Monthly Archives: May 2023

LONDON, May 16 (Reuters) - Novelist Salman Rushdie has warned that countries in the West face the most severe threats to freedom of expression and freedom to publish in his lifetime, speaking nine months after a man repeatedly stabbed him onstage in New York.

Rushdie, 75, was awarded the 'Freedom to Publish' award by The British Book Awards on Monday.

"We live in a moment, I think, at which freedom of expression, freedom to publish has not in my lifetime been under such threat in the countries of the West, Rushdie said in a video message from New York broadcast to the award ceremony.

"The freedom to publish, of course, is also the freedom to read and the freedom to write, the ability to write what you want ... to be able to choose what you want to read and not have it decided for you externally."

An attack onstage in August, 2022, during a lecture in New York state left the Indian-born British author blind in one eye and affected the use of one of his hands.

Rushdie has long faced death threats linked to his fourth novel, "The Satanic Verses," which was banned in many countries with large Muslim populations upon its 1988 publication over passages deemed to be blasphemous.

Rushdie, who spent years in hiding after Iran's supreme leader at the time pronounced a fatwa, or religious edict, calling upon Muslims to kill him, also referred to the banning of certain books in some U.S. school libraries and classrooms.

In the countries in the West, until recently, there was a fair measure of freedom in the area of publishing. Now I am sitting here in the United States, I have to look at the extraordinary attack on libraries, and books for children in schools," he said.

"The attack on the idea of libraries themselves. It is quite remarkably alarming, and we need to be very aware of it, and to fight against it very hard."

More than a thousand book titles, many addressing racism and LGBTQ issues, have been banned from U.S. classrooms and libraries in the past two years amid pressure from conservative parents and officials, the writers' organization PEN America has said.

Reporting by Farouq Suleiman, Editing by William James and Bernadette Baum

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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Farouq reports on general news across the United Kingdom and Ireland.

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Salman Rushdie warns of threat to freedom of expression in West - Reuters

Mass rally organized in Stepanakerts Renaissance Square, May 9, 2023 (Photo: Siranush Sargsyan)

Last week, Artsakhs defenders and supporters in the US eastern region and around the world commemorated the 31st anniversary of the liberation of Shushi and honored the brave soldiers who sacrificed life and limb to pursue freedom and self-determination after years of living under Azerbaijans discriminatory and deadly rule. The Armenians of Artsakh also rallied last week against Azerbaijans campaign to ethnically cleanse them from their indigenous lands, putting the world on notice that only the people of Artsakh have the right to determine their destiny.

That is why recent meetings hosted in Washington, DC by US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken with Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov are ineffective and can have no meaningful impact on Artsakhs citizens and their unshakable goal of self-determination. Diplomatic efforts that occur against the backdrop of Azerbaijans ongoing blockade of the only road between Artsakh and Armenia and its continuing provocations and killings of Armenians in Artsakh and Armenia are doomed to fail. No viable, lasting solution is possible as long as Azerbaijan is permitted to disregard the rights and security concerns of the Armenian population of Artsakh, the root causes of the conflict are not addressed, and the self-determination rights of Artsakhs 120,000 citizens are not recognized.

Although the government of Azerbaijan continues its efforts to break the spirit of Artsakhs people, last weeks rallies honoring the liberation of Shushi and against Azerbaijans ethnic cleansing efforts show that Artsakhs Armenians cannot be dissuaded in their fight for freedom and justice.

On May 20, those defending the rights of Artsakhs Armenians will travel from Yerevan to the border town of Kornidzor near the Hakari bridge occupied by Azerbaijan to continue to show Azerbaijan and the rest of the world that all efforts to relinquish the human rights of Artsakhs 120,000 men, women and children will be resisted. The demand for Artsakhs freedom will persist and only intensify until the inevitable recognition is secured that Artsakh is and shall always be Armenian.

The ARF Eastern Region Central Committees headquarters is the Hairenik Building in Watertown, Mass. The ARF Eastern Regions media and bookstore are also housed in this building, as are various other important Armenian community organizations. The ARF Eastern Region holds a convention annually and calls various consultative meetings and conferences throughout the year.

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Government reps can't stop the Armenian nation's demand for ... - Armenian Weekly

Paul Huson, the founder and head of Flyers Rights, a US consumer rights movement for the aviation industry, had been instrumental in fighting Boeing and the US Government in telling the truth, releasing secret documents, and going to court.

eTurboNews reported about this lawsuit in March since experts could not determine if the Boeing 737 MAX, whose original certification is alleged by the DOJ to be a product of a criminal conspiracy, and is safe to fly.

Flyers Rights want FAA and Boeing to be transparent, and the latest case at the US Appeals court in Washington, DC, shows this.

This case began before the last crash of the Boeing Max in 2019.

In a press conference today, Paul Hudson shared some background of where he was coming from, why he called for the press conference, and where he was going with the case.

My name is Paul Hudson. Im the president of Flyers Rights. Paul is also designated to the FAA safety advisory committees.

I was unaware of the max problems until after the first crash.

No one else was either.

Associates at the FAA certainly knew some things, and Boeing knew a lot about how defective their plane was.

The first crash in October of 2019 was far away in Indonesia.

There were no Americans on board.

I was paying attention to it. But then I got a phone call from a frequent traveler. He told me there was a real problem here.

I contacted the Boeing representative with whom Ive been acquainted for many years.

The fact that the plane had a haywire flight control system that had taken over caused many ups and downs and then crashed, killing everyone on this brand-new aircraft.

I asked him why Boeing hadnt grounded this plane.

This was the first week in December of 2018.

He answered: Well, its under investigation with the NTSB, but we cant tell you anything. Its all secret.

I waited a few weeks. I wait a little longer, but I shouldnt have done that.

