in a shootout.

The Sikh separatist insurgency in Punjab largely waned in the late 90s, but several groups remain committed to the Khalistan movement and dozens of alleged Sikh militants are in prison.

The bloody campaign -- launched in the 1970s -- claimed more than 20,000 lives, mostly civilian.

Syria forces take third of rebel-held Aleppo, civilians flee

Syria forces take third of rebel-held Aleppo, civilians flee

2016-11-28 19:53:36.0

ALEPPO, Syria, Nov. 28: (AFP) - Government forces have retaken a third of rebel-held territory in Aleppo, forcing nearly 10,000 civilians to flee as they pressed their offensive to retake Syria's second city.

In a major breakthrough in the push to retake the whole city, regime forces captured six rebel-held districts of eastern Aleppo over the weekend, including Masaken Hanano, the biggest of those in eastern Aleppo.

On Sunday, the 13th day of the operation, they also took control of the adjacent neighbourhoods of Jabal Badra and Baadeeen and captured three others, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

Inzarat, Al-Sakan al-Shaabi and Ain al-Tall have all returned to regime hands and government forces have made large forays into Sakhur and nearby Haidariya, the monitor said.

It said government forces are "in control of most of the northern part" of Aleppo.

"The rebels have lost at least 30 percent of the territory they once controlled in Aleppo," Observatory chief Rami Abdel Rahman said.

The regime gains came as its aircraft pounded rebel positions and amid heavy clashes between the opposition and forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad in the strategic Sakhur district.

Masaken Hanano was the first district the rebels took in the summer of 2012 in a move that divided the city into a rebel-held east and a regime-controlled west.

Around 250,000 civilians besieged for months in the east have faced serious food and fuel shortages.

The Observatory said that nearly 10,000 civilians had fled east Aleppo overnight Saturday -- at least 6,000 to the Kurdish-controlled northern district of Sheikh Maksoud, with the rest fleeing to government-held areas.

"It is the first exodus of this kind from east Aleppo since 2012," Abdel Rahman said.

- Regime sights on Sakhur -

Syrian state television broadcast images of a crowd of civilians including women and children gathered around green buses that it said had come to pick them up in Masaken Hanano.

One woman was shown pushing a stroller and many others carried plastic bags on their heads as bombardment was heard in the distance.

Official media said they were taken "by the army to safe areas".

Yasser al-Youssef, from the rebel group Nureddin al-Zinki, said opposition fighters were consolidating their positions in Sakhur.

"We are strengthening our positions to defend the city and residents, but the aircraft are destroying everything methodically, area by area," he said of a regime campaign of air strikes.

Sakhur lies on a stretch of just 1.5 kilometres (less than a mile) between west Aleppo and Masaken Hanano, now both regime-controlled.

If the regime takes control of Sakhur, east Aleppo would be split in two from north to south, dealing a further blow to the armed opposition.

The latest regime push comes after days of intense bombardment on the east, which has been pounded with air strikes, shelling and barrel bombs.

On Saturday, dozens of families fled Sakhur and Haidariya as regime raids and artillery killed at least 18 civilians in several districts, the Britain-based Observatory said.

At least 225 civilians, including 27 children, have been killed since the government's latest assault on east Aleppo began on November 15.

- IS chemical attack -

Rebel forces also intensified rocket attacks on western districts overnight, killing at least four civilians and wounding dozens, the Observatory said.

Such attacks have killed a total of 27 civilians since the offensive began, among them 11 children.

The United Nations has a plan to deliver aid to Aleppo and evacuate the sick and wounded, which rebel factions have approved but which Damascus has not yet agreed. Guarantees are also needed from regime ally Russia.

Once a commercial and industrial hub, Aleppo has seen some of the worst fighting in Syria's nearly six-year war.

The conflict broke out in 2011 with the brutal repression of anti-government protests, and has since evolved into a complex war involving different factions and foreign powers.

On Sunday, the Turkish army said that 22 pro-Ankara Syrian rebels were hit by a chemical gas attack from Islamic State group jihadists in northern Syria.

The Turkish army is backing the Syrian fighters in an unprecedented cross-border operation it says is targeting both IS and the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militia, which Ankara considers to be a "terrorist" group.

The YPG is a key component of a US-backed Arab-Kurdish alliance fighting to oust IS from its de facto Syria capital of Raqa, after the jihadist group overran large parts of Syria and Iraq in 2014.

Syria's war has killed more than 300,000 people and displaced more than half the population.

UN reports more civilians forced to Mosul, possibly as shields

UN reports more civilians forced to Mosul, possibly as shields

2016-11-01 19:15:29.0

GENEVA, Nov. 1:(AFP) - The UN said Tuesday it had received more reports of Islamic State group fighters forcing thousands of civilians into Mosul, possibly to be used as human shields against advancing Iraqi troops.

The jihadists also reportedly killed another 40 former Iraqi Security Force (ISF) members before dumping their bodies in the river, UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva.

The rights office has listed numerous IS atrocities, including tens of thousands of forced relocations and hundreds of executions, allegedly committed in and around Mosul since a government operation to retake the northern city began last month.

Some of the allegations have been termed "preliminary" and needing more investigation.

Asked about the credibility of the fresh reports, Shamdasani said: "This is raw information. It hasn't gone through our usual verification processes," while stressing that rights office sources were "reliable."

In the early hours of Monday, IS fighters "brought dozens of long trucks and mini-buses to Hamam al-Alil City, south of Mosul, in an attempt to forcibly transfer some 25,000 civilians towards locations in and around Mosul," the rights office said in a statement.

Most of the vehicles were prevented from reaching Mosul because of coalition aircraft patrolling the area, the statement added.Shamdasani said there was "a pattern" of the jihadists surrounding their offices and bases with civilians.

"That seems to support the assertion that they are planning to use these people as human shields as well as to make sure that the area is heavily populated with civilians to frustrate a military operation against them," she added.

Separately on Saturday, 40 ex-ISF officers "were killed and their bodies thrown in the Tigris River," after being kidnapped by IS earlier in the week, Shamdasani further said.

That brings to 296 the number of former Iraqi security officers killed by IS since last Tuesday, according to the UN.RSS