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After walking away empty-handed at the Grammy Awards and the Academy of Country Music Awards earlier this year, Keith Urban found redemption at the 2017 CMT Music Awards, picking up four honors including video of the year for "Blue Ain't Your Color."...
TAUNTON, Mass. (AP) -- A young woman charged with using text messages to encourage her boyfriend to kill himself when they were teenagers sent a text to a friend from high school about two months after the death, saying, "It's my fault," according to testimony at her trial on Wednesday....
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) -- Brazil's top electoral court is considering whether to annul what is left of President Michel Temer's term because of allegations his ticket received illegal campaign contributions. While the Superior Electoral Tribunal is the most immediate risk to Temer's political survival, it's only one of several. Temer, vowing to continue in office despite calls for his resignation and approval ratings around 9 percent, faces the threat of being forced...
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea fired several suspected short-range anti-ship missiles off its east coast Thursday, South Korea's military said, in a continuation of defiant launches as it seeks to build a nuclear missile capable of reaching the continental United States....
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- Kuwait's emir traveled to Qatar to help mediate an end to a crisis that's seen Arab nations cut ties to the energy-rich nation home to a major U.S. military base, though Emirati officials warned there was "nothing to negotiate."...
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Seen in the kindest light, legal experts say conversations attributed by the fired FBI director to President Donald Trump were clumsy and inappropriate. In the worst light, James Comey's recollections could provide enough evidence to build a case that the president tried to interfere with a criminal investigation....
Obala, Cameroon, Jun 7, 2017 / 03:17 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Local news reports say that “signs of torture” have been found on the body of a Cameroonian bishop whose body was found in a river last week.Unusual circumstances surrounded the death of Bishop Jean-Marie Benoît Balla of Bafia, leading some to think he had committed suicide.Bishop Balla, who was 58, left his residence late in the evening of May 30. He disappeared, and his car was found parked on the Sanaga bridge near Ebebda, about 25 miles northwest of Obala. His body was found June 2, about 10 miles from the bridge.A note was found in his car which reportedly read: “Do not look for me! I am in the water.”While some believe this was the bishop’s suicide note, others believe he may have been murdered, due to other unsolved murders of priests in the country. The bishop’s autopsy seems to support those suspicions.The autopsy shows that the bishop's body spent fewer than 4 hours in t...
Obala, Cameroon, Jun 7, 2017 / 03:17 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Local news reports say that “signs of torture” have been found on the body of a Cameroonian bishop whose body was found in a river last week.
Unusual circumstances surrounded the death of Bishop Jean-Marie Benoît Balla of Bafia, leading some to think he had committed suicide.
Bishop Balla, who was 58, left his residence late in the evening of May 30. He disappeared, and his car was found parked on the Sanaga bridge near Ebebda, about 25 miles northwest of Obala. His body was found June 2, about 10 miles from the bridge.
A note was found in his car which reportedly read: “Do not look for me! I am in the water.”
While some believe this was the bishop’s suicide note, others believe he may have been murdered, due to other unsolved murders of priests in the country. The bishop’s autopsy seems to support those suspicions.
The autopsy shows that the bishop's body spent fewer than 4 hours in the water before it was found, even though his body was found several days after he had disappeared. The autopsy also notes the lack of water in his lungs, which would have been present had he died by drowning.
"The body removed from the river Sanaga had a stiffened arm, folded on its abdomen indicating that Bishop Balla was not fighting against the fury of the waters. Bishop Balla was tortured and brutally murdered," stated the findings of the autopsy, according to BaretaNews.
Father Ludovic Lado, a Cameroonian Jesuit living in Ivory Coast, told the African edition of La Croix that for the most part, the suspected cause of death in the case has now moved from suicide to murder.
Archbishop Cornelius Esua of Bamenda told the daily Le Jour that Bishop Balla “did not seem to us as troubled as that (to have committed suicide),” and noted that bishop suicides are rare.
“The bishops do not commit suicide," he said.
Fr. Lado noted that it was hard to imagine why a “discreet and devoted” person like Bishop Balla would be the target of assassins. The Cameroon Concord notes that the bishop was a beloved pastor whom the faithful often called “Papa Benoit,” and he was known especially for his care for the sick and under-served.
Fr. Lado added that some have suspected a link between the bishop’s death and the death of Father Armel Collins Ndjama, the rector of the minor seminary of Bafia, who was found dead in his room earlier in May.
