World News

The United States has issued satellite images and cited intelligence to back its claim that Iran was behind attacks on Saudi oil facilities.

Iran denies involvement in Saturday’s air attacks, which were claimed by Iran-aligned Houthi rebels in Yemen.

But unnamed US officials speaking to US and international media say the direction and extent of the attacks cast doubt on Houthi involvement.

The incident has cut global oil supplies by 5% and prices have soared.

What is the US saying?
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo blamed Iran at the weekend, without providing any evidence, prompting Tehran to accuse Washington of deceit.

Tweeting on Sunday, President Donald Trump stopped short of directly accusing Iran, but suggested possible military action once the perpetrator was known.

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Saudi Arabia oil supply was attacked. There is reason to believe that we know the culprit, are locked and loaded depending on verification, but are waiting to hear from the Kingdom as to who they believe was the cause of this attack, and under what terms we would proceed!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 15, 2019

Unnamed US officials have been speaking to the New York Times, ABC and Reuters.

One official said there were 19 points of impact on the targets and the attacks had come from the west and north-west – not Houthi-controlled territory in Yemen, which lies to the south-west of the Saudi oil facilities.

The officials said that could suggest launch sites in the northern Gulf, Iran or Iraq.

A close-up image of damaged tanks at the Abqaiq processing plant appeared to show impact points on the western side.

Officials quoted by the New York Times said a mix of drones and cruise missiles might have been deployed, but that not all hit their targets at Abqaiq and the Khurais oilfield.

ABC quotes a senior US official as saying that Mr Trump was fully aware that Iran was responsible.

What are the oil markets doing?

The oil price has surged.

Brent crude jumped 10% to $66.28 a barrel, in what Bloomberg describes as the biggest intraday surge since 1988.

West Texas Intermediate rose 8.9% to $59.75 in Asian trading.

Prices eased slightly after President Trump authorised the release of US reserves.

How has Iran reacted?

Iran has yet to respond to the latest US assertions.

But Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif tweeted on Sunday to deride Mr Pompeo, saying that “having failed at max pressure, Sec Pompeo’s turning to max deceit”.

He was referring to the Trump administration’s stated “maximum pressure campaign” which has targeted Iran with sanctions since Washington pulled out of an international agreement to limit the scope of Iran’s nuclear programme.

Why might the Houthis have attacked Saudi Arabia?

The Houthis have repeatedly launched rockets, missiles and drones toward populated areas in Saudi Arabia. The attacks have left at least four civilians dead.

Yemen has been devastated by a conflict that escalated in March 2015, when the Houthis seized control of much of the west of the country and forced President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi to flee abroad.

Alarmed by the rise of a group they believed to be backed militarily by regional Shia power Iran, Saudi Arabia and eight other mostly Sunni Arab states began an air campaign aimed at restoring Mr Hadi’s government and imposed a partial blockade on Yemen.

The UN says the conflict has claimed the lives of at least 7,290 civilians and left 80% of the population – 24 million people – in need of humanitarian assistance or protection, including 10 million who rely on food aid to survive.

Houthi military spokesman Yahya Sarea said on Saturday that operations against Saudi targets would “only grow wider and will be more painful than before, so long as their aggression and blockade continues”.

Source: BBC

At least 34 people are feared drowned after a boat sank in the River Congo.

Police said 76 passengers were rescued from the whaleboat – a flat-bottomed vessel used to transport people on lakes and rivers.

It was travelling to DR Congo’s capital Kinshasa from Mai Ndombe province, north of the city.

The cause of the accident is not yet known, but it is unlikely that passengers were equipped with life jackets.

Accidents on the waterways are common in DR Congo, often caused by overloading and unsafe vessels, correspondents say.

Many passengers on board the whaleboats, which are up to 40 m (130 ft) long and often with two decks, are unable to swim.

The boats are often relied upon as a means of transport, as DR Congo’s road network is poorly maintained.

Source:BBC

A Kenyan MP has demanded that a law be passed to help flight crews deal with passengers battling flatulence on board.

Lilian Achieng Gogo, MP for Rangwe constituency in western Kenya, told parliament that farting passengers were increasingly becoming a security threat because of the discomfort caused to fellow travellers.

“There is one irritant that it is often ignored, and this is the level of farting within the aircraft… If this is not managed well it can cause discomfort and insecurity on board.”

The MP was contributing to a motion about amendments to a law on offences committed on aircraft.

Among her proposed reforms was one that would allow flight crews to dispense anti-flatulent drugs to passengers.

“We should have systems of the food offered onboard and we should have basic medical systems that are able to reduce the level of gas that one can exude within the flight.”

