Syria war: Last of British IS 'Beatles' gang captured by Kurds

9 February 2018

State group (IS) cell have been seized by Syrian Kurdish fighters, US officials say.

Alexanda Kotey, 34, and El Shafee Elsheikh, 29, were the last two members of the cell to remain at
large. The four, all from London, were nicknamed "the Beatles" because of their British accents.

US officials said the "execution cell" had beheaded more than 27 Western hostages and tortured
many more.

Who were the IS 'Beatles'?

The US state department says the four-man cell was responsible for beheading several Westerners.
They are:

 Mohammed Emwazi - dubbed Jihadi John, beheaded a number of Western hostages on video.
The west Londoner was killed in a drone strike in 2015 in Raqqa, the former de facto IS capital in
Syria
 Aine Davis, also from west London, was convicted of being a senior IS member and jailed in
Turkey last year
 Alexanda Kotey, another west Londoner, took part in the torture of hostages, the US State
Department says, and also acted as a recruiter for IS
 El Shafee Elsheikh "earned a reputation for waterboarding, mock executions, and
crucifixions" while serving as the cell's guard, the US state department says

The alleged ringleader of the group was Emwazi who was killed in an air strike in Syria in 2015. He
was the masked militant who featured in gruesome IS videos, taunting Western powers before
beheading hostages. Aine Davis was jailed in Turkey last year on terrorism charges, after being
arrested near Istanbul in 2015.

Victims who appeared in those videos included British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning,
US journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and American aid worker Peter Kassig.

How were they captured?

The latest arrests were confirmed by US officials.

Officials quoted by US media said the two men had been captured by members of the US-backed
Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who are targeting remnants of IS.
The UK Foreign Office, meanwhile, said it did not comment on individual cases or investigations.
Their capture was first reported by the New York Times, who noted that American officials had
wanted to keep the news secret.

The aim was "to allow analysts more time to pursue the intelligence leads developed from their
detention and prepare raids against unsuspecting Islamic State targets", the newspaper said.

The Syrian fighters who apprehended them told US officials in mid-January that the two may have
been captured, and the men's identities were later confirmed using fingerprints and other biometric
data.

The families of the men were not aware of the capture until the story was reported by news
organisations, they told the BBC this evening.

What is the state of IS in Syria?

The Islamic State's group self-declared caliphate - its area of control - shrunk rapidly last year.
In October, the group lost its "capital" of Raqqa to the SDF. In the beginning of November, it lost
Deir-al Zour in Syria on the same day as it lost al-Qaim in Iraq.

The SDF is an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters opposed to IS. The US-backed group has played
a key role in driving IS from its strongholds in Syria.

The US has said it aims to maintain an open-ended military presence in the country to ensure the
jihadist group's defeat.

However, the presence of large numbers of Kurdish armed forces in northern Syria has alarmed
neighbouring Turkey.

The pair are said to have provided valuable intelligence following their capture. That may be helpful
in answering the wider question of what happened to the foreign fighters as the so-called caliphate
disintegrated.

How many of the thousands of foreign fighters were killed and how many went to other countries or
would seek to come home? These men will have been priority targets - but not the only ones.

Their capture also raises the issue of what happens next. They could be put on trial in the US, since
they were allegedly involved in the killing of US hostages - but there may be some in the Trump
administration who would like to send them to Guantanamo Bay.

And it is not clear if this is - formally - an issue for the UK Government, as there are reports the pair
may have had their UK citizenship stripped from them using powers available to the Home Office.
US budget vote delay as senator foresees 'spending oblivion'
9 February 2018

The US government is poised for another shutdown after a senator held up a budgetary vote by
accusing Congress of "spending us into oblivion".

Hours before federal funding expires, the Senate was hoping to pass the mammoth two-year spending
bill. But Kentucky Senator Rand Paul demanded a debate in the chamber on his amendment to kill
the bipartisan deal. Last month failure to pass a bill led to a three-day government shutdown. The
previous one in 2013 lasted 16 days.

An hour before the deadline, the Senate voted for a recess until 00:01 local time on Friday (05:01
GMT) - essentially guaranteeing a shutdown. This latest budget measure has angered Republican
fiscal hawks, while Democrats are upset about the lack of an immigration concession.

What happens next?

Funding to keep the government open runs out at midnight when a one-month spending bill expires.
The White House said it was preparing federal agencies for a shutdown.

The legislation faces an even tougher test in the House of Representatives, though Republican
Speaker Paul Ryan said he believes they can muscle it through.

