MEMPHIS: Memphis was on edge Monday ahead of the possible release of video footage of a Black man’s violent arrest that has led to three separate law enforcement investigations and the firings of five police officers after he died in a hospital.
Relatives of Tyre Nichols were scheduled to meet with city officials to view video footage of his Jan. 7 arrest, according to lawyers for the family. Mayor Jim Strickland and Memphis Police Department Director Cerelyn “CJ” Davis said last week that video of the arrest would be released after the conclusion of an internal police investigation and after Nichols’ family has seen it, but the exact timing wasn’t immediately clear.
Nichols, a 29-year-old father, FedEx worker and avid skateboarder, died Jan. 10, authorities said.
His family, protesters and activists have called for the video’s release and for the officers to be charged with murder. Davis announced Friday that five officers involved in the arrest were fired after the police probe determined that they used excessive force or failed to intervene and render aid.
The officers have been identified as Tadarrius Bean, Demetrius Haley, Emmitt Martin III, Desmond Mills, Jr. and Justin Smith. All five are Black.
Relatives have accused police of beating Nichols and causing him to have a heart attack. Authorities have only said that Nichols experienced a medical emergency. The US Justice Department has opened a civil rights investigation into the arrest, and the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is looking into whether excessive force was used.
City and community leaders have expressed concern about the possibility of civil unrest following the video’s release.
“With the potential of civil unrest, we’re hoping that it won’t happen but we also have to prepare,” Shelby County Sheriff Floyd Bonner told WREG-TV.
State Rep. Antonio Parkinson, a Memphis Democrat, said the predominantly Black city has been on edge since the arrest, which he called “horrific and senseless.”
“The release of the tape may certainly aggravate the feelings of hurt, sorrow and embarrassment that we are all feeling,” Parkinson said. “However, the need for transparency is vitally important in all cases of police involved deaths.”
Van Turner, president of the Memphis chapter of the NAACP, also acknowledged that Memphis appears tense as it waits for the video. But he praised the city and the police department for taking “quick action” in firing the officers.
“We will continue to monitor and support a fair and just resolution to this matter,” Turner said. “We join the call for peaceful protests as we all work toward making sure that proper measures are put in place to prevent this type of incident from occurring in the future.”
Turner also said that the potential for unrest could be higher if the officers who were involved were white.
“If the video is significantly more egregious than what we have seen, then the unrest could still be there,” Turner said.
Nichols was arrested after officers stopped him for reckless driving, police said. In a news release the day after his arrest, the police department said that as officers approached the vehicle, “a confrontation occurred’ and he ran. It said officers caught up to him and that ”another confrontation occurred” while they were taking him into custody. Police said he complained of shortness of breath and was hospitalized.
Officials said a cause of death has not been determined.
Relatives have said the officers who pulled over Nichols were in an unmarked vehicle and that he experienced cardiac arrest and kidney failure from the officers beating him.
Attorneys Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, who represent Nichols’ family, issued a statement Friday saying they support the department’s decision to fire the officers.
“This is the first step toward achieving justice for Tyre and his family. They must also be held accountable for robbing this man of his life and his son of a father,” they said.
The attorneys said they “will continue to demand transparency and accountability” and plan to review video footage to seek additional clarity about the circumstances that led to Nichols’ death. The lawyers planned a news conference for later Monday with the family.
As for the timing of the video’s release to the public, Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy said the law “places limits on such video release, and that we have to make sure we do so without compromising our ability to arrive at justice in this case.”
“I ask for your patience as we gather all necessary information so that we don’t compromise the investigation or any possible future prosecution,” Mulroy said in a statement.
The Nichols case is the latest high-profile death case to rattle the city. Since November 2021, Memphis has seen the fatal shooting of rapper Young Dolph in a daytime ambush at a bakery; a crime rampage in which a man has been charged with fatally shooting three people and wounding three others; the killing of a United Methodist Church pastor during a carjacking in her driveway; and the early-morning kidnapping of a jogger whose body was later found near a house.
