Islamic State Expands Reach In Afghanistan, Threatening West

In this Thursday, May 30, 2019 photo, members of Farmanullah Shirzad's family who fled their village in Nangarhar province in late April as Islamic State group fighters swept through the area, are seen at their temporary home in the city of Jalalabad east of Kabul, Afghanistan. The Islamic State group has lost its caliphate in Syria and Iraq, but in the forbidding mountains of northeastern Afghanistan the group is expanding its footprint, recruiting new fighters and plotting attacks in the United States and other Western countries. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)

BY KATHY GANNON

JALALABAD, AFGHANISTAN (AP) — The Islamic State group has lost its caliphate in Syria and Iraq, but in the forbidding mountains of northeastern Afghanistan the group is expanding its footprint, recruiting new fighters and plotting attacks on the United States and other Western countries, according to U.S. and Afghan security officials.

Nearly two decades after the U.S.-led invasion, the extremist group is seen as an even greater threat than the Taliban because of its increasingly sophisticated military capabilities and its strategy of targeting civilians, both in Afghanistan and abroad. Concerns run so deep that many have come to see the Taliban, which have also clashed with IS, as a potential partner in containing it.

A U.S. intelligence official based in Afghanistan told The Associated Press that a recent wave of attacks in the capital, Kabul, is “practice runs” for even bigger attacks in Europe and the United States.

“This group is the most near-term threat to our homelands from Afghanistan,” the official said on condition of anonymity to preserve his operational security. “The IS core mandate is: You will conduct external attacks” in the U.S. and Europe. “That is their goal. It’s just a matter of time,” he said. “It is very scary.”

Bruce Hoffman, director of the Center for Security Studies at Georgetown University, sees Afghanistan as a possible new base for IS now that it has been driven from Iraq and Syria. “ISIS has invested a disproportionate amount of attention and resources in Afghanistan,” he said, pointing to “huge arms stockpiling” in the east.

A ‘PROVINCE’ OF THE CALIPHATE

The Islamic State affiliate appeared in Afghanistan shortly after the group’s core fighters swept across Syria and Iraq in the summer of 2014, carving out a self-styled caliphate, or Islamic empire, in around a third of both countries. The Afghanistan affiliate refers to itself as the Khorasan Province, a name applied to parts of Afghanistan, Iran and central Asia in the Middle Ages.

The IS affiliate initially numbered just a few dozen fighters, mainly Pakistani Taliban driven from their bases across the border and disgruntled Afghan Taliban attracted to IS’ more extreme ideology. While the Taliban have confined their struggle to Afghanistan, the IS militants pledged allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the reclusive leader of the group in the Middle East, and embraced his call for a worldwide jihad against non-Muslims. Within Afghanistan, IS launched large-scale attacks on minority Shiites, who it views as apostates deserving of death

The group suffered some early stumbles as its leaders were picked off by U.S. airstrikes. But it received a major boost when the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan joined its ranks in 2015. Today it counts thousands of fighters, many from central Asia but also from Arab countries, Chechnya, India and Bangladesh, as well as ethnic Uighurs from China.

The group has long been based in the eastern Nangarhar province, a rugged region along the border with Pakistan, but has a strong presence in northern Afghanistan and of late has expanded into neighboring Kunar province, where it could prove even harder to dislodge. The mountainous province provided shelter for Osama bin Laden for nearly a year after the Taliban’s ouster, and U.S. forces struggled for years to capture and hold high-altitude outposts there, eventually all but surrendering the region to the Taliban.

The area comprising the provinces of Nangarhar, Nuristan, Kunar and Laghman was so dangerous that the U.S.-led coalition assigned an acronym to it in the years after the invasion, referring to it as N2KL. Militants launching shoulder-fired rockets from Kunar’s peaks downed a U.S. Chinook helicopter in 2005, killing 16 Navy SEALs and special operations forces in one of the deadliest single attacks of the war.

Ajmal Omar, a member of the Nangarhar provincial council, says IS now has a presence in all four provinces.

“Right now in Kunar, the right side of the road is Taliban, the left side is Daesh and the government is in the middle,” he said, referring to the group by its Arabic acronym. Speaking inside his heavily fortified home in the provincial capital, Jalalabad, he said neighboring Kunar would soon replace the Middle East as the IS group’s center of gravity.

“When they began in Afghanistan they were maybe 150 Daesh, but today there are thousands and thousands,” he said.

“The bad news is their acquisition of key terrain, height concealment, where they can have easy access to money, weapons, equipment . . .and from where they can plan, train, stage, facilitate and expedite attacks,” said the U.S. intelligence official. “I think expansion of territory in eastern Afghanistan is their number one military objective,” with the goal of eventually encircling Jalalabad, he said.

TURNING TO THE TALIBAN

It’s been nearly 18 years since the U.S. invaded Afghanistan to topple the Taliban, which had harbored al-Qaida when bin Laden and his lieutenants were planning the Sept. 11 attacks. Now military and intelligence officials see the Taliban as a potential ally against a similar threat.

In recent months the Taliban have said they have no ambitions to monopolize power in a post-war Afghanistan, while IS is committed to overthrowing the Kabul government on its path to establishing a global caliphate. The Taliban and IS are sharply divided over ideology and tactics, with the Taliban largely confining their attacks to government targets and Afghan and international security forces. The Taliban and IS have fought each other on a number of occasions, and the Taliban are still the larger and more imposing force.

U.S. envoy Zalmay Khalilzad has held several rounds of talks with the Taliban in recent months in a bid to end America’s longest war. The two sides appear to be closing in on an agreement in which the U.S. would withdraw its forces in return for a pledge from the Taliban to keep the country from being used as a launch pad for global attacks.

