Miracle 520, June 5, 2020

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Volume 20 Issue 520- Shawwal 14, 1441H, June 5, 2020

BC, CANADA First Muslim Biweekly & Bilingual

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3 DG ISPR warns

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8 Surrey-Jamea Masjid

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Nearly 60,000 students return on first

Fundraising Night

B.C. students won’t return

likely

India of ‘uncontrol Taliban shadow government prepares Canada’s ‘inevitable’ second wave

All four former officers involved in George Floyd’s killing now face charges

DG ISPR Pakistan warns India of ‘ uncontrollable’ consequences in case of military adventurism

At Pg 4, 17

At Pg 3

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Is the pandemic an ‘act of God’?

No difference between racism in How Saudi Arabia and Iran became riv.

Justin Trudeau Explained His Silent Moment But Still Didn’t Mention Trump At Pg 11

BC's Masajids and Centers Opening under Covid-19 Protocols

At Pg 10

Please contact your local Masajids and Centres for Five-time Prayers and Jumma Sallah Procedures.

Coronavirus Cases:

Deaths:

Recovered:

3,261,276

6,714,335

393,408

Coronavirus Cases:

Deaths:

Recovered:

Coronavirus Cases:

Deaths:

Recovered:

93,726 2,632

7,637 166

51,739 2,665

Last updated: June 5, 2020,07:53 GMT

www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/?

CANADA Last updated: June 5, 2020, 07:53 GMT

BC;CANADA Last updated: June 5, 2020, 07:53 GMT

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

o p i n i o n

American backlash

ACK in the 1940s, an American blues singer by the name of Big Bill Broonzy came up with a song that initially no recording label wished to release.

This is how it begins: “This little song that I’m singin’ about/ People you know it’s true./ If you’re black and gotta work for a living/ This is what they will say to you.” It then goes straight to the chorus: “They says, ‘If you was white, you’d be all right/ If you was brown, stick around,/ But as you’s black, oh brother, get back, get back, get back’.”

Much has changed since then, but too much hasn’t.

Some 20 years later, at the cusp of the 1960s, author James Baldwin concluded an extended essay in The New Yorker thus: “If we — and now I mean the relatively conscious whites and the relatively conscious blacks, who must, like lovers, insist on, or create, the consciousness of the others — do not falter in our duty now, we may be able, handful that we are, to end the racial nightmare, and achieve our country, and change the history of the world. If we do not now dare everything, the fulfilment of that prophecy, recreated from the Bible in song by a slave, is upon us: God gave Noah the rainbow sign, No more water, the fire next time!”

“The fires burning across the US undermine its claim to be a model democracy.”

A great deal happened in that decade. There was the March on Washington, where Martin Luther King articulated his dream of the day when “justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream”.

This was followed by the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, key pieces of legislation that were deemed to have changed the course of American history.

Technically, perhaps they did. But just as the period of reconstruction that followed the American civil war of the 1860s ended all too soon in tears and renewed discrimination against exslaves, the practical consequences of the legal changes 100 years later fell far short of black aspirations. America erupted in violence in 1965 and 1967, and most notably in 1968, following the assassination of Dr King exactly a year after the day he had called out his nation’s government as “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today”.

“These cities are burning now/ All over the USA,” Jimmy Collier and the Reverend Frederick Douglas Kirkpatrick sang that year. “You know if the white folks don’t settle up soon/ We all goin’ to wake up to Judgement

Day.” Just a few years later, Bob Dylan described the status quo in these words: “If you’re black you might as well not show up on the street/ Unless you wanna draw the heat.”

Dylan was born and brought up in Minnesota, and briefly attended university in Minneapolis, the city where George Floyd was publicly lynched last week. That’s where police officer Derek Chauvin brought his knee down on Floyd’s neck, and kept it there for eight minutes and 46 seconds, three minutes longer than it took Floyd to die.

“That’s not a chip on my shoulder, that’s your foot on my neck,” a currently popular meme cites Malcolm X as saying. That is by no means the only echo from those times that continues to ring true. In 1970, Baldwin wrote to the incarcerated Angela Davis: “We know that we, the blacks, and not only we, the blacks, have been, and are, the victims of a system whose only fuel is greed, whose only god is profit. We know that the fruits of this system have been ignorance, despair, and death, and we know that the system is doomed because the world can no longer afford it….”

He was wrong, as he probably would have admitted if he had lived this long, about “the world can no longer af-

ford it” bit, but in the past few days we have seen reminders of how the system may be doomed. Not that Donald Trump and his allies, nor for that the leading Democrats, will acknowledge as much.

Even Trump and his acolytes were obliged to acknowledge, more or less, that Floyd’s murder was an atrocity. Not surprisingly, though, they have little to say about the fact that it took several days for the Minnesota authorities to charge Chauvin with murder — third degree, mind you — and the three colleagues who facilitated the crime had not been apprehended at the time of writing, and rioting.

Far too often, policemen are not charged for such egregious violations of human rights, or get off lightly, if not scot-free. And the authorities are invariably more outraged by the backlash, peaceful or violent, than by the unpunished crime.

The fires burning in towns and cities right across the US starkly illuminate the absurdity of its claim to be a model democracy. The multicoloured backlash is beautiful to behold, yet it may just lead to another uncomfortable calm before the next inevitable storm.

Courtesy By: American backlash

Waan laysa lil insaniilla ma’ sa’aa That man can have nothing but what he strives for.

‘EID’- Divine ceremonial Celebration of Testimony of success’.

By:Gulshan Aalani SubhanAllah, we did it, finished the month’s fasting, passed the exam with flying colors and qualified to receive the ‘Crown’ of Testimony of success in obeying Creator’s commandments. Obviously with HIS Hidden Help made it much easier and miraculously the month flew at the speed of the ‘Light’.

‘EID’ celebration isn’t just a getting together with families and friends but is in fact the day of the ceremony of a ‘Crown’ presentation of a successful achievement of Believers proving the faithful obedient servants of Allah-Creator, qualified to get the ‘Divine Crown’ on the head.

Celebration of EID-Ul Fitr is the testimony of a Believer proving faithfulness to their Lord Creator of the Universe by following HIS order and commandments of fasting in the Holy month of Ramadaan, which is successfully finished with most satisfaction of controlling oneself from all the illegal/ Harram actions, most of all controlling the desires of munching delicious food in front of you.

The wonderful Holistic Eid celebration by true Muslims fasting as

ordained by the Divine Power and taught by the Universal Messenger Muhammad SAWS, brings the most satisfaction of being successful and being with the family and friends.

Although, difficult for some of the converts to Islam rejected by their families, but gained the love and care of fasting faithful Muslim community obedient servants of Allah with whom they have divine commonality.

So the painful regrets of loosing family but the happiness of gaining the Divine truth and it’s ‘Shade’ of protection proven to be most satisfactory. Who can deny such truth.

What could be better than joining the chosen ones, millions of Muslims all over the world the obedient servants of Creator, welcoming Ramadaan and fasting with a smile, especially this is the first time the whole family stayed together at home relaxed and took the virus as blessings in disguise to be with the family and resting while fasting. In fact working Muslims should officially get time off from work while fasting in the Sacred Blessed month of Ramadaan.

Such Divine practices reflects the true concept of religion that is ‘Divine

Scriptural’ religion, and not like paganism, polytheism, man-made cults.

The true Scriptural religions has the commandments of Creator brought by HIS Prophets, whose names are mentioned in the Quran.

Fasting is the treatment for physical and spiritual transformation, changing the health problems and teaching to keep away from unethical immoral actions. It is the medicinal treatment for the Mind, body and Soul.

Learning to take care of the body as HIS signature is on human body that needs to keep clean by eating clean halal food and of course actions of clean ethical and moral values.

The rules of Halal and Harram food and other actions in daily life are given by the Divine authority, and so every human being should follow it to keep the evil spirits away that comes through calamities of deadly diseases and Viruses, most dangerous and destructive to human lives.

Salvation is in HIS obedience and to give Oath of allegiance to HIM only, as only HIS baptism is legal, which keeps mankind under the shade of Allah-Creator and HIS officersAngels, our protectors, whose services are free open 24H. a day. No

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Contents

waiting time as ordained by human gods to contact them at certain times only, who also charges fees for every prayers and for forgiveness of sins.

By following false gods and their worship is like building the wall against the Creator, that leads to the wickedness and violation of HIS law that eventually makes the wall crumbles down and the day of Judgement starts in the Court.

EID Mubarak/HuBeRasul.

Editorial Pak. News Int. News Faith Local New

Middle East

Kashmir Crime Politics Health Women Word Cri BCMA Pakistan Corona Urdu

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

PAKISTAN

Red zone files: The next 13 weeks

The worst is yet to come. In the last week or so, Covid-19 seems to have exploded in Pakistan.

The pandemic has finally started to live up to its name as it permeates homes, timelines and dashboards with a menace that grows by the day.The crisis is now actually looking like one.

But under the overhang of this public health crisis lie sheltered a number of smaller crises that are ballooning in size as the spread of the virus picks up pace. The foremost among these, possibly, is the government’s handling of Covid-19.

It has been over 13 weeks since the first Pakistani citizen was diagnosed with the virus. In this relatively short period, PTI government’s policy has seen some successes like the formation of the NCOC, and some failures like the confusion and contradictory public messaging. In all, the policy has combined in itself a potent mix of dynamism and denial. These two contradictions worked fine — in a twisted way — till such time the virus remained an abstract notion that was seen as affecting some people far away from us.

Now, suddenly, the government is faced with a fresh set of challenges.

The first real challenge is to recognise the challenge itself. In a recent briefing at the NCOC premises, Minister for Planning Asad Umar was on the mark when he said the world had moved beyond the lockdown debate and it was time we did the same. He was also correct in saying that the numbers of the day have not come as a surprise to the government. Other senior officials within the Red Zone argue that Prime Minister Im-

ran Khan had been consistently saying the infection would spread in the coming weeks and people should follow all SOPs. The challenge for the government in the first 13 weeks was then to make a success of its anti-lockdown policy. The crux of the official approach was to frame Covid-19 not just as a public health issue but as a health/ economic issue. This framing provided strategic direction to all aspects of policy, which was then parroted by party personnel with varying shades persuasive sobriety.

Thirteen weeks later, Pakistan’s infection count is hitting global lists. Line and bar graphs are spiking and threatening to go off the charts while most citizens now personally know the Pakistanis who are infected with Covid-19. This when the worst is still ahead of us. As per official projections, the number of citizens infected with Covid-19

by June 15 would be between 110,000 and 125,000. The death count on this date is projected between 2,750 and 3,250. Hidden within these numbers is the post-thirteen weeks challenge. Source:: dawn.com

Director General of Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Maj Gen Babar Iftikhar on Wednesday said that any military adventurism by India will be met with “uncontrollable and unintended consequences”, cautioning the neighbouring nation to “not play with fire”. Iftikhar expressed these views while speaking to Geo News’ Hamid Mir on the programme Capital Talk.

He began his interview by giving a rundown of the situation along the Line of Control (LoC). “This year alone, 1,229 ceasefire violations have taken place, seven civilians have been martyred and more than 90 have been injured. “Many times, their [India’s] quadcopters have intruded on our side [of the LoC] and in the past we have downed some of them, and it has been covered in the media.

“Despite this, senior Indian military leadership talks about alleged intrusion from different launchpads, which I think leaves a question-mark on their capabilities — despite such a well-guarded LoC and counterinfiltration measures, how can someone infiltrate one of the most militarised zones in the world?”

He went on to say that the artillery deployed by the Indian military during the past few days was in civilian populations so that, in case of counter-bombardment, it would target Kashmiris living in the occupied valley.

“The Pakistan Army is responding [to Indian aggression] in the same area, and with the same calibre along the LoC. But we are

ing an orbit to adjust his high altitude for approach, which he did not accept,” it added.

Quoting the approach controller, the letter read: “When aircraft was 7NM final from touchdown RWY [runway] 25L passing 5,200 feet, it was relatively high as per the standard approach profile. I instructed pilot twice to discontinue approach and turn left heading 180 [degree] which he did not comply and continued to proceed towards RWY 25L with his own discretion to establish ILS approach.

I again warned aircraft at 05NM from touchdown which was passing 3,500 feet. At 04NM aircraft was observed approaching 1,300 feet with ground speed of 250 knots. Aircraft was observed passing runway threshold at ground speed of 210 knots.”

The CAA said the plane lifted up from the runway and crashed over Model Colony while attempting a second approach for runway 25-L. Approach tower deals with the aircraft from the start of descend till it is five nautical miles and then hands over to local tower (Karachi tower in this case) after the final landing approach has been established.

The local tower visually looks at the aircraft for landing gears, etc, and directs the landing. Once on the ground, the pilot is handed over to ground control, which then guides the pilot to parking.

A question, however, arises as to why the approach tower did not transfer the aircraft to Karachi tower, which could have physically seen if the landing gears were down or not when the pilot came in for first landing.

Source:: dawn.com

ISLAMABAD: With the coronavirus situation worsening day by day, Pakistan conducted the highest number of 20,167 Covid-19 tests in a day as the authorities launched an operation against violators of SOPs (standard operating procedures) in various parts of the country on Thursday.

According to the data released by the National Command and Control Centre (NCOC) on Thursday, Pakistan conducted 20,167 coronavirus tests on June 3, the highest-ever number in a single day. A total of over 610,000 Covid-19 tests have so far been conducted in the country.

Pakistan, which has already surpassed China in terms of the number of Covid-19 affected persons, witnessed nearly 2,900 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, taking the total tally to 86,139.

As many as 64 people lost their lives due to the pandemic in the last 24 hours, taking the death toll to 1,793.

Minister for Planning and Development Asad Umar had last month expressed the view that the capacity of 30,000 tests per day would be sufficient for Pakistan to control the spread of the deadly virus.

PM’s aide acknowledges number of per day cases rapidly increased in last few days “Currently, we are in a position to hold over 25,000 tests per day and with every passing day our capacity to conduct tests is increasing,” Mr Umar had stated, expressing the hope that they would be able to hold 30,000 tests per day by the start of June. He was of the view that 30,000 daily tests would be a sizeable number to ascertain the pace of spread and formulate future strategy accordingly. When contacted, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) on Health Dr Zafar Mirza acknowledged that the number of per day cases had rapidly increased during the last few days.

“However, it is also a fact that Pakistan is a large country with a huge population. We are the sixth most populous country with 25 per cent population is under absolute poverty. Therefore, human interaction and

Crashed plane’s pilot didn’t follow ATC instructions: CAA

KARACHI/RAWALPINDI: While the French air safety organisation announced on Wednes­day that the data of the ill-fated PK-8303 black box was successfully downloaded and being analysed, the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) said in a letter to the Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) that the pilot of the crashed aircraft did not follow the instructions of the air-traffic controller (ATC).

On May 22, a PIA A320 plane, from Lahore to Karachi, crashed in a densely populated area near Karachi airport, killing 97 of the 99 passengers and crewmembers on board. A teenage girl on ground also died later.

The Sindh health department said in a tweet on Wednesday that 91 of the 97 bodies of plane crash victims had been identified and handed over to their families.

The June 2 letter from CAA official Iftikhar Ahmed to the PIA safety and quality assurance department, while pointing out “non-compliance of ATC instructions” by PK-8303, asked him to “ensure avoidance of recurrence of such situation in the interest of flight safety”.

A PIA spokesperson told Dawn that the national flag carrier would respond as per regulations. Taking strong exception, the Pakistan Airlines Pilots Association (Palpa) said on Wednesday that release of limited details about the crash was tantamount to influencing the ongoing investigation.

The CAA letter said the duty approach controller had raised a non-compliance report in respect of the pilot of PK-8303. It claimed that the pilot was warned twice about his speed and high altitude for approach but he did not follow.

It said that PK-8303 was cleared to an altitude of 3,000 feet while entering the control zone that is 25 nautical miles (NM), but the aircraft was spotted at a high altitude of over 5,000 feet over Makli.

“The same was communicated to the pilot who reported comfortable for descent. Later, at 10NM pilot was again cautioned by offer-

DG ISPR warns India of ‘uncontrollable’ consequences in case of military adventurism

always trying not to harm civilians living on the other side.“The people of occupied Kashmir are becoming targets of Indian aggression. Women and children are also included in them. Indian security forces have also not spared innocent seven year olds.”

Commenting on the International Day for Innocent Children Victims of Aggression — which will be celebrated tomorrow (June 4) — DG Iftikhar said: “Looking at this through this lens, thousands of children and young people are becoming targets of Indian pellet guns in occupied Kashmir.”

He said that Indian security forces, in an effort to squash dissent, were killing young Kashmiris and not handing over the dead bodies to the families.“They have also levelled strange allegations against Pakistan. It started with, them saying that corona-infected terrorists were sent via the LoC and that is how the virus spread in occupied Kashmir.”

He maintained that all of these actions were indicative of a “stage being set” for the next few months for adventurism with Pakistan.

Source:: dawn.com

Highest number of Covid-19 tests in single day

proximity of living together are also very high,” the SAPM explained while highlighting the cause of the sudden rise in Covid-19 cases. He gave the example of Brazil and Mexico where, according to him, the conditions are the same as in Pakistan.

Dr Mirza expressed the hope that considering the trends in other countries, Pakistan’s graph would also straighten in the coming weeks or by the end of the current month. “It is observed that after such spikes, the number of daily cases starts reducing,” he said.

SOPs violations The authorities started taking action against those violating the SOPs at public places in various parts of the country on the recommendations of the NCOC. On Thursday, the relevant authorities imposed 727 lockdowns across the country.

According to the data released by the NCOC, 115 people were fined and 83 shops and 22 industrial units were sealed in Islamabad over violations of SOPs. Besides, 42 public transporters were fined for violating the SOPs. In Gilgit-Baltistan, it says, 907 people were fined, 440 shops sealed and action was taken against 297 transporters. Moreover, 13 industrial units and four areas were sealed under the policy of ‘smart lockdown’.

In Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, as many as 9,449 persons were checked, of which 3,553 were fined. As many as 525 markets/shops, 37 industrial unites and 16 transport terminals were sealed in the province. Moreover, 82 public transport vehicles were fined for the SOPs violations.

Source:: dawn.com

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020 I

n t e r n at i o n a l N e w s

China accused of hiding All four former officers involved in data from WHO: George Floyd’s killing now face charges Beijingcoronavirus denies it stalled in providing informa-

By: Josh Campbell, Sara Sidner and Eric Levenson MINNEAPOLIS -- The former Minneapolis Police officer who pressed his knee into George Floyd’s neck was charged on Wednesday with a new, more serious count of second-degree murder, and the three other officers on scene during his killing were charged with aiding and abetting seconddegree murder.

“I strongly believe that these developments are in the interest of justice for Mr. Floyd, his family, our community and our state,” Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison said in announcing the charges.

The announcement came more than a week after Floyd was killed while in police custody in Minneapolis, sparking nationwide protests that call for the end to police violence against black citizens.

Derek Chauvin, who pressed his knee into Floyd’s neck for nearly nine minutes, had previously been charged with third-degree murder and second-degree manslaughter.

The new second-degree murder charge says that he killed Floyd “without intent” in the course of committing assault in the third degree, according to an amended complaint.

Thomas Lane and J. Alexander Kueng, who helped restrain Floyd, and Tou Thao, who stood near the others, were not initially charged. Lane, 37, Kueng, 26, and Thao, 34, are now charged with aiding and abetting second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree manslaughter.

Second-degree murder and aiding and abetting second-degree murder are punishable by up to 40 years in prison. Manslaughter and aiding and abetting manslaughter are punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

Two autopsies on Floyd determined that he died by homicide. Minneapolis Police Chief Medaria Arradondo fired the four officers and said they were “complicit” in Floyd’s death, and Floyd’s family and protesters nationwide have called for them to be arrested and convicted for the killing.

According to the video and the criminal complaint, Chauvin kept his knee on Floyd’s neck as Floyd pleaded that he could not breathe, as witnesses protested that he was dying, and even as Lane twice asked to turn him onto his side. Still, Chauvin kept his knee in position for almost three minutes after Floyd became unresponsive, the complaint states. Photos C. By: google.com/ search?q=George+Floyd’s+killed Source: ctvnews.ca/world/all-four

tion to UN body while new study shows hydroxychloroquine not effective.

At least two US senators have accused China of hiding data from the World Health Organization that could have altered the course of the coronavirus outbreak, even as a Chinese official denied delays in sharing information and said the government acted openly and transparently.

