Racist abuse of Dutch football players

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A law that aims to promote ethnic harmony has come into force in China, but critics say it undermines the rights of minority groups. And Japan's currency falls to its lowest level against the dollar for forty years Also in this podcast? We need to hire earth moving equipment and all of that has been used on the houses of the rich and important people These are people in here too, not dogs or animals, and they deserve help. After two devastating earthquakes in Venezuela, there's anger over the lack of equipment to help search for survivors begin with the ongoing civil warar in Sudan, when the rapid support forces known as the RSF seized the southern city of Al Fasa last October, there were almost immediately reports of atrocities carried out by its troops against civilians One of the most shocking allegations was that patients and staff were killed at a hospital Residents who fled the city had terrible stories to tell. And or if in fact un I say get them There are violations taking place on the roads, including looting and shooting, with no distinction made between young or old Thanks be to God, we managed to reach Twila And another I did minage it Hasitaban I am a displaced woman who flled El Fashir They left us with nothing, not even food They beat my two year old child right in front of me, and I nearly lost my mind when I saw that people who escaped al fasha speaking last year. The United Nations has already said the attack on the city bore the hallmarks of genocide by the rights group, Amnesty International, has provided more details about what went on. Among other accusations, Amnesty says the RSF deliberately targeted children The RSF now seems to be preparing an attack on another city in the south, El Abid, and there are fears that similar atrocities could be carried out there. Our Africa correspondent is Barbara Plet Usher. she told me why this new report matters I think this report essentially strengthens the evidence we already had about mass atrocities being committed in Al fashher, not just when the RSF took it over and captured it last October, but also in the siege of the city and the campaign in the surrounding areas. So Amnesty interviewed more than two hundred survivors. They talked about witnessing mass killings, detentions, beatings, sexual violence, the kind of thing that we have heard before. Amnesty very much emphasized that there was an ethnic element to this The armed groups that were defending the city came from the local Zagawa tribe. and so the RSF seems to have targeted the Zagawa civilians just as it did the fighters. One thing that struck me is that they said the children were not collateral damage of the violence. There were cases of them being deliberately targeted. and so they mentioned specifically shootings, abductions in particular also rape. and they said that they had identified RSF commanders who had carried out violations of international law and they urged accountability. I suppose a takeaway that I had was, as the evidence mounts, calls for accountability to grow and yet the violence is still being committed with impunity, which it is. I should say, as we've reported before, that the RSF has admitted there were some violations in El Fasher, but it says the scale of them were wildly exaggerated by its enemies. Obviously it's important to document the truth and the full horrors of what happened, but does this report lead to anything? Does it change anything adds to the calls for criminal investigations, for monitoring, for eventually using the bodies that do international accountabilities, such as the International Criminal Court to try to bring people to book for what has happened. And the other thing it does is it also strengthens calls for some sort of civilian protection mechanism, an international protection force, especially as the RSF does appear to be preparing to launch an invasion of another city, the strategic city of Al A Bid in central Sudan, which has led to lots of international expressions of concern that there could be more civilian killings. And in terms of where we are now with this ongoing conflict between the RSF and the Sudanese military, what's happening today? The RSF does appear to be preparing to launch an invasion of this other city, the south central city of Al Albid, which is at a strategic transport and location junction It has essentially had the city under siege for a large part of the war, but it has increased drone strikes in recent months and it has started to mass troops there. Albbeed is different than al Fasir in the sense that the local population there is not one major ethnic group that the RSF sees as an enemy, which it didn't alfashir. There's people from all over Sudan in Alobeid. But nevertheless, the increase in drone strikes have really been targeting things like fuel and water and power and supply trucks. So there's a humanitarian crisis I was speaking to somebody whose family is in Aloit and I said, arere they preparing to flee if the RSF looked like it was actually going to be able to launch a ground invasion. She said not really. She said the feeling in Elebat is they don't believe the RSF will be able to come