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Since the start of the impeachment inquiry six weeks ago, more than a dozen current and former Trump administration officials have refused to testify before House of Representatives investigators, raising questions about Congress’ ability to summon key witnesses. 
 
In the latest instance, acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney failed to show up for a scheduled deposition on Friday, despite a subpoena issued by the House Intelligence Committee.
 
Lawmakers’ strongest investigative tool is the subpoena — a legal order to appear before a congressional committee. But Congress has had mixed success over the years in utilizing this mechanism to compel testimony. 
 
While Mulvaney, a former Republican House member, is unlikely to cooperate, more than a dozen other officials have stepped forward, in many cases after being subpoenaed. 
 
With the testimony of these officials from the White House, the State Department and the Pentagon and other evidence, House Democrats appear confident they have enough to build a case that Trump abused his power when he pressed the president of Ukraine over the summer to investigate Trump’s political rivals while military aid to Ukraine was withheld. 
 
Here are four things you need to know about congressional subpoenas:  

What is a congressional subpoena? 
 
A congressional subpoena is similar to a grand jury subpoena, a legal order issued to a recalcitrant witness to produce testimony and documents in connection with an investigation. Witnesses — private citizens and government officials alike — are typically requested to provide information on a voluntary basis. When they refuse to do so, congressional committees can serve them with subpoenas to compel their compliance. 
 
What is the source of Congress’ subpoena power? 
 
While there are no constitutional provisions that explicitly give Congress the authority to investigate the executive branch and issue subpoenas, the Supreme Court has interpreted the Constitution to imply a power to conduct such investigations, according to Kimberly Wehle, a law professor at the University of Baltimore and author of “How to Read the Constitution.” 
 
“It’s implied in its power to make laws and its power to impeach,” Wehle said of Congress’ power to investigate. “It has to find facts in order to legislate and decide whether to take impeachment action.” 
 
As part of that broad authority, congressional committees can first ask witnesses to testify and produce documents and then subpoena them if they refuse to cooperate. 
 
Can subpoenas be ignored? 
 
Every recipient of a congressional subpoena has a legal obligation to comply. “There is no blanket immunity from having to show up,” Wehle said. 
 
However, while private citizens can find it hard to defy a congressional subpoena, administration officials unwilling to testify possess an oft-used evasive tool: executive privilege. 
 
“That is a constitutionally recognized doctrine which basically safeguards the communications of the president and senior officials and others that work in the executive branch,” said Hans von Spakovsky, a senior legal fellow at the Heritage Foundation. 
 
Nearly as many officials have simply ignored subpoenas in the impeachment inquiry as have complied, while a former deputy national security adviser, Charles Kupperman, has asked a federal judge to rule on whom he should obey: the White House or Congress.  

“A private citizen cannot sue Congress and try to avoid coming in when they’re served with a lawful subpoena,” Representative Adam Schiff, chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, said after Kupperman failed to show up for his scheduled deposition on Oct. 28. 
 
How does Congress enforce subpoenas? Are there penalties for noncompliance? 
 
Congress has a couple of mechanisms to enforce subpoenas issued to executive branch officials.It can petition a federal court and try to convince a judge that the executive branch official is legally obligated to comply. Alternatively, it can ask the Justice Department to bring contempt-of-Congress charges against the defiant party, although Democratic investigators likely would get a cool reception from Attorney General William Barr, a strong proponent of executive power. 

In theory, there is a third way for lawmakers to gain compliance: sending the House sergeant at arms to arrest anyone who refuses to comply. But that’s an option that hasn’t been in use since the early days of the American republic.

Members of Congress have floated various ideas about how to strengthen compliance over the years, including requiring courts to expedite subpoena enforcement lawsuits brought by Congress.

But, said von Spakovsky, Congress is unlikely to go down that route.

“This boils down to a basic constitutional fight, a political fight that involves the separation of powers between the congressional branch and the executive branch. Sometimes the executive branch wins. Sometimes the Congress wins,” he said.

…

The Libyan civil war has found a new battlefield: the halls of Washington. The eight-year conflict shows little sign of ending, and the warring governments are stepping up their efforts to influence policymakers in the United States.

Crucial to these efforts, and the Libyan conflict as a whole, is the country’s oil output. Production currently stands at more than a million barrels a day, and the revenue is crucial to all aspects of the conflict. It funds the weapons, the militias, and the lawyers lobbying officials in the United States.

Most of the oil is shipped to Western Europe, where Libyan oil retains an “outsized significance to the European market,” according to Dr. Cullen Hendrix, professor at the University of Denver and nonresident senior fellow at Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Under army’s control

Most of the oil facilities are located in territory controlled by the Libyan National Army, led by Field Marshal Khalifa Haftar, even as the revenue generated goes to Libya’s state-owned oil company, the NOC. The oil funds are then distributed through Libya’s central bank, which supplies only the U.N.-backed Government of National Accord (GNA).

The LNA, representing the Tobruk-based House of Representatives (HoR), is currently sieging the GNA’s capital of Tripoli. The U.N. estimates more than 1,000 people have been killed in the seven-month siege alone.

The siege is symptomatic of the international nature of the conflict. Foreign drones dot the air, Turkish and Emirati-made armored personnel carriers bring fighters to the battlefield, and recent reports indicate that Russian and Sudanese mercenaries now are fighting for the LNA.

While the United States officially backs the GNA, it is largely uninvolved outside counterterrorism efforts. Libya’s rival governments are seeking to change that.

In the past year, the rival governments of Libya penned millions of dollars’ worth of contracts with government relations firms in the United States. The U.N.-backed GNA hired Mercury Public Affairs for $2 million a year, not including a $500,000 initial payment. The contract came shortly after President Donald Trump called LNA chief Haftar.

Mercury’s activities are extensive. Its contract details its services as lobbying Congress and the executive branch, identifying interest groups, public relations and international affairs. According to records from the Foreign Agents Registration Act, Mercury contacted congressional offices over 380 times, press agencies upward of 110 times and the White House deputy chief of staff.

These contacts included requests to secure interviews for the Government of National Accord’s deputy prime minister, largely with major press organizations.

Oil exports

The GNA enlisted further help to lobby on behalf of Libya’s oil exports, hiring the international law firm Gerstman Schwartz in August of this year. Gerstman’s efforts are centered on modifying the sanctions surrounding a fund built up by oil exports that is earmarked for Libya’s reconstruction.

The windfall from the export revenue will be crucial to rebuilding efforts, but current sanctions don’t allow the funds to collect any interest. As a result, banks are siphoning money through fees, draining a fund that would be best used in the extensive rebuild Libya will have to undergo after the conflict is resolved.

In September, Tripoli retained another firm, Gotham Government Relations, where Gerstman and Schwartz are partners. According to the contract, Gotham will “highlight the [GNA]’s contributions to combating terrorism; counsel GNA regarding outreach to U.S. and foreign think tanks; and prepare reports on Haftar’s human rights violations and crimes against the Libyan people.”

The contract is worth $1.5 million for the year.

On the other side of the conflict is the Libyan National Army and its nominal government, the eastern-based House of Representatives. In May the two signed a new contract with Linden Strategies after parting ways with the firm Dickens & Madson.

Ari Ben Menashe, the president of Dickens & Madson, described his role as “arranging meetings” between Haftar and officials in Russia and the United States. Menashe “advised Haftar against” the siege of Tripoli, and said he dedicated his time to mediation efforts. The eastern-based government paid handsomely for Dickens & Madson’s services, with a contract totaling $6 million.

Trip to U.S.

Since then, Linden has taken the torch and organized a trip for representatives of the eastern government to the United States. In conjunction with this trip, Linden contacted members of Congress, officials at the State and Defense departments, the National Security Council and the White House.

The Libyan delegation met with these same officials. During these meetings, Linden did not press for U.S. intervention, though it did welcome “continued cooperation” in fighting terrorist elements in Libya, such as Islamic State and al-Qaida. The fees for this agreement reached $5.4 million.

If officials in the U.S. choose to put Washington’s formidable clout to use, these millions of dollars in lobbying contracts will be money well spent.

…

A student at a Hong Kong university who fell during protests earlier this week died Friday, the first student death in months of anti-government demonstrations in the Chinese-ruled city that is likely to be a trigger for fresh unrest.

Chow Tsz-lok, 22, an undergraduate student at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, died of injuries sustained early Monday. The circumstances of how he was injured were unclear, but authorities said he was believed to have fallen from the third to the second floor in a parking garage when police dispersed crowds in a district east of the Kowloon Peninsula.