The malaria drug, hydroxychloroquine which President Donald Trump took to try to prevent COVID-19, proved ineffective for that purpose in the first large, high-quality study to test it in people in close contact with someone with the disease, according to a study published by the New England Journal of Medicine.

Spanish legislators have voted to extend the state of emergency a final time through to June 21. It is the sixth time the measure has been renewed, meaning the restrictions will remain in force, although they have been eased since the start of the lockdown in mid-March. Around 6.4 million coronavirus cases have been confirmed around the world, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. More than 383,000 people have died, including some 107,000 in the US. More than 2.7 million have recovered from the disease.

Thursday, June 400:05 GMT - Report raises coronavirus concerns about China, WHO; Beijing denies At least two US senators said that China hid

data from the World Health Organization (WHO) that could have altered the course of the coronavirus outbreak, even as a Chinese official denied delays in sharing information and said the government acted openly and transparently.. They were referring to an Associated Press investigation published this week that found China stalled on providing critical coronavirus information to WHO, which expressed considerable frustration in private even as it praised the country in public. Politicians said the report raised key questions, and public health experts said it shed light on a story that has become highly politicised. At a press briefing on Wednesday, Zhao Lijian, a spokesman for China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, called the AP report “seriously inconsistent with the facts”.

He read off a timeline of events that did not contradict the AP’s findings and added that China had always maintained “close and good communication and cooperation with WHO.” Source: aljazeera.com

for the Middle East peace process, Nickolay Mladenov, also condemned the killing, calling it a “tragedy that should and could have been avoided”.

“The authorities should swiftly investigate and make sure such incidents are not allowed to happen,” Mladenov said. olice inquiry into the shooting.

“The news of Israeli authorities ordering an investigation into Iyad’s murder means nothing to us,” he told Al Jazeera, speaking from the occupied East Jerusalem neighbourhood of Wadi al-Joz. “We know they’ll twist the facts and we won’t be surprised if they concluded that the officers fired at him out of ‘self-defence’.”

Israeli investigations into the killing of Palestinian civilians are rarely credible, he added. According to Israeli rights group B’Tselem, over the last decade - April 2011 until May 2020 - Israeli security forces have killed 3,408 Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories and within Israel.

Of these cases, only five Israeli security personnel - which includes both military and police - were convicted.

“We don’t have the number of investigations opened into police killings,” B’Tselem media spokesperson Amit Gilutz told Al Jazeera. “But as far as military goes, over this same period investigations into the killings of about 200 Palestinians were opened.”

Source: aljazeera.com

UNITED NATIONS: The Taliban Leadership Council has established a range of commissions and bodies that replicate the offices and duties of a normal governmental organisation, says the latest UN report on the situation in Afgha­nistan.

The report, submitted recently to a UN Security Council committee, desc­ ribes this arrangement as the Taliban shadow government, which seems to have a central structure as well as provincial and local administrative bodies.

The report also notes that the “Taliban are assessed to have close connections with Al Qaeda” and the group’s central leadership may face resistance from the lower ranks if it tries to uproot it, as promised in the US-Taliban agreement sign­ed in February this year.

The monitoring team, which prepared the report with the help of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan and Afghan government Interlocutors, notes that the Taliban leaders have steered the movement through negotiations with the United States to conclude an agreement.

“The process has increased their political leverage” and throughout this process, “the Taliban have managed to stay unified, despite internal divergences of view,” the team adds.

The monitors maintain that “the great majority of Taliban” will follow orders from their leadership relating to the recently signed agreement with the United States, “whatever those orders or directives may be.”

The monitors believe that the Taliban leaders proved capable of maintaining the discipline of their fighters during the reduction in violence period and are likely to maintain the same discipline during any ramping-up of fighting in 2020, while seeking to gain political leverage.

According to the report, The Taliban have reshuffled their shadow government structure over the winter in preparation for the 2020 summer, which is also the fighting season. Taliban members gathered in February to discuss the reorganisation of the shadow governance and military structure in the appointments in Bada­khshan, Baghlan, Balkh, Bamyan, Kabul, Kapisa, Kunduz, Samangan and Takhar Provinces.

Abdul Aziz Abbasin, a senior member of the Haqqani Network and brother of Taliban deputy Sirajuddin Haqqani, ordered increased supplies of ammunition and explosive materials for Taliban forces in Ghazni, Wardak, Paktiya and Parwan Provinces.

One notable appointment in mid-February was the transfer of Mullah Abdul Rehman, better known by his alias of Pir Agha, from his position as shadow governor for Nangarhar to the role of shadow governor for Zabul. Agha leads the Taliban’s rapid reaction forces, known as the red units. He had been appointed shadow governor for Nangarhar to deal with the threat posed by the militant Islamic State group in Iraq and the Levant-Khorasan (ISIL-K). Sou: dawn.com

Family of slain autistic Palestinian not optimistic over inquiry In the last 10 years Israeli security forces have killed more than 3,400 Palestinians but only five have been convicted.

The killing of an autistic Palestinian man by two Israeli police officers last week has prompted rare statements of condolence from both Israeli and international officials, but Palestinians have little faith an inquiry will result in any accountability.

Iyad Hallaq, 32, was walking to his special needs school in the Old City of Jerusalem, when he was called on by the Israeli officers to stop. In their official statement, the officers said they suspected Hallaq was carrying a weapon and began chasing him when he panicked and began to run. As Hallaq hid behind a dumpster, just a few metres away from his school, he was shot dead.

The Israeli police’s internal investigations department is probing the incident. According to Israeli daily Haaretz, a source within the investigation said one of the officers - a new recruit armed with an M16 assault rifle - is suspected of continuing to shoot at Hallaq despite being told by his commander to stop. The same officer said he suspected Hallaq was a “terrorist” because he was wearing gloves, Haaretz added.

Hallaq was diagnosed with low-functioning autism as a child and had trouble communicating with people. According to his father, Khairy Hallaq, his son had the mental capacity of an eight-year-old and no concept of the dangerous reality of life under occupation around him. Hallaq was given special documentation by his school, which he had attended for the past six years, that explained his disability so he could prove his condition to Israeli forces, as he was unable to do so himself. His family members told Israeli media he “wasn’t capable of harming anyone”. On Sunday, Israeli Minister of Defense Benny Gantz issued a rare apology.

“We are very sorry for this incident,” Gantz said in a government meeting. “I am sure the issue will be investigated quickly, and conclusions will be drawn.”

The same day, the UN special coordinator

Taliban shadow government prepares for takeover

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

f a i t h

The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said: “A person who does not show mercy to our young ones and respect to our old ones is not one of us.” Al-Tirmidhi

The beauty of Prayer in Islam

By: JINAN BASTAKI

G

OING deeper into our spiritual state during prayers (salah) requires that we have a presence of heart and are mindful of the words being said during the prayers.

Our prayer will feel shorter, yet when we look at how much time we actually spent, we will think, “Did I just spend 10 minutes?” or even 15 and 20 minutes.

A person who began applying this said he wished the prayer would never end.

A feeling that Ibn Al-Qayyim describes as “what the competitors compete for… it is nourishment for the soul and the delight of the eyes,” and he also said, “If this feeling leaves the heart, it is as though it is a body with no soul.”

The love of Allah Some people’s relationship with Allah is limited to following orders and leaving prohibitions, so that one does not enter hell. Of course, we must follow orders and leave prohibitions, but it needs to be done out of more than fear and hope; it should also be done out of love for Allah. Allah says in the Qur’an: “… Allah will bring forth [in place of them] a people He will love and who will love Him.” (Qur’an, 5:54) We often find that when a lover meets the beloved, hearts are stirred and there is warmth in that meeting. Yet when we meet Allah, there is not even an ounce of this same feeling. Allah says in the Qur’an: “And (yet) among the people are those who take other than Allah as equals (to Him). They love them as they (should) love Allah. But those who believe are stronger in love for Allah.”

(Qur’an, 2:165) And those who believe are stronger in love for Allah. There should be a feeling of longing, and when we raise our hands to start the prayer, warmth and love should fill our hearts because we are now meeting with Allah. A dua of the Prophet (peace be upon him): “O Allah, I ask You for the longing to meet You” (An-Nisa’i, Al-Hakim) Ibn Al-Qayyim says in his book Tareeq Al-

Hijratain that Allah loves His Messengers and His believing servants, and they love Him and nothing is more beloved to them than Him. The love of one’s parents has a certain type of sweetness, as does the love of one’s children, but the love of Allah far supersedes any of that. The Prophet, peace be upon him, said: “Any person who combines these three qualities will experience the sweetness of faith: 1) that God and His messenger are dearer to him than anything else; 2) that his love of others is purely for God’s sake; and 3) that he hates to relapse into disbelief as much as he hates to be thrown in the fire.” (Bukhari) Thus, the first thing he mentioned was: “… that God and His messenger are more beloved to him than anything else…”

Ibn Al-Qayyim says: “Since ‘there is nothing like unto Him’ (Qur’an, 42:11), there is nothing like experiencing love for Him.” If you feel this love for Him, it will be a feeling so intense, so sweet, that you would wish the prayer would never ever end.

Do you truly want to feel this love? Then ask yourself: ‘why do you or should you love Allah?’

Know that you love people for one (or all, in varying degrees) of three reasons: For their beauty, because of their exalted character or/and because they have done good to you.

And know that Allah combines all of these

three to the utmost degree.

All-embracing beauty We’ve all been touched by beauty. It is almost fitrah (natural disposition) to love what is beautiful. Ali ibn Abi Talib, may Allah be pleased with him, said about the Prophet, peace be upon him, that it was “as if the sun is shining from his face.” Jabir (may God be pleased with him) said: “The Messenger of Allah was more handsome, beautiful, and radiant than the full moon” (Tirmidhi) Allah made all His Prophets have a certain beauty so that people would have a natural inclination toward them.

And beauty is more than what is in the face, because beauty is in all of creation and somehow has the ability to take our breath away and give us peace simultaneously. The glimmer of the crescent moon on a calm night, the intensity of a waterfall as the water drops for thousands of feet, the sunset by the sea … certain scenes of natural unspoiled beauty stirs something in us. As Allah is the One Who made it beautiful, so what of Allah’s beauty?

Ibn Al-Qayyim said: “And it is enough to realize Allah’s Beauty when we know that every internal and external beauty in this life and the next are created by Him, so what of the beauty of their Creator?”

This fitrah for loving what is beautiful is because Allah is beautiful. One of His Names

is Al-Jameel (the Most Beautiful). Ibn AlQayyim states that the beauty of Allah is something that a person cannot imagine and only He knows it. There is nothing of it in creation save for glimpses.

Ibn Al-Qayyim says if all of creation were the most beautiful they could be (so let’s imagine, ever single human being looked as beautiful as Yusuf, peace be upon him, and the whole world was like Paradise), and all of them combined from the beginning of time until the Day of Judgment, they would not even be like a ray in comparison to the sun when compared to Allah. Allah’s beauty is so intense that we will not even be able to take it in this life. In the Qur’an, Allah describes Musa’s (peace be upon him) request: “And when Moses arrived at Our appointed time and his Lord spoke to him, he said, ‘My Lord, show me (Yourself) that I may look at You.’ (Allah) said: ‘You will not see Me but look at the mountain; if it should remain in place, then you will see Me.’ But when his Lord appeared to the mountain He rendered it level, and Moses fell unconscious.” (Qur’an, 7:143) Even the mountain could not bear the beauty of Allah and crumbled, and when Musa, peace be upon him, saw this (he did not even see Allah), he fell unconscious. This is why on the Day of Judgment it is Allah’s light that will shine on everything. We talk about breathtaking beauty, but we have yet to experience Allah’s beauty. While things in this world can be beautiful or majestic or if they combine both they are finite, true majesty and beauty are for Allah: “And there will remain the Face of your Lord, Owner of Majesty and Honor.” (Qur’an, 55:27) Keeping all of this in mind, the Prophet, peace be upon him, said: “Allah directs His Face toward the face of His servant who is praying, as long as he does not turn away” (Tirmidhi).

Remember this in your prayer, and ask Allah to allow you the joy of seeing Him in Paradise.

Source:arabnews.com

Is the pandemic an ‘act of God’? Legally, it depends

Prayer Schedule in Greater Vancouver June 5 - 19, 2020 Shawaal14-28 ,1441H Isl. Dt. Day Date Fajar

By: Graham Slaughter

CTVNews.ca Writer: June 3, 2020

TORONTO -- In the summer of 1861, a British event organizer rented out a music hall in Surrey, England with grand plans to throw a series of concerts. Unfortunately for him, before the first concert could take place, a fire ripped through the music hall and burned it to the ground.

While the blaze happened 159 years ago on the other side of the Atlantic, the legal implications are still present in Canada — particularly as the COVID-19 pandemic forces large events to be cancelled.

A judge determined that the contract be-

tween the event organizer and the owner of the burned-out music hall was to be excused because, without a usable venue, the contract could not be fulfilled.

The 19th-century case set the groundwork for what are known today as force majeure clauses. These clauses are often written into contracts to detail what sort of unexpected events, sometimes referred to as “acts of God,” could make it impossible for an agreement to be upheld. When successfully invoked, a force majeure clause can relieve a party from their contractual obligations or trigger a change within the contract.

To be Continued at page 21

Sunr

Zawal Dhuhr DhuhrAsarAsar Shafi Maghrib

Isha

14 Fri 15 Sat 16 Sun 17 Mon 18 Tue 19 Wed 20 Thus 21 Fri 22 Sat 23 Sun 24 Mon 25 Tue 26 Wed 27 Thus 28 Fri For such Prayers are enjoined on believers at stated times: Quran ,n 4:103 Source: BCMA

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

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&

I n t

Tam warns of ‘explosive’ second COV- Decline in travel to Canada holds, ID-19 wave if reopening mishandled border agency says’ OTTAWA -- Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam has issued a clear warning that Canada could see “explosive growth” in new cases if reopening is not done with caution, as the latest federal COVID-19 modelling projects that there will be more than 100,000 confirmed cases in Canada, and up to 9,400 deaths by June 15.

“These models all tell us that if we relax too much, or too soon, the epidemic will most likely rebound with explosive growth as a distinct possibility,” Tam said on Thursday, imploring all public health offices and levels of government to keep a close eye on what’s happening over the coming weeks to avoid being in another wave of infections in the fall.

According to new short-term federal modelling released by Health Canada, as of June 15 —more than three months since COVID-19 was declared a pandemic— the country could see between 97,990 and 107,454 cases, and between 7,700 and 9,400 deaths.

As of 11:15 a.m. ET, based on CTV News’ figures, there were 93,700 confirmed cases, of which 34,620 were still considered active.

Across Canada 7,635 people have died to date.

Broadly speaking, the rise in infections has slowed across all age groups and in most regions of the country, however as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau cautioned in his address ahead of the new data’s release: “the pandemic is still threatening the health and safety of Canadians.”

Setting up the new figures, Trudeau said the situation remains “serious” in some regions where large numbers of new cases are still being reported, as well as in places like longterm care homes across Canada.

As well, over the past 14 days, Quebec and Ontario have accounted for more than 90 per cent of the national case count.

The updated national projections on the severity and scope of COVID-19 in Canada show that 82 per cent of all COVID-19

deaths are linked to seniors’ homes, and that outbreaks in other congregate living and work settings are also driving case counts, such as those in meat packing plants, shelters, and correctional facilities.

Health Canada data shows that more than 8,700 people have been hospitalized, and of those more than 1,700 have been admitted to an intensive care unit over the course of the disease’s spread across Canada. Approximately 94 per cent of deaths have occurred in people over the age of 60.

COULD SEE ‘EXPLOSIVE’ SECOND SPIKE Tam said that even though progress is being made in fighting the novel coronavirus, until an effective vaccine or treatment is available, an ongoing effort is going to be required or Canada could see an “explosive” second spike. Federal modelling showed that if population-based measures are loosened – allowing larger gathering sizes, permitting students to go back to school, and allowing businesses to reopen without accompanying public health measures, for example -- it “will likely cause the epidemic to rebound.”

The figures showed that if the spread prevention measures are insufficient, Canada could have another peak come October.

“While we start loosening some restrictions, we also have to strengthen other measures…

Source: ctvnews.ca

India, Australia strengthen defence ties as China tensions loom India and Australia strengthened defence ties on Thursday, including sealing a pact to boost military logistics support and maritime cooperation, as both nations experience heightened tensions with regional superpower China.

In a virtual summit held online as the coronavirus pandemic restricts international travel, the two leaders signed a Mutual Logistics Support Arrangement as they hailed an upgrade of their strategic partnership.

“India is committed to further intensifying comprehensive relations with Australia,” India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi said in opening remarks. “This is important not only for our two nations, but is also needed for the Indo-Pacific region as well as for the world.”

His Australian counterpart Scott Morrison added that “in a time like this, we want to deal very much with friends and trusted partners”.

The foreign and defence ministers will now meet at least biannually to discuss strategic issues, the two nations said in a joint statement. Other agreements on education, mining, and defence science and technology were also inked during the summit, which took place after two earlier scheduled visits by Morrison to India were postponed because of the Australian bushfires and the pandemic.

Canberra has been at loggerheads with Beijing after Chinese anger over Australia’s push to probe the origins of the coronavirus.

Tensions have flared in recent weeks be-

tween India and China over their 3,500-kilometre frontier which has never been properly demarcated, with both sides said to have moved in hundreds of extra troops.

A senior Indian foreign ministry official told reporters in a media briefing later on Thursday that “there was no discussion on China” in the summit.

But analysts said Beijing’s increasing assertiveness in the region, as well as ongoing US-China tensions, was pushing India and Australia closer together to mitigate some of that risk.

“I didn’t expect these two would mention the ‘C’ word, China, but it was very much at the back of their minds,” Asian Studies Adjunct Professor, Purnendra Jain, of the University of Adelaide, told AFP. “Both the prime ministers are very much aware that these are turbulent times, and to deal with these times, we need to do something together. This is about coronavirus and free trade, but this is also very much about dealing with China.”

Source: dawn.com/

TORONTO -- With the Canada-U.S. border closure still in effect and fewer available flights, the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) says there continues to be a significant drop in travellers arriving in Canada from the same time the year before.

New statistics released Thursday showed there was an 87 per cent decrease in land border crossings between May 25-31 when compared to the same period the year before.

From May 27- June 2, 2019, there were 1,076,529 travellers arriving in Canada at land border crossings. A year later, from May 25-31, there were only 137,786 arrivals by land.

The Canada-U.S. border was closed to all non-essential travel on March 21 in an effort to prevent further spread of the novel coronavirus between the two countries.

Interestingly, the CBSA noted there was a 22 per cent decrease in truck drivers entering Canada from May 25-31, despite the fact that no restrictions have been placed on commercial shipments and the agency hasn’t seen any indication of issues with supply chains for essential goods, including

food and medical supplies, coming to Canada. “CBSA is working with other federal partners to share information with commercial stakeholders to provide assurances that commercial traffic continues,” the CBSA said in a press release.

As for travellers flying to Canada from May 25-31, the CBSA said there was a 98 per cent drop from the year before with 762,620 travellers arriving that week in 2019 to just 16,939 a year later.

On May 31, alone, the agency said air travel from the U.S. was down 98 per cent from 55,683 to 965 and air travel from international destinations had dropped by more than 97 per cent from 64,243 to 2,037.

Flights to and from Canada have been considerably reduced in recent months as countries around the world closed their borders and restricted international travel in response to the pandemic.

The CBSA data for the week of May 25-31 is consistent with their earlier numbers, which have shown a steady decline in air and land travel to Canada in comparison to the same periods in 2019. Source: ctvnews.ca

‘This was racially motivated,’ says grandmother of Tofino woman shot and killed by N.B. police VICTORIA -- A young woman who was shot and killed by police in New Brunswick on Thursday has been identified by family members as 26-year-old Chantel Moore of the Tlaoquiaht First Nation near Tofino, B.C. Police in Edmundston, N.B., say they were asked to perform a wellness check on a woman at an apartment building around 2:30 a.m. Thursday. The department said in a statement that the responding officer was confronted by a woman, who was allegedly holding a knife and making threats.

The officer shot the woman. Despite resuscitation efforts, she died at the scene, according to police. Chantel Moore’s grandmother, Nora Martin, said the family is in mourning and disbelief over what happened.

“Chantel was very friendly, she was very outgoing,” said Martin. “She was well-loved by the family and had numerous friends.” She said as soon as she heard news of Moore’s death, she felt that race was a factor.

