American midterm elections will be held November 6; however, states across the country are passing legislation to suppress the voting rights of people of colour. Carol Anderson, chair of African-American Studies at Emory University in Atlanta, GA., told the CBC that she believes laws with the goal of suppressing Black votes are being drafted with “horrific efficiency.”

Georgia has an “exact match” policy, meaning that a voter registration form can be rejected if it contains a single misspelling. On October 24, only two weeks before midterms, a judge ruled that voters must be notified of their status and given a chance to fix the error. 70 per cent of voters denied due to the exact match policy have been Black. The exact match policy is enforced by chief election officer Brian Kemp, who is running for governor against Democrat Stacey Abrams. If she wins, Abrams will be the first Black female governor in the entire country. Kemp has been endorsed by President Trump and has a largely white voter base.

Dodge City, Kansas, which is predominantly Hispanic, has closed its only polling place: residents will now have to travel further to access a polling location. This will require voters to take more time off from work in order to vote, and will require access to a vehicle; as, the nearest bus stop is a mile away from the new polling place. Dodge City is currently being sued by the American Civil Liberties Union for intentionally misleading voters about the location change.

North Dakota has a new policy in place which will target Indigenous voters. North Dakota was the only state in which voters were not required to register before election day and provide proof of residency in order to vote. Now, voters must provide a residential address, which proves difficult for many Indigenous people, as the five reservations in North Dakota do not use the same addressing system as the rest of the state. The policy, put in place by a Republican-led Legislature, is being introduced prior to the potential re-election of Democrat Heidi Heitkamp, who narrowly won a Senate seat in 2012 due to support from Indigenous communities.

Khashoggi Case Drags On

Jamal Khashoggi was killed in the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul, Turkey on October 2. Khashoggi was a journalist for The Washington Post, a U.S. resident, and a critic of the Saudi royal family. He went to the consulate to retrieve proof of his past divorce so he could marry his fiancée. Initially, Saudi officials had denied any knowledge of what happened inside the consulate. Later, they retracted their statement, instead saying the journalist died in a fist fight. After weeks of pressure by Turkish prosecutors, they admitted that the murder was premeditated, and identified 18 suspects in the case.

The Turkish government, unhappy with the way the investigation has been proceeding, has insisted that the suspects face prosecution in Turkey, but Saudi Arabia demands that the case be dealt with on their own grounds.

Currently hindering the investigation is the unknown whereabouts of Khashoggi’s body. “I want to bury the body of beloved Jamal. Therefore I am asking once again, where is his body? I believe that the Saudi regime knows where his body is. They should answer my demand,” said Hatice Cengiz, Khashoggi’s fiancée. Despite pressures from Turkish officials, Saudi authorities have not yet forfeited any information pertaining to the location of the body.

The United States has hesitated to get involved in the issue, although they have condemned Saudi Arabia’s resistance to a full investigation. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo stated it would be a “handful more weeks” before the U.S. could retaliate. Security interests, such as U.S. access to Saudi Arabia’s petroleum resources, could be at stake if the U.S. decides to further their investigation of Khashoggi’s death.

Merkel Resigns from CDU

On October 29, Angela Merkel announced in an address to her party that she will not be seeking re-election as Germany’s chancellor when her office term ends in 2021. Merkel’s party, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) suffered heavy losses in regional elections in the German state of Hesse. Merkel took responsibility for the CDU’s losses in the local elections, and confirmed to party members that she will not run again for the leadership of the party come December. The party’s decline in popularity is related to the rising right wing and anti-immigration sentiments, notably in the form of the nationalist Alternative for Germany party. The question is now whether Merkel will be able to last her full term. It is speculated that the current coalition between her party and the Social Democrats may collapse before the next national elections, in which case a snap election would be called.

Whichever direction the upcoming elections take, changes at the top of Germany’s political hierarchy can have important implications for all of Europe; the announcement of Merkel’s resignation itself has shaken confidence in the Euro within the region. Her successor will face major challenges. Reshaping the European Union after Brexit, Europe’s response to refugees, strengthening European unity, and clashes with governments in the west (the United States and the Trump Administration), and to the east (Russia and the Kremlin) are all factors the next chancellor must deal with. Merkel has confirmed that she will not be formally backing any of the candidates for the position.

The post Outside the Bubble Nov. 5 appeared first on The McGill Daily.

