🇮🇱 **Israeli spacecraft crashes onto moon after technical failures**
*Reuters* - <http://archive.fo/VwSV3>

The Israeli spacecraft Beresheet crashed onto the moon on Thursday after a series of technical failures during its final descent, shattering hopes of a historic controlled landing on the lunar surface.

The unmanned robotic lander suffered periodic engine and communications failures during the 21 minutes or so of the landing sequence, the support team said.

Beresheet, whose name is Hebrew for the biblical phrase “In the beginning”, had traveled through space for seven weeks in a series of expanding orbits around Earth before crossing into the moon’s gravity last week.

The final maneuver on Wednesday brought it into a tight elliptical orbit around the moon, 15-17 km (9-10.5 miles) from the surface at its closest. From there it was a short, nail-biting and ultimately disappointing conclusion.

So far, only three nations have succeeded in carrying out a “soft” landing on the lunar surface: the United States, the Soviet Union and China.
---------------

🇺🇸 **Justice Department unseals charges against Assange**
*CBS News* - <https://archive.fo/4yz1K>

The Justice Department has unsealed charges of conspiracy against Julian Assange, after the founder of WikiLeaks was arrested by London's Metropolitan Police Thursday at the Ecuadorian Embassy in the city. Assange, who has not left the embassy since 2012, recently had his asylum status revoked by Ecuador.

Police have also confirmed that Assange was arrested "on behalf" of U.S. law enforcement authorities, who have filed a formal extradition request for Assange for publishing classified information through WikiLeaks.

The charges from the Justice Department accuse Assange of conspiring with Chelsea Manning, a former Army intelligence analyst, to download and publish records containing classified defense information.

"The primary purpose of the conspiracy was to facilitate Manning's acquisition and transmission of classified information related to the national defense of the United States so that WikiLeaks could publicly disseminate the information on its website," the indictment reads.

**The statement by the London Metropolitan Police confirming that Assange had been "arrested in relation to an extradition warrant on behalf of the United States authorities" was the first official confirmation from either side of the Atlantic of an official extradition request.**
---------------

🇺🇸 ** Hillary Clinton says WikiLeaks' Julian Assange must 'answer' after London arrest **
*USA Today* - <https://archive.fo/N0D5d>

Hillary Clinton — among the high-profile targets of WikiLeaks' explosive document drops over the years — told a New York crowd Thursday that Julian Assange must "answer for what he has done" after his Thursday arrest.

London police arrested Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, on Thursday, the same day the Justice Department released an indictment alleging Assange conspired with ex-Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to steal classified government documents.

"The bottom line is he has to answer for what he has done," said Clinton, who said she would "wait and see what happens." The 2016 Democratic presidential nominee shared the Beacon Theater stage with her husband, former President Bill Clinton.
---------------

🇺🇸 **Man lights himself on fire outside White House**
*CBS News* - <https://archive.fo/zlxbh>

A man lit himself on fire near the White House Friday afternoon, prompting U.S. Secret Service agents to intervene. The man has been transported to a local hospital for what appear to be non-life-threatening injuries, the Secret Service says.

The identity of the man has not yet been disclosed. The incident took place around 3 p.m., and video footage showed Secret Service agents carrying the man to another location near the White House. Secret Service and D.C. Metropolitan Police are searching two bags the man had in proximity to him.

Secret Service confirmed the incident, saying in a statement, "Today at approximately 3:15 p.m, a male individual operating an electronic wheelchair-type scooter lit his outer jacket on fire while sitting on Pennsylvania Avenue. USSS Uniformed Division Officers responded in seconds, extinguished the fire and began to administer first aid. Fire transported the individual to a local hospital with what appeared to be non-life threatening injuries. Pedestrian traffic on Pennsylvania Avenue was closed following the incident. This is an ongoing investigation."
---------------

🇺🇸 **Roger Stone Wants Julian Assange To Testify At His Trial**
*Daily Caller* - <https://archive.fo/HGQ0E>

Longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone hopes to call WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange as a witness in his trial, a source familiar with Stone’s legal strategy told The Daily Caller News Foundation.

Stone believes that Assange can help his case by testifying that the pair were not in communication during the 2016 presidential campaign. Assange has long denied having contact with Stone or any Trump associates regarding WikiLeaks’ plans to release Democrats’ emails.

Stone was indicted and arrested on Jan. 24 on seven separate counts, most related to his testimony in 2017 before the House Intelligence Committee. (RELATED: Roger Stone Indicted In Mueller Probe)

The veteran GOP political operative has not been charged with conspiring with WikiLeaks or of lying when he denied having contacts with Assange. Instead, he is accused of making false statements about his communications with associates regarding discussions about WikiLeaks.

By showing that he had no contact with Assange, Stone hopes to show a jury that his alleged false statements were immaterial, TheDCNF’s source said.

