Collapsing Coalition

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff's (above) ruling coalition collapsed Tuesday when her main partner went into opposition, leaving the embattled president increasingly helpless in her fight against impeachment.

The PMDB, the country's largest party, voted to end its alliance with Rousseff's leftist Workers' Party, or PT, with immediate effect.

"From today, at this historic meeting of the PMDB, the PMDB withdraws from the government of President Rousseff," said Senator Romero Juca, the party vice president.

The meeting, broadcast live on national television, was the culmination of a long divorce with Rousseff that leaves Brazil's first female president grasping at straws as she tries to stay in power.

The vote and announcement took no more than three minutes and was accompanied by singing of the national anthem and shouts of "PT out!"

Senator Aecio Neves, who heads the PSDB opposition party and who narrowly lost to Rousseff when she won re-election in 2014, commented: "Dilma's government is finished."

"The exit of the PMDB is the last nail in the coffin," he said.

Rousseff, who is fighting recession, street protests, a mammoth corruption scandal, and the push in Congress for her impeachment, had met PMDB ministers Monday to try to convince them to stay.

But already on Monday, Tourism Minister Henrique Alves resigned, saying time had "run out" on the president.

The mostly centrist PMDB has long been an awkward partner for the Workers' Party.

But its votes in Congress, where it has 69 of the 513 lower house seats, would have been important to Rousseff in her bid to avoid impeachment, which requires two thirds of the votes in the lower house to pass.

Rousseff also fears that the PMDB's exit will encourage other coalition partners to jump ship.

Lawmakers from both the center-right Progressive Party, which has 49 deputies, and the center-left Social Democratic Party, which has 32, said their parties would meet this week on a possible split.  Read more: 

Ahead Full On...

Amnesty for Prisoners

Venezuela's opposition-led legislature approved an amnesty bill for political prisoners, setting up an epic political clash with embattled President Nicolas Maduro, who opposes the move.

National Assembly speaker Henry Ramos Allup said the measure passed after a second round of debate, sparking opposition lawmaker chants of "Freedom!" even as the president's socialist party's minority lawmakers voiced disgust.

"This law is aimed at laying the foundations for national reconciliation," said lawmaker Delsa Solorzano, who sponsored the legislation.

The measure demands the release of some 76 political prisoners, and hundreds of people "persecuted and exiled" due to their opposition to the leftist government in power for the past 17 years, she said.

Maduro quickly took a combative stance, broadcasting a speech on national television while the debate was under way.

"You can be certain that that law will not be making it through here, sir. Laws that are out to benefit terrorists and criminals, they will not make it to enactment. No matter what you do," the president said.

Legal experts say the opposition faces an uphill battle for the legislation to take effect. The president can send it to the Supreme Court, which critics claim he has stacked with supporters.

The amnesty law comes two years after the arrest of opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez. He was sentenced to 14 years in jail in September for alleged incitement to violence against the government in 2014 demonstrations that claimed 43 lives.

Venezuela's opposition is counting on the power of the street to force the deeply unpopular Maduro to listen to calls for change, after it won a landslide victory in legislative elections last December only to see the courts hamstring its new authority.

Seventeen years into the socialist "revolution" launched by the president's late mentor Hugo Chavez, a punishing economic crisis has stoked outrage in the once-booming oil giant, where chronic shortages of basic goods, long lines and soaring prices have become the norm.

Protests have come against the backdrop of a deep economic morass exacerbated by the crash in the price of oil, which long funded Chavez and Maduro's lavish social spending.

Despite holding the world's largest crude reserves, Venezuela's economy contracted 5.7 percent last year, its second year of recession.

Political analysts say all the constitutional options to force Maduro from power face likely rejection by the Supreme Court or the National Electoral Council, which the opposition has also accused the president of packing with allies.

But the president can't ignore the voice of the people either, analysts say.

Hump Day Art

 

The Art 
of 
Diana Al-Hadid

Diana Al-Hadid once described her work as “impossible architecture”, created by embracing her gut instinct and seeing where it takes her. The Brooklyn based, Syrian born artist’s work can be difficult to describe, monumental and ethereal mixed media works with a myriad of references throughout art history: her captivating installations, sculptures and paintings feature elements of figures from the Renaissance and classical imagery, forms that appear to be disintegrating into a “dripping” tower.