“One of the hopes of a negotiated settlement is that it will bring the Taliban into the government and into the fight against IS,” the U.S. intelligence official said. “They know the mountains, they know the terrain. It’s their territory.”

But a negotiated settlement could also prompt an exodus of more radical Taliban fighters to join IS. That process is already underway in parts of northern and eastern Afghanistan, where the Taliban have attacked IS only to lose territory and fighters to the rival extremist group.

Russia, which occupied Afghanistan in the 1980s before being driven out by U.S.-backed Islamic insurgents, has been sounding the alarm about IS for years, and had reached out to the Taliban even before the U.S. talks. During a visit to Kyrgyzstan last month, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu described Afghanistan as a “launch pad” for IS after the group was pushed out of Syria and Iraq.

Russia, like the United States, sees a peace agreement between the Taliban and the Afghan government as the best way of countering the threat posed by IS, and Moscow has held two rounds of informal talks involving the Taliban, government representatives and other prominent Afghans.

But as peace efforts have stumbled in recent months, Russia has turned to more lethal means of containing the threat. Shoigu said Russia has sent heavy equipment, including helicopters and armored vehicles, to Kyrgyz forces, and has boosted combat readiness in its bases in the former Soviet republics of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

THREATENING THE WEST

Without an aggressive counterterrorism strategy, Afghanistan’s IS affiliate will be able to carry out a large-scale attack in the U.S. or Europe within the next year, the U.S. intelligence official said, adding that IS fighters captured in Afghanistan have been found to be in contact with fellow militants in other countries.

Authorities have also already made at least eight arrests in the United States linked to the IS affiliate in Afghanistan.

Martin Azizi-Yarand, the 18-year-old Texan who plotted a 2018 attack on a suburban mall, said he was inspired by IS and was preparing to join the affiliate in Afghanistan. He was sentenced in April to 20 years in jail.

Rakhmat Akilov, the 39-year-old Uzbek who plowed his truck into pedestrians in Stockholm in 2017, also had links with the Afghanistan affiliate, the intelligence official said. “During interrogation he said ‘this is my commander in Afghanistan and he is telling me what to do,’” he said.

Inside Afghanistan, the group is actively recruiting at universities, where it is more likely to find tech-savvy Afghans able to travel abroad, use social media and help plan sophisticated attacks, according to the intelligence official.

The group’s brutal tactics have been on vivid display inside Afghanistan for years. Suicide bombings have killed hundreds of Shiite civilians in Kabul and elsewhere, and residents who have fled areas captured by the group describe a reign of terror not unlike that seen in Syria and Iraq.

Farmanullah Shirzad fled his village in Nangarhar in late April as IS fighters swept through the area.

“I was terrified to stay,” he said. “When Daesh takes over a village, they kill the people, they don’t care about the children and they come into the homes and they take the women.”

Associated Press writers Amir Shah in Kabul, Afghanistan, and Nataliya Vasilyeva in Moscow contributed to this report.

Sudan's Military Blames Protest Leaders For Escalation

In this frame grab from video shops are closed during a general strike, in the Al-Arabi souk business district of Khartoum, Sudan, Sunday, June 9, 2019. The first day of the workweek in Sudan saw shops closed and streets empty as part of a general strike called by protest leaders who are demanding the resignation of the ruling military council. The Sudanese Professionals Association had urged people to stay home to protest a deadly crackdown last week, when security forces violently dispersed the group’s main sit-in camp outside the military headquarters in the capital of Khartoum. (AP Photo)

BASSAM HATOUM, SAMY MAGDY

KHARTOUM, SUDAN (AP) — Sudan’s ruling military blamed the country’s protest movement for an escalation as the second day of the opposition’s general strike kicked in on Monday in the protesters latest bid to pressure the army to hand over power to civilian rule.

For the second day, shops and businesses were closed in the capital, Khartoum, though there was visibly more traffic in the streets than on Sunday, when the strike began.

But the military’s latest harsh words — describing actions by the protest movement as doing major harm to Sudan and its security — reflected that the ruling generals are hardening their stance.

It has been two months since the military ousted Sudan’s longtime autocrat, Omar al-Bashir, on April 11, following months of protests against his rule. The generals put al-Bashir behind bars and took over the country, promising free elections following a transitional period.

The protesters, however, remained in the streets demanding the generals relinquish power right away. The standoff lasted until troops moved in last Monday and violently broke up opposition sit-ins, including the main encampment outside the military headquarters in Khartoum.

Over 100 people have been killed in the violence since then, including more than 40 victims whose bodies were later pulled out of the Nile River in Khartoum. The military-backed Health Ministry disputes the death toll, saying the official total tally of those killed in the violence stands at 61, including three members of the security forces.

On Sunday, the military council said it was willing to return to the talks with what looked like a small concession on a plan offered by the Ethiopian prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, who visited Khartoum last week trying to revive negotiations between the generals and the protest leaders.

The opposition said it accepts Aby as mediator but put forth several conditions to return to negotiations, demanding the military stop arresting opposition figures and restore the internet, among others.

The Sudanese Professionals Association, an umbrella of unions which has been spearheading the protests against al-Bashir since last December, urged the Sudanese to continue the general strike Monday, part of a civil disobedience campaign to press the military.

The union association posted videos and photos on social media it said were of deserted streets and closed shops and businesses in Khartoum’s neighborhood of Gabra and the eastern city of Wad Madani.

According to the protest leaders, the participation in the strike on in the first day exceeded their hopes. They vowed Monday to continue their “peaceful resistance” until the military council is toppled.