Stone is scheduled to go to trial on Nov. 5.
---------------

🇺🇸 **U.S. has two months to finalize extradition case against WikiLeaks' Assange**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/hFyBi>

U.S. prosecutors have just under two months to present British authorities with a final and detailed criminal case to justify the possible extradition of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, a U.S. government official said on Friday.

The official, who asked for anonymity when discussing the case, said U.S. authorities had already sent Britain a provisional arrest warrant regarding Assange’s extradition to the United States.

But within 60 days from Thursday, when British police bundled Assange out of the Ecuadorean embassy in London where he had taken refuge seven years ago, U.S. authorities must submit a formal request outlining all the legal charges Assange would face if he is transferred into U.S. custody.

According to a criminal indictment against Assange which prosecutors in Virginia secretly obtained more than a year ago but only unsealed after Assange’s arrest, Assange is charged with conspiring with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to gain unauthorized access to a government computer.

The U.S. indictment filed in March 2018 said Assange, in March 2010, engaged in a conspiracy to help Manning crack a password stored on Defense Department computers connected to the Secret Internet Protocol Network (SIPRNet), a U.S. government network used for classified documents and communications.
---------------

🇿🇦 **‘Tie them down to a tree’: South African president urges white youth not to emigrate**
*RT* - <https://archive.fo/AMuFZ>

In a plea to stop young white people from continuing their exodus from the country, South Africa’s Cyril Ramaphosa posed a rather curious solution on the campaign trail — tying them to trees and begging them not to emigrate.

Speaking at a meeting of wine farmers in Stellenbosch in the Western Cape on Tuesday, the South African president said he did not want to see young white farmers and the skills they possess leaving the country, jokingly posing his own solution to the ongoing emigration crisis.

“If I could, I’d tie them down to a tree and say don’t leave, I want you here in this country,” Ramaphosa told the group of mainly white farmers. The leader also moved to assure the wine growers over their fears surrounding land reform in South Africa, promising that if re-elected, it would be done in accordance with the law.
---------------

🇫🇮 **Finnish voters may pave way for first leftist premier in two decades**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/nHEy5>

Finland may usher in its first leftist prime minister in two decades in a parliamentary election on Sunday, as voters fret over the future of the generous welfare system as the costs of
caring for a rapidly ageing population rise.

But if opinion polls are correct, the left-leaning Social Democrats’ ability to govern may be hampered by a surge in support for the nationalist Finns Party, riding a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment sweeping the Nordics.

A survey commissioned by public broadcaster Yle showed the Social Democrats could win top spot with 19 percent of the vote, giving leader Antti Rinne first shot at forming a government.

The Finns are running second with 16.3 percent support, after scoring rapid gains since the start of the year when cases of sexual abuse of minors by foreign men emerged.

Finns Party leader Jussi Halla-aho, 47, cast his vote near his home in Eira, one of Helsinki’s most expensive neighborhoods.

“As you probably know we have doubled our support in opinion polls during the past six months,” he said. “We want to reduce to as low as possible the kind of immigration that is, in our opinion, damaging to the
public finances of our country and to the safety and security of people.”

With the European Parliament election less than two months away, the Finnish ballot is being watched in Brussels. A strong result for the Finns Party could bolster a nationalist bloc threatening to shake up EU policy-making.

Anti-immigration parties have announced plans to join forces after the May 26 EU election in a move that could give them a major say in how the continent is run.
----------------

🇺🇸 **San Jose to fly rainbow flags near new Chick-fil-A location**
*The Hill* - <https://archive.fo/4g8zn>

The city council in San Jose, Calif., this week voted unanimously to fly rainbow flags in support of LGBTQ rights near a Chick-fil-A set to open next month at the city's airport.

Council members voted 11-0 on Tuesday to hang both a rainbow flag and a transgender-rights pink, blue and white flag at a yet to be determined location at the San Jose International Airport, according to NBC News.

"I made the suggestion to put the flags next to the restaurant, and council members liked that idea but also said that maybe put flags elsewhere, too, like outside," Ken Yeager, the first openly gay elected official in Santa Clara County, told NBC News.

The city council voted last year to let Chick-fil-A to open a location in the airport food court.

San Jose Vice Mayor Charles Jones told BNBC news that the plan is to have a flag or flags near the restaurant and outside the airport.

Chick-fil-A did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
---------------

@Spicy news about notre dame?

plz

🇫🇷 **Part of Notre-Dame Spire Collapses as Paris Cathedral Catches Fire**
*New York Times* - <https://archive.fo/V1k3S>

A large fire broke out at the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris on Monday evening, causing part of the historic church’s spire to collapse as the blaze spread along its roof.

André Finot, a spokesman for the cathedral, said in a telephone interview that the cause of the fire remained unknown, and there was no immediate indication that anyone had been hurt.

Thousands of Parisians and tourists gathered on the banks of the Seine river and watched in shock as the fire tore through the cathedral’s wooden roof and brought down part of the spire. Video filmed by onlookers and shared on social media showed smoke and flames billowing from the top of the cathedral.