“When I first heard about it, that was my first thought: ‘This was racially motivated,’” said Martin. “We’ve been dealing with police brutality for a number of years,” she added.

“I know in my own family it’s been going on for a long time.” Martin said Moore moved to New Brunswick roughly two months ago to be closer to her five-year-old daughter who was living with a relative in Edmundston.

According to family members, Moore’s boyfriend first contacted police in Edmundston to check on Moore because she claimed she was being harassed.

“She just moved into her own place two days ago and I guess somebody in the neighbourhood or in the town had been following her or hanging around her place,” said Martin.

Martin said the police then visited Moore’s mother, who referred police to Moore’s new apartment. That was the last time that Moore’s mother heard from police before

they called to tell her that her daughter had died. According to Martin, police told family members that Moore had been shot five times after threatening a lone police officer with a knife. “My granddaughter, Chantel, is small, she’s slim, she’s small in stature and she couldn’t do that,” said Martin. “I don’t think she would do that and we don’t believe that she would attack anybody.”

Martin also questioned why police fired five shots, and why a Taser or other non-lethal method of subduing someone was not used.

She said that she hopes police will change how they approach confrontations to focus more on deescalating situations.

“Like is said she was small in stature, it’s very appalling to us.” Police say that an autopsy has been scheduled. Investigators have not released any additional information about the incident, including what sort of threats the woman allegedly made.“The Edmundston Police Force has requested the services of an independent agency to conduct a review of the incident to ensure police actions were appropriate and conform to policing standards,” said police in a statement. “As a matter of accountability and transparency for the independent review, the New Brunswick RCMP is providing investigative and forensic support.”....Source: ctvnews.ca

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Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

f a i t h

TAWWAF Maximizing Your Hajj Worship – Part 3

By: Dr. Shaikh Ramzan

‘One’ [singular], and ‘one’ is an odd number] and He loves odd numbers. “ (Sahih Muslim 2677a) It was narrated from Ibn ‘Abbas that the Prophet (SAW) said: “I have been commanded to prostrate on seven bones [points touching the ground].”

(Sunan Ibn Majah, 1/5/883, graded Sahih)

Concept 2: Why Anti-Clockwise Circumambulation at the Kâ’bah?

F

irst, let us say the obvious, that there must be one direction for a circumambulation ritual,[i] not a mixture of the two possibilities. Worshipping Allah and praising Him when all the Hajjis are moving in the same one direction is a reinforcement of their unity as a community. A community must do more than sit together to hear the weekly Khutbah or stand together in Salah; they must move together to accomplish the purposes of the Islamic Ummah. Their individual spiritual energies, intertwined together, contribute to a group spiritual camaraderie when they carry out any activity together. It is important for a functioning Islamic community to move forward together in one direction, united in their joint affairs.

Furthermore, when we travel together symbolically around the Ka’aba, we are travelling in the land travelled by all the prophets of Allah, from Adam to Muhammad (SAW).

The Ka’ba in Makkah is never free from circumambulators. But why the particular one direction and not another? Why an anticlockwise (counter-clockwise) movement around the Ka’bah —rather than a clockwise direction?

Scholars have discussed the question of why the direction of Tawwaf would be fixed as anti-clockwise. Here are the kinds of things typically mentioned: Generally: In keeping with the natural order of our universe, when we circle the Ka’aba in an anti-clockwise direction we are circumambulating it on the same pattern of movement built into the universe as a whole and into all the creations of Allah, from the tiniest particles to the largest galaxies…

Specifically: The electrons of an atom orbit around their nuclei in the same manner as done in performing Tawwaf, in an anti-clockwise direction. Likewise the moon orbits the earth in an anti-clockwise direction. The earth rotates on its own axis in an anti-clockwise direction. The planets of the solar system orbit around the sun in an anticlockwise direction. The sun, along with its whole solar system, orbit in the galaxy in an anti-clockwise direction. All the galaxies orbit in space in an anti-clockwise direction.

The Coriolis Effect:[ii] Another anti-clockwise motion we can notice on earth is that when water goes down a drain, it will circle in an anti-clockwise direction when seen from above. The direction of ocean currents, trade winds and hurricanes follow the same pattern, with the northern hemisphere of the earth being a mirror image of the southern hemisphere.[iii] Of course, a Hajji is not required to know the hidden secrets of anti-clockwise circumambulation in Tawwaf in order to complete hisTawwaf properly, but no doubt most of us have wondered why anti-clockwise. Note that the term “Anti-Clockwise Direction” is to be understood as the direction when viewed from above. When we view hajjis from above them, their direction of movement is anti-clockwise. [We do NOT view them from under their feet or from inside the earth. That is, we do NOT observe them looking up from below, so to speak. Viewed from below, the hajjis would be seen as moving clockwise.]

Conversely, when we model the motion of the earth, sun, moon, planets, etc., we view their motion as if from above, as an outside observer looking down from the magnetic north pole of that heavenly body. This differs from our own experience on earth when we look up at the sky: From our position on earth [this time we ARE looking UP FROM BELOW as it were], we see the sun rise in the

Concept 4: Why perform Tawwaf as many times as one is able?

east and set in the west. That earth-bound human experience is consistent with the earth’s daily revolution on its north-south axis in an anti-clockwise direction when observed as it were from its North Pole.

When we see the sun “rising” from our east and “setting” in our west, it is actually the earth which is revolving on its axis [west to east /anti-clockwise, as seen from above] relative to the sun —and not the other way around. Another way to explain this is to say that the “apparent path of the sun” [which we see looking up], or the opening and closing of daylight, which we witness daily, proceeds east to west [clockwise] across the face of the earth. This clockwise direction of movement seen by humans looking up from the surface of the earth [from their viewpoint as if from the magnetic South Pole] is the opposite of what an astronaut would see from his viewpoint in space [as if from the magnetic North Pole] looking down from above.

Concept 3: Why Seven Circumambulations in Tawwaf?

The explanation given by some scholars above for the anti-clockwise direction of Tawwaf is similarly adopted for the number seven: that there must be something “natural” about it, something woven into the fabric of the universe. Can we discover what is relevant to the number seven?

The Quran speaks of seven heavens and refers to seven known planets: He it is who has created for you all that is on earth, and has applied His design to the heavens and fashioned them into seven heavens; and He alone has full knowledge of everything. [Surat Al-Baqarah 2:29] The seven heavens and the earth and those that are therein extol His glory; and there is not a thing but glorifies Him with His praise; but you understand not their glorification.

[Surat Al-Isrâ’, 17:45].

And, indeed, We have created above you seven [celestial] orbits, … [Surat Al-Mu’minîn, 23:17] Seven days to a week is mentioned in the Hadith: Abu Huraira reported that the Messenger of Allah (SWT) said: It is the right of Allah upon every Muslim that he should take a bath (at least) on one day (Friday) during the seven days (of the week) and he should wash his head and body. (Sahih Muslim 849) Seven is a number found often in the hadith, but so are other numbers. While seven days is commonly the prescribed duration of a medication, both ancient and modern,[iv] nevertheless, one hadith mentions a succession of odd numbers for cure. Seven is only one of those odd numbers: Thawban narrated that the Prophet (S.A.W) said: “When one of you suffers from fever – and indeed fever is a piece of the Fire – let him extinguish it with water. Let him stand in a flowing river facing the direction of it

and say: Allahummasahfi ‘abdaka wa saddik Rasulak (‘In the name off Allah. O Allah!

Cure your slave and testify to Your Messenger.)’ Do so after Salat Al-Subh (Fajr) and before the rising of the sun. Let him submerse himself in it three times, for three days. If he is not cured in three, then five. If he is not cured in five, then seven. If he is not cured in seven, then nine. For indeed it will not remain after nine, with the permission of Allah.” (Jamî al-Tirmidhi, 4.2.2084, graded Da’if) Prophet Muhammad (SAW) showed a preference for odd (not even) numbers, but seven was not necessarily the preferred odd number: Jabir (b. Abdullah) reported Allah’s Messenger (SAW) as saying: An odd number of stones is to be used for cleaning (the private parts after answering the call of nature), and casting of pebbles at the Jamras is to be done by odd numbers (seven), and (the number) of circuits between al-Safa’ and al-Marwa is also odd (seven), and the number of circuits (around the Ka’bah) is also odd (seven). Whenever any one of you is required to use stones (for cleaning the private parts) he should use odd number of stones (three, five or seven).

(Sahih Muslim 1300) So it seems that seven is the odd number related to the forms of worship unique to one’s Hajj, including the worship of Tawwaf.

In contrast, the worship ritual of Aalah is counted in pairs of rak’ât —a pair [two] is an even number— whether performed at the Ka’bah or anywhere else on earth. The first exception to the even count for Aalah is that a third rak’ah is added to a single pair of rak’ât for Salat al-Maghrib, making a total of three rak’ât, an odd number. This Prayer, Salat al-Maghrib, takes place at the time when the daylight is giving way to darkness; the second exception to the even number of rak’ât is when closing the night prayer with Salat al-Witr. Salat al-Witr is to be done sometime after the last Prayer at night and before dawn (Salat al-Fajr), when the darkness is giving way to daylight.

Ibn ‘Umar narrated that: The Prophet (SAW) said: “Salat in the night is two by two [in pairs of rak’ât]. So when you fear the dawn [is near] then make it [the total] odd by [adding] one [rak’ah], and make [the number of rak’ât in] the last of your Salat odd.” (Jami’ Al-Tirmidhi 437, graded Sahih) I [Allah] swear by the dawn — and the ten nights — and the even and the odd — and by the night when it departs. [Surat Al-Fajr, 89:1-4] Allah associates Himself with odd numbers: Abu Huraira reported Allah’s Messenger (SAW)as saying: There are ninety-nine names of Allah; he who commits them to memory would get into Paradise. Verily, Allah is Odd [He is

We cannot perform Tawwaf at any place apart from the Ka’bah in Makkah, and accordingly we are advised to perform as many Tawwafs as possible when we are visiting God’s house — whether we are performing Hajj, ‘Umrah, or at any other time during a presence in Makkah. The fact that there is the category Tawwaf al-Nafl [voluntary Tawwaf] indicates that there is extra reward for performing Tawwaf beyond those required, just as there is reward for performing more Salat beyond the minimum required.

We can only speculate what might be the measurable effects of the geological forces at play in the earth at the Ka’bah —and thus the beneficial and exhilarating physical and spiritual effects of Tawwaf on submissive believers. This is an area of research that should be undertaken and its results made known. In the meantime we are promised the pleasure of Allah for properly completing the rituals of Hajj or ‘Umrah. We can say with confidence that worshipping Allah in the ways that He has prescribed and with the correct intent is always rewardable.

Abdullah b. Mas’ud reported that Allah’s Messenger (SAW) said: None loves one’s own praise more than Allah, the Exalted and Glorious, does. It is because of this that He has praised Himself, and none is more self-respecting than Allah and it is because of this that He has prohibited abominable acts and there is none who is more anxious to accept the apologies of the people than Allah Himself and it is because of this that He has revealed the Book and sent the Messengers. (Sahih Muslim, 2760b) Samura b. Jundub reported: The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said, “The dearest phrases to Allah are four: Subhan Allah (Hallowed be Allah), Al-Hamdu-lillah (Praise be to Allah), La ilaha illa-Allah (There is no deity but Allah), Allahu Akbar (Allah is Greater). There is no harm for you in which of them to begin with (while remembering Allah)… (Sahih Muslim, 2137a) Allah “loves” both required and voluntary [nafl] worship and obedience.

On the authority of Abu Hurayrah: The Messenger of Allah (SAW) said, “Verily Allah ta’ala has said: ‘Whosoever shows enmity to a wali (friend) of Mine, then I have declared war against him. And My servant does not draw near to Me with anything more loved to Me than the religious duties I have obligated upon him. And My servant continues to draw near to me with nafl (voluntary) deeds until I love him. When I love him, I am his hearing with which he hears, and his sight with which he sees, and his hand with which he strikes, and his foot with which he walks. Were he to ask [something] of Me, I would surely give it to him; and were he to seek refuge with Me, I would surely grant him refuge.’ ” (Bukhari – 40 Hadith of Nawawi, 38) What we can say with confidence is that we are assured of the spiritual benefits of Tawwaf.

Dawud bin ‘Ajlan said: “We performed Tawwaf with Abu ‘Iqal in the rain, and when we finished our Tawwaf, we came behind the Maqam. He said: I performed Tawwaf with Anas bin Malik in the rain. When we finished the Tawwaf, we came

To be Continued at page 8

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Nearly 60,000 students return on first day of in-class instruction French, Chinese, Punjabi translations available

The Government of British Columbia reopened in-class instruction to all students on Monday, June 1, 2020, with about 30% of expected enrolment in attendance.

At the high end were Grade 6 students at 48.3% of expected enrolment, while Grade 12 students were at the low end with 14.5%.

These numbers reflect only the first day of the return to part-time, in-school learning. Other students will gradually be back in their classrooms over the course of this week.

As part of Stage 3 of B.C.’s return to schools, all families have been given the option to have their children back in classrooms for the remainder of the 2019-20 school year.

Kindergarten to Grade 5 students are limited to 50% of the school’s capacity, with a halftime or alternating schedule. Grade 6 to 12 classes are limited to 20% of the school’s capacity and approximately one day a week.

Children of essential service workers and

students who need more support will continue to be offered full-time classroom instruction.

Families who choose not to send their children to school are still being supported by teachers remotely. Schools are designating specific time for teachers to focus on remote education.

If families change their minds about in-class learning, they are asked to contact their child’s school as soon as possible so the school can plan to support the child.

All school districts have health and safety plans approved by the Ministry of Education that follow strict guidelines provided by the provincial health officer and WorkSafeBC. Some of these health and safety measures include: limiting the number of students in school, avoiding groups or gatherings of students in hallways or other common areas and taking students outside more often;

regular cleaning of high-contact surfaces like door knobs, toilet seats, keyboards and desks at least twice a day, and cleaning the school building at least once a day; staggered drop-offs, lunch and recess breaks, with increased outside time; and asking staff and students (or their parents/ guardians) to assess themselves daily for

Iqra School Hosts Eid Car Parade

By; Farwah Arslan Gr 6. On May 27 from 11pm- 1pm Iqra Islamic school hosted an Eid parade. At this parade kids would come with their parents, wear their Eid clothes, decorate their car, and come to the school. There were about 156 families that joined Iqra school with there parade. Iqra staff had decorated the school with, banners, poster, and many more decorations made by the kids and their families. The staff greeted everyone with smiles while they were all social distancing. The kids got treats from the school. It was a fun activity to end everyone’s Eid.

On Wednesday May 27th Iqra Islamic School hosted an Eid drive-through celebration. The event was hugely successful, with over 150 families partaking in the festivities. Freezies and goodybags were served, and - after weeks of isolation - Iqra students and their families were able to celebrate together.

Though this Eid was unique for the entire Muslim world, the covid-19 pandemic did not stop our local institutions from celebrating on this joyous occasion.

Bassam Abun-Nadi (Assistant Operations Manager)

TAWWAF Maximizing Continued from page 7

behind the Maqam and prayed two Rak’ah.’

Anas said to us: ‘Start your deeds anew, for you have been forgiven. This is what the Messenger of Allah (SWT) said to us when we performed Tawwaf with him in the rain.’ (Sunan Ibn Majah, 4.25. 3118, graded Da’if) Tawwaf is prayer, so when performing Tawwaf, Hajjis must not miss the opportunity to send up their praise and supplications to Allah.

Abdullah bin Umar said: “Speak little when you are performing Tawwaf for you are in a state of Salah.“ (Sunan

al-Nasâ’i 2923, graded Sahih Mawquf) So then, in conclusion, it is my desire to advise all people who find themselves in Makkah for Hajj and ‘Umrah to perform more and more Tawwaf for the benefit of their physical and spiritual health[v] and to increase Allah’s blessings. I pray that the insights presented here will inspire pilgrims to perform up to 50 Tawwafs —or however many is possible for their circumstances— in order to obtain the maximum benefits of this special form of worship.

“And God knows best!”

Source: https://aljumuah.com/tawwaf

symptoms of COVID-19, with clear policies not to come to school if unwell. If any student or staff member has even mild symptoms, arrangements will be made for that person to be returned home.

Local safety plans are posted on each school district’s website for parents to access.

Source: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases

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No difference between racism in Canada and the U.S., activists say

By:Brooklyn Neustaeter CTVNews.ca Writer

TORONTO -- Some of Canada’s leaders have said that systemic racism does not exist in the country the way it does in the U.S. However, Canadian activists say the racism black people face in each country is no different.

Former Liberal MP Celina CaesarChavannes told CTV’s Your Morning on Wednesday that racial tensions do not stop at the border.

“When people think about racism they look at what’s happening in the States and they put on these blinders, and they presume that racism… only exists when you can blatantly see it happening -- when someone’s being choked with a knee, when someone’s being shot at, when someone is dying,” CaesarChavannes said. “That’s not the case of our reality every single day. Systemic racism, microaggressions exist in our institutions.”

Protests began last week in Minneapolis in response to the death of George Floyd, a black man who died after a white police officer held his knee on Floyd’s neck for several minutes. The protests have since spread across other parts of the world and Canadians have joined in solidarity.

Despite a surge in anti-racism protests globally, Canadian author and activist Desmond Cole told CTVs Your Morning that is not a new movement in either Canada or the United States.

“Black people have literally been saying the same thing for generations and it feels like the desperation to be heard before -- [that] we’re completely unable to live in this society -- the desperation is what’s changing, but nothing that we’re saying is new,” Cole said in an interview on Wednesday.

Cole said that police are repeatedly sent to help when a crisis involves a black person because Canadians are still afraid of black people.

“We keep insisting that there’s no other way, but obviously somebody who’s trained in de-escalation, somebody who’s trained to talk to people, someone who doesn’t have a weapon, someone who can offer services and support, that person is obviously a better person to come and respond,” Cole said.

Cole said the federal government needs to look at other ways to help black people when they are in crisis rather than sending the police. “When somebody is in crisis, what we do now is we say, ‘Let’s send several burly men with guns, who have a licence to kill to go and support somebody who may be in mental health crisis.’ We don’t care about the fact that maybe that person might be terrified of an armed response to their house.”

Caesar-Chavannes said racism in Canada

can be seen daily when considering incarceration rates and health statistics.

“When you look at our health outcomes, when you look at our justice system and the overpopulation of our prisons with black and indigenous people, you have to really think about whether or not systemic racism does not actually exist in this country because I think it’s our lived reality every day,” Caesar-Chavannes said.

WHAT CAN BE DONE ABOUT RACISM IN CANADA? Caesar-Chavannes said politicians don’t have to look any further than the country’s Indigenous populations to understand that “racism has and continues to exist in Canada.”

Before steps can be taken to address racism in Canada, Caesar-Chavannes said there first needs to be “an accountability and an understanding [of] racism existing.” She said Canada’s leaders cannot throw around the term ‘anti-black racism’ without having concrete steps to help solve the issue.

“It needs to start with adequate, sustained and intentional funding for programs that address anti-black racism in a way that organizations [and] programs don’t have to keep seeking and looking for funding and jumping through hoops to get that funding,” Caesar-Chavannes said.

To do so, Caesar-Chavannes said “unusual suspects” -- anyone who has “intersections of intersecting identities” -- need to help drive these conversations forward and to suggest “ways for the government to actually create equity for equity seeking groups.”

Caesar-Chavannes explained that women, black women, Indigenous people, religious minorities and people with disabilities, among others, need to be part of the conversation to create change.

“We need to have those unusual suspects at the table. If you’re having the same conversations right now with the same people that you had conversations with two years ago, you need to really change and think about if you want, sustainable change and if you want lasting change -- change that’s going to have a real impact with people on the ground,” she said.

At the beginning of the 43rd Parliament, Caesar-Chavannes shared on Twitter her 43 goals that she hoped to accomplish during the term, including increasing the number of black people in Cabinet, increasing the number of black staffers, and to understand that diversity is ubiquitous.

“We’ve not had an Assistant Deputy Minister (ADM) or a Deputy Minister (DM) of black heritage, a black person, in any of those positions since the formation of our country.

Ex-defence chief Mattis rips Trump for response to Floyd protests At least 9,300 people have been arrested across the United States amid the continuing protests after the death of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who died last week in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota, and police brutality nationwide.

US President Donald Trump has outraged faith leaders and protesters for walking to an historic church near the White House and creating a photo opportunity, just minutes after police used chemical smoke canisters and flashbangs on peaceful protesters to clear the area.