Mali Resort Arrests

Two Malians who "actively participated" in a deadly Islamist assault on an Ivory Coast beach resort have been arrested, including the right-hand man of the suspected mastermind, security sources said Sunday.

The two were picked up in northern Mali at the weekend, two weeks after the March 13 gun and grenade assault on three hotels and a beach in Grand-Bassam that killed 19 people.

The arrests were welcomed by Ivory Coast which hailed "international cooperation in the fight against terror".

The Grand-Bassam rampage, the first of its kind in the Ivory Coast, was claimed by Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb which has also carried out similar assaults on tourist hot spots in Mali and Burkina Faso.

So far, 15 people have been arrested over the Grand-Bassam attacks, with Ivorian investigators backed by anti-terror specialists and judicial expert from Paris. 

The United States and Germany are also helping with the probe.

The latest suspects were identified as Ibrahim Ould Mohamed, who was arrested on Friday night, and Midy Ag Sodack Dicko, who was picked up a day later. 

"Evidence suggests that they actively participated in the Grand-Bassam attack," a Malian security source told AFP, with the information confirmed by several other sources.

Ould Mohamed, who was arrested late on Friday in Goundam, 80 kilometers (50 miles) southwest of the historic city of Timbuktu, is considered a close confidante of Kounta Dallah, the suspected attacks mastermind. 

"He is the driver and the right-hand man of Kounta Dallah, the brains behind the attack. He has provided some interesting information," a Timbuktu police official told AFP, without giving further details.

Dallah, who is still at large, is suspected of both organizing and taking part in the attack, according to the Abidjan prosecutor, who did not give his nationality.

"Ibrahim Ould Mohamed did not hide the fact that he is close to Kounta. He knows many things," said a source close to the Timbuktu government. 

The second suspect, Ag Sodack Dicko, was arrested on Saturday in Gossi, 160 kilometers (100 miles) west of Gao, the biggest town in northern Mali, a local police source said.

He had "acknowledged that several of those involved in the operation in Grand-Bassam stayed at his place in Abidjan," the source said, referring to Ivory Coast's main city. 

"He said he didn't know they were going to carry out this crimes," the source said, dismissing the claim as a bluff.

Global Drug Laws Vary

US

The hard-line drug policies adopted during the 1980s in the “war on drugs”, including mandatory minimum sentences for some drug-related crimes, has led to extremely high levels of incarceration in the country. The US has more than 2 million people in its jails – the second highest rate of incarceration per capita in the world – about half of whom were convicted of drugs-related crimes.

 

UK

In the first half of the 20th century, doctors in the UK were allowed to prescribe drugs including morphine and cocaine to addicts – during this period there was a relatively low amount of drug use. In 1964, the UK introduced the first of several laws that would make it a criminal offense for individuals to possess drugs. The country now has, by some estimates, the highest level of dependent drug use in Europe – the number of dependent heroin users increased (pdf) from about 5,000 across the UK in 1975 to about 281,000 in England alone in 2007.

 

Australia

In the 1980s, Australia was one of the first countries to enact the policy of “harm minimisation”, which involves reducing supply of drugs, education policies that aim to cut demand, and minimising harm caused by drugs on the user and community, through initiatives such as needle programs and safe injecting sites. Despite this, a major international study warned in 2013 that Australia had “one of the world’s most serious drug problems”, particularly regarding opioid and cannabis use.

Portugal

Portugal changed its drug laws in 2001, making possession for personal use an administrative rather than a criminal offense – punished by fines and community service rather than jail time. The policy is widely regarded as successful with decreased rate of HIV infections among drug users, a drop in deaths among heroin users, a dramatic increase in addicts seeking treatment, and no increase in drug use.

 

Czech Republic

The second most liberal country in Europe regarding drug legalization. In 2009, the Czech government began allowing people to possess small quantities of marijuana and heroin without facing criminal charges. Production and trafficking of drugs, as well as possession of larger quantities, is illegal. Cannabis has been legally available for medical purposes since 2013.

