Category: World

On Groundhog Day, Punxsutawney Phil predicts early spring in the US | Weather News

More than 40,000 people gathered to see the Pennsylvania prognosticator as part of a tradition dating back to 1887.

Pennsylvania’s primo prognosticator Punxsutawney Phil did not see his shadow during annual Groundhog Day celebrations on Friday, meaning that, according to legend, there will be an early spring.

The US state’s tradition of using a large rodent to predict the seasons dates back to the Pennsylvania Dutch belief that if a groundhog left its burrow and saw its shadow, it would scurry back inside and winter would go on for six more weeks.

Groundhog Day is now a major yearly event in Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, complete with top-hatted comperes, cheering crowds and a full-court press.

Phil and his predecessors, also called Phil, have been forecasting since 1887, and this year more than 40,000 people camped out in a festival atmosphere to wait for sunrise and the groundhog’s emergence.

“Another winter slumber paused so I could meet the crowd, it’s hard to sleep anyway when the party is this loud,” said Dan McGinley, vice president of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club, reading from a scroll “selected” by the groundhog.

A crowd watches the festivities while waiting for Punxsutawney Phil, the weather prognosticating groundhog, to come out and make his prediction [Barry Reeger/AP Photo]

McGinley even raised the prospect of voters writing in Punxsutawney Phil’s name on ballots as the US enters a presidential election year.

In the past 10 years, Phil has been accurate only 30 percent of the time, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

In 2023, Phil saw his shadow but temperatures that February were above average and in March only slightly below, leading the NOAA to declare that the furry forecaster had got it wrong.

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro took the stage before Phil to urge people around the world watching the festivities to come to Punxsutawney next year. Shapiro also announced the famed groundhog is the new official meteorologist for Pennsylvania.

“Punxsutawney is the centre of the universe right now and I love that you’re all here,” Shapiro said.

Eager to cash in on the craze of animal forecasters, other states have adopted their own meteorological soothsayers, including Wisconsin’s Sun Prairie Jimmy, Woody the Woodchuck in Michigan, and Scramble the Duck in Connecticut.

Businesses did not miss a trick, with potato chip maker Frito Lay preparing to air advertisements showing actor Stephen Tobolowsky enduring a scenario similar to the plot of the popular movie, Groundhog Day.

The cult 1993 film, in which Tobolowsky played a relentlessly upbeat salesman, saw leading man Bill Murray stuck in a never-ending 24-hour loop after Punxsutawney Phil predicted six more weeks of winter.

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Photos: South Korea beat Australia 2-1 to reach semifinals | Football News

South Korea has advanced to the semifinals of the Asian Cup with a 2-1 comeback win over Australia in extra-time at Al Janoub Stadium, after Son Heung-min scored the winner with a sublime free kick.

Australia had beaten South Korea by the same scoreline in extra-time in the 2015 final to lift their first Asian Cup. But during Friday’s match, it was the East Asian team who prevailed after netting yet another goal in stoppage time to force extra-time.

Australia had taken the lead just before half-time when they cleverly switched flanks with neat passes in the box. Then, a cross from Australian player Nathaniel Atkinson found teammate Craig Goodwin, who had time to set himself up for a successful volley into the bottom corner.

Forward Martin Boyle could have made it 2-0 when he received a cross into the box, but goalkeeper Jo Hyeon-woo made two saves to deny him. Mitchell Duke’s volley from the rebound, meanwhile, went over the bar to give South Korea a reprieve.

South Korea coach Juergen Klinsmann made a tactical change in the second half, pushing Son further forward. The strategy worked when Son, a Tottenham Hotspur forward, was fouled in the box by Australia’s Lewis Miller in the fourth minute of stoppage time.

Hwang Hee-chan stepped up: The Wolverhampton Wanderers forward took his time to calm his nerves before he fired his effort into the top corner to force extra-time — their fourth goal after the 90th minute at the tournament.

It was the second straight game for South Korea going to extra-time, after they beat Saudi Arabia on penalties. This time, Hwang won a free kick on the edge of the box from a foul conceded by Miller once again.

Son stepped up and saw his effort sail past the wall, beating goalkeeper Mathew Ryan to find the net. The goal sparked a wild celebration, with Klinsmann letting out a roar with his arms raised.

Australia’s attempts to fight back suffered a blow when Aiden O’Neill was sent off after a video assistant referee (VAR) review for a foul on Hwang, reducing Graham Arnold’s side to 10 men for the second half of extra-time where they could not find an equaliser.