In March, the second plane went down. Now we had 346 lives lost.

I then met with the associate administrator for safety at the FAA.

His name was Ali Brahimi. I asked him why.

He responded: We wont release the information on any fix to this system. He assured me: We know its safe the next time after it is un-grounded.

The FAA, after the first crash, has said its safe.

Boeing has said its safe.

And even after the second crash, they all said it was safe.

It turned out that China, perhaps Canada, and some other countries had grounded it, and then they overruled the FAA essentially and grounded the plane.

Ali Bahrami said, well keep everything secret, and theres no reason I can say to change things.

Of course, we disagreed and filed a formal freedom of Information request.

It was ignored.

Oh, and by the way, 70 other organizations and people also filed a freedom of information or wire requests that were also ignored.

Flyers Rights was the only one that took it to court. In December of 2019, we began this legal action.

This morning, there was an oral argument before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

Now the issue is: Should the FAA be able to keep secret all the data relating to its decisions on aircraft certification and, more broadly, on safety enforcement generally?

We think the answer should be no, particularly when you have a crash.

The information should be public or at least released to outside experts so they can evaluate it.

The FAA disagrees.

They want to keep everything secret.

Following the litigation that began in the district court. We found out that they used approximately 95 documents, 9500 pages of documents, to ground the Boeing Max.

In November of 2020, virtually none of it was released.

And everything was labeled a trade secret or proprietary information.

Also, the individuals involved were kept secret under the Personal Privacy Protection Act.

This policy, if its ratified by the appeal court, wont just apply to the Max. It wont just apply to the FAA.

Itll apply to all federal agencies.

Itll apply to everyone, especially those that have jurisdiction over health and safety, because under the FAA policy, almost everything can be labeled as proprietary or trade secrets or some other exception, and that will essentially collapse the intention of the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which is to make a government agency, decisions transparent.

We thought we had some progress in this because the Boeing CEO and the former FAA administrator promised to be transparent.

Congress promised the public that everything would be transparent.

However, when they got to court, it was a different story.

They said they didnt mean what they said.

That was just puffery that had nothing to do with the actual policy.

About a dozen safety experts who agreed with us, including some stakeholders like the Flight Attendants Union, testified, but it didnt matter.

Boeing prevailed at the district court level. And now, these experts also filed a brief in the current appeal.

This morning it was argued by our lead counsel, Joseph Sandler.

Joseph Sandler explained:

I think its safe to say that despite the commitment of the current administration to greater openness and transparency, and meaningful enforcement of the Freedom of Information Act, the court agreed to make it more challenging to find out.

In 2019, the Supreme Court held that if information is normally treated as confidential and proprietary by a business that submits it to a government agency, the presumption is it can be withheld from the public.

So that decision has threatened to make it much more difficult to figure out the basis for agency decisions involving any regulated industry, whether its airlines, cars, or whatever it is.

And in this case, as Paul explained, the FAA deferred it to Boeings determination that every piece of paper they submitted, every documentation minute to persuade the agency to ground the 737 Max, was confidential and proprietary.

It had to be withheld from the public.

I think we were encouraged this morning that the panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit expressed skepticism and concern about the FAAs efforts to throw a complete blanket of secrecy over every document that Boeing had submitted.

It included the FAA comments and responses to Boeings proposed fixes to the aircraft design. It includes the test procedures, and the means of compliance that Boeing itself proposed to demonstrate its compliance with the FAA regulations.

In fact, when this appeal was first filed, the government urged the Court of Appeals to throw it out without even hearing it based on some refinements of the district courts decision, and the court decided to hear it.

Were hopeful that there will to some extent, efforts not to allow to keep everything secret on the part of the FAA.

But it will be necessary for the lower courts to find ways to limit the damage to the Supreme Court decision, to the proper implementation of the Freedom of Information Act, and ultimately may be necessary for Congress to act further if we cant achieve it through the courts.

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Boeing and FAA put the US Freedom of Information Act in Danger - eTurboNews | eTN

De La Salle's Tanner Griffith, shown here scoring in a file photo, knocked in four runs on Tuesday as the top-seeded Spartans rolled past Castro Valley in the first round of the North Coast Section Division I playoffs. (Shae Hammond/Bay Area News Group)

The Bay Valley Athletic League was overshadowed this spring by the East Bay Athletic League as teams such as Granada and Amador Valley found comfort in the upper half of the baseball rankings.

Not so Tuesday.

On the first day of the North Coast Section playoffs, the BVAL won three games in the Division I bracket, including upset victories by 12th-seeded Pittsburg and 13th-seeded Freedom.

No. 8 seed Liberty also advanced.

On the season-ending side of those results were teams from the EBAL, including fourth-seeded Granada and fifth-seeded Amador Valley.

No. 9 seed Dublin also lost, as did No. 6 seed Foothill to James Logan of the Mission Valley Athletic League.

For Pittsburg, which scored five runs in the final two innings on the road to stun Granada 8-4, it was the programs first NCS playoff victory since 1996, according to its coach, Marco Cartagena.

He called his teams small-ball performance gritty. The Pirates got three hits from Halen Guerrero and three walks from Daniel Trujillo.

Obviously, the EBALs got stacked teams, Cartagena said. They have great teams like De La Salle and San Ramon. They all play great baseball. But I felt this year in our league, we all kind of beat up on each other. Everybody pretty much had an ace. They had one or two pitchers that are really good.

We just fought and we battled. We have tested kids that have been in playoffs. We were in the playoffs last year with the same group almost that lost a tough game at San Ramon. I kind of feel like were not fazed by this moment.

