Judge rules pro-Palestinian student and permanent US resident cannot be detained

Actions against Yunseo Chung form part of a pattern of government efforts against pro-Palestinian voices critical of Israel’s military assault on Gaza, her lawsuit said. (Photo/social media)
Actions against Yunseo Chung form part of a pattern of government efforts against pro-Palestinian voices critical of Israel’s military assault on Gaza, her lawsuit said. (Photo/social media)
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Updated 26 March 2025
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Judge rules pro-Palestinian student and permanent US resident cannot be detained

Judge rules pro-Palestinian student and permanent US resident cannot be detained
  • Protesters, including some Jewish groups, say the administration wrongly conflates their criticism of Israel and support for Palestinian rights with antisemitism and support for Hamas

WASHINGTON: A Korean American Columbia University student, who is a legal permanent US resident and has participated in pro-Palestinian protests, cannot be detained by federal immigration officials for now as she fights the administration of President Donald Trump over attempts to deport her, a judge ruled on Tuesday.
Yunseo Chung, 21, has lived in the US since she was seven, and sued the Trump administration on Monday to prevent her deportation. Her legal team was informed this month that her lawful permanent resident status was being revoked, according to court records in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York.
Trump has pledged to deport foreign pro-Palestinian protesters and accused them of supporting Hamas militants, of posing hurdles for US foreign policy and of being antisemitic.
Protesters, including some Jewish groups, say the administration wrongly conflates their criticism of Israel and support for Palestinian rights with antisemitism and support for Hamas. Human rights advocates condemn the government’s moves.
The US Department of Homeland Security alleged Chung engaged in concerning conduct, including when she was previously arrested by police during a protest at Barnard College that DHS termed “pro-Hamas.”
Chung has not yet been arrested by federal officials. Immigration agents made multiple visits to her residences looking for her.
US District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald on Tuesday issued a temporary restraining order against the government that prevents Chung from being detained, court records showed.
Actions against Chung form part of a pattern of government efforts against pro-Palestinian voices critical of Israel’s military assault on Gaza, her lawsuit said.
Columbia protester Mahmoud Khalil, who was arrested this month and is legally challenging his detention, is also a lawful permanent resident. Trump, without evidence, accused Khalil of supporting Hamas, which Khalil denies.
Badar Khan Suri, an Indian studying at Georgetown University, was detained last week. A federal judge barred Suri’s deportation.
US officials have asked Cornell University student Momodou Taal to turn himself in, his attorneys say, adding his visa was being revoked.

 


US tariffs will make sneakers, jeans and T-shirts cost more, trade groups warn

US tariffs will make sneakers, jeans and T-shirts cost more, trade groups warn
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US tariffs will make sneakers, jeans and T-shirts cost more, trade groups warn

US tariffs will make sneakers, jeans and T-shirts cost more, trade groups warn
  • Neither US companies in the fashion trade, nor their overseas suppliers are likely to absorb new costs that high
  • India, Indonesia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka also got slapped with high tariffs so aren’t immediate sourcing alternatives

