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☆ Kansas cult leaders convicted of forcing children to work 16-hour days without pay
▼ + stars: | 2024-09-18 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

After a 26-day trial, jurors convicted all six defendants of conspiracy to commit forced labor. One of the six, Kaaba Majeed, 50, also was convicted of five counts of forced labor. Prosecutors said the group, which was labeled a cult by a federal judge in 2018, beat children and imposed severe dietary restrictions. Jenkins, who died in 2021, had been a member of the Nation of Islam until 1978, when he founded the separate United Nation of Islam. Two other co-defendants previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit forced labor.

Persons: Royall Jenkins, Majeed, Stephen Cyrus, Prosecutors, Jenkins, Judge Daniel Crabtree, Yunus Rassoul, James Staton, Randolph Rodney Hadley, Daniel Aubrey Jenkins, Dana Peach Organizations: KANSAS CITY, Kan, United, of, U.S . Department of Justice, “, of Islam, University of Arts and Logistics of Locations: KANSAS, Kansas, Kansas City , Kansas, Kansas City, New Jersey , New York , Ohio, Maryland, Georgia, North Carolina

The Department of Veterans Affairs has clawed back billions of dollars that countless veterans were given as incentives to leave the military, including when it needed to downsize, according to new data obtained by NBC News. Disabled veterans have been told in the last 12 fiscal years to return nearly $3 billion in special separation pay — lump-sum incentives that were offered when the U.S. had to reduce its active-duty force or release slightly injured service members, the data shows. The justification of the recoupment rule carried over in the 1990s when other forms of special separation payments — unrelated to disabilities — were authorized. Those payments, including the Special Separation Benefit (SSB), were designed instead to help the Defense Department manage its force size. He was told to pay back the money in 2017 after he filed for VA disability for PTSD and other conditions.

Persons: ”, Damon Bird, “, ” Salahudin Majeed, Bird, Salahudin Majeed, ” Majeed, ‘, ’ ” Majeed, —, ” Marquis Barefield, Marquis Barefield, ” Barefield, John Colage, Terrence Hayes, Hayes, Colage, ” Colage, Domenick Fini, Denis McDonough’s, Majeed, recoupment, Ruben Gallego, Gallego Organizations: of Veterans Affairs, NBC News, Disabled, NBC, Army, ” Army, Congressional Research Service, Defense Department, DAV, American Veterans, ” Navy, U.S ., Appeals, Veterans, Veterans ’ Appeals, RAND Corporation Locations: U.S, —, Haslet , Texas, USS Iowa, Missouri, Texas, Iraq

☆ Pakistan extends visas for 1.45 million Afghans but denies deportations on hold
▼ + stars: | 2024-07-11 | by ( Lex Harvey | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —Pakistan is extending the stay of nearly 1.5 million registered Afghan refugees – but its mass deportation of “illegal immigrants” will continue, authorities said. The fate of 1.45 million refugees whose PORs expired at the end of June had previously been in doubt, with many fearing they’d be deported. But Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs disputed the UN’s claims that Islamabad had put on hold its plan announced last October to deport undocumented Afghan refugees. Trucks transporting Afghan refugees and their belongings are seen along a road heading toward the Pakistan-Afghanistan Torkham border on November 3, 2023. More than 3 million Afghan refugees, including registered refugees and more than 800,000 undocumented people were living in Pakistan as of March 2024, according to UNHCR data.

Persons: ”, Shehbaz, they’d, ” Filippo Grandi, Mumtaz Baloch, Abdul Majeed, They’re, Moniza, ” Kakar, Asif Hassan, Ruwanpathirana Organizations: CNN, United Nations, Pakistan’s, of Foreign Affairs, Trucks, Getty, Pakistan, Afghan, UNHCR, Taliban, UN, ” Police, South Asia, Amnesty International Locations: Pakistan, Afghanistan, Islamabad, AFP, Karachi, South

☆ Opinion | A Message From the West Bank: ‘We Are Coming to Horrible Days’
▼ + stars: | 2024-06-29 | by ( Nicholas Kristof | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The West Bank village of Qusra was smoldering as I arrived. Clouds of black smoke swirled from a field where rampaging Israeli settlers had lit it on fire, while also setting fire to Palestinian homes and vehicles, according to Qusra residents. “At any moment, we expect settlers to attack,” said Abdel-Majeed Hassan, a salt-of-the-earth farmer in his 70s. I met Hassan here in 2015, on one of my many trips to Israel and the Palestinian territories over the years. Despite enduring repeated attacks by settlers who coveted his land, he thought then that he could hang on to his family farm.

Persons: ”, Abdel, Majeed Hassan, Hassan Organizations: “, West Bank Locations: Bank, Qusra, Gaza, Israel

CNN —Unseasonal rainfall has lashed Pakistan and Afghanistan over the past few days, killing more than 100 people across the neighboring countries, authorities said. In Afghanistan, heavy rain and floods in 23 provinces killed 66 people and wounded 36 others, according to preliminary reports from Mullah Janan Sayeq, a spokesman for the Ministry of Disaster Management. The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs in Afghanistan said Tuesday that the heavy rains and floods have affected more than 1,200 families and damaged almost 1,000 houses, according to a statement on X. Houses submerged after heavy rains flood Nowshera district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province on April 16, 2024. The heavy downpours are unusual for the region at this time of the year, as Pakistan typically experiences the monsoon season from June through September.