They made that clear on Tuesday. Here are more details:

No. 13 Freedom 2, No. 4 Amador Valley 0 (8 innings)

Shawn McBroom pitched a two-hitter with eight strikeouts, retiring Amador Valley in order in the bottom of the eighth after Freedom broke a tie with two runs in the top half of the frame, as the Falcons pulled off a stunning upset in the first round of the NCS playoffs.

Matthew Foley matched McBroom zero for zero through seven innings but couldnt escape the eighth. The junior pitched 7 1/3 innings, allowing two runs (one earned).

An error on a hard-hit ball by Zach Fesinmeyer accounted for Freedoms first run. McBroom followed with a double to drive in Fesinmeyer with the second run.

Freedom (14-11) will visit BVAL rival Pittsburg in the quarterfinals on Friday.

Amador finished 18-6.

No. 12 Pittsburg 8, No. 5 Granada 4

When Quinn Boyd hit a two-run homer in the home half of the fourth inning, Granada held a 4-3 lead. Pittsburg did not panic. The Pirates scored three runs in the sixth and added two in the seventh to pad the cushion.

Theyre gritty, Cartagena said about his players. We get after it and battle and battle and battle. We wear these pitchers down and thats kind of what happened. We took a lot of pitches. Fouled off a lot of pitches. When we found our spots to put the small ball in, it worked.

Jason Krakoski started for Granada and pitched three innings. Four relievers went the rest of the way.

Six days earlier, Granada was feeling great after its senior ace, Arizona-bound Joshua Morano, shut out De La Salle 6-0 in the semifinals of the EBAL playoffs.

Friday, Granada was four outs from the EBAL championship when San Ramon Valley rallied and won 3-2 in nine innings.

Now, the Matadors season is over. They finished 20-8.

Pittsburg, which also got two hits and two RBIs from Octavio Lopez, improved to 19-9.

In early March, Granada rolled over Pittsburg 7-0 as Morano pitched a one-hitter without a walk over 6 1/3 innings.

No. 8 Liberty 4, No. 9 Dublin 0

Dublin was the only EBAL team to defeat De La Salle before the league playoffs. Now, the Gaels season is over after Libertys David Roberts scattered six walks over six hitless innings and Cole Ehrhorn finished off the no-hitter with a scoreless seventh in a game played at Pittsburg High.

Luke Hyland went 3 for 3 with an RBI and Sutter Doctolero had two hits, including a double, to lead Liberty.

The Lions (17-9) will travel to De La Salle on Friday.

Dublin finished 16-9.

No. 11 James Logan 9, No. 6 Foothill 0

James Logan, playing at home in Union City, held Foothill hitless as Daniel Hernandez pitched 5 1/3 innings and Julian Vasquez retired all four batters he faced.

The loss left the EBAL with a 2-4 record on Tuesday.

Trevian Martinez led MVAL champion Logan with three hits and two RBIs. Daniel Hernandez and Juan Pablo Manzo also knocked in two runs apiece for the Colts (19-6), who will visit Clayton Valley on Friday.

Logan scored five in the first and one in the second to quickly put away last seasons NCS Division I runner-up.

Foothill finished 15-10.

No. 10 Berkeley 6, No. 7 Heritage 0

Daniel Beadles pitched a three-hitter over 6 2/3 innings and Manny Selles went 3 for 4 with a double and five RBIs as Berkeley cruised into the quarterfinals with a victory on the road over Heritage.

The Yellowjackets (19-7) will travel to San Ramon Valley on Friday.

BVAL champ Heritage finished 19-8.

No. 2 San Ramon Valley 5, No. 15 Antioch 1

Tied 1-1 through four innings, San Ramon Valley avoided an upset by its BVAL guest as the Wolves scored two in the fifth and two more in the sixth to advance.

Colin Linteo had two hits, including a triple, and drove in two runs and Max Ellis and Joseph Coupland each had an RBI to lead SRV (19-9).

Charles Reiland allowed one run in five innings and Nate Simonton pitched two scoreless innings to help the Wolves reach the quarterfinals.

Antioch ended its season 15-10.

No. 1 De La Salle 15, No. 16 Castro Valley 4 (5 innings)

De La Salle stretched its NCS playoff winning streak to 21 games as the Concord powerhouse broke open this one with seven runs in the third inning and four more in the fourth.

The Spartans, who have won five consecutive Division I championships dating to 2016, got two hits and four RBIs from Tanner Griffith. Kai Smith added three hits, including a home run, and three RBIs as De La Salle improved to 21-5.

Michael Olsen and Anthony Mares each had two hits and an RBI for Castro Valley, which finished 10-16.

No. 3 Clayton Valley Charter 9, No. 14 College Park 2

Aiden Romero knocked in three runs and Isaiah Landry drove in two as Clayton Valley scored six in the fifth to pull away from visiting College Park.

Landry finished with two hits and Ryder Helfrick had two hits and scored three runs as Clayton Valley upped its record to 20-5.

College Park finished 11-14.

Hideki Prather hit two home runs and finished with four RBIs as third-seeded Campolindo edged No. 14 seed Kennedy-Fremont 4-3 in the Division III playoffs. Campo will be at home on Friday to face No. 6 seed Novato. Jakob Poole allowed two runs over six innings and Daniel Polasek had a hit and two RBIs to lead fourth-seeded Alhambra to a 4-2 victory over No. 12 seed Sonoma Valley in a Division III game. The Bulldogs will play host to Bishop ODowd in a quarterfinal Friday. Justin Jones pitched a two-hitter and Jonah Simkin England and Zachariah Lazzarini each knocked in a run as No. 10 seed Las Lomas ousted No. 7 seed Pinole Valley 2-0. Las Lomas will play No. 2 seed Redwood Christian on Friday at San Leandro Ballpark.