The SPA urged people to close up roads again, rebuild dismantled barricades across the country, and avoid clashes with the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces. In a video posted late Sunday, Mohammed al-Asam, an SPA leader, said the first day of the strike was “an unparalleled success.” He urged the Sudanese to continue the campaign peacefully.

Security forces on Sunday removed barricades from main roads and reopened the sit-in area outside the military’s headquarters.

“The solution is to get life paralyzed,” the protest leaders said.

Lt. Gen. Jamaleddine Omar, from the ruling military council, said late Sunday that by closing roads and setting up barricades, the protesters committed a crime.

“The technique of closing the roads and building barricades ... is a full-fledged crime as it deprives people from being able to go about their normal life,” he said.

Omar said the Forces for Declaration of Freedom and Change, which represented the protesters in negotiations with the military council that went on for weeks till the generals suspended the talks earlier this month, are to blame for “all the regrettable events” of the past days.

The protest leaders, by their actions, have “crossed the line of peaceful practices ... and have become a major liability for the country and the people’s security,” he said.

Omar also said the military and the Rapid Support Forces have beefed up their presence across the country “to restore life back to normal.”

In other developments, three rebel leaders arrested in Khartoum last week were released, the state-run SUNA news agency said Monday.

Yasir Arman, deputy head of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement-North was detained Wednesday, while leader Ismail Jalab and the group spokesman Mubarak Ardol were detained Saturday.

___

Magdy reported from Cairo.

California Lawmakers Agree To Health Benefits For Immigrants

File Photo: People march on May Day, also known as International Workers Day, on May 1, 2019 in Los Angeles, California. Thousands are participating in multiple May Day marches and rallies around Los Angeles, calling for support of labor and immigrant concerns such as wage improvement, immigration reform and a citizenship question in the upcoming national census.(Photo by David McNew/Getty Images)

BY ADAM BEAM

SACRAMENTO (NBC LOS ANGELES) -- The agreement means low-income adults between the ages of 19 and 25 living in California illegally would be eligible for California's Medicaid program.

California will become the first state in the country to pay for some adults living in the country illegally to have full health benefits as the solidly liberal state continues to distance itself from President Donald Trump's administration.

Democrats in the state Legislature reached an agreement Sunday afternoon as part of a broader plan to spend $213 billion of state and federal tax money over the next year. The agreement means low-income adults between the ages of 19 and 25 living in California illegally would be eligible for California's Medicaid program, the joint state and federal health insurance program for the poor and disabled.

The legislature also rejected a new tax on residential water bills that Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom had proposed to make improvements to drinking water systems across the state. Lawmakers instead agreed to use $130 million of existing tax revenue.

The Last Living Nun Who Fought Katy Perry's Purchase Of LA Convent Says The Singer 'Has Blood On Her Hands'

Image Combo (L-R): Mel Melcon/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images, Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP

BY ELLEN CRANLEY

LOS ANGELES (INSIDER) -- The last living nun of the convent who fought off Katy Perry's purchase of a Los Angeles property isn't giving up on the feud.

Sister Rita Callanan, 81, told the New York Post that the singer "has blood on her hands" after the lengthy legal battle over the former home of Sisters of the Most Holy and Immaculate Heart of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Los Angeles.

Her comment comes as the home is back on the market after years of legal troubles, and more than a year after 89-year-old Sister Catherine Rose Holzman died in March 2018 while in court battling Perry's lawyers.

Holzman pleaded to KTTV for the singer to back off the sale hours before she died, saying: "To Katy Perry, please stop."

"It's not doing anyone any good except hurting a lot of people," Holzman said as she entered the courthouse with Sister Callanan.

The nuns took aim at Perry after a tangle of ownership issues and their personal disapproval of the singer.

On her mission to woo the nuns into accepting the sale, Perry reportedly sang"Oh Happy Day" for them at a meeting regarding the sale, and showed them a "Jesus" tattoo on her wrist.

It apparently didn't do the trick, as Holzman wrote to an archdiocese official that if they sold to Perry, they would feel they "are being forced to violate our canonical vows to the Catholic Church."

She went further in a 2015 Billboard interview, saying "Katy Perry represents everything we don't believe in," and "it would be a sin to sell to her."

In 2015, Perry ended up buying the convent for $14.5 million in cash from the Los Angeles archdiocese. However, the nuns contend that this was a wrongful sale because they purchased the property with their own money in 1972.

After they were reportedly forced to relocate in 2011, they approved a sale to businesswoman Dana Hollister in 2015. The archdiocese objected to the sale and in 2016, a judge declared the transaction invalid, and Perry and the archdiocese were awarded damages of more than $15 million.

Sister Callanan told the Post: "I really didn't like Katy Perry. I'm sure she doesn't like me."

Dem, GOP Senators Want To Check Trump's Power To Sell Arms To Saudis

President Donald Trump meets with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman at the White House on March 20, 2018. Image: Jonathan Ernst

BY DAN DE LUCE

WASHINGTON (NBC NEWS) — Two senators plan to introduce a bill Monday designed to force a vote on current and future U.S. arms sales and other military support to Saudi Arabia, saying it was time lawmakers checked President Donald Trump's attempts to bypass Congress on foreign policy.

The bill, sponsored by Republican Sen. Todd Young of Indiana and Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut, who both sit on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, marks the latest counterpunch by lawmakers who strongly oppose selling weapons to Saudi Arabia and who are outraged at the Trump administration's recent decision to sidestep Congress on an arms deal worth billions of dollars.

"The process we are setting in motion will allow Congress to weigh in on the totality of our security relationship with Saudi Arabia, not just one arms sale, and restore Congress's role in foreign policy-making," Murphy said in a statement.

