World

A federal judge has ordered former President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil to surrender to the authorities by Friday afternoon to start serving a 12-year prison sentence on a corruption conviction.

The warrant was issued hours after the country’s top court rejected da Silva’s bid to remain free while appeals of the conviction were considered.

A federal judge, Sérgio Moro, wrote in the arrest warrant that da Silva would be held in a special cell, outside of the general prison population, in consideration of the “dignity of the office he held.” da Silva will be allowed to surrender to the federal police in the southern city of Curitiba, where his trial was held, Judge Moro said. He set Friday at 5 p.m. as the deadline.

da Silva’s Workers’ Party remained defiant on Thursday, vowing that he would still run for a third term in October, despite the Supreme Federal Court’s 6-to-5 ruling early Thursday that he could not remain free pending further appeals.

da Silva’s imminent imprisonment also sends a chilling message to other prominent political figures caught up in corruption investigations. The threat of jail time has been one of the most important tools in the large-scale investigation known as Lava Jato, or Car Wash, which has ensnared not only da Silva, but also dozens of business and political leaders, including President Michel Temer.

Last July, da Silva was convicted on corruption and money laundering charges and sentenced to almost 10 years in prison. The Supreme Federal Court, in denying Mr. da Silva’s request to remain free, upheld a 2016 ruling that allows trial judges to jail defendants after an initial appeal has been rejected.

Source : The New York Times

In light of Facebook’s recent privacy woes, the company today pledged to take a meaningful step in righting past wrongs by shutting data brokers out of its multi-billion dollar ad platform.

Facebook’s product marketing director Graham Mudd had this to say:

"We want to let advertisers know that we will be shutting down Partner Categories. This product enables third party data providers to offer their targeting directly on Facebook. While this is common industry practice, we believe this step, winding down over the next six months, will help improve people’s privacy on Facebook."

The plan centers on third-party brokers like Acxiom Corp. and Epsilon Data Management LLC, both of which collect information to package and sell — sometimes to other brokers, other times to marketers who intend to use the insights on platforms like Facebook’s.

It’s a lucrative industry. Acxiom reported over $800 million in revenue last year alone.

Data brokers have been around a while, each collecting information that dates back before the internet was commonly used in most US households. Back then they collected information on your magazine and newspaper subscriptions, whether you owned a home, and how you were likely to vote. Today they know your sexual preferences, what you watch on TV, who your closest friends and family members are, and even whether you prefer a coupe or a sedan. It’s fair to say the internet has upped the ante.

Major players often purchased this bundled data, using that to help segment specific audiences to advertise to on social networks — in this case Facebook. Mudd is correct in saying that it’s common industry practice. Facebook though, provides targeting options that allow marketers to create laser-focused campaigns using the insights, a powerful combination that hadn’t existed just a decade prior — or, even on the same scale five years ago.

Today’s move to shut the door on these companies is a big one for Facebook, a company burdened by the weight of yet another privacy scandal. There’s still work to do, but even I — a self-professed Facebook cynic — commend the company for taking a proactive move rather than its typical reactionary backpedaling after major missteps.

Facebook Inc. scans the links and images that people send each other on Facebook Messenger, and reads chats when they’re flagged to moderators, making sure the content abides by the company’s rules. If it doesn’t, it gets blocked or taken down.

The company confirmed the practice after an interview published earlier this week with Chief Executive Officer Mark Zuckerberg raised questions about Messenger’s practices and privacy. Zuckerberg told Vox’s Ezra Klein a story about receiving a phone call related to ethnic cleansing in Myanmar. Facebook had detected people trying to send sensational messages through the Messenger app, he said.

“In that case, our systems detect what’s going on,” Zuckerberg said. “We stop those messages from going through.”

Some people reacted with concern on Twitter: Was Facebook reading messages more generally? Facebook has been under scrutiny in recent weeks over how it handles users’ private data and the revelation struck a nerve. Messenger doesn’t use the data from the scanned messages for advertising, the company said, but the policy may extend beyond what Messenger users expect.

