RFK Jr ‘endangering’ all Americans, health agency ex-chiefs warn

Nine former leaders of the top US health body sounded the alarm Monday about the Trump administration’s evisceration of the agency and warned that vaccine skeptic Robert F. Kennedy Jr is “endangering every American’s health.”The blunt guest essay in The New York Times marks the latest in snowballing attacks on the US health secretary after the director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was recently fired by President Donald Trump after just weeks in her post.Susan Monarez was fired last week after clashing with RFK Jr and reportedly refusing to commit to supporting his vaccination policy changes. The ouster triggered the resignation of at least four top officials and plunged the agency deeper into chaos.”We ran the CDC: Kennedy is endangering every American’s health,” warned the opinion piece penned by nine former leaders of the historically independent agency who served under every president, Democrat or Republican, from Jimmy Carter to Donald Trump.What Kennedy has done to the CDC and the nation’s public health system — “culminating in his decision to fire Dr. Susan Monarez as CDC director days ago — is unlike anything we have ever seen at the agency, and unlike anything our country has ever experienced,” the experts wrote.They mentioned how Kennedy has fired thousands of federal health workers; weakened programs aimed at protecting Americans from cancer, heart attacks and more; and, during the country’s largest measles outbreak in decades, focused on “unproven ‘treatments’ while downplaying vaccines.”He also championed federal legislation that is expected to kick millions of people off their health insurance, they said.”This is unacceptable, and it should alarm every American, regardless of political leanings,” said the experts, including doctor Anne Schuchat, who served as CDC acting director in Trump’s first term.The blistering criticism comes one day after Demetre Daskalakis, who resigned in protest from his role as director of the CDC’s National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases after Monarez was ousted, warned that “the firewall between science and ideology has completely broken down” at the agency.Meanwhile Trump said he wants more information released publicly about the “various Covid Drugs” introduced during the pandemic.”Many people think they are a miracle that saved Millions of lives. Others disagree!” Trump posted on Truth Social.”With CDC being ripped apart over this question, I want the answer, and I want it NOW.”

Siege tightens on Sudan city with fiercest RSF assault: what we knowMon, 01 Sep 2025 13:12:49 GMT

The western Sudanese city of El-Fasher has been under siege for more than a year by paramilitary forces seeking to capture it amid a wider war with the army that began in April 2023.Gripped by brutal violence, the city has become the latest strategic front in the conflict as the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) …

Siege tightens on Sudan city with fiercest RSF assault: what we knowMon, 01 Sep 2025 13:12:49 GMT Read More »

Mauritania’s Tah takes over as Africa’s ‘super banker’Mon, 01 Sep 2025 12:25:39 GMT

Mauritania’s former economy minister Sidi Ould Tah took office Monday as head of the African Development Bank, vowing to build a “robust and prosperous” continent despite US aid cuts.The AfDB is one of the world’s largest multilateral development banks and is funded by member subscriptions, loans raised on global markets as well as repayments and …

Mauritania’s Tah takes over as Africa’s ‘super banker’Mon, 01 Sep 2025 12:25:39 GMT Read More »

