World’s highest daily rise in COVID cases in India, record deaths

 More than 300,000 cases in the last 24 hours while COVID-19-related deaths also jump by a record 2,104 fatalities.

India has reported more than 300,000 coronavirus cases over the last 24 hours, the highest daily global total, while COVID-19-related deaths also jumped by a record, as a brutal second wave raises fears about the ability of the country's health services to cope.

India’s daily jump of 314,835 cases on Thursday surpasses the previous highest one-day rise in the world of 297,430 cases posted by the United States in January.

India’s total cases are now at 15.93 million, the world’s second highest, while deaths rose by 2,104 to reach a total of 184,657, according to health ministry data.

The second wave of coronavirus infections, blamed on a “double mutant” variant and “super-spreader” mass gatherings, in the world’s second-most populous nation has stretched its long-underfunded healthcare system to a breaking point.

Health workers attend to a suspected COVID-19 patient in Mumbai [Divyakant Solanki / EPA]

Hospitals across northern and western India including the capital, New Delhi, have issued notices to say they have only a few hours of medical oxygen required to keep COVID-19 patients alive.

More than two-thirds of hospitals had no vacant beds, according to the Delhi government’s online data base and doctors advised patients to stay at home.

At least 24 COVID-19 patients died in western India’s Maharashtra state on Wednesday when the oxygen supply to their ventilators ran out, amid a nationwide shortage of medical oxygen, hospital beds and medicines such as the anti-viral drug, remdesivir.

Health experts say India let its guard down when the virus seemed to be under control during the winter, allowing big gatherings such as weddings and festivals.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is himself facing criticism for addressing packed political rallies for local elections and allowing a Hindu festival to go ahead where millions gathered.

On Thursday, despite the biggest public health emergency the country has faced in a generation, people were voting in the eastern state of West Bengal for a new state assembly in an election that Modi has been campaigning in.

“It’s a festival of democracy and everyone is participating. You can see the queues, ”said Krishna Kalyan, a candidate from Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

‘Beg, borrow or steal’

Meanwhile, India’s television channels showed images of people with empty oxygen cylinders crowding refilling facilities in the most populous state of Uttar Pradesh as they scrambled to save relatives in hospital.

“The situation is very critical,” Dr Kirit Gadhvi, president of the Medical Association in the western city of Ahmedabad, told Reuters news agency.

“Patients are struggling to get beds in COVID-19 hospitals. There is especially acute shortage of oxygen. ”

A patient with breathing problems is seen inside a car while waiting to enter a COVID-19 hospital in Ahmedabad [Amit Dave / Reuters]

Modi said in an address to the nation on Tuesday night that “all efforts are being made” to boost the supplies of medical oxygen.The Delhi High Court on Wednesday ordered the government to divert oxygen from industrial use to hospitals to save people’s lives.

“We cannot let people die due to lack of oxygen… you beg, borrow and steal but have to provide,” the judges said in response to a petition by a New Delhi hospital seeking its intervention.

The judges asked why the government is “not waking up to the gravity of the situation”, calling it “a national emergency”.

The health ministry said of the country’s total production of 7,500 metric tonnes of oxygen per day, 6,600 metric tonnes were being allocated for medical use.

It also said 75 railway coaches in the Indian capital have been turned into hospitals providing an additional 1,200 beds for COVID-19 patients.

Meanwhile, major private and government-run hospitals in New Delhi have sent out urgent appeals to the central government, calling for immediate supplies of oxygen for hundreds of patients on ventilator support.

On Wednesday, nearly 500 tonnes of oxygen was supplied to the capital but this fell short of the required 700 tonnes per day.

The city’s government has also accused neighboring states governed by Modi’s BJP of holding up supplies.

States across India have imposed restrictions, with Delhi in a six-day lockdown, all non-essential shops shut in Maharashtra state, and Uttar Pradesh set for a weekend shutdown.

India has launched a vaccination drive but only a tiny fraction of the population has had the shots.

