We’re covering escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran, the capture of a Uighur family from the Belgian Embassy in Beijing and the evolutionary science of puppy-dog eyes.
A cry to preserve Hong Kong’s sanctuary status
Since the late 1800s, Hong Kong has been a refuge for people fleeing mainland China, particularly political dissidents.
The recently proposed extradition bill would have changed that by creating an opening for China to capture people suspected of crimes — a move that strikes at the core of Hong Kong’s values.
Mainland Chinese were among the millions of people in Hong Kong who have been protesting the bill, with hundreds of recent immigrants signing a petition opposing the proposal.
Quotable: “You feel like you are in a port of freedom but authoritarianism is approaching,” said Ma Jian, an author whose first book was banned in China, prompting him to move to Hong Kong in 1986. He is now settled in London.
The latest: The territory’s top official, Carrie Lam, apologized again for introducing the measure, which has been suspended, but she didn’t concede to protesters’ demands to withdraw the bill entirely. She also said she wouldn’t step down.
Europe caught in the middle of U.S.-Iran feud
As tensions between Washington and Tehran ramp up, each side has been pressuring Europe to side with it.
Iran wants Europe to help solve the economic crisis brought on by American sanctions, and the U.S. wants Europe to press Iran into new negotiations to shut down its nuclear program.
Stuck in the middle, the Europeans have been reduced to the role of calling for restraint. While they have tried to help bolster Iran’s economy, they are basically powerless in the face of American military and financial clout.
Related: President Trump pulled the nomination of the acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan, leaving the Pentagon without a permanent leader at a time of escalating tensions with Iran.
Belgian case shows limits of Muslim protections
Wureyetiguli Abula and her children headed to the Belgian Embassy in Beijing at the end of May, seeking visas that would allow them to be reunited with her husband, Abdulhamid Tursun, in Brussels, where he had won asylum in 2017.
A Uighur Muslim, she told the embassy she was scared of the police and asked to remain there for safety. Hours later, the Chinese police marched into the embassy, dragged the family to a hotel and drove them back to Xinjiang, where Ms. Abula is currently under house arrest.
Now, Belgium is trying to find out what happened. The country said that it was sending an envoy to Beijing to clarify the events and that it would try to secure passports for Ms. Abula and her children. The embassy’s handling of the case is also being criticized.
Takeaway: The ordeal shows that the Muslim minority group has limited protections — even from Western democracies.
Over the past two years, China has detained around one million Uighurs in a vast network of internment camps in Xinjiang. The government asserts that they are a terrorism threat, an argument that is disputed by many Western nations.
Could the Christchurch attacks have been prevented?
The man accused of killing 51 Muslims in two mosques back in March had earlier posted radical opinions online, applied for gun licenses and is believed to have purchased several assault rifles.
Yet he escaped the attention of authorities in both Australia and New Zealand. Ahead of his trial, the nations must grapple with whether they have neglected the threat of right-wing extremism while they have focused on Islamist terrorism.
Response: New Zealand opened an investigation into whether its intelligence apparatus missed anything and the government has vowed to strengthen its laws on hate speech.
Australia’s parliament passed a law threatening huge fines to social media companies for failing to remove “abhorrent violent material” quickly.
Related: A New Zealand man was sentenced to almost two years in prison for sharing online video from the man accused in the mosque shootings. His lawyer asserted the sentence was because of his white supremacist beliefs, not his actions.
If you have 5 minutes, this is worth it
Where Buddhas stood, a hologram remains
Ever since the Taliban destroyed two ancient Buddha statues in Bamiyan, Afghanistan, in 2001, the international community has debated what to do to protect or restore the site.
A wealthy Chinese couple financed a 3D light projection of a Buddha, pictured above, which is turned on occasionally. But most of the time, the monument’s remains are so poorly guarded that visitors can walk in and do pretty much whatever they want. And many do.
Here’s what else is happening
Facebook: The tech giant and a group of 27 partners introduced a cryptocurrency called Libra, which they hope will become the basis for an alternative financial system. Unlike Bitcoin, Libra would be directly backed by government currencies to avoid wild fluctuations in value.
U.S.-China: President Trump confirmed that he would meet President Xi Jinping at the G-20 forum next week in Japan, suggesting the two countries may be trying to find a compromise after stalled trade talks.