 

Canada

Became the first country to legalize the use of cannabis by terminally ill patients in 2001. There have been strong campaigns around the country to legalize cannabis. In 2015, the Vancouver government introduced rules to license and regulate marijuana stores, to the consternation of federal government, though the newly elected Liberal prime minister, Justin Trudeau, ran on a drug platform which promised to “legalize, regulate and restrict access to marijuana”.

Peru (photo above)

One of the world’s largest producers of coca leaf, Peru traditionally adopted policies of prohibition and punishment. However, changes to the criminal code, introduced in 2003, have relaxed this policy, making possession of drugs in small quantities for immediate use “not punishable”. This applies to cocaine, marijuana, opium and ecstasy. However, possession of two or more types of drugs is punishable, as is trafficking drugs.

 

Indonesia

Drug laws in Indonesia are notoriously strict. Possession of illicit drugs is punished by jail time and hefty fines and drug trafficking carries long jail sentences or the death penalty. The government has recently introduced provisions that allow people convicted of drug possession to go through rehabilitation rather than prison, in some cases.

 

United Arab Emirates

The UAE has one of the world’s longest lists of prohibited substances. Possession of drugs commonly available in other countries – such as codeine and some antidepressants – can lead to criminal charges and a potential jail sentence. The UAE also enforces the death penalty in cases of drug trafficking. The presence of illegal drugs detected in blood or urine is considered possession and can lead to prison time, even in very small, trace amounts.

 

Iran

Iran has a very mixed drug policy. It mandates harsh penalties for possession, which can result in public lashing, and for drug trafficking. Approximately 70% of all executions in the country are for drug-related crimes. But the country, which has one of the highest drug addiction rates in the world, has received praise for progressive policies relating to treating addiction, including government-supported clean needle programs.

Dazzling...

Freeing Rebels

Shiite rebels who control the Yemeni capital Sanaa have released nine Saudis in exchange for 109 Yemenis, the Saudi-led coalition fighting them said Monday, ahead of planned peace talks next month.

"Nine Saudi prisoners have been recovered and 109 Yemenis who were arrested in the military operations zone" near the border have been handed over, the coalition said in a statement.

The prisoner swap is the latest confidence-building measure in the lead-up to a planned ceasefire and peace negotiations next month.

UN envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed announced last week that the combatants have agreed to a ceasefire from midnight on April 10, to be followed by peace talks in Kuwait on April 18.

Previous negotiations have failed and several ceasefires were never respected in the year since the Saudi-led coalition began air strikes in support of President Abedrabbo Mansour Hadi.

But a more conducive atmosphere prevails ahead of the new round of planned talks.

A mediation effort by tribal leaders earlier this month led to the exchange of one Saudi soldier for seven Yemenis detained by Saudi authorities at the border.

More than 90 people have been killed on the Saudi side of the frontier by shelling and in skirmishes over the past year.

But since the tribal mediation the border zone has been relatively calm, the coalition has said.

Food and medical supplies have been sent to the Huthi rebel stronghold of Saada, coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed al-Assiri said.

The Huthis seized Sanaa in September 2014 then advanced south, raising fears in Riyadh that the Zaidi Shiite rebels from Yemen's northern highlands would extend the influence of Shiite Iran in the kingdom's southern neighbor.

Forces loyal to Hadi, backed by coalition ground troops, have since pushed the rebels out of five southern provinces, including second city Aden, where Hadi has established a temporary capital.

But the rebels have held on to eight of Yemen's 22 provinces and heavy fighting has been raging in five others for months.

The UN says about 6,300 people have been killed in the conflict, more than half of them civilians.

No Natural Gas Here

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (above) made an unprecedented appearance at the Supreme Court Sunday to defend a deal signed in December with U.S. and Israeli developers drilling offshore gas deposits.

Israel's Channel 10 TV reported Netanyahu as telling the court that if Israel were to alter its deal investors could turn away and buy gas from Israel's enemies instead.

Netanyahu said he chose to speak in court because of the strategic importance of the gas deal, which he says will allow Israel to develop ties with Jordan, Egypt and Turkey and significantly boost its economy.

Israel's Supreme Court overturned the government's landmark deal to begin pumping natural gas, handing a painful blow to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a consortium of energy companies.

Sunday's decision gave parliament a year to amend the plan or the framework will be canceled.

Netanyahu has made the gas deal a centerpiece of his agenda, saying the discovery of large reserves would bring energy self-sufficiency and billions of dollars in tax revenues. 

