36 2GM Tuesday December 21 2021 | the times
Wo r l d
Thousands protest over
‘media freedom’ bill
Poland Protesters marched in
towns and cities across the
country after MPs voted to
tighten laws against foreign
ownership of media outlets. If the
law is approved by President
Duda, the US company Discovery
would have to sell its majority
stake in TVN, Poland’s largest
private broadcaster. The
government says the law to ban
media owners from outside the
European Economic Area is to
bar regimes such as Russia and
China buying outlets. Opponents
say the measure targets TVN, a
government critic, and strikes at
media freedom. Thousands of
people gathered in Warsaw to
urge Duda to veto the bill.Saudi-led forces strike
Yemeni capital’s airport
Yemen A Saudi-led coalition
fighting rebels backed by Iran
launched airstrikes against Sanaa
airport yesterday, it said. Just over
an hour before the strikes in the
capital, the coalition asked UN
agencies and civilians to leave the
airport, which it claims Houthi
rebels have turned into a military
base for launching missiles into
Saudi Arabia. The Houthis have
held Sanaa since September 2014.More than 50,000 flee
homes after flooding
Malaysia Seven people have been
killed and 51,000 have been
forced to leave their homes after
a month’s rain in one day caused
rivers to overflow, officials said.
Major roads were cut off and
many motorists were trapped in
their cars. The worst-affected
area is the eastern state of
Pahang, where 32,000 fled.
Selangor, surrounding Kuala
Lumpur, has been hit badly. (AFP)Armed gangs kill 47
in farming conflict
Nigeria Security forces are
hunting armed gangs who killed
at least 47 people in raids on rural
areas in Kaduna state, in the
country’s troubled northwest
region, officials said. The attacks
are suspected to be by gangs
comprised of young men from the
Fulani ethnic group, who feud
with Hausa farmers over land and
water. The gangs have killed at
least 2,500 people this year. (AP)Monkeys in dog-killing
rampage are captured
India Two “ringleaders” of a
marauding band of monkeys who
have killed up to 200 puppies
have been captured in the Beed
district of Maharashtra. In recent
months puppies have been
thrown off buildings in revenge
for an attack on a baby monkey,
villagers said. The conservation
group Wildlife SOS dismissed the
idea of revenge and said the
figure of 200 was doubtful.Survivors call for food
after 375 die in typhoon
Philippines The death toll from
Super Typhoon Rai reached 375
with 56 missing. The Red Cross
reported “complete carnage” in
coastal areas after the storm left
homes, hospitals and schools
“ripped to shreds”. In the city of
Surigao residents urgently need
drinking water and food, a street
vendor said. More than 380,000
people fled their homes when the
storm hit last week. (AFP)Spain
Sabrina Penty Madrid
were found in shallow graves in July. A
grandfather in his sixties was found tied
to a tree; he appeared to have been tor-
tured to death.
The army has attacked villagers as aThe Myanmar military tortured and
killed more than 40 civilians in villages
known to be opposition strongholds.
Soldiers attacked civilians in four
incidents in Kani Township in Sagaing
in July, according to a BBC investi-
gation. Men were taken, beaten and
tortured, then buried in shallow graves.
Videos shot on phones by villagers
and photos from the UK-based human
rights group Myanmar Witness appear
to corroborate witness accounts.
The area is home to militia groups
Villagers killed by ‘vengeful’ Burmese military
that have been fighting the junta since
it seized power from the government of
Aung San Suu Kyi in February. The
assault on the villagers is believed to be
in revenge for attacks on the junta by
the People’s Defence Forces militia.
The independent news organisation
Myanmar Now reported on torture and
killings in Yin village in July. “The first
two bodies we found had their faces
slashed with knives,” a witness said.
“Some were nearly decapitated and
some had their limbs mutilated. We can
assume that they slit the victims’ faces
with knives as they interrogated them.”
In another village, mutilated bodiesform of collective punishment. General
Zaw Min Tun, deputy minister for
information, told the BBC: “When they
treat us as enemies, we have the right to
defend ourselves.”
More than 1,300 civilians are thought
to have been killed by the military since
February.
The trial of Suu Kyi for illegally
importing and possessing walkie-talk-
ies was adjourned yesterday until
Monday. The Nobel laureate has
already been found guilty of breaking
pandemic rules and faces a catalogue of
charges, including corruption, that
could result in her being jailed for life.Myanmar
Gavin Blair Japan
Taking the air Like horses, this zebra in South Africa’s Kruger Park also exposes
its mouth while inhaling to get an intense interpretation of surrounding smellsRussia demands
Nato’s answer on
forces withdrawal
The Kremlin has threatened an escala-
tion in tensions with western countries
if Nato does not meet its demand to
withdraw forces from member states in
eastern and central Europe, with Rus-
sian state media warning viewers that
the two powers could go to war.
