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‘Brutal’ donkey skin trade banned in 55 countries

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Campaigners against the skin trade say it is inhumane and unsustainable (BBC)

Animal welfare charities have welcomed an Africa-wide ban on the controversial donkey skin trade.

It will make it illegal to slaughter donkeys for their skin in 55 countries across the continent. African state leaders approved the ban at the conclusion of the African Union summit in Ethiopia on Sunday.

Demand for the animals’ skins is fuelled by the popularity of an ancient Chinese medicine called Ejiao, traditionally made from donkey hides. Ejiao is believed by some to have anti-ageing and health benefits, although this is unproven. Chinese companies that make it used to use skins from donkeys sourced in China. But when the numbers of the animals in the country plummeted, they looked overseas.

The Charity, the Donkey Sanctuary, called the the trade “brutal and unsustainable” and said it had decimated donkey populations around the world, particularly in Africa and South America. “At first our governments saw this as an opportunity, and many legal slaughterhouses opened in Africa,” explained Dr Solomon Onyango from the Donkey Sanctuary in Kenya. “But, here in Kenya, between 2016 and 2019, about half of our donkeys were killed for the trade,” he said.

A man with his working donkeys in Lamu, Kenya
A donkey can mean the difference between a modest livelihood and destitution for many people in poor, rural communities

Dr Onyango told BBC News that the ban would “go a long way to safeguarding donkeys and the livelihoods of millions of people who rely on them”.

About two-thirds of world’s estimated population of 53 million donkeys are in Africa. People in the poorest, rural communities use them for transport and to carry water, food and other goods.

One recent study in Ethiopia – that set out to measure the economic value of donkeys – showed that owning one could mean the diffeence between destitution and a modest livelihood.

Raphael Kinoti, who is regional director of the animal welfare charity The Brooke in East Africa said this was a “terrific moment for communities in Africa who have benefitted from donkeys since time immemorial”. “Donkey slaughter for its skin has eroded livelihoods in Africa, robbing the continent of its culture, biodiversity and identity,” he said.

“We urge all AU members to uphold the decision for the good of all.”

A child with a donkey
Some worry that, if the trade is not curbed, the next generation will not have access to a donkey (BBC)
(BBC)


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India ‘engaging with US’ after shackled deportees spark anger

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The US military plane carrying Indian deportees landed in Amritsar on Wednesday [BBC]

India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar has told parliament the government is working with the US to ensure Indian citizens are not mistreated while being deported.

His statement came a day after a US military flight brought back 104 Indians accused of entering the US illegally.

One of the deportees told the BBC they had been handcuffed throughout the 40-hour flight, sparking criticism.

But Jaishankar said he had been told by the US that women and children were not restrained. Deportation flights to India had been taking place for several years and US procedures allowed for the use of restraints, he added.

Deportation in the US is organised and executed by the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

“We have been informed by ICE that women and children are not restrained,” Jaishankar said.

He added that according to ICE, the needs of deportees during transit, including for food and medical attention, were attended to and deportees could be unrestrained during bathroom breaks.

“There has been no change from past procedure,” he added.

However Jaspal Singh, one of the deportees on the flight that landed in Amritsar city in the state of Punjab on Wednesday, told BBC Punjabi that he was shackled throughout the flight.

“We were tortured in many ways. My hands and feet were tied after we were put on the plane. The plane stopped at several places,” he said, adding that he was unshackled only after the plane landed in Amritsar.

BBC/Gurpreet Chawla A photo of Jaspal Singh
Jaspal Singh spent 11 days in the US before he was deported [BBC]

The US has not given further details of how deportees were treated on the flight. Officials have said that enforcing immigration laws is “critically important to the national security and public safety of the United States” and it was US policy to “faithfully execute the immigration laws against all inadmissible and removable aliens”.

The US border patrol chief posted video showing deportees in shackles, saying the deportation flight to India was the “farthest deportation flight yet using military transport”.

President Donald Trump has made the mass deportation of undocumented foreign nationals a key policy. The US is said to have identified about 18,000 Indian nationals it believes entered illegally.

Trump has said India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured him that the country would “do what’s right” in accepting US deportations.

In his statement on Thursday, Jaishankar said all countries had an obligation to take back their nationals who had entered other countries illegally. They often faced dangerous journeys and inhumane working conditions once they had reached their destinations, he said.

Fraudulent Indian travel agencies are known to take huge sums of money from people desperate to travel abroad for work, and then make them undertake dangerous journeys to avoid being caught by immigration officials.

Jaspal said he had taken a loan of 4m rupees ($46,000; £37,000] to travel to the US, a dangerous journey that took months and during which he saw bodies in the jungle of other migrants who had died on the route.

