COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s government Tuesday formally apologized to the island’s Muslim minority for forcing cremations on Covid victims, disregarding WHO assurances that burials in line with Islamic rites were safe.
The cabinet issued an “apology regarding the compulsory cremation policy during the Covid-19 pandemic,” the government said in a statement.
It said a new law would guarantee the right to burial or cremation to ensure the funeral customs of Muslims or any other community were not violated in future.
Traditionally, Muslims bury their dead. Sri Lanka’s majority Buddhists are typically cremated, as are Hindus.
Muslim representatives in Sri Lanka welcomed the apology, but said their entire community, accounting for about 10 percent of the island’s 22 million population, was still traumatized.
“We will now sue two academics — Meththika Vithanage and Channa Jayasumana — who were behind the forced cremation policy of the government,” Hilmy Ahamed, spokesman for the Muslim Council of Sri Lanka, told AFP.
“We will also seek compensation.”
Ahamed said a young Muslim couple suffered untold anguish when their 40-day-old infant was cremated by the state against their wishes.
Then president Gotabaya Rajapaksa banned burials despite his administration facing international condemnation at the UN Human Rights Council and other forums for violating Muslim funeral norms.
In a book published earlier this month, he defended his action saying he was only carrying out “expert advice” from Vithanage, a professor of natural resources, not to let Covid victims be interred.
She has no medical background.
Rajapaksa halted his forced cremations policy in February 2021 following an appeal from then Pakistan prime minister Imran Khan during a visit to Sri Lanka.
The government then allowed burials at the remote Oddamavadi area in the island’s east under strict military supervision — but without the participation of the bereaved family.
Rajapaksa was forced out of office two years ago following months of protests over an unprecedented economic crisis, which had led to shortages of food, fuel and medicines.
Sri Lanka apologizes for cremating Muslim Covid victims
https://arab.news/bqgzv
Sri Lanka apologizes for cremating Muslim Covid victims
- Rajapaksa halted his forced cremations policy in Feb 2021 after an appeal from then Pakistan PM Imran Khan during a visit to Sri Lanka
- The government then allowed burials at the remote Oddamavadi area in the island’s east, but without participation of the bereaved family
Muslim Brotherhood ‘threat to national cohesion’: French report
It highlighted the “subversive nature of the project,” saying it aims “to gradually bring about changes to local or national rules“
PARIS: The Muslim Brotherhood movement is a “threat to national cohesion” in France and action must be taken to stop the spread of “political Islamism,” according to a report to be presented to President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday.
“The reality of this threat, even if it is long-term and does not involve violent action, poses a risk of damage to the fabric of society and republican institutions... and, more broadly, to national cohesion,” said the report, a copy of which was obtained by AFP on Tuesday.
The report, prepared by two senior civil servants, is to be examined by the Defense Council on Wednesday.
France and Germany have the biggest Muslim populations among European Union countries.
The report pointed to the spread of Islamism “from the bottom up” and at the municipal level, adding the phenomenon constituted “a threat in the short to medium term.”
In France, the movement is “based on a solid structure, but political Islamism is spreading primarily at the local level,” the authors stressed.
“Resolute and long-term action on the ground seems necessary to stem the rise of political Islamism,” they said.
The report highlighted the “subversive nature of the project,” saying it aims “to gradually bring about changes to local or national rules,” particularly those concerning secularism and gender equality.
Such “municipal Islamism” risks affecting the public sphere and local politics, the report said, pointing to “the creation of increasingly numerous Islamist ecosystems.”
France’s tough-talking Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau expressed concern on Tuesday about “a low-level Islamism” whose “ultimate goal is to turn the entire French society to Sharia law.”
But the report authors said that “no recent document demonstrates the desire of Muslims in France to establish an Islamic state in France or to enforce Sharia law there.”
Muslims in France (Musulmans de France), formerly the Union of Islamic Organizations of France, is identified as “the national branch of the Muslim Brotherhood in France.”
“We are not dealing with aggressive separatism” but a “subtle (...) yet no less subversive aim for the institutions,” the authors said.
The report estimates that there are 139 places of worship affiliated with Muslims of France, with an additional 68 considered close to the federation.
This represents seven percent of the 2,800 Muslim places of worship listed in France, the report said.
The Islamist movement is losing its influence in the Arab world and “focusing its efforts on Europe,” it added.
A public awareness campaign must be combined with renewed efforts to promote a “secular discourse” as well as “strong and positive signals to the Muslim community” including the teaching of Arabic, the report said.
