Síntesis informativa - 1° de agosto 2019
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Wary of Trump’s Hard Line on Iran, Europeans Decline to Join Escorts in Gulf
BRUSSELS — With tensions rising with Iran, the United States and Britain have been shopping for European support to bolster patrols in the Persian Gulf around the Strait of Hormuz, a vital passage way for global oil supplies.
But so far the American requests for help to escort shipping in the Gulf have been met with silence or rejection, including a blunt “no” on Wednesday from Germany.
Nor have nations like France, Germany, Italy or Sweden yet responded favorably to Britain’s suggestion of a European escort force, separate from the Americans, even after Iran seized a British-flagged tanker in the gulf.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/01/world/europe/trump-iran-gulf-patrol.html
At Least 32 Killed in Attacks on Yemen Military Parade and Police Station
ADEN, Yemen — Two separate attacks in Yemen on Thursday, including a missile assault by Yemen’s Iran-aligned Houthi movement, killed at least 32 people, including police officers and a military commander, officials said.
The Houthi movement said it had mounted drone and missile attacks on a military parade in Aden, the seat of the Saudi-backed government, killing the commander and dozens of others.
In another attack in the Omar al-Mokhtar neighborhood of Aden, an explosives-laden car blew up at a police station, killing at least three officers, a security official said, and wounding dozens of others, including civilians.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/01/world/middleeast/yemen-houthi-military-parade.html
Hamza bin Laden Sought to Continue His Father’s Terrorism Legacy
BAGHDAD — As a boy, Hamza bin Laden appeared in propaganda films for Al Qaeda, the terrorist group led by his father, Osama. He preached jihad, trained with fighters and was introduced as a voice of Al Qaeda, “a young lion to carry forth the cause.”
But much of his story remains shrouded in mystery. And when American officials announced on Wednesday that the younger Mr. bin Laden had been killed in a United States strike in the past two years, details about where and how he died were as scarce as information about his life in the shadows.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/01/world/middleeast/hamza-bin-laden.html
U.S. Sanctions on Foreign Minister Unite Iran’s Fractious Elite
BEIRUT, Lebanon — Iranian officials reacted with unified irritation on Thursday to the Trump administration’s sanctions on Iran’s foreign minister, calling the move petty and provocative, and evidence of Washington’s insincerity when it talks of peace.
The foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, an American-educated diplomat who negotiated the 2015 nuclear deal that President Trump deplored and abandoned, is one of Iran’s best-known leaders and perhaps its most effective in making his country’s case to the West. The sanctions, imposed on Wednesday, could make it more difficult to engage in the new diplomacy that Mr. Trump says he wants.
With Iran and the United States locked for months on the brink of armed conflict, Iran’s leaders are often viewed as split between hard-liners who urge confrontation and moderates like Mr. Zarif who support diplomacy.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/01/world/middleeast/iran-mohammad-javad-zarif-sanctions.html
THE GUARDIAN
Just 10% of fossil fuel subsidy cash 'could pay for green transition'
Coal, oil and gas get more than $370bn (£305bn) a year in support, compared with $100bn for renewables, the International Institute for Sustainable Development (IISD) report found. Just 10-30% of the fossil fuel subsidies would pay for a global transition to clean energy, the IISD said.
Should we worry about the robots and mind-reading apps remaking our world?
Elon Musk, the South African co-founder of PayPal, unveiled the latest step in his plan to build mind-reading implants two weeks ago. Musk suggested that the technology would be important for when an artificial intelligence takes over the world. “Even under a benign AI, we will be left behind,” he told reporters. “With a high-bandwidth brain-machine interface, we will have the option to go along for the ride.”
Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg, the American founder of Facebook who built an AI to run his home, has revealed his company’s own success at building a mind-reading device. Facebook’s version of the technology currently requires invasive probes to be inserted into user’s brains, and successfully recorded answers to nine set questions from a list of 24 potential responses. Asked about the privacy implications of the technology in February, Zuckerberg said: “Presumably this would be something that someone would choose to use.”
