World IN BRIEF Indian soldiers killed in gun battle SRINAGAR—Four suspected rebels and two Indian army soldiers were killed in a gun battle in a village in Indian-administered Kashmir on Sunday, an army spokesman said. The militants were hiding in a south Kashmir village when the army and police surrounded it, a police official said. In the ensuing fire fight four militants and two soldiers were killed. “Four terrorists were killed and four weapons were recovered from the encounter site,” army spokesman in Srinagar, Col Manish told AFP. “Two soldiers were also martyred and three injured during the encounter,” he added. The operation was ongoing, Col Manish said. A civilian, the young son of the owner of the house in which the militants were hiding, was also killed, Jammu and Kashmir police chief SP Vaid told AFP. Three militants managed to escape, a Superintendent of Police, who declined to be identified, told AFP. Kashmir has been divided between India and Pakistan since they won independence from Britain in 1947. Both claim the Himalayan territory in its entirety. AFP
IS fighter stripped of citizenship SYDNEY―An Islamic State fighter has become the first Australian to be stripped of his citizenship under anti-terrorism laws, authorities and reports said. Khaled Sharrouf -- who made headlines in 2014 when he posted an image on Twitter of his young son holding a severed head -- had his citizenship revoked earlier this year, The Australian newspaper reported Saturday. A spokeswoman for the Immigration Minister Peter Dutton confirmed to AFP Sunday a person was stripped of their citizenship but would not provide or confirm further details. Sharrouf is also a Lebanese citizen, The Australian reported. Sharrouf, reportedly aged 35, left Australia for Syria in 2013 with his family. His wife Tara Nettleton reportedly died last year and Sharrouf was believed to have been killed in a drone strike in Iraq in 2015. But later media reports cast doubt on whether he was dead. The fate of their five children is unknown, the newspaper added. The government has been increasingly worried about foreign fighters returning home. Numerous national security laws, including legislation to strip dual nationals linked to terrorism of their citizenship, have been passed since Canberra raised the national threat alert to high in September 2014. AFP
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Protests set against Trump M
EXICO CITY―Mexicans are planning their largest protests yet Sunday against US President Donald Trump, hitting back at his anti-Mexican rhetoric and vows to make the country pay for his “big, beautiful” border wall.
Heir to Saudi throne honored RIYADH―The heir to Saudi Arabia’s throne has been awarded a medal by the new director of the US Central Intelligence Agency, who honored his counter-terrorism work. Mike Pompeo, making his first overseas tour since being confirmed as spy agency chief in late January, made the presentation to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef at a weekend ceremony, the official Saudi Press Agency (SPA) said. Prince Mohammed, 57, has been interior minister since 2012 and has years of experience in intelligence work. Widely respected in the West for his efforts to combat violent extremism, he oversaw a crackdown on Al-Qaeda which killed security officers and foreigners in the kingdom between 2003 and 2007. In 2009 Prince Mohammed survived with only light injuries an assassination attempt by AlQaeda. Pompeo awarded him the George Tenet Medal in recognition of his “excellent intelligence performance, in the domain of counter-terrorism and his unbound contribution to realize world security and peace.” George Tenet was the CIA’s longest-serving director, from 1996 to 2004. Pompeo and Prince Mohammed also held talks on security issues, SPA said. AFP
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2017
FASHION WEEK. A model walks the runway during Charles and Ron at New York Fashion Week Art Hearts Fashion NYFW FW/17 at The Angel Orensanz Foundation on February 11, 2017 in New York City. AFP
Marches are planned in some 20 cities across the country, including the capital, Mexico City, with throngs of people expected to turn out dressed in white and waving the red, white and green of the Mexican flag. Dozens of universities, business associations and civic organizations are backing the protests, which start at 12:00 pm (1800 GMT). “It’s time we citizens combine forces and unite our voices to show our indignation and rejection of President Trump, while contributing to the search for concrete solutions,” said the coalition behind the marches. US-Mexican relations have plunged to their lowest point in decades since Trump took office on January 20. Trump, who launched his presidential campaign calling Mexican immigrants “criminals” and “rapists,” has infuriated the United States’s southern neighbor with his plan to stop illegal immigration by building a wall on the border -- and in particular with his vows to make Mexico pay for it. Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto canceled a January 31 trip to Washington over Trump’s insistence that Mexico pay for the wall. Trump has also wrought havoc on the Mexican economy with his threats to terminate the country’s privileged trade relationship with the United States, blaming Mexico for the loss of American jobs. The Mexican peso has taken a beating nearly every time
