Terrorism Watch

2020 was a bad year for maritime piracy. The global number of sea-piracy incidents rose by over 20% from 2019 and West Africa experienced the highest number of attacks and attempted attacks since data collection began in the early 1990s at the  the  International Maritime Bureau’s Piracy Reporting Center ( see Figure 1 ).  But the Gulf of Guinea was not the only piracy hotspot in 2020. In fact, attacks increased in Southeast Asia and the Americas, as  land-based crime  appeared to spill over into the ports and anchorages of Dumai, Taboneo, Callao, and Macapa. Kidnappings jumped sharply in 2020 and the illegal boarding of steaming ships reached its highest level in five years. Some recent  headlines  appear to minimize the threat of sea-piracy and fail to appreciate the harmful economic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, previous financial crises have been followed by significant surges in maritime crime. The novel Coronavirus will likely produce similar conditions that have fueled

Around the world, tens of thousands of children are fighting in armed conflicts where they're routinely exposed to violence, sexual exploitation and psychological trauma. Some 40 percent of them are girls. This Red Hand Day, also known as the International Day against the Use of Child Soldiers, we speak to Camille Romain des Boscs, CEO of the NGO World Vision France. She tells us about how to protect the world's most vulnerable children from being recruited and how to rehabilitate those who are.   Source:  https://www.france24.com/en/tv-shows/perspective/20210212-red-hand-day-addressing-the-plight-of-the-world-s-child-soldiers

A  new report prepared by the Canadian Association of Black Lawyers  confirms what Ontario’s Black population has been feeling for decades: racism and racial bias exists in the criminal justice system, and little has been done to correct it. According to the  report , “the perception of anti-Black discrimination within policing has remained constant among Black Toronto residents” for the past 25 years. In fact, little has been done to quash racial disparities when it comes to police tactics, such as stopping a Black person, questioning them and searching them. Toronto-based lawyer and association president Raphael Tachie said it’s both “sad and discouraging” to read nothing has changed. “It also is an imperative. It’s a call to action for us,” Tachie said. In 2019, the organization partnered with researchers at the University of Toronto to conduct a new round of research examining public perceptions and experiences of racialized and white Canadians within Ontario’s criminal justice sys

hen the film of the 6 January Capitol insurrection was shown to the US Senate on the first day of Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, the TV station I watched ran a warning in the upper right-hand corner.  Explicit video . After a few minutes, I began to think that  explicit  was an understatement, that we should have been warned that what we’d be seeing was brutal. In the aftermath of the 6 January riot, I – like many Americans, I imagine –watched plenty of footage of the riot. It was horrifying, for obvious reasons, and also mysterious, because I found it hard to understand exactly what, in addition to Donald Trump’s urging and the fake claims of a stolen election, had unleashed such murderous rage in so many people. But as the film that was shown at the impeachment trial makes clear, I – and many Americans – had seen a somewhat denatured version of the truth, a toned-down report on what happened that day. It turns out that when the police officer was being squeezed in a door, i

More children could be pushed into joining armed groups in conflict zones as families face increasing poverty due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a top United Nations official has warned. The exact number of child soldiers is unknown, but in 2019 alone about 7,740 children – some as young as six – were recruited and used as fighters or in other roles by mostly non-state armed groups, according to UN data. Speaking on International Day against the Use of Child Soldiers – or Red Hand Day – the UN Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict Virginia Gamba said that number was likely to rise as a result of coronavirus-related hardship. “There is a real threat that as communities lack work and are more and more isolated because of the socioeconomic impact of COVID-19, we’re going to see an increase in the recruitment of children for a lack of options,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a video call. “More and more children will be either attracted or sometimes told by their pa

China has banned BBC World News from broadcasting in the country, its television and radio regulator announced on Thursday. China has criticised the BBC for its reporting on coronavirus and the persecution of ethnic minority Uighurs. The BBC said it was "disappointed" by the decision. It follows British media regulator Ofcom revoking state broadcaster China Global Television Network's (CGTN) licence to broadcast in the UK. Ofcom's decision earlier this month came after it found that CGTN's licence was wrongfully held by Star China Media Ltd. CGTN was also found in breach of British broadcasting regulations last year,  for airing the allegedly forced confession of UK citizen Peter Humphrey. In its decision, China's State Film, TV and Radio Administration said BBC World News reports about China were found to "seriously violate" broadcast guidelines, including "the requirement that news should be truthful and fair" and not "harm China'