NEW YORK: Sending children back to school in new sneakers, jeans and T-shirts is likely to cost US families significantly more this fall if the bespoke tariffs President Donald Trump put on leading exporters take effect as planned, American industry groups warn.
About 97 percent of the clothes and shoes purchased in the US are imported, predominantly from Asia, the American Apparel & Footwear Association said, citing its most recent data. Walmart, Gap Inc., Lululemon and Nike are a few of the companies that have a majority of their clothing made in Asian countries.
Those same garment-making hubs took a big hit under the president’s plan to punish individual countries for trade imbalances. For all Chinese goods, that meant tariffs of at least 54 percent. He set the import tax rates for Vietnam and neighboring Cambodia at 46 percent and 49 percent, and products from Bangladesh and Indonesia at 37 percent and 32 percent.
Working with foreign factories has kept labor costs down for US companies in the fashion trade, but neither they nor their overseas suppliers are likely to absorb new costs that high. India, Indonesia, Pakistan and Sri Lanka also got slapped with high tariffs so aren’t immediate sourcing alternatives.
“If these tariffs are allowed to persist, ultimately it’s going to make its way to the consumer,” said Steve Lamar, president and CEO of the American Apparel & Footwear Association.
Another trade group, Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America, provided estimates of the price increases that could be in store for shoes, noting 99 percent of the pairs sold in the US are imports. Work boots made in China that now retail for $77 would go up to $115, while customers would pay $220 for running shoes made in Vietnam currently priced at $155, the group said.
FDRA President Matt Priest predicted lower-income families and the places they shop would feel the impact most. He said a pair of Chinese-made children’s shoes that cost $26 today will likely carry a $41 price tag by the back-to-school shopping season, according to his group’s calculations.
Preparing for a moving target
The tariffs on the top producers of not only finished fashion but many of the materials used to make footwear and apparel shocked US retailers and brands. Before Trump’s first term, US companies had started to diversify away from China in response to trade tensions as well as human rights and environmental concerns.
They accelerated the pace when he ordered tariffs on Chinese goods in 2018, shifting more production to other countries in Asia. Lululemon said in its latest annual filing that 40 percent of its sportswear last year was manufactured in Vietnam, 17 percent in Cambodia, 11 percent in Sri Lanka, 11 percent in Indonesia and 7 percent in Bangladesh.
Nike, Levi-Strauss, Ralph Lauren, Gap. Inc., Abercrombie & Fitch and VF Corporation, which owns Vans, The North Face and Timberland, also reported a greatly reduced reliance on garment-makers and suppliers in China.
Shoe brand Steve Madden said in November it would reduce imports from China by as much as 45 percent this year due to Trump’s campaign pledge to impose a 60 percent tariff on all Chinese products. The brand said it already had spent several years developing a factory network in Cambodia, Vietnam, Mexico and Brazil.
Industry experts say reviving the American garment industry would be hugely expensive and take years if it were feasible. The number of people working in apparel manufacturing in January 2015 stood at 139,000 and had dwindled to 85,000 by January of this year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Sri Lanka employs four times as many despite having a population less than one-seventh the size of the US
Along with lacking a skilled and willing workforce, the US does not have domestic sources for the more than 70 materials that go into making a typical shoe, the Footwear Distributors & Retailers of America said in written comments to Trump’s trade representative.
Shoe companies would need to find or set up factories to make cotton laces, eyelets, textile uppers and other components to make finished footwear in the US on a large scale, the group wrote.
“These materials simply do not exist here, and many of these materials have never existed in the U.S,” the organization said.
Price increases may come as a shock
The expected barrage of apparel price increases would follow three decades of stability. Clothes cost US consumers essentially the same in 2024 as they did in 1994, according to US Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
Economists and industry analysts have attributed the trend to free trade agreements, offshoring to foreign countries where workers are paid much less and heated competition for shoppers among discount retailers and fast-fashion brands like H&M, Zara and Forever 21.
But customers unaccustomed to inflation in the apparel sector and coming off several years of steep rise in the costs of groceries and housing may be extra sensitive to any big jumps in clothing prices. Priest, of the Footwear Distributors and Retailers of America, said he has observed shoppers pulling back on buying shoes since Trump’s return to the White House.
“They’re nervous,” he said. “They’ve obviously been playing the long game as it relates to inflation for a number of years now. And they just don’t have the endurance to absorb higher prices, particularly as they’re inflicted by the US government.”
Winners and losers in a garment trade war
According to a report by British bank Barclays published Friday, the winners in the tariff wars are retailers that have at least one of these attributes: big negotiating power with their suppliers, a strong brand name and limited sourcing in Asia.
In clothing and footwear, that includes off-price retailers Burlington, Ross Stores Inc. and TJX Companies, which operates T.J. Maxx and Marshalls, as well as Ralph Lauren and Dick’s Sporting Goods, according to the report.
The companies in for a tougher time are those with limited negotiating power, limited pricing power and high product exposure in Asia, a list including Gap Inc., Urban Outfitters and American Eagle Outfitters, according to the report.
Secondhand clothing resale site ThredUp cheered a related action Trump took with his latest round of tariffs: eliminating a widely used tax exemption that has allowed millions of low-cost goods — most of them originating in China — to enter the US every day duty-free.
“This policy change will increase the cost of cheaply produced, disposable clothing imported from China, directly impacting the business model that fuels overproduction and environmental degradation,” ThredUp said.
Several industry analysts and economists said they think tariffs will end up being a consumer sales tax that widens the yawning gap between America’s wealthiest residents and those in the middle and lower end of the income spectrum.
“So where will the US be buying its apparel now that the tariff rates on Bangladesh, Vietnam and China are astronomical?” Mary E. Lovely, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said of the schedule set to take effect Wednesday. “Will the new ‘Golden Age’ involve knitting our own knickers as well as snapping together our cellphones?”