Pakistan: Six mountain climbers were rescued after an avalanche trapped them on a treacherous stretch of the Hindu Kush on the border with Afghanistan, officials said.
Snapshot: Above, a library in Pakistan’s Darra Adem Khel district. It opened less than a year ago in the midst of a sprawling weapons bazaar, offering locals a respite in a region once controlled by the Taliban and regularly targeted by militants.
Sex-changing tomatoes: A plant in northern Australia frequently changes its sexual form, going from male to female to sometimes both — a confounding phenomenon that scientists hope sheds a light on the sexual fluidity of the plant kingdom.
“I will not work overtime, period!” A TV drama that has captured the attention of Japan has a simple plotline: Can an employee leave work at 6 p.m. sharp and make it to happy hour? It has resonated in a country with a sometimes dangerous work ethic.
Australia: After President Trump tagged the wrong ABC News in a post on Twitter, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. responded with a GIF of a koala.
Who’s a good boy? That quizzical, slightly sad look your dog gives you is the result of evolution, scientists say. They found that dogs, but not wolves, have a specific muscle that helps raise their eyebrows.
52 Places traveler: In his latest dispatch, our columnist takes a midnight train to Aberdeen, Scotland, where he finds an underappreciated city that’s quietly exploding with creativity.
What we’re reading: This investigation from Reveal. Mike Isaac, one of our technology reporters, calls it “a deeply reported look at the sheer number of hate groups harbored by Facebook — and the many members of law enforcement across the country who are active participants in them.”
Now, a break from the news
Cook: There’s nothing complicated about thispotato salad with a Dijon vinaigrette.
Go: Julia Jarcho’s new play, “Pathetic,” is a squirmy, sinister meditation on female desire, with a whiff of ancient Greece, our theater critic writes. It’s Off Off Broadway in Manhattan.
Read: The writing in Ariana Reines’s new poetry collection, “A Sand Book,” is raunchy, raw and occult, seemingly never pulling away from her deepest vulnerabilities, our reviewer writes.
Listen: What emerges when the wry, mystic Sturgill Simpson writes the title track for “The Dead Don’t Die,” the new Jim Jarmusch zombie comedy, is an elegant, elegiac hard-country song, writes Jon Caramanica.
Smarter Living: New research shows that breast-fed milk may nourish an infant’s microbiome in ways that bottled breast milk can’t, possibly setting the course for the baby’s growing immune system and metabolism. In some ways, pediatric experts say, it’s a signal to society to make breast-feeding a real option for many more women.
And try our seven-day money challenge, one simple task each day for a week to strengthen your financial well-being.
And now for the Back Story on …
Juneteenth
Today, the U.S. celebrates a day that has come to be known for the end of slavery.
In actuality, June 19, 1865, was the day that enslaved Texans got the news that President Abraham Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation. It declared the freedom of the enslaved in rebelling states — a full two and a half years after its signing, and a few months before the 13th Amendment abolished slavery.
Juneteenth is now celebrated around the country with cookouts, music and dancing.
But when African-Americans in Houston wanted to commemorate the occasion shortly after emancipation, they ran into a problem: There were few, if any, public spaces where they could gather.
So a group led by the Rev. Jack Yates, a formerly enslaved Baptist minister, pooled together $1,000 in 1872 to purchase 10 acres of land for annual Juneteenth celebrations.
Today, those 10 acres in Houston’s historic Third Ward are known as Emancipation Park. The park, which had a $33 million renovation completed two years ago, is considered the city’s oldest.
You might say it is the spiritual epicenter of Juneteenth festivities.
That’s it for this briefing. See you next time.
— Alisha
Thank you Chris Stanford helped compile today’s briefing. Mark Josephson and Eleanor Stanford provided the break from the news. John Eligon, a national correspondent covering race, wrote today’s Back Story. You can reach the team at [email protected].
P.S. • We’re listening to “The Daily.” Our latest episode is about the U.S. infiltration of Russia’s power grid. • Here’s our Mini Crossword, and a clue: GPS suggestion (5 letters). You can find all our puzzles here. • Michael Barbaro, the host of “The Daily,” appeared last week on the BBC podcast “Beyond Today.”
Alisha Haridasani Gupta writes the Morning Briefing. @alisha__g
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Home » Analysis & Comment » Your Wednesday Briefing
Your Wednesday Briefing
Good morning.