Persons: Mullah Janan Sayeq, Sayeq, Muhammad Sajjad, Abdul Majeed, – Organizations: CNN, Ministry of Disaster Management, United Nations Office, Humanitarian Affairs, UN, Getty, Pakistan Locations: Pakistan, Afghanistan, Peshawar, Herat, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, AFP, Balochistan

☆ The Palestinian keffiyeh explained: How this scarf became a national symbol
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-28 | by ( Zoe Sottile | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +9 min

Dalia Jacobs, a Palestinian brand strategist and creative director, told CNN she wears a keffiyeh made in her hometown, Hebron, when she travels abroad. The keffiyeh “says who I am and carries my family’s history with me always,” she told CNN. To combine the two pieces of Palestinian cultural heritage, she used traditional embroidery techniques to adorn her black and white keffiyeh. During the 1960s, there was another resurgence in the keffiyeh as political symbol, with the scarf worn by both men and women. Yasser Arafat, who served for decades as the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, was often pictured wearing the black and white keffiyeh, which further cemented the scarf as a symbol of the Palestinian national struggle.

Persons: ”, Majeed Malhas, keffiyehs —, keffiyehs, Malhas, Hazem Bader, Dalia Jacobs, ” A.S, “, Ghnaim, ” Yasser Arafat, Georges De Keerle, Yasser Arafat, Leila Khaled, Harry Koundakjian, Carrie Bradshaw, Louis Vuitton, keffieh, ” Malhas Organizations: CNN, University of Toronto, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Arab, Palestinian, West Bank, Getty, Palestinian Liberation Organization, Palestinian Authority, Palestine Liberation Organization, Popular Front, Liberation, Palestine, City Locations: Vermont, Israel, Palestinian, Canadian, Palestine, New York City, ”, Old City, Hebron, North Carolina, Jordan, France, Burlington, New York

GAZA, Aug 14 (Reuters) - A heatwave and worsening power cuts in Gaza have left some of those living in the overcrowded Palestinian enclave struggling to breathe. Power cuts, which are unpredictable at the best of times, now last for around 12 hours a day instead of 10 as demand for air conditioning soars. "Power cuts deprive patients of their right to regular oxygen ventilation and that pushes patients to keep visiting hospital," Haj said. Alongside cases of acquired pulmonary fibrosis, Gaza health officials say more than 300 people in the enclave were born with cystic fibrosis, which causes the lungs and digestive system to become clogged with sticky mucus. Abdel-Majeed Al-Sbakhi, who has diabetes as well as cystic fibrosis, was among those forced in hospital by the heat.

Persons: Ismail Nashwan, Mohammad Al, Haj, Gaza's Shuhada, Majeed Al, Sbakhi, Nidal al, Philippa Fletcher Organizations: Hamas, Aqsa, Thomson Locations: GAZA, Gaza, Egypt, Israel, Gaza's, Gaza's Shuhada Al

☆ Without climate change, these extreme weather events would not have happened
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-15 | by ( Rachel Ramirez | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +13 min

People often want to know if an extreme weather event happened because of climate change, said Friederike Otto, climate scientist and co-lead of the World Weather Attribution initiative. And, more often than not, they are finding the clear fingerprints of climate change on extreme weather events. “We’re always going to have extreme weather, but if we keep driving in this direction, we’re gonna have a lot of extreme weather,” said Ted Scambos, a glaciologist at the University of Colorado-Boulder. Alexander Nemenov/AFP/Getty ImagesSiberian heat wave, 2020In 2020, a prolonged, unprecedented heat wave seared one of the coldest places on Earth, triggering widespread wildfires. A study from the journal Nature Climate Change found the period from 2000 to 2021 was the driest the West has ever been in 1,200 years, noting human-caused climate change made the megadrought 72% worse.

Persons: Friederike Otto, Otto, We’re, we’re, ”, Ted Scambos, Alexander Nemenov, Andrew Ciavarella, Kathryn Elsesser, San Salvador de la, Aitor De Iturria, ” Otto, Mamunur Rahman Malik, “, Fadel Senna, Debarchan Chatterjee, Saeed Khan, koalas, David Paul Morris, Lake Powell, Hurricane Ian, Ricardo Arduengo, Ian, Lawrence, Abdul Majeed, António Guterres Organizations: CNN, University of Colorado -, Getty, UK’s Met, Oregon Convention, Northern, World Health Organization, South Asia, Bloomberg, Western, Stony Brook University, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory ., UN Locations: University of Colorado - Boulder, Siberia, AFP, Oregon, Portland, Pacific, . Oregon, Washington, Canada, British Columbia, Canadian, Lytton, San Salvador de, Cercs, Catalonia, Spain, North America, Europe, China, Dahably, Wajir County, Kenya, Africa, Horn of Africa, Somalia, Ethiopia, Masseoud, Morocco, Portugal, Algeria, Kolkata, India, South Asia, South, Vietnam, Myanmar, Laos, Bangladesh, Thailand, New South Wales, Australia, Oroville, Oroville , California, States, California, Lake Oroville, Lake Mead, Lake, Nevada, Arizona, Mexico, Hurricane, Matlacha , Florida, Caribbean, Florida, Swat, Bahrain, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan, Sindh, Balochistan

☆ India stops journalist from flying to U.S. to receive Pulitzer Prize
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-20 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +2 min

NEW DELHI — A Pulitzer Prize-winning Kashmiri photojournalist said Wednesday that Indian immigration authorities prevented her from flying to the United States to receive the award even though she had a valid visa and ticket. Sanna Irshad Mattoo was scheduled to fly to New York on Monday to receive the Pulitzer Prize but was blocked by officials at New Delhi’s airport, she said. Saqib Majeed / SOPA Images/Sipa USA via AP fileMattoo was working on assignment for Reuters, which won the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography for coverage of the Covid-19 crisis in India. Journalists have long braved threats in the restive region as the Indian government seeks to tighten control over the media. Their situation has grown worse since India revoked the region’s semi-autonomy in 2019, with dozens arrested, interrogated and investigated under harsh anti-terror laws.

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