The company told Bloomberg that while Messenger conversations are private, Facebook scans them and uses the same tools to prevent abuse there that it does on the social network more generally. All content must abide by the same "community standards." People can report posts or messages for violating those standards, which would prompt a review by the company’s “community operations” team. Automated tools can also do the work.

“For example, on Messenger, when you send a photo, our automated systems scan it using photo matching technology to detect known child exploitation imagery or when you send a link, we scan it for malware or viruses,” a Facebook Messenger spokeswoman said in a statement. “Facebook designed these automated tools so we can rapidly stop abusive behavior on our platform.”

Messenger used to be part of Facebook’s main service, before it was spun off into a separate application in 2014. Facebook’s other major chat app, WhatsApp, encrypts both ends of its users’ communications, so that not even WhatsApp can see it -- a fact that’s made it more secure for users, and more difficult for lawmakers wanting information in investigations. Messenger also has an encrypted option, but users have to turn it on.

The company updated its data policy and proposed new terms of service on Wednesday to clarify that Messenger and Instagram use the same rules as Facebook. “We better explain how we combat abuse and investigate suspicious activity, including by analyzing the content people share,” Facebook said in a blog post.

Facebook is on the defensive after revelations that private information from about 50 million users wound up in the hands of political ad-data firm Cambridge Analytica without their consent. Zuckerberg has agreed to testify before the House next week and is holding a conference call on Wednesday afternoon to discuss changes to Facebook privacy policies. (Follow the call on the TOPLive blog.)

The company is working to make its privacy policies clearer, but still ends up with gaps between what it says users have agreed to, and what users think they actually agreed to.

The Messenger scanning systems “are very similar to those that other internet companies use today,” the company said.

(Bloomberg)

After days of speculation, it has been confirmed that North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un has visited China.

The visit, confirmed by China and North Korea, was Mr Kim's first known foreign trip since taking office in 2011.

Kim held "successful talks" with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing, China's Xinhua news agency reported.

China is North Korea's main economic ally and it was thought highly likely it would consult Beijing before planned summits with South Korea and the US.

Kim is due to meet South Korean President Moon Jae-in in April, and US President Donald Trump in May.

The Beijing visit is considered a significant step in North Korea's preparation for the proposed talks.

During the visit, Kim assured his Chinese counterpart he was committed to giving up his nuclear weapons, China's Xinhua news agency reported, but with conditions.

Source : BBC

A woman armed with a handgun opened fire today at the headquarters of YouTube, shooting three people. She was found dead after turning her gun on herself.

The shooting happened just before 1pm at the video-sharing giant's offices in San Bruno, California, the city's cops confirmed.

San Francisco General Hospital treated a 36-year-old man, who is in a critical condition, and two women, aged 32 and 27, who are in serious and fair conditions respectively. All three had been shot.

Another woman, understood to be the shooter, died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds near the YouTube campus. Identified locally as 38-year-old Nasim Aghdam, she was, according to her family, "angry" that YouTube had stopped paying her for her online videos and taken down her material.

"There is no equal growth opportunity on YouTube or any other video sharing site, your channel will grow if they want to,” Aghdam wrote on her website. “YouTube filtered my channels to keep them from getting views.”

Aghdam's family had reported her missing, after she disappeared for two days, and was found sleeping in her car. Her father, Ismail, said he warned police she had developed a hatred for YouTube and may target the organization.

A Pakistani news channel has hired the country's first transgender TV newsreader.

Marvia Malik, a journalism graduate who has also worked as a model, told the BBC she was moved to tears when she was offered the job.

She anchored her first show on private broadcaster Kohenoor on Friday, after three months of training.

Transgender people face discrimination in Pakistan and many struggle to find employment.

Some are forced into begging, dancing or prostitution to earn money.

Ms Malik told the BBC she had to stop herself from screaming with joy when she learned she had got the job.

"The dream that I saw for myself, I was able to climb on the first stair to achieving it," she said.

She said she hoped her work would help improve the lives of Pakistan's transgender community.