Chow’s death is expected to spark fresh protests and fuel anger and resentment against the police, who are already under pressure amid accusations of excessive force as the city grapples with its worst political crisis in decades.

Demonstrators had thronged the hospital this week to pray for Chow, leaving flowers and hundreds of get-well messages on walls and notice boards inside the building. Students also staged rallies at universities across the former British colony.

“Wake up soon. Remember we need to meet under the LegCo,” said one message, referring to the territory’s Legislative Council, one of the targets of the protest rallies. “There are still lots of things for you to experience in your life.”

Another read: “Please add oil and stay well,” a slogan meaning “keep your strength up” that has become a rallying cry of the protest movement.

Leading the protests

Students and young people have been at the forefront of the hundreds of thousands who have taken to the streets since June to press for greater democracy, among other demands, and rally against perceived Chinese meddling in the Asian financial hub.

The protests, ignited by a now-scrapped extradition bill for people to be sent to mainland China for trial, have evolved into wider calls for democracy, posing one of the biggest challenges for Chinese President Xi Jinping since he took charge in 2012.

Protesters have thrown petrol bombs and vandalized banks, stores and metro stations, while police have fired rubber bullets, tear gas, water cannon and, in some cases, live ammunition in scenes of chaos.

In June, Marco Leung, 35, fell to his death from construction scaffolding after unfurling banners against the extradition bill. Several young people who have taken their own lives in recent months have been linked to the protests.

Graduation day

Chow, an active netball and basketball player according to his university peers, had been studying a two-year undergraduate degree in computer science.

Chow’s death came on graduation day for many students at his university, located in the city’s Clear Water Bay district.

Hundreds of students, some in their black graduation gowns and many wearing now banned face masks, held a silent gathering in the main piazza of the campus after receiving their degrees. Some were in tears.

They later moved to a stage where the graduation ceremonies had been held. Chanting “Stand with Hong Kong” and “Five demands and not one less,” they spray painted Chow’s name and pinned photos and signs of him on nearby walls.

“I can’t put a smile on my face thinking about what has happened,” said Chen, a female graduate in biochemistry, who was wearing a formal gown and holding bouquets of flowers.

A memorial at the carpark where Chow fell and a vigil on campus are planned by students for Friday night.

Hong Kong’s government said in a statement that it expressed “great sorrow and regret” and that the crime unit was conducting a “comprehensive investigation” into Chow’s death.

Further rallies

At a separate event, around 1,000 people rallied in the city’s main financial district to protest against alleged police brutality and actions. Many held white flowers in memory of Chow.

“I am very sad over Chow’s death. If we don’t come out now, more people might need to sacrifice (themselves) in the future,” said Peggy, an 18-year-old university student at the University of Hong Kong.

High school pupils are also planning a rally in the eastern district of Kwun Tong, they said in advertisements before Chow’s death.

Protests scheduled over the weekend include “Shopping Sunday” centered on prominent shopping malls, some of which have previously descended into chaos as riot police stormed areas crowded with families and children.

Last weekend, anti-government protesters crowded a shopping mall in running clashes with police that saw a man slash people with a knife and bite off part of the ear of a local politician.

Hong Kong returned to Chinese rule in 1997 under a “one country, two systems” formula, allowing it colonial freedoms not enjoyed on the mainland, including an independent judiciary and the right to protest.

China denies interfering in Hong Kong and has blamed Western countries for stirring up trouble.

…

U.S.-Chinese trade contracted again in October, despite optimism about possible progress in talks aimed at ending a tariff war that threatens global economic growth.

Chinese imports of U.S. goods fell 14.3% from a year earlier to $9.4 billion, customs data showed Friday. Exports to the United States sank 16.2% to $35.8 billion.

President Donald Trump announced a tentative deal Oct. 12 and suspended a planned tariff hike on Chinese imports. But details have yet to be agreed on and earlier penalties stayed in place. That is depressing trade in goods from soybeans to medical equipment.

Beijing announced Thursday the two sides agreed to a gradual reduction in punitive tariffs if talks on the “Phase 1” deal make progress. However, there has been no sign of progress on major disputes about China’s trade surplus and technology ambitions.

Optimism about the talks “could improve the climate for exports in the coming months by improving global sentiment and trade. But we remain cautious,” said Louis Kuijs of Oxford Economics in a report.

“It is unlikely that the bulk of existing tariffs will be removed soon,” Kuijs said. He said a “substantial gap” in perceptions about what each side is gaining means “there is a substantial risk of re-escalation of tensions in 2020.”

China’s global exports declined 0.9% to $212.9 billion, a slight improvement over September’s 3% contraction. Imports tumbled 6.4% to $170.1 billion, adding to signs Chinese demand also is cooling.

…

A magnitude 5.9 earthquake struck northwestern Iran early Friday, killing at least five people and injuring more than 300 others, officials said.

The temblor struck Tark county in Iran’s Eastern Azerbaijan province at 2:17 a.m., Iran’s seismological center said. The area is about 400 kilometers (250 miles) northwest of Iran’s capital, Tehran.

More than 40 aftershocks rattled the rural region nestled in the Alborz Mountains, and residents rushed out of their homes in fear. The quake injured at least 312 people, state television reported, though only 13 needed to be hospitalized. It described many of the injuries happening when people fled in panic.

The head of Iran’s emergency medical services, Pirhossein Koulivand, gave the casualty figures to state television. There were no immediate video or images broadcast from the area.

Rescuers have been dispatched to the region, officials said. State TV reported the earthquake destroyed 30 homes at its epicenter.

The U.S. Geological Survey said the quake’s epicenter was at a depth of 10 kilometers (6.2 miles). Shallow earthquakes tend to cause more damage.

Iran sits on major seismic faults and experiences one earthquake a day on average. In 2003, a magnitude 6.6 earthquake flattened the historic city of Bam, killing 26,000 people.

A magnitude 7 earthquake that struck western Iran in 2017 killed more than 600 people and injured more than 9,000.

…

When billboards in Chinese start appearing, along with Korean and Japanese grocery stores and restaurants that span tastes from almost all of Asia, they are signs that you have entered California’s San Gabriel Valley.

For some people, it is a bedroom community of Los Angeles. For others, the Asian enclave is a home away from home.

Known to the locals as the “SGV,” San Gabriel Valley spans 36 kilometers east of downtown Los Angeles, with close to half a million Asians living there. Nine cities in the area are majority-Asian.

They include the city of Walnut, where Mike Chou’s family settled in 1989 when they immigrated from Taiwan. Walnut already had an established Chinese community.

“My parents, they didn’t speak English at the time, so it’s made it easier for them to kind of get around,” said Chou, who was 5 when his family arrived in the United States. “It’s so close to all the shopping. It’s so close to the (Chinese) grocery stores. It made fitting in there a lot easier.”

Chinese arrived in 1970s

According to the 2019 San Gabriel Valley Economic Forecast and Regional Overview Report, the SGV has a large ethnic Chinese population that started in the 1970s, with a flood of immigrants from Taiwan.

Chou is now a real estate agent with an 80% Asian clientele — half of them Chinese. Speaking fluent Mandarin and English, Chou has been so successful in real estate that he now leads a multilingual team of agents, including Roxane Sheng, who immigrated to the United States from China in 2005 for graduate school and stayed.

“Most of my clients are Mandarin-speaking Chinese,” Sheng said. “But they’re either living here and work here, or study here. Or they come to United States just to reinvest, to buy investment property. But they still go back to China and live there.”

In the past 10 to 15 years, Chou said people from mainland China have become the new immigrants to the SGV.

WATCH: California’s San Gabriel Valley a Mecca for Asian Americans

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Mild climate, lots of land

Sheng said the area’s mild climate and the relatively close distance to China make Southern California attractive to Chinese homebuyers. A common language is another attraction.

“Everyone speaks Mandarin.” Sheng said. “They can walk into a bank, post office, grocery stores — they can do everything without speaking English.”

For immigrants who largely lived in expensive high-rise apartments in China, the San Gabriel Valley offers an additional perk.

“We have plenty of single-family homes,” Sheng explained. “They just find a house. They get the land. They get the yard, and they have no neighbors up or down below them. And home prices are still cheaper if they move from Beijing or Shanghai.”

Beyond Chinese

Immigrants from other Southeast Asian countries also live in the region.