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NCS baseball playoffs: Pittsburg, Freedom, Liberty step out of EBAL shadow - The Mercury News

Permanent Protections for Floridians from the Biomedical Security State

DESTIN, Fla.Today,Governor Ron DeSantis signed four pieces of legislation that protect Floridians from medical mandates, empower doctors, and prohibit dangerous gain of function research. Through these comprehensive pieces of legislation, Governor DeSantis codified permanent COVID-19 protections in the state and positioned Florida as the national leader for medical freedom. For more information, clickhere.

The landmark legislative package signed today safeguards residents freedom by ensuring no patient is forced by a business, school, or government entity to undergo testing, wear a mask, or be vaccinated for COVID-19. The legislation also affords medical professionals the freedom to collaborate with patients in prescribing alternative treatments and protects physicians freedom of speech. Lastly, Florida is the first state to ban unsafe and unregulated gain-of-function research, like the research conducted in the Wuhan lab.

Our early actions during the pandemic protected Floridians and their freedoms,saidGovernor Ron DeSantis. We protected the rights of Floridians to make decisions for themselves and their children and rejected COVID theater, narratives, and hysteria in favor of truth and data. These expanded protections will help ensure that medical authoritarianism does not take root in Florida.

Governor DeSantis has been a pinnacle for freedom, and today we advance the cause of public health and individual autonomy in medical decisions,saidState Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo. From empowering patients to safeguarding children in schools, Florida continues to enshrine individual liberty and lead with common sense.

Senate Bill 252 Most Comprehensive Medical Freedom Bill in the Nation:

House Bill 1387 Banning Gain of Function Research:

Senate Bill 1580 Physicians Freedom of Speech:

Senate Bill 238 Public Records/Protection from Discrimination Based on Health Care Choices

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Governor Ron DeSantis Signs the Strongest Legislation in the ... - Governor Ron DeSantis

CHEYENNE, Wyo., May 17, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- Return to Freedom Wild Horse Conservation announced on May 17, 2023 that it had filed suit in federal court to stop the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) from stripping about 2 million acres from wild horses in southwest Wyoming for the benefit of private livestock ranchers.

"This decision must not be allowed to stand," said Neda DeMayo, president of Return to Freedom (RTF), a national nonprofit wild horse and burro advocacy organization. "The BLM is using an agreement with livestock ranchers as an excuse to violate its responsibilities under the Wild and Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act. Federally protected wild horses and burros must not be allowed to be removed from our public lands due to private landowner pressure -- or whole herds will vanish across the West."

RTF is joined in the lawsuit by plaintiffs Front Range Equine Rescue (FRER), a Colorado non-profit organization, and wild horse photographers and advocates Meg Frederick and Angelique Rea.

Under the BLM's changes, finalized on May 8, 2023, the agency will:

The BLM says that it amended its Resource Management Plan based on an agreement it entered into in 2013 with the Rock Springs Grazing Association.

The ranching group sued for the removal of all of the wild horses from the 2-million-acre Checkerboard region, an unfenced area of alternating, one-mile-square blocks of public and private land set up in the 1860s as part of negotiations with the Union Pacific railroad.

BLM's reason for removing land from wild horse use: complying with its legal obligations to America's wild horses is too much trouble for it.

"The BLM can't just throw up its hands because Congress handed it a challenge," said Hilary Wood, president of plaintiff FRER. "That's just not good enough for the agency charged with conserving wild horses and burros on our public lands on behalf of all Americans."

The announced changes demonstrate explicit bias and violation of federal law. And during a $1.1 million, three-month-long helicopter roundup from late 2021 to early 2022. the BLM set the stage for the changes by capturing and removing 3,502 wild horses from their home ranges in Southwest Wyoming. Thirty-seven wild horses died during the roundup.

Return to Freedom Wild Horse Conservation(RTF) is a national nonprofit organization dedicated to wild horse preservation through sanctuary, education, conservation,andadvocacy since 1998. It also operates the AmericanWild Horse Sanctuary at three California locations, caring for more than 450 wild horses and burros. Follow us onFacebook,Twitter,andInstagramfor updates about wild horses and burros on the range and at our sanctuary.

Front Range Equine Rescue (FRER) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit working to end the abuse and neglect of horses through rescue and education. It was incorporated in the State of Colorado in 1997. FRER's"Save the Wild Horses" campaign provides rescue, education, advocacy and legal action to protect America's wild horses. To learn more, visitwww.frontrangeequinerescue.org.

SOURCE Return to Freedom Wild Horse Conservation

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Return to Freedom Files Suit to Stop BLM from Taking 2 Million ... - PR Newswire

In 2017, the Iowa Legislature responded to concerns from Gov. Terry Branstad and amended Iowa law to ensure that when government employees are forced out of their jobs, the reasons must be made public and not shrouded in secrecy.

The goal was commendable. The governor was right. People deserve to be told why. It is called public accountability.

Since then, the transparency promised six years ago has diminished.

Since then, government employers have been more interested in avoiding embarrassment or uncomfortable questions.

Since then, government has been less interested in informing the people of Iowa in whose name government exists and operates.

Last week, the nonprofit organization I lead stepped up to try to stem this tide of secrecy-over-transparency. The Iowa Freedom of Information Council and I sued the Centerville school board, challenging the legality of its closed meeting in February that ended a two-month suspension of the Centerville High School guidance counselor and baseball coach.

Ryan Hodges was placed on leave around Dec. 1 last year following allegations of inappropriate behavior with a minor. School officials refused in December and again in February to share with the public the nature of Hodges actions. They refused to say whether the investigation found the allegations to be true or whether the investigation found no factual basis for the accusations.

School officials claimed they were not required to make public any of those details because Hodges submitted what they insisted was a voluntary resignation.

