Новости за 12.01.2023

Afghanistan’s ruling Taliban indicated Thursday they may ease a ban on women’s education, saying work is underway to resolve “this temporary step.”  The statement came in response to a call by an alliance of Muslim-majority countries for the Islamist group to reverse its bans on girls’ education and Afghan female aid workers. The 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation, or OIC, based in Saudi Arabia, convened an “extraordinary meeting” of its executive committee Wednesday to discuss the Taliban curbs on women. Читать дальше...

A Turkish court has convicted the head of Turkey's Medical Association of terrorism propaganda, as rights groups warn of an intensifying legal crackdown on civil society ahead of elections this year. For VOA, Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul.

This week on The Inside Story, a look into the 150th anniversary celebration of Yellowstone National Park. Come visit the beauty and natural wonder of this unique location, learn about its history, and see what's being done to keep it pristine for years to come. Airdate: January 12, 2023

German police Thursday continued efforts to clear hundreds of climate protesters occupying the western village of Luetzerath to prevent the demolition of the town for the expansion of a coal mine. Police began moving in Tuesday after a regional German court Monday rejected the last legal effort by the protesters to stop the demolition of the town located in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia. Utility company RWE wants to extract coal beneath Luetzerath, which it says is necessary to ensure energy security in Germany. Читать дальше...

Israel has vowed to crack down on an armed Palestinian resistance group in the West Bank called the Lion’s Den, which has carried out dozens of attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians over the past six months. Linda Gradstein reports for VOA from Nablus. VOA footage by Ricki Rosen.

Britain and Japan signed a defense agreement Wednesday that could see troops deployed on each other’s territory. As Henry Ridgwell reports, it’s a sign of growing concerns over China’s military power.

U.S. judges will be making important rulings on immigration in 2023, playing a significant role in shaping the nation’s immigration policy. Congress has not revised American immigration laws comprehensively since 1990, and Cornell Law School Professor Stephen Yale-Loehr told VOA that efforts by subsequent administrations to revise the immigration system through executive orders are tied up in court battles.   “Courts are not a good way to manage immigration,” he told VOA.   Here are some of the major cases before the courts. Читать дальше...

A look at the best news photos from around the world.

Documents with classified markings from U.S. President Joe Biden’s time as vice president have been found in the garage of his home in Wilmington, Delaware, the White House said Thursday, days after it confirmed that other sensitive material had been discovered at the Washington think tank where he had an office before running for president in 2020. In the latest disclosure, Richard Sauber, a special counsel to Biden, said that after the initial documents were found at the Penn Biden Center for Diplomacy and Global Engagement... Читать дальше...

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration reported Thursday that air traffic in the United States was largely back to normal one day after a faulty file in a computer system triggered an outage affecting more than 11,000 flights through delays or cancellations. The flight-tracking website FlightAware.com also reported delays and cancellations were back to normal levels for Thursday. FAA officials said they traced the outage to a damaged database file, affecting the Notice to Air Missions System ... Читать дальше...

For years, 51-year-old Rodney Stotts says he was living a dead-end life. Today, he is a different person, teaching young people about birds of prey and the importance of protecting the environment. Maxim Moskalkov has the story. Camera: Sergii Dogotar

Human Rights Watch says African nations need to do more to address the widespread displacement, killings and other abuses that have come about from the continent’s many conflicts. The rights group published a new report this week that summarizes human rights trends in 23 African countries. Mausi Segun, head of Human Rights Watch Africa, said that in many African countries, the population is caught up in conflict and simply has nowhere to turn. "Some of the most egregious of human rights violations... Читать дальше...

Pakistan’s government has rejected British media reports that a uranium-contaminated cargo shipment seized at London’s Heathrow Airport originated from the South Asian nation.   “No information to this effect has been shared with us officially. We are confident that the reports are not factual,” Pakistani Foreign Ministry spokeswomen Mumtaz Zahra Baloch told VOA on Thursday. British police said in a statement earlier this week they had detected “a very small amount of contaminated material after... Читать дальше...

Zambia's former ruling Patriotic Front party has rejected a report by the International Monetary Fund saying corruption flourished under its government. The IMF said this week the political elite under former president Edgar Lungu bent rules to access lucrative government contracts. Current President Hakainde Hichilema pledged to tackle corruption and secured $1.3 billion in IMF debt support after Zambia defaulted to creditors. An IMF mission conducted a study last year focusing on governance... Читать дальше...

Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida is in Canada Thursday for talks with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Kishida is on a tour of Group of Seven, or G-7, leading industrialized countries as Japan assumes the rotating presidency of the group. A statement from Trudeau’s office said the two leaders will discuss Japan’s priorities for its G-7 presidency as well as further strengthening bilateral trade between the two countries.  Kishida arrived in Canada’s capital, Ottawa, after a visit to London Wednesday... Читать дальше...

Doctors Without Borders, known by its French abbreviation MSF,  welcomed Cameroon's release of five members of its staff detained for a year on charges of helping separatists. MSF maintains it helps anyone who needs medical care and says it will only resume work in separatist areas with government security guarantees. The group this week welcomed the military tribunal’s December 29 acquittal of the five workers – four of them Cameroonians and one Indian. The military arrested two of the staff in December 2021 in Nguti... Читать дальше...

Human Rights Watch is voicing concerns about "violence and repression" ahead of Bangladesh's general elections this year, as attacks against opposition political leaders and workers continue to rise. "The ruling Awami League is promising free and fair elections in response to increased international scrutiny but is belying those claims by ramping up repression," Meenakshi Ganguly, the organization's South Asia director said in the group's World Report, published Thursday. Prime Minister Sheikh... Читать дальше...

A statue in Benin of one of the female warriors of Dahomey, which appeared in the Hollywood film 'The Woman King,' was likely built by a sanctioned North Korean company, according to evidence discovered by VOA's Korean Service. In an exclusive interview with VOA, the Beninois government denies the statue was constructed by North Korea. Henry Wilkins reports from Cotonou, Benin.

Palestinian officials said Israeli forces shot dead a Palestinian man Thursday in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian health ministry said the shooting happened during a raid at the Qalandiya refugee camp. Israel’s military said its forces were struck with rocks as they conducted an operation in Qalandiya, and that they responded with live fire. Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters.

International aid agencies, frustrated with the failure of more than a year of international isolation to budge the Taliban from their hard-line and misogynistic policies, are saying it is time for Western nations to send their diplomats back to the Afghan capital, Kabul. All countries have refused to recognize the Taliban administration that seized power in Kabul in August 2022, demanding that the de facto leaders first form an inclusive government, respect the rights of women and ensure their territory does not become a base for terrorists.

The World Health Organization said Wednesday it is calling on China to provide more information about its surge in COVID-19 cases. “WHO still believes that deaths are heavily underreported from China, and this is in relation to the definitions that are used but also to the need for doctors and those reporting in the public health system to be encouraged to report these cases and not discouraged,” Michael Ryan, WHO’s emergencies director, told reporters. Ryan did praise China’s efforts to increase... Читать дальше...

A town in France has decided to hide from public view a sign noting its brief connection to the former supreme leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. The sign, which includes a portrait of Khomeini, stands on private land in Neauphle-Le-Chateau, outside of Paris, but it is visible from the street. Khomeini stayed there for several months in late 1978 and early 1979 before returning to Iran. Amid the current protests in Iran sparked by the death in police custody of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini... Читать дальше...

Hundreds of people have been evacuated from their homes in a Himalayan town in North India where the land is slowly sinking. In Joshimath, panicked residents began moving their belongings out of their homes earlier this month after cracks developed in about 700 of the roughly 4,500 buildings in the town, raising safety concerns. Scores of families have been shifted to relief camps set up in local hotels and schools in recent days and disaster response teams have been deployed. After authorities... Читать дальше...

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s purge of former Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho, who was instrumental in two summits with the U.S. in 2018-19, could have sent “a shock wave” through the ranks of Pyongyang’s diplomats, said experts. If Ri was executed, as some unconfirmed reports have suggested, the shock would be even greater. Ri disappeared from public view two years ago, prompting speculation about his fate. The respected diplomat had played a key role in the summits between North Korean leader... Читать дальше...

Brazilian federal prosecutors on Wednesday requested the investigation of three congressional allies of former President Jair Bolsonaro for allegedly inciting the worst attack on the country's democratic institutions in decades.  The call for the probe came as the government of leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva had prepared stepped-up security measures to face renewed protests on Wednesday, but mass demonstrations proposed on pro-Bolsonaro social media to "retake power" failed to materialize. Читать дальше...