Mayor Anne Hidalgo of Paris said on Twitter that “a terrible fire” had struck at the cathedral.

“The Paris firefighters are currently trying to stop the flames,” Ms. Hidalgo said. “I ask everyone to respect the security boundaries.”
---------------

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VI22gjfJQ7Q

🇮🇱 **After Israeli elections, Netanyahu sets out to build ‘indictment-proof’ coalition**
*Washington Post* - <https://archive.fo/D3X7j>

As negotiations on the formation of a new Israeli government got underway Monday, almost a week after parliamentary elections, analysts said one issue is foremost in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s mind: building an “indictment-proof” coalition.

Israeli President Rivlin Reuven began consulting Monday with the heads of the country’s various political parties about whom they want to head the new government, a process that was live-streamed for the first time.

There is little doubt that Netanyahu will manage to form a coalition, most likely one made up of his own ruling Likud party and his traditional coalition partners of ultra-Orthodox and right-wing parties, giving him a 65-seat majority in Israel’s Knesset, or parliament.

But Netanyahu will be looking to form a bloc that will stand by him regardless of whether expected indictments in three corruption cases against him proceed — or one that will even agree to pass legislation granting him immunity from prosecution.

To do that, he will have to balance demands from emboldened ultra-Orthodox parties, secular coalition parties and right-wing nationalists that are pushing for annexation of parts of the West Bank. The nationalists’ pro-annexation interests in particular could clash with Netanyahu’s own reluctance to publicly torpedo a U.S. peace plan expected to be rolled out by later this spring or early summer.
---------------

🇯🇵 **Workers begin removing fuel from Fukushima nuclear reactor**
*New York Post/AP* - <https://archive.fo/2VA7e>

The operator of the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant began removing fuel Monday from a cooling pool at one of three reactors that melted down in the 2011 disaster, a milestone in what will be a decades-long process to decommission the facility.

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said workers started removing the first of 566 used and unused fuel units stored in the pool at Unit 3. The fuel units in the pool located high up in reactor buildings are intact despite the disaster, but the pools are not enclosed, so removing the units to safer ground is crucial to avoid disaster in case of another major earthquake similar to the one that caused the 2011 tsunami.

TEPCO says the removal at Unit 3 will take two years, followed by the two other reactors, where about 1,000 fuel units remain in the storage pools.

Removing fuel units from the cooling pools comes ahead of the real challenge of removing melted fuel from inside the reactors, but details of how that might be done are still largely unknown. Removing the fuel in the cooling pools was delayed more than four years by mishaps, high radiation and radioactive debris from an explosion that occurred at the time of the reactor meltdowns, underscoring the difficulties that remain.

Workers are remotely operating a crane built underneath a jelly roll-shaped roof cover to raise the fuel from a storage rack in the pool and place it into a protective cask. The whole process occurs underwater to prevent radiation leaks. Each cask will be filled with seven fuel units, then lifted from the pool and lowered to a truck that will transport the cask to a safer cooling pool elsewhere at the plant.

The work is carried out remotely from a control room about 500 yards away because of still-high radiation levels inside the reactor building that houses the pool.
---------------

🇷🇴 **Anti-Semitism threatens Romania's fragile Jewish community**
*BBC* - <https://archive.fo/zgPig>

Vandals badly damaged 73 gravestones in the north-eastern town of Husi earlier this month, amid a surge in anti-Semitic attacks across Europe.

"It's a very disturbing event, but it's nothing surprising," said Maximillian Marco Katz, founding director of the Centre for Monitoring and Combating anti-Semitism in Romania.

"It shows that anti-Semitism is alive, it doesn't matter who did it," he told the BBC.

"They didn't knock down two or three gravestones, they knocked down 73 gravestones - that takes some determination and it takes time."

A criminal investigation has been opened.

An elderly community dying out
The Shabbat service is about to start at the Status Quo synagogue in Targu Mures, a city in central Romania.

Standing in the sunlit courtyard, community leader Vasile Dub, 72, expresses a mix of concern and caution.

Nowadays he says that he feels "absolutely safe" in Romania, but later admits that he doesn't always declare that he is Jewish.

"The real tragedy was in the 1940s," says Mr Dub, who lost family members in the Holocaust.
----------------

Based Legionaries

🇪🇨 **Julian Assange used the embassy as ‘center for spying,’ Ecuadorian president says**
*Fox News* - <https://archive.fo/qVxcI>

WikiLeaks co-founder Julian Assange reportedly violated his asylum conditions when he used the Ecuadorian embassy in London as a “center for spying,” the country’s president said in a new interview.

Lenin Moreno told the Guardian newspaper that Ecuador’s government had provided facilities within the embassy that allowed Assange to “interfere” with other states.

“Any attempt to destabilize is a reprehensible act for Ecuador because we are a sovereign nation and respectful of the politics of each country,” he said in his first English-language interview since Assange’s arrest last week. “We cannot allow our house, the house that opened its doors, to become a center for spying.”