We’re covering escalating tensions between the U.S. and Iran, the capture of a Uighur family from the Belgian Embassy in Beijing and the evolutionary science of puppy-dog eyes.
A cry to preserve Hong Kong’s sanctuary status
Since the late 1800s, Hong Kong has been a refuge for people fleeing mainland China, particularly political dissidents.
The recently proposed extradition bill would have changed that by creating an opening for China to capture people suspected of crimes — a move that strikes at the core of Hong Kong’s values.
Mainland Chinese were among the millions of people in Hong Kong who have been protesting the bill, with hundreds of recent immigrants signing a petition opposing the proposal.
Quotable: “You feel like you are in a port of freedom but authoritarianism is approaching,” said Ma Jian, an author whose first book was banned in China, prompting him to move to Hong Kong in 1986. He is now settled in London.
The latest: The territory’s top official, Carrie Lam, apologized again for introducing the measure, which has been suspended, but she didn’t concede to protesters’ demands to withdraw the bill entirely. She also said she wouldn’t step down.
Europe caught in the middle of U.S.-Iran feud
As tensions between Washington and Tehran ramp up, each side has been pressuring Europe to side with it.
Iran wants Europe to help solve the economic crisis brought on by American sanctions, and the U.S. wants Europe to press Iran into new negotiations to shut down its nuclear program.
Stuck in the middle, the Europeans have been reduced to the role of calling for restraint. While they have tried to help bolster Iran’s economy, they are basically powerless in the face of American military and financial clout.
Related: President Trump pulled the nomination of the acting defense secretary, Patrick Shanahan, leaving the Pentagon without a permanent leader at a time of escalating tensions with Iran.
Belgian case shows limits of Muslim protections
Wureyetiguli Abula and her children headed to the Belgian Embassy in Beijing at the end of May, seeking visas that would allow them to be reunited with her husband, Abdulhamid Tursun, in Brussels, where he had won asylum in 2017.
A Uighur Muslim, she told the embassy she was scared of the police and asked to remain there for safety. Hours later, the Chinese police marched into the embassy, dragged the family to a hotel and drove them back to Xinjiang, where Ms. Abula is currently under house arrest.
Now, Belgium is trying to find out what happened. The country said that it was sending an envoy to Beijing to clarify the events and that it would try to secure passports for Ms. Abula and her children. The embassy’s handling of the case is also being criticized.
Takeaway: The ordeal shows that the Muslim minority group has limited protections — even from Western democracies.
Over the past two years, China has detained around one million Uighurs in a vast network of internment camps in Xinjiang. The government asserts that they are a terrorism threat, an argument that is disputed by many Western nations.
Could the Christchurch attacks have been prevented?
The man accused of killing 51 Muslims in two mosques back in March had earlier posted radical opinions online, applied for gun licenses and is believed to have purchased several assault rifles.
Yet he escaped the attention of authorities in both Australia and New Zealand. Ahead of his trial, the nations must grapple with whether they have neglected the threat of right-wing extremism while they have focused on Islamist terrorism.
Response: New Zealand opened an investigation into whether its intelligence apparatus missed anything and the government has vowed to strengthen its laws on hate speech.
Australia’s parliament passed a law threatening huge fines to social media companies for failing to remove “abhorrent violent material” quickly.
Related: A New Zealand man was sentenced to almost two years in prison for sharing online video from the man accused in the mosque shootings. His lawyer asserted the sentence was because of his white supremacist beliefs, not his actions.
If you have 5 minutes, this is worth it
Where Buddhas stood, a hologram remains
Ever since the Taliban destroyed two ancient Buddha statues in Bamiyan, Afghanistan, in 2001, the international community has debated what to do to protect or restore the site.
A wealthy Chinese couple financed a 3D light projection of a Buddha, pictured above, which is turned on occasionally. But most of the time, the monument’s remains are so poorly guarded that visitors can walk in and do pretty much whatever they want. And many do.
Here’s what else is happening
Facebook: The tech giant and a group of 27 partners introduced a cryptocurrency called Libra, which they hope will become the basis for an alternative financial system. Unlike Bitcoin, Libra would be directly backed by government currencies to avoid wild fluctuations in value.
U.S.-China: President Trump confirmed that he would meet President Xi Jinping at the G-20 forum next week in Japan, suggesting the two countries may be trying to find a compromise after stalled trade talks.
