CFR Daily News Brief - October 6, 2023 Jailed Iranian Women’s Rights Activist Wins Nobel Peace Prize and more...

 

Daily News Brief October 6, 2023

Top of the Agenda Jailed Iranian Women’s Rights Activist Wins Nobel Peace Prize The prize for Narges Mohammadi, who has campaigned for a more free and equal Iran for decades and is currently held in the country’s Evin prison, also recognizes (NYT) the hundreds of thousands of people who have demonstrated against Iran’s discriminatory policies targeting women, the Nobel Committee said. The award comes roughly one year after the start of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement; as protesters marked the anniversary in recent days, Iranian security forces have detained hundreds of people (RFE/RL), according to a human rights group.  In addition to women’s rights activism, Mohammadi has also long campaigned against the death penalty (AP) and been imprisoned thirteen times, the head of the Nobel Committee said. In a written statement, Mohammadi said she hopes the recognition “makes Iranians protesting for change stronger and more organized.”

Analysis “I think [the award] will generate global solidarity, it will generate sympathy, and it would raise the cost for keeping someone so high-profile in prison,” the Center for International Policy’s Negar Mortazavi tells Democracy Now. “The attempt is to try to silence people and to try to sentence and pressure them in the dark without much attention.” “[Iran’s nationwide protests] constitute the most widespread and sustained challenge to the Islamic Republic in decades,” the International Crisis Group’s Ali Vaez wrote for Foreign Affairs in February. “A revolution has already happened in the minds of the Iranian people.”

Pacific Rim Australia to Allow Generative AI In Schools Starting Next Year Education ministers approved the implementation (The Guardian) of artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT in classrooms at a meeting yesterday. A full framework is expected to be released in the coming weeks.   This episode of the Why It Matters podcast looks at the potential role of AI in the world.  China/Kenya: Kenya will seek a $1 billion loan (Reuters) from China to complete road construction, Kenyan President William Ruto’s deputy said. Ruto criticized his country’s lending from China during his campaign last year.

South and Central Asia Myanmar’s Top Court Rejects Appeals by Former Civilian Leader The Supreme Court rejected Aung San Suu Kyi’s efforts (Bloomberg) to reverse her convictions in six corruption cases after her legal team tried to appeal them at a lower court.    India: Heavy rains caused a lake to overflow in northern India, washing out roads, bridges, and a major hydropower dam, and killing at least nineteen people (CNN), state officials said. More than one hundred people are still missing. This article by CFR’s Noah Berman and Sabine Baumgartner looks at the effects of a season of extreme weather.

Middle East and North Africa Drone Strike on Graduation Ceremony in Syria Kills At Least Eighty-Nine People No group immediately claimed responsibility (BBC) for the attack at a military academy in the city of Homs. The Syrian military blamed the strike on “terrorist groups backed by known international forces.”

Preparing for the Next Pandemic With a diminishing window of opportunity for enhancing pandemic preparedness, Yanzhong Huang and Rebecca Katz highlight three emerging global health priorities in a new Council Special Report. Read the report

Sub-Saharan Africa USAID Resumes Food Aid to Ethiopia Ethiopia recently strengthened its monitoring of food delivery, an unnamed U.S. official told Reuters, prompting the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) to resume its aid. Reports of food aid being stolen by government officials led donors including the United States to suspend aid earlier this year. Zimbabwe: The government is limiting numbers of people (AP) gathering at funerals and other social events in parts of the country after it recorded one hundred deaths that are suspected to have been caused by cholera.

Europe Deadliest Russian Strike This Year Kills Fifty-One in Ukraine’s Kharkiv Region A Russian missile hit an area where residents had gathered (FT) following a funeral, Ukraine’s interior minister said. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called the attack a “completely deliberate act of terrorism.”   Russia: President Vladimir Putin said that Russia has successfully tested a nuclear-capable cruise missile and that Russia’s legislature might revoke its ratification (The Guardian) of a ban on nuclear testing. Russia has not carried out nuclear testing in more than three decades. This In Brief by CFR’s Jonathan Masters and Will Merrow maps nuclear weapons across Europe.

Americas Countrywide Demonstrations Call for Peaceful Transfer of Power in Guatemala Tens of thousands of people demonstrated across the country (Reuters) for the fourth consecutive day yesterday in support of President-Elect Bernardo Arévalo de León. Arévalo’s party has faced legal attacks from the country’s Attorney General’s office that he says are politically motivated.   Haiti/Kenya: Kenyan opposition lawmakers called for Parliament to hold a vote (AP) before moving forward with plans to lead a UN-backed stabilization mission in Haiti.

United States U.S. To Resume Deportation Flights to Venezuela The deportations aim to serve as a consequence (AP) for unauthorized northward migration, U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro N. Mayorkas said. Venezuelans were the largest group encountered at the U.S.-Mexico border last month. Separately, the Biden administration has increased legal pathways for migrants to come to the United States.

Friday Editor’s Pick With Australians voting next week on whether to recognize Indigenous people in the constitution, Indigenous communities express to Reuters how they seek to be better heard by the government.

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