in by ground, but also I think just the effort of leaving is huge. If you manage to get to another so called safe city, rent is just over the top. Displacement camps are not a place you want to be. aboutbout two hundred thousand people in Elevator are already displaced. So people are quite reluctant to move That's our Africa correspondent Barbara Platusher Next to China, where a law has come into effect focusing on the country's different ethnic groups The Chinese government claims the legislation with more than sixty articles will promote ethnic unity and harmony. Critics say it will further impose the culture of China's dominant ethnic group, the Han Chinese on the rest of the population. The law makes it clear that all children now have to study using Mandarin Chinese, regardless of what language they speak at home I asked Micky Bristo what the law says and what the Chinese government is trying to achieve. quite a long law with lots of provisions, but a couple of things stand out. Fly, the law about language, which you mentioned there. Previously Chinese governments have emphasized that ethnic minorities can learn, study children at school in their own languages so that they get a proper grounding in that language. That's now flipped. So all children have to learn in Mandarin Chinese. The Chinese government says that's to help them integrate with the rest of China and to help them get jobs in the future. A couple of other things also shine out of this document. Firstly that parents be prosecuted for not teaching their children properly about ethnic harmony. They've got to teach them to love the Chinese Communist Party and to love China or the China that the Communist Party defines as being China and that they can be prosecuted for not doing that.'s kind of an odd idea And thirdly, there is a provision where people can be prosecuted individuals and organizations overseas. so you might say something about China's ethnic situation overseas and face prosecution. It's difficult to see how China could prosecute people whilst they are abroad. They don't have legal basis to do that, but when people perhaps say things outside of China go back to China. they might be prosecuted there and there's already evidence that's already happened. Okay. And perhaps inevitably with what you've just outlined, lots of criticism of this There is primarily about the language. If you think about China, it's a vast country and a lot of minority groups are ethnically, linguistically, culturally, very different to Han Chinese people. they make up. about ninety percent of the population So not allowing them to use their own language really undermines everything about their culture. A couple of years ago, I did a radio documentary about the situation in Tibet where children as young as three and four, they were going to kindergartens and schools. Because Tibet is a wide area with not many people, schools are often central plac and people have to go on board there. So they're learning all the time in Mandarin going home and not being able to speak to their parents or their grandparents. So really it's undermining This is what the critics argue, the very basis of what an ethnic culture is about. And the concept of ethnic unity, it sounds like it means something different to the Chinese authorities than it might to many other people around the world In many countries, we basically feel that the individual and groups have a right to express themselves, speak in whatever language they want and have that enshrined in legislation They might go to school, be able to interact with government organisations, see signposts in that language. In China, they don't see it like that. They fear the country splitting apart, what they want to do them. Chinese government under Xi Jinping is essentially bring everybody together under one dominant ideology, one dominant culture, the Han Chinese culture and essentially allow people to dance and sing and wear ethnic costumes Not go too deep into their culture. Mickey Bristo reporting It's six days since two earthquakes hit Venezuela. The full extent of the destruction still isn't known, and few Venezuelans believe the official figures reflect the true number who die beneath a rubble. Along the northern coast, some of the affected communities live in social housing built under the late President Hugo Chavez, and victims' families say those houses were of poor quality Our correspondent Will Grant met the relatives who are refusing to give up the search Almost a week on from the dual earthquakes which flattened entire communities of northern Venezuela, fififteen year old Samuel Lord Donz is still calling out his older brother's name into the rubble Edward is somewhere inside, entombed in the concrete and broken glass of a collapsed twelve story housing block by the government of the late Socialist leader Augl Chavez Edward isn't alone in there His wife and their two children, aged three and four are also missing erami guy Lahal in We know we've found his apartment, Samuel tells me. We've found his crockery pointing at a set of broken purple bowls and plates at our feet Samuel, his young face stained with dust and ash, says the responsibility of crawling into dangerous spaces, searching for his