Last week, a bipartisan group of senators, including Murphy and Young, proposed nearly two dozen resolutions that would require votes on each of the arms sales that make up the $8.1 billion weapons package to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan announced by the Trump administration on May 24. By law, arm sales require congressional approval but the Trump administration avoided any review by lawmakers for the controversial deal by declaring a national security "emergency," citing the threat posed by Iran.

Now Murphy and Young are proposing a separate resolution that would allow Congress to vote on not only the expedited arms deal last month but to block or restrict future weapons sales and military assistance to Saudi Arabia.

Frustration over Saudi Arabia's killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi and its intervention in Yemen's civil war — and President Trump's reluctance to criticize Riyadh — has sparked a growing bipartisan response in Congress.

"Our arms sales to Saudi Arabia demand Congressional oversight," Sen. Young said in a statement. "This bipartisan resolution simply asks the Secretary of State to report on some basic questions before moving forward with them. The ongoing humanitarian crisis and complicated security environment in Yemen requires our sustained attention and we cannot permit U.S. military equipment to worsen the situation on the ground."

Murphy said the administration "has effectively given a blank check to the Saudis — turning a blind eye to the brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi and allowing their ballistic missile program to expand," and added: "Congress needs to change how we do business with the Kingdom."

In a vote in March to end U.S. military support for the Saudi-led war in Yemen and to curtail presidential war powers, seven Republican senators sided with Democrats to pass the bill. But Trump vetoed the legislation last month.

It remains unclear whether more Republicans will join Democratic senators to form a sufficient majority to overcome a future presidential veto on the new resolutions being proposed on Saudi arms sales.

"We believe we would gain lots of bipartisan support on this," said a Democratic congressional aide, who was not authorized to speak on the record.

The Trump administration has rejected criticism of its staunch support for Saudi Arabia, portraying the country as an important bulwark against Iran, citing Iran's backing of Houthi rebels in Yemen and Houthi rocket attacks into Saudi territory. President Trump often has argued that arms sales to Saudi Arabia are important for U.S. defense companies and generate jobs for Americans.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo defended the decision last month to fast-track the massive arms package, saying the threat from Iran required urgent action and that Washington needed to act as a reliable supplier of weapons and ammunition for its Arab partners.

The State Department, which oversees U.S. arms exports, did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Murphy and Young's resolution.

The resolution cites an obscure provision of the Foreign Assistance Act, which allows Congress to request information on a country's human rights record within 30 days. After receiving a report, Congress can then vote on restricting or halting security assistance to that country, congressional aides said.

Apart from setting up votes on weapons deals for Riyadh, the resolution would also force the administration to offer a public accounting to Congress on the kingdom's human rights record.

The Trump administration has yet to provide a report to Congress as required by law as to whether Saudi Arabia's crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, was personally responsible for the death of Khashoggi, who was killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

U.S. Archbishop Stands With Burkina Faso Church After Recent Attack

A displaced Christian woman prays in front of a grotto with a statue of Mary in Kaya, Burkina Faso, May 16, 2019. Bishops' conferences from Francophone West Africa have pledged solidarity with Christian communities after a spate of Islamist attacks. (Credit: CNS photo/Anne Mimault, Reuters.)

WASHINGTON, D.C. (CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE) - The chairman of the U.S. Bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace offered condolences to the Catholic Church in Burkina Faso following a wave of attacks on churches there.

Archbishop Timothy P. Broglio of the Archdiocese for the Military Services said the U.S. Church stands in solidarity with the Burkinabe people in a letter to Archbishop Paul Yembuado Ouedraogo of Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso, president of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Burkina Faso and Niger.

“I join the Holy Father in his statements and expressions of condolences and support in reaction to these church attacks and add my own following the most recent attack on a Catholic church 26 May in Toulfe that killed four people,” Broglio said in the letter released June 7.

He acknowledged how Burkina Faso has “struggled to build a democratic country where Christians and Muslims” can live side by side in peace. He said he hoped that the Burkinabe people “will persevere and protect liberty, democracy, and the right to freedom of religion.”

Overall, at least 400 people have died in attacks on churches, schools and government buildings in Burkina Faso, whose mostly Muslim-inhabited northern provinces have been targeted by extremists since the October 2014 ouster of President Blaise Compaore.

In the most recent incident, armed assailants broke into Our Lady of All Joy Church in the village of Toulfe during Mass May 26 and opened fire, said Bishop Justin Kientega of Ouahigouya, Burkina Faso. Two people, including an elderly catechist, were wounded, he said.

Local media reported that no group had claimed responsibility for the attack but said that the government had blamed Muslim militants operating in the Sahel region from neighboring Mali.

Burkina Faso: Weakened State Is Paving The Way For Terrorism

Burkinabe protesters march against terrorism. Ahmed Ouoba/AFP

BY ISMAILA KANE

THE CONVERSATION

Last month in northern Burkina Faso there were attacks on a church and on a procession of Catholics. These have raised fears of religious strife in a country where security remains a major challenge. These attacks follow the murder of a pastor and five congregants in Silgadji, in the north, and the kidnapping of a Catholic priest.

These events are part of a violent trend that is mostly affecting the country’s northern and eastern regions. Terrorist attacks and inter-communal conflict – like the massacre of Fulani in Yirgou (north) in early 2019 – there are concerns have many concerned for the West African nation.

Who is responsible for the violence plaguing part of Burkina Faso? Why have Christian communities become targets? To answer these questions, we must first look closely at the country’s political context.
Political instability

The rise in attacks in Burkina Faso is largely attributable to the weakening of the state over the last ten years. This has been driven by political instability. For instance 2011 saw clashes between police and students and a military mutiny, during which several soldiers committed acts of theft and pillage against the populace.