Briton, 79, describes ‘hell’ of Taliban prison

Briton, 79, describes ‘hell’ of Taliban prison
Updated 06 April 2025
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Briton, 79, describes ‘hell’ of Taliban prison

Briton, 79, describes ‘hell’ of Taliban prison
  • Peter Reynolds and his wife Barbie were arrested in February over flight permit issue
  • The couple have lived and worked in Afghanistan since 2007

LONDON: A 79-year-old Briton imprisoned in Afghanistan is living in “the nearest thing to hell I can imagine.”

Peter Reynolds and his wife Barbie were detained on Feb. 1 along with their Chinese-American friend Faye Hall and their interpreter Jaya in Bamiyan province.

The couple, who both hold Afghan passports, have lived in the country for 18 years, where they married in 1970 and run various educational projects.

They were arrested after flying to Bamiyan from Kabul in a small rented plane which they were later told lacked proper landing permission.

In a phone call, details of which were shared with the Sunday Times, Peter Reynolds described conditions in Pul-e-Charkhi prison as living in “a cage rather than a cell.”

He added: “I’ve been joined up with rapists and murderers by handcuffs and ankle cuffs, including a man who killed his wife and three children, shouting away, a demon-possessed man.”

Peter Reynolds said he receives only one meal a day, but he is in “VIP conditions” compared to his wife, who is being held in the women’s wing of the prison.

“The atmosphere is pretty shocking. I’m learning a lot about the underbelly of Afghanistan,” he said. “The prison guards shout all the time and beat people with a piece of piping. It’s a horrible atmosphere — the nearest thing to hell I can imagine.”

He added that the four were initially told they would shortly be released. However, their phones were confiscated and they were handed over to the Ministry of Interior in Kabul.

Officials there told him his house in Bamiyan had been raided, and 59 books “against Islam” had been found and confiscated.

“I asked, ‘Can you tell me any part of those books which is against Islam?’” Peter Reynolds said. “No one has been able to, so I think it’s an outrage.

“They’ve interrogated more than 30 people who worked with us in Yakawlang and Kabul, including our accountant and tax people, and we had to put our thumbprint on a nine-page-long CID (criminal investigation department) report and they said they could find no crime. That was three weeks ago but still they haven’t released us.”

He added: “These things are an utter disgrace and shame. The Taliban have made a mistake and need to face up to it.”

Hall was released last week after bounties worth $10 million placed on various Taliban figures, including Interior Minister Sirajuddin Haqqani, were lifted by the US.

Peter Reynolds told his family not to pay any ransoms demanded for the couple’s release. “No money should be paid in hush money or hostage money, it doesn’t solve anything if millions of dollars are paid,” he said.

“This government needs to face up to the fact it has made a mistake, it has done wrong. If money is paid there’s nothing to stop them arresting people again.”

He said although a lawyer working for the EU had delivered him medication last week, he has been denied all requests to see his wife.

Sarah Entwistle, the couple’s eldest daughter, told the Sunday Times: “The hardest part for mum and dad is this is the longest they have gone without speaking to each other since they became sweethearts in the 1960s.

“When they go to court, they are taken separately and can only see each other from behind the mesh and mouth, ‘I love you.’”

Peter Reynolds has appeared in court four times and his wife three times since their detention, but their case has not progressed.

In a phone call last week, she reassured her family that she was “in her element” and had started teaching fellow inmates English. 

“This is who my parents are, even in this dark place, trying to be a hope to people,” Entwistle said. “In the midst of all this, mum and dad are still true to themselves — loving people, keeping peace and creating solutions in one of the darkest, violent and most hopeless places in the world.”

She added: “They understand the power of the Taliban but are literally prepared to sacrifice their lives for the welfare of these people. We couldn’t be prouder of them.”

