Category: 2. World

NEW DELHI: A day after violent protests rocked Leh, and minutes before he was to address a news conference, Ladakh democracy activist Sonam Wangchuk was arrested on Friday.

The development came a day after the Modi government acc­used him of instigating the violent protests that broke out in Leh on Wednesday, and which ended in the death of four individuals in police firing. Another fifty people were injured.

The following day, the centre revoked the foreign donations licence of the Students’ Educ­ational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh, founded by Wangchuk. The CBI has also initiated an inquiry into the Himalayan Ins­titute of Alternatives Ladakh, which he runs, for alleged FCRA violations, Indian Express said.

Wangchuk had said he would address a press conference on Friday at Hotel Abduz in Leh, which would also be broadcast on Zoom. Though his secretary started the press conference, Wangchuk did not appear.

Promised statehood

Wangchuk, who was part of the Leh Apex Body (LAB), had been on a hunger strike to press for his demands, which include the promised statehood for Ladakh. Wan­gchuk called off the strike after violence flared. Many of the protesters are believed to have broken off from the peaceful protest on Wednesday after two people fainted during the fast.

The government had accused Wangchuck of inciting the mob by alleged provocative statements and said that “several politically motivated individuals” were not happy about the “progress” being made in the talks between the representatives of the government and Ladakh groups.

Wangchuk has claimed the central government is building a case against him “to bring me under the Public Safety Act and throw me in jail for two years”.

“I am ready for that, but Sonam Wangchuk in jail may cause them more problems than a free Sonam Wangchuk,” he said on Thursday.

Omar Abdullah, the chief minister of occupied Jammu and Kashmir, called the development “unfortunate” and said: “The way the Centre was after him since yesterday, it was obvious.”

Omar said the Centre has a problem of making promises it does not fulfil.

“Some promises were made to them just like promises were made to us. I am unable to understand what forces the Centre to renege on their promises,” Omar said.

Mehbooba Mufti, a former chief minister, called the development “deeply disturbing”. “A lifelong adv­­ocate of peace, sustainability and truth is being punished merely for demanding that promises be kept.

“Today, Leh is under curfew, a grim echo of what Kashmir has long endured. In today’s India, speaking truth to power comes at a heavy cost,” she said.

Sweeping economic and military sanctions on Iran lifted under a landmark international deal over its nuclear programme 10 years ago are set to be reimposed on Saturday night barring a last-minute breakthrough.

It comes after the UK, France and Germany wrote to the UN Security Council last month, accusing Iran of failing to fulfil its commitments. That triggered a mechanism giving Iran 30 days to find a diplomatic solution to avert renewed sanctions.

Iran has called the move illegal and says it will freeze co-operation with the global nuclear body the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) if sanctions are restored.

Iran stepped up banned nuclear activity after the US quit the deal in 2016.

Donald Trump pulled the US out in his first term as US president, criticising the deal – the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) – negotiated under his predecessor Barack Obama as flawed.

Iran barred IAEA inspectors from accessing its nuclear facilities after Israel and the US bombed several of its nuclear sites, as well as military bases, in June after negotiations held indirectly between the US and Iran to try to reach a new nuclear deal became deadlocked.

Iran is legally obligated under the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to allow inspections. It has been in talks this week with the IAEA to find a way forward, but has warned that a return of sanctions will put that in jeopardy.

The sanctions would include:

• an arms embargo
• a ban on uranium enrichment
• a ban on activity connected to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons
• a freeze of assets and a travel ban on Iranian figures and entities
• authorisation of countries to inspect Iran Air and Iran Shipping Lines cargo

Unless a solution is found, UN sanctions would come into force first, followed by EU sanctions next week.

Western powers and the IAEA say they are not convinced that Iran’s nuclear programme has purely peaceful purposes.

Iran strongly insists it is not seeking nuclear weapons, and that its programme is solely a civilian one.

Palestinians pursuing an apology from the UK over colonial-era war crimes allegations have urged the government to respond in light of its recognition this week of a state of Palestine.

The group submitted a 400-page legal petition to the Foreign Office earlier this month seeking an official apology and reparations from the UK.

They represent 13 families who say they were subjected to violence, exile or repression during the period known as the British Mandate in historical Palestine from 1917 until 1948.

Victor Kattan, who speaks for the petitioners, said the government had a responsibility to acknowledge what took place “to advance understanding and knowledge” about its past.

Speaking to the BBC during this week’s UN conference in New York, he welcomed Britain’s decision to recognise a Palestinian state – but argued it had not properly addressed the UK’s historical conduct and legacy.

“Britain denied self-government to the Palestinian community… It empowered a high commissioner to behave like a dictator [and] Palestinian people bore the brunt,” he said.

“Recognition alone does not deal with all these historic problems which for Palestinians are not history but the living reality to this day,” said Prof Kattan, an expert in public international law at the University of Nottingham.

The Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) would not confirm whether ministers had been made aware of the legal petition saying it did not “routinely comment on” them, although the BBC understands that Deputy Prime Minister and former Foreign Secretary David Lammy is to ask officials to look into the submission.

It documents three decades of alleged abuses by UK forces during mounting violence until 1948, after which the UK rapidly withdrew and the State of Israel was declared.

The alleged abuses by British forces range from murder, torture, expulsion and collective punishment which the submission says repressed the Arab Palestinian population amounting to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

In 2022, a BBC review of some of the historical evidence involved found details of arbitrary killings, arson of entire villages, “caging” of civilians in the open air, the use of human shields by strapping them to the front of military vehicles and the introduction of home demolitions as collective punishment.