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Centuries-old mosque razed in Indian capital | Religion

NewsFeed

Worshippers from a New Delhi mosque are shocked over the destruction of the centuries-old structure. The property was left in ruins, and a case has been filed in court alleging no notice was given before the demolition.

Published On 2 Feb 2024

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Could the island of Ireland unite or will the UK stay intact? | News

Former IRA political wing Sinn Fein is now largest party in Stormont Assembly.

A standoff that has frozen politics in Northern Ireland for two years is over.

Pro-British unionists are to take their seats in the regional parliament where the biggest party is Sinn Fein.

But its goal is Irish unity.

So, could that happen? Or will the United Kingdom remain intact?

Presenter: Adrian Finighan

Guests:

Danny Morrison – Author who formerly served as the national director of publicity for the Sinn Fein party in the 1980s

Mark Devenport – Independent journalist and author

Deirdre Heenan – Professor of social policy at Ulster University and a former member of the Irish Council of State

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German upper house approves bill easing citizenship rules | Demographics News

Lawmakers in the upper house of parliament passed the legislation that will simplify the process of naturalisation.

German lawmakers have passed a bill that makes the process of obtaining citizenship easier, and moved to simplify repatriations.

The naturalisation reform, approved by the upper house of parliament on Friday, allows people to become German citizens while keeping their original citizenship.

People will be able to apply for citizenship after living in Germany for five years rather than eight years. Children of parents from abroad will also be granted German citizenship at birth if one parent has been legally residing in Germany for five years rather than eight.

If applicants demonstrate “special integration achievements” through particularly good performance at school or work or civic engagement, they may be able to be naturalised after only three years.

One important aspect of the new law is that people who obtain their German citizenship will not have to give up the citizenship of their native country, previously only possible for residents from other EU countries in Germany.

This will allow tens of thousands of German-born Turks to become voters.

Likewise, Germans who wish to become citizens of another country will no longer need special authorisation from German authorities.

The bill was put forward by centre-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s socially liberal coalition. The main centre-right opposition bloc had criticised the project, and argued it would cheapen German citizenship.

The bill was approved by Germany’s lower house two weeks ago. At the time, Scholz hailed the legislation and said it was for those who had lived and worked in Germany for “decades”.

“With the new citizenship law, we are saying to all those who have often lived and worked in Germany for decades, who abide by our laws, who are at home here: You belong to Germany,” Scholz said.

Filiz Polat, a Green Party migration expert, welcomed the prospect of dual citizenship and slammed parties opposing the law as failing to understand the “modern immigration society that has long existed in Germany”.

Al Jazeera’s Dominic Kane, reporting from Berlin, said there were “speeches in favour and there were speeches against” the bill in the state’s house of parliament.

“But in the end, the house decided not to vote in favour, but also, not to vote against,” Kane said. This means that the law goes through because of Germany’s constitution.

“The elected house of parliament had already voted in favour of it,” he explained.

The legislation still has to be approved by Germany’s upper chamber of parliament, and by the president as a formality, before it becomes law.

It will come into effect by mid-May at the earliest, Kane said.

Hundreds of thousands of people are already in the system, meaning there will likely be a massive backlog before new applications are processed, our correspondent added.

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‘It’s immoral’: UN special rapporteur on UNRWA funding cuts | Israel War on Gaza

What impact will UNRWA funding cuts have on Gaza? Marc Lamont Hill speaks to UN Special Rapporteur, Francesca Albanese.

The humanitarian situation in Gaza is worsening with more than 26,000 Gaza Palestinians killed and another 1.7 million displaced since October 7th.

At least a dozen countries have announced they will be suspending funds for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) after Israel accused 12 of the agency’s employees of participating in the October 7th attacks.

UNRWA has been a crucial provider of humanitarian aid in Gaza, so why, during a time of crisis and based only on allegations, have countries pulled their funding? What will happen to civilians who depend on the agency for survival?

On UpFront this week, Marc Lamont Hill talks to the UN’s special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, on the impending consequences of UNWRA’s funding cuts.

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UK court dismisses case against Greta Thunberg over London climate protest | Climate Crisis News

The Swedish climate activist was on trial for protesting outside an oil and gas conference in London in October.