All four fired Minneapolis police officers involved in George Floyd’s death have been charged and and Derek Chau-

vin, the officer who knelt on Floyd’s neck, previously charged with third-degree murder, has now been charged with second-degree unintentional murder.

Those protesting against police brutality have been met with, at times, excessive force by authorities. Journalists have also been targeted by police. Officers have also been injured in the protests.

Protesters have remained undeterred by curfews and the presence of the US National Guard in some cities. Largely peaceful protests have at times turned violent, with looting and vandalism.

Wednesday’s protests, however, remained largely peaceful after curfews took effect.

Source: aljazeera.com

And I think the federal composition of our system needs to be reflective of the population that it serves and that includes on the bureaucratic side,” Caesar-Chavannes said in an interview with Your Morning.

She quit the Liberal caucus in March 2019 to sit as an independent after alleging that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had been hostile towards her.

POLICING AND CORPORATE POWER Toronto community organizer and human rights activist Akio Maroon said in an interview with CTV News Channel that defunding the police would help address racism in Canada.

“Demilitarizing the police, defunding the police, that would be a start. I think Toronto’s police budget is $1.08 billion... And that is just way too much,” Maroon said on Wednesday. She added that that money could be spent elsewhere to better address the issue.

“The money that we are spending for law enforcement, we can move that money to mental health resources, we can have after school programs, we can educate our community members,” Maroon said. “There are other ways in which we could be looking at reinvigorating our justice system without

this kind of carceral environment.”

In addition to the police, Cole said corporations can also be blamed for continued racism against black people, saying both of their powers should be disbanded.

While corporations including Nike, Ben & Jerry’s, Spotify and Amazon have taken to social media to share statements in support of anti-racism protests, Cole says they need to do more.

“Corporations have too much power like the police do. They are a huge part of this problem if not the main source of this problem, because all of this labour that poor people are doing is to serve these corporations while we die against it,” Cole said.

Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers have found that black people are at a higher risk of in-hospital death compared to white people.

“We’re living in a crisis right now where people are dying of a communicable disease that we have never seen before this year, and corporations are still forcing people to go to work for minimum wage,” Cole said.

“Black people are disproportionately dying of COVID, working for these corporations instead of staying home.”

Source: ctvnews.ca

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C URREN T

A FF A IR S

Controlled Re-opening of BCMA Masajid and Centers June 8

Assalaamu Alaykum, Eleven weeks ago on March 16, 2020, the BCMA voluntarily closed its masajid and centers to contain the spread of coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. This decision was indeed very difficult and painful for us to make and we would like to take this opportunity to thank all of you for the overwhelming support and cooperation in this regard.

In Ramadan, we promised to re-open our masajid gradually provided the pandemic abate and the safety and health of our patrons to be our top priority. Alhamdulillah, last Friday, the BCMA Executive Council and the Board of Religious Services decided to re-open our masajid and centers on June 8 within the guidelines of the Ministry of Health. Please contact your local branch for details.

The following are some of the restrictions and responsibilities that shall apply to the congregants and the managements: Restrictions: (a) Anyone with symptoms of COVID-19

including fever, chills, cough, shortness of breath, sore throat and painful swallowing, must isolate at home for a minimum of 10 days; (b) Anyone under the direction of the Provincial Health Officer to self-isolate must follow those instructions; (c) Anyone who has arrived from outside of Canada, or who is a contact of a confirmed COVID-19 case, to self-isolate for 14 days and monitor for symptoms; (d) Unfortunately, in this phase we will not be able to accommodate persons under 16 years old and our sisters.

Congregant Responsibility: (a) Ensure you are permitted to attend a prayer at BCMA facility by the branch management; (b) We recommend to visit washroom and make your wudu from home before coming to pray; (c) Facemask or covering is recommended; (d) Bring a sanitized prayer mat; (e) Arrive at the door 5 minutes before Iqa-

ma time; (f) Exit the prayer hall and property within 5 minutes after the Fard salat. Please perform your Sunnah and Nawafil prayers at home; (g) Maintain 2-meter physical distancing at all times which means there shall be no hand shaking nor hugging on BCMA property; (h) Follow any other rules set out by the local managements.

Branch Management Responsibility: (a) Set up process to permit a maximum of 50 persons to pray per session; (b) Permit and supervise congregants coming for prayer; (c) Ensure 2-meter physical distancing rule is followed both inside the building and outside on BCMA property; (d) Provide hand sanitizers at entrance; (e) Disallow persons exhibiting sickness; (f) Sanitize hard surface at least once a day; (g) Sanitize high touch surfaces at least twice a day; (h) Install CDC signage;

guidelines from the BC Centre for Disease Control. We have increased the frequency with which we clean all hard surface floors and high touch surfaces, using chemicals recommended by the BCCDC. For everyone’s safety, at this time we have limited the area of the building accessible to the public to just the main prayer areas, the ground floor lobby, and the underground parkade.

We kindly ask that you follow the signage posted at the Masjid for entry and exit protocols.

What we expect from you?

•1.For the 5 daily salāh, the Masjid will open 5 minutes before the adhān and close 5 minutes after the salāh. We ask that you be on time and not remain on the premises after the Masjid closes. For up to date information on adhān and iqāmah times, please visit our website www.bcmaburnaby.org •2.Always maintain a distance of 6 feet from everyone around you •3.Bring your own clean prayer mat [very important] •4.Sanitize your hands using the sanitizer provided at the entrance and throughout the Masjid •5.Before entering the prayer area, please provide your name and phone number on the entry log. We will only share this information with health officials if they require it

for contact tracing purposes •6.Place your clean prayer mat 6 feet apart from your neighbour as indicated by the markings on the floor of the prayer area •7.We strongly encourage you perform wudū prior to your arrival; we strongly discourage the use of the washrooms and wudū areas Jumu’ah Due to the limit imposed by the health authorities, only 50 individuals will be permitted to attend Jumu’ah salāh. You must preregister to attend Jumu’ah. Registration will be online only at www.bcmaburnaby.org on a first come first served basis beginning at 8:00 PM on Friday until we reach capacity.

We will stop accepting registrations once we have reached our limit.

Masjid doors will open 10 minutes before the adhān on Friday and will close once we have reached capacity. Security guards will admit only those individuals who have registered.

First Jumu’ah Salāh: 1:30 PM [Register here] Second Jumu’ah Salāh: 2:45 PM [Register here] Important Notes •1.Children under the age of 16 are not permitted on the premises at any time •2.At this time, we are not able to accom-

modate sisters for Jumu’ah salāh. Sisters are still welcome to attend any of the 5 daily salāh apart from Jumu’ah.

•3. Masjid al Salaam administration reserves the right to refuse entry to anyone exhibiting symptoms of illness or for any other reason.

•4.Failure to abide by the protocols set forth above may result in immediate removal from Masjid premises and/or a subsequent ban on attendance for an indefinite period.

•5.While pre-registration is not required to attend the 5 daily salāh, Masjid al Salaam will be required to limit access to the building once the number of attendees reaches 50.

•6Due to the quickly changing nature of the pandemic and guidelines issued by the health authorities, we encourage you to remain up to date on procedures and protocols by visiting our website www.bcmaburnaby. org/covid-19 We appreciate your cooperation during our gradual reopening. May Allah accept our worship and forgive our shortcomings. Āmīn Daud Ismail Secretary and Acting Chairperson Masjid al Salaam and Education Centre burnaby.secretary@thebcma.com

day. He added that this spike in cases would especially affect areas where people ignore Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommendations to wear masks and practice social distancing, or where restrictions have been loosened too much.

Jarrett also warned that “super-spreader events” such as large summertime parties and other gatherings are especially high risk for transmission of the corona virus. “If you get a couple of people spreading it to 500 people, those 500 people now spread it to 1,000 people, and it keeps escalating,” he said.

Jarrett also pointed to history as an example of how things may unfold by comparing the current COVID-19 pandemic to the 1918 influenza pandemic. Using figures from the CDC, it’s been established that after starting in March 1918, there was a significant drop in cases over the summer before an autumn resurgence of the flu virus claimed even more lives than the initial outbreak. Given the highly contagious nature of the novel corona virus, today’s medical experts share concern that history could easily repeat itself in this way.

Others add that summertime habits may be to thank for these dropping numbers that are lulling us into a false sense of security.

“People are in less-ventilated spaces [in the fall and winter], so there’s a higher chance of you being exposed to aerosols that contain the virus,” Bettina Fries, MD, chief of the infectious disease division at Stony Brook Medicine, told Newsday. But since COVID-19 was only discovered in humans

five months ago, scientists say that mapping the virus’s trajectory could be even trickier than anyone anticipates. For now, medical experts recommend following all CDC guidelines and resisting the temptation to break social distancing rules too early. It also means wearing your face mask, diligently washing your hands, and avoiding large gatherings.

Source: nationalpost.com/news/world

(i) Keep full record and file weekly incident report.

The Executive Council has also empowered each local branch managements to develop rules and guidelines suited to their respective site so we would highly appreciate if you please respectfully follow them.

The BCMA shall not be liable for any person(s) who acts contrary to the guidance of the Public Health Officer that may result in any negative outcome whatsoever.

Abdullah Nasib Ali General Secretary, BCMA

Masjid al Salaam and Education Centre, Burnaby

Al salāmu ‘alaikum wa rahmatullāh We hope this message finds you and your family in the best of health. Please be advised that, pursuant to approval from the Executive Council and the Board of Religious Services, Masjid al Salaam will reopen for the general public on Monday, June 8, 2020 inshā’Allah. While we are excited to reopen and welcome you back to the Masjid, it is extremely important that we all follow the guidelines set forth below in order to ensure a smooth and safe reopening experience for everyone.

What we are doing to keep you safe?

Masjid al Salaam is committed to maintaining the highest level of cleanliness and sanitization practices in accordance with

Here’s When the Second Wave of Corona virus Is Coming, Doctors Warn By: Muhammad Younas After months of stay at home orders in an attempt to flatten the corona virus curve, there’s finally a little good news coming in.

The number of reported new COVID-19 cases in former hot spots around the country is going down. And that cautious optimism has even allowed certain states to begin the early phases of reopening. Unfortunately, that’s where the good news ends, as medical experts believe that a lack of social distancing, refusal to wear face masks, and the flouting of other precautions amid reopening could erase any progress in a matter of months. As a result, according to doctors, a second wave of the coronavirus could come as soon as September.

Many experts—including National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases director Anthony Fauci, MD—say that fall or early winter will likely see the first resurgence in COVID-19 infections across the country.

“We should not see a full second wave in the summer, but we may see hot spots all over the country,” Mark Jarrett, MD, chief quality officer for North well Health, told News-

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P o l i t i cs

Justin Trudeau Explained His Silent Moment But Still Didn’t Mention Trump

in the United States. He was asked about his response again today. However, he would not directly say why he took so long to answer. During his June 4 address, Trudeau announced new COVID-19 modelling, as well as some updates to benefits for seniors.

However, during the question period, the prime minister received queries about his silent reOne of the major topics of discussion this week is Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s si- sponse to a question about the ongoing prolent moment when asked about the situation tests over racist police brutality in the United

States.“Canadians continue to watch with consternation and horror at what’s going on in the United States right now,” he said, echoing the response he offered after his 21 seconds of silence.

Trudeau followed this by saying that Canadians cannot let it distract from their own country’s issues and the work that needs to be done at home.

The questions didn’t end there, however, with one reporter speaking in French about how Bloc leader Yves-François Blanchet referred to Trudeau as “spineless” for his response, and also mentioning criticisms from Jagmeet Singh and Reverend Al Sharpton.

“My job as prime minister is to stand up for Canadians’ values, to express those values,

By: Stephanie Levitz OTTAWA -- NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh has accused the prime minister of hypocrisy for calling on Canadians to do more to combat racism but refusing to condemn inflammatory remarks by U.S. President Donald Trump.

Justin Trudeau was pressed Tuesday to address how Trump has been handling escalating protests in the U.S. related to the death of a black man in police custody. Violence has since broken out across the country, in many cases touched off by aggressive police, with deaths in several cities, widespread damage and even the media being targeted.

Trump has lashed out at the protesters, calling them thugs and anarchists. He has suggested the military be used to quash them and has appeared to advocate violence against protesters. This week, tear gas was used on protesters who were blocking Trump’s path to a photo op outside the White House.

The prime minister fell silent for several moments when a reporter asked for his views on the crisis Tuesday. He eventually said Canadians were watching in horror what was going on in the U.S., but did not mention Trump directly.

He then pivoted to acknowledging more

must be done in Canada to address racism.

Trudeau’s silence was deafening, Singh said Wednesday.

“The prime minister of Canada has to call out the hatred and racism happening just south of the border and if the prime minister can’t do that how can everyday people be expected to stand up?” Singh said Wednesday.

“The prime minister should lead by example.” Trudeau has long ducked questions calling on him to respond to statements by the U.S. president, repeating -- as he did Tuesday -- that Canadians expect their government to focus on them.

But Singh said that’s not acceptable.

He called Trump’s actions reprehensible, accusing the president of inflaming hatred and divisions, fuelling racism and putting people’s lives at risk.

“There are times when we have to be strategic and there are times when we have to stand up for what’s right,” he said.

“And this is one of those times you have to stand up for what’s right.”

Singh called on Trudeau to put actions behind his focus on Canadians. The Liberals could find a path through legislation to end racially motivated policing tactics and address the over-representation of visible mi-

norities and Indigenous people in prisons, he said.

They could also move faster to sew up holes in the country’s social safety nets that create the inequalities that lead to racism.

“Those are just some of the things the government can do immediately that would go beyond the pretty words of a prime minister who says that he cares,” Singh said, “Well, the prime minister has the power to do something about it.”

In a separate appearance, the Green party’s Elizabeth May said while it is true that Trudeau’s “pretty words” were not the same as action, they are the epitome of what is making Canada different from the United States at this time.

“Pretty words are so much better than vile language so bad that Twitter decides to put a warning that it incites violence, that Facebook employees quit because Mark Zuckerman (sic) won’t take down comments that are incendiary and those comments are from the president of the United States,” she said.

May said Trump has made everything go-

cause they acquired another company in the fall. Like so many businesses, they have been hit hard and their workers need help to be able to stay on the job.

Now, I have repeatedly raised this issue with the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance.

So why haven’t they fixed this technical issue impacting companies and workers across the country?

On April 8th, Conservatives called on the government to give back to small businesses the GST they had remitted in the last year.

This would have provided much needed cashflow to literally thousands of businesses across the country.We also raised concerns with the wage subsidy and proposed changing the criteria so that businesses could demonstrate their 30% revenue loss using other metrics like loss of earnings, have repeatedly raised this issue with the Prime Minister and Minister of Finance. So why haven’t they fixed this technical issue impacting companies and workers across the country?

We also raised concerns with the wage subsidy and proposed changing the criteria so that businesses could demonstrate their 30% revenue loss using other metrics like loss of earnings, subscriptions or orders.

Thousands of companies can’t access the wage subsidy because of this barrier.

In fact, according to the Department of Finance, uptake has been only half of what the government expected.

So, why won’t the Trudeau Liberals help these companies?

On April 26th, we asked the Prime Minister to change the criteria for the Canada Emergency Business Account so that small businesses who use a chequing account can qualify.

That’s a simple fix that would have helped so many. So why hasn’t it been made?

Over a month ago, we raised the issue of businesses who don’t qualify for the emergency business account, because they don’t have regular payroll.

We asked the Liberals to expand the eligibility criteria to include revenue decline. So why haven’t they?

On May 14th, we asked the Liberals to include a sliding scale in the Canada Emergency Commercial Rent Assistance Program for businesses with less than 70% revenue loss, so those experiencing significant revenue decline get some rental relief.

The program only started taking applications on May 25th. So why did the government not make this simple change to help more small business owners?

These are just some of the ways that Justin Trudeau and his Liberal government are letting down Canadians.

These aren’t just numbers on a spreadsheet.

They are real Canadians who are struggling.

Canadians who need help but who have fallen through the cracks.

Conservatives have proposed easy solutions to help them. So why hasn’t Justin Trudeau acted?

Meanwhile, the Canadian Medical Association has warned that Canada won’t be ready

and to ensure that I’m standing up for Canadians’ interests as well, and I’m defending those interests, and I will continue to do that,” Trudeau answered.

He also said that he would continue to support racialized Canadians and people all over the world in the fight against racism.

The reporter was apparently not satisfied with the answer, asking if Trudeau was afraid of reprisals from the Trump administration.

Trudeau was more succinct in answering this question, again saying he stands up for Canadians’ values and interests while making it clear what those are. He concluded with “That’s exactly what I’ve done.”

Source: narcity.com

If Trudeau won’t stand up to Trump, how will regular people: Singh

ing on in his country worse and that Canada must stop pretending the United States offers a safe place of refuge for minorities.

She repeated the Greens’ long-held stance that Canada must suspend the Safe Third Country Agreement between Canada and the United States. The deal sees both countries reject most asylum claims lodged at the land border on the grounds that both countries are safe, and so asylum seekers must seek refuge where they first arrive.

“It is clear that if you’re Muslim, if you’re black, if you’re Latina, if you’re Indigenous, the United States is not a safe country,” May said.

Source: ctvnews.ca/politics

Hon. Andrew Scheer – Press Conference Remarks: CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY

Good morning everyone,

I would like to start today by addressing the recent events in Minneapolis and across Canada and the US over the weekend.

Like all of you, I am heartbroken by the killing of George Floyd.

No one should ever feel unsafe around police officers, who must uphold the law for all, or feel unsafe because of the colour of their skin.

We all have a responsibility to fight antiblack racism, and all forms of brutality or injustice, in Canada and everywhere.

Now, Conservatives have put forward constructive solutions to fix what are largely technical problems so that Canadians can get the help that they need.

But, instead of making these simple changes, Justin Trudeau is letting Canadians down.

He promised in March to fix the problems.

Well it’s now June.

For example: Brandt Tractor, a company in my riding, can’t access the wage subsidy be-

if a second wave hits.

Government procurement efforts have been plagued with issues. Masks are defective, test kits contaminated, and sometimes shipments don’t show up at all.

According to the government’s own statistics, they have ordered more than 100 million N95 masks since the beginning of this year but have received less than 12 million .

Of those 12 million masks, 9.8 million (82%) have not met our standards and cannot be distributed to front line emergency workers.

So what is the government’s plan to get the personal protective equipment Canadians need?

There is no plan.

But with the help of the NDP, the Liberals have shamefully shut down Parliament until at least the fall.

If MPs can gather safely in the Chamber four days a week for a hybrid special COVID-19 committee meeting, why can’t MPs carry out normal Parliamentary business?

The Liberals spent weeks trying to shut down Parliament, instead of looking for ways to ensure that it could safely reopen.

They have only allocated four hours to study and debate more than $150 billion worth of new spending. That is not how our democracy is supposed to work.

Opposition parties provide vital oversight and hold the government accountable.

It is our job to comb through every line item, to question every expense and make sure that Canadians’ tax dollars are spent properly.

Happy to take your questions.=

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gO V T / L o ca l

New COVID-19 data reveals northern Vancouver Island hit harder than Victoria, Nanaimo

VICTORIA -- New data released by the province Thursday offers a revealing look into the COVID-19 pandemic in B.C., including how the virus spread and where it has hit hardest.

On Vancouver Island, the majority of cases have been found – surprisingly – in the island’s northern region, which includes part of the mainland’s central coast.

Island Health recorded 59 cases in the sparsely populated northern region between Jan. 22 and May 31. The more densely populated South Island, meanwhile, has recorded 43 positive-test cases for COVID-19 during the same period. The Central Island region has seen just 25 cases.

Of the 127 cases on Vancouver Island before June, 121 patients had fully recovered, five

had died and one person was in intensive care. On Thursday, provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry laid out the path the virus took to B.C. and how it spread once here.

The very earliest cases of the novel coronavirus in B.C. were found in January and originated in China, particularly from the Wuhan region.

Those cases were followed shortly thereafter with cases originating in Iran. Health officials were able to discover this by examining the different genomes in the two strains of the virus. These earliest cases, however, did not lead to widespread transmission in B.C. COVID-19 infections only took off after a Vancouver dental conference in early March spread a strain of the virus that had more in common with European and East-

ern Canada strains. Around the same time, a coronavirus strain from Washington state was starting to appear and these two strains became the dominant sources of infections in B.C., according to health officials.