With some difficulty, the then-president Blaise Compaoré eventually re-established control. He dissolved the government to appease critics. But hostilities flared up again when he proposed a change to the constitution to run in the 2015 presidential election. As parliamentarians prepared to vote on the constitutional amendment, he was overthrown in a popular uprising in 2014.

In September 2015, after a period of uncertainty during which the army temporarily took power, the Regiment of Presidential Security attempted a coup. Later that year the transitional government organised a presidential election that brought former prime minister and president of the National Assembly, Roch Marc Christian Kaboré, to the nation’s highest office.

But since his election, the government has had resistance from some groups who believe it is incapable of confronting the country’s multiple challenges.

The central powers in Burkina Faso, and the army in particular, have been substantially weakened by these crises.

In addition to domestic instability, the region is also experiencing significant insecurity, particularly neighbouring Mali. Some attacks have been claimed by Al-Qaeda, who are present in northern Mali. The weakening of the Burkinabe State means it can’t cope with the challenges within its borders or effectively police the borders, which have become very porous.
Weak state

A weakened central power makes it easier for violent groups – like highway bandits, local militias and armed bands of jihadists – to emerge and thrive. These groups carry out various forms of violence, from pillaging to religiously motivated attacks. Jihadi groups flourish in this growing atmosphere of insecurity.

Although these groups usually act under the banner of Al-Qaeda or the Islamic State, they are often homegrown. They rely on local ethnic or religious divisions to gain traction.

This is the case of Ibrahim Dicko’s Ansar ul Islam, operating in the north of Burkina Faso. They exploit the historical rift between the Fulani and the Rimmayɓe communities, whose ancestors were enslaved by the Fulani.

The actions of jihadi groups like this have led to violence, revenge and retaliation, as demonstrated by the Yirgou massacre. Terrorism targets State institutions, like the police, local governments and, increasingly, other religious communities, like Catholics and Protestants.
Targeting other communities to target the State

A look at other groups, like Boko Haram in Nigeria, shows how jihadists will often other religious groups to spark and sustain open religious strife. In Burkina Faso, Christians are a religious minority, accounting for around 20-25% of the population. Repeated attacks against Christian churches, including killings and kidnappings, are part of the terrorists’ strategy to generate tensions between religious communities.

They also attack Christians, particularly Catholics, because of their relationship with the state. The government in Burkina Faso generally protects religious minorities. So an attack against Christians is also an attack against the State. And although a minority, Catholics have had a strong influence on the history of Burkina Faso. Since independence, many of the country’s leaders have been Catholic.

The Catholic Church has a huge influence on society and has acted as a moderator in the country’s times of crisis. By targeting Catholics, these attacks are targeting one of the main pillars of Burkinabe society.

Attacks on churches are also a way to get media attention in a conflict that has so far garnered little international attention. Attacks targeting Christians are a kind of publicity stunt. They are designed to provoke reactions from various groups including potential recruits, competing terrorist groups, the general public, and western embassies.
A central position

Given its central geographical position in West Africa, Burkina Faso is vulnerable to the political instability and influence of neighbouring countries. The gradual weakening of the state has left it open to the actions of violent groups.

From the start, the occupation of northern Mali by jihadists raised concerns among Burkinabe Catholics who are committed to the delicate balance between religious communities. They are also determined to maintain dialogue between Christians and Muslims. It remains to be seen if this will help the country overcome these new threats.

Translated from French by Alice Heathwood for Fast ForWord.

Sudan's Protesters Launch General Strike After Crackdown

Sudanese Americans rally outside the White House in Washington, Saturday, June 8, 2019, in solidarity with Pro-democracy protests in Sudan. Pro-democracy protest leaders in Sudan on Saturday called on Sudanese to take part in acts of civil disobedience in a bid to pressure the military to hand over power after the deadly break-up of their main sit-in in the capital of Khartoum earlier this week. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

BY BASSAN HATOUM, SAMY MAGDY

KHARTOUM, SUDAN (AP) — Shops were closed and streets were empty across Sudan on Sunday, the first day of a general strike called for by protest leaders demanding the resignation of the ruling military council.

The Sudanese Professionals Association had called on people to stay home starting on Sunday, the first day of the work week, in protest at the deadly crackdown last week, when security forces violently dispersed the group’s main sit-in outside the military headquarters in the capital, Khartoum.

The protesters say more than 100 people have been killed since the crackdown began last Monday.

The protesters hope that by bringing daily life to a halt they can force the military to hand over power to civilians. The military overthrew President Omar al-Bashir in April after four months of mass rallies but has refused demonstrators’ demands for an immediate move to civilian rule, instead pushing for a transitional power-sharing arrangement.

An Associated Press journalist saw heavy deployment of troops from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces in several parts of the capital, Khartoum, and its sister city of Omdurman.

Security forces removed barricades from the main roads and opened the sit-in area outside the military’s headquarters for the first time since the dispersal. The SPA urged protesters to avoid clashes with the RSF.

Protesters have accused the RSF, which grew out of the notorious Janjaweed militias used by al-Bashir in the Darfur conflict in the early 2000s, of leading the nationwide crackdown. The SPA has called for the force to be disbanded.

The Sudan Doctors’ Committee, the medical affiliate of the SPA, said at least three people were killed on Sunday, including a young man who was shot dead by the RSF in Khartoum’s Bahri neighborhood. The other two died of their wounds after RSF forces beat them in Omdurman, it said. The committee says 117 people have been killed since Monday.

The opposition Sudanese Congress Party posted video of what it said was a funeral in Bahri. “Blood for blood. We do not accept blood money,” the mourners chanted.