Annie Xu, another agent on Chou’s real estate team, was raised in the Philippines of ethnic Chinese parents. She speaks Tagalog, Hokkien, Mandarin and English.

“I’ve been doing real estate for three years, because I used to be a stay-at-home mom,” said Xu, who came to the U.S. with her husband. “And then when my youngest turned 2, I decided that I want to do something. Real estate is a business that you don’t need a lot of startup costs.”

As a real estate agent, she has worked with immigrants from China, Taiwan, the Philippines and Indonesia.

One of her clients is Shabana Khan, a half-Pakistani Indian immigrant seeking a house with a yard. Khan moved to the San Gabriel Valley from New York.

“New York has the vibe of the energy and stuff, but you can get it here, too,” Khan said. “But as soon as you have kids, I think California is the best place to settle down. San Gabriel Valley is amazing. You have so many different cultures within Asia.”

Many immigrants, some undocumented

South Asians are among the fastest-growing Asian American groups in the SGV, according to a 2018 report by the civil rights group Asian Americans Advancing Justice-Los Angeles.

Using numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau, Advancing Justice also found that more than 67% of Asian Americans in the SGV are immigrants, including an estimated 58,000 people who are undocumented. Close to a third in the region are low income, according to the report.

“Some of them just immigrated here, and they haven’t found a stable job. Or their English is not good enough that they have to compromise for a job that’s not ideal for them,” Sheng said.

Regardless of socioeconomic status, the report found that San Gabriel Valley’s Asian population continues to grow.

“You have a lot of restaurants and grocery stores that are in Chinese. And some of the workers, they only speak Chinese, so they don’t speak English. It makes it easy if you’re an immigrant to come here and just kind of feel very much at home,” Chou said.

…

Several senior U.S. diplomats, including former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, are key witnesses in the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump. Trump is accused of having withheld U.S. military aid to Ukraine until that country’s new president agreed to investigate one of Trump’s political opponents, former Vice President and current presidential candidate Joe Biden. As transcripts from diplomats’ closed-door Capitol Hill hearings are released, many are questioning why Secretary of State Mike Pompeo did not shield or even support Yovanovitch from an administration campaign that led to her eventual ouster.

Then-U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Yovanovitch told lawmakers in sworn testimony she was shocked to get a phone call in the middle of the night, telling her to leave her post and take the next plane home.

WATCH: Cindy Saine’s video report

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She said she was told she had done nothing wrong but was in immediate diplomatic trouble, not from unrest in Ukraine, but from a potential tweet by President Trump undermining her.

A transcript of her deposition was released this week. She outlined her 33 years as a Foreign Service officer, serving under six presidents. She said U.S. diplomats frequently put themselves in harm’s way, believing that in return, their government will protect them if they come under attack. However, she said this basic understanding no longer holds true.

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Testimony: US Former Ambassador to Ukraine Advised to Tweet Support for Trump

Marie Yovanovitch said she was never disloyal to Trump in newly released testimony to lawmakers

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo defended her early recall on ABC News “This Week,” saying she is still a diplomat in good standing.

“Ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president. When a president loses confidence in an ambassador, it is not in that ambassador, the State Department, or America’s interest for them to continue to stay in their post,” he said.

However, another career diplomat, former U.S. Ambassador Laura Kennedy, told VOA that Pompeo’s lack of support for Yovanovitch is extraordinary.

 “She is one of the most straight-arrow, dedicated professionals I know. And the fact that she didn’t even get a hearing or any direct communication with the secretary of state,” Kennedy said.

Yovanovitch testified that U.S. Ambassador to the EU Gordon Sondland had advised her to tweet out her support of Trump to save her job. Unthinkable, former Ambassador Kennedy said.

“We support, of course, the policy of the administration which we serve, we are obligated to support that policy publicly, that’s our job,” she said. ” But again, we, the career diplomats, as other public servants, they pledged their support to the Constitution, not to any particular person.”

Some former diplomats say confidence in Pompeo has taken a hit at the State Department, and they fear it has already hurt recruitment efforts.

WATCH: What does Quid Pro Quo Mean?

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…

Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova is clear. There is nothing the Kremlin can do about Russian military contractors operating in Africa.

During one of her weekly press briefings shortly after news broke that more than two dozen Russians had been killed in Libya, I pressed her about whether the Kremlin endorsed their presence.

And if it did not, what would be done to prevent Russian veterans pursing freelance foreign policies.

“I have no detailed information about what soldiers you are talking about,” she said. She added there is nothing the Kremlin can do to stop Russian military outfits waging secret wars overseas. It is reminiscent of 2014 when the Kremlin presumably could do nothing about the so-called “little green men” who miraculously appeared in Crimea but paved the way for the annexation of the Ukrainian peninsula. 

“We have no laws to stop this,” Zakharova said, throwing her arms wide open.

No socializing

Afterward, I talked with her deputy who, before taking up his role at the foreign ministry in Moscow, had been Russia’s press attaché in Berlin, and someone who I thought therefore might be open to some sociable contact with reporters. I sent a follow-up email and suggested lunch.

He has not replied.

That is par for the course. Russian officials are wary nowadays of socializing with foreign journalists, especially from international public broadcasters, deemed to be what the Russian government has labeled “foreign agents.” VOA, BBC, France 24, Radio Free Europe and Deutsche Welle are all in the frame.

On the margins of a press conference the other day a soberly suited man who said he was a lawyer but who I assumed was some kind of spook, asked me who I worked for and finding out, declared, “Oh, we are enemies then.” I responded, “No. I am just a reporter.”

Some old guard Kremlin-types will flout what appears to be a general ban on socializing with foreign reporters, but on the whole, we are given a wide berth outside the confines of stilted formal meetings. The one exception is Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. He is been known to drink with foreign journalists in hotel bars, but only on overseas trips. Despite his mien, akin to that of an undertaker, he is said to have an uproarious sense of humor.

Lavrov on Wednesday came out formally against banning foreign international public broadcasters from working in Russia, something being proposed by lawmakers who have accused the broadcasters of breaking legislation covering election reporting.

Difficult to pin down

Even securing a formal meeting with some officials can be an uphill struggle. Take Boris Titov, the presidential commissioner for entrepreneurs’ rights. His role is to defend business interests and to act not only as a liaison between the Kremlin and Russia’s entrepreneurs but to promote their views.

Recently, I requested an interview with Titov to discuss how Western sanctions are impacting Russian business. I wanted to ask him also about whether Russian entrepreneurs who took advantage of a tax amnesty offered by President Vladimir Putin may now feel cheated.

Putin had promised Russians repatriating assets held overseas that they would not face unpaid taxes. And they have not, but some declarations apparently are being used as evidence in fraud cases. Last week, financier Andrey Kakovkin, who had recently returned to Russia assuming all would be well, was sentenced to three years in a penal colony for embezzlement of $157,000.

I still have not heard back from Titov.

Trolls and bots

Shunning foreign journalists does not help the Kremlin get its spin on the news. But then it prefers apparently to do that unfiltered via trolls and bots, and through the assistance of oligarchs like Yevgeny Prigozhin, a close ally of Putin, whose soldiers were the ones killed in Libya fighting on the side of Gadhafi-era renegade general Khalifa Haftar.

Seven more Wagner Group soldiers are believed to have been killed in Mozambique last month.

Prigozhin seemingly hasn’t been deterred by the indictment filed against him last year by U.S. special counsel Robert Mueller for overseeing a troll factory that spearheaded alleged Russian meddling in U.S. elections. Prigozhin mocked the Mueller indictment, telling the Russian state news agency Ria Novosti: “The Americans are very impressionable people; they see what they want to see. I have a lot of respect for them. I am not upset at all that I ended up on this list. If they want to see the devil, let them see him.”

Last week, Facebook revealed that Prigozhin was behind a network of 200 fake accounts pumping out disinformation to assist local political clients of the Kremlin in eight African countries. The countries were Madagascar, Central African Republic, Mozambique, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ivory Coast, Cameroon, Sudan, and Libya.

“While many of Prigozhin’s activities in Africa are known, we provide evidence that he is engaged in social media activities in several African countries to a much wider extent than we have previously known,” tweeted Shelby Grossman, a research scholar at the Stanford Internet Observatory, which partnered with Facebook on the investigation.

According to Facebook, the most recent of the Prigozhin-tied disinformation campaigns was launched in Mozambique last September, just weeks before the country held presidential and parliamentary polls. The content supported the incumbent president and sought to tarnish the opposition.

