Month: December 2022

Despite its chaotic military and diplomatic withdrawal from Afghanistan over a year ago, U.S. global leadership approval has seen a slight uptick among some Afghans, a new survey conducted inside the country says.

Approval of U.S. leadership among all Afghans is measured at 18%, slightly more than the 14% measured last year, while U.S. popularity is sharply different among different ethnic groups in Afghanistan.

“The U.S. remains popular among Afghanistan’s Hazara ethnic community; 53% are still supportive of U.S. leadership,” Gallup said in a statement about its latest survey in the country.

The Shia Hazaras are an ethnic and religious minority in Afghanistan making up 10 to 12% of the country’s estimated 36 million people.

Gallup says its surveyors interviewed 1,000 men and women from 21 of Afghanistan’s 34 provinces this year.

Among Pashtuns, Afghanistan’s largest ethnic group, the U.S. remains widely unpopular with only an 8% approval rate, while among Tajiks, the second largest ethnic group, it’s reported at 23%.

Most Taliban leaders are Pashtuns who fought against the United States in Afghanistan from 2002 until U.S. and Taliban representatives signed a peace agreement in February 2020.

Despite its complex history of engagement in Afghanistan, the U.S. remains more popular in the South Asian country than China and Russia, whose leadership approval rates are equally ranked at 14% in the survey.

The U.S. spent about $2 trillion on the Afghan war for over two decades. More than 150,000 people lost their lives in the war, including at least 2,400 U.S. military personnel.

A majority of Americans, 69%, said the U.S. mostly failed in achieving its goals in Afghanistan, according to an August 2022 Pew survey.

Loss of hope

The drastic changes Afghanistan has seen over the last year seem to have disappointed an overwhelming majority of ordinary Afghans, according to the Gallup survey.

Nearly all Afghans, 98%, rated their living conditions as “suffering” under the new regime and only 11% said they have hopes for better opportunities for the next generation.

Afghans are also increasingly concerned about a sharp deterioration in women’s rights.

“A record-low 22% of Afghans say women in their country are treated with respect and dignity — down from the previous low of 31% in 2021,” reads a Gallup statement.

“The one positive we did see was in relation to the safety that Afghans feel within their communities. The percentage of Afghans who feel safe walking alone at night in their communities increased from 22% to 52%,” said Julie Ray, a Gallup analyst.

The Taliban’s return to power has crippled the Afghan economy, pushing 90% of the population into poverty, the United Nations has reported.

“Taliban’s rules of the 90s and currently can be encapsulated in one word: suffering,” Malaiz Daud, senior research fellow with the European Foundation for South Asian studies, told VOA.

“They lack the management, organizational and resource mobilization skills to run a polity designed to look after an entire country.”

Taliban officials, however, redirect all criticisms of economic paralysis to the West saying financial sanctions, assets freeze and a cessation of development assistance have pushed the country to the ongoing humanitarian crisis.

Editor’s note: An earlier version of this article incorrectly attributed a quote from Gallup analyst Julie Ray.
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Salvadoran digital newspaper El Faro’s employees filed a lawsuit in a U.S. federal court on Wednesday against NSO Group, alleging the Israeli firm’s controversial Pegasus software was used to spy on them.

The lawsuit was filed in California by 13 El Faro journalists and two administrative staff, represented by lawyers from the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University.

Pegasus was used to breach the phones of at least 22 people associated with El Faro, including the plaintiffs, compromising their communications and data, according to the complaint — a copy of which was released by the Knight Institute.

“Their devices were accessed remotely and surreptitiously, their communications and activities monitored, and their personal data accessed and stolen,” it alleges.

“The attacks have compromised Plaintiffs’ safety as well as the safety of their colleagues, sources, and family members.”

These alleged activities violated the U.S. Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), according to the lawsuit.

The Pegasus software infiltrates mobile phones to extract data or to activate a camera or microphone to spy on their owners.

NSO Group claims it is only sold to government agencies to target criminals and terrorists, with the green light of Israeli authorities.

The company has been criticized by global rights groups for privacy violations around the world and is facing lawsuits from major tech firms such as Apple and Microsoft.

U.S. authorities put NSO Group on a blacklist last year, with the Commerce Department saying the firm’s tools “enabled foreign governments to conduct transnational repression.”

The El Salvador government has denied it was behind the surveillance of El Faro staff.

“Unfortunately, we have had to look for a court in another country, because there is no possibility that in El Salvador we can obtain justice,” El Faro’s director, Carlos Dada, said in a statement.

“One of the main demands of this lawsuit is that the federal court requires NSO Group to identify, return and delete all information obtained through these attacks,” El Faro said. 