Memphis on edge ahead of violent arrest video’s release
https://arab.news/vfr27
Memphis on edge ahead of violent arrest video’s release
- Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old father, FedEx worker and avid skateboarder, died Jan. 10
- Relatives have accused police of beating Nichols and causing him to have a heart attack
World Central Kitchen to resume Gaza aid after staff deaths in Israeli strike
NICOSIA: World Central Kitchen or WCK said it would resume operations in the Gaza Strip on Monday, a month after seven workers of the US-based charity were killed in an Israeli air strike. Prior to halting operations, WCK had distributed more than 43 million meals in Gaza since October, representing by its own accounts 62 percent of all international NGO aid.
The charity said it had 276 trucks with the equivalent of almost 8 million meals ready to enter through the Rafah Crossing and will also send trucks into Gaza from Jordan.
“The humanitarian situation in Gaza remains dire,” said the charity’s chief executive officer Erin Gore.
“We are restarting our operation with the same energy, dignity, and focus on feeding as many people as possible.”
The April 1 deaths triggered widespread condemnation and demands from Israel’s allies, including the US, for an explanation.
Israel said its inquiries had found serious errors and breaches of procedure by its military, dismissing two senior officers and reprimanding senior commanders.
WCK is demanding an independent investigation. Israel’s six-month war against Hamas in Gaza followed an Oct. 7 attack by the militant group in southern Israel when more than 250 hostages were seized and some 1,200 people killed, according to Israeli tallies. Israel’s offensive has killed more than 34,000 people, Palestinian health authorities say, and caused a humanitarian disaster for the enclave’s more than 2 million inhabitants.
“We have been forced to make a decision: Stop feeding altogether during one of the worst hunger crises ever ... Or keep feeding knowing that aid, aid workers and civilians are being intimidated and killed,” Gore said.
“These are the hardest conversations, and we have considered all perspectives when deliberating. Ultimately, we decided we must keep feeding, continuing our mission of showing up to provide food to people during the toughest of times.” (Writing by Michele Kambas; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)
White House urges ‘peaceful’ campus protests after hundreds arrested
WASHINGTON: The White House insisted on Sunday that pro-Palestinian protests that have rocked US universities in recent weeks must remain peaceful, after police arrested around 275 people on four separate campuses over the weekend.
“We certainly respect the right of peaceful protests,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told ABC’s “This Week.”
But, he added: “We condemn the anti-Semitism language that we’ve heard of late and certainly condemn all the hate speech and the threats of violence out there.”
The demonstrations began at Columbia University in New York, but they have since spread rapidly across the country.
While peace has prevailed on many campuses, the number of protesters detained — at times by police in riot gear using chemical irritants and tasers — is rising fast.
They include 100 at Northeastern University in Boston, 80 at Washington University in St. Louis, 72 at Arizona State University, and 23 at Indiana University.
Among those arrested at Washington University was Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein, who faulted police for aggressive tactics she said provoked the sort of trouble they are meant to quell.
“This is about freedom of speech ... on a very critical issue,” she told CNN shortly before her arrest on Saturday.
“And there they are, sending in the police and creating a riot.”
College administrators have struggled to find the best response, caught between the need to respect free-speech rights and the imperative of containing inflammatory and sometimes violently anti-Semitic calls by protesters.
At the University o Southern California, school officials late on Saturday closed the main campus to the public after pro-Palestinian groups again set up an encampment that had been cleared earlier, the school announced on X.
With final exams coming in the next few weeks, some campuses — including the Humboldt campus of California State Polytechnic University, have closed and instructed students to complete their classes online.
The activists behind the campus protests — not all of them students — are calling for a ceasefire in Israel’s war with Hamas and want colleges to sever ties with Israel.