Boosting defenses

Hardly a day goes by now without some announcement from the Kremlin of a test firing of this or that new missile, a military exercise here or there or the launching of a new warship or development of a fresh weapon system. On Wednesday, President Putin assured military commanders that Russia won’t stop boosting its defensive capabilities with state-of-the-art weaponry.

“Hypersonic, laser and other state-of-the-art weapon systems, which no other country possesses, will be put in service,” Putin told the military commanders. But he added these new generation weapons “are no excuse for Russia to threaten anybody.”

Some Western military analysts say quite a lot of smoke and mirrors may be involved when it comes to the military buildup — at least when it comes to the Russian Navy. Writing in the National Interest, a U.S. magazine focused on international affairs, academic Robert Farley noted: “The Russian Navy inherited a massive, modern fleet of surface ships and submarines. Most of these disappeared in short order, as Russia was incapable of maintaining such a flotilla. The remaining major units of the Russian Navy are very old, and in questionable states of repair.”

Most of the holdouts from the Soviet Navy are approaching the end of their useful lifespans, according to Farley, author of “The Battleship Book” and a visiting professor at the U.S. Army War College. “The Russian national security state thrives on the announcement of big projects, but not so much on their fulfillment.”

There is a tremendous buildup of frustration among the young in Moscow and St. Petersburg — and further afield, too — at how difficult it has become to get visas to travel to the U.S. and, to a lesser extent, Europe. Outward-looking and curious about the wider world, they are exactly the same as their peers in other Central European countries — aspirational, increasingly multilingual and determined to carve out their own paths without larger forces getting in the way.

Partly thanks to cycles of tit-for-tat expulsions of diplomats and consular officials, most countries have fewer staff around to handle visa applications and so the wait for the application process to conclude just gets longer. And the rise of international suspicions and tensions has only added difficulties to the visa process, unless you are an oligarch or rich, of course.

On his departure, outgoing U.S. envoy Jon Huntsman publicly lamented the visa problems — while complaining, too, about Russian blocks on issuing visas for Westerners. Like his predecessors, Huntsman argues that people-to-people contacts will be crucial in breaking down suspicions.
 

…

French actress Catherine Deneuve, 76, was admitted to hospital in Paris after suffering a “limited” stroke, French media reported.

“Catherine Deneuve has suffered a very limited and therefore reversible ischemic stroke. Happily, her motor control has not been affected. She will need a few days’ rest,” French news wire AFP and French daily Le Parisien reported, quoting from a Deneuve family statement.

A spokeswoman for Deneuve declined to comment.

Nicknamed the “Ice Maiden” because of her exquisite, fragile beauty and detached manner, Deneuve became France’s leading screen actress and a top international star in the 1960s.

She won fame for her portrayal of an umbrella seller’s daughter in Jacques Demy’s 1963 musical “Les Parapluies de Cherbourg” (“The Umbrellas of Cherbourg”) for which she won the Best Actress award at the Cannes Film Festival.

In 1965, she triumphed as a frigid, schizophrenic woman in Polish director Roman Polanski’s harrowing “Repulsion” and in 1968, she was nominated for a BAFTA Best Actress award for her role in “Belle de Jour.” In 1993, she was nominated for a Best Actress Academy Award for her role in “Indochine.”

Often described as the embodiment of French womanhood, Deneuve is a fixture at Paris fashion shows and is known for her biting wit.

Last year, she and 99 other French women denounced a backlash against men following the Harvey Weinstein scandal, saying the #MeToo campaign against sexual harassment amounted to “puritanism.”

Deneuve remained active as an actress in recent years and was working on a film this month.

“Either you do cinema or you don’t,” she told Le Parisien newspaper in an interview in September.

“My mother will turn 108 in a few days. My sisters and I have her genes,” she added.
 

…

President Donald Trump is blasting the media for not reporting the name of a person who has been identified in conservative circles as the whistleblower who spurred the impeachment inquiry. Yet Trump has carefully avoided using the name himself.

Exposing whistleblowers can be dicey, even for a president. For one thing, it could be a violation of federal law to identify the whistleblower. While there’s little chance Trump could face charges, revealing the name could give Democrats more impeachment fodder. It could also prompt a backlash among some Senate Republicans who have long defended whistleblowers.

And, despite wanting the name to be disclosed, Trump sees some benefits to keeping it secret. The anonymity makes it easier for Trump to undermine the credibility of the person behind the complaint as well as the complaint itself, according to three officials and Republicans close to the White House not authorized to publicly discuss private conversations. It also allows him to bash the media for supposedly protecting the whistleblower.

In recent weeks, a name has circulated in conservative media of a man said to be the whistleblower. The president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., on Wednesday tweeted a link to a story on the Breitbart website that used the name. He also included the name in his tweet.

U.S. whistleblower laws exist to protect the identity and careers of people who bring forward accusations of wrongdoing by government officials. Lawmakers in both parties have historically backed those protections. The Associated Press typically does not reveal the identity of whistleblowers.

The identity of the whistleblower is almost a moot point: Much of the unnamed person’s August complaint about Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has been corroborated and expanded upon by officials’ on-the-record, congressional testimony and the reconstructed, partial transcript of the call released by the White House.

In a statement shortly after Trump Jr.’s tweet, the whistleblower’s attorneys warned that “Identifying any suspected name for the whistleblower will place that individual and their family at risk of serious harm.”

The statement by Andrew P. Bakaj and Mark S. Zaid said that “publication or promotion of a name shows the desperation to deflect from the substance of the whistleblower complaint. It will not relieve the President of the need to address the substantive allegations, all of which have been substantially proven to be true.”

A number of Trump allies have counseled the president not to unveil the whistleblower’s identity. So in recent days Trump has shifted to a new tactic, denouncing the media for allegedly protecting the whistleblower by refusing to identify the person, allowing him to charge that the media is in cahoots with Democrats and the “deep state” —  Trump opponents in the government.

The strategy is reminiscent of the one Trump used during special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe, during which he derided the so-called deep state investigators for allegedly plotting to bring down a duly elected president.

Trump, on Twitter and while talking to reporters, relentlessly painted then-FBI director James Comey, agent Peter Strzok and FBI lawyer Lisa Page as corrupt and conspiratorial. Though there’s no solid evidence that the Russia probe suffered from any improper bias at its origin, Page and Strzok, in a series of text messages, revealed their dislike of Trump, which the president pointed to as proof of a plot against him.

With help from some allies, including Sen. Rand Paul at a Kentucky rally on Monday, Trump has moved to create a similar dynamic with the whistleblower. Without providing evidence, Trump has painted the whistleblower as a liberal “Never Trumper” and held up the person’s anonymity — essential for protection — as some sort of nefarious proof of a conspiracy with Democrats.

Much like his scattershot efforts to muddle the narrative of the Mueller probe, often by questioning the integrity and process of the investigation itself rather than the facts, Trump has been looking to plant the seed of doubt about the Ukraine matter with both his base and the GOP senators who could decide his fate in an impeachment trial, according to the officials and Republicans.

But if he identified the supposed whistleblower, Trump could risk antagonizing some of those same senators, who believe whistleblowers are important for rooting out corruption. Advocates for whistleblowers warn that stripping anonymity from the person who made the Ukraine complaint would make people across the government more reluctant to speak up about wrongdoing.

In the context of an investigation, someone who names or retaliates against a whistleblower could be prosecuted for obstructing an investigation or harassing a witness, said Tom Devine, legal director for the Government Accountability Project.

But whistleblowers in the intelligence community, like the one who reported the Ukraine call, lack many of the protections provided to their counterparts elsewhere in the government. “There are some rights on paper, but in reality they are extremely weak,” Devine said.

In other parts of the government, whistleblowers can take claims they have been retaliated against to independent administrative agencies and, potentially, federal courts. In the intelligence agencies, complaints are handled internally.

“The way you do that is by going back to the agency that retaliated against you to ask them to change their minds,” Devine said. There is a right of appeal to the inspector general, whose work can be reviewed a panel of auditors he appoints, he said.

Stephen Kohn, chairman of the board of the National Whistleblower Center, said it’s troubling that prospects for protecting the whistleblower really depend on Trump.

“The only guarantee here is to hope the president does his job” and prevents retaliation against him in the first place, Kohn said.
 

…

Voting in U.S. state and local elections on Tuesday showed no evidence of successful tampering by any foreign government, the Justice Department and six U.S. security agencies said.