Critics have said the deal gave excessively favorable terms to the government's corporate partners.

Resource-poor Israel announced the discovery of sizeable offshore natural gas deposits about five years ago, and a partnership of Israeli and U.S. companies, including Texas-based Noble Energy and Israel's Delek Group — have already begun extracting some reserves.

Resource-poor Israel announced the discovery of sizeable offshore natural gas deposits about five years ago. 

A partnership between Noble Energy and Delek Group, which is led by billionaire Yitzhak Tshuva, is the main developer at Israel's two larger gas fields, Tamar and the heftier Leviathan. 

After the country's antitrust commissioner determined the gas companies' ownership constituted a monopoly, a government committee reached a deal with the firms to introduce competition.

Opponents later challenged the deal in court because they said it favored the developers over the Israeli public.

Opposition lawmaker Shelly Yachimovich, a leading opponent of the deal, tweeted that Netanyahu's speech was full of "exaggerations, clichés and general statements without one fact behind them."

Jiggle Baby... Jiggle...

Korea Escalates Tensions

Escalating military tensions on the divided Korean peninsula took an increasingly personal turn on Friday, with the leaders of North and South each threatening the other's destruction.

For North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un that meant overseeing a long-range artillery drill, simulating a strike on the offices and official residence of his South Korean counterpart, Park Geun-Hye.

Park, meanwhile, countered by accusing Kim of leading his country down an ultimately destructive path and stressing the need for a drastic change of direction by the regime in Pyongyang.

Tensions between the two Koreas have been rising since North Korea carried out its fourth nuclear test in January, and a satellite rocket launch a month later that was widely seen as a disguised ballistic missile test.

Pyongyang has upped the rhetorical ante in recent weeks, with near daily threats of nuclear and conventional strikes against the South and the US mainland in response to large-scale South-US war games.

On Wednesday, it warned of a "miserable end" facing Park Geun-Hye, with its artillery units standing ready to turn the presidential Blue House in Seoul into a "sea of flames and ashes".

According to a report by the North's official KCNA news agency on Friday, Kim took that warning a step further by ordering and personally monitoring a live-fire exercise involving the same target.

"Artillery shells flew like lightning and intensely and fiercely struck targets simulating Cheong Wa Dae and rebel governing bodies in Seoul," the North's official KCNA news agency said.

Cheong Wa Dae is the Korean name for the Blue House.

According to KCNA, it was the largest drill of its type ever conducted, involving "hundreds of different types" of long-range artillery.

"If the enemies challenge us... our artillery forces' merciless retaliating blow will turn Seoul into rubble and ashes," Kim was quoted as saying.

The North's ruling party newspaper, Rodong Sinmun, published around 40 colour photos of the drill in its Friday edition, showing Kim watching through binoculars as multiple batteries of heavy-caliber artillery units and missile rocket launchers pounded an offshore island from a beach.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency cited military sources as saying the exercise was held Thursday near the eastern port city of Wonsan.

The North always reacts strongly to the annual South-US military exercises, which it sees as provocative rehearsals for invasion.

Sunday Funnies

TOO CUTE

T. G. I. F. Solitude

Too Anxious

Seventy years ago, there was “the greatest generation.”

Later, Generation X became known as the slacker generation. 

Today, millennials are turning o ut to be the anxious generation.

Numerous recent studies have shown that millennials suffer from anxiety at a much higher rate than generations that preceded them. 

What’s wrong with kids these days?

A lot, actually. 

They’re the first generation raised with Internet. 

The first generation to experience “helicopter” parenting. 

They’re at once constantly exposed on social media but also permanently sheltered by overbearing parents. 

They’re not the first generation to experience a rough economy, but they certainly act as if they were.

Much has been written about how millennials are tender and delicate. 

They’re sometimes absurd, like when they don’t eat cereal because there is, apparently, too much clean-up involved — what with the bowl and the spoon. 

They draw headlines like “Do Millennials Stand a Chance in the Real World?”

But the spike in anxiety is a real issue, one that shouldn’t be lumped with their “omg! lol! I can’t even” social ineptitude.

In New York magazine last week, Jean Twenge, a social psychologist at San Diego State University, offered an explanation for why anxiety among young people is at an 80-year high. 

