The Times - UK (2020-10-20)

34 2GM Tuesday October 20 2020 | the times

Wo r l d

Palestinian negotiator

in coma with Covid-19

West Bank Saeb Erekat, the

secretary-general of the Palestine

Liberation Organisation and its

long-standing chief negotiator, is

in a critical condition in a

medically induced coma after

being admitted to the Hadassah

Ein Kerem hospital in Jerusalem

on Sunday with Covid-19. The

hospital said that Mr Erekat, 65,

presented a “challenge” as he had

had a lung transplant in the

United States in 2017, was

immuno-suppressed and had

another infection besides

coronavirus. After a quiet night

his condition had worsened and

he was anaesthetised and

ventilated owing to respiratory

distress. (Reuters)

Exiled leader’s party

wins election rerun

Bolivia The party of Evo Morales

claimed to have won the rerun of

the annulled presidential election

last October that led the left-wing

leader to resign and go into exile,

accused of fraud. Luis Arce, his

handpicked successor, won more

than 50 per cent of the vote,

according to two polls after the

ballot closed on Sunday. Jeanine

Áñez, the conservative interim

president, conceded defeat. (AP)

‘Protesters’ put police

building under attack

Nigeria A police building in the

southern city of Benin was

attacked by “people posing as

protesters” who stole arms and

ammunition, freed prisoners and

set the building on fire, the police

said. Youths in the largest cities

continued protests over abuses by

the Special Anti-Robbery Squad,

which has been replaced by a new

division. At least 15 people have

died in the protests. (AFP)

Top US official went to

Syria for hostage talks

Syria Kash Patel, a senior White

House counterterrorism adviser,

met the Assad regime in

Damascus this year in an attempt

to free two Americans believed to

be held captive, it has been

confirmed. The US broke off

diplomatic relations with Syria in

2012. The whereabouts of Austin
      Tice, 39, a journalist, and Majd
      Kamalmaz, 62, a psychotherapist,
      remain unknown.

Payout for children of

executed Indonesians

Netherlands The government is

to pay €5,000 compensation to

the children of men summarily

executed by Dutch forces during

the Indonesian struggle for

independence in the 1940s. It

follows a court ruling in March to

extend a scheme originally set up

for widows. In March, King

Willem-Alexander apologised for

his country’s aggression during

350 years of colonial rule. (AP)

Taiwan accuses China

of beating up diplomat

Ta i w a n The government in Taipei

has accused Chinese officials of

beating up a diplomat as they

tried to force their way into an

event in Suva, the capital of Fiji,

being held to celebrate Taiwan’s

national day. The diplomat

suffered concussion. China,

which claims sovereignty over

Taiwan and is seeking to isolate it

internationally, responded by

accusing the Taiwanese of assault.

The Galapagos Islands, one of the

world’s most important marine re-

serves, has accused China of pillaging

the area’s vital food supplies on an

industrial scale.

Satellite and radio tracking data has

shown that almost 300 vessels, part of

China’s massive “distant-water” fishing

fleet, which includes refuelling vessels

and fish processing plants, were sta-

tioned off the islands in July and

August. The ships are understood to

have caught several thousand tonnes of

squid, tuna and billfish.

The fish are critical to the diet of

several protected species in the Galapa-

gos, which belong to Ecuador, and

essential to the islands’ economy.

“This is an attack on our resources,”

Ángel Yánez Vinueza, the mayor of the

Santa Cruz province on the islands, told

seemingly recently discarded and

labelled in Chinese, which they suspect

come from the ships.

The US Coast Guard said that several

of the Chinese vessels appeared to have

deliberately concealed their locations,

switching their GPS transponders off

or, in one case, reporting an alternative

Huge Chinese fishing fleet accused of

‘raping’ Galapagos on industrial scale

Ecuador

Stephen Gibbs Sao Paulo

the Los Angeles Times. “They are killing

the species we have protected and pol-

luting our biota with the plastic waste

they drop overboard. They are raping

the Galapagos.”

The presence of the flotilla, just out-

side the exclusive economic zone that

surrounds the islands, led to diplomatic

appeals for restraint on the part of

China from the Ecuadorean govern-

ment. Both the Ecuador navy and a US

Coast Guard cutter also stepped up

patrols of the area to ensure the Chi-

nese vessels at least remained in inter-

national waters.

The Chinese embassy in Quito insist-

ed that Beijing respected Ecuador’s

measures to protect the environment

and preserve marine resources.