brother's family should not fall to a teenager I'm fifteen and I'm giving it everything I can, he says But you need to hire earth moving equipment and all of that has been used on the houses of the rich and important people These are people in here too, not dogs or animals, and they deserve help That sense of anger at the authorities will be particularly acute among one set of relatives. In the morning of the earthquakes, a deportation flight returned to Caracas from the United States with one hundred and forty seven Venezuelans of which seven were children Authorities took the deportees to a hotel near the airport. which is where they were housed when the earthquake struck the building crumble Only twelve of the deportees have been found alive G As we drove up to the site, we were stopped by the security forces generic National Guard troops, however, but officers of the Sebin intntelligence pololice. No one was authorized to visit the site, they said hotel's name with terrible irony was El Santuadio. meaning the sanctuary An unknown number of the deportees and the residents of the Chaveis housing complex have ended up at the port in La Guaida, now a makeshift mall Inside on the open courtyard, body bags are laid out one after another Fam members are driving up there constant flow of Hses are vandans that are being waved in I spoke to one official, asked him G me some kind of indication of how many bodies are coming in and all he would say is Misimos Lots and lots. Back at the devastated housing complex, silence has been called for so that rescue workers can listen carefully for a voice or a sound to confirm life prevails beneath the cement and metal As we wait for an answer, one woman spots my microphone and asks to say her piece K book of wor I think I'm going to say something quite strong, she says But these buildings were cages of dead. She is Lorena Layer and is digging in the ruins for her father, stepmother, fourteen year old brother and six year old sister Norenna says the buildings built by Uo Chavez and donated to the poorest was simply not up to code. They put the poorest in here, but the structuralists, engineers and officials who signed off on the plans are largely the reason that today we're looking for our loved ones The silence has gone on for several minutes with no answer from the rubble It is another false alarm Families get back to their search. Most have vowed to keep looking until all hope is lost. There will be many more raised spirits and broken hearts in La Guaida before they're finished our correspondent W will Grant in Lagguara in northern Venezuela. Still to come in this podcast? The major consequence of climate change is that Earth is accumulating energy and most of that extra accumulated energy goes into the ocean. 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If you wait until something breaks, you're already behind Count on Granger for quality products, easy reordering and twenty four seven support Call one eight hundred Granger, click Granger. com or just stop by. Granger. For the ones who get it done The Japanese currency has fallen to its lowest level against the dollar for forty years. The Japanese government has previously intervened when the yen has dropped in value. I find out more from my correspondent in Tokyo Kurumiori It's basically happening because the Japanese interest rates have been kept low for decades. It was to help the economy grow Countries like the US and other major economies have much higher interest rates. So investors can earn better returns by saving or investing in other currencies besides Japan. And that encourages investors to sell the yen and buy USD instead, for example. So as more people do that The demand for the Japanese yen falls because it's not worth as much to them in terms of investment. and then it's value drops. So now we're seeing this weakness in the Japanese currency. Sounds like one option for the authorities might be to put interest rates up. Yeah, well, absolutely. However, it's not so simple. The Bank of Japan has started slowly raising interest rates after just years of ultra loose monetary policy. And that basically means that they've been keeping the interest rates really, really low for many years And they've intervened in the foreign exchange market and also stepped up several times to try to prop up the yen by buying when the yen has fallen too quickly. But officials also warn traders against pushing the yen down too fast in a way to try to calm the markets. I mean, so when They raise interest rates. They have to do it really slowly and really carefully because otherwise, disrupts the market. It's very, very sensitive to these changes And what happens if this low yen persists for longer Well, the longer it goes, I mean the worse the effects get. So Japan will have to keep paying more and more for many of the things that it buys from overseas. So it really impacts things that we import from abroad, like fuel and food. and that will affect prices for everyday things that we buy and they can remain high. And so that really pinches consumers, the everyday people, household spending People are spending more on essentials, then they have less money to spend on other things like investments and that can slow