[BBC]

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More than 100 women raped and burned alive in DR Congo jailbreak, UN says

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Footage from the jailbreak shows people fleeing from the building as black smoke rises into the air [BBC]

More than 100 female prisoners were raped and then burned alive during a jailbreak in the Congolese city of Goma, according to the UN.

Hundreds of prisoners broke out of Munzenze prison last Monday, after fighters from the M23 rebel group began to take over the city.

Between 165 and 167 women were assaulted by male inmates during the jailbreak, an internal UN document seen by the BBC says.

The report states that most of the women were killed after the inmates set fire to the prison.

The BBC has not been able to verify the reports.

Goma, a major city of more than a million people, was captured after the Rwanda-backed M23 executed a rapid advance through eastern DR Congo.

The city was plunged into chaos, with bodies lying in the streets and missiles reportedly flying over residential homes.

Footage from last week’s jailbreak showed people fleeing from the building as smoke rose in the background. Heavy gunfire could also be heard.

[BBC]

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Philippines feud escalates as lawmakers vote to impeach vice-president

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Sara Duterte, the daughter of former president Rodrigo Duterte, has been accused of misusing millions of dollars in public funds [BBC]

The Philippines’ parliament has voted to impeach Vice-President Sara Duterte following complaints about alleged corruption.

Duterte has been accused of misusing millions of dollars in public funds and threatening to have President Ferdinand ‘Bongbong’ Marcos Jr assassinated.

She has denied the charges and alleged she is the victim of a political vendetta.

The shock move is widely seen as an escalation of the bitter feud between Duterte and Marcos which has kept the nation on edge for months. Both are scions of Philippine political dynasties: she is the daughter of former president Rodrigo Duterte, while he is the son of the late strongman leader Ferdinand Marcos Sr.

A total of 215 out of 306 members of the House of Representatives voted for impeachment, well above the one-third threshold needed for the bill to pass.  The bill will now be heard by the 24-member Senate, which will convene as an impeachment court.

If found guilty, Duterte faces removal from her post and would be the first vice-president in Philippine history to be impeached.  She is expected to stay in office until the Senate delivers its judgement. A trial date has not been set yet.

Duterte is widely perceived as a potential successor to Marcos, who is ineligible to run again in 2028 as the constitution limits presidents to a single six-year term.

An impeachment would effectively bar her from the presidency, as she would be permanently banned from holding public office.

The move comes ahead of the mid-term elections in May, which will be seen as a referendum for Marcos halfway into his term as well a barometer of public support for Duterte.

Duterte has not commented on the impeachment vote. But her elder brother who represents their hometown of Davao in parliament, Paolo Duterte, said the administration was “treading on dangerous ground” with what he described as a “clear act of political persecution”.

Marcos has also not commented on Duterte’s impeachment. In November, he had said it would be a “waste of time” for lawmakers to impeach her when it has more important work to do.

Since the end of Ferdinand Marcos Sr’s dictatorship and the restoration of democracy in 1986, only one sitting president has been impeached – Joseph Estrada in 2000, for alleged corruption.

But his trial ended without a judgement after a popular revolt forced him from power in January 2001.

Only one impeachment trial made it to a verdict, that of former Supreme Court chief justice Renato Corona, who was convicted of corruption in 2012.

Both the Estrada and Corona impeachment trials were highly politicised and divisive affairs and dragged on for months.

What’s behind the Marcos and Duterte feud?

Duterte and Marcos had presented a picture of unity when they ran for the 2022 elections, calling themselves the “UniTeam”.

But cracks began to appear even before they assumed office, when Duterte asked to handle the defence portfolio in Marcos’ cabinet but instead was made education minister.

Their alliance unravelled further soon after they took power, as they pursued their separate political agendas while differing on crucial fronts such as diplomacy.

Their differences on the Philippines’ relationship to the US and China became more pronounced, as encounters between Philippine and Chinese ships in disputed waters became more frequent.

Marcos has pivoted the Philippines back to the US, reversing the pro-China stance of Duterte’s father.

He has also promised a less violent approach against illegal drug rings, dialling back the elder Duterte’s “war on drugs” that left over 6,000 suspects killed, according to a government count.

The lower house of parliament, where Marcos’s allies hold power, then started scrutinising Duterte’s budget requests, particularly her confidential funds which are not covered by state audits.

In July last year, she resigned from the cabinet.

The feud took a dramatic turn a few months later when, in a late-night livestreamed press conference, Duterte said she “talked to a person” to “go kill” Marcos if she were assassinated.

She later said that she was not plotting to assassinate the President and Marcos had dismissed the threat as a “storm in a teacup”.

Getty Images Bongbong Marcos and Sara Duterte
Marcos and Duterte won by a landslide in the 2022 election [BBC]

[BBC]

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