Hopes for a quick vote in the upper chamber on Thursday evening dimmed as Senator Paul stood up.

Why are budget hawks opposed?

While the spending bill's funding for the Pentagon has delighted the national security wing of the
party, fiscal conservatives are up in arms about ramifications for the nation's debt.

In a doom-laden speech, the Kentucky politician angrily charged his fellow Republicans with fiscal
profligacy.

"I ran for office because I was very critical of President Obama's trillion-dollar deficits," he said.

"Now we have Republicans, hand in hand with Democrats, offering us trillion-dollar deficits.

"I can't in all good honesty, in all good faith, just look the other way just because my party is now
complicit in the deficits."

This would be "the very definition of hypocrisy", he added.

What's in this bill?
As Senator Paul pointed out, the 650-page spending plan was only unveiled on Wednesday night, so
the finer details are unclear.

White House legislative affairs director Marc Short said the package would increase spending by
"just shy" of $300bn (£216bn). The Washington Post puts the figure at half a trillion dollars.

The bill contains $165bn of additional defence spending and $131bn in domestic spending, including
funding for healthcare, infrastructure and tackling the US opioid crisis, reports Reuters news agency.

The proposal would raise the US debt ceiling until March 2019.

Why are some Democrats unhappy?

Despite the imprimatur of their Senate leader Chuck Schumer, who says the budget accord will
"break the long cycle of spending crises", some Democrats have complained that the bill does not
address immigration.

The party's leader in the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, said on Thursday morning she was
opposed to the plan, but would not order rank-and-file Democrats to vote against it.

The California congresswoman has called for the bill to include a provision shielding so-called
Dreamers, young immigrants who entered the US illegally as children, from deportation.
Her remarks came a day after she told the stories of immigrants for eight hourson the floor of the
lower chamber in a record-breaking speech.

Obama-era guarantees for those immigrants were cancelled by US President Donald Trump and are
set to become invalid next month.

Illinois representative Luis Gutierrez, one of the leading congressional advocates for immigrants, is
urging colleagues to vote against the plan.

"Don't collude with this administration," he said.

What's the White House saying?

Kellyanne Conway, an adviser to the president, told Fox News the deal offers long-term budget
certainty and funding for his priorities including infrastructure and military funding.
Earlier this week, Mr Trump said he would "love to see" the US government shutdown if there
was no deal on funding for his proposed US-Mexico border wall.

Deficits are already projected to climb because of the Trump administration's $1.5tn tax cuts, which
were approved by Congress in December.
 Rohingya crisis: Reuters journalists held 'for investigating
Myanmar killings'
9 February 2018

Reuters has revealed details of an investigation into a mass execution of Rohingyas by soldiers
and villagers, which it says lies behind the arrest of two of its journalists in Myanmar.

Wa Lone and Kyaw Seo Oo are awaiting trial, charged with violating the country's Official Secrets
Act.The news agency claims they uncovered evidence the 10 Rohingyas were killed unlawfully in
Rakhine state last year. It hopes this will demonstrate the pair was acting in the public interest.

What happened to the journalists?

Wa Lone and Kyaw Soe Oo are two Burmese journalists credited with some powerful reporting.
They were arrested on 12 December after meeting police and receiving documents from them.

Authorities say they were "arrested for possessing important and secret government documents
related to Rakhine State and security forces" and that the information had been "illegally acquired
with the intention to share it with foreign media".

But ever since their arrest there has been speculation that the men were working on a highly sensitive
investigation. Reuters have now decided to publish details to support their claim the men were
working on a story with clear global public interest.

What do we know about the investigation?

It centres on an episode in the village of Inn Din in northern Rakhine on 2 September last year.
Reuters says its two journalists had been collecting evidence of the execution of 10 men based on
interviews with Buddhist villagers, security personnel and photographs. The agency says it has
pieced together what happened to them.

According to Reuters, a group of Rohingya men seeking safety on a beach were singled out as their
village was raided.

Buddhist men from the village were then ordered to dig a grave and then the 10 men were killed. The
agency claims this is the first time soldiers have been implicated with photographic evidence and by
fellow security personnel. They also claim to have confessions from the Buddhist villagers.
After the arrest of the two journalists the Burmese military carried out their own
investigation into the incident. The investigation corroborated what the two journalists had found -
that there had been an execution.
However, the military described the 10 men as "Bengali terrorists" and said that they were executed
because they could not be transported due to attacks on police stations by Rohingya militants.
Reuters claim the two journalists found no evidence the 10 men were connected with terrorism - with
several witnesses saying the men had been picked out of a crowd.