Climate activist Greta Thunberg has been cleared of a public order offence over a protest outside an oil and gas conference last year, after a judge in a London court ruled she had no case to answer.

District judge John Law dismissed the case against the 21-year-old Swedish campaigner and four other activists on the second day of their trial at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Friday.

He ruled that police had attempted to impose “unlawful” conditions during an environmental protest in the British capital last October when they were arrested.

Thunberg, who became a prominent campaigner worldwide after staging weekly protests in front of the Swedish parliament in 2018, was arrested along with dozens of others outside a London hotel where the Energy Intelligence Forum was hosting oil and gas industry leaders.

She and four others, aged between 19 and 59, were also accused of failing to comply with an order by police to move their protest to a designated area near the conference.

Thunberg had pleaded not guilty in November to breaching a public order law, alongside two protesters from the Fossil Free London (FFL) campaign group and two Greenpeace activists.

She also joined a march last weekend in southern England to protest against the expansion of Farnborough airport, which is mainly used by private jets.

‘Remember who the real enemy is’

In advance of Friday’s court ruling, Thunberg lamented about not being able to have a climate strike in London.

“Even though we are the ones standing here, and climate, environmental and human rights activists all over the world are being targeted for their activism, prosecuted, sometimes convicted and given legal penalties for acting in line with science,” she said in a post on the social media platform X.

“We must remember who the real enemy is,” she added.

Addressing the five defendants on Friday, Law said, “You are all found not guilty of this offence.”

In his ruling, he also highlighted that the conditions imposed on protesters were “so unclear that it is unlawful”, which meant “anyone failing to comply were actually committing no offence”.

Greenpeace UK campaigner Maja Darlington hailed Friday’s verdict as “a victory for the right to protest”.

She told the AFP news agency that “it is ridiculous that more and more climate activists are finding themselves in court for peacefully exercising their right to protest, while fossil fuel giants like Shell are allowed to reap billions in profits from selling climate-wrecking fossil fuels.”

Thunberg and her four co-defendants hugged before leaving court.



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ICJ rules that it will hear part of Ukraine-Russia genocide case | Russia-Ukraine war News

UN’s top court will not address aspects of case accusing Russia of violating Genocide Convention by falsely alleging genocide.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has ruled that parts of Ukraine’s case against Russia arguing that Moscow baselessly accused Kyiv of genocide to justify the 2022 invasion can move forward.

However, the ICJ ruled on Friday that it will not address whether Russia violated the 1948 Genocide Convention by using what Ukraine says were trumped-up genocide charges as a pretext for the war, even if the invasion may have violated international law broadly.

Instead, the case will proceed to assess whether Ukraine committed genocide in the eastern parts of the country, as Russia claims – a matter where judges ruled that they have jurisdiction.

When Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion on February 24, 2022, part of his argument was that pro-Russian people in eastern Ukraine had been “subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kyiv regime”.

Ukraine filed a suit at the ICJ, “emphatically denying” this and arguing that Russia’s use of “genocide” as a pretext for invasion went against the Genocide Convention.

“In the present case, even if the Russian Federation had, in bad faith, alleged that Ukraine committed genocide and taken certain measures against it under such a pretext, which the respondent [Ukraine] contends, this would not in itself constitute a violation of obligations” under the genocide convention, the ICJ said in the ruling read out by its president, Joan Donoghue on Friday.

The ICJ, known as the World Court, said it did not have jurisdiction to rule on whether Russia’s invasion violated the Genocide Convention, or on whether Moscow’s recognition of Donetsk and Luhansk, two breakaway republics in eastern Ukraine, amounted to a breach of the convention.

But the judges said they would allow Ukraine’s request for the court to rule that there was no “credible evidence that Ukraine is committing genocide in violation of the Genocide Convention” in eastern Ukraine.

Kyiv is seeking a declaration from the ICJ that it did not commit genocide. A final, legally binding decision is likely still years away.

Enforcement

Before Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Ukraine had been battling Russian-backed separatist forces in the east of the country since 2014. But Kyiv insists that there was no risk of genocide there.

As well as citing an alleged “genocide” against the Russian-speaking residents of Donetsk and Luhansk to justify its invasion, Moscow also invoked NATO’s eastward expansion as one of the reasons behind the conflict.

Triestino Mariniello, a law professor at Liverpool John Moores University, said Friday’s ruling is important because it moves the case to the merits stage.

