UK lawmakers pass motion saying China committing genocide
LONDON — British lawmakers on Thursday approved a parliamentary motion declaring that China’s policies against its Uyghur minority population in the far western Xinjiang region amounted to genocide and crimes against humanity.
The motion is non-binding and does not compel the British government to act. But it is another move signalling the growing outcry among U.K. politicians over alleged human rights abuses in China.
The motion was moved by Conservative lawmaker Nus Ghani, one of five British lawmakers recently sanctioned by China for criticizing its treatment of the Uyghurs.
“There is a misunderstanding that genocide is just one act — mass killing. That is false,” she said, adding that all the criteria of genocide — an intention to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group — “are evidenced as taking place in Xinjiang.”
The U.S. government and the parliaments of Belgium, the Netherlands and Canada have accused Beijing of genocide, although Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been reluctant to use the term.
US troops in Afghanistan begin packing gear in pullout prep
KABUL, Afghanistan — The U.S. military has begun shipping equipment and winding down contracts with local service providers ahead of the May 1 start of the final phase of its military pullout from Afghanistan, a U.S. Defense Department official said Thursday.
The pullout under U.S. President Joe Biden marks the end of America’s longest war after a 20-year military engagement. Currently, some 2,500 U.S. soldiers and about 7,000 allied forces are still in Afghanistan.
In February last year, the U.S. military began closing its smaller bases. In mid-April, the Biden administration announced that the final phase of the withdrawal would begin May 1 and be completed before Sept. 11.
Since then, the military has been shipping equipment and winding down local contracts for services such as trash pickup and maintenance work, the U.S. official told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with briefing regulations.
While preparations are under way, troops likely won’t begin to depart for a few weeks, he said, adding that “we won’t see a coming down of the (troop) numbers” until remaining bases close.
Stocks end lower after report on Biden’s tax proposal
A report that President Biden will propose a hefty tax increase on the gains wealthy individuals reap from investments triggered a stock market sell-off Thursday afternoon that left indexes broadly lower.
Investors who earn $1 million or more would have to pay a 39.6% tax rate on any capital gains, nearly double the current rate for Americans in that income bracket, according to the report by Bloomberg. A separate surtax on investment income could boost the overall federal tax rate for wealthy investors as high as 43.3%, the report said, citing unnamed people familiar with the proposal.
The S&P 500 fell 0.9%, wiping out an early gain. The benchmark index gave up nearly all of its gain from the day before, leaving it on track for its first weekly loss in five weeks.
The selling was widespread, with every sector in the S&P 500 closing lower. Technology stocks, banks and companies that rely on consumer spending, accounted for much of the skid. Treasury yields held mostly steady.
“The things that the market is going to react to are the unknowns,” said Andrew Mies, chief investment officer of 6Meridian. “The knowns are the economy is good and improving, earnings are good and vaccinations are going pretty well in the United States. The things the market doesn’t know are tax policy, both at the corporate and individual level, and what the Fed is going to do in the next 12 to 18 months.”
Gold-medal project: Judo seeks solutions in police training
DOUGLAS, Wyo. — The stakes were clear to the two dozen police officers who gathered for a workshop with an ambitious and increasingly urgent mission — recalibrating the way police interact with the public in America.
The class took place the same week as jury selection for the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis officer who was convicted Tuesday of second-degree unintentional murder, third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter in the death of George Floyd.
No one attending the conference would deny that the profession failed the day Floyd died with Chauvin’s knee on his neck. They came to the classes with the idea that judo, the martial art with a deep global history and an imprint at the Olympics, but still shallow roots in the United States, might be able to help fix it.
“The social contract between police officers and the public is degrading a bit,” said Joe Yungwirth, a trainer at the workshop who built his career doing counterterrorism work for the FBI and now runs a judo academy in North Carolina. “All law-enforcement officers I know, we feel we need to bring that back in line somehow.”
That’s been a common refrain over a year’s worth of police shootings and protests, all of which have been underscored by calls for police reform.