Farting was such an irritant that it could lead to fights on board between travellers, Ms Gogo explained.

“Farting is terrible within the plane.

“We should have basic provision of medicines like Eno… yes this should be done and it should be a practice that is embedded in law.”

The MP also wanted all local and international flights to have paramedics on board, as well as the amount of alcohol served to passengers checked.

“The drinking that happens in flights is terrible, it’s worse than what happens here on the ground. We should have a system where we are able to manage and control… also people’s medical history should be obtained before they are served certain alcoholic drinks for their own security.”

Source: BBC

Mexican Foreign Secretary Marcelo Ebrard said Thursday that Mexico’s government doesn’t agree with an “astonishing” US Supreme Court order that would block migrants from countries other than Mexico and Canada from applying for asylum at US borders.

Speaking at President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s daily news conference, Ebrard said that Mexico has a different policy when it comes to asylum seekers and would never implement such a rule.

“Our policy of refuge, of asylum is a tradition in Mexico,” he said.

The US Supreme Court on Wednesday granted a request by the Trump administration to fully enforce a new rule that would curtail asylum applications by immigrants at the US-Mexico border.

The court said the rule, which requires most immigrants who want asylum to first seek safe haven in a third country through which they had travelled on their way to the United States, could go into effect as litigation challenging its legality continues.

“The United States has a very hardline immigration policy,” Ebrard continued. “The court’s decision is astonishing in the impact that it is going to have.”

Ebrard declined to explain that expected effects, saying that he had various meetings scheduled on Thursday to try to evaluate how Mexico will be affected. But the ruling is likely to drive more Central American migrants to try to irregularly enter the US with the help of smugglers or move them to apply for asylum in Mexico, which is already swamped with applications.

Mexico has long resisted a so-called safe third country agreement with the US that would require migrants to request asylum there first, but the court’s decision appears to have unilaterally brought about the same result.

On Thursday, Lopez Obrador said that he spoke by phone with President Donald Trump a day prior, noting the US president recognised Mexico’s efforts and relations between the two countries were very good.

He also said things were looking better for the ratification of a new free trade agreement between US, Mexico and Canada.

“There are no deep differences, there’s no discrepancy, nothing that could lead them to take measures or apply measures that affect the economy, the development of our country,” Lopez Obrador said. “On the contrary, there’s a very favourable environment for the United States Congress … unbeatable conditions to approve the free trade treaty.”

His conciliatory approach contrasts sharply with a line taken earlier this year by Trump, who tied immigration to economic policy by threatening crippling tariffs on all Mexican imports.

Following Trump’s threat, Mexico cracked down on migrants crossing the country, deployed the National Guard to the southern and northern borders, and tried to contain migrants to the southern part of the country.

It also accepted the expansion of the “Remain in Mexico” policy, under which the US has sent more than 40,000 asylum applicants back across the border to wait in Mexico.

Mexico faces criticism over policies at home

Mexico announced on Friday that it had reduced the flow of migrants arriving at its northern border by 56 percent in three months, and it has said that it’s beginning to invest in the Central American countries responsible for the majority of the migrants.

But leftist Lopez Obrador’s increasingly hardline immigration policies have attracted criticism at home and abroad.

United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet said this week she was concerned that immigration policies implemented in Mexico, the US and some Central American countries “are putting migrants at heightened risk of human rights violations and abuses”.

Asked about her comments Thursday, Ebrard said Mexico also had concerns and requested a meeting with her office to exchange information.

The foreign minister also explained that in return for its work on immigration, Mexico has asked the US government to help stem the tide of guns flowing into Mexico. The country currently has more murders than at any point in at least the past 20 years.

Ebrard said that 70 percent of the crimes committed with guns in Mexico between January and June involved guns purchased in the US.

“Mexico put on the table in this meeting that control of arms trafficking at the border for us is of the same priority ranking as the immigration issue is for them,” Ebrard said, referring to Tuesday talks. The two sides agreed to form a binational commission to track progress on the issue.

Ebrard said Mexico had proposed that the US begin operations at border crossings in San Diego, as well as the Texan cities of El Paso, Laredo, McAllen and Brownsville. He said 41 percent of the guns used in crimes and recovered in Mexico have been traced back to Texas. Mexico wants the US to do more to inspect whether vehicles leaving the country have guns and to investigate gun sales.

“Mexico’s objective would be to freeze arms traffic at the border,” he said. “For that, we need the participation of North American authorities.”

Source: Aljazera

The dispute between ex Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe’s family and the government has overshadowed arrangements for Zimbabweans to pay their respects to the late leader.