Reuters says the two journalists spoke to a number of witnesses in the village of Inn Din, police
officers and relatives of the men killed- who are now living in refugee camps in Bangladesh. One
man admitted to the murder of a Rohingya Muslim, the news agency says.

What does Myanmar's government say?

The BBC contacted the Burmese authorities about the Reuters investigation and is awaiting a
response. However, government spokesman Zaw Htay told the news agency: "We are not denying
the allegations about violations of human rights."If there was "strong and reliable primary evidence"
of abuses, the government would investigate, he said. "And then if we found the evidence is true and
the violations are there, we will take the necessary action according to our existing law."

He defended the military operation in Rakhine. "The international community needs to understand
who did the first terrorist attacks. If that kind of terrorist attack took place in European countries, in
the United States, in London, New York, Washington, what would the media say?"

On the journalists, a spokesman for Myanmar's de facto leader Aung San Suu Kyi has previously
said the men will be afforded the protection of the law.

What is the background to the crisis?

Nearly 700,000 Muslim Rohingya have fled mainly Buddhist Myanmar since August 2017 after a
brutal military crackdown responding to Rohingya militants attacking police posts and killing
members of the security forces.

The crisis erupted suddenly after years of tensions and sporadic violence between the communities.
Reports by the BBC have shown widespread burning of Rohingya villages and have contradicted
military claims that no Rohingya are forced to flee.

The United Nations human rights chief Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein has said an act of genocide against
Rohingya Muslims by state forces in Myanmar cannot be ruled out. He previously had said the
conflict seemed "a textbook example of ethnic cleansing".
The Burmese military has repeatedly denied allegations of massacres, and has exonerated itself in
an internal inquiry.
Koreas Olympics: A brief political backgrounder
7 February 2018

It is not unusual for the Olympic Games to take place with a heated political backdrop.

But these Winter Olympics, in the mountainous Pyeongchang region of South Korea, are happening
in particularly intriguing circumstances.

The Games are happening only 80km (50 miles) from the North Korean border and come at a time of
heightened concerns over the North's military capabilities. After several missile and nuclear tests,
there are fears North Korea, an autocratic, unpredictable state, may now have a nuclear weapon
they're able to fit on a missile - one that could reach the US. Leader Kim Jong-un has also been
engaged in a war of words with Donald Trump - a key ally to South Korea.

But there's been a warming of ties between North and South before the Games. How long will that
last?

The Winter Olympic Games and Paralympic Games are taking place in a country still technically at
war with its neighbour, which is only 80km (50 miles) from the Games venue.

In reality though, they're not in a state of war - neither side was able to claim victory after the 1950-
53 Korean War, so they agreed a ceasefire. Relations between the two remain fraught.

But South Korea's president Moon Jae-in has said the Games are a "precious opportunity" to seek
peace on the Korean peninsula, and has called these Games the "Peace Olympics".

Both countries will walk together under the same unified flag, and are fielding a joint women's
hockey team.

What's the background?

The Korean peninsula has been divided since the end of World War Two.

The North is an autocratic state of 25m people, largely isolated from the world, headed by Kim Jong-
un.

The South is a thriving democratic state of about 51m people that is a key US ally.

Officially, both countries support unification. But their visions of what a unified Korea would look
like are very different.
What's happened recently?
North Korea, insisting it has the right to defend itself, has pushed ahead in recent years with
developing a nuclear programme and producing ever more advanced missiles.

In 2017, it conducted its sixth nuclear test and also tested intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of
reaching the US. North Korea also said it could now place a miniaturised nuclear weapon on top of a
missile.

The US has installed a missile defence system in South Korea - its presence there has infuriated the
North.

Last year also saw a war of words between the North and US President Donald Trump, who
threatened to "totally destroy" North Korea in a UN speech.

What changed?
In a surprise move, Kim Jong-un extended a rare olive branch to the South in his new year's speech,
saying he was willing to send a team to the Games.

This was noteworthy as there hasn't been much co-operation between the countries under the past
two governments in South Korea. The North also boycotted the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul, so its
willingness to travel to Pyeongchang is significant.
After Mr Kim's speech, the North agreed to send a 500-strong delegation to the Games - his sister,
Kim Yo-jong, will be among the officials to visit.

Are things looking rosier?

The warmer ties have been welcomed, but there's been plenty of scepticism too.

Hong Joon-pyo, leader of South Korea's main opposition party, said the government "is being
dragged around by Kim Jong-un's false peace offensive and political show".