Our interest in the Centerville case is not motivated by some prurient interest in the details of what he is accused of engaging in with more than just one female student. Our concerns come from a belief residents of the Centerville district, the people who pay the taxes and sent their kids and grandkids to the schools there, deserve to know what went on at Centerville High School.

They deserve to know how their elected school board and the districts administrators responded to the allegations brought to their attention by female students during the two-month investigation. The public deserves to know what outside investigators learned about allegations of predatory behavior by Hodges.

They deserve to know why, after Hodges had been on administrative leave for two months, he was allowed to depart without any documented reasons and rationale being made public about the sudden end of his employment, a disclosure the Branstad-era amendment added to the public records law.

They deserve to know why, if the allegations against Hodges were baseless, he was not allowed to return to work with his name cleared. They deserve to know why, if the allegations against Hodges were true, the school board did not begin the firing process. After all, the taxpayers had been continuing to pay his full salary and provide insurance for the two months he was not allowed to work during the investigation.

And equally important, potential future employers deserve to know what baggage Hodges might bring to a new school district after being accused of violating parental trust and possibly Iowa law, too.

Such baggage has not always been easily knowable for prospective employers, or the public. Consider the case of Cody LaKose.

He was arrested in March at Regina High School in Iowa City, where he was a teacher. The criminal charges involve allegations, backed up with cellphone text messages, that LaKose groomed and then had an ongoing sexual relationship with an underage female student at Central DeWitt High School in 2017.

LaKose taught there from 2010 until December 2018, when he abruptly resigned in the middle of his contract. He and the Central DeWitt district signed an agreement to resolve all issues arising out of LaKoses employment with the district.

Just as with Ryan Hodges in Centerville, Central DeWitt officials never provided details about LaKoses conduct or what those issues were.

Instead, Central DeWitt continued to pay LaKose and provide him with insurance benefits for the remainder of the school year. The district also agreed to provide him with mutually agreeable letters of reference he could present to prospective employers.

The Central DeWitt district did not report his sudden resignation, or the background leading to it, to the Iowa teaching licensing board. Having a license in good standing and the absence of transparency about his departure allowed LaKose to obtain teaching jobs in the Cedar Rapids schools and then at Regina High School.

The opaqueness about LaKoses departure shows what can occur when secrecy wins out over transparency and when school officials are more concerned about getting a problem employee out of their district and less concerned about the potential for the person committing misconduct somewhere else in the future.

A footnote to the LaKose case should outrage parents everywhere:

While Central DeWitt Superintendent Dan Peterson insisted he could not say what LaKose did that led to his resignation, after LaKoses arrest in Iowa City, Peterson posted the criminal complaint filed against the former employee on the school districts website. That posting included the name of the girl who went to police last year when she was worried LaKose might try to take advantage of students in another district the way he took advantage of her.

It is hard to understand why the superintendent chose to share that detail. But it should not be hard to understand why there is a need for more transparency about resignations that are not strictly voluntary.

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Why Iowa Freedom of Information Council is suing the Centerville ... - Iowa Capital Dispatch

On the same stage where her husband, the prominent Russian dissident Vladimir Kara-Murza, was honored for his courage years earlier, Evgenia Kara-Murza took the floor. She was addressing the 15th Annual Geneva Summit for Human Rights and Democracy in Geneva, Switzerland, on Wednesday to speak about her husbandthe political prisoner Russian President Vladimir Putin fears mostand others fighting against authoritarian regimes around the world. Had Evgenias husband not been sentenced to 25 years in a penal colony a month earlier for his vocal opposition to Russias full-scale invasion of Ukraine, perhaps he would have been there with her. It is the longest sentence handed down to a Putin critic to date.

Since Vladimirs detention last year, Evgenia has taken up the mantle of his activism, traveling around the world to speak out against his detention and the crimes of Putins authoritarian regime. Despite her high-profile role, Evgenia insists that, unlike her husband, she is no politician. I have no such ambition whatsoever, she says. I never wanted to be a public speaker. I never wanted to be a public figure. I was happy working from home, being there for the kids when they came from school.

Read More: My Friend Vladimir Kara-Murza Is the Political Prisoner Putin Fears Most

TIME caught up with Evgenia on the sidelines of the summit to discuss her and her husbands activism, the toll it has taken on their family, and whether she can envisage a future in a free, democratic Russia.

Evgenia Kara-Murza: Not fully, because Vladimir is a politician. First and foremost, hes a politician and I believe that one brilliant politician is enough for our family. He has a very clear vision of what Russia can offer to the world as a democratic country, of how to build democracy in Russia.

But I took up his work speaking on behalf of political prisoners, calling for sanctions. And as a Russian citizen, Im devastated by the war and I will do everythingI will talk about it and talk about it again. I will call on politicians not to allow Vladimir Putin to get away with it, not to allow him any victory in this war. Not to force or coerce Ukraine to donate part of its territory to the Russian Federation to appease, yet again, a dictator who can never be appeased. Appeasement doesnt work. Vladimir Putin is a bully. He behaves like a bully. Hes always behaved like a bully. And in the past, hes tried his hand at these same crimes that hes now committing on a large scale.

What were witnessing today was inevitable; it was an absolutely inevitable thing. All those years of impunity have led to this; all those years of Vladimir Putin believing that he could commit a crime and get away with it and commit another one and get away with it. I believe that in these circumstanceswhen the war is raging, when tens of thousands of people are being killed in Ukraine, when tens of thousands of people are arbitrarily detained in RussiaVladimirs work cannot stop. He has been speaking on behalf of political prisoners in Russia for many years before becoming a political prisoner himself. So I have to continue making sure that these voices are heard, that their stories are known, that the world understands that not the entire Russian population stands behind Vladimir Putin and his vision.

I believe that these voices need to be heard, and I continue as best I can. I dont have the skillset. I dont have the knowledge. The first public speech that I ever made, I made last year when Vladimir was arrested.