“The United States must sign off on
its hegemony; its hegemony is over,” a
presenter on the Rossiya 1 channel said,
“Either they step back voluntarily or
we’ll make them do it by force. And
Russia makes no guarantees about the
survival of Ukraine, especially as a sov-
ereign state. Maybe we really are on the
eve of war with Nato.”
Russia issued proposals on “security
guarantees” for the country last week
that also called on Nato to halt its east-
ward expansion into eastern Europe
and countries of the former Soviet
Union, including Ukraine.
The White House said it would dis-
cuss the proposals with European allies
but emphasised that Moscow could not
be allowed to interfere in the foreign
policy decisions of sovereign states.
The Kremlin said yesterday it had yet
to receive a substantive reply from
Nato. Sergei Ryabkov, 61, Russia’s depu-
ty foreign minister, said any delay in ne-
gotiations would fuel tensions that had
worsened in recent months over a Rus-
sian military build-up near Ukraine’s
eastern borders. The Kremlin has
denied that Russia plans an invasion.
Yury Ushakov, President Putin’s top
foreign policy adviser, and Jake Sulli-
van, President Biden’s national security
adviser, discussed Russia’s demands in a
“business-like and pragmatic” tele-
phone call yesterday, the Kremlin said.
Russia’s demands specify a ban on
Nato deployments to states that joined
the western military alliance after 1997,
unless approved by the Kremlin.
If Nato agrees to the proposals, it
would have to remove troops and mis-
sile defence systems from Poland and
Romania, as well as withdraw its forces
from Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Nato would also be obliged publicly
to renounce a promise made in 2008
that Ukraine and Georgia would one
day be allowed to join the alliance. Pu-
tin, 69, has said that Russia would con-
sider Ukraine’s acceptance into Nato as
a threat to its national security.
Ryabkov threatened last week that
Russia could be “forced” to deploy
intermediate-range nuclear missiles to
its western borders with Europe if its
demands were rejected.
Relations between Berlin and Mos-
cow worsened further yesterday when
Russia expelled two German diplomats
in response to a German court ruling
that Moscow had ordered the assassi-
nation of Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, a
former Chechen rebel commander,
who was shot in a park in Berlin in 2019.
6 Ukraine has accused Petro Porosh-
enko, the country’s former president, of
treason over the alleged purchase of
coal from Kremlin-backed separatists
in the Donbas conflict zone.Russia
Marc Bennetts
BRAEME HOLLAND/CATERS NEWSRussian rocket launchers take part in
military drills near Ukraine’s border
Bay of
BengalINDIATHAILANDMandalay100 milesKani
TownshipMYANMARYangonThe Catholic Church in Spain faces a
Vatican investigation into claims of
institutional paedophilia after more
than 250 cases of abuse of minors by the
clergy were uncovered.
The inquiry will look into allegations
dating back 80 years. The newspaper El
Pais has investigated abuse by priests
for three years and handed a 385-page
dossier to the Pope on December 2.
The pontiff has stepped up criticism
Church in Spain faces abuse claims dating back to 1940s
of violence affecting the family,
describing domestic violence against
women as “almost satanic”.
The Vatican said the Spanish case
had been passed to “competent bodies
so it could proceed according to current
law”. The church recently faced criti-
cism when it was revealed that since the
1950s, 216,000 children in France had
been sexually abused by members of
the clergy.
In Spain there are at least 1,237 vic-
tims, although the number is likely to be
higher, according to El Pais. The casesleadership of the Catholic Church in
Spain has said there are “very few”
instances and it has not received many
complaints.
However, El Pais claims it has re-
ceived 600 messages to the complaint
email address the newspaper set up
when the investigation was announced.
The only figure relating to the
Bishops’ Conference was provided by
the Congregation for the Doctrine of
Faith, which says that it has received
“only 220 cases” from Spain since 2001,
El Pais said.highlighted by the newspaper allegedly
took place between 1942 and 2018. The
allegations concern 31 religious orders
and 31 of the 70 dioceses.
The Pope’s action has prompted the
Spanish Bishops Conference to carry
out an investigation into the matter
after reporting it to the clerical tribunal
of Barcelona, El Pais said.
The organisation had originally stat-
ed in September that it had no intention
of investigating instances of abuse
within the clergy.
So far the body that represents the