13 May
For a change from the same old news stories from the same old news networks, here are links to English-edition online newspapers from other parts of the world. Nearly all of these are English-edition daily newspapers. These sites have interesting editorials and essays, and many have links to other good news sources. We try to limit this list to those sites which are regularly updated, reliable, with a high percentage of “up” time.
Some of the available newspapers:
Asia & CIS
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China
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China & Hong Kong
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France
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Israel
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Norway
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Palestine
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Russia
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Ukraine
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Lobbying funds have gone towards opposing bills that would extend statutes of limitations for child sex abuse cases or grant temporary windows to take action
Since 2007, the New York bishops’ lobbying arms have poured more than $1.1m into ‘issues associated with timelines for commencing certain civil actions related to sex offenses’. Photograph: NurPhoto/Rex Shutterstock
The US Catholic church has poured millions of dollars over the past decade into opposing accountability measures for victims of clergy sex abuse, according to state lobbying disclosures.
The lobbying funds have gone toward opposing bills in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland that would extend statutes of limitations for child sex abuse cases or grant temporary civil windows for victims whose opportunities for civil action have already passed.
In light of major child sex abuse scandals from Jerry Sandusky to Dennis Hastert, lawmakers nationwide are pushing to give victims other avenues to sue. In Pennsylvania, house representative Mark Rozzi, who was abused as a child by a Catholic priest, has led a campaign to extend the age before which child abuse victims can bring on cases. In New York, assemblywoman Margaret Markey is pushing to grant a temporary one-year window for those whose statute of limitations has already expired.
“Many child sex abuse cases are done gradually, under the guise of love or sex education, and so what happens is most victims don’t even realize until literally decades later,” said David Clohessy, a director with the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests. “The overwhelming majority of us rationalize it. That’s how we as survivors cope with this stunning betrayal. We cope with it by denying and minimizing it.”
Since 2007, the New York bishops’ lobbying arms have poured more than $1.1m into “issues associated with timelines for commencing certain civil actions related to sex offenses”, nearly half of their total compensation for lobbyists in that period. Another nearly $700,000 also went towards lobbying for a package of church priorities, including but not limited to influencing the climate on “statute of limitations” legislation.
During this same time period, bishops’ conferences spent millions on lobbyists in states where the church is actively opposing similar legislative proposals. Pennsylvania, Maryland and New Jersey spent more than $5.2m, $1.5m and $435,000 respectively on top lobbyists in the state capitols. Opposition efforts ultimately thwarted statute of limitations reform efforts in those states.
These states did not provide breakdowns of how much of that money was spent opposing these particular bills. The Pennsylvania Catholic Conference said in a statement: “The list of issues for which we advocate is long – services for the poor, education, access to healthcare especially for the poor, elderly and children, religious liberty, immigration, pro-life issues, death penalty, just to name a few.”………..
Newly released files may show connections between low-level Saudi officials and a terrorist support network in southern California led to the 9/11 attacks
People are seen in a reflection of a photo of the twin towers during an anniversary ceremony commemorating the terrorist attacks on 11 September 2015 in New York City. Photograph: Andrew Burton/Getty Images
Investigators for the 9/11 commission would later describe the scene in Saudi Arabia as chilling.
They took seats in front of a former Saudi diplomat who, many on the commission’s staff believed, had been a ringleader of a Saudi government spy network inside the US that gave support to at least two of the 9/11 hijackers in California in the year before the 2001 attacks.
At first, the witness, 32-year-old Fahad al-Thumairy, dressed in traditional white robes and headdress, answered the questions calmly, his hands folded in front of him. But when the interrogation became confrontational, he began to squirm, literally, pushing himself back and forth in the chair, folding and unfolding his arms, as he was pressed about his ties to two Saudi hijackers who had lived in southern California before 9/11.
Even as he continued to deny any link to terrorists, Thumairy became angry and began to sputter when confronted with evidence of his 21 phone calls with another Saudi in the hijackers’ support network – a man Thumairy had once claimed to be a stranger. “It was so clear Thumairy was lying,” a commission staffer said later. “It was also so clear he was dangerous.”
An interrogation report prepared after the questioning of the Saudi diplomat in February 2004 is among the most tantalizing of a sheaf of newly declassified documents from the files of the staff of the 9/11 commission. The files, which were quietly released by the National Archives over the last 18 months and have drawn little public scrutiny until now, offer a detailed chronology of how the commission’s staff investigated allegations of Saudi government involvement in 9/11, including how the panel’s investigators flew to Saudi Arabia to go face-to-face with some of the Saudis believed to have been part of the hijackers’ support network on American soil………..
Administration will send decree saying all students must have access to facilities consistent with their gender identity, even if others object
A bathroom sign at the Cacao Cinnamon coffee shop in Durham North Carolina, where a bill forcing transgender people to use restrooms according to the sex assigned at birth has sparked a national row. Photograph: Jonathan Drake/Reuters
The Obama administration will order all US public schools to allow transgender students to access restrooms that match their identities in a move that escalates the national fight over LGBT rights that has erupted in response to North Carolina’s controversial “bathroom bill”.
The Justice Department and department of education will send the decree, a copy of which was obtained by the Guardian, on Friday. It offers guidelines to school districts across the country on how to protect transgender students from discrimination.
The letter, which was first reported by the New York Times, “does not add requirements to applicable law”, but provides extensive guidelines on how to ensure that trans students are treated fairly and have access to appropriate facilities………….
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‘Ryan’s challenge is particularly exquisite.’ Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images