I think its my fury and adrenaline speaking. Ive been living on adrenaline for over a year now. I sometimes stop and wonder how long can a person live on pure, concentrated adrenaline? I dont know. After Vladimirs poisonings [in 2015 and 2017 in Moscow, in purported retaliation for his anti-Kremlin activism], I lasted a year after each. When he was poised in 2015, I went to Moscow. I was there while he was in a coma, while he was being treated. Then we came back to the United States for rehabilitation. And I literally used to carry him around in my arms because he could not walk without help. He could not use a spoon. He was talking gibberish because he had a stroke while in a coma in Moscow.

I had to hold it all together. We have three kids. The oldest was nine; we had a six-year-old, a three-year-old. I had to hold it all together, and Vladimir. I think it took a year for everything to fall back into some kind of normalcy. And when I felt that everyone was okay and Vladimir was walking and talking and doing his thing, the thing that he does best, that was when I collapsed. So I think I have a delayed reaction and this has saved me before. But now its been over a year, so I sometimes wonder: How much time have I got?

I think you dont know what [strength] you have until youre faced with a situation where you dont really have a choice other than to stand up and do something about it. And I was raised to stand up and do something. I was not raised to just sit quietly and wait for things to happen on their own. That has never been my approach to any kind of crisis. I try to think of what I can do under the circumstances, with whatever I have at hand.

I believe this is what marriage is about. Whenever Vladimir was in a difficult situation, I was there for him. And whenever I fell apart, he was always there for me, to pick up the pieces and put them together. So it has always been a partnership, and I believe that it will continue being a partnership because this is the only way I understand a marriage. Otherwise, why would you live with a person? You share everything and youre there for each other. Thats the only way to me.

I think that the Kremlin has their hands full and they dont really notice me running around the world and screaming. Its mostly the statements, the efforts, the help, and the solidarity of the world with Vladimir that annoys them and that makes them maybe think twice about doing something to him. I dont believe its my activity, per se. I just talk. But Vladimir has made friends all over the world all these years and they all stand in solidarity with him. They always welcome me with open arms because they know and love and respect Vladimir, and so its easy for me to come and speak because Im always welcome being Vladimirs wife.

I do receive a lot of hatred on social media. And honestly, because Im an introverted person, because I dont like publicity, I have never been a big fan of social media. I only use it because I have to right now to spread information. But I try not to read comments. I need the remnants of my sanity to do the work.

My kids. They are the United States. Weve always believed that in order for Vladimir to do his work as he saw fit, the kids needed to be safe. They were born in the States. They are bilingual: they can read and write and speak both English and Russian fluently. Russian has always been a big part of their culture and theyve been to Russia many times. But over the years, it became apparent that it would not be safe for them there. I think [theyre] my place of strength. Going home even for a few days a month. I dont get to spend more at home than just a few days at a time. But when I come home thats my place of strength.

I think they are proud, but also absolutely terrified. You see, these kids have been growing up like this. Vladimir was poisoned when the oldest one was nine. He was poisoned for the second time when she was 11. Shes now 17. Our youngest, the third one, is 11 and his father was just sentenced to 25 years [in a penal colony] in Russia. So our kids have been growing up like this, unfortunately, living in two parallel realities. One reality is where they have a home, a loving family, where they have their friends and schools and their extracurricular activities, their passions, their hobbies. And another one is where the Russian regime is consistently trying to kill their father. And their father, being a genuine Russian patriot, refuses to give up his fight and keeps on and on and on. I can only imagine how excruciatingly painful it is for them.

I will do anything to bring the father back and to make sure that our family is reunited again. I do want to show them that in order to make something happen, you have to fightyou have to go to war, in a way. And I think that Vladimir, somehow amazingly, manages to teach them a lesson as well, even from behind bars. A lesson about always fighting, never giving up without a fight, and always being prepared to stand up for what you believe in and to know that there are risks involved.

If Vladimir survives and the regime in Russia collapses, I know 100% that Vladimir will want to be a part of a new and democratic system in our country. I know that he will be one of those willing to undertake the impossible task of rebuilding a country from scratch and making it into a democracy. Because Im still very much in love with my husband, I think [laughs] I will have to tag along.

I dont know what our kids will choose to do. We want them to have all the opportunities in the world, all the possibilities. Im very happy that theyre growing up in the United States. Im very happy that they are bilingual. Their understanding of the world is definitely more profound. We want them to choose their own path, and we have always tried to create opportunities for that.

Obviously, we will never try to force our kids to move back to Russia with us. We want them to have this possibility, and in order for them to have this possibility, Vladimir has been fighting for a different Russia that would be safe to go to for our kids as well as many, many people. I will stand by him.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

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Write to Yasmeen Serhan at yasmeen.serhan@time.com.

Continued here:

Evgenia Kara-Murza on the Fight for Freedom in Russia - TIME

(ANALYSIS) Every year, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) releases a report on religious oppression around the world, recommending that the State Department designate specific countries as especially severe violators. In this years report, released May 1, 2023, Iran came in for particular criticism after months of protests and arrests sparked by headscarf laws. Sri Lanka, Cuba and Nicaragua were also singled out as areas of concern; Nicaragua is specifically accused of persecution against Catholics.

Created through the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998, the commission exemplifies how the right to freedom of religious expression has come to play a significant role in U.S. discussions about human rights and not just abroad. Legislation and recent Supreme Court rulings have created a new legal landscape in which religious freedom claims have become more likely to prevail at home, including well-known court cases like the Hobby Lobby ruling on contraception.

Underlying many debates about how courts and policies treat religion is an often-unspoken question: Is any human right religious freedom in particular more important than another? And what happens when human rights claims come into conflict?