Henry also revealed new details about some of the most serious cases of COVID-19 in B.C. The data show that while no one under the age of 40 has died from the virus, six people between the ages of 40 and 59 have died, and 45 people between the ages of 60 and 79 succumbed to the illness.

The majority of the dead - 113 of the 166 recorded to date - were over the age of 80.

Young people in B.C. have been hospitalized for the illness, including two children under of 20 and 29 have been sick enough to need the age of 10 and one person between 10 and treatment in the intensive care unit.

19 years old. Four people between the ages Source: vancouverisland.ctvnews.ca/

OTTAWA -- Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the one-time payment of up to $500 for seniors to offset additional costs from COVID-19 will be delivered the week of July 6.

Seniors have been anxiously awaiting the payment, after the federal government promised on May 12 to spend $2.5 billion sending these payments. Those who qualify for the Old Age Security benefit are eligible for a tax-free payment of $300, while those who receive the Guaranteed Income Supplement will get an additional $200.The 2.2

million seniors who qualify for both receive $500. Speaking outside Rideau Cottage in Ottawa on Thursday, Trudeau said he hopes these funds make a difference.

“Even as we start to reopen parts of the economy, many seniors will have to stay home for longer to protect their health. And that’s really weighing on them. So, our government stepped up to help them weather this storm,” he said. In April the government initiated a one-time payment through the Goods and Services Tax, which delivered $375 to single

seniors and $510 to senior couples.

Laura Tamblyn Watts, the CEO of CanAge, a national seniors’ advocacy organization, told CTV News the benefit is “a long-time coming.”“That was announced some months ago and it’s going to take a long time,” she said. “It’s good to have a date but seniors right now are really in need so the money can’t come soon enough.” She said her organization would like to see this be an ongoing payment, not distributed on a one-time basis. Source: ctvnews.ca/

Dear Community Member, May 30, 2020 As we wrap up the second week of Phase 2, there have been a lot of positive signs that many things are returning to normal. While we know this recovery won’t happen overnight, and there are likely to be a few bumps along the road, we have a lot of progress to be proud of.

Topping the list is Premier John Horgan’s success in convincing the federal government to commit to implementing a national sick leave program, which will give all workers in Canada 10 days of paid sick leave per year. To avoid a resurgence in new cases, it will be critical that people stay home if they are at all sick. Paid sick leave ensures that workers won’t have to choose between not spreading illness and a paycheque.

More local businesses in our community are starting to open up with safety plans in place, and our government is making it easier for restaurants and pubs to expand their patios and service areas so we can practice physical distancing while enjoying meals and drinks.

Supporting our local businesses safely will be a key part of restarting B.C.’s economy.

Parents who choose to do so will be able to send their kids back to school part-time starting next week, and child care centres are gradually re-opening and increasing their capacity. This transition is being done with the expert guidance of Dr. Bonnie Henry, and with the safety of children, families and staff as the top priority. This step will help a lot of parents get back to work and will give children more of that important learning and social time with their friends and teachers. This is especially important for children who need extra support, to help make sure they are not falling further behind.

We recently launched a provincewide survey, Your story, our future, to gather feedback from British Columbians on your experiences and actions you have taken so far in the COVID-19 pandemic in B.C. So far, over 275,000 British Columbians have completed the survey, which is an outstanding response, and we would like to hear from even

more: younger, older, in the north, south, east and west. It is only a few minutes of your time, but it will make a huge difference.

And, if you have already completed the survey, help someone else to do the same. If you know of a senior who may have difficulty completing the survey, reach out and provide some assistance. If English is not your first language, you can complete the survey by phone in 150 languages.

Surrey-Whalley Constituency Office 10574 King George Blvd., Surrey, B.C. V3T 2X3 P : (604) 586-2740 | F : (604) 586-2800 Email: bruce.ralston.mla@leg.bc.ca Website: www.bruceralstonmla.ca Facebook: / SWHMLAOffice Your feedback and your story will help us understand how the pandemic has affected you so far and make decisions on our future here in British Columbia.

For the Your story, our future For the Your story, our future survey, visit: www.bccdc.ca/ covid19survey For those who cannot complete the survey online, or need assistance in

another language, call 1 833 7071900 seven days a week between 8:30 a.m. and 4:30 p.m.

(Pacific time) to take the survey over the phone.

We have much more work to do, but we will get there together. If you have any questions or need assistance with COVID-19 financial supports or B.C.’s Restart Plan, I encourage you to reach out to my office. We remain open via phone, 604-586-2740, where you are welcome to leave a message which will be returned; and email to, bruce.ralston.mla@ leg.bc.ca, to support you.

The Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) currently pays Canadians $2,000 per month if they’ve applied for the new benefit that’s designed to help people who are out of work as a result of COVID-19. But not everyone’s thrilled with CERB. Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer is among the most vocal opponents, saying that the benefit discourages some workers from returning to their jobs. Some workers are getting paid more than if they were working.

It’s the equivalent of working 40 hours a week for four weeks and earning $12.50/ hour. That’s above minimum wage in some provinces. However, unlike with a paycheque from an employer, the CERB payment is before taxes, and thus, the onus is on the recipient to ensure they’ve set enough money aside for any taxes that they need to pay on it. But even for workers who make above minimum wage, the incentive may not be there to put in a full workweek and earn a little more than the CERB. And for part-time workers, there’s even less incen-

tive to return to work, as the CERB isn’t prorated based on hours. It’s a one-size-fits-all benefit designed with expediency in mind.

And that’s why it’s likely to end.

ing CERB payments at Employer and Social Development Canada have been instructed to process payments and to defer any questionable claims until a later period.

By extending the benefits, the government would create even more extra work itself.

There would be more follow-ups that it would have to push aside for later. And with provinces already starting to open back up for business, there should be less of a need for CERB moving forward. Individuals who are eligible for employment insurance (EI) could continue to apply for those benefits.

The government could also expand EI eligibility for those who aren’t.

The main reason for the CERB was to get money out quickly without involving a vetting process. But now, with ample time to plan for the end of CERB, that shouldn’t be a problem. By extending the CERB, the government may just end up creating more problems for itself while adding to its debt.

Seniors will have to wait another month for COVID-19 aid payment

Update you on the COVID-19 pandemic by Bruce Ralston, MLA for Surrey - Whalley

Bruce Ralston, MLA Surrey - Whalley

Will the Canada Revenue Agency Extend the $2,000/Month CERB Payments?

Why an extension to the CERB may not happen?

The one looming question that many CERB recipients have right now is whether the four-month benefit will be extended. Earlier this month, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau did say that the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS), which helps employers cover the cost of employee wages, will be extended until August. However, there’s been no word on a possible extension for the CERB. The CEWS helps the economy by paying employers and getting people back to work. And it avoids all the headaches and politics to do with CERB. A big problem is, there’s potential for lots of abuse in the system. From workers refusing to go to work to recipients collecting CERB payments they aren’t eligible for, it’s become Invest in dividend stocks to help add a political issue. The National Post reported stability earlier this month that staff who are process- If you have savings built up, now is a good

time to put them to use. Putting money into a Tax-Free Savings Account (TFSA) and investing in a dividend stock like Fortis or BCE could provide you with stable, recurring income. And unlike the CERB, you won’t have to worry about having to pay taxes on it — as long as the investment is in a TFSA. Investing in dividend stocks can be a stable way of boosting your cash flow. And stocks are also likely to rise in value over the long term.

The post Will the Canada Revenue Agency Extend the $2,000/Month CERB Payments? appeared first on The Motley Fool Canada.

Source: ca.finance.yahoo.com

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14 M IDDLE E A S T Analysis: How Saudi Arabia and Iran became rivals Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

he Cold War moved to the Middle East, where the front-line states are led not by political stances but religious ones. by: Imran Khan I landed at Baghdad International Airport on January 9, a week after Iranian General Qassem Soleimani had been assassinated in a United States drone strike on the road leading to it.

Already a shrine of sorts had been set up at the site. The dried blood deliberately left behind was turning a dull brown on the ground.

Pictures of Soleimani and others killed in the attack adorned the wall and writ large in English, no doubt intended to encourage Western news outlets to take pictures, a sign proclaimed: “The site of the American crime against the victory leaders.”

Soleimani was one of the most powerful men in Iran.

He was the public face and the sharp end of the Iranian spear. As the leader of the Quds Force, the foreign arm of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), it was his command that directed Iran’s overseas operations. Operations that took in Yemen,

Syria, Iraq and Lebanon in the region alone.

Washington quickly declared they considered him to be the head of a terrorist organisation “responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Americans”, while in Iran, he was hailed as a national hero and patriotic son of Iranian soil.

Forty years of history Stood there at this makeshift memorial it was obvious that what had taken place on that spot was part of a wider game that had at its heart a rivalry being played out between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

To understand why the two are rivals is to understand the last 40 years of history.

In 1979, the shah of Iran was toppled by his own people and the leader fled. In his place arrived Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini and with him a new sense of purpose: To establish Iran as a regional power through Shia Islam.

That sent shockwaves through the Sunni Muslim world and, in particular, Saudi Arabia, which had traditionally seen itself as the leader of the Muslim world. At the core of that belief is the fact that the kingdom is the guardian of the two holiest places in Islam Mecca and Medina.

But its importance to the region predates Islam. Before the birth of Islam, Mecca was a trading post and home to religious sites that were said to bestow good fortune on those who visited them. It was, as a result, a prosperous city.

After the birth of Islam and subsequent split among the followers of the Prophet Mohammed into Shia and Sunni, the city of Mecca continued to thrive. In modern times, Saudi Arabia’s influence has been compounded by

Reduction in violence is a key prerequisite for the Afghan government and the Taliban to sit at the negotiating table.

By: Michael Kugelman On May 23, the Taliban announced a three-day ceasefire to coincide with the Eid al-Fitr holiday. The Afghan government immediately announced its intention to reciprocate. The truce brought a brief but desperately needed respite from the country’s relentless violence.

It also delivered a big boost to a US-Afghanistan relationship that had been in a precarious state because of diverging positions on a floundering peace process. With the relationship now on a more level footing, Washington is in a better position to work with Kabul to help launch peace talks between the Afghan government and the Taliban - a core but elusive US goal.

A horrific May 12 attack on a maternity ward in a Kabul hospital had exposed a growing disconnect in US-Afghanistan relations.

For Afghans, the attack was the last straw following a surge in militant violence in previous weeks, with much of their anger directed at the Taliban. National Security Adviser Hamdullah Mohib tweeted that if the Taliban “cannot control the violence … there seems little point in continuing to engage Taliban in ‘peace talks’.”

President Ashraf Ghani announced Afghan forces were shifting from a defensive to an offensive position against the Taliban. And Ka-

bul suggested the Taliban was complicit in the attack. Washington reacted very differently.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared that “the ongoing peace process continues to present a critical opportunity for Afghans to come together” to combat terror. Zalmay Khalilzad, Washington’s special representative for Afghan reconciliation, tweeted that there could be “no more excuses” for not pursuing talks. Washington blamed ISIL (ISIS) for the attack, and called on the Taliban and the Afghan government to work together to track down the perpetrators.

In effect, Washington was urging Kabul to redouble efforts to pursue a peace process that the Afghan government had temporarily put on hold. By May 19, fighting was reported in 20 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces.

It is easy to understand what drove this disconnect. The US government badly wants Afghanistan to start a peace process that a US-Taliban agreement - signed nearly three months ago - was meant to set in motion.

Two factors account for Washington’s urgency.

One is a desire to ensure Afghanistan does not squander its best opportunity yet to end a nearly 19-year war. The other is US politics. It is an election year, and the Trump administration is committed to bringing troops home. It is easier for President Donald Trump to depict the withdrawal as an honourable exit - and harder for his rivals to denounce it as an ab-

T

the massive wealth generated by its oil fields.

Andrew Leber is a researcher at Harvard University with a focus on Saudi policymaking. He emphasises the importance to Saudi Arabia of the fact that millions of Muslim pilgrims visit the kingdom each year.

“In terms of foreign policy, they can and do highlight that they are the guardians of the two holy places,” he explained, adding: “They will always invest quite a bit in ensuring that pilgrimages come off relatively well.”

Its guardianship of the two holy places is at the heart of the kingdom’s self-image and strategy. Broadly and without going into 1,400 years worth of history, which includes wars, occupations, kingdoms, science, art and culture, the philosophy is aimed at fellow majority Sunni countries, such as Turkey, Indonesia, Pakistan and the Gulf Arab states.

A seat at the table So, contemporary Saudi Arabia sees itself as the leader of the Muslim world ... and then along comes Iran with a very different idea of what the Muslim world should be.

Iran firmly believes that political currents in the Muslim world need to be viewed as forces of change in a region long exploited by the US and other Western powers.

Naturally, as a Shia Muslim nation it backs other Shia Muslim groups, but also vocally throws its weight behind the Palestinian cause.

But crippled by decades of sanctions and Western interference in its affairs and without the oil money Saudi Arabia benefits from, Iran’s foreign policy has been to develop proxies by equipping armed groups elsewhere and backing sympathetic regimes like that of Bashar al-Assad in Syria. Its concern

is now its own survival as much as anything else.

Holly Dagres is a fellow at the Washingtonbased Atlantic Council think-tank and suggests Iran’s foreign policy is based in part on two important elements.

“It views every action the West takes against Tehran, particularly the United States, as having an underlying long-term goal of bringing about regime change,” she explained.

“With a dated military, Tehran hopes that in the event of strike on the country, its proxies can retaliate against its enemies, US allies in the region such as Israel.”

Dagres also believes that Iran’s self-image is at play here. “More importantly, Iran wants to be respected as a regional power. It wants to have a seat at the table and make decisions like its neighbour Saudi Arabia. Having proxies helps Tehran project influence.”

However, at home, like Saudi Arabia, it stifles dissent and alternative political thought.

Saudi and Iran in Iraq

There is a popular saying in some foreign policy circles: “The US invaded Iraq and gifted it to the Iranians.”

To be Continued at page 22

How the US and Afghanistan can jump-start talks with the Taliban ?

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ject surrender - if peace talks are happening as American soldiers head for the exits.

National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien, speaking on the day of the hospital attack, bluntly expressed Washington’s thinking: “It’s now time for the Afghan people to get together to enter into a meaningful peace process and it’s time for America to come home.”

Washington’s you-need-to-make-peace-andwe-need-to-leave message came across as tonedeaf in a nation in no mood to sit down with violent actors so long as militants continued to perpetrate violence - including attacks on two mosques on May 19 - that had surged since the signing of the US-Taliban deal.

The accord - concluded after months of negotiations that excluded Kabul - does not require the Taliban to reduce violence.

The risk of a diplomatic crisis is real, thereby jeopardising the sensitive diplomacy that Washington must undertake with Kabul to help guide it towards peace talks.

The Eid ceasefire, however, restored some stability to the US-Afghanistan relationship.

Kabul’s reciprocation of the Taliban’s unilateral truce proves it is prepared to step off the battlefield - Washington’s fervent preference - under the right circumstances.

The truce also underscores Kabul’s underlying position: We are ready for peace if the other side shows it is ready for peace. Indeed, a Taliban commitment to reduce violence - similar to the one it made with US negotiators prior to signing the deal with Washington - would likely bring Kabul to the negotiating table. In fact, Ghani’s decision to resume offensives against the Taliban earlier this month may have been meant in part to pressure the insurgents into making such a commitment.

To this end, it is time for Washington and Kabul to undertake a full-court press to compel the insurgents to agree to a longer ceasefire or reduction in violence.

It is an admittedly ambitious task, given the leverage the insurgents derive from deploying violence, but it is essential to do it.

The Afghan government has already done its part. On May 17, Ghani and his main rival, Abdullah Abdullah, signed a power-sharing deal. It ended a spat that had precluded the launch of peace talks. Kabul has also agreed to release Taliban prisoners - including 2,000 following the Taliban’s Eid ceasefire announcement - which was part of the US-Taliban deal.

It is now time for the Taliban to make a major concession.

Washington and Kabul should pull out all the stops to compel the Taliban to commit to lessen or pause its violence. They should partner on a broad global outreach effort that leverages each of their diplomatic comparative advantages. Washington should draw on its cordial ties with Riyadh and Islamabad to get these two key Taliban influencers to apply pressure on the insurgents.

Kabul should press Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran - bitter rivals of Washington that have nonetheless partnered with both Kabul and the Taliban to help advance peace and reconciliation - to do the same.

Meanwhile, Washington should threaten to halt any further troop withdrawals, beyond the initial roughly 4,000 called for in its agreement with the Taliban, until the insurgents agree to curb violence.

Getting the Taliban to agree to the violencereduction demand is arguably the only thing now preventing the start of talks. It is time for Washington and Kabul, now on the same page after the Eid truce, to make it happen.

Source: aljazeera.com

15

Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

C o r o n av i r u s

100,000 Lives Lost to COVID-19. What Did They Teach Us?

By: Caroline Chen Each person who has died of COVID-19 was somebody’s everything. Even as we mourn for those we knew, cry for those we loved and consider those who have died uncounted, the full tragedy of the pandemic hinges on one question: How do we stop the next 100,000?

The United States has now recorded 100,000 deaths due to the coronavirus. t’s a moment to collectively grieve and reflect. Even as we mourn for those we knew, cry for those we loved and consider also those who have died uncounted, I hope that we can also resolve to learn more, test better, hold our leaders accountable and better protect our citizens so we do not have to reach another grim milestone.

Through public records requests and other reporting, ProPublica has found example after example of delays, mistakes and missed opportunities. The CDC took weeks to fix its faulty test. In Seattle, 33,000 fans attended a soccer match, even after the top local health official said he wanted to end mass gatherings. Houston went ahead with a livestock show and rodeo that typically draws 2.5 million people, until evidence of community spread shut it down after eight days. Nebraska kept a meatpacking plant open that health officials wanted to shut down, and cases from the plant subsequently skyrocketed. And in New York, the epicenter of the pandemic, political infighting between Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio hampered communication and slowed decision making at a time when speed was critical to stop the virus’ exponential spread.

COVID-19 has also laid bare many longstanding inequities and failings in America’s health care system. It is devastating, but not surprising, to learn that many of those who have been most harmed by the virus are also Americans who have long suffered from historical social injustices that left them particularly susceptible to the disease.

This massive loss of life wasn’t inevitable. It wasn’t simply unfortunate and regrettable.

Even without a vaccine or cure, better mitigation measures could have prevented infections from happening in the first place; more testing capacity could have allowed patients to be identified and treated earlier.

I

nursing homes, COVID-19 got in even when they have “innocent symptoms” like a cough or low-grade fever, especially and ran roughshod.

From the first weeks of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, when the virus tore through the Life Care Center in Kirkland, Washington, nursing homes and longterm care facilities have emerged as one of the deadliest settings. As of May 21, there have been around 35,000 deaths of staff and residents in nursing homes and long-term care facilities, according to the nonprofit Kaiser Family Foundation.

Yet the facilities have continued to struggle with basic infection control. Federal inspectors have found homes with insufficient staff and a lack of personal protective equipment.

Others have failed to maintain social distancing among residents, according to inspection reports ProPublica reviewed. Desperate family members have had to become detectives and activists, one even going as far as staging a midnight rescue of her loved one as the virus spread through a Queens, New York, assisted living facility.

What now? The risk to the elderly will not decrease as time goes by — more than any other population, they will need the highest levels of protection until the pandemic is over. The CEO of the industry’s trade group told my colleague Charles Ornstein: “Just like hospitals, we have called for help. In our case, nobody has listened.” More can be done to protect our nursing home and long term care population. This means regular testing of both staff and residents, adequate protective gear and a realistic way to isolate residents who test positive.

Racial disparities in health care are pervasive in medicine, as they have been in COVID-19 deaths.

The COVID-19 pandemic is not over, far from it.

At this moment, the questions we need to ask are: How do we prevent the next 100,000 deaths from happening? How do we better protect our most vulnerable in the coming months? Even while we mourn, how can we take action, so we do not repeat this horror all over again?

Here’s what we’ve learned so far.

Though we’ve long known about infection control problems in

African Americans have contracted and died of the coronavirus at higher rates across the country. This is due to myriad factors, including more limited access to medical care as well as environmental, economic and political factors that put them at higher risk of chronic conditions. When ProPublica examined the first 100 recorded victims of the coronavirus in Chicago, we found that 70 were black. African Americans make up 30% of the city’s population.