Mugabe will not be given a state burial on Sunday at the national Heroes’ Acre site, family spokesman Leo Mugabe announced Thursday. The burial will be a private, family affair, he said to press outside Mugabe’s Blue Roof house.

“There have just been discussions between President Mnangagwa and Mai (Mrs.) Mugabe and it would look like nothing has changed,” said the ex-president’s nephew.

“The family … said they are going to have a private burial. We don’t want the public to come. They don’t want you to know where he is going to be buried. We are not witnessing burial on Sunday, no date has been set for the burial.”

The announcement came after President Emmerson Mnangagwa met with Mugabe’s widow, Grace, and other family members to try to resolve the burial dispute.

Instead of an interment on Sunday, Mugabe’s body will be on view to the public at a place near Mugabe’s birthplace in Zvimba district, said Leo Mugabe, who added that the family had not decided if he would be buried in Zvimba.

Speaking at the Mugabe house, Mnangagwa said his government would respect the family’s wishes over the burial, saying they have “the full support of the government. Nothing will change.”

The ongoing uncertainty of the burial of Mugabe, who died last week in Singapore at the age of 95, has eclipsed the elaborate plans for Zimbabweans to pay their respects to the former guerrilla leader at several historic sites.

The burial dispute has also highlighted the lasting acrimony between Mnangagwa and Mugabe’s wife and other family members. Mugabe was deposed in November 2017 by Zimbabwe’s military and his former ally Mnangagwa. Grace and other family members still resent his ouster, apparently resulting in their refusal to go along with state burial plans.

Shortly after Mugabe’s death, Leo Mugabe said the former strongman died “a very bitter man” because he felt betrayed by Mnangagwa and the army generals who were his allies for close to four decades before they put him under house arrest and forced him to resign.

It has long been taken for granted that Mugabe would be buried at Heroes’ Acre monument, a burial place reserved for top officials of Zimbabwe’s ruling ZANU-PF party who contributed to ending white colonial rule.

Mugabe had overseen the construction by North Korea of the monument atop a prominent hill and featuring a grandiose towering sculpture of guerrilla fighters. Mugabe gave many speeches at the site and his first wife, Sally, is buried there next to a gravesite long reserved for the ex-leader.

Mugabe’s casket will be displayed to the public at several sites. It will also be shown Friday at Rufaro Stadium.

On Saturday a ceremony will be held at the National Sports Stadium, which several African heads of state and other prominent officials are expected to attend. Supporters of the ruling ZANU-PF party are being bused from all over the country to go to the stadium ceremonies.

Grace Mugabe is expected to stay beside the casket the entire time.

Earlier Thursday at Blue Roof, Mugabe’s 25-bedroom mansion in Harare’s posh Borrowdale suburb, Zimbabwe’s opposition leader paid his respects to the man who had been his bitter political foe.

“I am here to do the African thing that is expected … to pay honor,” said Nelson Chamisa, leader of the Movement for Democratic Change, the main opposition party.

“In politics we have had many differences but we are here to reflect on his contribution.

“… We are here to pay condolences to the Mugabe family, all Zimbabweans and indeed the whole of Africa. It is only fair and necessary to see that we unite to see that he is given a decent burial and a peaceful send off. Today is a day of mourning.

Source: APNnws

Global oil demand is weathering economic headwinds, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Thursday, buoyed by lower prices brought on by abundant supply as the United States briefly dethroned Saudi Arabia as the world’s top exporter.

“With oil prices currently about 20% lower than a year ago, there will be support for consumers,” the IEA said in its monthly report.

“Booming shale production has allowed the U.S. to close in on, and briefly overtake, Saudi Arabia as the world’s top oil exporter … in June, after crude exports surged above 3 million barrels per day (bpd).”

The Paris-based agency maintained its estimate for growth in global oil demand during 2019 at 1.1 million bpd and 1.3 million bpd for next year, assuming no further breakdown in U.S.-China trade talks and citing an easing of tensions around Iran.

A rebound in U.S. production following Hurricane Dorian along with steep output growth from Brazil and the North Sea were set to drive production from outside the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) up sharply, it added.

Non-OPEC production growth is seen rising to 2.3 million bpd in 2020, up 400,000 from this year. Meanwhile, demand for OPEC crude is set to reach 28.3 million bpd in the first half of 2020, 1.4 million bpd less than the group produced in August.

The discrepancy may prompt OPEC and its allies including Russia to revisit their production-curbing pact.

“The implied market balance (will be) returning to a significant surplus and placing pressure on prices,” the IEA said. “The challenge of market management remains a daunting one well into 2020.”

Source: Reuters