Yet even on the shore, there is evi-

dence of unprecedented environmen-

tal damage. Park guides on the Galapa-

gos say the area is strewn with plastic

bottles and equipment packaging,

location thousands of miles away in

Alaska. A US official described the vol-

ume of ships as like a “city” at sea.

The Galapagos, famed for their many

endemic species, were studied by

Charles Darwin in the 1830s. His obser-

vations there formed a key part of the

development of his theory of evolution

and natural selection.

The islands’ economy has been badly

hit by the coronavirus pandemic, which

has led to a drop in tourism. The marine

nature park is normally open to a

restricted number of tourists each year,

who each pay a $100 entry fee. Income

since March this year has sunk to under

10 per cent of levels before Covid-19.

The Ecuadorean government is lob-

bying to extend the exclusive economic

zone around the islands, so it links up

with the areas it also controls off the

mainland. This would block off a chan-

nel of international waters where the

Chinese fleet operates.

Exclusive economic zone

1

2

3

Sept 30

Chinese fishing

fleet tracked

outside the

Galapagos Islands

Then moves west

towards Easter Island

COLOMBIA

Galapagos

Equator ECUADOR

PERU

Maritime

country

boundaries

Fleet

moves south

to the

Peruvian coast

Falcon auctions and com-

petitions are held across

the Gulf, including in

Qatar and the UAE.

Ben Long, of the

Falconry School in

Hardwicke, Glouces-

tershire, said: “I’ve

heard of competitions

where the winner is of-

fered $1 million plus a

Ferrari, another offering

three new Range Rovers.

Sadly most birds bought don’t

win, and end up being disposed of.”

Dozens of endangered falcons, worth

an estimated $1 million, have been

seized from armed smugglers in Paki-

stan as demand from the Middle East

drives illegal trafficking in birds of prey.

The 74 shaheen falcons and a houba-

ra bustard, prized as an aphrodisiac by

Arab royals, were rescued from around

the port of Karachi and will be released

into the wild. The birds are believed to

have been captured in the north and

were intended for sale in the Gulf. Last

Falcon smugglers caught with $1m of birds

week a young shaheen fal-

con, a cousin of the Euro-

pean peregrine, was sold

in Saudi Arabia, right,

for more than

$170,000, a record

price for a bird of its

kind, during a 45-day

auction event.

The wealthiest fal-

coners in the Gulf com-

monly travel to Pakistan,

Morocco and Central Asia

with their birds on chartered air-

liners to seek hunting opportunities.

Pakistan

Haroon Janjua, David Rose

Sudan is to be removed from the US list

of state sponsors of terrorism once it

provides $335 million for American

victims and their families, President

Trump announced yesterday.

The deal could also result in Sudan

taking steps towards establishing diplo-

matic relations with Israel, US officials

said, following similar moves by the

United Arab Emirates and Bahrain bro-

kered by the Trump administration.

Sudan’s designation as a state spon-

sor of terrorism dated to its previous

ruler Omar al-Bashir, ousted last year

in a coup, and has hampered the ability

of its transitional government to access

vital debt relief and foreign financing.

The designation was imposed in 1993

because Washington believed Mr

Bashir was supporting militant groups

but is now seen as outdated due to the

country’s change in leadership and co-

operation on counter-terrorism.

Washington wants Khartoum to

deposit funds on account for victims of

al-Qaeda attacks on US embassies in

Kenya and Tanzania in 1998. “GREAT

news! New government of Sudan,

which is making great progress, agreed

to pay $335 MILLION to U.S. terror vic-

tims and families,” Mr Trump tweeted.

“Once deposited, I will lift Sudan from

the State Sponsors of Terrorism list. At

long last, JUSTICE for the American

people and BIG step for Sudan!”

A Sudanese government source said

that it was ready to pay compensation

to US embassy bombing victims. Min-

utes after Mr Trump’s statement, Ab-

dalla Hamdok, Sudan’s prime minister,

tweeted: “Thank you so much, Presi-

dent Trump! We very much look for-

ward to your official notification to

Congress rescinding the designation of

Sudan as a state-sponsor of terrorism,

which has cost Sudan too much.”

A sticking point in the negotiations

was Sudan’s insistence that any

announcement on delisting not be ex-

plicitly linked to normalisation of rela-

tions with Israel. Differences remain

between Sudanese political and mili-

tary officials on how far and how fast to

go in improving relations with Israel.

US removes

Sudan from

terror list

Sudan

David Charter Washington

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Flying high

Foil windsurfers

practise for a

tournament at

Tarifa Beach, in

southern Spain,

renowned for its

strong winds

LEO MASON SPORTS/ALAMY LIVE NEWS