The Wall Street Journal - 23.08.2019

A16| Friday, August 23, 2019 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

league every year, mostly MLB

prospects in search of extra

seasoning in the winter. Bos-

ton Red Sox slugger J.D. Mar-

tinez, for instance, played for

the Leones del Caracas before

the 2014 season, the same

year Los Angeles Dodgers out-

fielder Joc Pederson played

for the Cardenales de Lara.

Participation by American

WebWarnings

Russianinternetfreedomsare

eroding.Scoresclosertozero

indicatemorefreedom.

Source: Freedom House

*Score out of 40 †Out of 35 ‡Out of 25

Note: Total scores above 60 indicate a status of

'not free'.

70

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

out of 100 points

2010 ’12 ’14 ’16 ’

Obstaclestoaccess‡

Limitsoncontent†

Violationsofuserrights*

WORLDWATCH

YEMEN

Yemen Wants U.A.E.

Expelled From Alliance

Yemen’s government accused
the United Arab Emirates of
supporting separatists in the
country and is demanding its
expulsion from a Saudi Arabia-
led coalition fighting rebels
there, in a setback to U.S.-
backed efforts to mend ties
within the alliance.
The U.A.E. joined the coali-
tion in early 2015 on the side of
Yemeni President Abed Rabbo
Mansour Hadi’s government, af-
ter the Iran-aligned Houthi reb-
els captured the capital San’a.
Rival agendas for Yemen
have since resulted in a widen-
ing rift in the Saudi alliance,
threatening attempts to end a
war that has caused a humani-
tarian crisis.
The Hadi government’s call
to remove the U.A.E. comes af-
ter an Emirati-backed Yemeni
faction within the coalition
seized control this month of the
southern port city of Aden, the
temporary seat of Mr. Hadi’s
government. The faction, called
the Southern Transitional Coun-
cil, is funded and trained by
Emirati forces and fights along-
side the Yemeni government
against the Houthis.
But the separatist group has
a rival goal of restoring an inde-
pendent state in southern Ye-
men.
—Saleh al-Batati

SUDAN

Top General Sworn In

To Lead Ruling Body

Sudan’s top general was

sworn in as the leader of a joint

military-civilian body created to

rule Sudan during a three-year

transition period toward demo-

cratic elections.

Gen. Abdel-Fattah Burhan took

the oath of office before the top

judge and will lead the 11-member

Sovereign Council for 21 months,

followed by a civilian leader ap-

pointed by the pro-democracy

movement for the next 18.

The move came after more

than four months of negotia-

tions between the ruling military

council and the pro-democracy

movement following the army’s

removal of longtime autocrat

president Omar al-Bashir in April.

The new Sovereign Council

was established under a power-

sharing agreement between the

military and the protesters.

The 59-year-old Gen. Burhan

chaired the military council that

took over after Mr. Bashir’s

ouster amid nationwide protests

against his three-decade rule.

The power-sharing pact,

signed Saturday, includes a pro-

test movement-appointed cabi-

net and a legislative council with

a majority from the Forces for

the Declaration of Freedom and

Change, the main protest coali-

tion. The legislative body is to

assemble within three months.

—Associated Press

MYANMAR

Rohingya Refugees

Shun Repatriation Bid

None of the thousands of

Rohingya Muslims living in

crowded refugee camps in Ban-

gladesh turned up for a planned

repatriation to Myanmar on

Thursday, demanding they first

be guaranteed safety and citi-

zenship.

“Not a single Rohingya wants

to go back without their de-

mands being met,” Bangladesh

refugee commissioner Abul Ka-

lam told reporters.

More than 700,000 Rohingya

fled across the border to Ban-

gladesh after Myanmar’s mili-

tary began a harsh counterinsur-

gency campaign against them

two years ago, a campaign that

involved mass rapes, killings and

the burning of homes.

Rohingya Muslims have long

demanded that Myanmar give

them citizenship, safety and

their own land and homes they

left behind. The Buddhist-major-

ity nation has refused to recog-

nize Rohingya as citizens or

even as one of its ethnic groups,

rendering them stateless, and

they also face other forms of

state-sanctioned discrimination.

Myanmar had cleared more

than 3,000 refugees from more

than 1,000 families as eligible

for repatriation and said the op-

eration to return them would

begin Thursday.

—Associated Press

Laborers take a break at a Rohingya refugee camp on Thursday in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya

Muslims fled to Bangladesh after Myanmar’s military began a campaign against them two years ago. Most are refusing to return home.

ALLISON JOYCE/GETTY IMAGES

plemented by our government.