"Our community should be treated equally and there must not be any gender discrimination. We should be given equal rights and be considered ordinary citizens, instead of third-gender."

She added: "My family knows I have modelled and they know that I work as a newscaster. It's the age of social media and there's nothing that my family doesn't know. But they have still disowned me."

The owner of Kohenoor, Junaid Ansari, told VOA news that Ms Malik had been selected on merit, not on gender issues.

Earlier this month, Pakistan's Senate voted to support a bill protecting the rights of transgender people, and allowing them to determine their own gender identity.

In June 2016, a 23-year-old transgender activist died after delays in receiving medical treatment.

Alisha, who was shot eight times, was in critical condition when admitted to hospital but staff could not decide whether to put her in a male or female ward, according to her friends.

(BBC)

South African anti-apartheid campaigner and former first lady Winnie Madikizela-Mandela has died aged 81.

She and her former husband Nelson Mandela, who were both jailed, were a symbol of the country's anti-apartheid struggle for three decades.

However, in later years her reputation became tainted legally and politically.

Crowds of mourners and political figures flocked to her home in Soweto, in Johannesburg, after news of her death broke.

Family spokesman Victor Dlamini confirmed earlier on Monday that Mandela "succumbed peacefully in the early hours of Monday afternoon surrounded by her family and loved ones" following a long illness, which had seen her go in and out of hospital since the start of the year.

Madikizela-Mandela was born in 1936 in the Eastern Cape - then known as Transkei.
She was a trained social worker when she met her future husband in the 1950s. They went on to have two daughters together.

They were married for a total of 38 years, although for almost three decades of that time they were separated due to Nelson Mandela's long imprisonment.

As rescuers continue to search the burned-out shopping mall in the city of Kemerovo, many have been frantically trying to reach their relatives, including children who were in the mall’s cinema or play area when the fire started.

So far, 48 people have been officially confirmed as having lost their lives in the blaze, according to the Emergencies Ministry. Up to eleven children are reportedly among the victims.

In the meantime, an estimated 16 people are still missing, but the chances of discovering anybody alive amid the smoldering rubble are slim. Earlier, 64 people had been listed as missing, but authorities clarified that these included the victims whose bodies were already found but had not yet been identified.

At least 48 people were injured in the blaze, according to the emergency services, and 12 remain hospitalized.

Emergency services battle the flames Credit: Danil Aikin/Getty

 Amid conflicting reports, some have described the source of the fire as the children’s playground, suggesting that the trampoline there caught fire after a child allegedly misused a lighter. Another version suggests that electrical wiring at the playground had short-circuited.

Reports from witnesses have described panic as people realized there was a fire spreading, with many saying on social media that there were no fire alarms or loudspeaker warnings, and that people had to find their own way through the top floor of the mall, which was already filled with smoke. Several hundred people, including many children, were in the mall at the time.

Tragically, some reportedly had left their children unattended in one of the mall's cinema halls or at the playground.

The fire, which broke out on Sunday afternoon, was finally contained some 12 hours later, after engulfing some 1,600 square meters. The building sustained severe damage, its roof and floors partially collapsing.

Fears are growing that almost an entire class of primary school children may have perished in the blaze. Eight kids from a school outside Kemerovo were visiting the city on an excursion with a teacher, who led them to watch a cartoon show at the shopping mall. Russian media reports suggest that she chose to have a stroll through the mall and left the children at the cinema, from which they apparently couldn’t find their way out.

‘No fire alarms, no warning’

When the blaze erupted, witness Anna Zarechneva was at the mall with her husband and little son. Describing their ordeal in an Instagram post, she said there was no fire alarm, that lights were not switched back on in the cinema and that the movie even kept playing. The family was lucky to escape as other mall-goers notified them of the fire.

When Anna and her son were safe outside of the mall, her husband tried to get back in to retrieve the clothes they left behind. The man witnessed chaotic scenes on the third floor, with children still trapped in the cinema and their parents unable to reach them through thick, toxic smoke.