But Russia, China, Iran and other adversaries of the United States will seek to meddle in U.S. elections moving forward, including through social media manipulation and cyberattacks, the agencies said.

“While at this time we have no evidence of a compromise or disruption to election infrastructure that would enable adversaries to prevent voting, change vote counts or disrupt the ability to tally votes, we continue to vigilantly monitor any threats to U.S. elections,” a joint statement, signed by the heads of each agency, said.

The agencies have increased efforts to protect elections and a new position was created within the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to focus solely on U.S. election security.

A January 2017 assessment by U.S. intelligence agencies found that Russia had meddled in the 2016 presidential election and its goals included aiding President Donald Trump.

National security experts have said they believe foreign governments will again target the 2020 presidential election in an effort to influence U.S. voters.

In February 2018, the Justice Department created the first ever Cyber Digital Task Force with the mission of protecting future U.S. elections from foreign interference.

…

From ex-prostitutes making jewelry out of bullet casing to drones delivering blood, rising numbers of businesses with a mission to help address social problems are emerging in Ethiopia as the economy opens up.

An estimated 55,000 social enterprises operate in Ethiopia, the second-most populous country in Africa and fastest growing economy in the region where about a quarter of 109 million people live below the poverty line, according to the World Bank.

But the number of ventures set up to do good is on the rise since Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed came in 18 months ago and vowed to open the economy to private investment, raising hopes of official recognition for the sector and easier access to funds.

Kibret Abebe, one of Ethiopia’s best-known social entrepreneurs, said the sector would be boosted as Ethiopia hosts the 12th annual Social Enterprise World Forum (SEWF) this week, the first developing country to do so.

“The economy is opening up and we are seeing more social enterprises in Ethiopia,” said Abebe, first president of Social Enterprise Ethiopia, which was set up last year to advance firms set up to do good that re-invest their profits into their work.

“Scaling up has been a nightmare in Ethiopia and it’s been hard to collaborate with the government but I’m optimistic this will change as we have a lot of social problems to fix.”

Ethiopia’s Education Minister Tilaye Gete said hosting SEWF, attended by more than 1,200 delegates from 50 or so countries, was a sign of change under Ahmed, who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this month.

“This is reflective of the overall change in leadership and mindset across the country,” said Gete as he officially opened the three-day conference.

Abebe, an anaesthetist, was a trailblazer for social enterprise in Ethiopia when he sold his house to set up TEBITA Ambulance more than a decade ago after seeing how many road accident victims struggled to get transport to medical help.

TEBITA now runs a fleet of 20 ambulances and a college training paramedics, funding its work by charging patients for journeys, offering training, as well as providing emergency services for the national football team.

Health to Housing

Abebe said TEBITA was one of thousands of social enterprises in Ethiopia aiming to help the most needy, with newcomers focused on agriculture, education, health, housing and IT.

For example Maisha Technologies PLC is a tech-based social enterprise testing advanced drones to deliver blood to health centers in rural areas where half of maternal deaths occur.

HelloSolar aims to provide rural communities without electricity with off-grid energy and affordable payment plans.

Abebe said young people – with 43% of the population aged 15 or under – were playing a key role in advancing new social enterprises, many with tech solutions and hoping to create jobs for the future.

A 2016 survey by the British Council – which co-hosts SEWF with local partners – estimated the number of social enterprises in Ethiopia and found about half were led by people aged under 35 while women led more than a quarter of social enterprises.

But these firms reported numerous challenges, including the lack of a policy framework with no distinct formal legal form or recognized means to register as social enterprises in Ethiopia.

The biggest barrier, however, was found to be financial – accessing capital or obtaining grants – so it was critical to find a revenue stream and one strong enough to support growth.

Ellilta Products, for example, was set up 2012 to support sister organization, Ellilta Women at Risk (EWAR), founded in 1995 to help break the generational cycle of prostitution.

Headquartered on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, Ellilta Products’ workforce of about 55 includes former prostitutes making jewelry from bullet casing and scarves and soaps that are sold locally and overseas to fund the work of EWAR.

EWAR workers visit red light areas in Addis Ababa to encourage women to join a year-long rehabilitation program of counselling and training while their children go to school.

Ellilta Products’ General Manager Emnet Mersha Seyoum said so far EWAR has rescued around 1,000 women, with a success rate of 90% not returning to prostitution.

Anchilu Alemu, aged about 50, said she was rescued nine years ago after 18 years as a prostitute and this has given her and her daughter a new life. She makes scarves at Ellilta and her daughter went to college and is now married with a child.

“Before prostitution was the only way I could make money. This saved me,” she said as she pulled at a spool of yarn.

Seyoum said it had been hard to get funding in Ethiopia as the government did not recognize or understand social enterprises but she hoped this would change under Ahmed and with the SEWF in Addis, attended by 1,200 people from 58 nations.

“Ideally in the future we want to scale up to grow tenfold so that we can provide jobs to all of the women that we rescue,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

…

Brazil’s mining regulator on Tuesday blasted iron ore miner Vale SA for failing to disclose problems with a mining dam before a deadly collapse in January, saying this kept the agency from taking actions that could have saved lives.

The dam in Brumadinho collapsed and flooded a nearby company cafeteria and the surrounding countryside with mining waste, killing more than 250 people. It was Vale’s second deadly dam collapse in less than four years.

The regulator’s report on its probe into the disaster is the latest blow to the reputation of Vale, which is under criminal investigation over accusations that top executives ignored warning signs about the dam.

Based on the report’s findings, ANM will now assess the iron ore miner with 24 new fines. Officials said that the amount of each fine is capped at around 6,000 reais ($1,500) under Brazilian law.

The report detailed several problems that it said Vale should have reported.

The first occurred in June 2018, seven months before the disaster, when the company installed horizontal drainage pipes and discovered sediment in the drainage water. This worrying sign should have been reported immediately, ANM officials told reporters in a briefing.

“The serious fact is that when there is sediment it must be reported. Period. It wasn’t. If it had been communicated, the area would immediately have been submitted to daily inspections,” said ANM head Victor Bicca. “But we didn’t know what was happening.”

Vale said in a statement it would analyze the report but it was unable to comment on technical decisions taken by its “geotechnical team” at the time.

The miner said it is providing all information on the history of the dam’s condition to authorities, adding that various investigations were pending into the cause of the dam burst.

Several ANM directors said if Vale had properly reported drainage, water pressure and other issues at the dam, it would have been classified as “emergency level 1,” bringing a higher level of scrutiny including daily inspections.

They said those inspections could have uncovered further problems, ultimately leading to evacuation, which would have saved lives.

Because problems were not disclosed, the dam was not given high priority, since it was not actively receiving more mining waste, director Tasso Mendonca said. He said the dam was “a bit forgotten.”

“It’s a kind of negligence, perhaps not intentional,” he said.

($1 = 3.9915 reais)

…

U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to tap Steve Biegun, the special representative for North Korea, as deputy secretary of state could spur Washington’s denuclearization talks with Pyongyang, said experts.

“[Biegun’s] in a position now where he will have much more influence, and he will be able to guide things from a senior level at the State Department to really help shape policy, even more than as … a special representative for North Korea,” said David Maxwell, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

The White House announced Trump has nominated Biegun for the No. 2 spot at the State Department on Thursday, and soon after announced the Biegun nomination had been sent to the Senate.

If the Senate approves his nomination, Biegun will replace John Sullivan, who was nominated to serve as the next U.S. ambassador to Russia. Biegun would then be the second highest-ranking official at the State Department after Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

If Pompeo steps down from his post to run for a Senate seat as widely speculated, then Biegun would serve as acting secretary of state.

As the deputy secretary, Biegun will continue in his role of overseeing diplomacy with North Korea, a senior U.S. official said.

Experts think Biegun’s nomination signals the Trump administration’s effort to elevate the significance of engaging in talks with North Korea.

“Making him the deputy secretary of state raises his stature and so it naturally raises the level of working level negotiations that he will continue to lead,” said Maxwell.

Joseph DeTrani, who served as the Special Envoy for the six-party denuclearization talks with North Korea during the George W. Bush administration, said, “I think that means the president and our secretary of state are putting more attention to the issue of North Korea.”

Biegun has been leading working-level talks with North Korea since his appointment as the special representative for North Korea in August 2018. Progress in the talks between Washington and North Korea have been slow due to their differences over the process of denuclearization and sanctions relief.