Other videos circulated online showed offices and businesses closed and light traffic, in both Khartoum and the Red Sea city of Port Sudan.

“The peaceful resistance by civil disobedience and the general political strike is the fastest and most effective way to topple the military council.... and to hand over power to a transitional civilian authority,” the SPA said. It called on international agencies to refrain from dealing with the military council.

The SPA posted photos it said were of an empty Khartoum International Airport. It said airport workers and pilots are taking part in the civil disobedience.

The SPA said security forces have arrested and intimidated activists, bankers, doctors, air traffic workers and other professionals in recent days.

“Dozens of airport workers have been arrested by intelligence and the RSF since Monday. We do not know their whereabouts. New workers have been seen in the past days to replace those who took part in the strike,” an airport worker told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity, fearing reprisal.

The state-run SUNA news agency cited authorities as saying the airport was functioning normally and that all workers had reported for duty on Sunday.

The leading opposition Umma party said Saturday that security forces had arrested one of its leaders, Adel al-Mufti, along with other opposition figures, including Mohammed Esmat, a negotiator for the protesters.

Esmat was detained after meeting with the Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed on Friday. Ahmed met separately with the ruling generals and the protest leaders in an effort to revive talks.

A spokesman for the military council did not immediately respond to calls seeking comment.

Pope Francis on Sunday told the faithful in St. Peter’s Square that the news from Sudan is causing “pain and worry.” He prayed that violence would cease and that the common good would be sought through dialogue.

5-Year-Old Girl Paralyzed By Rape Shocks Sierra Leone

In this Thursday, Sept. 27, 2018 file photo, Sierra Leone President Julius Maada Bio addresses the 73rd session of the United Nations General Assembly, at U.N. headquarters. At first no one knew why the 5-year-old girl could no longer move her legs. Some blamed witchcraft but the real reason was more horrific: She had been brutally raped and left paralyzed. The case has brought sexual violence to the forefront in Sierra Leone, where President Julius Maada Bio has declared it a national emergency. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

BY KRISTA LARSON

FREETOWN, SIERRA LEONE (AP) — At first no one knew why the 5-year-old girl could no longer move her legs or control her urine. For months she lay on the ground, unable to walk or play.

Some in the community blamed witchcraft but the real reason was more horrific: The child had been brutally raped and left paralyzed as a result of her injuries.

The case has brought the issue of sexual violence against children to the forefront in Sierra Leone, where such crimes are often dealt with between families in private. In February, President Julius Maada Bio declared sexual violence a national emergency and he has vowed to help the 5-year-old get medical treatment abroad.

But months later the girl’s case has shown just how difficult combating sexual violence can be: Her father objected to the rape being tried in court, requiring police to issue a restraining order so she could continue receiving medical treatment. No court date has been set, not even a prosecutor chosen.

Little has changed, too, for the child whose life was so cruelly affected.

“She doesn’t understand about bail or no bail. But she’s concerned that he’s walking, he’s mobile and she’s not,” said Fatmata Sorie, the lawyer representing the child, about the man who assaulted the girl, whose name is being withheld by The Associated Press because she is a minor.

Fatima Maada Bio, the wife of Sierra Leone’s president, has been vocal in promoting the rights of girls and initially heard about the child’s case. She and her husband later traveled to the Aberdeen Women’s Center where the 5-year-old has been receiving medical care free of charge.

The president’s proclamation in February has not been without controversy despite the widespread support for sexual violence victims: Opposition party legislators objected to the president’s unilateral declaration. The parliament must still approve the measure, though Sierra Leone’s attorney general has ordered judges to start applying it already.

The declaration calls for a special police division to handle sexual assault cases involving minors. Most significantly, it calls for life imprisonment for those convicted of raping children.

The law in the West African nation had carried a maximum penalty of 15 years, with no minimum sentencing requirement. Advocates say one man convicted of raping a 13-year-old served only 24 hours last year.

The man accused in the 5-year-old’s case — who is her uncle — remains jailed without bail while his case is before the country’s high court. A defense lawyer has yet to be assigned.


Health workers at the Aberdeen Women’s Center have determined she was in fact only 4 when the rape took place. Those who have cared for her especially want to see the law fully implemented as a deterrent.

“It’s OK for us to declare such an emergency and to say that we’re going to give life imprisonment. But until it happens to one person, two people — that’s when we start to see the law taking effect,” said Ivy Kalama with the Freedom from Fistula Foundation, which runs the clinic.

The government also must secure the funding to set up a 24-hour call center and train those who would work in the special division for child victims. And it is unclear whether how accessible these new services will be in Sierra Leone’s rural areas.

Sorie, the lawyer, praises the government for its new focus on sexual violence.

“We’re only concerned, however, that ... we’re still waiting for some of these things to happen,” she said.

A year after the assault, the 5-year-old is still unable to walk, and has had to use a hand-crank wheelchair to move around the health center’s grounds. She has been undergoing treatment for bed sores that developed on her back while she was immobile at home for months.

One of her leg bones has broken — health workers believe it is a complication of her paralysis — and now she lies in a hospital bed with her leg in traction.

A tiny foot with specks of pink nail polish peeks out of her cast, which is tethered to the metal bed frame. Nurses coax her to eat so that she can recover more quickly but she wants corn flakes, not rice for breakfast.

She has been out of school for a year and is getting restless.

“Even yesterday she was saying she wants to go to school and is going to need a motorbike,” her mother said in the local Krio language as she bounced her infant son on her lap. “When her grandmother was here sometimes she would ask her grandma: ‘When can I walk again?’”

Associated Press writer Clarence Roy-Macaulay contributed.