He added: “This activity violates asylum conditions. Our decision is not arbitrary but is based on international law.”
---------------

🇦🇫 **Taliban team at Afghan peace talks in Qatar to include women: spokesman**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/3v0Cn>

Women will be included for the first time in the Taliban delegation to peace talks in Qatar this month, the movement’s main spokesman said on Monday, ahead of the latest round of meetings aimed at ending the war in Afghanistan.

For a group notorious for its strictly conservative attitude to women’s rights, the move represents a step toward addressing demands that women be included in the talks, intended to lay the foundations for a future peace settlement.

The April 19-21 meeting in Doha will be the latest in a series of talks between Taliban and U.S. officials and is also expected to include a 150-strong delegation of Afghan politicians and civil society figures.

“There will be women among Taliban delegation members in the Doha, Qatar meeting,” Zabihullah Mujahid, the Taliban’s main spokesman, said by telephone.

He did not name the women, but added, “These women have no family relationship with the senior members of the Taliban, they are normal Afghans, from inside and outside the country, who have been supporters and part of the struggle
of the Islamic Emirate”.

In a tweet, he specified that the women would only join discussions with Afghan civil society and political representatives, not in the main negotiations with American officials, led by U.S. special peace envoy Zalmay Khalilzad.

While Afghanistan remains a deeply conservative country, especially in rural areas, there have been major advances in women’s rights since the U.S-led campaign of 2001 that toppled the Taliban government. Many women fear that if
the group regains some power, many of these gains could be erased.
----------------

🇳🇿 **6 charged with spreading New Zealand mosque shooting video online**
*CBS News* - <https://archive.fo/UgxjL>

Six people appeared in a New Zealand court Monday on charges they illegally redistributed the video a gunman livestreamed as he shot worshippers at two mosques last month. Christchurch District Court Judge Stephen O'Driscoll
denied bail to businessman Philip Arps and an 18-year-old suspect who both were taken into custody in March. The four others are not in custody.

The charge of supplying or distributing objectionable material carries a penalty of up to 14 years imprisonment. Arps, 44, is scheduled to next appear in court via video link on April 26.

The 18-year-old suspect is charged with sharing the livestream video and a still image of the Al Noor mosque with the words "target acquired." He will reappear in court on July 31 when electronically monitored bail will
be considered.

Police prosecutor Pip Currie opposed bail for the 18-year-old suspect and said the second charge, involving the words added to the still image, was of significant concern.

New Zealand's chief censor has banned both the livestreamed footage of the attack and the manifesto written and released by Brenton Harrison Tarrant, who faces 50 murder charges and 39 attempted murder charges in the March 15 attacks.

CBS News's Aimee Picchi reported that while the attack was livestreamed, the video was viewed fewer than 200 times, according to Facebook executive Guy Rosen, the company's vice president of integrity. Rosen said that during
the live broadcast, the service "did not get a single user report... This matters because reports we get while a video is broadcasting live are prioritized for accelerated review."

The video was viewed about 4,000 times before Facebook blocked it from the service, he added. The first report came in 12 minutes after the video ended.
----------------

🇺🇸 **Sanders releases 10 years of tax returns showing income bump from campaign book**
*NBC* - <https://archive.fo/K9JZx>

Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., released 10 years of tax returns Monday evening, showing the majority of his income came from his U.S. Senate salary until 2016, when his income jumped with the publication of a book on his first
presidential run.

His total income popped to over $1 million in 2016 and 2017, after he wrote “Our Revolution: A Future to Believe In” in November 2016, raising his effective tax rate for those years to over 30 percent.

“I consider paying more in taxes as my income rose to be both an obligation and an investment in our country," Sanders said in a statement released by his campaign. "I will continue to fight to make our tax system more
progressive so that our country has the resources to guarantee the American Dream to all people.”

His book debuted on the New York Times bestseller list at #3, and has sold approximately 227,000 copies, according to the industry tracker NPD BookScan. Two subsequent books, “The Bernie Sanders Guide to Political
Revolution” and “Where Do We Go From Here: Two Years in the Resistance” sold over 27,000 and 26,000 copies, respectively.

During his 2016 campaign, Sanders initially released just a summary of his 2014 tax returns, before releasing his full return later in the primary.

"We had a good idea based on his 2014 returns what to expect,” Steve Rosenthal, a senior fellow in the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center at the Urban Institute, told NBC News after reviewing his returns. “He made a whole
bunch of money as an author now, which is sizable. Running for president has been a lucrative business for him.”

Sanders has been under pressure to release his returns since he launched his campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination in February. In a televised CNN town hall shortly after, the senator promised to release
them "sooner than later.”
----------------

🇪🇬 **Egypt constitutional changes could mean Sisi rule until 2030**
*BBC* - <https://archive.fo/RQUVG>

Egypt's parliament has approved constitutional amendments that would allow President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi to stay in power until 2030.