Authorities have announced that vaccines will be available to anyone over the age of 18 from May 1 but India won’t have enough shots for the 600 million people who will become eligible, experts say.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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Britain’s unequal troop commemorations due to ‘pervasive racism’

 Inquiry by Commonwealth War Graves Commission finds Black and Asian troops who fought for Empire were not properly memorialized.

As many as 350,000 Black and Asian service personnel who died fighting for the British Empire might not have been commemorated in the same way as their white comrades because of “pervasive racism”, a report has concluded.

The inquiry commissioned by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC), in its report released on Thursday, says that between 45,000 and 54,000 individuals of predominantly Asian, Middle Eastern and African origin who died during World War I were commemorated “unequally”.

“A further 116,000 casualties [predominantly, but not exclusively, East African and Egyptian personnel] but potentially as many as 350,000, were not commemorated by name or possibly not commemorated at all,” the report said.

The CWGC works to commemorate those from Commonwealth forces who were killed in the two world wars and to ensure all those killed are remembered in the same way, with their name engraved either on a headstone over an identified grave or on a memorial to the missing.

It issued an apology in the wake of the inquiry’s findings.

“The events of a century ago were wrong then and are wrong now,” said Claire Horton, head of the CWGC. “We recognize the wrongs of the past and are deeply sorry and will be acting immediately to correct them.”

‘Watershed moment’

The CWGC commissioned the report in December 2019 after Unremembered, an investigative television documentary presented by opposition Labor Party MP and shadow justice secretary David Lammy.

The Unremembered investigation found that Africans killed in World War I had not been treated equally and revealed an example of a British governor saying: “The average native of the Gold Coast would not understand or appreciate a headstone.”

It also uncovered how African soldiers 'serious were abandoned in Tanzania, while European officers' resting places continued to be maintained.

According to Thursday's report, another officer, who later worked for the CWGC's predecessor - the Imperial War Graves Commission, had said: “Most of the natives who died are of a semi-savage nature”, and concluded that erecting headstones would be a waste of public money.

The inquiry said decisions that led to the failure to commemorate the dead properly - or even at all - was the result of a lack of information, errors inherited from other organizations, and the opinions of colonial administrators.

“Underpinning all these decisions, however, were the entrenched prejudices, preconceptions and pervasive racism of contemporary imperial attitudes,” the report concluded.

The United Kingdom’s Secretary of Defense Ben Wallace was expected to address Parliament about the findings later on Thursday.

Lammy hailed the report as a “watershed moment”.

“No apology can ever make up for the indignity suffered by the Unremembered,” he tweeted.

“However, this apology does offer the opportunity for us as a nation to work through this ugly part of our history - and properly pay our respects to every soldier who has sacrificed their life for us… The arc of history is long but it bends towards the truth. ”

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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More than 100 migrants feared dead as boat capsizes off Libya

 The ship was reportedly carrying some 130 people, with rescue teams saying little hope of finding survivors.

More than 100 migrants and refugees are feared to have drowned after a rubber boat capsized off the coast of Libya, a rescue charity said, adding there was little hope of finding survivors.

European humanitarian group SOS Mediterranee said on Thursday that the boat, with 130 people on board, was reported in distress on Wednesday in international waters off Libya in addition to two other boats.

A rescue effort, with the NGO’s Ocean Viking and three merchant vessels, was launched.

“Since we arrived on scene today, we have not found any survivors while we could see at least 10 bodies in the vicinity of the wreck. We are heartbroken, ”said Luisa Albera, the search-and-rescue coordinator on board the Ocean Viking.

Eugenio Ambrosi, the chief of staff of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said that at least 100 lives were lost in the incident that took place in the Central Mediterranean.

“These are the human consequences of policies which fail to uphold international law and the most basic of humanitarian imperatives,” he wrote on Twitter.

The shipwreck was the latest along the Central Mediterranean migration route, where about 350 migrants have died this year.

Since 2014, more than 20,000 migrants and refugees have died at sea while trying to reach Europe from Africa.