What now? States should make sure that safety-net hospitals, which serve a large portion of low-income and uninsured patients regardless of their ability to pay, and hospitals in neighborhoods that serve predominantly black communities, are well-supplied and sufficiently staffed during the crisis.

More can also be done to encourage African American patients to not delay seeking care,

when they suffer other health conditions like diabetes.

Racial disparities go beyond medicine, to other aspects of the pandemic. Data shows that black people are already being disproportionately arrested for social distancing violations, a measure that can undercut public health efforts and further raise the risk of infection, especially when enforcement includes time in a crowded jail.

First responders — EMTs, firefighters and paramedics — are often forgotten when it comes to funding, even though they are the first point of contact with sick patients. The lack of a coherent system nationwide meant that some first responders felt prepared, while others were begging for masks at local hospitals.

What now? As states reopen, it will be important to closely track hospital capacity, and if cases rise and threaten their medical systems’ ability to care for patients, governments will need to be ready to pause or even dial back reopening measures. It should go without saying that adequate protective gear is a must. I also hope that hospital administrators are thinking about mental health care for their staffs. Doctors and nurses have told us of the immense strain of caring for patients whom they don’t know how to save, while also worrying about getting sick themselves, or carrying the virus home to their loved ones. Even “heroes” need supplies and support.

Essential workers had little choice What we still have to learn?: but to work during COVID-19, but adequate safeguards weren’t put in place to protect them.

We’ve known from the beginning there are

some measures that help protect us from the virus, such as physical distancing. Yet millions of Americans haven’t been able to heed that advice, and have had no choice but to risk their health daily as they’ve gone to work shoulder-to-shoulder in meat-packing plants, rung up groceries while being forbidden to wear gloves, or delivered the mail.

Those who are undocumented live with the additional fear of being caught by immigration authorities if they go to a hospital for testing or treatment.

What now? Research has shown that there’s a much higher risk of transmission in enclosed spaces than outdoors, so providing good ventilation, adequate physical distancing, and protective gear as appropriate for workers in indoor spaces is critical for safety.

We also now know that patients are likely most infectious right before or at the time when symptoms start appearing, so if workplaces are generous about their sick leave policies, workers can err on the side of caution if they do feel unwell, and not have to choose between their livelihoods and their health. It’s also important to have adequate testing capacity, so infections can be caught before they turn into a large outbreak.

Frontline health care workers were not given adequate PPE and were sometimes fired for speaking up about it.

While health workers have not, thankfully, been dying at conspicuously higher rates, they continue to be susceptible to the virus due to their work. The national scramble for ventilators and personal protective equipment has exposed the just-in-time nature of hospitals’ inventories: Nurses across the country have had to work with expired N95 masks, or no masks at all. Health workers have been suspended, or put on unpaid leave, because they didn’t see eye to eye with their administrators on the amount of protective gear they needed to keep themselves safe while caring for patients.

There continue to be questions on which data is lacking, such as the effects of the coronavirus on pregnant women. Without evidence-based research, pregnant women have been left to make decisions on their own, sometimes trying to limit their exposure against their employer’s wishes.

Similarly, there’s a paucity of data on children’s risk level and their role in transmission. While we can confidently say that it’s rare for children to get very ill if they do get infected, there’s not as much information on whether children are as infectious as adults.

Answering that question would not just help parents make decisions (Can I let my kid go to day care when we live with Grandma?) but also help officials make evidence-based decisions on how and when to reopen schools.

There’s some research I don’t want to rush.

Experts say the bar for evidence should be extremely high when it comes to a vaccine’s safety and benefit. It makes sense that we might be willing to use a therapeutic with less evidence on critically ill patients, knowing that without any intervention, they would soon die. A vaccine, however, is intended to be given to vast numbers of healthy people.

So yes, we have to move urgently, but we must still take the time to gather robust data.

Our nation’s leaders have many choices to make in the coming weeks and months. I hope they will heed the advice of scientists, doctors and public health officials, and prioritize the protection of everyone from essential workers to people in prisons and homeless shelters who does not have the privilege of staying home for the duration of the pandemic.

The coronavirus is a wily adversary. We may ultimately defeat it with a vaccine or effective therapeutics. But what we’ve learned from the first 100,000 deaths is that we can save lives with the oldest mitigation tactics in the public health arsenal — and that being slow to act comes with a terrible cost.

I refuse to succumb to fatalism, to just accepting the ever higher death toll as inevitable. I want us to make it harder for this virus to take each precious life from us. And I believe we can.

Source: .propublica.org/article

16

Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

INFO / k A S H M IR

SpaceX rocket lifts off from U.S. in history-making flightMarcia Dunn

By: Marcia Dunn

A

CAPE CANAVERAL, FLA. -rocket ship built by Elon Musk’s SpaceX company thundered away from Earth with two Americans on Saturday, ushering in a new era in commercial space travel and putting the United States back in the business of launching astronauts into orbit from home soil for the first time in nearly a decade.

NASA’s Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken rode skyward aboard a white-and-black, bulletshaped Dragon capsule on top of a Falcon 9 rocket, lifting off at 3:22 p.m. from the same launch pad used to send Apollo crews to the moon a half-century ago. Minutes later, they slipped safely into orbit.

“Let’s light this candle,” Hurley said just before ignition, borrowing the historic words used by Alan Shepard on America’s first human spaceflight, in 1961.

The two men are scheduled to arrive Sunday at the International Space Station, 250 miles above Earth, for a stay of up to four months, after which they will come home with a Right Stuff-style splashdown at sea, something the world hasn’t witnessed since the 1970s.

The mission unfolded amid the gloom of the coronavirus outbreak, which has killed more than 100,000 Americans, and racial unrest across the U.S. over the case of George Floyd, the handcuffed black man who died at the hands of Minneapolis police.

NASA officials and others expressed hope the flight would lift American spirits and show the world what the U.S. can do.

“We are back in the game. It’s very satisfying,” said Doug Marshburn, of Deltona, Florida, who shouted, “USA! USA!” as he watched the 260-foot rocket climb skyward.

SpaceX becomes the first private company to launch people into orbit, a feat achieved previously by only three governments: the U.S., Russia and China.

“This is something that should really get people right in the heart of anyone who has any spirit of exploration,” Musk, the visionary also behind the Tesla electric car company, said after liftoff, pounding his chest with his fist.

The flight also ended a nine-year launch drought for NASA. Ever since it retired the space shuttle in 2011, NASA has relied on Russian spaceships launched from Kazakhstan to take U.S. astronauts to and from the space station.

Over the past few years, NASA outsourced the job of designing and building its next generation of spaceships to SpaceX and Boeing, awarding them $7 billion in contracts in a public-private partnership aimed at driv-

A SpaceX Falcon 9, with NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken in the Dragon crew capsule, lifts off from Pad 39-A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Saturday, May 30, 2020. For the first time in nearly a decade, astronauts blasted towards orbit aboard an American rocket from American soil, a first for a private company. (AP Photo/David J. Philip)

ing down costs and spurring innovation.

Boeing’s spaceship, the Starliner capsule, is not expected to fly astronauts until early 2021.

NASA plans to rely in part on commercial partners as it pursues it next goals: sending astronauts back to the moon within a few years, and on to Mars in the 2030s.

At a post-liftoff rally held at NASA’s massive 525-foot-high Vehicle Assembly Building, President Donald Trump commended Musk and proclaimed: “Today we once again proudly launch American astronauts on American rockets, the best in the world, from right here on American soil.”

He vowed the U.S. will be the first to land on Mars, promising a “future of American dominance in space.”

Vice-President Mike Pence, who also witnessed the launch, said that as the nation deals with the coronavirus and racial strife, “I believe with all my heart that millions of Americans today will find the same inspiration and unity of purpose that we found in those days in the 1960s” during Apollo.

The first attempt to launch the rocket, on Wednesday, was called off with less than 17 minutes to go in the countdown because of lightning. On Saturday, stormy weather threatened another postponement for most of the day, but the skies began to clear just in the time.

The astronauts set out for the launch pad in a gull-wing Tesla SUV after Behnken pan-

tomimed a hug of his 6-year-old son, Theo, and said: “Are you going to listen to Mommy and make her life easy?” Hurley blew kisses to his 10-year-old son and wife.

Nine minutes after liftoff, the rocket’s firststage booster landed, as designed, on a barge a few hundred miles off the Florida coast, to be reused on another flight.

“Thanks for the great ride to space,” Hurley told SpaceX ground control. The two crewmates batted around a floating blue dinosaur plush toy doubling as a dragon, demonstrating that they had reached zero gravity.

SpaceX controllers at Hawthorne, California, cheered and applauded wildly, and NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine declared: “This is everything that America has to offer in its purest form.”

Attendance inside Kennedy Space Center was strictly limited because of the coronavirus, and the crowd amounted to only a few thousand. By NASA’s count, over 3 million viewers tuned in online.

Despite NASA’s insistence that the public stay safe by staying home, spectators flocked to beaches and roads, some of them not wearing masks or keeping 6 feet from others.

Among the spectators was Neil Wight, a machinist from Buffalo, New York.

“With everything that’s going on in this country right now, it’s important that we do things extraordinary in life,” he said. “We’ve been bombarded with doom and gloom for the last six, eight weeks, whatever it is, and

this is awesome. It brings a lot of people together.”

Hurley, a 53-year-old retired Marine, and Behnken, 49, an Air Force colonel, are veterans of two space shuttle flights each.

Because of the coronavirus, the astronauts were kept in quasi-quarantine for more than two months. The SpaceX technicians who helped them get into their spacesuits wore masks and gloves that made them look like black-clad ninjas. And the SpaceX controllers had masks and were seated far apart.

In keeping with Musk’s penchant for futuristic flash, the astronauts wore angular white uniforms with black trim. Instead of the usual multitude of dials, knobs and switches, the Dragon capsule has three large touchscreens.

Once settled in orbit, Hurley disclosed that the capsule has been christened Endeavour -- or maybe the American spelling, Endeavor; he didn’t specify -- a storied name in the history of exploration, also given to one of the space shuttles.

SpaceX has been launching cargo capsules to the space station since 2012.

Under the new corporate-public model, aerospace companies design, build, own and operate spaceships, and NASA is essentially a paying customer on a list that could eventually include non-government researchers, artists and tourists. (Tom Cruise has already expressed interest.)

Saturday’s mission is technically considered a test flight. The next SpaceX voyage to the space station, set for the end of August, will have a full, four-person crew: three Americans and one Japanese.

The first flight was originally targeted for around 2015. But the project encountered bureaucratic delays and technical setbacks.

A SpaceX capsule exploded on the test stand last year. And Boeing’s first Starliner capsule ended up in the wrong orbit and was nearly destroyed during a test flight in December.

For SpaceX and the future of public-corporate space exploration, the stakes on Saturday were extraordinarily high.

With the spaceship finally on its way, Musk got choked up talking about the weight of his responsibility for the astronauts’ lives and their families and noted that the return to Earth is more dangerous in some ways than ascent, “so we don’t want to declare victory yet.” Still, Musk said he wasn’t nervous about the launch on Saturday the way he was during the previous attempt.

“Today, I don’t know, it felt like just the fates were aligned,” he said. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Mike Schneider in Cape Canaveral, Fla.,contributed to this report.

Source: ctvnews.ca/sci-tech

Death and ‘spy’ pigeons in Indian-administered Kashmir

Even ordinary things like funerals and pigeons have become political in Kashmir, where ongoing conflict disrupts normal life.

By Imran Khan

In Kashmir, on either side of the Line of Control that separates Indian-administered and Pakistani-administered Kashmir, seldom is anything simple.

Even burying the dead has become political.

Indian authorities are refusing to hand over the bodies of those killed in ongoing fighting between the Indian army and Kashmiri rebel fighters to their families.

They have given the COVID-19 pandemic as the reason for not handing over the bodies.

“Whilst there is the threat of coronavirus, the bodies will not be handed over,” the inspector general of police in Kashmir, Vijay Kumar, told Al Jazeera in early May. That is causing emotional pain to the family of Hazim Shafi Bhat, a disabled teenager

who was killed by Indian troops near his village in the Wangam area of Handwara in the north of Indian-administered Kashmir on May 4.

Indian authorities kept his body but allowed his parents to attend the funeral some 35km from their village. While the distance may not sound like much, when you have to navigate checkpoints, curfews and the daily security procedures of the area, also adding in the expense of travel, it becomes very difficult. Put simply, they cannot visit his grave like they would if he were buried in his local cemetery.

The authorities buried Bhat in an unmarked grave in a cemetery reserved for the bodies of unidentified rebel fighters. This, despite there being no evidence that he was a rebel fighter; even an Indian police statement refers to the 14-year-old as a civilian. According to his friends on social media, Bhat

was physically disabled and suffered from a speech disorder.

Bhat’s mother Meema Begum is upset about the situation. She tells Al Jazeera she fears other families will go through the same pain. “If they had handed us the dead body, the family members, his father and his sisters, sometimes could visit his grave,” she says. “In the future, such attacks will happen again but we demand that this practice shouldn’t be repeated with other people.”

But it is already happening. Since the Indian authorities began refusing to hand over bodies in April, local media has reported on at least eight families suffering similar ordeals. Given the remote nature of the area, security clampdowns and curfews, that figure is likely to be higher.

The Indian authorities are now routinely burying people away from their homes sometimes without any funeral.

One rebel fighter known as Wakil Nabi Dar was buried in a government-designated graveyard in Sonamarg, some 120km from his family home in Pulwama, 25km from

To be continued at page 17

17 c r i m e / / k A S H M IR ‘We have to take a stand’: crowds call for justice as protests ignite across the US Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

By: Chris McGreal in Minneapolis and Maanvi Singh Protests over police brutality and the death of George Floyd ignited once again on Friday across the US, as demonstrators clashed with police in Minneapolis, New York and Atlanta.

Gatherings were largely peaceful as people marched in the streets from Los Angeles to New York, but in Atlanta, demonstrators set a police car ablaze and broke windows at CNN’s headquarters. Meanwhile in Washington, the White House went under lockdown orders as protesters gathered outside.

In Minneapolis, where the governor had set an 8pm curfew, tensions were brewing as thousands of demonstrators refused to disperse even as police declared they were unlawfully assembled.

A large crowd was gathered around the 3rd precinct police station, which had been set on fire by crowds on Thursday night after patrol abandoned the building, when police made a stand and gave a warning before firing tear gas into the crowd.

Protests have raged all week in the wake of Floyd’s death, with protesters calling for an end to police brutality and justice for him and other black Americans.

As the protests continue, with more expected this weekend, city officials have called for calm and law enforcement teams are deploying tear gas, rubber bullets, and even drone surveillance against the crowds.

The largest protests so far have been in Minneapolis and St Paul, where officers pinned down Floyd until he became unresponsive.

On Friday morning crowds returned, and many helped clean up the damage to businesses and other buildings across the Twin Cities. A local mental health clinic distributed food to the community, and neighbors offered to keep watch over each other through another night of protests.

Sandra Hilbrands, a primary school teacher in a Black Lives Matter shirt, joined a volun-

teer clean up crew on Friday.

“I’m very privileged,” she said.

“I don’t know what it’s like to be afraid of the cops. I think people are reacting.”

Minnesota’s governor Tim Walz issued an executive order to set a temporary curfew for Minneapolis and St Paul on Friday afternoon, after decreeing a state of emergency and activating the national guard to respond to the protests yesterday. Anyone traveling on public streets or gathering in public places past 8pm could face prison time and $1,000 in fines.

“I need to ask Minnesotans, those in pain and those who feel like justice has not been served yet: you need to help us create the space so that justice will be served,” the governor said. “It is my expectation that it will be swift.”

In downtown Minneapolis, a group of protestors Friday afternoon took a knee in front of state patrol officers and national guard members for nine minutes. Police pinned Floyd down for nearly nine minutes before he became unresponsive and died.

Police officers guard the CNN Center during a protest in Atlanta.View photos Police officers guard the CNN Center during a protest in Atlanta. Photograph: Elijah Unrest across the country A demonstration in Atlanta that started

in Foley Square on Friday, where the mother of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man who died after a white police officer put him in a chokehold, while repeatedly crying out, as Floyd did, “I can’t breathe.”

“They have to stop coming into our neighborhoods and brutalizing, terrorizing, murdering,” said Gwen Carr, Garner’s mother, who wore a mask with “I can’t breathe” printed on the front. “We have to take a stand,” she said. The night before, the New York police made more than 70 arrests and citations, according to the NYPD, charging protesters with assault and resisting arrest. The police presence was heavy as demonstrators marched across the Brooklyn bridge. Hundreds of protestors also gathered at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on Friday evening chanting, “Fuck the police,” and “No justice, no peace.”

“Police violence is one of the biggest health issues in our country,” said Kimberly Sue, a physician who has also been treating coronavirus patients. “Whether it’s Covid or cops it lowers the life expectancy of black people in this country.”

In downtown Houston, hundreds have taken to the streets, marching toward city hall.

In San Jose, California, protestors blocked a major highway.

The protests came as Derek Chauvin, the

peacefully quickly changed tone Friday evening. Protesters used barricades to break police vehicle windshields and jumped from car to car. Hundreds of the protesters confronted police outside CNN headquarters.

They spray-painted the large, iconic CNN logo outside the building, breaking a windowed entrance. One protester climbed on top of the sign and waved a Black Lives Matter flag to cheers from the crowd.

In New York City, hundreds have gathered

former Minneapolis police officer seen kneeling on Floyd’s neck, was charged with third-degree murder in Floyd’s death on Friday, but cities are still bracing for more protests over Floyd’s death and the broader issue of police brutality. Three other officers involved in Floyd’s arrest have not yet been charged.

Denver mayor Michael Hancock called for calm and unity on Friday, following protests the previous night that saw shots fired,

these dead militants and rally behind them.

They don’t want to show people of India and internationally that anything is happening in Kashmir, so ... they are taking an excuse of COVID to implement a policy which they otherwise would have not been able to do.”

to Pakistani newspaper Dawn, appealing to Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi to return the bird to him, saying it was a symbol of peace, not a spy.

Burials. Pigeons. It seems that everything in the disputed region is subject to spin and politicking.

But once the coronavirus pandemic is over, the Indian authorities will be faced with a choice, whether to continue to bury rebel fighters and others killed in government burial grounds or hand them over to their families as before.

Many Kashmiris under Indian administration are not hopeful there will be a reversal, given the Indian government’s recent moves in the region. These moves included revoking the special status given to the area in the Indian constitution that guaranteed special rights, including the autonomy to make laws except on matters that concern foreign policy, defence and communications, and an ongoing curfew that began in August 2019.

Whether it is burials or pigeons or any num-

though no injuries. “Let not the story be about the riots and protests. Let’s keep the focus on the life that was lost,” he said at a news briefing.

Martin Luther King III, the son of the late Martin Luther King Jr has repeatedly evoked his father’s message that “a riot is the language of the unheard”.

“And what is it America has failed to hear?”

King Jr said. “It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met.”

Friday’s demonstrations come on the heels of protests in numerous cities the night before. In Columbus, Ohio, crowds smashed windows at the Ohio Statehouse and storefronts along surrounding downtown streets, and about 400 faced off with the Columbus police on Thursday night, according to the Columbus Dispatch. In Phoenix, protesters who marched from city hall to the state capitol on Thursday night into Friday morning carried signs reading, “Silence is violence” and “Being black should not be a death sentence”, the Arizona Republic reported. And in Louisville, where Breonna Taylor, a black woman, was shot and killed by police officers in March. Taylor’s mother called for an end to violence. On Thursday night, seven people suffered gunshot wounds after shots were fired at the protest.

“Breonna devoted her own life to saving other lives, to helping others, to making people smile and bringing people together,” Taylor’s mother said in a statement on Friday morning. Taylor, a 26-year-old black medical technician who worked at two Louisville hospitals, was shot and killed by police in her own home in an early morning 13 March raid by officers serving a no-knock warrant on a narcotics investigation.

“The last thing she’d want to see right now is any more violence.”

Ankita Rao and agencies contributed reporting Source:ca.finance.yahoo.com/news

Death and ‘spy’ pigeons in Indian-administered Kashmir

Continued from page 16

Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian-administered Kashmir. There was no family funeral for him under the new rules governing the handover of the body, and because he was a rebel fighter, his family was not allowed to go to the government graveyard.

In contrast, fallen Indian soldiers who have died in the fighting are given full military honours and buried with their family members in attendance.

The authorities say they do not want the large gatherings that funerals attract, for fear of the spread of infection.