Reportedly, Bishop Balla was particularly affected by the death of the young priest and cancelled several of his appointments after finding out about his death.
Catholic leaders in the country have called for prayers for Bishop Balla, as the investigations surrounding the bishop’s death are ongoing.
Bishop Balla was born in 1959, and was ordained a priest of the Archdiocese of Yaounde in 1987. He was consecrated Bishop of Bafia in 2003.
Brownsville, Texas, Jun 7, 2017 / 04:40 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Two Texas bishops have defended from charges of fear mongering the opponents of a new law which targets sanctuary cities for immigrants, explaining that the bill draws little distinction between criminals and undocumented immigrants.The law in question, Senate Bill 4, was signed into law May 7. It will take effect in September, and requires local government and law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law. Cities which do not comply face fines and the withholding of state funding.The law also allows law enforcement to question the immigration status of those they detain, as well as the victims and witnesses of crimes. This provision had led to fears that undocumented immigrants will be less likely to report crimes.“The public debate often makes it sound as if all immigrants are criminals because they are here without proper documentation. Overstaying a visa is not a criminal offense; it is a civil offense again...
Brownsville, Texas, Jun 7, 2017 / 04:40 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Two Texas bishops have defended from charges of fear mongering the opponents of a new law which targets sanctuary cities for immigrants, explaining that the bill draws little distinction between criminals and undocumented immigrants.
The law in question, Senate Bill 4, was signed into law May 7. It will take effect in September, and requires local government and law enforcement to enforce federal immigration law. Cities which do not comply face fines and the withholding of state funding.
The law also allows law enforcement to question the immigration status of those they detain, as well as the victims and witnesses of crimes. This provision had led to fears that undocumented immigrants will be less likely to report crimes.
“The public debate often makes it sound as if all immigrants are criminals because they are here without proper documentation. Overstaying a visa is not a criminal offense; it is a civil offense against a federal statute,” Archbishop Gustavo García-Siller of San Antonio and Bishop Daniel Flores of Brownsville wrote in a June 4 column.
“Yes, immigrants without valid documents have infracted federal statutes; but they are not justly lumped together with human traffickers, drug dealers and murderers,” they maintained.
The column, which appeared in the McAllen-based daily The Monitor, is a response to a previous column by Governor Greg Abbott (R) which appeared in the San Antonio Express-News and in The Monitor.
The governor had charged that “Whether driven by misunderstanding or by purposeful fear mongering, those who are inflaming unrest place all who live in Texas at greater risk.”
The bishops said there is more to the unrest than misunderstanding, and that it is SB 4 which is causing fear among immigrant communities.
“This new Texas state law encourages the notion that the immigrant community is defined by the criminals in our midst – instead of defined by the fact that most immigrants are working families with children. These things generate fear in the immigrant community.”
Archbishop García-Siller and Bishop Flores are worried that the option for law enforcement to question immigration status will lead to aggressive interpretations, and that “pretexts will be invented so that [people] can be stopped and asked about their immigration status.”
Noting that while the law “prohibits discrimination and profiling,” the bishops said that “the immigrant poor are not likely to have the resources or the counsel needed to defend themselves.”
“People get stopped, and they are desperately afraid. They immediately wonder about their children, and about their own safety if deported. It is this uncertainty and potential panic at the moment of questioning that breeds fear and that hurts the community fabric.”
Any law enforcement agencies that are more aggressive in questioning immigration status will undermine trust in all law enforcement persons, the bishops noted.
“And does not such uncertainty make it less likely that crimes will be reported?”
Archbishop García-Siller and Bishop Flores noted that “We are a nation of laws, as the governor says; unfortunately, not all our laws are good laws. Bad laws have bad effects.”
They stated, “we will step up our efforts to inform persons of their rights, including the right to remain silent, and to make available the best advice about what to do if you are stopped and are without valid documentation.”
“We will also work to repeal SB 4, or correct the most injurious aspects of this law. And we encourage all who oppose this law to work together in strenuous and peaceful ways toward this same end.”