More than 17,000 of those have been on the Central Mediterranean which is described by the UN as the most dangerous migration route in the world.

Transit point

Libya descended into chaos following the 2011 uprising that toppled and killed longtime ruler Muammar Gaddafi.

In the years since the uprising, Libya has emerged as the dominant transit point for migrants. Human smugglers based in Libya launch vessels, many of them flimsy rubber dinghies or rickety fishing boats, crowded with migrants who hope to reach European shores to seek asylum.

Thousands have drowned along the way, while others have ended up detained in squalid smugglers ’pens or crowded detention centers.

The European Union has reportedly spent more than 90 million euros ($ 109m) in funding and training the Libyan coastguard to stop the crossings.

An Associated Press investigation revealed the EU sent more than 327.9 million euros ($ 397.9m) to Libya, largely channeled through UN agencies.

“States abandon their responsibility to coordinate Search and Rescue operations, leaving private actors and civil society to fill the deadly void they leave behind. We can see the result of this deliberate inaction in the sea around our ship, ”said an SOS Mediterranee statement.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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Algerian scholar gets three years in jail for ‘offending Islam’

 Said Djabelkhir, who was released on bail, says will appeal sentence and keep fighting for ‘freedom of conscience’.

A renowned Algerian scholar on Islam, Said Djabelkhir, was handed a three-year prison sentence on Thursday for “offending Islam” in three Facebook posts, but pledged to appeal and keep fighting for “freedom” of thought.

Djabelkhir, 53, who has called for “reflection” on Islam’s founding texts, was put on trial after seven lawyers and a fellow academic made complaints against him.

Speaking to the AFP news agency after the verdict, Djabelkhir, who was released on bail, said he was surprised by the severity of the sentence and that he would appeal to the Court of Cassation if necessary.

“We have the misfortune to be doing research in Algeria,” said the academic, a specialist on Sufi Islam.

“[But] the fight for freedom of conscience is non-negotiable. It is a fight which must continue. ”

A little earlier, Djabelkhir’s lawyer Moumen Chadi, who also expressed shock about the ruling, said his client had “been sentenced to three years in prison… [for] offending the precepts of Islam”.

“There is no proof,” the lawyer said, describing the case as baseless.

The offence of which he was convicted can be punished by up to five years in prison.

The offence

The scholar, author of two well-known works, was criticized for writing that the sacrifice of sheep predates Islam and for criticizing practices including the marriage of pre-pubescent girls in some Muslim societies.

According to the global rights group Amnesty International, in three Facebook posts in January 2020, Said Djabelkheir drew comparisons between Eid al-Adha and the Berber New Year celebrations, referred to some stories in the Quran as “myths”, and said he considered certain “apocryphal” hadiths.

Algerian law stipulates a three-to-five-year prison term and or a fine for “anyone who offends the Prophet or denigrates the dogmatic precepts of Islam, whether it be by writings, drawings, a statement or another means”.

The cartoons were brought after a teacher at the University of Sidi Bel Abbs, who believed Djabelkheir’s Facebook posts had violated religious precepts and pressed cartoons against him.

During his trial of him earlier this month, Djabelkhir defended himself against accusations that he had “harmed Islam”, the religion of the Algerian state, arguing he had only provided “academic reflections”.

He has said that he was targeted by accusers who “have no expertise on religious matters”.

‘Criminalization of ideas’

Reacting to the verdict, the Algerian League for Human Rights decried “the criminalization of ideas, of debate and academic research… [rights] guaranteed by the constitution”.

The rights group said it “refutes that courtrooms… replace university lecture rooms, and that the courts transform themselves into courts of inquisition”.

Calling for the conviction to be “quashed immediately”, Amna Guellali, Amnesty International’s deputy regional director, described the three-year sentence as “outrageous”.

“Punishing someone for their analysis of religious doctrines is a flagrant violation of the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of belief - even if the comments are deemed offensive by others,” Guellali said.

