Missione ONU: la Russia viola i Diritti Umani in Ucraina🗞️ Rassegna del 21/03/2024

Israele

(Reuters) Blinken begins Middle East tour with strains growing in US-Israel ties

• U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken began a tour of the Middle East on Wednesday by holding talks in Saudi Arabia, hoping to secure a ceasefire in the Gaza war as increasing strain shows in Washington's relationship with its ally Israel.
• Fighting has intensified in recent days in northern parts of Gaza captured by Israeli forces early in the nearly six-month-old war, including Al Shifa, once Gaza's biggest hospital, now one of the few even partially functioning in the north.
• Israel's military chief, Herzi Halevi, said Israeli forces were targeting Hamas leaders who he said were in the hospital compound.
• State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said one of Blinken's aims was to discuss with Israeli leaders how to defeat Hamas "including in Rafah, in a way that protects the civilian population, does not hinder the delivery of humanitarian assistance and advances Israel’s overall security."

Ucraina

(Reuters) What’s in the UN report on rights abuses in Russian-occupied Ukraine?

• The UN's Human Rights Monitoring Mission in Ukraine (HRMMU) has released its first comprehensive report on the situation in the territories of Ukraine occupied since Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022.
• Although the U.N. did not have access to Russian-occupied areas, the report was based on 2,319 remote and in-person interviews with witnesses and victims.
• The report said its investigators had verified the executions of 26 civilians, including two children, on the spot, for instance during house searches, as well as the killing of a further 30 civilians during detention. Most executions were committed between March and May 2022, it said.
• The report said torture in places of detention was widespread.
• According to the report, Russia's armed forces conducted widespread arbitrary detentions and forced disappearances during their occupation.
• The report found that Russia has pressured local residents to take Russian passports. This pressure has been applied through the workplace and through economic pressures. It also said people's access to social benefits and healthcare was restricted if they did not take a Russian passport.
• The report found that Russia used intimidation and violence to pressure civil servants in fields such as law enforcement and education to work under the Russian system. Journalists were pressured not to write "pro-Ukrainian" articles, it said.
• The report found that approximately 1,600 civilian prisoners serving sentences in Ukraine's Kherson region before February 2022 had been transferred to Russian prisons.

Russia

(MEDUZA) Putin 2024 Meduza analizza le prove che indicano le elezioni più fraudolente della storia russa moderna - Meduza

• Il 18 marzo, Putin ottiene una vittoria schiacciante alle elezioni. Secondo i dati preliminari della CEC, Putin ha ricevuto un record dell'87,28 per cento dei voti, con un'affluenza alle urne altrettanto record del 77,44 per cento.
• Diversi analisti tra cui Ivan Shukshin hanno dimostrato che vi è una innaturale correlazione tra affluenza e voti per Putin, frutto probabilmente di una massiccia manipolazione del voto.
• Da quanto emerge dai modelli sembra che il broglio sia sistemico e abbastanza grezzo ove, raggiunta una certa soglia di votanti, le persone successivamente arrivate (in blocco) avrebbero votato esclusivamente solo per Putin.
• Utilizzando la metodologia di Sergey Shpilkin, Ivan Shukshin ha stimato che le commissioni elettorali ha dato a Vladimir Putin circa 22 milioni di voti in più, principalmente attraverso la manipolazione dei registri elettorali piuttosto che attraverso il riempimento fisico delle schede
• Novaya Gazeta Europe ha calcolato un surplus di 31,6 milioni di voti per Putin poiché la frode sembra essere così diffusa da rendere difficile l’applicazione di modelli data l’inaffidabilità dei dati (anche delle elezioni precedenti).

Europa

Irlanda:

(POLITICO) Leo Varadkar to stand down as Irish PM

• Prime Minister Leo Varadkar will resign as Irish leader next month, sending shockwaves through the political system [...]
• [...] Varadkar said he would quit as head of the ruling Fine Gael party immediately but remain as Taoiseach until his party holds its annual conference in  mid April, by which time a successor should be chosen.
• The next general election is required by February 2025 but could come sooner, with the main opposition Sinn Féin consistently leading in the polls.
• Varadkar’s resignation follows a government humiliation in this month’s two-pronged referendum on removing sexist references from the country’s 87-year-old constitution. Voters overwhelmingly rejected both measures, with many criticizing the government’s proposed replacement texts as vague and problematic.