Mr Sisi is due to stand down in 2022, when his second four-year term ends.

But the amendments, which must be put to a referendum within 30 days, would lengthen his current term to six years and allow him to stand for one more.

They would also give Mr Sisi more power over the judiciary and further enshrine the military's role in politics.

In 2013, Mr Sisi led the military's overthrow of Egypt's first democratically elected president, Mohammed Morsi, following protests against his rule.

Since then, he has overseen what human rights groups say is an unprecedented crackdown on dissent that has led to the detention of tens of thousands of people.

Mr Sisi was first elected president in 2014 and was re-elected last year after winning 97% of the vote. He faced no serious competition because several potential rivals dropped out or were arrested.

Parliament is also dominated by supporters of Mr Sisi and it has been criticised by the opposition as being a rubber stamp for the president.

One MP who campaigned for the constitutional amendments, Mohammed Abu Hamed, told AFP news agency that Mr Sisi was a president who "took important political, economic and security measures" and who had to be allowed to
"continue with his reforms" in the wake of the unrest in neighbouring Libya and Sudan.

But Khaled Dawoud, of the liberal al-Dustour party, dismissed the argument as "absurd" and told the BBC that the changes represented a "power-grab" by Mr Sisi.

The internet monitor NetBlocks said Egyptian authorities had partly or fully blocked 34,000 websites in an attempt to restrict access to a campaign website that had reportedly collected 250,000 signatures against the amendments.
----------------

🇸🇾 **Christianity grows in Syrian town once besieged by Islamic State**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/kKIaK>

A community of Syrians who converted to Christianity from Islam is growing in Kobani, a town besieged by Islamic State for months, and where the tide turned against the militants four years ago.

Children play near damaged houses in Kobani, Syria April 3, 2019. REUTERS/Ali Hashisho
The converts say the experience of war and the onslaught of a group claiming to fight for Islam pushed them toward their new faith. After a number of families converted, the Syrian-Turkish border town’s first evangelical
church opened last year.

Islamic State militants were beaten back by U.S. air strikes and Kurdish fighters at Kobani in early 2015, in a reversal of fortune after taking over swaths of Iraq and Syria. After years of fighting, U.S.-backed forces
fully ended the group’s control over populated territory last month.

Though Islamic State’s ultra-radical interpretation of Sunni Islam has been repudiated by the Islamic mainstream, the legacy of its violence has affected perceptions of faith.

Many in the mostly Kurdish areas of northern Syria, whose urban centers are often secular, say agnosticism has strengthened and in the case of Kobani, Christianity.

Christianity is one of the region’s minority faiths that was persecuted by Islamic State.

Critics view the new converts with suspicion, accusing them of seeking personal gain such as financial help from Christian organizations working in the region, jobs and enhanced prospects of emigration to European countries.

The newly-converted Christians of Kobani deny those accusations. They say their conversion was a matter of faith.
----------------

🇺🇸 **U.S. measles cases surge nearly 20 percent in early April, CDC says**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/Nc2dr>

The number of confirmed cases of measles in the United States this year jumped by nearly 20 percent in the week ended April 11, in the country’s second-worst outbreak
in nearly two decades, federal health officials reported on Monday.

As of April 11, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recorded 555 cases of the disease since the beginning of the year, up from 465 cases confirmed
by April 4. The cases were found in 20 states spanning the country.

The measles virus is highly contagious and can lead to complications and death, particularly in children. The CDC report did not say whether there have been any fatalities.

The U.S. outbreak is part of a worldwide rise. The World Health Organization reported on Monday that global cases had risen nearly four-fold in the first quarter of 2019
to 112,163 compared with the same period last year.

A growing and vocal fringe of parents in the United States oppose vaccines believing, contrary to scientific evidence, that ingredients in them can cause autism or other
disorders.

Five parents filed a lawsuit with the New York State court against the city’s health department on Monday, requesting a halt to emergency orders requiring the measles
vaccine on the grounds that it goes against their religious beliefs.

“There is insufficient evidence of a measles epidemic or dangerous outbreak to justify the respondents’ extraordinary measures, including forced vaccination,” said the
lawsuit, identifying the parents only by their initials.

The city’s Department of Health did not respond to requests for comment.
----------------

🇮🇶 **Iraq parliament bans online battle games, citing 'negative' influence**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/arl6X>

Iraq’s parliament voted on Wednesday to ban popular online video games including PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds and Fortnite, citing their “negative” influence especially on the young in a country long plagued by real-life bloodshed.

Iraq held its first election in 2018 after years of devastating factional violence. Islamic State militants held wide swathes of the country for three years until they were driven out in heavy fighting with U.S.-backed forces in 2017.

Lawmakers, who were sworn in last September after months of disputed results and ballot box recounts, approved a resolution that mandated the government to bar online access to the games and ban related financial transactions.