Ukraine launches probe into French-trained brigade
- The 155th Mechanized Brigade was supposed to be a flagship fighting force for Ukraine’s army
- A spokesperson for Ukraine’s land forces confirmed that a fresh investigation had been launched
KYIV: Ukraine’s military has launched another investigation into the scandal-hit “Anne of Kyiv” brigade, trained in France, after a media report alleged financial misconduct among commanders, a military spokesperson said Tuesday.
The 155th Mechanized Brigade was supposed to be a flagship fighting force for Ukraine’s army, announced by French President Emmanuel Macron as a symbol of cooperation between Kyiv and Paris.
But it has been plagued by scandals, including reports of equipment shortages, low morale and soldiers abandoning the unit while undergoing training in France.
A spokesperson for Ukraine’s land forces confirmed that a fresh investigation had been launched but declined to elaborate.
The Ukrainska Pravda media outlet recently alleged that brigade commander Col. Taras Maksimov had been possibly involved “in fictitious combat payments and extortion.”
It also said the brigade had seen over 1,200 cases of soldiers going absent without leave.
“After the publication of the article in the media, where new details and circumstances were revealed, an additional check was ordered to clarify all the facts set out in the article,” land forces commander Mykhailo Drapaty told AFP in a written statement.
He said a law enforcement investigation had started and that the land forces were taking “all necessary measures to facilitate the investigation and establish the truth.”
Macron announced the creation of the Anne of Kyiv brigade — named after a Medieval Kyiv princess who married into the French royal family — in June last year.
Paris hailed it as a “unique” initiative and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said he wanted to form a dozen other NATO-trained and equipped units.
Ukraine’s military has been beset with corruption scandals — ranging from weapons procurement to the falsification of draft exemption certificates — since Russia invaded in February 2022.
Georgia court rejects jailed ex-president Saakashvili’s appeal
- Saakashvili, 57, was sentenced in multiple cases to a combined 12 years and six months
- “The Tbilisi court of appeals upheld the verdict,” his lawyer Beka Basilaia told journalists
TBILISI: A Georgian court on Tuesday rejected an appeal by jailed ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili against a prison sentence that he and his backers see as political retribution by his opponents.
The pro-Western reformist politician, who ruled the Caucasus country from 2004 to 2013, was arrested in 2021 after returning to Georgia from exile in Ukraine in the back of a dairy truck.
Saakashvili, 57, was sentenced in multiple cases to a combined 12 years and six months earlier this year, charged with misuse of public funds and illegally crossing Georgia’s border.
“The Tbilisi court of appeals upheld the verdict,” his lawyer Beka Basilaia told journalists on Tuesday.
The sole appeal had been against a four-and-a-half-year sentence for the illegal border crossing.
Basilaia criticized what he called an “unprecedented” move by the court not to conduct an oral hearing as part of the appeal.
Saakashvili and rights groups have denounced his prosecution as a political move by the ruling Georgian Dream party, which has been accused of democratic backsliding and growing rapprochement with Moscow.
Saakashvili has been held in a civilian hospital since 2022, when he staged a 50-day hunger strike in protest at his detention.
The European Parliament has called for his immediate release.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky accused Russia of “killing” Saakashvili “at the hands of the Georgian authorities.”
Zelensky granted Saakashvili Ukrainian citizenship and named him one of his top advisers in 2019.
Georgia and Russia fought a short war in 2008 — while Saakashvili was president — for control of breakaway Georgian territories.
The European Union and the United States have urged Georgia to ensure Saakashvili is provided medical treatment and that his rights are protected.
The Council of Europe rights watchdog has branded him a “political prisoner,” while Amnesty International has called his treatment “apparent political revenge.”
Georgian authorities have also jailed several former Saakashvili officials, in what rights groups have described as a political witch-hunt.
‘Kyiv should be ours’: Russians boosted after Putin-Trump call
- “I am rooting for our country, I love it very much and I just want Vladimir Vladimirovich (Putin) to just, after all, get justice done,” Anastasia told AFP
- Asked what her main feeling was following the talks, pensioner Sofiya said: “Uncertainty“
MOSCOW: A day after Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump spoke by phone on Ukraine, showering each other with compliments, Russian home-maker Anastasia had one wish: for Moscow to finish what it started in 2022.
In the fourth spring of Moscow’s devastating offensive, which has killed tens of thousands, diplomatic movement in recent days has given Russians a boost in confidence that victory — in some shape or another — is approaching.
In the call with Trump on Monday, the Russian leader once again brushed off calls for an immediate ceasefire in Ukraine, as demanded by the West and Kyiv.