UK:

(Reuters) Easing UK inflation keeps BoE on track for rate cuts later in 2024

• British inflation slowed in February, keeping the Bank of England on track to start cutting interest rates in the months ahead and offering some better economic news to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak before an election expected later this year.
• Consumer prices rose by 3.4% in annual terms after a 4.0% increase in January, the weakest rate of inflation since September 2021, official data showed on Wednesday.
• Core inflation, which excludes energy, food and tobacco prices, also slowed, dropping to 4.5% from 5.1% in January. 
• The BoE has said underlying inflation pressures remain too persistent for it to cut interest rates now, although it has signalled that lower borrowing costs are likely later this year.
• Finance minister Jeremy Hunt said the latest fall in inflation could help the government with its goal of abolishing social security taxes altogether. But any moves would be done only if the government could avoid increasing borrowing or cutting funding for public services.

Politica internazionale

Nord America

USA:

(Reuters) Texas border enforcement law again blocked in legal whiplash + Mexico won't accept deportations from Texas, calls law 'dehumanizing'

• A Republican-backed Texas law that would empower law enforcement authorities in the state to arrest people suspected of illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border was blocked again late on Tuesday by a federal appeals court, just hours after the U.S. Supreme Court had cleared the way for it to go into effect.
• The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals halted enforcement of the law, reviving a federal judge's order blocking it in response to a challenge by Democratic President Joe Biden's administration. The 5th Circuit set arguments for Wednesday on whether to keep the block in place while Texas appeals it.
• Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador sharply criticized a Texas law that would empower state law enforcement authorities to arrest people suspected of illegally crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, saying Mexico will not accept anyone repatriated by Texas.

Asia e Pacifico

Indonesia:

(Associated Press) Indonesia’s defense minister, accused of abuses under dictatorship, is declared election winner

• Indonesian Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto was announced the winner of the presidential election in one of the world’s largest democracies Wednesday over two former governors who vow to contest the result in court over alleged irregularities.
• Subianto, who was accused of abuses under the past dictatorship and chose the son of the popular outgoing president as his running mate, won 58.6% of the votes. Former Jakarta Gov. Anies Baswedan received 24.9% and former Central Java Gov. Ganjar Pranowo got 16.5%, the General Election Commission said. It posted polling stations’ tabulation forms on its website, allowing for independent verification.
• In Indonesia, election challenges can be registered with the Constitutional Court during the three days following the announcement of official results. Baswedan and Pranowo have refused to concede and said they plan to file challenges.[...] They have alleged fraud, citing the vice presidential candidacy of Widodo’s son. Widodo could not run again, and his son’s candidacy has been seen as a sign of his tacit backing of Subianto.
• Questions also are still unanswered about Subianto’s alleged links to torture, disappearances and other human rights abuses in the final years of the brutal Suharto dictatorship, in which he served as a special forces lieutenant general.
• Subianto was expelled by the army over accusations that he played a role in the kidnappings and torture of activists and other abuses. He never faced a trial and vehemently denies any involvement, although several of his men were tried and convicted.

Vietnam:

(Reuters) Vietnam's president resigns, raising questions over stability

• The Vietnamese Communist Party has accepted the resignation of President Vo Van Thuong, the government said on Wednesday, in a sign of political turmoil that could hurt foreign investors' confidence in the country.
• Thuong, 53, quit days after Vietnamese police announced the arrest for alleged corruption a decade ago of a former head of central Vietnam's Quang Ngai province, who served while Thuong was party chief there. 
• He had also been a senior party official of economic hub Ho Chi Minh City, which has been rocked by a multi-billion-dollar long-running financial scam, for which a large trial is currently underway.
• Last year, when former president Nguyen Xuan Phuc quit after the party blamed him for "violations and wrongdoing" by officials under his control, it took one month and a half for lawmakers to appoint Thuong as his successor.
• The current political crisis may well be resolved with the swift election of a new president, but risks remain that repeated reshuffles of top leaders hurt business sentiment in a country that is highly dependent on foreign investment.