“The court is also requested to prohibit NSO Group from re-executing Pegasus against the members of this media and that the same federal court issue an order against NSO Group so that it can disclose the client who was behind the espionage.”
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The conviction on Tuesday of militia leader Stewart Rhodes in connection with the January 6, 2021 assault on the U.S. Capitol marks the first time in more than two decades that the Justice Department has successfully used a criminal charge known as “seditious conspiracy.”

Rhodes, the founder of the Oath Keepers, an anti-government militia made up largely of military veterans and former law enforcement officers, was found guilty of seditious conspiracy along with Kelly Meggs, the head of the group’s Florida chapter.

Three other Oath Keepers tried alongside Rhodes were acquitted of the sedition charge but were found guilty of other changes, including obstruction of an official proceeding.

All five face at least 20 years in prison.

Here is what you need to know about seditious conspiracy and the significance of the verdict in the Oath Keepers trial:

What is seditious conspiracy?

Enacted after the American Civil War of 1861-1865, the charge of seditious conspiracy includes two elements: conspiracy and sedition. Conspiracy is an agreement by two or more people to commit a crime. Sedition is defined as incitement or advocacy of insurrection against an established authority.

The federal law under which the Oath Keepers were charged defines seditious conspiracy as two or more people plotting “to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof…”

Seditious conspiracy is among a handful of crimes related to attempts to overthrow the government, make war against the United States, or unlawfully oppose its authority, said Jordan Strauss, a former federal prosecutor who is now a managing director at Kroll, a security consultancy.

“In a literal, legal sense, it isn’t the constitutional crime of treason, but it is up there with treason in terms of severity,” Strauss said.

How rare is a seditious conspiracy prosecution?

Seditious conspiracy is notoriously hard to prosecute. The last time prosecutors successfully applied the statute was in 1995 when Omar Abdel Rahman and nine of his followers were convicted of seditious conspiracy and other charges in connection with a plot to bomb New York City landmarks.

The government’s most recent seditious conspiracy prosecution failed, however. In 2012, a federal judge dismissed sedition charges against members of a Michigan-based Christian militia for plotting to kill a police officer. The judge determined prosecutors had failed to prove that the “defendants reached a concrete agreement to forcibly oppose the United States government.”

“You can commit a lot of crimes and you almost necessarily have to commit a lot of crimes up to and on the way to committing seditious conspiracy, but for it to be seditious conspiracy it really has to be against the U.S.,” Strauss said.

The January 6 attack sparked an internal debate among federal prosecutors over whether the action of right-wing groups accused of plotting the assault amounted to seditious conspiracy.

In the end, prosecutors determined they had enough evidence to charge the group with seditious conspiracy, and the jury agreed with respect to two defendants, Strauss said.

“At bottom, if you have laws on the books but don’t enforce them, many people start to wonder why you have laws on the books,” Strauss said.

What did prosecutors need to present to win convictions?

Rhodes was arrested in January 2022 and charged with seditious conspiracy along with 10 other members of the Oath Keepers. It was the most serious charge leveled against a group of January 6 defendants.

To win a conviction, prosecutors had to demonstrate that Rhodes and others plotted together to block Congress from certifying Joe Biden’s election on January 6, 2021.

“So basically, they had to find that there was an agreement between two or more people to forcibly try to prevent Congress from certifying the election on January 6 through the attack on the Capitol,” said Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor and now a law professor at George Washington University.

While Rhodes remained outside the Capitol during the attack, prosecutors charged in court that he began preparing for the attack immediately after the presidential election, exhorting his followers to travel to Washington, buying weapons and equipment, and setting up a “quick reaction force” to deploy in case they were needed.

In finding Rhodes and Meggs guilty of seditious conspiracy, the jury “decided that the ringleaders were responsible for the actual agreement and plan and the other three were more followers,” Eliason said.

What are the implications of the verdict for other January 6 prosecutions?

Another group of Oath Keepers charged with seditious conspiracy and other crimes is set to go on trial on Monday. That will be followed by the trial of a group of the far-right Proud Boys, including their leader, Enrique Tarrio.

While each case stands or falls on its own facts, the latest verdict “does put some wind in the sails of the prosecutors,” Eliason said.

“If you’re the defense maybe you’re feeling less good about your chances,” Eliason said.
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The pace of China’s accelerating nuclear expansion could enable Beijing to field a stockpile of about 1,500 warheads by 2035. That’s according to the Pentagon’s annual “China Military Power” report to Congress that was released Tuesday. VOA Pentagon correspondent Carla Babb has the details.
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U.S. President Joe Biden is set to host French leader Emmanuel Macron for talks Thursday at the White House that are expected to cover a range of topics including Russia’s war in Ukraine and China’s influence in the Indo-Pacific region. 

