World

Afghan judges in Brazil still fear the Taliban

A female judge, Muska, was hiding with her family from newly empowered Taliban militants in Afghanistan when an apparent reading mistake 7,000 miles away helped to drastically change her life.

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Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro opened his nation’s doors to potential refugees from the Asian nation during remarks at the United Nations General Assembly on Sept. 21.

“We will grant humanitarian visas for Afghan Christians, women, children and judges,” he read on the teleprompter — apparently mispronouncing the final word, which was “jovens” — youngsters — in his printed speech as “juizes,” or judges.

Error or not, his government fulfilled that offer.

Muska and her family were taken by bus to the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and were then flown to Greece with six female colleagues.

By the end of October, they found themselves in Brazil — a country with very little in common with Afghanistan beyond their shared love of soccer.

Speaking to international media for the first time, Muska told The Associated Press this week that she and the other judges still fear retribution from the Taliban — some of whose members had been sentenced for various crimes in their courts.

She asked that her true name not be used, nor her precise location — at a Brazilian military installation — be published. Her colleagues declined to speak to the news media.

Muska had been a judge for almost ten years before the Taliban captured power in August and she said her home in the capital, Kabul, had recently been searched.

Afghanistan had about 300 female judges, Muska said, and many are now in hiding, their bank accounts frozen.

“We knew they (the Taliban) wouldn’t let the women judges work. We would have serious threats to our lives,” she said. “They released all the criminals from the prison. These were the criminals that we sentenced.”

The judges who remain “are very scared, in hiding. They have serious financial problems, no salary, lost their jobs, had their bank accounts blocked. They are still in danger,” the judge said. “It is not good in Kabul.”

The Taliban won widespread support in Afghanistan in part because the toppled US-backed government was widely seen as corrupt.

“But women judges were the bravest, strongest and most honest officials in the previous administration,” said Muska, who said the decision by US President Joe Biden to end American presence in the country meant she quickly had to leave.

“Everything happened suddenly,” she said.

Judge Renata Gil, the head of the Brazilian Association of Magistrates that is sponsoring the refugees, said the Afghans arrived “in a lot of fear, still feeling threatened.”

“They are being chased because they convicted Taliban fighters,” she said noting that she herself had received death threats “because I sentenced drug dealers. For women this is much harder.”

Speaking at the association’s headquarters in the capital, Brasilia, she said, “I hope they are able to live their lives independently. But as long as they need, we will be here to help.”

The judges and their 19 family members — apparently the only Afghan refugees who have come to Brazil since the Taliban returned to power — now have Brazilian bank accounts and health care. Those who can are taking lessons in Portuguese.

It’s not clear yet what the future holds for them in Brazil, where at least they are protected. But Muska said they’d like to return home one day.

“I hope I can join my family members in Kabul. I have this dream I am in my house. I miss everything,” the judge said.

Muska hasn’t seen much of Brazil due to security reasons, difficulties with the language and her own fears. But she has found people with empathy for her situation.

“They cry with us, we know they can sense our feelings,” the judge said with tears in her eyes.

Muska’s three children, including a toddler, are also having a tough time adapting. The judge used to have her parents and nannies to help, but in Brazil she’s largely on her own, while worrying about her future, and theirs.

The children look happy and energetic as they run and jump at a public playground, speaking Dari among themselves. But the judge said her eldest daughter has questions she cannot answer.

“She is always asking about my parents, her friends, her cousins,” Muska said. “She always asks us questions about the Taliban, if they will kill us.”

Despite the difficulties, Muska said she believes the future will be brighter for her children than for those still in Afghanistan.

“I have hope for them. That they have their studies in a good situation, in a good educational system,” she said. “They will have their choice on what they can do.”

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World

Gulf states appeal to US on Israeli minister’s Palestinian comments

The Gulf Cooperation Council said Sunday it had written to Washington’s top diplomat condemning controversial comments from Israel’s finance minister in which he denied the existence of a Palestinian people.

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The GCC, in a letter to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, called on Washington “to assume its responsibilities in responding to all measures and statements that target the Palestinian people”.

