Новости за 23.03.2023

Leaders of Indian minority communities say controversial anti-conversion laws enacted in some states of India are aimed at persecuting and harassing Christian Muslim minorities, as the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has expressed concerns and called for the laws’ revocation. “India’s state-level anti-conversion laws violate international human rights law’s protections for the right to freedom of religion or belief. They impermissibly limit and punish an individual’s right to... Читать дальше...

A 3D-printed rocket goes up before crashing right back down. Plus, a new spacesuit designed with women in mind, and mysterious objects streak the California-night sky. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space.

Kurdish residents of a northwestern Syrian town have been protesting for three consecutive days following the killings of four civilians by members of a Turkish-backed armed group that controls the areas. Locals in the town Jinderis in northwest Syria gathered on March 20 to celebrate the Kurdish New Year, known as Nowruz, but armed men affiliated with the so-called Syrian National Army (SNA) opened fire on them, killing four civilians and injuring at least two others, local media and rights groups reported. Читать дальше...

The U.S. National Weather Service reports a rare tornado touched down Wednesday in a suburb of the city of Los Angeles, California, injuring one person and damaging commercial buildings.  In a report late Wednesday, the NWS said it was the strongest tornado to hit the area since 1983 and just the 46th tornado reported in Los Angeles County since 1950.  The weather service says the tornado touched down late in the morning, Los Angeles time, Wednesday in an industrial park and warehouse district in the suburban city of Montebello. Читать дальше...

Ethiopia’s prime minister has appointed the spokesperson of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front as head of an interim administration in the Tigray region. The appointment is the latest sign of progress in the peace deal that ended the two-year war between the government and the TPLF last November. Getachew Reda’s appointment was announced in a Twitter message from Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s office Thursday. The interim regional administration will be in place until elections are held for the region. Читать дальше...

Amid rallies against the far-right government, Israel's parliament passed a law Thursday to protect the prime minister from being removed from office. The measure, which passed 61-47 in the Knesset, dictates that the prime minister can be deemed unfit to rule only for mental or physical health reasons, and that only he or his government can make that determination.  Critics say the law is tailored to protect Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is in the midst of a corruption trial, facing charges of fraud... Читать дальше...

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

The World Health Organization warns that Cyclone Freddy, which left a trail of death and destruction across southern Africa, has increased the health risks for millions of people in Malawi, Mozambique and Madagascar. It says widespread flooding and torrential rains have caused extensive destruction, exposing more than 1.4 million people to outbreaks of waterborne and other diseases in the three countries affected by Cyclone Freddy’s devastating punch. The WHO reports the record-breaking storm... Читать дальше...

In Namibia, the German-supported Basketball Artists School (BAS) has been helping develop the sport while giving hope to at-risk youth. Beyond basketball, the program teaches life skills to disadvantaged youth and offers after-school meals. Vitalio Angula reports from Windhoek, Namibia. Camera: Dantagob Geingob

Human rights activists say Uganda's passage of an anti-homosexuality bill could be the impetus for similar far-reaching legislation across Africa as anti-gay sentiments grow. More than 30 African states already have laws that ban same-sex relationships. Ghana, for example, has recently introduced anti-LGBTQI bills before parliament in an attempt to criminalize consensual same-sex relationships. On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken "urged the Ugandan government to strongly consider... Читать дальше...

Pakistan's lingering political crisis is deteriorating further after election authorities delayed the polls for a key provincial legislature, a move legal experts and politicians are warning could plunge the nuclear-armed country into a constitutional crisis. The Election Commission of Pakistan, or ECP, tasked with holding national and provincial elections, announced late Wednesday it is moving the vote for the legislative assembly of the Punjab province from April 30 to October 8 after Prime Minister... Читать дальше...

Sikh separatist leader Amritpal Singh was little known inside India until a month ago. Now police have launched a massive manhunt for him in India’s northern Punjab state after his calls for an independent Sikh homeland stoked fears of violence in a region that was gripped by a bloody insurgency four decades ago. The 30-year-old Singh, a self-styled Sikh preacher, catapulted onto the national stage when he and scores of young men brandishing swords and guns stormed a police station in Punjab last month demanding the release of a jailed aide.

The Basketball Africa League has been around since 2019. It is part of the U.S. National Basketball Association or NBA and expanding basketball into Africa with its first season in 2021. A new initiative is opening the way for women players as well. Seydina Aba Gueye has this report from Dakar in this story narrated by Salem Solomon.