“It has confirmed that there is a dispute between Russia and Ukraine in relation to the application, interpretation and fulfilment of the Genocide Convention, and that the court has jurisdiction in particular in establishing in the merits case that Ukraine has not committed genocide in this specific areas of Luhansk and Donetsk in Ukrainian territory,” Mariniello told Al Jazeera.

Last month, the ICJ dismissed large parts of a Ukraine petition accusing Russia of “terrorism”.

In March 2022, shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine, the UN’s top court ordered Moscow to halt its military offensive.

But while the court’s decisions are legally binding, it lacks an enforcement mechanism.

“It’s upon individual states – in this case Russia – or international organisations like the [UN] Security Council to implement such decisions or judgements,” Mariniello said.

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Can South Africa’s genocide case at the ICJ stop Israel? | Israel War on Gaza

South Africa’s ambassador to the US talks to Marc Lamont Hill about the implications of the case and the court’s ruling.

Last week, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered provisional measures in South Africa’s genocide case against Israel. The ruling states that Israel must prevent and punish incitement of genocidal acts and allow civilians access to humanitarian aid.

The decision comes after nearly four months of war in Gaza, which has killed more than 26,000 people and caused a major humanitarian crisis.

While the interim ruling on South Africa’s case has been hailed as a legal win for Palestinians and their supporters, many are questioning what practical implications this will have on the war and for the people of Gaza. Will South Africa’s case help change the course of the conflict?

This week on UpFront, Marc Lamont Hill talks to South Africa’s ambassador to the United States, Ndumiso Ntshinga.

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UN estimates 17,000 Gaza children left unaccompanied amid Israel’s war | Israel War on Gaza News

At least 17,000 children in the Gaza Strip have been left unaccompanied or separated from their families nearly four months into Israel’s assault on the enclave, the United Nations children’s agency estimates.

Nearly all children in the strip also require mental health support, UNICEF said on Friday.

“Each [child] has a heartbreaking story of loss and grief,” said Jonathan Crickx, UNICEF’s chief of communication for the occupied Palestinian territories.

“This [17,000] figure corresponds to 1 percent of the overall displaced population – 1.7 million people,” he told a media briefing via video-link from Jerusalem, saying the number was an estimation as it is near impossible to verify information under current conditions.

Each one “is a child who is coming to terms with a horrible new reality”, he added.

Crickx said that tracing who the unaccompanied children were was proving “extremely difficult”, as they were sometimes brought to a hospital wounded or in shock, and “they simply can’t even say their names”.

He said that during conflicts, it was common for extended families to take care of children who lost their parents.

However, in Gaza, “due to the sheer lack of food, water or shelter, extended families are themselves distressed and face challenges to immediately take care of another child as they themselves are struggling to cater for their own children and family”, said Crickx.

Broadly, UNICEF terms separated children as those who are without their parents, while unaccompanied children are those who are separated and also without other relatives.

‘Almost all children’ need mental health support

Crickx also said the mental health of children in Gaza was being severely affected by the offensive, and that a million children in the Gaza Strip require mental health support.

Children in Gaza “present symptoms like extremely high levels of persistent anxiety, loss of appetite, they can’t sleep, they have emotional outbursts or panic every time they hear the bombings,” he explained.

Before the assault erupted, UNICEF estimated that more than 500,000 children in Gaza needed mental health and psycho-social support.

Now, it believes that “almost all children are in need” of such help. “That’s more than one million children,” Crickx said.

According to the Palestinian health ministry, Israeli attacks have killed more than 27,100 people in Gaza since the war began on October 7, around 11,500 of them children.

More than 66,200 others have been wounded amid a severe lack of medical supplies and functioning healthcare facilities. Thousands more are missing and are under the rubble.

With Israeli ground troops encircling most of northern, central, and eastern Gaza, families have been forced to flee their homes several times since the war began. Many are now crammed in the southern Rafah governorate, which Israel has said is its next target of attack.

Many who fled their homes have been shot at and arrested. Those who make it to the south often have no contact with their relatives or caregivers in other parts of the enclave, especially during times of communication blackouts.

“Children don’t have anything to do with this conflict. Yet they are suffering like no child should ever suffer,” said Crickx.

“No child should ever be exposed to the level of violence seen on October 7 – or to the level of violence that we have witnessed since then.”

He called for a ceasefire so that UNICEF could conduct a proper count of children who are unaccompanied or separated, trace relatives, and deliver mental health support.



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