Washington D.C., Jun 7, 2017 / 04:55 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After a myriad of reports of United States humanitarian aid not reaching Christian genocide survivors in Iraq, their advocates in the U.S. are hoping that will change very soon.“There is an emergency here,” Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), chair of the House panel on global human rights, stated at a press conference on Capitol Hill on Wednesday regarding emergency relief for Iraq and Syria genocide victims.“We’re not asking for new money,” he said June 7. “We’re asking to make sure the money that’s in the pot is provided to those who have been left out and left behind for about three years.” After forces of the Islamic State swept through Syria and Iraq in 2014, the U.S. has sent humanitarian aid for the victims of the caliphate, who were driven from their homes by the hundreds of thousands. Many fled to refugee camps or have been living in temporary shelters, at risk of di...
Washington D.C., Jun 7, 2017 / 04:55 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- After a myriad of reports of United States humanitarian aid not reaching Christian genocide survivors in Iraq, their advocates in the U.S. are hoping that will change very soon.
“There is an emergency here,” Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), chair of the House panel on global human rights, stated at a press conference on Capitol Hill on Wednesday regarding emergency relief for Iraq and Syria genocide victims.
“We’re not asking for new money,” he said June 7. “We’re asking to make sure the money that’s in the pot is provided to those who have been left out and left behind for about three years.”
After forces of the Islamic State swept through Syria and Iraq in 2014, the U.S. has sent humanitarian aid for the victims of the caliphate, who were driven from their homes by the hundreds of thousands. Many fled to refugee camps or have been living in temporary shelters, at risk of disease and malnutrition or starvation.
However, many Christians reportedly avoided refugee camps because of the security situation, and U.S. aid that was sent to the central government of Iraq or local governments has not reached Christians. There has been an “appalling lack of equitable distribution of U.S. humanitarian assistance when it came to the Christians and the Yazidis,” Smith said.
Thus, Christian genocide survivors in Iraq are almost completely dependent on NGOs and aid groups. The Knights of Columbus alone has sent over $12 million for their aid.
That money has been “squeezed to get every ounce of efficacy out of it to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, provide shelter, and of course to provide medicines,” Smith said.
However, the money from the private sector is “not enough,” he insisted, saying that Archbishop Bashar Warda of the Chaldean Archeparchy of Erbil has warned of “severe food shortages” if nothing is done.
Before Christmas, Smith toured the region around Erbil where many Christian families are living after they fled from the Islamic State.
“When I went to Erbil with my staff and a few other individuals, I can tell you I was shocked that we were not supplying the kind of assistance to these women, children, and men families,” he explained on Wednesday. He was told by the consulate that a camp for displaced persons a 10-minute drive away was unsafe to tour.
“It was not dangerous. It was filled with little kids and young families,” he said. “They had not even been there to do an assessment.”
So, Reps. Smith and Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.) co-sponsored a bill that passed the U.S. House Tuesday evening and is set to move on to the Senate, which would help ensure that the U.S. aid can go to churches and their auxiliaries that serve Christian refugees.
The Trump administration has reportedly signaled its support for the bill, the Iraq and Syria Genocide Emergency Relief and Accountability Act.
“The State Department would not allow any U.S. dollars to flow to church organizations. And this legislation allows for that,” Eshoo explained on Wednesday. “It is so essential to work with those that are on the ground who know exactly where the dollars should go.”
The money is there, Smith insisted, noting that Congress set aside a “huge pot of money” for beleaguered minorities in the recent omnibus bill. However, it has to reach the churches that are on the ground helping Christians.
A 2012 GAO report found that USAID had failed to show how it was fulfilling a 2008 mandate that funds be “provided” for aid to religious and ethnic minorities in Iraq during the war.
“I am still trying to track, through the GAO, dollars that the Congress appropriated many years ago at the height of the Iraq War,” Eshoo said. “And that all went through the State Department and their agencies, and we’re still trying to figure out where that money went.”
It is vital that more aid reaches Christians and other minorities in Iraq to ensure that they remain there, advocates insist.
Christians are examples of forgiveness and can help with the reconciliation process between different ethnic and religious parts of the region, and the preservation of minorities can help ensure “pluralism and stability” in Iraq, the Religious Freedom Institute explained.
IMAGE: CNS photo/Tyler OrsburnBy Josephine von DohlenWASHINGTON(CNS) -- The co-authors of a House bill that will provide humanitarian aid toChristians and other religious groups suffering at the hands of Islamic Statemilitants praised the June 6 House passage of the measure and urged the Senateto quickly act on it.TheHouse unanimously approved the bipartisan Iraq and Syria Genocide EmergencyRelief and Accountability Act, or H.R. 390, in a voice vote.Co-authoredby Rep. Chris Smith, R-New Jersey, and Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-California, the billwill provide emergency relief and aid to the victims of genocide in Iraq andSyria, particularly the Christians in the Middle East as well as otherreligious minorities.Thehumanitarian aid will be directed to groups such as the Chaldean CatholicArchdiocese of Irbil, Iraq, which provides direct care for victims, and thosegroups in turn get the assistance to those in need.Smithand Eshoo held a news conference June 7 urging the Senate to continue the prog...