The United States discontinued funding to a United Nations agency that aids Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza, Lebanon, Jordan, and Syria on August 31 2018. The U.S. has been a major contributor to the The United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for decades; in 2017, the United States donated $350 million to the agency, and was planning to make the same contribution this year. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency, offers a multitude of health, educational, and social services to Palestinians. The UNRWA helps attain schooling for over 500,000 children in the area, and grant medical aide to 9 million. The Trump administration also recently cut $200 million in aid to other agencies helping Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank. To explain this cut of funding, the U.S. government described the UNRWA as “irredeemably flawed,” and said their business strategy is “unsustainable.” In response to the United State’s decision, the UNRWA stated that “the international […] community, our donors and host countries have consistently praised UNRWA for its achievements and standards.” The U.S. used to supply 30% of its total budget, meaning that the elimination of funding from the U.S. could have disastrous results for millions of Palestinian refugees. In response to the actions of the US., Arab and European countries have promised to continue to defend the UNRWA, and Germany has pledged to increase its aid for the program. In May of this year, President Trump moved the U.S. embassy in Israel to the much disputed city of Jerusalem, a decision critics believe is in line with the funding cut, and an overall shift towards a more pro-Israel stance.

Trans Migrant Sex Worker Vanessa Campos Murdered in France

content warning: death, anti-sex work sentiment, transphobia

Vanesa Campos, a trans Peruvian migrant sex worker, was murdered by seven to eight men while trying to protect a client from being robbed at the Bois de Boulogne (West of Paris, France), the night of August 16. A new protest in honour of Vanesa Campos is scheduled for September 22 2018. 5 men are currently being detained for “organised group murder” and “group thefts with hurt.” Associations, like Acceptess Transgenres (AcceptessT) and STRASS (a French sex worker union), have been protesting the government’s silence, especially that of Marlène Schiappa’s, France’s Secretary of Equality between women and men. They particularly criticize France’s laws on sex work, which penalize clients and push sex workers into precarity. Activists also decry the general treatment of trans people, sex workers, and migrants in French society. On the matter, a representative of STRASS wrote: “our [sex workers’] deaths are normalised. […] A trans woman who dies remains a ‘tranny’.”

Journalists arrested in Myanmar

Two Reuters journalists, Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo, are being sentenced to prison for 7 years for the possession of official Myanmar documents. They were investigating the massacre of 10 Rohingya men in the Burmese village of Inn Din. The verdict is being considered a roadblock for the country’s free press and transition to democracy. Multiple governments and International Human Rights groups are calling for the reporters’ immediate release.

The reporters pleaded not guilty to violating Myanmar’s colonial-era Official Secrets Act, which is an offence punishable by up to 14 years in prison. They claim that they were framed by the police: the reporters told the court that two police officials handed them the papers at a restaurant in Yangon just prior to their arrest by other officers. Testimony presented by prosecution witnesses was contradictory. Another police witness testified the restaurant meeting was a set-up to block, or punish, the journalists for their reporting on the mass killings of Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine by Burmese military officials.

UN investigators have called for senior Burmese military officials to be prosecuted for genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. The State Counsellor of Myanmar Aung San Suu Kyi has remained silent on the issue, and has been criticized for failing to stand up for the free press after having championed the rights of journalists during her own house arrest.

India overturns section 377

The Indian Supreme Court decriminalized the “carnal intercourse” clause under Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code on September 6 2018, in what experts are calling a “landmark decision”. While Section 377 still exists, it can no longer be used to punish consensual gay sex. This law originated from the British colonization of India in the mid-1800s, and continued to be used for prosecution, despite Britain decriminalizing homosexuality in 1967. In a public statement, Chief Justice Dipak Misra described the law as being “irrational, indefensible and manifestly arbitrary.”

In 2008, a High Court in New Delhi overturned the law and decriminalized homosexuality. However, in 2013 this order from the New Delhi High Court was brought to the Supreme Court and ruled unconstitutional, reinstating Section 377. The Supreme Court decided to revisit the legality of Section 377 through the lens of privacy; in 2017 the Supreme Court ruled that privacy was an essential human right and that “sexual orientation is an essential attribute of privacy.” Following this decision, the recent revision to Section 377 focused on protecting the privacy of consenting adults. Currently, gay marriage and the adoption of children by same-sex couples is still criminalized, but many LGBTQ+ activists have been invigorated by the recent developments and are hopeful for future change. Dhrubo Jyoti, a queer LGBTQ+ activist, told CNN in an interview that the decriminalization of Section 377 “not just affirms one’s faith in the Constitution, but it also means that the gloom and the despair in this atmosphere of abuse for many of us, hopefully, for a new generation of queer people, it won’t be there.”

The post International news briefs appeared first on The McGill Daily.