The ban came “due to the negative effects caused by some electronic games on the health, culture, and security of Iraqi society, including societal and moral threats to children and youth,” the text of the resolution read.

Oil-rich Iraq has suffered for decades under the dictatorial rule of Saddam Hussein and U.N. sanctions, the 2003 U.S. invasion and civil war it unleashed, and the battle against Islamic State, over which Baghdad declared victory
in 2017.

Corruption is rampant and basic services like power and water are lacking. Unemployment is widespread, especially among young people.

The new ban quickly drew online discontent with hundreds of Iraqi social media users criticizing lawmakers for what they said were misplaced priorities. Parliament has passed only one piece of legislation since it first convened,
the 2019 federal budget law which was issued in January.
----------------

🇫🇷 **As Notre-Dame money rolls in, some eyebrows raised over rush of funds**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/dgB4G>

Pledged donations from French billionaires, companies and ordinary citizens for the restoration of fire-ravaged Notre-Dame cathedral are approaching 900 million euros after just two days, a
reflection of the landmark’s resonance in the national psyche.

But the outpouring has prompted questions from charities, politicians and commentators about why some of the business donors have offered so much so quickly, including speculation about how
they might benefit from tax breaks on the donations.

People on social media, both in France and abroad, have expressed frustration that other disasters - from the Syrian and Iraq refugee crisis to the Grenfell Tower fire in London - have not
received anything like the same degree of support.

The first major donation to Notre-Dame came from Francois-Henri Pinault, the billionaire head of luxury goods group Kering that owns fashion brands Gucci and Saint Laurent.

Pinault, 56, a celebrity figure in part because he is married to actress Salma Hayek, pledged 100 million euros ($113 million) as the blaze was still raging - a decision dictated by emotion,
a spokeswoman for his family’s holding company said.

Hours later, his great rival Bernard Arnault, France’s richest man and the head of Louis Vuitton owner LVMH, announced he was donating 200 million euros, moved by the alarming pictures on TV, according to a group spokesman.

The Bettencourt-Meyer family, the largest shareholder in L’Oreal, followed suit a while later, pledging a combined 200 million euros alongside the global cosmetics group.

Brand and reputation experts said the quick response by some of France’s most recognizable corporate titans made sense, especially since the disaster involves a national symbol.
----------------

🇵🇹 **Madeira crash: At least 28 killed on tourist bus near Caniço**
*BBC* - <https://archive.fo/8sKp6>

A bus carrying German tourists has plunged off a road and overturned on the Portuguese island of Madeira leaving 28 people dead.

Another 22 were injured in the accident near the town of Caniço, according to national news agency Lusa.

The accident happened at 18:30 (17:30 GMT) when the driver lost control of the bus at a junction and went off the road, reports said.

Portuguese media showed the overturned vehicle had come to rest near houses.

"I have no words to describe what happened. I cannot face the suffering of these people," local Mayor Filipe Sousa told broadcaster SIC TV.

He said all the tourists on the bus were German but it was not clear if the fatalities occurred only in the bus.

The scene of the crash has been sealed off and the injured transferred to a hospital in the capital, Funchal, Lusa said.

Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa is flying to the island to visit the scene, the agency added.

Madeira was the scene of another fatal bus crash in 2005 when five Italian tourists died in São Vicente, on the northern coast.
----------------

🇵🇪 **Peru's ex-president Garcia dies after shooting himself to avoid arrest**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/yxhHr>

Peru’s former president Alan Garcia died in a hospital in Lima on Wednesday, hours after shooting himself in the head to avoid arrest in connection with a bribery probe, authorities said on Wednesday.
Garcia, who had six adult children, was 69.

A skilled orator elected president twice, first as a firebrand leftist and then as a champion of foreign investment and free trade, Garcia had been dogged by allegations of corruption in recent years that he had
repeatedly denied.

Garcia was one of nine people a judge had ordered to be arrested on Wednesday for alleged involvement in bribes distributed by Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction company that triggered Latin America’s biggest graft
scandal when it admitted in 2016 that it had paid kickbacks to politicians across the region to secure lucrative contracts.

While three former presidents in Peru have also been ordered to jail in connection with Odebrecht, Garcia had blamed his legal troubles on political persecution, accusing President Martin Vizcarra without evidence of
trying to silence him.

“Others might sell out, not me,” Garcia said in some of his last broadcast comments on Tuesday, repeating a phrase he has used frequently as his political foes became ensnared in the Odebrecht investigation.

Members of his once-powerful Apra party announced his death to crowds gathered outside of hospital Casimiro Ulloa, where he suffered three cardiac arrests and underwent emergency surgery.
----------------

🇮🇹 **Italian students' BBQ results in €13m fine for forest fire**
*BBC* - <https://archive.fo/3zbkJ>

Two students blamed for a large forest fire in the Italian region of Como have each been fined €13.5m (£11.7m).

The men, both aged 22, were barbecuing at a mountain forest home belonging to one of their grandfathers when the fire broke out on 30 December last year.