As a scholar of human rights and religion, I believe its important to unpack those questions and to unpack the difference they make in the lives of people affected by U.S. policies around the world.

For the last several decades, the United Nations has been careful to describe all human rights as interdependent. In this view, protecting any human right requires protecting all human rights.

As an example, think of two distinct rights recognized in the Declaration of Human Rights: the right to adequate food and the right to protest. A person who doesnt have enough food to live on is unlikely to have the health and energy to protest, and someone deprived of food because of government policies may find it necessary to protest in order to claim their right to food.

The U.N. and many human rights advocates have also argued that all rights are equal: No human right outweighs another.

According to this view, the only permissible reason one right could ever be temporarily suspended is to protect some other right. Even then, restricting the first right should be a last resort, and it should be restored as soon as possible.

For instance, a person with active tuberculosis or some other contagious disease might be ordered to quarantine for a period. Forced quarantine restricts the individuals right to freedom of movement, but it is considered more urgent to protect other peoples rights to life and health.

In other words, rights might sometimes conflict, but they all depend on each other and are of equal importance in principle. No human right can be ignored or downplayed.

International discussion of human rights has not always reflected this view.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted in 1948, after the horrors of the Holocaust and World War II. It captured a general international consensus that rights protection should shape international humanitarian policy. However, when the U.N. General Assembly attempted to make the rights in the declaration enforceable in international law, disagreements about the importance of different types of rights led to not one but two treaties: the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. Some countries have not ratified the first, including China and Saudi Arabia; others have not ratified the second, including the United States.

Today, too, many political leaders do not view all rights as equally weighty. For example, the Chinese government is known to regularly invade citizens privacy and has brutally repressed minority groups. Chinese leaders and state-owned media have insisted that advancing peoples social and economic rights, such as peace and the right to basic subsistence, takes priority over pursuing civil and political rights.

In the United States, the opposite is true. U.S. leaders and influential thinkers have often argued that civil and political rights, like the right to vote or to a fair trial, are more fundamental than economic and social rights, that they are more practical to uphold, or that they fit more neatly into the countrys history of political thought. For example, some Republican politicians, such as Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, have argued that health care is a privilege, not a right.

Questions about how U.S. foreign policy should balance protections for different kinds of rights came under a spotlight in 2019, when then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo created the Commission on Unalienable Rights. This commissions stated goal was to advise the U.S. government on human rights, drawing on both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the founding documents of the United States.

USCIRF was not involved in the Commission on Unalienable Rights, but put out a statement in support of its work. At the time, USCIRFs president was Tony Perkins, best known for his leadership of the evangelical nonprofit Family Research Council. In the statement, Perkins referred to religious freedom as the most foundational fundamental right.

The commissions report received both praise and criticism from advocates and scholars for its attempt to distinguish unalienable rights, which all individuals have by nature, from positive rights, which are based in custom and written law. The report contends that, from the founders point of view, property rights and religious liberty are most essential, and governments should promote economic rights only insofar as those rights do not infringe on property and religious liberty rights.

The report also describes a few types of rights claims as matters of debate rather than settled law, such as the right to same-sex marriage, which it calls one of several divisive social and political controversies where it is common for both sides to couch their claims in terms of basic rights. Two sentences later, the writers argue that an increase in rights claims, in some ways overdue and just, has given rise to excesses of its own.

In short, the commission prioritized property rights and religious freedom claims. Pompeos State Department acted in line with these priorities, holding two summits on religious freedom with civic and religious leaders from around the world. The State Department also created an International Religious Freedom Alliance with more than two dozen nations, without similar initiatives around other human rights.

Under the administration of President Joe Biden, the Commission on Unalienable Rights was shelved. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has argued that all human rights are co-equal and has criticized the commissions report for seeming to create a hierarchy of rights.

The State Department under Biden has expressed its intent to advance rights claims of LGBTQ+ individuals. Recently, it threatened sanctions on Uganda over a new bill that would impose punishments as severe as death for same-sex relationships.

The latest International Religious Freedom report demonstrates that the right to religious freedom is threatened in many places. The entire world has a long way to go in ensuring it is meaningfully protected. At the same time, debates remain heated over whether protecting this right should ever mean violating others.

This post originally appeared at The Conversation.

Read more:

Are Some Human Rights More Important Than Others? Religious Freedom Advocates Often Put It First - Religion Unplugged

Last week, a sex tape purporting to feature Muharrem nce, a third-party candidate in Turkeys presidential election, circulated online. nce said that the tape was a deepfakeThis is not my private life, its slander, he said, according to The Guardian, claiming that the footage had been ripped from an Israeli porn sitebut he dropped out of the race regardless, citing a longer campaign of character assassination. What I have seen in these last forty-five days, I have not seen in forty-five years, he said. The supposed sex tape was not the only occasion on which claims of technological deception had surfaced during the campaign. Kemal Kldarolu, the main opposition candidate, accused Russia (without offering specifics) of weaponizing deepfake technology to boost Recep Tayyip Erdoan, the incumbent president. And, at a rally, Erdoan played footage that had been manipulated to suggest close ties between Kldarolu and the Kurdistan Workers Party, which the US and EU have branded a terrorist group.

According to the BBC, nce also said that he was dropping out to avoid being blamed for splitting the anti-Erdoan vote. At the time, pundits deemed it a live possibility that, despite nces slender support, his withdrawal could put a nail in Erdoans coffin after twenty years in powerwith days to go until the vote, Kldarolu was polling just one percentage point shy of the fifty-percent threshold needed to win the election outright. But the results would paint a different picture: as the official count neared completion, it was Erdoan who sat just shy of that threshold, with Kldarolu further back on forty-five percent of the vote. (In confidently predicting Erdoans demise, many pundits, Sinan Ciddi and Steven A. Cook wrote for Foreign Policy, indulged too much focus on polls and too much Twitter navel-gazing. Sound familiar?) The election is now set for a runoff on May 28. Erdoan is expected to prevaildespite having overseen an economic crisis, deepening political authoritarianism, and the botched response to the massive earthquake that devastated southern Turkey and neighboring Syria in February.