Working-level talks resumed in Stockholm in early October after months of stalled negotiations since the breakdown of the second summit between Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi in February. But the Stockholm talks fell apart after North Korea walked away from the negotiating table.

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After North Korea Walks Away From Talks, Experts See Familiar Tactic

Pyongyang ‘greatly disappointed’ with US approach in Stockholm

Robert Manning, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, said no matter who leads diplomatic efforts for the U.S, North Korea will not give up nuclear weapons.

“Kim is not testing all these missiles and quietly working on improving his nuclear weapons because he wants to give everything away,” said Manning.

North Korea conducted what it called “super-large multiple rocket launchers” on Friday in its 12th missile test since May. The short-range missiles that North Korea has been testing this summer are considered more advanced than those tested prior to its diplomatic outreach toward the U.S. in 2018.

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Experts: N. Korea’s New Missiles Designed to Dodge Preemptive Strikes 

The missiles launched most recently by Pyongyang are technologically advanced enough to avoid detection and destruction prior to launch. 

Manning thinks Biegun’s nomination could suggest that the Trump administration anticipates the talks with North Korea will continue to make slow progress.

“There may be a subtle message in his promotion to deputy secretary – which I think will be a great benefit to the Department of State – which is that they don’t expect the North Korea diplomacy to move very quickly,” said Manning.

However, Maxwell thinks Biegun will be able to create the right conditions for diplomacy to induce North Korea to denuclearize.

“If anyone can create the conditions, the diplomatic conditions for Kim Jong Un to make the right strategic decision to give up its nuclear weapons, it’s Steve Biegun,” said Maxwell, adding, “the ball is in Kim Jong Un’s court.”

Biegun’s nomination comes with a wide-ranging support from former U.S. officials and North Korea experts, according to the endorsement list issued by the State Department on Thursday.

Ashton Carter, who served as secretary of defense under the Obama administration, said “Steve Biegun is a man of integrity and breadth of vision who has always represented the best of American policymaking.”

Joel Wit, senior fellow at the Stimson Center who was involved in past negotiations with the North Koreans while at the State Department, said, “I fully support Stephen Biegun’s nomination. As special representative for North Korea, Steve has carried out his duties with great skill and determination, ably representing U.S. interests with the North Koreans, working closely with our allies, the Republic of Korea and Japan, and seeking to build support from other important countries, China and Russia, for American policy. I believe these same diplomatic skills make Steve the right choice to be our new Deputy Secretary of State.”

Previously, Biegun served as executive secretary of the National Security Council and chief of staff of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Prior to serving as Trump’s North Korea envoy, Biegun worked as vice president of international governmental relations for Ford Motor Company. 

…

North Korea on Tuesday lashed out at the United States for mentioning Pyongyang in its annual report on state sponsors of terrorism, saying the report is an example of Washington’s “hostile policy” that is limiting chances for dialogue.

The U.S. State Department on Friday published its 2018 Country Reports on Terrorism. Though the report scaled back its criticism of North Korea from the previous year, it mentioned that the U.S. re-designated North Korea as a state sponsor of terror in 2017. 

North Korea’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejected the report as a “grave politically motivated provocation,” according to a statement in the state-run Korean Central News Agency. 

“This proves once again that the U.S. preoccupied with inveterate repugnancy toward (North Korea) is invariably seeking its hostile policy towards the latter,” the statement said. 

North Korea last month walked away from working-level nuclear talks, blaming the United States for not offering enough concessions. It has since threatened to resume nuclear or long-range missile tests. 

The North Korean statement on Tuesday said it is an “insult” that the U.S. would issue the terrorism report, especially while U.S.-North Korea dialogue “is at a stalemate.” 

“The channel of the dialogue between the DPRK and the U.S. is more and more narrowing due to such attitude and stand of the U.S.,” the North Korean foreign ministry said, using an abbreviation for the country’s official name. 

North Korea was originally designated as a state sponsor of terror in 1988, following its involvement in the bombing of a Korean Airlines passenger flight a year earlier. The U.S. removed North Korea from the list in 2008 during a period of dialogue.

In 2017, then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson re-designated North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism during a period of heightened tensions. 

“The Secretary determined that the DPRK government repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism, as the DPRK was implicated in assassinations on foreign soil,” the latest State Department report said. 

The North Korean entry contained less than half as many words as the previous year’s report. It also removed descriptions of North Korea’s “dangerous and malicious behavior.” 

But North Korea still took issue with its inclusion on the state sponsors of terrorism list, which imposes unilateral sanctions. 

“This is an insult to and perfidy against the DPRK, dialogue partner,” North Korea’s foreign ministry insisted. 

North Korea is looking for sanctions relief and other concessions from the United States. It has given Washington until the end of the year to change its approach, after which it has warned of “dangerous” consequences. 

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and U.S. President Donald Trump have met three times since last June. Though they have agreed to “work toward denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” the two sides have not been able to agree on the first steps toward doing so.
 

…

Newly-announced U.S. sanctions targeting Iran’s construction sector have drawn a skeptical response from some Iran analysts who foresee the measures doing only limited harm to one of its top industries.

In an Oct. 31 announcement, the Trump administration said it had imposed sanctions on Iran’s construction sector for being controlled “directly or indirectly” by the nation’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a military branch designated by U.S. officials as a terrorist organization earlier this year.

Iran sees itself as a victim, rather than a perpetrator, of terrorism. In a Saturday statement, Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi denounced the U.S. sanctions on the nation’s construction industry as “economic terrorism” and said they reflected “weakness” and “failure in (American) diplomacy.”

IRGC-controlled companies such as Khatam al-Anbiya dominate Iran’s construction sector. Previous U.S. administrations sanctioned Khatam al-Anbiya in 2007 and four of its affiliates in 2010.

A State Department fact sheet said the new sanctions target international transactions with Iranian construction companies involving four specific commodities and products: raw and semi-finished metals, graphite, coal, and software for integrating industrial purposes.

“If you look at this designation of Iran’s construction sector, it is very limited,” said Saeed Ghasseminejad, a researcher on Iran’s economy and financial markets at the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). 

Speaking to VOA Persian, Ghasseminejad said Iranian construction companies typically produce their own basic commodities such as steel and cement rather than relying on certain imports targeted by the new U.S. sanctions. He said Iran also commonly imports other construction commodities and products not targeted by the sanctions, such Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), a thermoplastic, and tiles used in upper- and middle-class homes.

“So there still are items that can be designated which are not,” he said.

Ghasseminejad also noted that many Iranian construction companies linked to Iran’s Islamist rulers have not faced the type of specific U.S. sanctions previously applied to IRGC-controlled Khatam al-Anbiya and its affiliates. He said other organizations involved in construction and controlled by IRGC or by Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei have a big share of the construction market, such as the Mostazafan Foundation and Astan Quds Razavi, two charitable trusts led by Khamenei appointees.

Iran also has an unknown number of private construction companies, some of which have connections to Iranian government bodies, according to Ghasseminejad.

“There still is a lot to sanction in the construction sector,” said Ghasseminejad. “The Trump administration should designate the whole sector by saying that any kinds of dealings with it are prohibited.”

FDD has said such a step is necessary not only because of IRGC dominance of the construction industry but also because it supplies key products for Iran’s missile program.

Campaign of ‘maximum pressure’

Trump has been tightening U.S. sanctions against Iran since last year as part of his campaign of “maximum pressure” on the Islamic republic to end its missile and other perceived malign activities.

Iran analyst Ali Vaez of the Belgium-based International Crisis Group said previous rounds of sanctions imposed by Trump and his predecessors have weakened Iran’s economy and its construction sector to the point where the new sanctions are unlikely to hurt the sector much further.

“The important point here is because of the economic downturn in Iran, generally there is a slowdown in the construction business, and as a result, Iran needs less raw material than before,” Vaez told VOA Persian. “There is less demand for new construction than in the past, and as such, whatever impacts the previous U.S. sanctions had on the construction sector in Iran, I think they already have been felt and absorbed in the sector.”

Data published by the Statistical Center of Iran show the nation’s construction sector contributed 2.9% to gross domestic product for the last Persian year that ended in March, around the same level as in the previous two years. Prior to that, the contribution of construction to Iran’s GDP had been on a steady decline from a level of 5% in the year that ended March 2012.

Ownership and activities 

Another factor that could limit the impact of U.S. sanctions on Iran’s construction sector is a lack of information available to U.S. authorities regarding the ownership and activities of many companies.