But human rights groups are sceptical.

“The main issue for the government is that they are very scared of the spectacle which these funerals create,” says human rights activist and chair of the Asian Federation Against Involuntary Disappearances, Khurram Parvez, who spoke to Al Jazeera from Srinagar.

“Thousands of people come out and mourn

The ‘spy’ pigeon

But if death is subject to politics then perhaps it is not surprising that even the humble pigeon is not above suspicion.

On the May 25, a pigeon, perhaps unaware of the de facto border, entered the airspace of Indian-administered Kashmir from Pakistan, causing the Indian media to scream “Spy” because it had been marked with dye and had a ring attached to its legs - a common way for owners to identify their pigeons, and one used the world over. The pigeon was captured by residents who claim it was carrying a coded message.

As of the time of writing, the whereabouts of the pigeon remains unclear. However, a Pakistani villager claims ownership of the alleged feathered James Bond and has spoken

ber of other things, if it happens in Kashmir on either side of the Line of Control it is automatically political.

In an under-reported move on May 27, the Indian authorities extended the ban on 4G mobile internet in Kashmir until June 17.

The authorities say it is to hinder the movements of rebel fighters who rely on the network.

But ordinary Kashmiris speaking to local media say all the ban does is hamper their efforts to control the coronavirus pandemic, the same pandemic the Indian government says is the reason they cannot hand over bodies to their families to bury.

Source: aljazeera.com

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info/food

Windows 7 End Of Life: What You Need To Do Now To Stay Safe you’re on your own, and the Internet can get nasty.

We can help you stay as safe as possible, though.

ow to move on from — or keep living with — Windows 7 A legion of vocal PC enthusiasts swears by Windows 7. Why? Because it stays out of your way, and it just works.

Until today. On January 14, 2020, Microsoft ends Windows 7’s extended support. Windows 7 has reached end of life and the free Microsoft Security Essentials antivirus program will no longer be supported either Your PC will keep operating, of course.

Microsoft isn’t literally pulling the plug on your devices. But Windows 7 won’t receive any more updates or security patches, meaning your PC will also be very vulnerable to all those nasty malware programs garnering headlines seemingly every day. If you keep using Windows 7 — and over a quarter of all computers run it, per NetMarketShare —

thing else.

The bottom line is: Upgrade to Windows 10 ASAP and get a decent antivirus software regardless.

How to survive with Windows 7 (at Saving $20-$40 per year on a decent antivirus program will cost you dearly if you get least for a little while infected with nasty malware that will risk longer...)? your privacy and valuable data.

If you do decide to stick with Windows 7 Your old Windows 7 PC will be like a sitting after Jan. 14, you’ll need to take some pre- duck for every hacker under the sun cautions: (or looming in the darkness), without a - Update everything in the January 2020 proper antivirus program. Jump straight to: Microsoft Patch It’ll be your last chance to make sure Windows and other Microsoft Best PC Antivirus Software software are as secure as possible.

- Uninstall the Microsoft Internet Explorer browser. It’s a huge security hole.

Download Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox instead.

- Ditch Microsoft Office and any of its components, such as Word, Excel or Outlook.

Switch to Google’s office suite or to LibreOffice. For an email client to replace Outlook, try Gmail or Thunderbird.

The Best PC Antivirus 2020 at a Glance: - Turn off Java in your browsers.

- Turn off Adobe Flash Player in your • TotalAV • Norton browsers.

- Install one of the best antivirus programs. • PC Protect Microsoft will stop developing its own an- 1. TotalAV - Free! tivirus software for Windows 7, Microsoft Award-winning antivirus. Trusted by 10 Security Essentials, so you’ll need some- million users around the world.

By: Alicja Siekierska The Canadian government has signed a contract with General Motors Canada to produce 10 million masks, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Tuesday.

“As we speak, GM employees are already making these masks,” Trudeau said at his daily press briefing in Ottawa on Tuesday.

GM said in a statement that the company will be manufacturing the face masks at cost for the Public Health Agency of Canada beginning Tuesday, delivering the equipment to the government over the next year.

Neither GM or the federal government disclosed how much the masks are being purchased for.

The face masks will be produced at the company’s plant in Oshawa, Ont., which has been partially retooled to make personal protective equipment since the COVID-19 pandemic began. The automaker received its license to produce medical equipment on April 22.

“We built and installed the mask making machinery, sourced materials and trained its workers in approximately one month,” GM spokesperson Jennifer Wright said in a statement.

“We are proud to be helping Canadians during this COVID-19 emergency.”

The automaker said 60 employees have been recalled and trained to work two production shifts.

“This important joint initiative between our government and GM demonstrates how Canadian businesses and their employees are answering the call as we face this challenge together,” Anita Anand, the minister of public services and procurement, said in a statement.

“With this agreement, we are making sure Canada’s frontline healthcare workers know there is a steady and reliable domestic supply of this vital equipment.”

The GM contract is part of the Canadian government’s effort to help manufacturers

H

* Ranked #1 Antivirus of 2020 * Multi-level virus protection and outstanding detection rate * Includes VPN, Firewall and many other security enhancements * Download the basic edition for free 2. Norton - From $39.99 Norton is one of the most well-known brands in the competitive antivirus business - and with good reason... * Protect your PC, Mac or mobile device * Won the ‘Best Protection Award’ from AV-TEST * Virus Protection Promise (Money Back Guarantee) * Best Parental Control features 3. PC Protect - From $24.95 This ‘ultimate antivirus’ offers an antivirus engine, real-time protection, firewall, ad blocking, disk cleaning, startup program management, a browser manager and more. * One of the most accurate malware detectors * Received 4.6/5 Trustscore on Trustpilot (from 673 reviews) * Offers tune-up tools for optimizing system performance * Does not hog resources or slow you down, even on an old PC. Source: top10antivirus.

GM signs contract with Ottawa to produce 10 million masks

GM Canada president and managing director, Scott Bell, tours the Oshawa Operations Canadian Mask Making (CMM) room where workers will provide 10 million face masks over the next year to the Public Health Agency of Canada (photo credit: Jessica Hayes) produce medical supplies that help fight the sembly plant into a stamping and after-marspread and impact of the coronavirus. ket parts facility, preserving approximately GM’s Oshawa plant stopped producing ve- 300 jobs. hicles in December 2019, a move that was Download the Yahoo Finance app, available part of a broader restructuring that saw pro for Apple and Android and sign up for the duction halt at five North American facili- Yahoo Finance Canada Weekly Brief. ties. Since then, the U.S. automaker spent Source: ca.finance.yahoo.com $170 million to transform the historic as-

Recipes: Fattoush Salad

Ingredients: by: Rida Aftab

O

ne of my favorite It’s a Fattoush Salad that is made with simple fresh vegetables and toasted pita bread then tossed in a zesty sumac Mediterranean dressing! It’s an authentic recipe I know you’ll love!

Another very popular salad is this traditional Lebanese Tabouli Salad.

It’s a fresh Mediterranean appetizer made with bulgur, parsley, mint and very finely chopped vegetables. Because it doesn’t include lettuce, you can make a large batch and enjoy for

2-3 days without the salad wilting.

And be sure to try the Chicken Shawarma Salad – a salad that is actually a whole meal loaded grilled chicken smothered in shawarma spices and Middle Eastern style vegetables – it’s low-carb, high protein and the perfect meal!

For a salad without any lettuce, try the Mediterranean Couscous Salad or a simple refreshing Tomato Avocado Cucumber Salad made with only 4 ingredients and a lemon olive oil dressing.Source: feelgoodfoodie.net

Mince meat 250 gm ( hand-made) Gram lentil 4 tbsp (soak in water) Potato 1 (boiled) Cumin 1/2 tsp Fennel seeds 1 tsp Whole coriander 1 tsp Green cardamom 2 Whole red chilli 6 Salt 1 tsp Egg 1 Garlic cloves 4 Fresh coriander 2 tbsp Mint leaves 2 tbsp Green chillies 2 Ginger 1 tsp (chopped) All spice powder 1 tsp Oil for frying Cooking Directions

Shami Kabab

In a pan put minced meat, gram lentil soaked ,cumin seeds,fennel seeds,whole coriander,green gardamom, whole red chilli, salt, ginger and garlic cloves,boil on low flame with 2 glass of water.

When all ingredients are tender and the water has been completely absorbed.

Remove from stove, let it cool.

Then add boiled potato in it and chop the mixture in a chopper.

Now add egg, coriander leaves, mint leaves, green chillies and all spices powder, mix well.

Make kebabs and fry 3-4 kababs at a time to a rich brown color, turning them once.

Remove from pan and put them on absorbent kitchen paper to absorb excess oil.

Garnish with green chillies, coriander leaves,sliced onion and lemon.

Serve hot with Pullao,Chapati and Podinay ki Chutney.

Tip: For frying kebabs add enough oil to just cover the surface of fry pan if there is too much oil, the kebabs will split). Source:khanapakana.com/

19

Shawwal 14, 1441H June 5, 2020

womeN

Mental Health

Qualities & Strengths

By: Shabnam Khan, Family Counsellor

. It can be easy to appreciate your strengths your sense of humor, your generosity, or your analytical skills. And it is also easy to get down on yourself for having various personality traits you perceive as weaknesses - maybe you are quick to anger or always running late. Instead of getting down on yourself for your weaknesses, try instead to reframe them as something positive - as traits that make you uniquely you.

• Make a list of all your strengths. Include the big ones that are huge components of your personality, like your patience, all the way down to the small things you are good at. See how many great qualities you contribute to the world!

• Now make a list of all your weaknesses. Write down things you don’t like about your personality or you feel are negative traits.

• Look at your list of weaknesses. Think about ways you could see those weaknesses as positives. For example, say one of your weaknesses is that you think you talk too much. You could reframe this to a positive as, “It’s easy for me to express my opinion.” “I’m too sensitive” could be reframed as, “I have empathy for others.”

Stay true to yourself. To appreciate and accept yourself, it is important to know who you are. It may be helpful to identify your personal values.

Knowing what is important to you and making decisions based on your personal values helps you be authentic and appreciate your true self.

Make sure your values are your own and you are not simply taking on the values of your friends or family. Figure out what is important to you.

• Explore which values are important to you and write them down. A concrete list of your values may help you recognize when you are being inauthentic to yourself and your values.

• You may feel like other people may not like you if they see the “real” you. It may be helpful for you to explore these feelings with

someone you trust or by writing in a journal.

Determine when you feel most yourself and when you feel the need to pretend to be someone else, and explore the differences between those situations.

• If you feel you cannot be yourself around certain friends or family, perhaps because you fear being made fun of, then it may be a sign that you fear rejection about revealing your true self.

• The first step to changing your behavior is noticing when you do it. Pay attention and later, spend some time reflecting on what triggered your behavior in a particular situation.

It may take a while for you to feel comfortable enough to be your authentic self around other people. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you can’t do it right away.

Avoid comparisons. Comparing yourself to others can leave you feeling discouraged and judgmental. Remember, you generally see only a piece of others’ everyday lives (particularly on social media). Comparing yourself to someone will only set you up for disappointment and feeling bad about yourself.

• Measure your growth by comparing yourself to who you were in the past instead.

For example, think about your life 10 years ago.

Has it changed? Have you acquired new skills, new relationships, or left dysfunctional life patterns behind? If you feel you have stagnated, take some steps to make some positive changes in your life.

• You can also look at your life now and imagine what you would like it to look like five or 10 years in the future. Working towards a goal can help you feel your self-worth and in control of your own life.

It’s never too later to start living your own dreams!! info: shabnam@skcounselling.ca

By: Asma Shums, Having solid mental health doesn’t mean that you never go through bad times or experience emotional problems. We all go through disappointments, loss, and change. And while these are normal parts of life, they can still cause sadness, anxiety, and stress. But just as physically healthy people are better able to bounce back from illness or injury, people with strong mental health are better able to bounce back from adversity, trauma, and stress.It’s important to take care of yourself and get the most from life.Talking about your feelings can help you stay in good mental health and deal with times when you feel troubled. Regular exercise can boost your self-esteem and can help you concentrate, sleep, and feel better. Exercise keeps the brain and your other vital organs healthy, and is also a significant benefit towards improving your mental health.Your

brain needs a mix of nutrients in order to stay healthy and function well, just like the other organs in your body. A diet that’s good for your physical health is also good for your mental health.

There’s nothing better than catching up with someone face to face, but that’s not always possible. You can also give them a call, drop them a note, or chat to them online instead.

Keep the lines of communication open: it’s good for you!None of us are superhuman. We all sometimes get tired or overwhelmed by how we feel or when things don’t go to plan.

If things are getting too much for you and you feel you can’t cope, ask for help. Your family or friends may be able to offer practical help or a listening ear. A change of scene or a change of pace is good for your mental health.It could be a five-minute pause from cleaning your kitchen, a half-hour lunch break at work, or a weekend exploring somewhere new. A few minutes can be enough to de-stress you. Give yourself some ‘me time’. info at: asmashums@gmail.com

Joke:

1) Im not adding this year 2020 to my age as I did not use it.

2) Doctor: How did you fall into the gutter?

Patient: What can I say doctor....

There was a manhole, without a lid I Mistook it for a social distancing circle.

Alumnus wants UBC to push for jailed grad’s release from Saudi prison

The Three Rs

N By: Khadija Nadeem Gr 8 Have you ever heard of the three Rs? Well this is something I learned about when I was in grade 3. Each R stands for something meaningful that works for the benefit of our environment. The first R stands for reduce.

Reducing means to cut back on our use of things such as plastic wrappers, containers and other single use items. If we do this, we can decrease the amount of garbage that goes in to landfills. The second R stands for reuse.

Reusing is when one uses items repeatedly

to reduce pollution. For example, if we wash plastic spoons, forks and knives, we can simply reuse them. The last R stands for recycle.

Recycling is what we do to turn one item into something different. When we throw paper in to recycling bins at school, they go to recycling plants where it is turned to reusable paper. As you can tell the three Rs are very useful. The result of using this concept s a better, safer and greener environment.

BY SRUSHTI GANGDEV early two years after a UBC graduate was locked up in a Saudi prison for defying the country’s ban on women driving, one of her peers is asking why her alma mater isn’t more involved in seeking her freedom.

Loujain al-Hathloul remains in prison even after women won the right to drive in 2018.

She was arrested after driving into the kingdom of Saudi Arabia to protest the ban.

Since then, she’s allegedly been violently tortured and sexually harassed while in custody.

Fellow UBC grad Dalya al-Masri says the school encourages its students to be global citizens and it should be advocating for alHathloul, one of its prominent alumni.

UBC grad detained in Saudi Arabia UBC grad detained in Saudi Arabia “UBC, now, they have the opportunity to put more pressure,” said al-Masri.

“Maybe as an institution they don’t have as much [influence] as the Canadian government but I think that the Canadian government also needs to put on more pressure

and I just think maybe the case would have been different.”

When news broke in May 2018 of al-Hathloul’s arrest, UBC president Santa Ono wrote to then-Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland asking the government to work for her release.

UBC told Global News on Wednesday that al-Hathloul’s arrest is inconsistent with the Saudi government’s commitment to create a more open and tolerant society.

“Loujain Al-Hathloul is the embodiment of UBC’s commitment to free speech, equality, empowerment and education, and global citizenship. Her courageous and selfless work advocating for human rights in Saudi Arabia has come at a significant personal cost,” said spokesperson Kurt Heinrich in an email.

But it said it remains important for the university to be aware of diplomatic tensions between Canada and that country, and it wants to be careful that it’s external relations don’t impact her safety.

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health

Vancouver man becomes first plasma donor for Canadian COVID-19 treatment trial

A

By Craig Takeuchi national clinical trial to test a possible treatment for the novel coronavirus, using plasma from people who have recovered from COVID-19, received its first donation.

Canadian Blood Services (CBS) announced on April 29 that received its first COVID-19 convalescent plasma donation from a donor in Vancouver, Jerry Glubisz, who has been an active blood donor for 15 years.

CBS is recruiting convalescent plasma donors for a new national convalescent plasma collection program and has launched an online registry. (Plasma is the liquid part of the blood that contains proteins, including antibodies which fight infections. After recovery, people produce large amounts of antibodies.)

After requisite testing and processing, all donations will be provided to Canadian physicians who have COVID-19 patients participating in the CONCOR-1 clinical trial, which will test convalescent plasma as a treatment for the coronavirus, and under authorization from Health Canada.

Additional testing will be conducted to ensure there are adequate antibodies against the COVID-19 virus in the donor’s plasma to be part of the trial.

Hemorrhoids are varicosities of

The CONCOR-1 clinical trial involve Canadian Blood Services and HémaQuébec, 10 research teams, and over 50 hospitals across Canada.

“Convalescent plasma may help patients recover from COVID-19, but this has not yet been proven,” CBS chief scientist Dr. Dana Devine explained in a news release.

“Well-designed clinical trials, like CONCOR, will help provide the necessary information about whether this is a safe and effective treatment option for patients.”

Plasma transfusions, in which randomly chosen patients will receive 500 millilitres of convalescent plasma transfusions, are expected to begin in a few weeks.

Convalescent plasma donors must meet

Queer male blood donors

Hemorrhoids

the veins around the dentate line of the anal canal. Of all the anorectal disorders, hemorrhoids has the highest rate of occurrence and is commonly believed to be caused by: 1. Anatomical reason 2. Chronic constipation 3. Pregnancy, tumor in the pelvic region, enlarged prostate glands 4. Infection, excessive hot and spicy food, alcoholism, inflammation in the rectal region

Hemorrhoids can be classified based on their location into:

1. Internal: inflamed and swollen veins above the dentate line at the rectum, and commonly called primary hemorrhoids. Major symptoms are bright red blood covered stools, the gradually growing hemorrhoids will be eventually pushed outside the anus and may stay prolapsed. Internal hemorrhoids can be pathologically classified into three types: varicose vein, inflamed artery and fibrosis.

2. Depending on the condition it can be graded into: – Grade I – bleeding upon defecation and no prolapse; – Grade II – prolapsed upon defecation but can be pushed back into the anus; – Grade III – hemorrhoids stay prolapsed.

3. External: inflamed and swollen veins below the dentate line at the rectum or skin growth (cutaneous skin tag) at the anus region. Major symptoms are difficulty in cleaning the anus region after bowel movement, pain arising from inflamed veins or blood clots at these veins. External hemorrhoids can be classified into four types: scarring, varicose veins, blood clot, inflammatory.

4. Combined: varicose veins both above and below the dentate line, and frequently the internal and external hemorrhoids are connected together. Major symptoms are bright red blood covered stools, prolapsed hemorrhoids, difficulty in cleaning the anus region after bowel movement, itchiness, mucous discharge, in serious cases there may be

current plasma donor eligibility criteria, be younger than 67 years old, have been previously confirmed positive for COVID-19 by a laboratory test, have been fully recovered from the virus and symptomfree a minimum of 28 days to participate, and live within driving distance of a donor centre.

There are 11 CBS centres across Canada in Calgary, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Regina, Winnipeg, London, Hamilton, Toronto, Ottawa, and Halifax, but walk-in donations are not being accepted during the pandemic. Registered convalescent donors who qualify will be contacted.

CBS’ policy regarding blood donations from men who have sex with men (MSM) has been the subject of controversy.

Queer men and other MSM have not been allowed to donate blood if they had sex with another man for the past three months, regardless of whether they are in a monogamous relationship or not.

The deferral period had previously been reduced from one year, which became effective in June 2019.

Advocates and activists call the policy discriminatory and based on stereotyping, and are calling for behaviour-based screening to replace identity-based policies.

As countries have been facing bloodsupply shortages during the COVID-19 pandemic, some countries have changed their regulations for donations from queer men.

Australia announced on April 17 that it will be reducing its wait period to three months and Northern Ireland announced on April 29 that it will reduce restrictions on queer male donors to match standards in the U.K. The U.S. also reduced its wait time on April 2, matching policies in Canada and the U.K. Source: straight.com/covid-19-pandemic

severe pain caused by the prolapsed and inflamed hemorrhoids.

Why are Hemorrhoid Conditions Common among Females?

There is a Chinese saying that nine out of ten men have hemorrhoids but in reality, same is also true of women.

The reasons for this are: 1. Anatomical: women’s colon is subjected to the pressure exerted by the uterus inside the pelvic cavity and is longer than that of men’s, as a result feces take long time to get to the rectum; such condition can easily lead to constipation and consequently hemorrhoids.