Ukraine warns front ‘worsened’ as Russia claims fresh gains
- Russia’s troops are advancing in the eastern Donetsk region
- The US finally approved a $61 billion package of financial aid
VOZDVYZHENKA, Ukraine, April 28, 2024 Agence France Presse: Ukraine’s army leader admitted Sunday that Kyiv’s position on the battlefield has worsened after Russian forces captured another village in the east, pressing their advantage in manpower and ammunition.
Russia’s troops are advancing in the eastern Donetsk region as Kyiv awaits the arrival of much-needed US weapons that it hopes will stabilize the fragile front lines.
“The situation at the front has worsened,” Ukrainian commander-in-chief Oleksandr Syrsky said in a Facebook post Sunday.
Ukrainian troops had “retreated” westwards to new defensive lines in a section of the front that runs past the city of Donetsk, controlled by pro-Russian forces since 2014.
Russia has “a significant advantage in forces and means” and had been able to notch up advances amid “heavy fighting,” Syrsky said.
“In some sectors the enemy had tactical success, and in some areas our troops managed to improve the tactical position,” he added.
Russia’s defense ministry earlier on Sunday claimed its troops had captured the village of Novobakhmutivka in the Donetsk region — around 10 kilometers (six miles) north of Avdiivka, which they seized in February.
The stark assessment of the picture facing Ukrainian troops comes at the end of week of ups and downs for Kyiv.
The United States finally approved a $61 billion package of financial aid after months of political wrangling, unlocking much-needed arms for Ukraine’s stretched troops.
But on the battlefield Russia chalked up more successes.
Its troops managed to make rapid advances in a narrow column to the northwest of Avdiivka.
In the village of Vozdvyzhenka, some eight kilometers from the fighting in Ocheretyne, AFP reporters saw civilians loading a small truck with furniture and belongings on Sunday.
“We’re going a long way from here... I don’t have time to talk because of the shelling,” one of them told AFP, before climbing into the vehicle and speeding out of the village.
Soldiers on the side of a road in the woods said they had originally been sent to build defensive lines.
“But the situation has changed. We were told not to take the shovels but to stay and wait for orders. The Russians are attacking and advancing,” one told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Syrsky confirmed on Sunday that Russia had made some “tactical” progress in that part of the front, but said Moscow had not yet achieved what he called an “operational advantage.”
He also said additional units were being deployed to replace those that had sustained heavy losses.
The recent setbacks have prompted rare criticism from Ukraine’s military bloggers.
“The (Russian) breakthrough near Ocheretyne revealed a number of problems,” the Deep State Telegram channel, with close links to the Ukrainian army, said in a post on Wednesday.
It said leaders of the 115th mechanized brigade, which is fighting in the area, were “responsible for the collapse of the defense in the entire sector, allowing significant losses.”
Kyiv’s forces are outnumbered across the battlefield, with the country struggling to recruit enough soldiers to replace those who have been killed, wounded or exhausted by the war, now in its third year.
Leaders in Kyiv have warned the military outlook could worsen in the next few weeks, while shipments of US weapons are making their way to the front lines.
“We are still waiting for the supplies promised to Ukraine,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky in his evening address Sunday.
Speaking after talks with Hakeem Jeffries, leader of the Democrats in the US House of Representatives, he said he had once again stressed the urgent need for Patriot anti-missile systems “as soon as possible.”
Ukraine’s head of intelligence at the ministry of defense Kyrylo Budanov said this month that the battlefield situation would likely be at its most difficult in mid-May to early June.
Philippines swelters in scorching heat as mercury hits record high in Manila
- Children will attend remote classes on Monday, Tuesday in flashback to COVID times
- Temperature in capital’s Metro region could surpass 40 degrees next month, forecasters say
MANILA: The Philippines is bracing for more blistering weather as temperatures in the capital region rose to a record high over the weekend.
Unusually hot temperatures have been recorded across South and Southeast Asia in recent days, forcing schools to close and authorities to issue health warnings.