The huge bill for the two students was calculated by local officials based on a formula used to determine the extent of damage caused by the fire.

One of the students told Italian media they were "scapegoats" for the blaze.

Speaking to Italy's La Stampa newspaper, one of the university students said he was "deeply sorry" - but said there were multiple sources of the outbreak.

"We are the scapegoats of a fire that cannot be explained," he said, adding: "We are the real victims of this story.

"[We] immediately alerted the fire brigade and threw ourselves at the flames to try and put them out."

Prosecutors, however, traced the path of the fire back to the property and said it had been started by embers from the barbecue, coupled with extremely dry conditions.
The two young men were found jointly responsible, along with the owner of the property.

The fire lasted for several days, destroying some 1,000 hectares of forest on Monte Berlinghera - the damage caused to some 100 hectares was said to be irreversible.

The fine of €13,542,000 was calculated by forest police based on an established formula under local laws.
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🇾🇪🇸🇦🇮🇱🇺🇸 **Trump vetoes resolution to end U.S. participation in Yemen’s civil war**
*The Washington Post* - <https://archive.fo/xqtSj>

President Trump on Tuesday vetoed a resolution that would have ended U.S. support for the Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen.

The move, which had been expected, marks the second veto of Trump’s presidency.

“This resolution is an unnecessary, dangerous attempt to weaken my constitutional authorities, endangering the lives of American citizens and brave service members, both today and in the future,” Trump said in a statement.

The measure had passed the House on a 247-to-175 vote this month and was approved by the Senate last month with the support of seven Republicans.

This month’s House vote marked the first time both chambers had acted to invoke the same war-powers resolution to end U.S. military engagement in a foreign conflict. It also represented the latest instance of Congress’s challenging Trump’s decisions as commander in chief.

The veto means the United States will continue its involvement in Saudi Arabia’s bombing campaign against Yemen’s Houthi rebels, waged in the name of holding back Iran’s expansion in the region.

But the Saudi-led effort, which has targeted civilian facilities and prevented aid shipments from getting to Yemenis, has been faulted by human rights organizations for exacerbating what the United Nations has deemed the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophe.
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🇺🇸 **Read the text of the Mueller report**
*NBC News* - <https://archive.fo/oqXhd>

Special counsel Robert Mueller's report on his investigation into Russian election interference was released publicly Thursday, with some redactions.
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Download full report here:
<https://www.justice.gov/storage/report.pdf>
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🇺🇸 **U.S. Church Membership Down Sharply in Past Two Decades**
*Gallup* - <https://archive.fo/z84Y9>

As Christian and Jewish Americans prepare to celebrate Easter and Passover, respectively, Gallup finds the percentage of Americans who report belonging to a church, synagogue or mosque at an all-time low, averaging 50% in 2018.

U.S. church membership was 70% or higher from 1937 through 1976, falling modestly to an average of 68% in the 1970s through the 1990s. The past 20 years have seen an acceleration in the drop-off, with a 20-percentage-point decline since 1999 and more than half of that change occurring since the start of the current decade.

The decline in church membership is consistent with larger societal trends in declining church attendance and an increasing proportion of Americans with no religious preference.

This article compares church membership data for the 1998-2000 and 2016-2018 periods, using combined data from multiple years to facilitate subgroup analysis. On average, 69% of U.S. adults were members of a church in 1998-2000, compared with 52% in 2016-2018.

The decline in church membership mostly reflects the fact that fewer Americans than in the past now have any religious affiliation. However, even those who do identify with a particular religion are less likely to belong to a church or other place of worship than in the past.
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🇺🇦 **Comedian Zelenskiy keeps Ukraine presidential poll lead**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/ddmwI>

Comic actor Volodymyr Zelenskiy, a political novice who plays a fictional president in a popular TV series, has kept his lead in Ukraine’s presidential election race, according to an opinion poll published on Thursday.

The poll by research body Reiting showed Zelenskiy on 57.9 percent of votes and incumbent Petro Poroshenko on 21.7 percent. Reiting polled 3,000 voters in all regions, except annexed Crimea, from April 12 to 16.

The previous poll made by Reiting in April 5-10 gave Zelenskiy 61 percent of votes while Poroshenko received 24 percent.

Poroshenko and Zelenskiy will meet in the second round of Ukraine’s presidential election, which will take place on April 21. Zelenskiy won nearly twice as many votes as Poroshenko in the first round, on March 31.
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🇧🇩 **Bangladeshi student burned to death by fellow students for reporting sexual harassment by head teacher**
*Fox News* - <https://archive.fo/y7fLh>

A Bangladeshi teenager who braved the shame and taboo of being sexually harassed by reporting her ordeal to officials, has been doused with kerosene at school and burned to death.

Nusrat Jahan Rafi, 19, filed a complaint with local police in late March after allegedly being touched inappropriately by the head teacher at her Islamic school, also known as a madrasa, according to the BBC.
A police officer filmed her distraught testimony on his mobile phone and it was leaked after the teacher was arrested.