Djabelkhir’s lawyers argued before the court that the complaint against him was inadmissible because it came from individuals and not from the public prosecutor.

They also warned against the trial becoming a launchpad for courts becoming an arena for “religious debates”.

Djabelkhir has received the backing of many academic colleagues and Algerian politicians since the accusations against him surfaced.

Opponents, however, accuse him of disrespecting the Quran and the five pillars of Islam, including the annual Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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UNSC: ‘Deep concern’ about sexual violence allegations in Tigray

 In first joint statement after nearly six months of fighting in northern Ethiopian region, Security Council urges ‘unfettered humanitarian access to all people in need’.

Hundreds of women have reported horrific accounts of rape and gang rape since the start of the conflict in Tigray Nearly six months after the eruption of fighting in Ethiopia's Tigray region, the United Nations Security Council has issued its first joint statement on the continuing crisis, expressing “Deep concern” about allegations of human rights violations, including reports of sexual violence against women and girls.

Global African Family Meeting

The 15-member body on Thursday also called for “a scaled-up humanitarian response and unfettered humanitarian access” to address humanitarian needs, including for people in the embattled region who are in need of food assistance.

“Today, the Security Council breaks its silence on the ongoing crisis in the Tigray region of Ethiopia,” said Geraldine Byrne Nason, Ireland’s ambassador to the UN who led negotiations over the text. “For the first time, this Council speaks with one voice to express its collective concern about the dire humanitarian situation on the ground.”

The Security Council has discussed the situation in Tigray behind closed doors several times before but had not been able to agree on a statement, because of opposition from its African members and Russia and China, according to reports citing diplomats speaking on condition of anonymity.

In one of those closed-door sessions last week, the UN's top humanitarian official had said “the humanitarian situation in Tigray has deteriorated” and warned that the “vast majority” of the region of some six million people “is completely or partially inaccessible” for humanitarian agencies.

“The conflict is not over and things are not improving,” Mark Lowcock had told the council as he gave a sobering assessment of the events on the ground, calling the “reports of systematic rape, gang rape and sexual violence… especially disturbing and alarmingly widespread ”.

Furthermore, Lowcock said he had received a report of 150 people dying of hunger in one area of ​​southern Tigray, calling it “a sign of what lies ahead if more action is not taken”.

Ethiopia’s mission to the UN said in a statement on Thursday that the situation in Tigray “is an internal affair regulated by the laws of the country, including human rights laws”.

The statement said the Ethiopian government is “providing significant portion of the humanitarian assistance delivered to those in need and will continue to allocate the maximum available resources” and stressed the commitment to “investigate and ensure accountability” for alleged human rights violations “will be upheld ”.

Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed ordered troops into Tigray in November 2020 after accusing leaders of the Tigray’s then-governing party, the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF), of launching an attack to take over the Northern Command of Ethiopia’s military. A senior official of the TPLF, which used to dominate Ethiopia’s politics until Abiy came to power in 2018, accused the federal government and its longtime foe Eritrea of ​​launching a “coordinated attack” against it.

Abiy, the winner of the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize, declared victory after federal forces entered the regional capital, Mekelle, on November 28 but fighting has continued and analysts have warned of a prolonged deadlock in a conflict that is believed to have killed thousands of people and left millions in need of aid.

For months the Ethiopian and Eritrean governments denied Eritreans were involved, contradicting testimony from residents, rights groups, aid workers, diplomats and even some Ethiopian civilian and military officials.

Abiy finally acknowledged the Eritreans ’presence in March while speaking to legislators, and pledged soon after that they would leave. On Friday, a day after Lowcock said the UN and its aid partners had seen “no proof” of the Eritrean troop withdrawal, neighboring Eritrea made its first explicit admission of its role in fighting in Tigray and pledged to pull out its forces.

On Monday, the European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called on Eritrea to “immediately” make good on promises to withdraw its troops from the northern region. The United Nations and United States have also demanded Eritrea withdraw its forces from the region without delay.