Pakistan: Six mountain climbers were rescued after an avalanche trapped them on a treacherous stretch of the Hindu Kush on the border with Afghanistan, officials said.
Snapshot: Above, a library in Pakistan’s Darra Adem Khel district. It opened less than a year ago in the midst of a sprawling weapons bazaar, offering locals a respite in a region once controlled by the Taliban and regularly targeted by militants.
Sex-changing tomatoes: A plant in northern Australia frequently changes its sexual form, going from male to female to sometimes both — a confounding phenomenon that scientists hope sheds a light on the sexual fluidity of the plant kingdom.
“I will not work overtime, period!” A TV drama that has captured the attention of Japan has a simple plotline: Can an employee leave work at 6 p.m. sharp and make it to happy hour? It has resonated in a country with a sometimes dangerous work ethic.
Australia: After President Trump tagged the wrong ABC News in a post on Twitter, the Australian Broadcasting Corp. responded with a GIF of a koala.
Who’s a good boy? That quizzical, slightly sad look your dog gives you is the result of evolution, scientists say. They found that dogs, but not wolves, have a specific muscle that helps raise their eyebrows.
52 Places traveler: In his latest dispatch, our columnist takes a midnight train to Aberdeen, Scotland, where he finds an underappreciated city that’s quietly exploding with creativity.
What we’re reading: This investigation from Reveal. Mike Isaac, one of our technology reporters, calls it “a deeply reported look at the sheer number of hate groups harbored by Facebook — and the many members of law enforcement across the country who are active participants in them.”
Now, a break from the news
Cook: There’s nothing complicated about this potato salad with a Dijon vinaigrette.
Go: Julia Jarcho’s new play, “Pathetic,” is a squirmy, sinister meditation on female desire, with a whiff of ancient Greece, our theater critic writes. It’s Off Off Broadway in Manhattan.
Read: The writing in Ariana Reines’s new poetry collection, “A Sand Book,” is raunchy, raw and occult, seemingly never pulling away from her deepest vulnerabilities, our reviewer writes.
Listen: What emerges when the wry, mystic Sturgill Simpson writes the title track for “The Dead Don’t Die,” the new Jim Jarmusch zombie comedy, is an elegant, elegiac hard-country song, writes Jon Caramanica.
Smarter Living: New research shows that breast-fed milk may nourish an infant’s microbiome in ways that bottled breast milk can’t, possibly setting the course for the baby’s growing immune system and metabolism. In some ways, pediatric experts say, it’s a signal to society to make breast-feeding a real option for many more women.
And try our seven-day money challenge, one simple task each day for a week to strengthen your financial well-being.
And now for the Back Story on …
Juneteenth
Today, the U.S. celebrates a day that has come to be known for the end of slavery.
In actuality, June 19, 1865, was the day that enslaved Texans got the news that President Abraham Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation. It declared the freedom of the enslaved in rebelling states — a full two and a half years after its signing, and a few months before the 13th Amendment abolished slavery.
Juneteenth is now celebrated around the country with cookouts, music and dancing.
But when African-Americans in Houston wanted to commemorate the occasion shortly after emancipation, they ran into a problem: There were few, if any, public spaces where they could gather.
So a group led by the Rev. Jack Yates, a formerly enslaved Baptist minister, pooled together $1,000 in 1872 to purchase 10 acres of land for annual Juneteenth celebrations.
Today, those 10 acres in Houston’s historic Third Ward are known as Emancipation Park. The park, which had a $33 million renovation completed two years ago, is considered the city’s oldest.
You might say it is the spiritual epicenter of Juneteenth festivities.
That’s it for this briefing. See you next time.
— Alisha
Thank you
Chris Stanford helped compile today’s briefing. Mark Josephson and Eleanor Stanford provided the break from the news. John Eligon, a national correspondent covering race, wrote today’s Back Story. You can reach the team at [email protected].
P.S.
• We’re listening to “The Daily.” Our latest episode is about the U.S. infiltration of Russia’s power grid.
• Here’s our Mini Crossword, and a clue: GPS suggestion (5 letters). You can find all our puzzles here.
• Michael Barbaro, the host of “The Daily,” appeared last week on the BBC podcast “Beyond Today.”
Alisha Haridasani Gupta writes the Morning Briefing. @alisha__g
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