Other eyewitnesses have also reported that the fire alarm at the mall did not work. When the fire broke out, people panicked and ran towards the exits in a reportedly disorderly rush.

“We’ve decided to go and watch a cartoon in this mall for the first time. God ... Thank you for saving us,” a woman, identified only as Alexandra, says in the caption to the video. “I saw a woman running and screaming about the fire ... panic erupted, we were almost knocked down ... No there were no alarms!”

Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai has returned to her home town in Pakistan for the first time since she was shot there by Taliban militants, security officials say.

Yousafzai, 20, was shot in the head by a gunman for campaigning for female education in 2012.

Her family's home region of Swat was once a militant stronghold, and she was attacked on a school bus there at 15.

It had been unclear if she would visit the area because of security concerns.

On Thursday, it was announced that Ms Yousafzai had returned from the UK to Pakistan for the first time since she was attacked.

Yousafzai delivered an emotional speech at the prime minister's office in Islamabad:

"Always it has been my dream that I should go to Pakistan and there, in peace and without any fear, I can move on streets, I can meet people, I can talk to people.

"And I think that it's my old home again... so it is actually happening, and I am grateful to all of you."

A helicopter carrying Yousafzai landed not far from her family home in Mingora on Saturday, amid a tight security operation.

Her trip to Pakistan is expected to last four days. Officials from her Malala Fund group are travelling with her, local media report.

Source : BBC

Pic :

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, his ratings in a slump amid a suspected cronyism scandal and cover-up, apologised again on Sunday for causing anxiety and loss of confidence in his government.

Protesters urged Abe to resign, as riot police kept tight security outside the venue of his ruling party's annual convention, at which the premier stressed his intention to revise Japan's pacifist post-war, U.S.-drafted constitution.

Abe faces his biggest political crisis since taking office in December 2012 as suspicions swirl about a sale of state-owned land at a huge discount to a nationalist school operator with ties to his wife.

"This problem has shaken the people's confidence in the administration," Abe told the convention. "As head of the government, I keenly feel my responsibility and would like to deeply apologise to the people."

He pledged a thorough clarification of the facts and the prevention of a recurrence by pulling the government together, but offered no sign of stepping down.

Abe has denied that he or his wife intervened in the sale or that he sought to alter documents related to the deal.

His close ally, Finance Minister Taro Aso, has also denied involvement in the alterations made by ministry officials.

Public opinion polls last weekend showed support for Abe's cabinet sinking as low as 31 percent, with majorities saying he bears some responsibility for the affair.

The sliding support rates could dash Abe's hopes of winning a third three-year term as ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leader in a party vote in September, victory in which would set him on track to become Japan's longest ruling premier.

Also at the party convention, the LDP adopted a proposal to revise the pacifist constitution in line with a plan floated by Abe last year to explicitly refer to the Self-Defence Forces, as Japan's military is known.

"The time has finally come to tackle constitutional revision, which has been a task since the founding of the party," Abe said.

"Let's stipulate the Self-Defence Forces and put an end to a controversy about violation of the constitution."

Abe proposed last May that the first two clauses of Article 9, which renounces the right to wage war and bans maintenance of a standing military, be unchanged but that a reference to the SDF be added to clarify its ambiguous status.

Despite its literal ban on a standing army, successive governments have interpreted the charter to allow a military exclusively to defence.

Abe wants to make that stance clear in the constitution itself, but says the change will not alter Japan's security policies. Critics worry the revision would open the way to a bigger role for the military overseas.

Abe's weakened support and a wary junior coalition partner could make it hard for the LDP to push for the change, which would spark a divisive debate. Japan's constitution has never been amended and any changes require approval by two-thirds of each house of parliament and a majority in a public referendum.

Source : Channel News Asia

The Saudi-funded spread of Wahhabism began as a result of Western countries asking Riyadh to help counter the Soviet Union during the Cold War, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman told the Washington Post.