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/aug/01/future-imperfect-robots-mind-reading-apps
US Senate pushes Trump to safeguard last Russian nuclear arms control treaty
Trump has already pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran and the Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty with Russia, which is due to end on Friday.That would leave New Start, which limits strategic nuclear warheads deployed by the US and Russia to 1,550 each, as the last formal restraint on the world’s major arsenals and its demise is widely seen as the potential death of arms control.The bill, seen by the Guardian, calls for New Start to be extended until 2026 unless Russia can be shown to be in material breach of the treaty, or a new agreement is signed which “provides equal or greater constraints, transparency, and verification measures”.
AL JAZEERA
Yemen: Dozens killed in Houthi attack on Aden military parade
Rebels launch medium-range ballistic missile, armed drone at military parade in the southern city of Aden, report says.
The Houthi movement, which controls the capital, Sanaa, claimed responsibility for Thursday's attack which targeted a military parade at a camp belonging to the Yemeni Security Belt forces backed by the United Arab Emirates, a key partner in a military alliance assembled by Saudi Arabia to fight against the rebels.
A car, a bus and three motorcycles laden with explosives targeted the police station during a morning police roll-call, Abdel Dayem Ahmed, a senior police official told AP.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the suicide attack. It was not clear if the two attacks in Aden were linked.
Separately, the Houthis said on Thursday they targeted a military site in Dammam, in eastern Saudi Arabia, with a long-range missile.
Second US Democratic debate night two: What did candidates say?
Joe Biden, Kamala Harris and other Democratic 2020 candidates clash about healthcare and immigration.
Former Vice President Joe Biden, the current frontrunner, was the target of many of the candidates' attacks. But Biden struck a shaper and more aggressive tone than in the first debate when he came off as shaky and flustered.
Joining Biden on stage were Senators Michael Bennet, Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand and Kamala Harris, Representative Tulsi Gabbard, New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Washington Governor Jay Inslee, former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro and entrepreneur Andrew Yang
Harris said her proposal would extend health insurance to all Americans, while Biden's would "leave out" almost 10 million.
Castro has promised to make crossing the US-Mexico border irregularly punishable by a civil penalty and repeated that call on Wednesday.
As expected, Trump was a major target in Wednesday night's debate. The event comes after weeks of racist and racially-charged comments from the president, including telling four congresswomen of colour to "go back" to where they came from and calling the black-majority city of Baltimore "rat -infested".
Gillibrand said engaging with climate change would be her top priority if elected president - but the first thing she would do if elected was "Clorox the Oval office".
Democratic presidential candidates largely agreed on the overall goal of addressing climate change but differed in degrees of urgency.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/07/democratic-debate-night-candidates-190731221604941.html
Iran's Rouhani slams US over 'childish' Zarif sanctions
The US said it was imposing sanctions on Zarif for acting on behalf of Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
In his speech, Rouhani also accused the US of being "afraid" of Zarif, who recently gave a series of wide-ranging interviews to foreign media in New York.
In one of them, Zarif hit back at US President Donald Trump's call for new nuclear negotiations that encompass Iran's ballistic missiles programme and accused Washington of bringing the Middle East to the brink of "explosion" by selling arms to allies in the Gulf.
AL MAYADEEN
Maduro reconoce a activistas defensores de Embajada venezolana en Washington
Los activistas viajaron a Caracas para asistir entre el 25 y el 28 de julio a la XXV Edición del Foro de Sao Paulo, que contó con más de 720 delegados y delegadas de varios países.
Tras finalizar la reunión, los activistas reiteraron -junto al canciller Jorge Arreaza- su solidaridad con la nación bolivariana ante los ataques del Gobierno de Donald Trump.
Unión Africana pide aprobar sin retraso declaración constitucional en Sudán
El enviado de la Unión Africana (UA) para Sudán, Mohammed Hassan Lebatt, dijo que la mediación continental no aceptará ninguna excusa para retrasar la aprobación de la declaración constitucional por parte del Consejo Militar de Transición (CMT) y de las Fuerzas de Libertad y Cambio.
El CMT y la alianza opositora tenían previsto una sesión de conversaciones directas el martes para discutir la declaración constitucional, pero no se realizó debido a los eventos violentos ocurridos el lunes durante una manifestación de estudiantes en El Obeid, que dejaron cinco muertos, de ellos cuatro educandos.