Among other groups, the stakes of the election have been particularly acute for Turkeys press, which has seen its freedom to report systematically eroded under Erdoan. While the election was mostly considered to be free, it was also in many respects unfairnot least due to Turkeys deeply skewed media environment. After the first round, observers led by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe deemed that continued restrictions on fundamental freedoms of assembly, association and expression hindered the participation of some opposition politicians and parties, civil society and independent media in the election process.

As the election unfolded, I spoke with my colleague Pesha Magid, who has covered Turkey, including for CJR; in March, she profiled a reporter who had tracked the aftermath of, and political fallout from, the earthquake. We talked about the context for the vote, the threats that journalists faced in covering it, and what a victory for Erdoan or Kldarolu would respectively mean for press freedom. Our typed conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.

You recently wrote for CJR about Murat Bayram, a reporter in Turkey who covered the aftermath of the devastating earthquake that hit that country and Syria earlier this year. How did the upcoming election play into yourand hisreporting? And how has the earthquake aftermath affected the electionand the coverage of itsince then?

Since the earthquake, I think the election has been lurking at the back of most people who cover Turkeys minds. The failure of the governments earthquake response caused a backlash of anger from communities that would normally support Erdoans Justice and Development Party (AKP). Many survivors were first-hand witnesses to the governments fatal mismanagement of the emergency response, waiting days for lifesaving rescue teams to show up. Over fifty thousand people died in the earthquake. Many of those deaths could have been prevented either through a competent rescue effort or through the government enforcing building codes.

Murat Bayram witnessed for himself some of the anger on the streets when he was reporting on the earthquake. He spoke about people who were asking where the government and the media were. I dont think anyone has forgotten the earthquake or the images that spread on social media of people waiting for their loved ones to be rescued from the rubble. Theres an odd symmetry with Erdoans own rise to power, which followed another devastating earthquake in 1999 and a bungled response from the government of the time. One of Erdoans electoral promises back then was to do better on earthquake preparedness.

The coverage of the election in Turkey has been a complicated topic as the vast majority of major news organizations have been co-opted by the government and no longer provide independent or critical reports. Much of the government-affiliated press took the line that the earthquake was an unpreventable disaster and that the government was doing the best it could. They blamed scapegoats for some of the worst failures. Election coverage has followed a similar pattern of most major channels supporting the AKP, while a slim slice of independent media has been providing more critical coverage.

Going into the election, what were the stakes for the Turkish press?

Under Erdoan, Turkey has become one of the worlds worst jailers of journalists. Journalists are commonly beaten, harassed, or targeted with legal cases. Only a scattered few small outlets remain independent. The stakes were the freedom of the press as a whole.

Did we see any repression of the press linked directly to election coverage? And how did this affect the way in which the first round of the election was conducted?

The short answer is yes. Since May 9, at least four journalists have been found guilty of terrorism charges, while others have faced beatings and harassment during their work.

On May 10, a journalist named Muhammed Yava posted a critique of the Grey Wolves, a hypernationalist group, on Facebook, only to then be beaten up by a local leader of the group. In a joint statement on May 10, the monitoring organizations Human Rights Watch and Article 19 warned of the Turkish governments history of online censorship and throttling of social media ahead of the elections; subsequently, Twitter blocked some posts inside Turkey.

There was also the worry that pro-government media may skew information in favor of the AKP. According to the journalist Amberin Zaman, writing in Al-Monitor, In April, Erdogan got 32 hours of air time on state TV compared with 32 minutes for Kilicdaroglu. As the election results began to come in, some expressed fears that the state-run Anadolu agency may preemptively announce an Erdoan victory before all the results were counted. In the end, both sides claimed to be ahead, with Erdoan telling his supporters, Although the final results are not in yet, we are leading by far, according to the New York Times.

What has the opposition, led by Kldarolu, said about press freedom in the country, if anything? And how credible has that sounded?

Kldarolu has promised a return to democracy and many journalists expressed hope that this would mean that press freedom would again be possible. Many media watchers seem cautiously hopeful that a Kldarolu victory would also be the way to open the door to an independent press. We still would have a press freedom problem if the opposition takes power, said Kenan ener, general secretary of the Ankara-based Journalists Association, in an interview with the Committee to Protect Journalists. However, I believe its certain that we will be in a better spot than this.

On the other hand, when Kldarolus opposition party, the CHP, was in power in the nineties it had a checkered record when it came to freedom of the press. It was known for also jailing journalists that opposed it, although not to the same extent as Erdoan.

How do you see the Turkish media landscape changing as a result of this election, as it now heads to a runoff?

It truly depends on the results. If the opposition wins then I anticipate that we will see an initial gleeful rush of media freedom as journalists stretch their wings for the first time in years. But its unclear how long that would lastas I said, the CHP does not have the best record when it comes to journalists though it seems unlikely that the crackdown on the press would remain as stringent as it has been under Erdoan. I am hopeful that journalists who have long been in jail on trumped-up charges might finally be released.

If Erdoan wins, things will undoubtedly get worse. If nothing else, the closeness of this election shows that the AKPs grip on power is fraying. That insecurity may cause it to take an even more draconian grip on power. As Bar Altnta, the director of Istanbuls Media and Law Studies Association, said in the same CPJ interview: If they [the AKP] win by a slim margin, they might lose some of their perceived legitimacy, feel cornered, and become more repressive towards free speech and media freedoms.

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