U.S. and French officials said Iran’s nuclear program and security in the Sahel region of Africa would also be on the agenda. 

Macron is the first world leader Biden is hosting on a state visit since becoming president. 

“If you look at what’s going on in Ukraine, look at what’s going on in the Indo-Pacific and the tensions with China, France is really at the center of all those things,” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said ahead of Macron’s visit. “And so the president felt that this was exactly the right and the most appropriate country to start with for state visits.” 

Biden and his wife, Jill, had dinner with Macron and his wife, Brigitte, at a Washington restaurant Wednesday. 

Earlier Wednesday, Macron brought up one source of tensions between his country and the United States and he spoke in a meeting with U.S. lawmakers about Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act. 

Macron cited provisions in the legislation that provide subsidies for U.S.-made products, saying the measure was “super aggressive” toward European companies. 

“I don’t want to become a market to sell American products because I have exactly the same products as you,” Macron said. 

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Reuters 
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The United States is pushing to regain its position as a center for semiconductor manufacturing and research as part of a Biden administration plan to make the nation less reliant on supply chains in Asia. VOA’s Michelle Quinn reports from the Southwest state of Arizona on competition for billions of dollars in federal funding to bolster domestic chip manufacturing. Additional videographer: Levi Stallings
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U.S. security officials see no signs that threats to the homeland are decreasing now that the country has weathered contentious elections and a politically polarizing decision by the Supreme Court on abortion.

Although neither event sparked widespread violence, the Department of Homeland Security said Wednesday that the United States is still mired in “a heightened threat environment,” with little hope that things will get better over the next several months.

“Lone offenders and small groups motivated by a range of ideological beliefs and/or personal grievances continue to pose a persistent and lethal threat to the homeland,” the department warned in a new National Terrorism Advisory System bulletin.

Senior DHS officials pointed to several recent acts of violence across the country — the shooting this month at a gay nightclub in Colorado, a rash of threats to various religious institutions and the October attack against the husband of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi — as evidence of what they describe as a dynamic and complex threat landscape.

“We do not at this time have credible intelligence indicating an impending [attack],” a senior official told reporters, briefing on the condition of anonymity under ground rules established by the department.

“There’s no one event that that caused us to issue this bulletin,” said a second senior DHS official. “This is a public communication … seeking to point out, to share with the American public, our concern about an ongoing threat environment that has persisted for a period of time now.”

Bulletin warns of extremists

One cause for concern, they said, is the information environment, which has enabled violent extremists to praise previous attacks and acts of violence and share writings or manifestos by the attackers.

U.S. officials have also seen the spread of conspiracy theories, some of which appeal to a wide range of extremists.

“One of the things we’ve seen with violent extremist ideologies is that they often commingle or cross over,” the second senior official said. “It just contributes to an environment where individuals … might grab on to those narratives in a way that motivates and animates their violent or potentially violent activity.”

While U.S. officials have emphasized the growing threat from domestic extremists, the DHS bulletin notes that “foreign terrorist organizations continue to maintain a visible presence online in attempts to motivate supporters to conduct attacks.”

Whether foreign or domestic, the new bulletin warns extremists could seize upon a number of upcoming events as justification for violence.

They include the ongoing certification of the results of this month’s midterm elections and the December 6 run-off election for the U.S. Senate seat in the southern state of Georgia.

“Fortunately, things went fairly well with the actual election,” one of the DHS officials told reporters when asked about concerns over potential election-related violence.

But he warned “that concern doesn’t evaporate on Election Day.”

DHS says perceptions could trigger violence

DHS said other events that could spark violence include the two-year anniversary of the riot at the U.S. Capitol, and even holiday gatherings.

The department also said additional violence could be driven by the growing perception of overreach by the U.S. government, warning that government officials and even law enforcement officials could become targets.

“DHS is committed to working with partners across every level of government, in the private sector, and in local communities by sharing information, equipping communities with training and resources, and providing millions of dollars in grant funding for security enhancement and prevention,” Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said in a statement Wednesday.

The department said such grants include $20 million in 2022 for prevention programs and another $250 million to help improve security for nonprofit organizations at risk of attack.

This is the seventh time DHS has issued a NTAS bulletin since January 2021. The previous bulletin, issued in June, also warned of a heightened threat environment, pointing to the anticipated Supreme Court decision on abortion and the potential for violence surrounding the November midterm elections.
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