Follow Africa news at https://twitter.com/AP_Africa

Scientists Feel Chill Of Crackdown On Fetal Tissue Research

In this Tuesday, May 23, 2017 file photo, activists dressed as characters from "The Handmaid's Tale" chant in the Texas Capitol Rotunda as they protest SB8, a bill that would require health care facilities, including hospitals and abortion clinics, to bury or cremate any fetal remains whether from abortion, miscarriage or stillbirth, and they would be banned from donating aborted fetal tissue to medical researchers in Austin. Tissue left over from elective abortions has been used in scientific research for decades, and is credited with leading to lifesaving vaccines and other advances. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

BY LAURAN NEERGAARD, MALCOLM RITTER & RICARDO ALONSO-ZALDIVAR

WASHINGTON (AP) — To save babies from brain-damaging birth defects, University of Pittsburgh scientist Carolyn Coyne studies placentas from fetuses that otherwise would be discarded — and she’s worried this kind of research is headed for the chopping block.

The Trump administration is cracking down on fetal tissue research , with new hurdles for government-funded scientists around the country who call the special cells vital for fighting a range of health threats. Already, the administration has shut down one university’s work using fetal tissue to test HIV treatments, and is ending other fetal tissue research at the National Institutes of Health.

“I knew this was something that’s going to trickle down to the rest of us,” said Coyne. She uses the placenta, which people may not think of as fetal tissue but technically is classified as such because the fetus produced it, to study how viruses such as Zika get past that protective barrier early in pregnancy.

“It seems to me what we’re moving toward is a ban,” she added. If so, when it comes to unraveling what happens in pregnancy and fetal development, “we’re going to stay ignorant to a lot of things.”

Different types of tissue left over from elective abortions have been used in scientific research for decades, and the work has been credited with leading to lifesaving vaccines and other advances. Under orders from President Donald Trump, the Health and Human Services Department abruptly announced on Wednesday the new restrictions on taxpayer-funded research, but not privately funded work.

Aside from the cancellation of an HIV-related project at the University of California, San Francisco, university-led projects that are funded by the NIH — estimated to be fewer than 200 — aren’t affected right away.

But as researchers seek to renew their funding or propose new studies, HHS said it will have to pass an extra layer of review, beyond today’s strict scientific scrutiny. Each project will have a federal ethics board appointed to recommend whether NIH should grant the money.

HHS hasn’t offered details but under the law authorizing the review process, that board must include not just biomedical experts but a theologian, and the nation’s health secretary can overrule its advice.

“I predict over time we will see a slow and steady elimination of federal funding for research that uses fetal tissue, regardless of how necessary it is,” said University of Wisconsin law professor Alta Charo, a nationally recognized bioethics expert.

Necessity is the crux of a fierce debate between abortion foes and scientists about whether there are alternatives to fetal tissue for research.

Zika offers a glimpse at the difficulty. Somehow, the Zika virus can sneak from the mother’s bloodstream across the placenta, which protects and nourishes the fetus, and target the fetus’ brain. It’s something researchers hope to learn to block.

Studying the placentas of small animals or even monkeys isn’t a substitute because they differ from the human organ, said Emory University researcher Mehul Suthar. For example, the specific type of placental cell where Zika can lurk in humans isn’t thought to be present in mouse placentas.

And because the placenta continually changes as the fetus that created it grows, first-trimester tissue may show a very different vulnerability than a placenta that’s expelled during full-term birth, when it’s no longer defined as fetal tissue but as medical waste.

Suthar recently submitted a new grant application to study first- and second-trimester placental tissue, and is worried about its fate under the still uncertain ethics provision.

It “sounds a bit murky as to what the impact could be,” he said. It could be small, “or it could be an outright ban on what we’re doing.”

Anti-abortion groups argue there are alternatives, such as stem cells, growing organ-like clumps of cells in lab dishes, or using tissue taken from newborns as they have heart surgery.

Indeed, NIH is funding a $20 million program to research alternatives to fetal tissue and to prove whether they work as well.

“Taxpayer funding ought to go to promote alternatives that are already being used in the production of treatments, vaccines and medicines, and to expand approaches that do not depend on the destruction of unborn children,” said Mallory Quigley of the Susan B. Anthony List, which works to elect anti-abortion candidates to public office.

But dozens of medical and science organizations have told HHS there is no substitute for fetal tissue in studying certain — not all — health disorders, such as HIV, Zika, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, spinal cord injury, and a variety of eye diseases.

To Pittsburgh’s Coyne, part of the political debate is a “completely unsubstantiated belief that not allowing research and science is going to prevent or stop abortions, which is not the case.”

Medical research using fetal tissue won’t stop but will move to other countries, said Charo, who advised the Obama administration. The United Kingdom, Australia, Singapore and China are among the countries using fetal tissue to seek breakthroughs.

“Other countries work with this in a regulated fashion and they will continue to outstrip us,” she said. “We have allowed patients’ interests to become collateral damage in the abortion wars.”

Ritter reported from New York.

The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes

Free Traders No More? GOP Warms Up To Trump's Use Of Tariffs

Men carry containers of black-market gasoline, recently brought illegally across the Suchiate River on rafts, near Ciudad Hidalgo, Mexico, Thursday, June 6, 2019. U.S. President Donald Trump has pledged to impose 5% tariffs on Mexican products unless Mexico country prevents Central American migrants from traveling through its territory. Some migrants pay raft operators in order to avoid swimming or going through the official border crossing. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)

BY LISA MASCARO

WASHINGTON (AP) — With President Donald Trump threatening to slap tariffs on goods from Mexico, his transformation of Republican Party trade policy is nearly complete.

