LONDON: Weeks after anti-immigrant riots spread across England, a London exhibition is celebrating the impact immigrant communities have had on Britain through photos, testimonies and art installations.
Migration is “often seen as something that’s very divisive” but in reality “is just a part of our daily lives,” said Aditi Anand, curator of “All Our Stories: Migration and the Making of Britain.”
“It’s shaped Britain over the centuries and we want to get a sense of that long history and show that migration has always been happening,” she told AFP.
The exhibition, which opened Thursday at London’s Migration Museum, features 7,000 testimonies, 200 photographs and contributions from about 50 artists.
It aims to show the “human stories behind the headlines,” added Anand, the museum’s artistic director, who said migration had influenced Britain from food to fashion.
The long history of migration down the centuries also features in the exhibit, which runs until December next year.
A video by director Osbert Parker recalls that between 4,000 and 800 BC, “communities from the Mediterranean and continental Europe arrived in Great Britain including Celtic tribes, today known as the Ancient Britons.”
The video is a reminder that the Romans were followed in the fifth century by the Angles, Saxons and Jutes of northern Europe, who brought with them Germanic languages and culture.
“The idea is to show that the immigration is not something modern. It’s been going on for generations,” she added.
According to the last census in 2021, 17 percent of the British population was born outside the country, or around 10 million people.
“I think what we really want to show is that it (migration) has just been a part of our lives. It’s part of the fabric of this country’s DNA,” said Anand.
The display features a vending machine of products that “look like they’re quintessentially British brands” but have “migrant founders,” she noted.
One company featured is Marks & Spencer, co-founded by Michael Marks who was born into a Polish-Jewish family before arriving in Leeds in northern England in 1882.
The country’s first coffee chain, Costa Coffee, is also included. It was created by two brothers who arrived from Italy in the 1950s.
The exhibition also shows a reconstructed Chinese takeaway and the kitchen of a Spanish restaurant.
It also details the European migration crisis of 2015 with a look at the now-closed “Calais Jungle,” a vast camp where thousands of people waited to cross the Channel from northern France.
Next to a reconstructed tent, a series of photos put faces and stories to the migration crisis.
The exhibition comes as the UK continues to grapple with high levels of irregular migration, with nearly 23,000 crossing the Channel in dangerous small boats this year.
It recalls that three centuries ago, Huguenot French Protestants fled persecution by crossing the same body of water to England where they were warmly welcomed by the authorities.
London exhibition honors ‘human stories’ of migrants
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London exhibition honors ‘human stories’ of migrants
- The exhibition, which opened Thursday at London’s Migration Museum, features 7,000 testimonies, 200 photographs and contributions from about 50 artists
- It aims to show the “human stories behind the headlines,” added Anand, the museum’s artistic director
Philippines seeks to enhance energy security with new Saudi cooperation
- Under national energy plan, Manila wants to increase renewable sources to 50 percent by 2040
- Saudi-Philippine cooperation can also explore tech, solutions related to climate change mitigation
MANILA: The Philippines wants to expand its international energy partnerships and improve energy security with a new cooperation with Saudi Arabia, its Department of Energy said on Monday ahead of an official trip to the Kingdom.
Manila has been exploring clean and sustainable options to generate power as the country regularly suffers outages and faces high tariffs. Coal remains the main source of electricity in the Southeast Asian nation, accounting for more than half of its power generation.
A Philippine energy mission was headed to Saudi Arabia on Monday for a two-day trip “aimed at enhancing energy security, driving economic growth, and fostering sustainable development,” the DoE said in a statement.
“A major highlight of the mission is the signing of a memorandum of understanding with the Ministry of Energy of the KSA.”
The latest mission follows President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s trip to Riyadh last October, during which a $4.26 billion investment agreement was signed with Saudi business leaders.
At the time, some Saudi state-owned enterprises had expressed interest in investing in the Philippine energy sector, the DoE said.
The preliminary agreement will provide “a framework for cooperation on key areas,” including renewable energy and natural gas, as well as relevant technologies and solutions related to climate change mitigation.
Under the Philippine Energy Plan, the government aims to increase the share of renewable sources in the energy mix from 22 percent currently to 50 percent by 2040.
Philippine authorities expect the country’s power demand to increase almost fourfold from 2020 to 2040, especially as it remains dependent on imported fossil fuels and has insufficient renewables.
“Partnerships with Saudi Arabia extend beyond addressing the current energy needs,” the energy department said, adding that the two countries can explore possibilities for joint research and development projects, policy exchange, and capacity building in areas such as carbon capture, use and storage, and hydrogen.
“As global efforts to transition to cleaner and more sustainable energy sources intensify, the Philippines and Saudi Arabia can cooperate in the development and deployment of low-carbon technologies.”
Three Pakistani policemen killed in attack at police HQ
- Three assailants were killed by police
PESHAWAR: At least three policemen were killed in northwest Pakistan when Islamist militants stormed a district police headquarters in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on Monday, a police source told Reuters.
The attack on the complex, which houses both the district police headquarters and a residential complex, was ongoing, the high-ranking police source said, adding that the assailants, who included suicide bombers, had been “pinned down” in the area.
Three assailants were killed by police, he added.
The source, requesting anonymity due to the sensitivity of the matter, said three policemen were killed while resisting the assault on the Police Lines of District Bannu, which borders the restive North Waziristan tribal district on the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
Islamist militant group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan claimed responsibility for the attack, a spokesperson for the group said.
