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This is VOA news. Via remote, I'm Marissa Melton.
Demonstrators calling for a stop to police brutality are marching in Atlanta days after police [fi...] fatally shot Rayshard Brooks in the city and three weeks after the death in police custody of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The Atlanta protests organized by civil rights groups gathered outside the Capitol where lawmakers were returning to work after a coronavirus shutdown. More than a thousand demonstrators demanded lawmakers take up criminal justice [repor...] reform, as [welling] well as voting issues after last week's election was marred by long lines at the polls in Atlanta. A few protesters came inside the state Capitol building, chanting slogans in the building's rotunda. Demonstrations were also expected in Lafayette Park across the street from the White House. It has been two weeks since law enforcement forcefully cleared [...] a peaceful crowd shortly before President Donald Trump walked through the area to stand in front of a church, upholding a bible. Also on Monday, the U.N. Human Rights Council agreed to hold an urgent debate on Wednesday and this is a quote "on the current racially inspired human rights violations, systematic racism, police brutality and violence against peaceful protesters." Those are the words of the [hia...] Human Rights Council, which is meeting on Wednesday to discuss the matter. The U.S. Supreme Court [re...] ruled on Monday that federal employment laws protect LGBTQ workers from [bis...] discrimination, delivering a major victory to the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender community amid concerns over an erosion of their rights in recent years. In a landmark 6-3 decision, the conservative-controlled court ruled an "employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender" violates the Civil Rights Act. From Washington D.C., you're listening to VOA news. The United Nations said on Monday that for the fifth consecutive year, Afghanistan was the deadliest country on the planet for children. In its annual report, the U.N. secretary-general reported that more than 3,000 Afghan children were killed in 2019 and nearly that many were injured. [mm...] More than 1,200 casualties were attributed to the Taliban. Afghan National Forces were believed responsible for about a thousand more. In Yemen, the world's largest humanitarian crisis, more than 1,400 children were killed or injured and there were at least 20 attacks on schools. The report attributed 313 of the casualties to Houthi rebels and 222 to the Saudi Arabian-led coalition. Doctors Without Borders has withdrawn from a hospital in Kabul, Afghanistan, a month after unknown gunmen raided the facility's maternity ward and killed 16 women. Doctors Without Borders, also known by its French acronym MSF, announced the decision on Monday no one has taken responsibility for the assault May 12 on the hospital in the Afghan capital and there has been no information about the perpetrators or the motive. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration on Monday revoked the emergency us authorization for a malaria drug promoted by U.S. President Donald Trump as a treatment for COVID-19. The FDA said there is growing evidence that hydroxychloroquine along with chloroquine are not likely to be effective in treating the coronavirus and could cause deadly side effects. The agency said the drugs' unproven benefits "do not outweigh the known and potential risks." The move means that federal supplies of the drug will no longer be distributed to state and local health officials to use against the coronavirus. The decades-old drugs are still available for other uses including combating malaria as well as lupus and rheumatoid arthritis. At the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States, President Trump said he believed hydroxychloroquine along with the antibiotic azithromycin had a "real chance" in his phrase to be what he called "game changers" in fighting COVID-19. He later said he took the drugs preventively to stave off the virus. Voice of America Director Amanda Bennett and her top Deputy Sandra [shuk...] Sugawara resigned today. They said Michael Pack, the newly approved chief executive of VOA's parent organization, the U.S. Agency for Global Media, has a right to replace them with his own VOA leadership. President Trump named Pack to the VOA job more than two years ago. His approval was blocked until recently by Senate Democrats' questioning his business dealings. Via remote, I'm Marissa Melton. You're listening to VOA news. |