In Metro Manila on Saturday, the mercury hit 38.8 degrees Celsius, surpassing the previous record set in 1915.
Elsewhere in the country, the weather has been even hotter, with Tarlac province seeing the mercury hit 40.3 degrees earlier in the year.
The hottest ever temperature recorded in the Philippines was 42.2 degrees in 1912.
Glaiza Escullar of state weather agency PAGASA told Arab News it was likely that some parts of the country would continue to see temperatures of 40 degrees and above until the second week of May.
March, April and May are typically the hottest and driest months of the year, but conditions this year have been exacerbated by the El Nino weather phenomenon.
The heat index, which also takes into account humidity, reached 45 degrees on Saturday, which the weather agency classifies as “danger.” It said it could hit 46 degrees on Monday.
“We are issuing a heat index warning just to emphasize that apart from the hot weather or high temperature, relative humidity has a factor in terms of health,” Escullar said.
“If (a person) is dehydrated or he is not in a good condition, the body tends to overheat because the sweating process is slowed down by the high relative humidity.”
In response to the searing heat and a nationwide transport strike, the Department of Education announced on Sunday that all public schools would be closed on Monday and Tuesday but that classes would be held remotely.
Jeepney drivers are staging a three-day strike in protest at the government’s plan to phase out the iconic vehicles.
Many schools in the Philippines do not have air conditioning and several were forced to close earlier this month and hold remote classes in a reminder of the COVID-19 pandemic.
High school student Ivan Garcia told Arab News the soaring heat was affecting his studies.
“The weather is annoyingly hot … I cannot focus on doing my school work,” he said.
Ninth-grader Adrian Reyes said he preferred to work from home.
“I usually leave the house around noontime and it’s really a challenge especially for me and others like me who have to commute to get to school,” he said.
“I prefer the asynchronous mode of learning because we have aircon at home.”
Wiping out polio ‘not guaranteed,’ support needed — Bill Gates
- Pakistan and the neighboring Afghanistan are the only two countries in the world where polio remains endemic
- Gates warned against complacency in tackling the disease as he welcomed $500 million pledge from Saudi Arabia
LONDON: Success in the fight to wipe out polio is not guaranteed, according to tech billionaire turned philanthropist Bill Gates, whose foundation has poured billions into the effort.
Gates warned against complacency in tackling the deadly viral disease as he welcomed a $500 million pledge from Saudi Arabia on Sunday to fight polio over the next five years, bringing it in line with the US as one of the biggest national donors.
However, there is still a $1.2 billion dollar funding gap in the $4.8 billion budget for the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) up to 2026, a spokesperson said. The new money from Saudi Arabia will go some way toward closing that.
Saudi Arabia has supported polio eradication for more than 20 years, but the significant increase in funding comes amid a “challenging” situation, said Abdullah Al Moallem, director of health at the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center, the kingdom’s aid arm.
Cases of polio, a viral disease that used to paralyze thousands of children every year, have declined by more than 99 percent since 1988 thanks to mass vaccination campaigns.
But the aim of getting cases down to zero, particularly in the two countries where the wild form of the virus remains endemic – Afghanistan and Pakistan – has been held up by insecurity in the regions where pockets of children remain unvaccinated.
“It’s not guaranteed that we will succeed,” Gates told Reuters in an online call last week. “I feel very strongly that we can succeed, but it’s been difficult.”
The support of powerful Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia would help, he added, particularly in addressing some lingering suspicions about vaccination.
The foundation said it would open a regional office in Riyadh to support the polio and other regional programs.
It is allocating $4 million to humanitarian relief in Gaza, to be distributed through UNICEF, it said. The King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center will also allocate $4 million, it said.
The first missed target for eradicating polio was in 2000, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is the largest donor trying to realize that goal.
“If we’re still here 10 years from now, people might be urging me to give up,” Gates said. “But I don’t think we will be. If things go well, we’ll be done in three years,” he said.