down the economy. and they might not be splurging on big ticket items, right? becausecause now they feel like they need to save because they're spending more at the grocery store. And so that doesn't help the economy grow. That will hurt the Japanese GDP That was Karumi Mori with me from Tokyo. New data shows that global ocean surface temperatures last month were the highest on record Scientists from the European Union's climate monitor, Copernicus say the latest figures are the culmination of an unprecedented period of ocean warming this year, which they say looks to continue. So what does that mean for the world's oceans and weather patterns? James Menendz has been talking to oceanographer Professor Helen Cherssky, author of Blue Machine How The Ocean Shapes Our World It's definitely not a surprise. know the ocean is a liquid engine. It completely defines the way our planet works. and we know that we are adding energy to it all the time. The major consequence of climate change is that Earth is accumulating energy and most of that extra accumulated energy goes into the ocean and it comes out in the form of heat. So of course, temperatures are going to rise, but it changes a little bit from year to year. So Yes, not unexpected, but definitely serious and something to worry about But the long term trend is clear and is it likely to get worse? I mean, we've been told in recent weeks that we're about to enter or are entering a new El Nino event in the Pacific. Are those temperatures, those surface temperatures likely to go up in the next twelve months El Nino is a phenomenon that happens every few years. It does have a big impact on weather patterns, especially around the Pacific But El Nino kind of comes and goes over the years anyway. And what the additional heat in the ocean and these continual marine heat waves we've seen over the past few years are doing is they're actually changing how the ocean itself functions The water itself just being warm, actually increases sea level rise, about half of sea level rise up until now has been caused by water that just expands because it's warmer. So the impacts go far beyond what happens on the land. They impact how the ocean itself works We don't need to wait for some currents to make things even worse in the future. So I tend to think we ought to worry about what's happening right now, Do what we can to stop that And when you say do what we can to stop that, I mean, what does that mean? That just means again, trying to reduce The amount of carbon dioxide going into the atmosphere That's right, carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases like methane. And the thing is we do have the technology to do this. and increasingly these technologies are cheaper than the alternatives. So actually, of all the times we've been having this discussion over the past two decades, now is really the time when we can absolutely see a route that is not just better for the climate, it's better for human society because it's cheaper and it's more effective. And yet we sometimes hear about tipping points, people talking about vicious circles I mean, is it possible that there is so much extra energy in the oceans now that they've reached their limit and the effects will play out anyway? It absolutely isn't the case that it's all going to be awful anyway and we should just give up. The thing to hold in mind, I think, is that there are serious impacts coming down the line. We definitely have to prepare already. But every single thing we can do to prevent those impacts getting worse is absolutely worth it because it is cheaper and more effective than patching up the problems afterwards And that was Professor Helen Chersky, author of Blue Machine How The Ocean Shapes Our World. Now the Men's World Cup has entered the knockout phase. so the penalty shootout is once again a thing. Deciding a football match in this way is dramatic, but it does put huge pressure on the penalty taker. It takes enormous courage to step up for your country in front of tens of thousands of people in a stadium millions of TV viewers A few years ago, three England players faced online racist abuse after missing penalties, and this week the same thing has happened to several Dutch players after the Netherlands were eliminated from the World Cup The Dutch sports journalist, Refka O Hetfeld, told us about the racist abuse the Dutch players have faced There are three Dutch players that have missed a quite dramatic penalty shootout that got the Dutch eliminated against Morocco a couple days ago. The three players that missed are Justin Claudford and Crresentio Somerville, two Premier League players and Quentin Timber. Yeah, they have unfortunately received a lot of racial abuse on their social media, including pictures of monkeys Cloford and Somerville have both turned off the ability to react on their Instagram after that. so it's hard to tell how many people responded to them exactly. but Timber's Instagram account is still open and can yeah, we can see dozens of people who have written racist comments. Thankfully also a lot of people telling those people off, but it's still horrible obviously. So this is becoming a trend now, I guess because there's such a attension on the individual player