The letter from the six-member GCC’s foreign ministers also called on the US “to play its role in reaching a just, comprehensive and lasting solution” to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Israel’s far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, speaking earlier this month, said that the Palestinians did not exist as a people, comments that sparked outrage among Arab nations.

The US State Department said they had found Smotrich’s comments “to not only be inaccurate but also deeply concerning and dangerous.”

Smotrich is part of veteran Israeli leader Benjamin Netanyahu’s hard-right government that took office in December.

The GCC ministers also denounced earlier remarks by Smotrich, calling for the Palestinian town of Huwara in the West Bank to be “wiped out” after two Israelis were shot dead there by an alleged Hamas militant in February, remarks he later walked back.

The GCC, whose foreign ministers met in Riyadh last week, includes the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain, which normalized relations with Israel under the US-crafted 2020 Abraham Accords, as well as Saudi Arabia, which has not.

Violence has intensified in the West Bank in recent months, which Israel has occupied since the Six-Day War of 1967.

On Tuesday, the State Department criticized a move by Israel’s parliament to annul part of a law banning Israelis from living in areas of the West Bank evacuated in 2005, calling it “provocative” and in direct contradiction of promises made to Washington at the time.

Blinken, appearing before a Senate committee, also reiterated previous US pushback on Smotrich’s comments about Palestinians, saying they do not reflect US values.

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World

UK politicians caught in sting for lucrative second jobs

A senior British minister on Sunday defended former cabinet colleagues after they were shown negotiating top-dollar rates to work on the side for a fake South Korean consultancy.

The sting operation by the anti-Brexit group Led By Donkeys, which targeted former finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng among others, exposed nothing illegal.

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But the issue of Conservative MPs taking lucrative second jobs with companies has been provoking fresh controversy as Britons endure the worst cost-of-living crisis in decades.

Kwarteng’s involvement in particular focussed anger, after he and short-lived prime minister Liz Truss triggered a crash on financial markets that drove up borrowing costs for millions last year.

He and former health secretary Matt Hancock were shown separately negotiating a daily rate of £10,000 ($12,000) to advise a sham consultancy purportedly based in Seoul that was set up by Led By Donkeys.

“On this occasion, I think it is pretty clear that things that were offered and considered were within the rules,” cabinet member Michael Gove told Sky News.

Gove said it was “absolutely vital that we know who is paying” MPs for second jobs, “and that is what the register (of MPs’ interests) is there for”.

“And ultimately, the really important thing is, is an MP delivering for their constituents, is a member of parliament doing everything they can to put public service first?”

Led By Donkeys showed a clip on social media in which Kwarteng said he “wouldn’t do anything less than for about 10,000 dollars a month.”

Prompted by a recruiter representing the fictious “Hanseong Consulting”, he switched the currency to pounds, which are worth more than dollars, and the rate to daily.

Hancock had already drawn controversy for taking an unauthorised break from his work as an MP to take part in a reality television show, in which he ate animal genitalia among other challenges.

He was forced to resign as health secretary for breaking his own pandemic rules on social distancing, when it was exposed that he was having an extra-marital affair with a senior advisor.

A spokesman said Hancock had “acted entirely properly and within the rules” regarding the apparent job offer from South Korea.
Kwarteng has yet to comment.

The sting threatens embarrassment for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who replaced Truss in October with a vow to restore “integrity, professionalism and accountability” after her term and that of her predecessor Boris Johnson.

Senior opposition Labour member Lucy Powell told Sky News that she was “pretty appalled and sickened,” reiterating her party’s call to ban MPs from holding second jobs.

🚨MPs FOR HIRE: a Led By Donkeys undercover investigation🚨
Watch the trailer… pic.twitter.com/TOPxuhmbr9

— Led By Donkeys (@ByDonkeys) March 25, 2023

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Burhan says Sudan’s army will be under leadership of civilian government

Sudan’s leader General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan said on Sunday that the country’s army will be brought under the leadership of a new civilian government.

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Speaking before a session for security and army reforms in Khartoum Burhan said his country will build a military force that will not intervene in politics and will be trusted by the Sudanese people in building a modern and democratic state.

More than a year after the military took power in a coup, the military and its former civilian partners and other political forces have agreed on a framework to form a new transitional government and write a new constitution to be announced next month.

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