She cites all the change and upheaval young people today have seen. As marriages happen later or not at all, the family structure is changing dramatically.

But the real change comes in the freedom of movement that has made it easy for people to leave families far behind. 

Studies have shown that having limited family in close proximity can lead to anxiety and depression.It makes sense. 

In 2015, the American Psychological Association’s annual “Stress in America” survey found that people who have close family or friends to turn to in times of crises experienced less stress. 

Today we instill independence in our kids and tell them to forge their own paths.

But we’ve stopped telling them that doing so might be easier if they stay geographically closer to us.

When I tell people I’ll encourage my kids not to move away from our family in adulthood, I’m told I’ll be “stifling” them. 

In reality, providing a solid family structure through geographical closeness would go a long way toward minimizing the kind of anxiety 20-somethings are now experiencing.

It’s not a crazy idea that if you live near people who love you the most, you’re more likely to be more comfortable and confident, all other things being equal.

The endless choices millennials face have also proven paralyzing. They’re the constantly-swiping-right generation. 

It’s always on to the next thing. And this is played out in the way they see their geographical options.

Carol Beaton, in Psychology Today, says an abundance of choices is stressing young people out: 

“Paradoxically, our stress befalls the generation with the most optionality yet,” she says. “This blessing could also be our curse.”

China's New Goals

China is already testing surface-to-air missiles that could strike targets in orbit and it’s also working with experimental lasers that can scramble or “blind” satellites. 

But as China keeps looking up to space, it’s raising some concern down below. Particularly from the US, according to China Cheat Sheets.


The United States is already at odds with Beijing over cyber-warfare accusations and China’s militarization in the South China Sea. 

Now, security officials are worried that China’s armament might spread to outer space, home to US satellites vital to American interests.

The US relies on these devices for various military and civilian implications including gathering intelligence, and targeting weapons. 

Some analysts worry they may soon fall into Chinese striking distance. 

This year, China intends to launch the Tiangong 2 space laboratory. 

China plans to later send astronauts to this habitual module, which will serve as a stepping stone toward a major space station. 

Chinese officials plan to have this station fully operational by 2020. Some security analysts fear the station will have military implications. 

China still trails far behind Russia and the US in terms of space technology. 

But in the last 12 years, China has sought to rapidly reduce the gaps it holds with both nations, and it’s showing no intentions of slowing down.

Moreover, the extent of the military implications behind its rapidly-growing space program remains a mystery.

"There are a lot of avenues to go after satellites, and what worries people is that the Chinese are pursuing all of them," said James Andrew Lewis of the Center for Strategic and International Studies." 

The question becomes: If they're so into peace, why are they building so many weapons?"

Emulsion

China Losing Control

China’s propaganda mouthpiece is in some ways just your typical, old-school news outlet, stumbling its way through the brave new world of social media. 

The difference from other newspapers is that from the perspective of the People’s Daily, losing control over the online conversation could have dire consequences.

In a lengthy essay published Monday, Yang Zhenwu, chief editor of the Chinese Communist Party’s flagship newspaper, warned that Beijing could make a “historic mistake” if it fails to control new media and harness it for propaganda.

“To lose speech is to lose power,” he wrote — apparently without irony — about the challenge facing state media.

It isn’t exactly a new message: China has been “perfecting” its “Internet controls” for years. 

But it comes amid renewed crackdowns on social media accounts after a high profile loyalty tour by Chinese President Xi Jinping to the three central Communist Party-controlled media outlets in February.

Mr. Xi paid particular attention to the news outlets’ online operations and called on official news media to “reflect the Party’s will and views.” 

Chinese social media services are generally more freewheeling than traditional media, but have been held to gradually stricter censorship.

Mr. Yang’s essay emphasized that social media is not only not exempt from this loyalty campaign, it must lead it. 

That point might be of interest Mark Zuckerberg, who was in Beijing over the weekend as part of his long-running charm offensive to convince China’s censors to allow Facebook back in the country. 

Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“Some people believe the party’s publications, TV channels and radio stations should direct public opinion, while there is a ‘hole in one side of the net” for local publications or new media,” Mr. Yang wrote. 

“This kind of belief is wrong and harmful.”

Hump Day Art