With respect to the Venezue-

lan Winter League, MLB will

suspend its involvement in

that league until it receives di-

rection from the relevant

agencies that participation by

affiliated players is consistent

with the Executive Order,” a

spokesman for Major League

Baseball said on Thursday.

Richard Gomez, the general

manager of the Leones del Ca-

racas, said the Venezuelan

league hasn’t been advised of

MLB’s decision.

For fans and team adminis-

trators in baseball-crazed Ven-

ezuela, the prohibition would

be another painful hit at a time

when the country is reeling.

players—and top Venezuelan

stars—has dwindled in recent

years as unrest in the country

has grown.

MLB’s action in Venezuela

comes just months after it

faced scrutiny over its efforts

in Cuba. In April, the Trump

administration blocked MLB

from signing players directly

from Cuba to play professional

in the U.S., nullifying a historic

deal the league struck in De-

cember with the island na-

tion’s baseball federation.

“MLB has been in contact

with the relevant government

agencies regarding the Execu-

tive Order issued by President

Trump on Venezuela. MLB will

fully adhere to the policies im-

superstar Miguel Cabrera—

have played in MLB, more than

any foreign country besides the

Dominican Republic.

But baseball in Venezuela

has been hurt by the political

and economic strife ravaging

the nation. MLB’s teams have

shut down their academies in

Venezuela and now rarely send

scouts there. Players and their

families have been subjected

to crime and violence in Vene-

zuela; in 2011, then-Washing-

ton Nationals catcher Wilson

Ramos was kidnapped and

wasn’t rescued for two days.

Venezuelans make up the

majority of LVBP’s eight

teams, though players from

other countries play in the

This month, President

Trump signed an executive or-

der freezing all assets from

the government of President

Nicolás Maduro and prohibit-

ing transactions with it, unless

specifically exempted. Venezu-

ela’s baseball league, known in

Spanish as Liga Venezolana de

Béisbol Profesional, is heavily

sponsored by Petróleos de

Venezuela SA, the state-owned

oil company.

MLB’s 30 teams featured 68

Venezuelan players on their

opening-day rosters this sea-

son, in addition to dozens more

throughout the minor leagues.

More than 400 Venezuelans—

including Hall-of-Fame short-

stop Luis Aparicio and modern

Authorities have detained

more than 2,000 protesters in

Moscow in recent weeks during

rallies for free elections, mark-

ing the most serious challenge

to Mr. Putin’s power in years.

International sanctions also

have eroded living standards,

and anxiety is growing over

what will happen in 2024 when

Mr. Putin’s current six-year

term expires and term limits

prevent him from running

again.

Russia’s state communica-

tions censor, Roskomnadzor,

demanded earlier this month

that Google stop advertising

“illegal public events” on its

YouTube video platform. It said

that people were buying adver-

tising tools from YouTube,

such as push notifications, to

spread information about pro-

tests.

If Google didn’t prevent

that, Roskomnadzor said it

would consider this “interfer-

ence in the sovereign affairs of

state as well as hostile influ-

ence and obstructing of the

holding of democratic elections

in Russia.”

Google declined to com-

ment.

Mr. Putin’s government has

long demonstrated its willing-

ness to clamp down on the

global flow of data when it

feels threatened.

After protesters went online

to organize antigovernment

rallies in 2012, Moscow began

blocking websites and intro-

duced a host of new censorship

laws. Russia has also tried to

compel internet companies

such as Facebook, Google par-

ent Alphabet Inc. and Tinder to

hand over user data or keep

servers on Russian soil. So far,

WORLD NEWS

the companies say they haven’t

complied.

More recently, Roskomsvo-

boda has lost some of its gov-

ernment grants and has had its

website briefly blocked.

The new kill switch is sched-

uled to go live in November. It

is built on a monitoring net-

work based on a technique

called deep-packet inspection

that can track the flow of in-

formation from outside the

country, and between different

regions. Mr. Putin has pre-

sented the legislation enabling

it as a necessary measure to

thwart potential cyberattacks

from the West.

Activists view this powerful

new tool as a sea change in the

long-running battle for the web

in Russia.

“We pretend to be a West-

ern democracy and our consti-

tution protects rights and free-

doms,” said Alexander Isavnin,

who wears an amulet fashioned

from a microchip. “But we have

many exceptions and the inter-

net has become one of them.

It’s an example of how our

whole life in Russia is one big

exception.”

Roskomnadzor, the censor,

didn’t respond to questions.

Mr. Putin has pledged to keep

the internet free, but also has

called for stricter controls.

It is all a far cry from

Roskomsvoboda’s beginnings.