Speaking to the paper, bin Salman said that Saudi Arabia's Western allies urged the country to invest in mosques and madrassas overseas during the Cold War, in an effort to prevent encroachment in Muslim countries by the Soviet Union

He added that successive Saudi governments had lost track of that effort, saying "we have to get it all back." Bin Salman also said that funding now comes mostly from Saudi-based "foundations," rather than from the government.

The crown prince’s 75-minute interview with the Washington Post took place on March 22, the final day of his US tour. Another topic of discussion included a previous claim by US media that bin Salman had said that he had White House senior adviser Jared Kushner "in his pocket."

Bin Salman denied reports that when he and Kushner – who is also Donald Trump's son-in-law – met in Riyadh in October, he had sought or received a greenlight from Kushner for the massive crackdown on alleged corruption which led to widespread arrests in the kingdom shortly afterwards. According to bin Salman, the arrests were a domestic issue and had been in the works for years.

He said it would be "really insane" for him to trade classified information with Kushner, or to try to use him to advance Saudi interests within the Trump administration. He stated that their relationship was within a normal governmental context, but did acknowledge that he and Kushner "work together as friends, more than partners." He stated that he also had good relationships with Vice President Mike Pence and others within the White House.

The crown prince also spoke about the war in Yemen, where a Saudi-led coalition continues to launch a bombing campaign against Houthi rebels in an attempt to reinstate ousted Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi as president. The conflict has killed thousands, displaced many more, driven the country to the brink of famine, and led to a major cholera outbreak.

Although the coalition has been accused of a large number of civilian deaths and disregard for civilian lives - an accusation which Riyadh denies - the crown prince said his country has not passed up "any opportunity" to improve the humanitarian situation in the country. “There are not good options and bad options. The options are between bad and worse,” he said.

The interview with the crown prince was initially held off the record. However, the Saudi embassy later agreed to led the Washington Post publish specific portions of the meeting.

Zimbabwe has launched an investigation into the country's former first lady, Grace Mugabe, over her alleged involvement in an ivory smuggling ring.

The probe was opened after a three-month undercover mission by Australian wildlife photographer Adrian Steirn.

Speaking exclusively to Al Jazeera, Steirn said he uncovered the poaching and smuggling syndicate when he began looking into the illegal ivory trade in December.

"Ivory was being sourced either from the national park's vault, being thieved or pilfered, or from live elephants being killed by poaching syndicates. The syndicate would then sell to Grace Mugabe's clientele," he said.

"She would then be able to pack that and send it out through the airport. Anything through that airport, that was the property of the first lady, was not searched or scanned in any way."

Steirn has gathered documents, undercover videos and testimonies, which he showed to Al Jazeera's Investigative Unit. They expose the syndicate and the former first lady's involvement in ivory smuggling, he said.

Controlled ivory trade is allowed in Zimbabwe, but its export is not permitted.

In a written statement to Al Jazeera, Christopher Mutsvangwa, a special adviser to President Emmerson Mnangagwa, said Zimbabwe's government "will seek answers from all parties including former First Lady Grace Mugabe … about their knowledge of the illegal export of prohibited items from our country."

Two alleged smugglers have been charged with possession of ivory.

Al Jazeera contacted Grace Mugabe's staff, lawyers and relatives for comment, but they did not respond.

During the presidency of her husband, Robert, she was a controversial figure, earning the nickname "Gucci Grace" for her extravagant shopping sprees.

Her hopes of succeeding him were dashed when the army forced Mugabe from power in November, and Mnangagwa took over.

That was when Steirn saw an opening to investigate, going undercover as an ivory buyer.

Three weeks later, in December, authorities in Zimbabwe seized an illegal shipment of 200 kilograms of ivory destined for Malaysia at Harare's Robert Mugabe International Airport.

Steirn said the evidence he gathered connects that shipment to Grace Mugabe and the smuggling syndicate.

Al Jazeera's Malcolm Webb, reporting from Johannesburg, said Mnangagwa's government was eager "to clean up its international image after decades of Mugabe rule".

"The poaching and smuggling investigation is the first major challenge to the Mugabe family dynasty since the change of power," he said.

Source : Al Jazeera