In messages sent to VOA Persian, economist Mahdi Ghodsi of the Vienna Institute of International Economic Studies said he found only 144 large Iranian construction companies registered in Orbis, a Moody’s Analytics database of financial statements of companies around the world. He said that the estimated turnover of 113 of those companies amounted to 0.5% of Iran’s GDP, only a small part of the total construction activity in the country.

“The rest of the construction sector in Iran is not transparent. The reason could be simply to avoid the sanctions radar of the U.S. Treasury,” Ghodsi wrote.

Further complicating the challenge of sanctioning Iranian construction companies is their involvement in reconstruction efforts in war-torn Syria and in other projects in Iraq, Central Asia, Africa and Latin America.

“Most of the Iranian companies engaged in these kinds of activities do not publicize them,” said Vaez. “Sometimes they use shell companies so that you don’t know that a particular company is of Iranian origin. At the end of the day, this is a very elaborate game of cat and mouse, with the Iranians trying to obfuscate and operate in the shadows, and the U.S. Treasury trying to spotlight and designate them.”

Ghasseminejad said the new U.S. sanctions also may not do much to stop the activities of Chinese and other foreign construction companies in Iran.

“Since the entire Iranian construction sector has not been designated, the pressure on foreign companies to leave the Iranian market has not been that big,” Ghasseminejad said. “If the U.S. actually sanctions the whole industry, and enforces that policy, it will impact the presence in Iran of foreign firms that bring investment, equipment and expertise, and it will impact one of Iran’s few economic sectors that exports services to other countries, where they go and build things.” 

This article originated in VOA’s Persian Service. 
 

…

As the US House of Representatives continues to march forward with an impeachment inquiry against President Donald Trump, voters are speaking out in the political battleground state of Wisconsin. VOA’s Kane Farabaugh has more from Madison

…

Iran’s nuclear chief announced Monday the country is operating dozens of advanced centrifuges in a move that further goes against the 2015 agreement the country signed with a group of world powers.

Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization, said told state television Monday that Iran was operating the IR-6 centrifuges, which allow the processing of uranium much faster than the IR-1 centrifuges Iran was allowed to used under the nuclear deal.

Salehi also said Iran was working on the development of even faster centrifuges.

The 2015 agreement called for Iran to limit its nuclear activity in response to allegations it was working on a nuclear weapons program.  Iran said its nuclear work was solely for peaceful purposes, but agreed to the conditions in exchange for badly needed relief from economic sanctions.

Since U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement last year, Iran has taken several steps back from its commitments, including exceeding limits on the amount of enriched material it is allowed to stockpile and the level to which it is allowed to enrich uranium.

Iran has complained the other signatories, particularly European nations, have not done enough to help it achieve sanctions relief after the United States imposed new sanctions.

…

Pakistan has closed its consular office in Afghanistan’s capital, citing unspecified security reasons.

Pakistan said the Kabul office will be closed until further notice.

Pakistan’s Foreign Ministry said Afghanistan’s charge d’affaires has been summoned to “convey serious concerns over the safety and security” about its diplomats in Kabul.

Pakistan said in a statement that its embassy staff members had been “obstructed on the road and the embassy vehicles were also hit by motorcycles while going towards the embassy.”

Relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan have long been tense.

Kabul allege that leaders and fighters of the Afghan Taliban use sanctuaries on Pakistani soil to direct insurgent attacks against local and international forces, a charge Pakistan denies.

…

Smuggling gangs in Mexico are cutting through the “virtually impenetrable” wall President Donald Trump is building along the U.S.-Mexico border to keep migrants and drugs out of the country, but Trump says he is not concerned.

“We have a very powerful wall,” Trump told reporters Saturday at the White House. “But no matter how powerful, you can cut through anything, in all fairness. But we have a lot of people watching. You know cutting, cutting is one thing, but it’s easily fixed. One of the reasons we did it the way we did it, it’s very easily fixed. You put the chunk back in.”

Trump offered his thoughts after The Washington Post disclosed that gangs have repeatedly sawed through the border wall in recent months using a reciprocating saw, a popular household tool that sells for as little as $100 at hardware stores.

When equipped with specialized blades, the saws can cut through the steel-and-concrete bollards within minutes, according to border agents. 

Once bases of the bollards have been cut, smugglers have been able to push them aside, creating a space wide enough for migrants and smugglers to enter. It has not been disclosed how many times the breaches have occurred.

One of Trump’s favorite 2016 election campaign themes was that he would build a wall along the U.S.-Mexican border to thwart illegal immigration – and that Mexico would pay for it. 

But with his 2020 re-election bid a year away, the wall remains a work in progress. Trump long ago abandoned efforts to get Mexico to pay for it, but also never won congressional approval of the tens of billion of dollars that would be required to build it.

Trump instead declared a national emergency at the southern border and, over the objection of critics in Congress, transferred money from other projects to fund wall construction.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection said that overall $9.8 billion has been secured in the last three years to build more than 800 kilometers of a “new border wall system.”

To date, however, no “new wall” — an extension to an existing barrier — has been built.

But about 90 kilometers of replacement barrier and 14 kilometers of new secondary barriers have been constructed.

…

The White House on Sunday defended President Donald Trump’s bid to get Ukraine to investigate one of his chief 2020 Democratic political rivals, former Vice President Joe Biden, saying the request did not amount to an impeachable offense.

“Nothing would lead to a high crime or misdemeanor,” one of Trump’s top aides, Kellyanne Conway, told CNN. She was referring to the standard for impeaching a U.S. president days after the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives approved proceedings for the impeachment inquiry targeting Trump over his actions related to Ukraine.

But Conway said she did not know whether Trump had initially conditioned release of $391 million in military aid to Ukraine in exchange for Kyiv investigating Biden, his son Hunter Biden’s work for Ukrainian natural gas company, Burisma, as well as a debunked political theory that Ukraine, and not Russia, had hacked into Democratic National Committee computers to try to help defeat Trump in the 2016 election.

“I feel comfortable in saying that [Trump] never mentioned a quid pro quo or 2020” in a late July call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, Conway said. 

“Let’s be honest …,” she added, “what is not there [in the phone call between the two leaders] is holding up the aid. They got that aid.”

Democrats contested White House assertions. “The Congress appropriated money for foreign aid for Ukraine, and the president illegally withheld that money,” Rep. Eliot Engel, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told ABC.

Trump said on Twitter, “Many people listened to my phone call with the Ukrainian President while it was being made. I never heard any complaints. The reason is that it was totally appropriate, I say perfect. Republicans have never been more unified, and my Republican Approval Rating is now 95%!”

Many people listened to my phone call with the Ukrainian President while it was being made. I never heard any complaints. The reason is that it was totally appropriate, I say perfect. Republicans have never been more unified, and my Republican Approval Rating is now 95%!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 3, 2019

On CNN, Conway said Trump has “great faith” in the U.S. intelligence community. But she declined to say whether Trump believes its conclusion that Moscow, and not Ukraine, meddled in the 2016 U.S. election to help him defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. secretary of state.

Several Trump administration national security and diplomatic officials have told impeachment investigators in the House that Trump had temporarily withheld release of the money that Kyiv wanted to help fight pro-Russians separatists in the eastern part of the country in an effort to pressure Ukraine to open the investigations to help him politically.

But Conway dismissed the accounts of the witnesses, saying it was “inappropriate to cherry pick 10 hours of testimony.”

Soliciting and receiving foreign contributions in an election is illegal under U.S. campaign finance law. 

Asked by CNN’s Dana Bash whether it was appropriate for Trump to ask a foreign country to investigate an American citizen, Biden, Conway said, “That’s a very simplified version of what happened.”

Conway said, “Joe Biden is not insulated from his past actions,” when as second in command under former President Barack Obama, he, along with European leaders, pressed Ukraine to oust a prosecutor they believed was not investigating high-level corruption in the eastern European country. 

Neither of the Bidens has been implicated in any wrongdoing. The younger Biden, however, has acknowledged that he used “poor judgment” in accepting the position on the Burisma board, which he left months ago, because it has caused his father political problems as he tries to win the Democratic Party presidential nomination to face Trump in the 2020 election that is a year from Sunday.

Trump has repeatedly said there was no quid pro quo even as he asked the Ukrainian leader for “a favor” in the form of politically-related investigations.