Trump insisted on renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), attacked car-makers and other companies that manufacture in Mexico, or vowed to slap steep tariffs on Mexican-made goods. Mexico sends 80 percent of its exports to the United States -- nearly $300 billion in goods in 2015. The confrontation has stoked patriotic pride in Mexico, where US companies like Starbucks, Coca-Cola and McDonald’s are the targets of boycott campaigns and many people have taken to putting the Mexican flag in their profile pictures on social media. That new nationalism appears to be giving a boost to Mexican presidential hopeful Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, whom some political analysts call a “leftist Donald Trump” for his populist, anti-establishment rhetoric. Lopez Obrador -- widely known by his initials, AMLO -was the runner-up in the past two presidential elections. He is leading in opinion polls for presidential elections in 2018 -- and appears to be benefiting from Trump’s anti-Mexican vitriol, which has badly dented the popularity of Pena Nieto and the ruling PRI party, seen by many as too conciliatory toward a bullying neighbor. Ironically, a Lopez Obrador victory next year could work to Trump’s disadvantage, giving him a far more hard-line counterpart to work with. AFP
Turmoil grows over White House correspondents’ dinner WASHINGTON―It is supposed to be a light-hearted gathering of journalists, celebrities and the president, where differences are put aside for good-natured jibes. But amid a bitter war of words between the Trump administration and the Fourth Estate, plans for the 2017 White House Correspondents’ Association Dinner in April have been thrown into turmoil. After President Donald Trump’s repeated barbs against the “dishonest media” and “fake news,” some journalists and media outlets are thinking twice about their par-
ticipation in the April 29 dinner, a tradition that dates back to 1921. “How can media clink glasses with a White House that makes clear its contempt for press freedom and its admiration for (Russian President Vladimir) Putin methods?” tweeted David Frum, a senior editor at The Atlantic. The association, which organizes the annual event that raises money for journalism scholarships, said the dinner will be held as planned. The White House has indicated it is on Trump’s calendar -- de-
spite some doubts about whether he will attend. Opinion editor Robert Schlesinger of US News & World Report said that regardless of what Trump does, “the media should boycott the dinner.” “News organizations should buy tickets as usual (it’s for a good cause) but make other plans that night and if he does attend, let the ratings- and crowd-obsessed narcissist freak address an empty ballroom,” Schlesinger wrote. Ironically, some analysts say the 2011 dinner in which then presi-
dent Barack Obama skewered Trump became a pivotal moment in the billionaire’s decision to make a White House run. In recent years, the dinner has become a star-studded event attracting A-list celebrities ranging from George Clooney to Helen Mirren to Lindsay Lohan, with politics mainly an afterthought. This year, The New Yorker and Vanity Fair have canceled parties they traditionally host as part of the hoopla surrounding the dinner. Also, many stars are avoiding the event this year and no “head-
liner” comedian has committed so far, according to The Hollywood Reporter. - ‘Stick a fork in it’ Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan said the glitzy party and related events around it no longer seem appropriate. “Once merely embarrassing and ridiculous, the annual White House correspondents’ dinner is poised to tip over into journalistic self-abasement,” she wrote. “It’s time to stick a silver-plated fork in it.” AFP
Germany seen electing ‘anti-Trump’ candidate BERLIN―Billed as Germany’s “anti-Trump”, the center-left former foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier is Sunday set to be elected as the new ceremonial head of state. The 61-year-old, who regularly polls as Germany’s most popular politician, will represent the EU’s top economy abroad and act as a kind of moral arbiter for the nation. For the Social Democrats (SPD), his appointment raises the party’s profile just as its candidate Martin Schulz, the former European parliament president, readies to challenge Chancellor Angela Merkel in September elections. Steinmeier is expected to receive a large majority of votes after Merkel’s conservatives, lacking a strong candidate of their own, agreed to back him to replace incumbent Joachim Gauck, 77, a former pastor from ex-communist East Germany. The vote will be held in Berlin’s glass-domed Reichstag building by a 1,260-strong special Federal Assembly, made up of national lawmakers and deputies sent from the country’s 16 states. With his snow white hair, round glasses and dimpled smile, Steinmeier is one of Germany’s best known politicians, having twice served as top diplomat under Merkel for a total of seven years. Though the trained lawyer is usually measured in his speech, in the thick of last year’s US election campaign Steinmeier labelled Donald Trump a “hate
preacher”. After the billionaire won the White House, Steinmeier predicted relations would get “more difficult” and said his staff were struggling to detect any “clear and coherent” foreign policy positions from Trump. As Steinmeier has prepared for the new post, which he assumes on March 19, he has vowed to “be something of a counterweight to the trend of boundless simplification”, calling this approach “the best antidote to the populists”. The Berliner Morgenpost daily judged that Steinmeier looks set to be “the anti-Trump president”. Steinmeier is only known to have lost his cool once, in 2014, when he yelled at Berlin protesters who had accused him of being a “war monger” over his Ukraine policy. The outburst was so unusual it became a minor YouTube hit. A policy wonk by nature, Steinmeier served as advisor and then chief of staff to Merkel’s predecessor, the SPD’s Gerhard Schroeder, coordinating the security services and helping shape biting labour and welfare reforms. In 2009, Steinmeier ran against Merkel and lost badly, only to return years later to serve in her cabinet. Political scientist Michael Broening of the SPD’s think-tank the Friedrich Ebert Foundation said that “as foreign minister, Steinmeier often acted as a voice of reason, bridging gaps and bringing people together”. AFP
INVITATIONAL. Kaique Pacheco rides Mystical during the 15/15 round of the PBR Kansas City Invitational at the Sprint Center on February 11, 2017 in Kansas City, Missouri. AFP