NPR
A U.N. official met with a Taliban leader over a ban on women working for NGOs
KABUL, Afghanistan — A senior U.N. official in Afghanistan met on Sunday the deputy prime minister of the Taliban-led authorities to debate a ban on ladies working for nongovernmental teams that Afghan authorities have introduced in a series of measures rolling back women’s rights.
The choice by the Taliban authorities to bar ladies from NGO work has prompted main worldwide help businesses to droop operations within the nation. The ban has raised fears that folks will probably be disadvantaged of meals, training, healthcare and different important companies, as over half of Afghanistan’s inhabitants wants pressing humanitarian help.
Assist businesses have warned the ban may have catastrophic penalties and “a whole bunch and hundreds” of Afghans will die due to the Taliban resolution.
The Guardian
Faint hopes that Taliban will relax ban on NGO women after UN condemnationFaint hopes exist that the Taliban might loosen up its ban on all women working for the non-governmental help businesses in Afghanistan after the UN safety council condemned the ban in a uncommon present of unanimity.
Virtually all the big NGO help businesses working in Afghanistan have suspended nearly all their work whereas talks proceed to influence the Taliban to rescind or make clear their resolution. Tens of hundreds of help employees – a lot of them the chief breadwinners for the family – have been informed to remain at house throughout the suspension, because the UN seeks to influence the Taliban of the results for peculiar folks in Afghanistan.
The help businesses say beneath Afghanistan’s customs they can not present important companies to ladies in Afghanistan akin to well being recommendation with out feminine employees or medical doctors.
The sabres are being rattled:
The Guardian
Kim Jong-un vows to ‘exponentially’ increase nuclear warhead production
Kim Jong-un has vowed to ramp up the manufacturing of nuclear warheads and construct a extra highly effective intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), whereas singling out South Korea as his nation’s “undoubted enemy”, North Korean state media reported on Sunday.
In an indication of deepening animosity in the direction of the US, South Korea and Japan, Kim known as for an “exponential enhance” within the regime’s nuclear arsenal throughout an deal with at a plenary assembly of the ruling Employees’ celebration that ended on Saturday.
The chief’s assertion was launched hours after North Korea fired a ballistic missile in the direction of its japanese waters, beginning 2023 because it had ended the earlier yr, when it carried out a report variety of weapons checks.“The presently established scenario requires our nation doubling down our efforts to strengthen our navy energy overwhelmingly to safeguard our sovereignty, security and fundamental nationwide curiosity to deal with the damaging navy strikes by the US and different hostile forces that focus on us,” Kim mentioned, in response to the official KCNA information company.
Reuters
Yoon says South Korea, U.S. discussing exercises using nuclear assets
SEOUL, Jan 2 (Reuters) – South Korea and the US are discussing attainable joint planning and workouts utilizing U.S. nuclear belongings within the face of North Korea’s rising nuclear and missile threats, South Korean President Yoon Suk-yeol mentioned in a newspaper interview.
The Chosun Ilbo newspaper quoted Yoon as saying the joint planning and workouts could be geared toward a simpler implementation of the U.S. “prolonged deterrence.”
The time period means the power of the U.S. navy, notably its nuclear forces, to discourage assaults on U.S. allies.
“The nuclear weapons belong to the US, however planning, data sharing, workouts and coaching ought to be collectively carried out by South Korea and the US,” Yoon mentioned, including Washington can be “fairly optimistic” concerning the thought.
Yoon’s remarks come a day after North Korean state media reported that its chief Kim Jong Un known as for creating new intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and an “exponential enhance” of the nation’s nuclear arsenal to counter U.S.-led threats amid flaring rigidity between the rival Koreas.
Al Jazeera
Tens of hundreds of individuals flooded Brazil’s capital to attend the inauguration of Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva because the nation’s new president.
The veteran leftist defeated far-right President Jair Bolsonaro in October’s election to return for a 3rd time period that supporters hope will flip the web page on 4 turbulent and divisive years.
The group of individuals gathered close to the seat of energy in Brasilia on Sunday sang on the high of their lungs, parading with carnival-style flare and waving large purple and rainbow flags.
A gaggle of Indigenous dancers lined in physique paint performed conventional percussion devices and sang.
Followers from throughout the nation stood in big traces to filter by way of the tight safety cordon across the presidential palace and Congress, belting out chants as they waited, akin to “Lula, guerreiro do povo brasileiro!” (Lula, warrior of the Brazilian folks).
Uncooked Story
Republican Caucus call ends up being another debate with Matt Gaetz — but this time McCarthy gave in
Rep. Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) path to the Speaker of the Home continues to be a tough one as a name with the Republican Caucusended with big concessions and extra debates with Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL).
Politico reporter Olivia Beavers wrote {that a} GOP supply informed her that they’d solely comply with a guidelines change that may make it simpler to topple the Speaker of the Home.
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) reportedly requested Gaetz if Republicans lowered the edge for the movement to vacate if he would in the end help McCarthy for Speaker. Gaetz then replied that McCarthy would not comply with it. McCarthy then argued that it is the convention would not discover it acceptable.
Washington Submit
U.S. watchdogs guarding $5 trillion in covid aid say they need more money
Michael Horowitz got here to Congress with a plea: If the U.S. authorities actually hoped to maintain monitor of roughly $5 trillion in coronavirus help, then federal watchdog businesses would wish some new cash of their very own.
It was June 2022, greater than two years after the pandemic first arrived in the US — and Horowitz, the chief of the nation’s chief pandemic oversight physique, mentioned a number of the authorities’s high officers may use the assistance. Criminals already had bilked billions of {dollars} from beneficiant packages meant to assist jobless Individuals and small companies in want, and Washington confronted lengthy, pricey work to attempt to get all of it again.
“I can let you know the fraud numbers, and the investigative work, is rising,” Horowitz informed lawmakers at a congressional oversight hearing, acknowledging at one level it had been “irritating, frankly” that lawmakers had not supplied the funds.“Is it being spent in a approach that’s wasteful? Did the cash go to the precise place? Was it defrauded? Accountability goes with understanding the place the cash went.”
New York Occasions
A Toxic Stew on Cape Cod: Human Waste and Warming Water
MASHPEE, Mass. — Ashley Okay. Fisher walked to the sting of the boat, pulled on a pair of thick black waders, and jumped into the river to seek for the lifeless.
She quickly discovered them: the encrusted stays of ribbed mussels, choked in gray-black goo that smelled like rubbish and felt like mayonnaise. The muck on the underside of the Mashpee River will get deeper yearly, suffocating what grows there. It got here as much as Ms. Fisher’s waist. She struggled to free herself and climb again aboard. The muck is what turns into of the toxic algae that’s taking on extra of Cape Cod’s rivers and bays every summer time.
The algal explosion is fueled by warming waters, mixed with rising ranges of nitrogen that come from the antiquated septic techniques that a lot of the Cape nonetheless makes use of. A inhabitants growth over the previous half-century has meant extra human waste flushed into bogs, which finds its approach into waterways.
Extra waste additionally means extra phosphorus coming into the Cape’s freshwater ponds, the place it feeds cyanobacteria, a sort of algae that may trigger vomiting, diarrhea and liver harm, amongst different well being results. It might additionally kill pets.