Japan's foreign minister said North Korea was using the Games as a chance to improve its image,
while continuing its missile and nuclear programmes regardless. "It's not the time to ease pressure
towards North Korea," Taro Kono said.

Meanwhile, the signs that North Korea is happy to continue provoking its critics are still there - it
moved its traditional military display forward two months, to the eve of the Games.
The country running out of space for its millionaires
By Katie Beck 6 February 2018

What do you do when you’re the ruler of a country that runs out of space for its super rich?

Imagine a pint-sized country – less than a square mile in size (2 square kilometres) – with sun-
drenched, quiet streets, no dog poo and no income tax to pay. A place where motor racing and
yachting are the national pastimes and people hop into a helicopter to get from A to B instead of
hailing a taxi. 

Now imagine that one in three of the people who live there are millionaires – often many times over.

This little oasis has, in fact, become such a magnet for millionaires that many more want to relocate
to its sunny shores. So, the local authorities have taken the radical step of allowing the construction
of artificial islands out across the sea to house them all.

An estimated 2,700 more millionaires are hoping to claim a piece of this diminutive country for
themselves in the next 10 years. It sounds too bizarre to be true, but perched on the picturesque cliff
tops of the French Riviera, such an odd place does exist. 

It’s the tiny principality of Monaco – millionaire hub of the world, with the highest number of
millionaires per capita. 

If you drive along the Mediterranean coast of France, glimpses of pebbly beaches dotted with sun-
bleached umbrellas poke though the cypress trees.  

Then out of nowhere towering, concrete buildings emerge from an otherwise sleepy seafront. When
you spot shimmering skyscrapers, Bugattis whizzing past and a world-famous casino, you know
you’ve arrived in the city-state of Monaco.

With the highest population density of any country in the world, and reputation as a playground for
the world’s super rich, demand for property here has soared. 

There will be 16,100 millionaires or multimillionaires in Monaco by 2026 

Over 30% of the roughly 38,000 residents of Monaco are millionaires, according to Williams’
research. “Next down the list are some Swiss cities like Geneva and Zurich and so on,” he says. 

That number is forecast to rise. According to Knight Frank property agency’s analysis, there will be
16,100 millionaires or multimillionaires hoping to claim a piece of this diminutive country for
themselves in the next 10 years, but at the moment they can’t. There’s no more room. 
Measuring just 0.78 square miles (2.02 square kilometres) Monaco is crowded, it’s the second
smallest country in the world (after Vatican City) and existing building space has already been
stretched to the limit by carving homes into the mountainsides, building up into the sky and even
tunneling down into the ground. 

So, in a bid to try and cater to the demands of this new super rich tribe, the current ruler, Prince
Albert II, has agreed an ambitious land reclamation project. The government of Monaco is
overseeing the project and private financiers are paying for the build and will sell the real estate.

The £1.5 billion ($2.1 billion) Offshore Urban Extension Project will add 15 acres of landmass to the
principality by 2026. Portier Cove, will include a harbour big enough for 30 ships, a landscaped park
and luxury residential buildings with plans for 120 new homes. 

But the construction involves a Herculean effort: putting large concrete-filled watertight chambers,
called caissons, into the sea, then draining the water from the surrounding area and filling it in with
sand imported from Sicily to create an artificial landmass jutting out from the seafront. 

The £1.5 billion ($2.1 billion) Offshore Urban Extension Project will add 15 acres of landmass to the
principality by 2026 

And expansion on this scale doesn’t come without costs. Although French construction firm,
Bouygues Travaux Publiques, are planning to relocate marine flora and fauna from the building site
to other protected areas and creating a 3D-printed artificial reef as part of the development, there are
still risks.

Marine experts suggest that no matter how carefully you carry out land reclamation, disrupting the
sea to build artificial islands will have a direct impact on natural surroundings and marine life. 

It is estimated that hundreds of types of algae and thousands of marine organisms live in the waters
that will be replaced by dry land. Environmentalists warn that there is no way to fully protect the
area’s fragile biodiversity in the face of such a large-scale offshore project. 

Land reclamation is nothing new to Monaco – the principality has already expanded its territory by
20% since 1861 - but now even the deep ocean seems no match for property demand.

Still the eco-conscious prince – who drives an electric car and has donated millions through his
foundation to environmental causes – is adamant further land expansion in his country must now be
carefully weighed up against environmental concerns. 

The unique challenge for Portier Cove is that the builders are being asked to meet international
sustainable urban development certifications including the HQE Aménagement, Building Research
Establishment Environmental Assessment Method standard and the Clean Ports label.

It is hoped the project will become a flagship example that other growing countries will look to
follow.