2. Pregnancy: the fetus exerts pressure on the colon and rectum, restraining the return of blood from the veins leading to varicosis and consequently hemorrhoids.

3. Menstruation and leucorrhea: the discharge irritates the region around the anus, which may result in chronic inflammation, followed by abnormal skin tissue growth, eventually developing into hemorrhoids or anal eczema.

4. Childbirth: during the childbirth process, different level of laceration of the pudendum may occur resulting in swelling and inflammation of the anus

prior to entering old age or before any signs of cardiovascular, neurological diseases appearing will make it easier for senior people to maintain a healthier life. Disease prevention is obviously a better choice and to avoid having hemorrhoids, older people should pay attention to the following: 1. Maintain regular routine on diet, sleep, exercise, rest and entertainment, and keep the body in a healthy condition.

2. Have a nutritional diet that provides high protein, multi-vitamins, low fat, low cholesterol, low salt, low sugar; have meals at regular times, in constant quantities, neither too hot or too cold and easy to digest.

3. Exercise at an appropriate intensity level on a consistent basis, avoid being vigorous and being excessive.

4. Prevent disease and when sick, seek medical treatment as early as possible, pay attention to body conditions and with accompanying pain, and develophave periodic medical checkup so that ing into external hemorrhoids. problems can be dealt with at an early 5. Postnatal condition: following childstage. birth, women may feel emptiness and weakness in the abdomen, with de- Constipation and Hemorrhoids creased sensation on the urge for bowel Constipation is a common symptom of movement. The lack of physical activity the hemorrhoids patient. Around 50% of is also making it difficult for them to the senior people suffer from constipation. make bowel movement, as a result feces Constipation is not only a cause of anorecwill remain in the colon for longer pe- tal diseases like hemorrhoids and fistula, it riod leading to dry and harder stools, may also lead to other diseases or worsening with the possibility of injuring the anus them. when straining bowel movement and Constipation can have three different developing anal fissure. meanings: How Do Senior People Prevent Hem- • infrequent bowel movements (less than orrhoids and Choose Treatment Meththree times per week): moisture and toxins will be absorbed by the body; ods? decreased elasticity of the anal venous Generally senior people have weaker physivessels leading to blood stasis cal conditions and many have cardiovas• difficult bowel movement, not smooth, cular and/or neurological disorders, with with feeling of incomplete evacuation diminishing functional capacity and lower • dry and hard stools: with tendency of self-healing capabilities in response to exstraining on bowel movement thereby ternal stimulations. Under these conditions, injuring the anal muscle, leading to insurgical operation to treat the anorectal flammation and abscess, increasing the diseases will carry higher risk whereas our extent of blood stasis treatment therapy using external application Chronic constipation may cause more serious of our “Ba Zhi San” powder is a completely complications like intestinal obstruction. safe option.

Source: vannatcm.com People generally feel that a thorough treatment to take care of the anorectal problems

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‘Like a bad dream’: Sister convinced online romance scam took more than her brother’s savings David Molko By:David Molko Senior Reporter, CTV News Vancouver SURREY, B.C. -- Barb Smith and her brother, Roger, had finally reconnected after years of distance.

“He loved to make people laugh,” Smith said. “He had a real big, kind heart.”

But before she could make the trip from Vancouver Island to visit him at home in Surrey, a police officer knocked on her door.

Roger Smith, 60, had been found dead in his apartment.

“I thought it was some kind of joke,” Barb Smith remembered about that day in late February. But it was merely the first of many moments in what Smith has since called a “bad dream,” a nightmare she feels she can’t wake up from.

A marriage ended, an online girlfriend At the Vancouver blind company where Roger Smith worked for over 30 years, his former boss, Duncan Porter, called him both reliable and loyal.

“He was in every morning. He’d stay late every day,” Porter said. “Every time you’d need some overtime done, he would work the overtime.”

But over the last couple of years, Porter said, he noticed that the normally chatty Smith had started to grow a little more withdrawn.

Smith’s third marriage had ended. His sister described him as “heartbroken.”

And sometime after, Porter became aware that Smith had met someone online.

Her name was “Amanda,” Porter said. She was going to be flying up from Los Angeles for a visit, and she had sent photos.

As soon as Porter saw the pictures of a woman he described as a “very attractive, very racy 24-year-old,” he knew it didn’t make sense.“(Roger) had sent her some money for a plane ticket, and it was always getting delayed and delayed and delayed.

And I just said, ‘Roger, it’s not real.’”

Smith’s sister said she first became aware of the online romance last December.

“Apparently she was a geologist and she knew all about stones,” Barb Smith said, adding that her brother painted and made jewelry. “And she was coming with money, $150,000 to invest in his business.”

Smith said she thought it was “wonderful,” until she saw the photo of a woman she described as a “hot young babe.”

“I didn’t know what to do,” she said. “I believe I said something to him like, are you sure it’s legit?”

CTV News found the photos Roger Smith had of “Amanda” were of a U.S. porn star who goes by the name Raven Riley.

Her photos and her name are plastered across internet scam warning sites. Discovery leaves sister ‘completely devastated’ When Barb Smith entered her brother’s home for the first time after his death in February, she immediately knew something was off. He had left a light blue journal on the kitchen counter with account numbers and passwords, and a troubling message: “I’m sorry, this is the only way out of my mess,” it read in part. “I cannot live like this anymore.” It got worse. “We opened his tablet, started scrolling through, and were horrified,” Smith recalled.

First were the photos: Dozens of photos of at least four young women, many explicit, several holding signs with messages that read “I love you Roger.”

Then came the Google chat messages: at least four online conversations with thousands upon thousands of messages, dating back to 2017.

And finally, the videos of himself that Roger Smith had recorded and sent via the messaging service the week before he died.

In one, timestamped Feb. 18, Smith, speaking to an “Amanda” and “Rachel” says he has nothing to live on, and can’t even pay the trustees for bankruptcy, because they, meaning Amanda and Rachel, had taken all his money.

At the end of that video, he says he intends to take his own life. “I was completely devastated,” Barb Smith recalled. “The humiliation and the shame and the hurt he must have felt.”

Dozens upon dozens of used iTunes and prepaid Vanilla cards, and a stack of moneygrams, also dating back to 2017.

Some were rubber banded together in groups. Roger Smith, it appears, was meticulous with his accounting.

Together, the gift cards totalled $8,000, and the money grams $25,481.28.

And Barb Smith is sure there were more. “(Roger) had a line of credit of $70,000,” she said. “And that was gone.”

‘How do you convince someone it’s a lie?’

As Barb Smith and her daughter, Daina, began reading through the moneygrams and the messages, an overwhelming and troubling picture came into focus.

Smith said the trail showed her brother had sent money to at least 20 different people, some of them men. “I was in disbelief. I mean it’s so bizarre. My brother is an intelligent man,” Smith recalled, as she tried to reason her way through it.

And Roger Smith’s Google chat messages seemed to follow a similar pattern over the weeks and months.

No matter who was on the other end, they began with romantic and sometimes explicit exchanges, and were followed by an ask for money. It appears as early as November 2018, Smith was already voicing his doubts.

“Why am I being so generous with stuff I don’t have?” Smith wrote in chat with “Amanda Philip,” who said she was from California.

And three days later: “Do you really love me, or am I just a sugar daddy?”

Amanda’s response: “I really love you so much.”

By February 2020, the week before his death, the exchange had changed to one of resignation.

Smith: “You will not come (to Vancouver) let’s face it. Just wishful thinking.”

Amanda Philip: “I will come honey. That my home.”

Smith: “Reality is that you won’t, and I’m out of money to live on.”

Barb Smith was heartbroken.

“I don’t understand why he wouldn’t have reached out for help,” she said. “I’d have been there in a heartbeat.”

Smith’s manager, Duncan Porter, said he doesn’t know what else he could or should have done.

“How do you convince someone that this is fake, it’s a lie?” he said.

He’s not the only one Roger Smith’s story is unfortunately familiar to Jeff Thomson, Senior RCMP Intelligence Analyst with the Canadian AntiFraud Centre (CAFC), which tracks and traces scams, and maintains a database with reports from Canadians.

When ranked by dollar loss, romance scams are the number two fraud affecting Canadians.

In 2019, the CAFC tallied up 975 reports, 682 victims, and over $18 million in losses nationwide.

And fraud is vastly under-reported, Thomson said, with less than five per cent of victims coming forward to the CAFC. When asked if it would be an exaggeration to say hundreds of millions of dollars were lost by British Columbians to romance scams every year, he said: “No.” “It’s not just a financial loss,” Thomson said. “They’re devastating emotionally and psychologically for the victims.”

And often times, there are sophisticated international criminal organizations behind the scams, as a W5 investigation uncovered last year after the suicide of a Delta woman.

“It’s important for the Smiths to know that he’s not the only person this has happened to,” Thomson said.

“We really want to get people talking about fraud and to reduce the stigma…the fear, the shame, the embarrassment,” he added.

And the number one thing people who are victims of suspected fraud can do, Thomas said: report it.

“If we can get one phone number shut down, and it stops 10 people from falling victim, then we’d have an effect on the fraudsters.”

Waiting for answers Three months after her brother’s death, Barb Smith is still waiting for the official coroner’s report.

She wishes she could afford a private investigator who could look through the paper and electronic trails, and who could trace them back to a suspect.

And she is still hoping police will investigate.

“These people are very tricky and hard to catch,” Smith said. “It’s probably a very slim chance. But it’s worth a try.”

Source: bc.ctvnews.ca/

Continued from page 5

Not all force majeure clauses are created equal. Contracts often list examples of what kinds of cataclysmic events might count as force majeure: fires, floods or war. But if “pandemic” isn’t listed, then it’s up to legal interpretation as to whether or not these current circumstances apply.

“It really does come down to the language,” Lam said.

In most contracts, she said, the language around force majeure is broad enough that the pandemic should be considered. But Lam said she’s seen a few rare examples of “very old” contracts with restrictive definitions in which COVID-19 may not apply.

“Maybe in light of current events, people will be revisiting how broadly those provisions are construed. But I don’t think because it’s not listed, you’re necessarily precluded. It really does come down to the agreement.”

Nikki Rudachyk, a Saskatoon-based partner at McKercher LLP, said it’s “pretty rare” to see pandemics listed as an example of a force majeure in Canada. But in the aftermath of COVID-19, she expects Canadian courts will begin to consider the issue more broadly.

“Over the next five to 10 years, we’re going to see a development of where force majeure clauses are going to go, and where it’s going

to tie into pandemics. And then we’ll know exactly what to do next pandemic,” she said.

But it’s unlikely that Canadian courts will ever offer their own list of events that qualify for force majeure, Rudachyk said, because courts have no way of knowing what the next major disruptive global event could be.

“They have to leave flexibility for what we can’t even contemplate,” she said.

So far Rudachyk said she’s seen businesses acting “pretty reasonably” and avoiding legal battles over the finer wording of their contracts.

“I’m seeing most companies, hotels and banquet facilities giving refunds. I’ve seen negotiations where things will be extended for another year … they’re pushing the deposit into the future.”

Large events, such as music festivals or corporate events, are among the more common examples of where force majeure clauses may apply, Lam said. Offering a bit more flexibility on meeting contractual obligations is something she said she’s encouraging her clients to do.

“People are more interested in preserving their relationships with each other than they are in enforcing their strict legal rights. And believe it or not, even as a litigator, I encourage that,” she said. “That makes good sense,

not just commercially, but at a human level.”

Lam pointed out that, even if a force majeuere clause is invoked, it doesn’t always mean that a contract automatically becomes null and void. In some cases, the terms of the contract may change. For example, a company that promised to fulfil a delivery by a certain date may be given an extension.

Even so, the longer the pandemic plays out, Lam said she expects to see more organizations and individuals take a closer look at what leverage their contracts may provide.

Do I expect more people to pay attention and invoke force majeure? Yeah, I do think so. It’s a concept that few people really thought about before the pandemic.”

Source: ctvnews.ca

Is the pandemic an ‘act of God’? Legally, it depends

These days, lawyers across Canada are closely analyzing force majeure clauses as physical distancing measures force hotels to cancel conferences, wedding venues to delay nuptials and many businesses find themselves unable to fulfil orders they promised.

In April, the Canadian Transportation Agency said exceptions within force majeure clauses may affect travellers’ ability to receive refunds from airlines forced to cancel flights. In the NBA, a force majeure clause between players and the league means that players could lose one per cent of their salaries for each regular season game that isn’t played.

Miranda Lam, a Vancouver-based partner with law firm McCarthy Tetrault, said force majeure is a trendy topic nowadays, even if it may have only been covered “for 10 minutes” in her first year of law school.

She said it’s important to understand that these clauses aren’t a “get out of jail free card” for anyone with a contract.

“People think it’s something that they can just invoke. But if it’s not in the contract, it’s not a right you have,” she explained in a phone interview with CTVNews.ca on Wednesday.

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Top 50 Most Viewed YouTube Channels Worldwide • Week Of 5/25/2020

Top Gainers

D

uring a week when Muslims celebrated the feast of Eid al-Fitr, many viewers visited YouTube to watch a show regarded as one of the most popular offerings in the Islamic world. That show is known as Diriliş: Ertuğrul in its native Turkish, but it was the Urdu version of the historical epic, titled Ertugrul Ghazi, that made the biggest splash on YouTube this week. (The English translation of the title is Resurrec-

tion: Ertuğrul.)

Ertugrul Ghazi follows the titular Ertugrul, who was the father of Osman I, the founder of the Ottoman Empire. The show, set in the 13th century, has been likened to Game of Thrones and has become quite popular among Islamic viewers, particularly in the Middle East and South Asia. A month ago, Turkish public broadcaster TRT began posting full episodes of Ertugrul Ghazi on a new channel. The uploads have been extremely popular, with the first episode receiving close to 40 million views in its first month on YouTube.

The week, viewership on the TRT Ertugrul

by PTV channel jumped by 17%, allowing it to rise from 49th place in our charts up to 33rd. In total, the Ertugrul Ghazi episodes (along with a few adjacent videos) scooped

up 136.7 million weekly views on their Urdu-language home.

TRT has bigger goals in mind for its TRT Ertugrul by PTV channel. It would like to set an #ErtugrulYouTubeRecord by receiving more subscriptions in a month than any other channel. Right now, it has 4.07 million subscribers, so it still has a ways to go before it surpasses the record-high total of 6.6 million subscribers in a month.

Here’s a breakdown of the Top 50 Most Viewed channels this week in terms of their countries of origin: United States: 14 channels in the Top 50.

India: 12 channels in the Top 50.

South Korea: 3 channels in the Top 50.

Argentina, Canada, The Philippines, Russia, United Arab Emirates, and the United

Kingdom: 2 channels each in the Top 50.

Brazil, Jordan, Mexico, South Korea, Netherlands, Pakistan, Puerto Rico, Romania, Thailand, and Turkey: 1 channel each in the Top 50. Source: www.tubefilter.com

was deployed in and outside the high court while barricades were also erected in the surrounding area apparently to stop political workers from reaching the court.

A large number of PML-N workers already gathered at the LHC while Shahbaz arrived around 12pm to attend proceedings of his bail petition before a two-judge bench.

Senior leaders of the party including Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, Ahsan Iqbal, Rana Sanaullah, Khwaja Saad Rafiq, Tariq Fazal Ch, Marriyum Aurangzeb and Azma Bokhari also reached the court before the hearing.

Officials searching for the PML-N president stopped the car of the party’s provincial president Rana Sanaullah after they suspected the leader of the opposition was also present in the vehicle.

The courtroom was packed to its capacity

when the bench commenced hearing of the bail petition. The security personnel failed to enforce Covid-19 pandemic SOPs including social distancing inside the courtroom.

“Where is the petitioner?” Justice Muhammad Tariq Abbasi, who headed the bench, asked the lawyers standing behind the rostrum. Advocate Azam Nazir Tarar told the bench that Shahbaz was present in the court.

He said his client was a cancer patient. Justice Abbasi asked the counsel whether the petitioner had apprehension of his arrest by the NAB. With an answer in affirmative, the counsel said the NAB had also arrested the petitioner on Oct 5, 2018 in the Punjab Ashiana-i-Iqbal Housing Scheme when he appeared before the investigators in the Saaf Pani Company case. He said the bureau kept the petitioner in its custody for 63 days and also caused his arrest in another case of Ramzan Sugar Mills while failing to establish any charge against him. He said the NAB once again wanted to arrest the petitioner.

The judge asked NAB Special Prosecutor Faisal Bokhari whether the prosecution will

say something or act like a silent spectator.

He said the NAB will oppose the bail petition. Shahbaz’s lawyers claimed that even though he was summoned by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) on June 2, warrants were dated May 28, implying that the anti-corruption watchdog had already decided to arrest him. Justice Abbasi questioned the delayed attempt of the NAB to arrest the petitioner. “It seems that the NAB does not want to arrest the petitioner,” the judge expressed his wonder.

The bench allowed the pre-arrest interim bail to Shahbaz, restraining the NAB from arresting him till June 17. It also issued a notice to the NAB for submission of a detailed reply.

Shahbaz was ordered to furnish bail bonds of Rs 500,000 with the deputy registrar (judicial) of the high court.

Meanwhile the National Accountability Bureau, Lahore, on Wednesday again summoned Opposition Leader Shahbaz Sharif on June 9 in an investigation related to alleged money-laundering and assets beyond means. Source: thenews.com.pk

trolled by Tehran. There’s a narrative that, for example, striking Houthi targets is, in fact, striking at Iran.”

Both countries face immense pressures at home. They each have youthful populations that are demanding a greater say in politics, while biting sanctions have hit Iran’s economy hard and fluctuating oil prices are doing the same for Saudi Arabia.

A continuation of the Cold War The rivalry is further complicated by Western states’ tactical support of Saudi Arabia (as long as their interests align) and Russia’s support for Iran (albeit not unconditionally and subject to change depending on the in-

terests of Moscow).

In many ways, the Cold War between the West and the former Soviet Union never ended - it simply moved from Europe to the Middle East. Today’s front-line states are no longer led by political stances but religious ideology.

Saudi Arabia and Iran wrap themselves in the righteousness of faith, but at the centre is the naked ambition of survival, influence and what it means to be a, or perhaps the most, powerful Muslim state.

Source: aljazeera.com

Channel Distribution

LHC grants pre-arrest bail to Shahbaz till June 17th

LAHORE: The Lahore High Court on Wednesday granted interim pre-arrest bail to Leader of Opposition in National Assembly Shahbaz Sharif and barred the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) from arresting him till June 17 in an investigation of assets beyond means.On Tuesday, a team of the NAB had raided the Model Town residence of Shahbaz to arrest him after he did not appear before a combined investigation team of the bureau. The raiding team, however, was unable to trace him and returned empty-handed. A heavy contingent of police

Analysis: How Saudi Arabia and Iran became rivals?

Continued from page 14

There is some truth to those words. After Saddam Hussein was overthrown in 2003, the Iranians wasted no time in making things difficult for the US-led occupation and in cementing its own political influence.

In 2014, when the ISIL (ISIS) group took control of large parts of Iraq, it was Iranbacked armed groups that helped to defeat it, while the US backed the Iraqi armed forces in achieving the same goal. In effect, Iran and the US fought on the same side, despite the bitter relationship between them.

Saudi Arabia has only recently begun a diplomatic relationship with Iraq, reopening a consulate there in 2019 for the first time in 30 years and signing several trade agreements. Still, the kingdom seems to be happy to let the US take the lead and represent its interests, while being a tempering influence on Iran.

The US, for its part, is clear that the destabilisation of Iraq is off the cards, and that

seems to have kept both Iran and Saudi Arabia in check.

Saudi and Iran in Yemen

Where it gets further complicated is in Yemen.

Alarmed by the rise of the Houthis in 2011, Saudi Arabia decided it was Iran that was backing the group on its borders. In 2015, a Saudi-led air bombing campaign backed by some Sunni states and the US, the United Kingdom and France began. It was supposed to last a few weeks. It continues to this day.

For Saudi Arabia, it is clear that Iran has a hand in that conflict.

Iranian influence has become a clear talking point, according to Leber.

“Iran’s ability to influence non-state actors and governments in the region is a primary concern for the Saudis I talk to and for the Saudi leadership as well,” he explained.

“There’s a sense that they’re encircled by [Iranian influence] in these surrounding countries and a sense that the militias, regardless of what they publicly say, are con-

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15, 26, Coronavirus Cases:

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Pakistan Last updated: June 5, 2020, @ 06:34 GMT