Despite the increasing threats of violence against her, Rafi continued going to class and on April 6, reportedly was lured to a building rooftop at her school. She was then surrounded by several burqa-clad
individuals who demanded that she retract her police report.

After refusing, the Police Bureau of Investigation Chief told the BBC, the student was doused in kerosene and set alight –but their plan to “make it look like a suicide” failed after the severely injured Rafi was rescued.

She suffered burns to more than 80 percent of her body, and died ten days later. But while being rushed to hospital via ambulance and in one final act of courage, Rafi recorded a statement on her brother’s phone exposing
some of her attackers as fellow students.

“The teacher touched me,” she reportedly said. “I will fight this crime till my last breath.”

“When a woman tries to get justice for sexual harassment, she has to face a lot of harassment again,” Salma Ali, a human rights lawyer and former director of the Women Lawyers’ Association, told the BBC. “The case lingers
for years, there is shaming in society, a lack of willingness from the police to properly investigate the allegations. It leads the victim to give up on seeking justice.”
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🇺🇸 **Elizabeth Warren calls on Congress to begin impeachment proceedings against Trump**
*CBS News* - <https://archive.fo/GbuKY>

Elizabeth Warren became the first Democratic presidential candidate to call for Congress to begin impeachment proceedings against President Trump Friday afternoon, citing the "severity" of "misconduct" detailed in the report by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

"The severity of this misconduct demands that elected officials in both parties set aside political considerations and do their constitutional duty. That means the House should initiate impeachment proceedings against the President of the United States," the Massachusetts senator wrote on Twitter.

In an earlier tweet, Warren said that the report proved that Russia had interfered in the 2016 election with the goal of helping Mr. Trump, and showed that the president "obstructed the investigation into that attack." Mueller did not come to a conclusion as to whether Mr. Trump obstructed justice.
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY HITLER AND HAPPY 20TH ANNIVERSARY COLUMBINE

🎉💥

🇱🇰 **Sri Lanka explosions: More than 200 killed as churches and hotels targeted**
*BBC* - <https://archive.fo/im7X0>

At least 207 people have been killed and 400 hurt in explosions at churches and hotels in Sri Lanka, police say.

At least eight blasts were reported. Three churches in Negombo, Batticaloa and Colombo's Kochchikade district were targeted during Easter services.

The Shangri-La, Kingsbury, Cinnamon Grand and a fourth hotel, all in Colombo, were also hit.

A curfew has been imposed from 18:00 to 06:00 local time (12:30-00:30 GMT). Seven arrests have been made.

The government also said there would a temporary block on the use of major social media networks.

No-one has yet claimed responsibility for the attacks but the defence minister said they were probably carried out by one group.

St Sebastian's church in Negombo was severely damaged. Images on social media showed its inside, with a shattered ceiling and blood on the pews. Dozens of people are reported to have died there.

There were heavy casualties too at the site of the first blast in St Anthony's, a hugely popular shrine in Kochchikade, a district of Colombo.

Among those killed in Colombo were at least nine foreign nationals, hospital sources told the BBC.
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🇺🇸 **North Carolina man accused of shooting 2 children in road rage incident**
*Fox News* - <http://archive.is/rde5c>

A North Carolina man was arrested Saturday after he allegedly shot a 9-year-old boy and a 7-year-old girl during a road rage incident involving their father, investigators said.

The two siblings were rushed to Northern Hospital of Surry County by their father, Graig Allen Sheff, the Surry County Sheriff's Office said. The boy was treated and released, and the girl was reported in stable condition after she underwent surgery.

Surry County officials identified Byron Donnell Green, 41, as the suspect and found him at his apartment in Mount Airy, Winston-Salem station WXII-TV reported.

Green was charged with assault with a deadly weapon with intent to kill inflicting serious injury, discharging a weapon into an occupied property causing bodily injury and assault by pointing a gun, police said. Green was being held at the Surry County Detention Center on $600,000 bond.
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🇱🇰🇩🇰 **Three children of Danish billionaire killed in Sri Lanka attacks**
*Reuters* - <https://archive.fo/U4xCM>

Denmark’s richest man Anders Holch Povlsen and his wife lost three of their four children in the Easter Sunday attacks in Sri Lanka, a spokesman for Povlsen’s fashion firm said on Monday.

The spokesman declined to give any further details but Danish media said the family had been on holiday in Sri Lanka.

A string of bombings at churches and luxury hotels across Sri Lanka killed 290 people and wounded about 500 in Sunday’s attacks. A senior investigator said on Monday that seven suicide bombers had taken part in the attacks.

Povlsen is the owner of fashion firm Bestseller, which includes brands like Vero Moda and Jack & Jones, and is the majority stakeholder in online retailer Asos while also holding a big stake in Zalando.

He owns more than 1 percent of all the land in Scotland, according to Forbes.
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