Peter Reynolds said despite his ordeal, he wants to keep working in Afghanistan. “I told the Ministry of Interior I don’t want to leave here saying how bad Afghanistan is, we want to be a friend of Afghanistan.”

The couple moved to Afghanistan from the UK in 2007. Their organization Rebuild was established to provide education and training, “dedicated to fostering healthy relationships in homes, workplaces and communities across Afghanistan.”

After the fall of the Western-backed government in 2021, they decided to stay in the country as they had experienced no issues with the Taliban in the past.

Barbie Reynolds even became the first woman in the country to receive a certificate of appreciation from the new regime.

Entwistle said she had met with UK Foreign Office officials, including Middle East Minister Hamish Falconer, who said they were “doing all they can” but it could take “a few more weeks” to make progress.

Relations between the UK and the Taliban are strained, with neither having an embassy in the other’s capital.

The Sunday Times reported that the Taliban is pushing for it to be allowed to have a diplomatic presence in London, with 200,000 Afghans currently living in the UK.


Sri Lankan navy seizes 800 kg of heroin, meth in record drug bust 

Sri Lankan navy seizes 800 kg of heroin, meth in record drug bust 
Updated 06 April 2025
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Sri Lankan navy seizes 800 kg of heroin, meth in record drug bust 

Sri Lankan navy seizes 800 kg of heroin, meth in record drug bust 
  • The country of 22 million people is known as a hub for drug trafficking 
  • New president says he is determined to eliminate drug abuse 

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan naval forces have made a record drug seizure after finding more than 800 kilograms of heroin and crystal methamphetamine on a fishing vessel off the country’s west coast.

The island nation of 22 million people is known as a hub for drug trafficking.

There has been an increase in drug-related incidents in recent years, with about 162,000 people arrested in 2023 for such offenses, government data showed. In 2017, the number was about 81,000.

In a special operation on the high seas on Saturday morning, the Sri Lanka Navy confiscated a multi-day fishing trawler and arrested seven suspects.

“This is the largest amount of drugs caught by the Sri Lankan navy from a multi-day Sri Lankan fishing trawler,” Sri Lanka Navy spokesman Cmdr. Buddhika Sampath told Arab News on Sunday. 

They were brought to Dikkowita Harbor, about 10 kilometers north of the capital Colombo, for an inspection carried out by the Police Narcotic Bureau. 

“They scaled them and found ICE (crystal meth), approximately more than 671 kilograms, and heroin approximately more than 191 kilograms,” Sampath said. 

The drugs were “meticulously hidden” in the multi-day fishing trawler, the navy said in a statement. 

Because investigations are still ongoing, authorities have yet to confirm the origin and destination of the trawler used to transport the drugs.

The Sri Lanka Navy said it has been working with local and international intelligence agencies to tighten “its grip on criminal networks operating” in Sri Lankan waters.  

“No illegal substances, particularly narcotics, will be allowed to enter the country via sea routes,” the navy statement read. 

“Smuggling of narcotics disguised as fishing operations, or any attempt to aid and abet such activities, will be met with strict action.” 

Sri Lanka’s President Anura Kumara Dissanayake, who took office in September, has called on authorities to scale up efforts to “suppress drug trafficking” since late last year. 

In a discussion with police chiefs from the Western Province — the country’s most densely populated — last month, he said he was committed to “eliminate organized crime and drug abuse” in the country. 


Al-Shabab launches mortar attacks near Somalia’s main airport

Al-Shabab launches mortar attacks near Somalia’s main airport
Updated 06 April 2025
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Al-Shabab launches mortar attacks near Somalia’s main airport