Despite that, the US president said the “tone” of the conversation was “excellent.”
Russia controls a fifth of Ukraine and holds an upper hand on the battlefield.
“I am rooting for our country, I love it very much and I just want Vladimir Vladimirovich (Putin) to just, after all, get justice done,” Anastasia told AFP in the Moscow suburbs, echoing official language calling for the defeat of Ukraine.
Not knowing how or when it would happen, the 40-year-old mother, who declined to give her surname, said she was getting impatient.
“I don’t want my children to have to solve this issue. Let’s decide it here and now.”
But she had no trust in Trump — who she said is “just a businessman” who “wants money and nothing else” — and worried the “Anglo-Saxons” will trick Russia.
Putin has shown no sign of scaling down his maximalist demands for ending the Ukraine conflict, seeking little short of capitulation from Kyiv.
At talks in Istanbul last week, Russian negotiators demanded Ukraine abandon territory it still controls in the east and south.
Russia also wants Ukraine barred from NATO and for Western military support to end.
Putin has repeatedly called for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to be removed from office.
Confidence was tinged with uncertainty in Moscow after the Putin-Trump call, in which the Russian leader floated a vague “memorandum” that would outline demands for a peace deal and Trump said Kyiv and Moscow would begin talks swiftly.
Many in Moscow did not know what Trump or Putin meant.
Asked what her main feeling was following the talks, pensioner Sofiya said: “Uncertainty.”
“It’s interesting what will happen to us, not only to our families, but our country,” said the 72-year-old, who declined to give her surname.
Like many, Sofiya saw no real progress from last week’s talks — the first direct negotiations on the conflict in more than three years.
“I don’t know how to express this, but I would like calm and peace,” she said.
Moscow has ramped up military censorship amid its Ukraine offensive, threatening years in prison for those who criticize or question the campaign.
Zelensky said Russia was not serious about talks and is trying to “buy time” to continue its offensive.
Putin was indeed hoping to advance more on the ground and will not “miss the opportunity” for a summer offensive, said Russian analyst Konstantin Kalachev.
He called the Trump call a “tactical victory” for the Russian leader.
“Russia is hoping to push them (Ukrainian forces) this summer,” Kalachev said.
“There will be no peace, while Russia has not yet used the option of a final offensive,” he said, highlighting the prospect of a summer ground campaign.
Though Putin said both sides should be ready to make “compromises,” few were forthcoming from the Kremlin or on the streets of Moscow.
“I believe that Odesa, Kharkiv, Nikolayev (Mykolaiv), Kyiv should be ours,” said another pensioner, 70-year-old Marina, who also declined to give her surname, reeling off a string of Ukrainian cities that Russia has not formally claimed.
Russian state TV said Moscow’s negotiators threatened in Istanbul to seize more land if Ukraine does not pull its troops out of the Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions that Moscow claims to have annexed.
“If the four regions will not be recognized in the nearest future, the next time there will be six regions,” said state TV presenter Yevgeny Popov.
Moscow’s chief negotiator Vladimir Medinsky later evoked Russia’s 21-year war with Sweden in the 18th century, hinting Moscow was ready for a long fight.
Marina, too, said she would support Russia to fight on, even as thousands of Russian soldiers have been killed.
“Of course, it is a big shame that our people are also dying,” she told AFP. “But there is no other way.”
Poland to try suspect in alleged Russian plot to assassinate Zelensky
- The man, identified as Pawel K., was arrested in April 2024
- Prosecutors said he had declared his readiness to act for Russia’s military intelligence
WARSAW: Polish authorities have indicted a man charged with planning to help Russian foreign intelligence services prepare a possible attempt to assassinate Ukraine’s president, prosecutors said on Tuesday.
The man, identified as Pawel K., was arrested in April 2024 after cooperation between Polish and Ukrainian prosecutors, and faces up to eight years in prison.
According to prosecutors, he had declared his readiness to act for the military intelligence of the Russian Federation and established contacts with Russians who were directly involved in the war in Ukraine.
“The activities were to help, among other things, in the planning by the Russian special services of a possible assassination attempt on the life of ... the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky,” the prosecution said in a statement.
Pawel K.’s tasks included collecting and providing information on security at the Rzeszow-Jasionka Airport in southeastern Poland, prosecutors said.
Poland, a hub for Western military supplies to Ukraine, says it has become a major target of Russian spies, accusing Moscow and its ally Belarus of trying to destabilize it — accusations which the Kremlin has repeatedly denied.