The evidence included audio recordings made decades later in which British soldiers and police officers described abuses. Some were conducted within formal policy guidelines for UK forces at the time or with the consent of senior officers.

The UK Ministry of Defence said in 2022 it was aware of historical allegations against armed forces personnel during the period, and any evidence provided would be “reviewed thoroughly”.

During World War One, Britain invaded Palestine, driving out the Ottoman Turks, and it facilitated its promise for a Jewish homeland made in the 1917 Balfour Declaration.

In the decades that followed, violence mounted between Arabs and Jews.

An insurgency known as the Arab Revolt broke out against British rule from 1936 until 1939. It was brutally suppressed by the British leaving about 10% of the adult male Arab Palestinian population killed, wounded, imprisoned or exiled, according to one estimate.

The Palestinian petitioners seek to build on previous concessions made by the UK over colonial-era war crimes, including this year’s apology for the 1948 Batang Kali massacre in Malaya and the settlement over abuses of Kenyans during the Mau Mau uprising of the 1950s.

The decision by the UK, France and several other countries to recognise a Palestinian state saw them join more than 150 nations that already do so.

The move was welcomed by Palestinians – but rejected by Israel and the US, which argued it damaged efforts to mediate a ceasefire in the war in the Gaza Strip.

Israel has inflicted abuse, starvation and invasive cell searches on an eminent Palestinian doctor, according to an Israeli nonprofit, nearly a year after he was first detained in a raid that shut down one of the last remaining functioning hospitals in northern Gaza.

On Thursday, a lawyer working with Physicians for Human Rights Israel (PHRI) was able to visit Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya after four prior attempts were denied “without explanation,” the group said.

Abu Safiya has lost 55 pounds (25 kilograms) from “severe starvation” at Ofer Prison in the occupied West Bank, PHRI alleged. Authorities have withheld clean clothing and medical care from Abu Safiya, who has pre-existing heart struggles and untreated scabies, the PHRI lawyers added.

He has not been brought before a judge, interrogated, or informed of the legal grounds of his detention since March, PHRI said, adding: “Dr. Abu Safiya emphasized that he is detained solely because of his role as a doctor.”

CNN has reached out to the Israel Prison Service for comment on the allegations.

Israeli forces detained Abu Safiya — the former director of Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya — during a raid that shut down the medical facility in December. At the time, the Israeli military said it detained him because he was “suspected of being a Hamas terrorist operative.” The military did not provide any evidence to support the claims.

Abu Safiya’s detention comprises a broader campaign of “systematic targeting and abuse” of Palestinian health care workers, PHRI said. More than 100 medical staff have been incarcerated without formal charges, according to the Israeli nonprofit, in “clear violation” of due process.

A renowned environmentalist at the forefront of a protest movement in the Indian region of Ladakh has been arrested amid a wider crackdown on dissent under the prime minister, Narendra Modi.

Sonam Wangchuk, an activist, engineer and inventor, has been leading a lengthy agitation against the Modi government, calling for statehood and greater protections to be granted to his home region of Ladakh. He was arrested on Friday afternoon, on his way to address a press conference.

His detention came after demonstrations in the regional capital of Leh turned violent on Wednesday. The local offices of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were among the buildings set on fire. The police responded with live ammunition, killing at least four protesters who were demanding autonomy and statehood for Ladakh.

Ladakh – which sits high up in the Himalayan mountains along the fractious borders with China and Pakistan – has been under the control of the central government since 2019.

The territory was part of the state of Jammu and Kashmir before it was unilaterally dissolved by the Modi government and brought fully under its control, to the anger and frustration of the local population.

The central home ministry accused Wangchuk, who had been staging a 15-day hunger strike, of inciting the “mob violence” through “provocative statements”, which referred to the Arab Spring and recent anti-corruption protests in Nepal.

Wangchuk had rejected the allegation, saying he did not support violence. He claimed that the central government was building a case against him to “throw me in jail for two years”.

“I am ready for that,” he said the night before his arrest. “But Sonam Wangchuk in jail may cause them more problems than a free Sonam Wangchuk.”

Wangchuk rose to prominence in his fight for the educational rights and environmental preservation of Ladakh.

He established an award-winning school as part of his students’ educational and cultural movement of Ladakh and is the inventor of the ice stupa, an artificial glacier that helps with crucial water storage that has been adopted globally. He was also the inspiration for one of Bollywood’s most beloved films, Three Idiots.

But after the Modi government took away the statehood of Jammu and Kashmir and, as deadly border skirmishes with China resulted in a massive military buildup and infrastructure push in Ladakh, with a heavy environmental impact, Wangchuk began to lead a movement fighting for Ladakh’s regional autonomy.

He has held repeated protests and hunger strikes, and last year led a group of hundreds of protesters on a 500-mile march from Leh to New Delhi to urge the government to heed to their demands for statehood.

Wangchuk claimed he had been harassed for standing up to the BJP government, which over its decade in power has routinely arrested activists, environmentalists and those who have taken part in government action, often charging them under stringent laws.

This week, the home ministry cancelled the registration that allowed Wangchuk’s NGO to receive foreign funds and put the Ladakh school he founded under criminal investigation. The move mirrors actions against organisations such as Amnesty International and Greenpeace after they were critical of the Modi government.