Al-Shabab launches mortar attacks near Somalia’s main airport

MOGADISHU: Al-Shabab militants fired multiple mortar rounds near Mogadishu’s airport on Sunday morning, disrupting international flights to Somalia, a security official told AFP.
The attack comes just weeks after a roadside bomb blast narrowly missed the convoy of President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, with Al-Shabab claiming responsibility.
According to security sources, the mortars were launched from the outskirts of Mogadishu and landed in an open area of Aden Adde International Airport.
“There were about two to three mortar shells that struck an open area of the airport early this morning,” a security official, who requested anonymity, told AFP.
A Turkish plane scheduled to land at the airport was rerouted to Djibouti, an airport employee said, also speaking on condition of anonymity. He added that they were informed EgyptAir had also canceled its flight for the day.
Halane camp — a heavily fortified compound that houses the United Nations, aid agencies, foreign missions, and the headquarters of the UN-backed African Union Transition Mission (ATMIS) — was also targeted, according to ATMIS spokesman Lt. Col. Said Mwachinalo.
“There has been shelling. Our team is currently on the ground making assessment,” Mwachinalo told AFP.
No casualties have been reported so far and some operations at the airport seems to be ongoing, the security official said.
The government is yet to comment on the attack.
Al-Shabab has been fighting the federal government in Somalia for over 15 years and analysts say it has become an increasing threat in recent months.
The latest attacks have raised fears of a resurgence of the jihadist militia, potentially reversing gains made by the Somali government and its international partners over the years, analysts say.


Main Turkish opposition rallies as protests rage on

Main Turkish opposition rallies as protests rage on
Updated 06 April 2025
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Main Turkish opposition rallies as protests rage on

Main Turkish opposition rallies as protests rage on

ANKARA: Turkiye’s main opposition party will hold an extraordinary congress on Sunday to re-elect its leader Ozgur Ozel, rallying support as the party weathers the government’s crackdown on the country’s largest protest movement in years.
Turkiye has clamped down on demonstrations triggered by last month’s arrest of Istanbul’s popular opposition mayor, Ekrem Imamoglu, also a member of Ozel’s Republican People’s Party (CHP).
Nearly 2,000 people have been detained in the unrest following the detention of the man widely considered President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s greatest political challenger, including several hundred students, journalists and young people.
On Thursday authorities briefly detained 11 people, including a leading actor, with prosecutors accusing the suspects of “incitement to hatred and enmity” for relaying calls for a boycott.
“I will talk to party members in the hall but outside, I will be meeting tens or hundreds of thousands” of people, Ozel said, calling for “all citizens, whether they voted for CHP or not” to gather outside the congress hall in Ankara on Sunday.
“Our congress’s main demand will be the release of our presidential candidate Ekrem Imamoglu,” added the CHP leader, who has become the face of the protests since the Istanbul mayor’s arrest.
The party hopes Sunday’s events will help counter further political and judicial pressure, following the dismissal and arrest of seven mayors from its ranks.

PROTESTS TO SHOW FORCE
Eren Aksoyoglu, a political communications analyst, said the party will use Sunday’s meeting as an opportunity for a “show of force” in the face of the crackdown.
According to Turkish media reports, the authorities are seeking to remove the CHP party’s leaders, a year after the opposition’s sweeping victory in municipal elections.
“We decided to convene an extraordinary congress on April 6 to block attempts to appoint a trustee” to head the party, Ozel said on March 21.
The party came out on top in the March 2024 municipal elections with nearly 38 percent of the vote across the country.
In addition to maintaining its lead in large cities such as Istanbul and Ankara, the CHP also made inroads into regions previously considered Erdogan strongholds.
In the days following Imamoglu’s arrest, the CHP drew tens of thousands of people into the streets of Istanbul and many other cities to denounce a “coup d’etat.”
Besides calling people to rally the CHP has managed to put pressure on the authorities by other means, such as the boycott of companies deemed close to the government.
The opposition party called on Turkish people to hold a day-long boycott on purchases last Wednesday in support of the hundreds of students detained since the start of the protests.
That day, many cafes, bars and restaurants in Istanbul and Ankara were deserted as people followed their calls, AFP journalists saw.
“Since Imamoglu’s arrest, Ozgur Ozel has given the CHP the image of a party that listens to the street and leads a tenacious opposition,” said Aksoyoglu.
“This approach has been successful within the CHP and with voters,” the political analyst added.
For Berk Esen, a professor of political science at Istanbul’s Sabanci University, Ozel “may not be a very charismatic speaker but he’s articulate, precise and very critical of those in power.”
“Ozel is at the head of the CHP but has not yet fully assumed the role of leader,” he added. “By pursuing a tenacious opposition to Erdogan, he could strengthen his leadership.”