The roads around the complex have been closed to traffic as security forces moved to neutralize the remaining attackers, the police source added.
Bannu is about 350 kilometers from Pakistan’s capital Islamabad, which is under strict security lockdown due to the arrival of Chinese Premier Li Qiang on Monday ahead of a regional leaders’ meeting this week.
French government wants new immigration law in 2025
- The government wants to extend the detention period for undocumented migrants deemed to be dangerous in order to better enforce expulsion orders
PARIS: The French authorities want to adopt a new immigration law next year, a spokeswoman said, as the new right-wing government seeks to crack down on immigration.
“There will be a need for a new law,” government spokeswoman Maud Bregeon told broadcaster BFMTV on Sunday.
The government’s plan to tighten immigration policies and border controls is emblematic of the rightward shift in French politics following this summer’s legislative elections that resulted in a hung parliament.
Michel Barnier’s government hopes the bill will be submitted to parliament at the beginning of 2025.
In September, a Paris student was raped and murdered in a case that has further inflamed a French debate on migration after a Moroccan was named as the suspected attacker.
The government wants to extend the detention period for undocumented migrants deemed to be dangerous in order to better enforce expulsion orders.
One of the options under consideration is to increase the maximum period of detention from 90 to 210 days, which is now only possible for terrorist offenses.
“We don’t rule out the possibility of considering other provisions,” said Bregeon, adding that there should be “no taboos when it comes to protecting the French.”
Last December, France already passed an immigration law.
The bill was hardened to gain the support of the far-right and right-wing MPs.
But the country’s highest constitutional authority censured most of the new amendments which were dropped before President Emmanuel Macron signed it into law.
The measures struck down by the Constitutional Council “will serve as a basis for the new immigration bill,” a government source told AFP. “Some of them could be modified and there will be additions.”
The most hard-line member of the government, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, has vowed to crack down on immigration. He has stirred controversy just days into the job, saying that “the rule of law is neither intangible nor sacred.”
Retailleau, who previously headed the Republicans party in the Senate, was seen as the driving force behind the tough legislation last year.
He wants to reinstate the offense of illegal residence, among other measures.
Gabriel Attal, Barnier’s predecessor and now leader in parliament of Macron’s Renaissance party, said on Monday that a new law on immigration did not seem a “total priority.”
“Adopting a law for the sake of a law makes no sense,” he told broadcaster France inter.
He said “the priority is to act so that the state can truly control who enters and leaves” France.
Ukraine says destroyed army transport plane in Russia
- Kyiv’s military intelligence agency said it had destroyed the Tu-134 transport aircraft overnight between Saturday and Sunday at a military airfield in the Orenburg region
KYIV: Kyiv said Monday its forces had destroyed a Russian military transport plane stationed at an airfield deep inside Russian territory over the weekend, the latest Ukrainian claim of an attack behind Moscow’s lines.
Ukraine has stepped up attacks inside Russian territory in recent months, targeting military sites and energy facilities, aiming to upend Russian military logistics.
Kyiv’s military intelligence agency said it had destroyed the Tu-134 transport aircraft overnight between Saturday and Sunday at a military airfield in the Orenburg region, which lies around 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) from the border with Ukraine.
“These Soviet-built airplanes are used mainly to transport leadership of the Russian defense ministry,” the Defense Intelligence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine said on social media.
The agency posted footage of what Ukraine said was an arson attack, showing a blaze burning inside an aircraft, but it did not provide details of how the alleged attack was carried out.
There was no immediate comment on the specific claims from Moscow.
Since the start of its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Moscow has detained hundreds of people for alleged sabotage and arson attacks on military, railway and other infrastructure sites.
EU condemns all attacks on UN missions, foreign policy chief Borrell says
- Israel has disputed some UN accounts of incidents involving UNIFIL peacekeepers in Lebanon
- Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said they were providing “human shields” for Hezbollah militants
AMSTERDAM: The European Union condemns all attacks against United Nations missions, the union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said in a response to targeting of the UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon, known as UNIFIL, by the Israel Defense Forces.
“Such attacks against UN peacekeepers constitute a grave violation of international law and are totally unacceptable. These attacks must stop immediately,” Borrell said in a statement on behalf of the EU published Sunday night.
“The EU condemns all attacks against UN missions,” Borrell said.
“It expresses particularly grave concern regarding the attacks by the Israeli Defense Forces against UNIFIL, which left several peacekeepers wounded.”
Israel has disputed some UN accounts of incidents involving UNIFIL peacekeepers in Lebanon, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said they were providing “human shields” for Hezbollah militants during an upsurge in hostilities.
In his statement, Borrell said “all actors” in the conflict have the obligation to ensure the safety and security of UN personnel and property.
“We urgently await explanations and a thorough investigation from the Israeli authorities about the attacks against UNIFIL, which plays a fundamental role in the stability of South Lebanon,” he said.
Spain's Foreign Minister has also made several key statements regarding the situation involving the UNIFIL and Israel. He condemned the attacks by Israel on UNIFIL, calling them "unacceptable."
He also emphasized that only the United Nations has the authority to order the withdrawal of UNIFIL forces, reaffirming the importance of the mission, stating that the work UNIFIL is doing is "valid and necessary."