The international community has also pressed Ethiopia to allow greater access for aid agencies to Tigray. In its statement on Thursday, the Security Council said it acknowledged the efforts by the Ethiopian government “to provide humanitarian assistance and to provide increased humanitarian access” but “recognized, nevertheless, that humanitarian challenges remain”.

There are also calls for full investigations into accusations of widespread rights abuses including sexual violence being used as a weapon of war.

“We have heard the alarm bells about human rights violations and abuses, in particular sexual violence against women and girls,” Nason said on Thursday.

“Continued violence, deaths and sexual and gender-based violence are unacceptable. Those responsible, no matter their affiliation, must be held accountable, ”Nason added.

The Ethiopian government has set up a task force to investigate the reports of sexual violence in Tigray, insisting it takes the allegations seriously.

Separately, Ethiopia’s state-appointed human rights commission and the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights announced in late March they had agreed to carry out a joint investigation “into human rights violations and abuses allegedly committed by all parties” in Tigray.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES

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Coronavirus reaches Mt Everest as Norway climber tests positive

 Outbreak a blow to Nepal’s hopes for a bumper mountaineering season on the world’s highest peak.

A Norwegian climber hoping to summit Mount Everest has confirmed he tested positive for COVID-19, in a blow to Nepal’s hopes for a bumper mountaineering season on the world’s highest peak.

The pandemic wiped out last year’s season but Nepal has eased quarantine rules in an effort to attract more climbers despite the difficulties of treating them if they contract the virus.

“My diagnosis is COVID-19,” Erlend Ness told the AFP news agency in a Facebook message. “I am doing ok now… The hospital is taking care (of me).”

Ness was evacuated from the slopes by helicopter and taken to a hospital in the Nepali capital Kathmandu after spending time at Everest base camp.

Norwegian broadcaster NRK, which interviewed him, reported that a Sherpa in his party had also tested positive.

“I really hope that none of the others get infected with corona high up in the mountains. It is impossible to evacuate people with a helicopter when they are above 8,000 meters [26,246 feet], ”Ness told NRK.

Mount Everest as seen from the route to Kalapatthar in Nepal [File: Tashi Sherpa / AP]

Breathing is already difficult at high altitudes so any outbreak of disease among climbers presents huge health risks.

“The plan was to get fast high up in the mountains to make sure that we wouldn’t get infected… I’ve been unlucky and I could have done more by myself when it comes to sanitary precautions,” Ness added.

One hospital in Kathmandu confirmed it had taken in patients from Everest who had contracted coronavirus but could not give a number.

“I can’t share the details but some evacuated from Everest have tested positive,” Prativa Pandey, the medical director at Kathmandu’s CIWEC Hospital, told AFP.

But Mira Acharya, a spokesperson for Nepal’s tourism department, said it had so far not received any reports of COVID-19 among climbers.

“A person was evacuated on April 15 but we were informed that he is suffering from pneumonia and is being treated in isolation. That is all the information we have received, ”she said.

Dawa Steven Sherpa of Asian Trekking said everyone at base camp was concerned.

Nepal has issued 377 permits this year to climb the mountain and the final number is expected to exceed the 381 handed out in 2019.

A city of tents hosting hundreds of foreign climbers and support staff is fast growing at the foot of Everest and other peaks in the area.

In recent seasons Everest has seen a surge in the numbers of climbers making attempts to summit the slope, leading to overcrowding that has been blamed for multiple deaths.

Eleven people died climbing the world’s highest peak in 2019, with four deaths blamed on overcrowding. On one day, 354 people were lined up to reach the top from Nepal’s southern side and Tibet’s northern approach.

To ease the crowding, Nepal’s tourism ministry has announced rules capping the number of people who can summit the mountain per window of suitable weather.

Expedition organizers have been told to send teams up the peak strictly in accordance with permit numbers or limit the number of climbers going up at one time.

“The decision… (was) taken after consultation with expedition organizers and other stakeholders concerned,” Acharya said.

SOURCE: AFP

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