The impeachment inquiry in the House was touched off by the account of a whistleblower, identified in news reports as a Central Intelligence Agency official who formerly worked in the White House, who was troubled by Trump’s request to Zelenskiy to investigate Biden and his son.

“The Whistleblower got it sooo wrong that HE must come forward,” Trump said Sunday on Twitter. However, the general thrust of the whistleblower’s account was verified by a rough transcript of the Trump-Zelenskiy call released in September by the White House and subsequent testimony to the impeachment investigators.

“The Fake News Media knows who he is but, being an arm of the Democrat Party, don’t want to reveal him because there would be hell to pay,” Trump said. “Reveal the Whistleblower and end the Impeachment Hoax!”  

The Whistleblower got it sooo wrong that HE must come forward. The Fake News Media knows who he is but, being an arm of the Democrat Party, don’t want to reveal him because there would be hell to pay.
Reveal the Whistleblower and end the Impeachment Hoax!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) November 3, 2019

CBS reported the whistleblower has offered to answer written questions posed by Republican lawmakers without having to go through the House Intelligence Committee’s Democratic majority, according to the whistleblower’s attorney. Republicans have argued that Trump is entitled to confront his accuser.

If the full House, on a simple-majority vote, approves articles of impeachment against Trump in the coming weeks, a trial would be held in the Republican-majority Senate, where a two-thirds vote would be needed to convict him and remove him from office. With the votes of at least 20 Republican senators needed to turn against Trump to oust him, his conviction remains unlikely.

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Venezuela’s Foreign Ministry said on Sunday it was expelling El Salvador’s diplomats from the country, in response to the Central American country’s decision to expel diplomats representing Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.

In a statement, the ministry said it would give the diplomats 48 hours to leave. El Salvador President Nayib Bukele’s government does not recognize Maduro as legitimate and said on Saturday it would receive a new diplomatic corps representing opposition leader Juan Guaido.

Guaido, who presides over the opposition-controlled National Assembly, in January invoked the South American country’s constitution to assume an interim presidency, arguing Maduro stole the 2018 election. He has been recognized by dozens of Western countries, including the United States.

The Salvadoran move came less than a week after the U.S. government extended temporary protections for Salvadorans living in the United States by an extra year.

“Salvadoran authorities are breathing oxygen into the failing U.S. strategy of intervention and economic blockade against the people of Venezuela,” Venezuela’s ministry said.

“Bukele is officially assuming the sad role of a pawn of U.S. foreign policy.”

Maduro, a socialist, calls Guaido a U.S. puppet seeking to oust him in a coup, and blames U.S. sanctions for a hyperinflationary economic collapse that has led to a humanitarian crisis in the once-prosperous OPEC nation, prompting millions to emigrate.

While most of Venezuela’s neighbors recognize Guaido and have called on Maduro to step down, Maduro has remained in power thanks to the backing of the armed forces and allies including Russia, China and Cuba.

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The song “Baby Shark” blared over loudspeakers and a wave of red washed across this politically blue capital Saturday as Nationals fans rejoiced at a parade marking Washington’s first World Series victory since 1924. 

“They say good things come to those who wait. Ninety-five years is a pretty long wait,” Nationals owner Ted Lerner told the cheering crowd. “But I’ll tell you, this is worth the wait.” 

As buses carrying the players and team officials wended their way along the parade route, pitcher Max Scherzer at one point hoisted the World Series trophy to the cheers of the crowd. 

At a rally just blocks from the Capitol, Scherzer said that early in the season his teammates battled hard to “stay in the fight.” And then, after backup outfielder Gerardo Parra joined the team, he said, they started dancing and having fun. And they started hitting. “Never in this town have you seen a team compete with so much heart and so much fight,” he said. 

And then the Nats danced. 

‘I trusted these guys’

Team officials, Nationals manager Dave Martinez and several players thanked the fans for their support through the best of times and staying with them even after a dismal 19-31 start to the season. “I created the circle of trust and I trusted these guys,” Martinez said. 

The camaraderie among the players was a theme heard throughout the rally. “It took all 25 of us. Every single day we were pulling for each other,” said pitcher Stephen Strasburg, named the World Series’ Most Valuable Player. 

Veteran slugger Howie Kendrick, 36, said that when he came to the Nationals in 2017, “I was thinking about retiring. This city taught me to love baseball again.” 

Mayor Muriel Bowser declared D.C. the “District of Champions.” The Capitals won Stanley Cup in 2018, the Mystics won the WNBA championship this year, and now the Nationals are baseball’s best. 

The Nationals won the best-of-seven series against the Houston Astros, with the clincher coming on the road Wednesday night. 

“I just wish they could have won in D.C.,” said Ronald Saunders of Washington, who came with a Little League team that was marching in the parade. 

Nick Hashimoto of Dulles, Virginia, was among those who arrived at 5 a.m. to snag a front-row spot for the parade. He brought his own baby shark toy in honor of Parra’s walk-up song, which began as a parental tribute to the musical taste of his 2-year-old daughter and ended up as a rallying cry that united fans at Nationals Park and his teammates. 

As “Baby Shark, doo doo doo doo doo doo” played on a crisp morning, early risers joined in with the trademark response — arms extended in a chomping motion. Chants of “Let’s go, Nats!” resonated from the crowd hours before the rally. 

‘Fight Finished’

A packed crowd lined the parade route. Cheers went up and fans waved red streamers, hand towels and signs that said “Fight Finished” as the players rode by on the open tops of double-decker buses. General Manager Mike Rizzo, a cigar in his mouth, jumped off with the World Series trophy to show the fans lining the barricades and slap high-fives.  

“We know what this title means to D.C., a true baseball town, from the Senators to the Grays and now the Nationals,” Bowser said at the rally. “By finishing the fight you have brought a tremendous amount of joy to our town and inspired a new generation of players and Nationals fans.” 

Bowser added: “We are deeply proud of you and I think we should do it again next year. What do you think?” Then she started a chant of “Back to back! Back to back!” 

Martinez said he liked to hear the mayor pushing for back-to-back championships and said: “I get it. I’m all in. But let me enjoy this one first. I don’t know if my heart can take any more of this right now. I need to just step back and enjoy this.” 

Martinez, who underwent a heart procedure recently, said that during the series, as things heated up, players and fans shouted at him to watch out for his heart. “All this right here has cured my heart,” he said. 

And as the “Baby Shark” theme played once more, team owner Lerner told the team’s veterans, “From now on, you can call me `Grandpa Shark.’ ”   

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Thousands of Lebanese flocked together Saturday in Tripoli to keep a protest movement alive in a city dubbed “the bride of the revolution.” 

Despite its reputation for conservatism, impoverished Tripoli has emerged as a festive nerve center of anti-graft demonstrations across Lebanon since Oct. 17. 
 
The movement has lost momentum in Beirut since the government resigned this week, but in the Sunni-majority city of Tripoli late Saturday, it was still going strong. 
 
In the main square, protesters waved Lebanese flags and held aloft mobile phones as lights, before bellowing out the national anthem in unison, an AFP reporter said. 

‘Everyone’ urged to go

“Everyone means everyone,” one poster read, reiterating a common slogan calling for all political leaders from across the sectarian spectrum to step down. 
 
Many people had journeyed from other parts of the country to join in. 
 
Ragheed Chehayeb, 38, said he had driven in from the central town of Aley. 
 
“I came to Tripoli to stand by their side because they’re the only ones continuing the revolution,” he said. 
 
Leila Fadl, 50, said she had traveled from the Shiite town of Nabatiyeh south of Beirut to show her support. 
 
“We feel the demands are the same, the suffering is the same,” she said. 
 
More than half of Tripoli residents live at or below the poverty line, and 26 percent suffer from extreme poverty, a U.N. study found in 2015. 

Future uncertain
 
On Tuesday, embattled Prime Minister Saad Hariri announced his cabinet would step down. 

But it was still unclear what a new government would look like and whether it would meet protesters’ demands that it include independent experts. 
 
Roads and banks have reopened after nearly two weeks of nationwide paralysis. 
 
Fahmy Karame, 49, called for a “rapid solution to the economic crisis.” 
 
“We’re waiting for a government of technocrats,” he said.  

In Beirut, hundreds protested Saturday evening after a day of rain. 
 
“Down with the rule of the central bank,” they shouted at the tops of their lungs, clapping their hands near the institution’s headquarters. 
 
Economic growth in Lebanon has stalled in recent years in the wake of repeated political crises, compounded by an eight-year civil war in neighboring Syria. 

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