IMAGE: CNS photo/Tyler Orsburn
By Josephine von Dohlen
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- The co-authors of a House bill that will provide humanitarian aid to Christians and other religious groups suffering at the hands of Islamic State militants praised the June 6 House passage of the measure and urged the Senate to quickly act on it.
The House unanimously approved the bipartisan Iraq and Syria Genocide Emergency Relief and Accountability Act, or H.R. 390, in a voice vote.
Co-authored by Rep. Chris Smith, R-New Jersey, and Rep. Anna Eshoo, D-California, the bill will provide emergency relief and aid to the victims of genocide in Iraq and Syria, particularly the Christians in the Middle East as well as other religious minorities.
The humanitarian aid will be directed to groups such as the Chaldean Catholic Archdiocese of Irbil, Iraq, which provides direct care for victims, and those groups in turn get the assistance to those in need.
Smith and Eshoo held a news conference June 7 urging the Senate to continue the progress of this legislation to ensure the swift direction of funds to the Middle East.
"We are celebrating something today that we believe is something that is going to make a difference in the lives of tens of thousands of people who have been persecuted by ISIS," Eshoo said. "Certainly the Christians, those of my own background, the Yezidis, and other minorities in the Middle East."
Since 2013, Smith has actively worked through hearings and mission trips to spread awareness of the situation of the victims of ISIS in the Middle East. Part of the effort was to get the United States to admit that what was occurring was genocide.
"As I think many of you know, Congress has been trying for the better part of three years to finally get a designation of genocide being committed by ISIS against Christians, Yezidis and some other Muslim minorities in the area," Smith said. "Ultimately, it did become a policy of the United States of America."
When then-Secretary of State John Kerry issued a declaration of genocide about ISIS in March 2016, it was one of the few times in the nation's history that the U.S. government had made such a determination. Eshoo said the declaration requires further legislation that will confirm what the victims have endured.
"They too, like people in our country, want their lives to go on, especially for their children," Eshoo said. "The State Department would not allow any U.S. dollars to flow to church organizations and this legislation allows for that."
In addition to sending humanitarian aid for groups in Iraq and Syria to provide to genocide victims, the bill also ensures that the government's money will be monitored.
"There will be accountability for these dollars," Eshoo said. "But it is so essential to work with those who are on the ground that know exactly where the dollars should go."
Supreme Knight Carl Anderson, the CEO of the Knights of Columbus, has worked with Smith to get support of the bill and has testified on behalf of the measure.
"We must have the courage to confront reality and then we must have the courage to change reality," Anderson said.
The Knights of Columbus has donated over $12 million to groups in the Middle East aiding Christian refugees. In addition, they recently began an ad campaign in an effort to raise more funds.
"These are people who are still praying in the language of Jesus," Anderson said. "They have every right to survive."
Chaldean Catholic Bishop Bawai A. Soro, who heads the Diocese of St. Peter the Apostle, which is based near San Diego, also attended the news conference. He said the current situation for Christians in the Middle East remains fragile, as they suffer at the hands of radical Islamic groups.
"It is very unfortunate that Iraq as a country still lacks the certain constitutional amendments that guarantee liberty and equality to all Iraqis," Bishop Soro said. "It remains our dream that the Christians will not be second-class citizens in their own native homeland, Iraq. But instead, they will hopefully soon have equal social, economic, political, lives and statuses just as all Iraqis have."
Haider Elias, president of the human rights group Yazda, whose own brother and other relatives were killed by ISIS, spoke to the critical aspect of the bill.
"As this legislation has been passed by the House, we urge the Senate to act upon it and expedite it as quickly as possible," Elias said. "These Yezidis and Christians are in dire need for such assistance in order to survive as religious minorities in our region."
Smith said that they have contacted several representatives in the Senate who they believe will offer similar support to the bill. He said he hopes they will vote within the next couple of weeks.
"I think its very important that the Senate moves quickly -- within weeks," Smith said. "There's no reason for delay on this. Its not a complicated bill."
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