The group started out tracking

which websites the govern-

ment was banning, along with

listing services required to

share data with the govern-

ment and helping copyright pi-

rates avoid prosecution.

But as Moscow began tight-

ening its leash on the web, the

group stopped receiving gov-

ernment grants and took on

higher-profile cases, emerging

as one of the most important

advocates for the rights and

freedoms of Russia’s 100 mil-

lion users—the eighth-largest

market in the world, according

to data provider Internet

World Stats.

“When we started, we didn’t

imagine they would adopt so

many laws against online free-

doms,” said Mr. Darbinyan.

MOSCOW—As Vladimir Pu-
tin’s Russia increasingly cracks
down on internet freedoms, a
band of self-styled pirates is
fighting back.
The group of fewer than a
dozen lawyers and techies call-
ing themselves Roskomsvo-
boda—or Russian Communica-
tions Freedom—has notched
some surprising successes in
protecting what they deem a
basic human right.
The group has unblocked
banned websites, mounted le-
gal cases and recently revealed
that Moscow had ordered dat-
ing app Tinder to share user
information with security ser-
vices, setting off fresh debate
over Moscow’s tightening grip
on the internet.
Roskomsvoboda’s main ob-
jective now is to prevent Mr.
Putin’s government from ad-
vancing plans to install a “kill
switch” that would allow Rus-
sia to firewall itself from the
rest of the internet, much as
China does.
“Every year, every month,
every day we lose more and
more internet freedom,” said
one of the group’s founders,
Sarkis Darbinyan, sitting in a
small Moscow office sur-
rounded by free-speech stick-
ers and other antiestablish-
ment symbols, including a Guy
Fawkes mask.
The group, which began as
part of the Russian offshoot of
Sweden’s pro-internet-freedom
Pirate Party, says Russia has
banned more than 200,
sites, and bloggers are now re-
quired to register as media,
which subjects them to greater
government pressure. “They
want to control all information.
That’s what we’re up against,”
Mr. Darbinyan said.
Roskomsvoboda’s duel with
the state comes at a sensitive
time.

BYGEORGIKANTCHEV

Web Activists Joust With Kremlin

Group seeks to protect

online freedoms and

block internet firewall

planned by Moscow

Alexander Isavnin, above, and Sarkis Darbinyan, below, members of Roskomsvoboda—Russian

Communications Freedom—have pushed back against Moscow’s tightening grip on the internet.

ARTHUR BONDAR FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (2)

European Central Bank offi-

cials gave a further signal that

they would launch a big stimu-

lus package next month, which

could include rate cuts and as-

set purchases, in an effort to

arrest the region’s economic

slowdown.

According to minutes from

the ECB’s July 25 meeting, re-

leased Thursday, officials dis-

cussed the benefits of combin-

ing interest-rate cuts with

bond purchases.

“The view was expressed

that the various options should

be seen as a package,” the min-

utes stated. “Experience had

shown that a policy package—

such as the combination of rate

cuts and asset purchases—was

more effective than a sequence

of selective actions.”

The ECB held its policies

unchanged last month, but sig-

naled it was preparing to lower

its already negative policy rate

and relaunch bond purchases

as soon as September.

Expectations for a signifi-

cant stimulus package were

further fanned by Finnish cen-

tral banker and ECB Governing

Council member Olli Rehn,

who in an interview with The

Wall Street Journal last week

said, “It’s important that we

come up with a significant and

impactful policy package in

September.”

The minutes “suggest that

there is a majority at the ECB

in favor of a package of new

measures, rather than a series

of single measures,” said

Carsten Brzeski, economist at

ING Bank, in a research note.

The eurozone has struggled

in recent months amid con-

cerns that its biggest econ-

omy, Germany, may slide into

recession. Meanwhile, annual

inflation in the eurozone was

1% in July, far below the ECB’s

target of just below 2%.

BYBRIANBLACKSTONE

ECB’s

Minutes

Augur Big

Stimulus

Major League Baseball is
suspending players from par-
ticipating in the Venezuelan
Professional Baseball League
this winter as it seeks clarifi-
cation on how to comply with
the U.S.-imposed economic em-
bargo against the government
of Venezuela, several people
familiar with the matter said.
The prohibition applies to
major-league and minor-league
players, these people said. The
ruling won’t prevent Venezuelan
players from returning to their
home country in the off-season.
MLB began informing teams of
its decision on Thursday.

BYJAREDDIAMOND
ANDKEJALVYAS
More than 400
Venezuelans have
played baseball in
the major leagues.

MLB Won’t Let Its Players Participate in Venezuela League