Republican lawmakers usually don’t like tariffs. They’re viewed as a tax on consumers and unwanted government intervention in free trade. But many Republicans, unwilling to buck Trump, are prepared to follow the president’s lead and support 5% tariffs on Mexico in his dispute over illegal immigration .

It’s a crossroads for the GOP as the White House is taking the party in a confrontational new direction. The tariffs may, or may not, solve the border crisis. But as with Trump’s tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum and goods from China, the threat alone is sending ripple effects into a jittery economy.

“I’m a free trader but I want equal access,” said Georgia GOP Sen. David Perdue, a former Fortune 500 business executive and close ally of Trump.

“What we’re talking about here is trying to change behavior,” he said. “Here, we need the Mexican government to help us with this avalanche of people that’s coming.”

Said Florida GOP Sen. Rick Scott: “I don’t like it, but I’m going to support the president. ... I want border security.”

As Trump returned Friday from Europe, he was expected to assess the situation ahead of Monday’s deadline for imposing the tariffs. Talks between U.S. and Mexican officials were underway all week.

Trump tweeted from aboard Air Force One there was “a good chance” a deal could be struck. But he added, “If we are unable to make the deal, Mexico will begin paying Tariffs at the 5% level on Monday!”

The administration says Mexico can prevent the tariffs by securing its southern border with Guatemala, cracking down on criminal smuggling organizations and overhauling its asylum system. But it’s unclear if any of the concessions so far will satisfy the president.

During negotiations in Washington, Mexican officials have agreed to deploy 6,000 National Guard troops to the Mexican border with Guatemala to help control the flow of migrants. However, one of the main U.S. demands — that Mexico agree to becoming a “safe third country” for asylum seekers — remained a key topic during Friday’s talks, those monitoring the situation said. Mexico has resisted that demand, which would make it difficult for those who enter Mexico from other countries to claim asylum in the U.S.


“That is being looked at,” Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said Friday during his daily news conference, where he held out hope there was still time before Monday to strike a deal. “I am optimistic that an agreement will be reached.”

The debate is catapulting Republican lawmakers into new terrain, using tariffs not only as economic policy for trading outcomes but as a negotiating tool in an unrelated dispute over immigration policy. The tactic runs counter to long-held GOP views on trade — prioritizing free markets — and is pushing Republicans, particularly those who will be running for re-election alongside Trump in 2020, to fall in line.

Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina said he was prepared to support Trump if the issue comes to a vote. But he also hopes any tariffs are temporary — and don’t dramatically escalate.

“None of us would want to see a long-term tariff imposed,” Tillis said. “I think it’s fair to put it on the table. If it was a 50% tariff we’d be having a different discussion.”

Ever since President Ronald Reagan, there has been an “inexorable movement” within the GOP toward free trade, culminating in passage of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA, said Tim Phillips, president of Americans for Prosperity, a pro-free market group backed by the conservative Koch brothers.

But that’s changing under Trump, and it’s scrambling traditional alliances between Republican lawmakers and America’s business community, putting both on uncertain footing. Trump wants to do away with NAFTA — the new U.S.-Mexico-Canada deal had been heading toward a vote in Congress but could be jeopardized by the tariffs — and he has shelved the Obama-era proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership with more than a dozen nations.

“We’ve got a long road ahead of us to bring that orthodoxy back,” Phillips said.

To be sure, plenty of Republicans are resisting Trump’s transformation. Those from agricultural, manufacturing and border states are particularly opposed to the tariffs on Mexico. Kansas GOP Sen. Pat Roberts called tariffs “a really awkward thing. And tariffs are like shattered glass. You never know where it’s going to end.”

In some ways, Trump’s approach is more in line with liberals, including potential 2020 rivals Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, creating new political cross-currents in the debate.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, long the dominant business group in Washington, has been encouraging the White House and Republican lawmakers to steer away from the Mexico tariffs. The group is evaluating legal options to intervene if they are put in place.

“We do have a real crisis at the border,” said Neil Bradley, the Chamber’s chief policy officer. “But imposing a tax that’s going to be paid for by businesses and consumers won’t solve that problem — and if anything will make it worse.”

With Friday’s jobs numbers pointing to a slowing economy, Bradley said the administration needs to avoid missteps. “Imposing tariffs on everything we import from our No. 1 trading partner would definitely count as a misstep,” he said.

At the same time, it’s not at all clear the tariffs would check the rising number of migrants at the border, a crisis that has vexed the White House. The Department of Homeland Security said this week that U.S. apprehensions of migrants illegally crossing the border in May hit the highest level in more than a decade: 132,887.

Frank Sharry, executive director of the advocacy group America’s Voice, said Trump is taking a “sledgehammer” to a complex migration and refugee problem, which stems from conditions in Central America and is fueled by smugglers capitalizing on the president’s own threats to shut the U.S.-Mexican border.

“This is a regional refugee crisis caused by violence and drought in Central America that has been so thoroughly mismanaged by the failing and flailing Trump administration that they’ve created a humanitarian crisis at our border,” he said. Trump, he said, is “quadrupling down on a failed strategy.”

Warning Trump off the tariffs, some GOP senators have pledged to vote against them in a measure of disapproval that would send a stiff rebuke from his own party.

But Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has not promised to bring a vote forward, and others monitoring the situation doubt he ever will.

And that may be fine with many lawmakers, too. GOP Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri said he understands the president’s frustrations and is willing to consider options.

“You’ve got to fight the fight differently,” he said. “It doesn’t necessarily mean you’re against free trade. It just means you got to take the long view of what free trade looks like.”

Associated Press writers Jill Colvin, Matthew Lee and Luis Alonso Lugo in Washington contributed to this report.