In the sprawling Nairobi slum of Kibera, Renice Owino, a young computer programmer, is passing on her knowledge to disadvantaged students. Owino is the founder and driving force behind the “Code with Kids” initiative, which has reached hundreds of children in Nairobi and other areas. Saida Swaleh visited Owino’s classroom in Nairobi and has this story. Camera: Nelson Aruya.

Reported incidents of assault, vandalism and harassment targeting Jews in the United States rose to new “historic levels” last year, the Anti-Defamation League said on Thursday. In its annual “Audit of Antisemitic Incidents,” the Jewish civil rights organization said it documented 3,697 such incidents in 2022, up 36% from 2021, and the highest level since the group started keeping records in 1979. This was the third time in the past five years during which antisemitic incidents have set a record high, the ADL said. Читать дальше...

According to Argentina’s migration data, some 11,000 Russian women have arrived in the country since the start of 2022. Many of them were pregnant and gave birth to children in the South American country. Karina Bafradzhian tells us why. Video: David Gogokhia

Two Cambodian opposition figures have been charged under the country's rarely used lese majeste law with insulting King Norodom Sihamoni for posts made on Facebook about a photograph of the king and Prime Minister Hun Sen. A judge at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court also charged Yim Sinorn and Hun Kosal with incitement to cause serious social unrest in the country, a court document showed. The men, once members of the now-dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), could face a... Читать дальше...

The United States denied a Chinese claim Thursday that Chinese forces drove away a U.S. guided-missile destroyer that had entered Chinese territorial waters.  Tian Junli, a spokesman for China's Southern Theatre Command, said the USS Milius intruded into waters around the Paracel Islands “undermining peace and stability in the South China Sea.”  The U.S. Navy 7th Fleet rejected China’s statement as false, saying the destroyer was “conducting routine operations in the South China Sea and was not... Читать дальше...

An Australian study published Thursday found that up to 138 shallow-water reef species that have suffered sharp declines in the past 10 years now qualify as endangered or critically endangered.      The Reef Life Survey found that larger fish have shown a greater decline than smaller varieties — most likely because of a combination of overfishing and climate change.  Pollution and development are also factors.    In what the survey’s authors say is a clear sign of global warming, population declines... Читать дальше...

A federal appeals court in a sealed order Wednesday directed a lawyer for Donald Trump to turn over to prosecutors documents in the investigation into the former president's retention of classified records at his Florida estate. The ruling is a significant win for the U.S. Justice Department, which has focused for months not only on the classified documents found at Mar-a-Lago but also on why Trump and his representatives resisted demands to return them to the government. It suggests the court... Читать дальше...

A federal judge is expected to rule soon on the fate of a pill that leads to a medication abortion. The drug in question, mifepristone, has been on the market for 20 years, but opponents of abortion rights say it is unsafe. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti explains.

Malawi President Lazarus Chakwera is appealing for additional humanitarian assistance for thousands of Malawians displaced by Cyclone Freddy, which has killed more than 500 people in the country. Chakwera made the urgent request to Malawi’s parliament on Wednesday, when he was presenting an assessment of the impact of the cyclone, which also hit Mozambique. Though the country is receiving a lot of local and international assistance for the victims, he said, more aid is needed. “So many have responded positively to our appeal... Читать дальше...

U.S. authorities have been flying migrants caught illegally crossing the U.S.-Canada border to Texas as part of a deterrence effort to tackle a rise in crossings, according to authorities, flight records and a Reuters witness.  U.S. Border Patrol has quietly transported about 100 migrants this month on two charter flights from Plattsburgh, New York, near the border with Canada, to the Texas cities of Harlingen and El Paso.   The southbound flights from the northern border are a break from past... Читать дальше...

A federal judge in New York ordered Iran's central bank and a European intermediary on Wednesday to pay out $1.68 billion to family members of troops killed in the 1983 car bombing of the U.S. Marine Corps barracks in Lebanon. U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska said a 2019 federal law stripped Bank Markazi, the Iran central bank, of sovereign immunity from the lawsuit, which sought to enforce a judgment against Iran for providing material support to the attackers. The lawsuit also names Luxembourg-based Clearstream Banking SA... Читать дальше...

Worries about recent bank failures and bailouts are rippling through the world economy, from New York to Beijing, and central bankers are working to calm depositors and financial markets. Mike O’Sullivan reports from California, where a major player in the tech industry, Silicon Valley Bank, collapsed earlier this month. Rob Garver contributed.