Tunisian brutalist landmark faces wrecking ball, sparking outcry

Tunisia’s brutalist landmark the Hotel du Lac — a 1970s postcard icon said to have inspired a desert-roving vehicle in “Star Wars” — is being demolished, sparking calls from architects, historians and activists to save it.Built by Italian architect Raffaele Contigiani in central Tunis, the concrete-and-steel inverted pyramid opened in 1973 during a push to boost post-independence Tunisia’s tourism industry.Its daring silhouette has since enraptured brutalism and modernist architecture admirers from across the globe. But after getting caught up in inheritance disputes and mismanagement, the hotel shut down in 2000, and its 10 floors and 416 rooms have grown decrepit since.Tunisian historian Adnen El Ghali sees the Hotel du Lac as one of the world’s “top 10 brutalism jewels”.Its demolition would mean “a great loss for world heritage”, he said.LAFICO, a Libyan state investment fund that has owned the hotel since 2010, has not made any public announcements about its future.But earlier this month, its head, Hadi Alfitory, told AFP the fund had “obtained all the necessary permits for demolition”.- ‘Must be demolished’ -When construction fences went up around the building in recent weeks, outrage spread.A petition on Change.org calling to “save the urban landscape” of Tunis and preserve the “brutalist icon” collected more than 6,000 signatures within days, with a protest set to take place in Tunis in September.Alfitory said the decision to tear down the structure came after “various expert assessments” determined that “the building is a ruin and must be demolished”.Its replacement, a 20-storey luxury hotel and mall, will keep to its “concept and shape”, Alfitory said, with the Libyan fund pledging $150 million in investment and 3,000 jobs.Critics say the plan ignores both the building’s engineering achievements and its cultural resonance.”Investing and modernising does not mean demolishing and erasing collective memory and architectural heritage,” said Amel Meddeb, a member of parliament and architect who first raised alarms about the demolition permit this year.Like many, she said the proposed plan was “totally vague”, and therefore difficult to officially challenge.Safa Cherif, head of Tunisian conservation group Edifices et Memoires, said there was “no official sign explaining the nature of the work underway, nor any indication about the new project”.The Hotel du Lac has survived other close calls.Between 2010 and 2020, demolition plans were shelved, and in 2022, a wave of media campaigns led by civil society convinced the Culture Ministry to grant it temporary protection. That safeguard expired in April 2023, and the ministry declined to renew it despite an expert rebuttal maintaining that the building was indeed restorable.- ‘The main symbol’ -Parliament member Meddeb said the refusal was “a 180-degree turn”, insisting the hotel was a cultural monument worthy of saving.To Gabriele Neri, a professor of architectural history at the Polytechnic University of Turin, its loss would be profound.”These buildings are 50 years old and will soon be 60 or 100,” he said. “They are witnesses of important eras.”The Hotel du Lac is “the main symbol in Tunisia” of the independence wave that swept across African nations, when leaders like the country’s first president Habib Bourguiba “sought to project a new, modern and international image”, he added.It is an “engineering feat” with its narrow base supporting a wider top using Austrian-imported steel, said Neri, who urged authorities to preserve “as much as possible”.Across the world, he pointed out, nations are learning to embrace late 20th-century architecture rather than discard it.”In Uzbekistan, where I just returned from, the authorities have undertaken efforts to seek UNESCO recognition for Soviet monuments of the 1970s and 80s,” he said.Brutalism — a style characterised by its use of exposed concrete — had “a very powerful era in many places”, Gabriele added. It’s now “attracting a growing amount of attention, almost becoming fetishistic”, he added, citing books, magazines and movies like 2024’s “The Brutalist”.Amid this wave, Hotel du Lac as it stands could “become an attraction for high-level cultural tourism”.

Fierce winds force Gaza aid flotilla back to Barcelona

Fierce Mediterranean winds forced a Gaza-bound flotilla carrying humanitarian aid and hundreds of pro-Palestinian activists, including environmental campaigner Greta Thunberg, to return to Barcelona, organisers said on Monday.Around 20 vessels left the Spanish city on Sunday aiming to “open a humanitarian corridor and end the ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people” amid the Israel-Hamas war, said the Global Sumud Flotilla — sumud being the Arabic term for “resilience”.But “due to unsafe weather conditions, we conducted a sea trial and then returned to port to allow the storm to pass,” the organisation said in a statement, without specifying when exactly the boats returned to Barcelona.”This meant delaying our departure to avoid risking complications with the smaller boats,” it added, citing gusts that exceeded 55 kilometres (34 miles) per hour.”We made this decision to prioritize the safety and well-being of all participants and to safeguard the success of our mission.”Spanish media reported that the organisers would meet to decide whether to resume the expedition later on Monday.Among the activists from dozens of countries were Thunberg, actors Liam Cunningham of Ireland and Eduard Fernandez of Spain, as well as European lawmakers and public figures, including former Barcelona mayor Ada Colau.The flotilla is expected to arrive in Gaza in mid-September and comes after Israel blocked two activist attempts to deliver aid to the devastated Palestinian territory by ship in June and July.The United Nations has declared a famine in Gaza, warning that 500,000 people face “catastrophic” conditions.The war was triggered by an unprecedented cross-border attack on Israel by Palestinian militant group Hamas on October 7, 2023, which resulted in the death of 1,219 people, mainly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official data.Palestinian militants also seized 251 hostages, with 47 still held in Gaza, including 25 the Israeli army says are dead.Israel’s retaliatory offensive has killed at least 63,459 Palestinians, mostly civilians, according to figures from Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry which the UN considers reliable.

Afghanistan earthquake kills more than 800

A massive rescue operation was underway in Afghanistan on Monday, after a strong earthquake and multiple aftershocks collapsed homes onto sleeping families in a remote, mountainous region, killing more than 800 people, according to the Taliban authorities. The 6.0-magnitude earthquake struck just before midnight, rattling buildings from Kabul to neighbouring Pakistan’s capital, Islamabad.  More than 1.2 million people likely felt strong or very strong shaking, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS), which recorded at least five aftershocks throughout the night.Casualties and destruction swept across at least five provinces.Near the epicentre in eastern Afghanistan, around 800 people were killed and 2,500 injured in remote Kunar province alone, chief Taliban government spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said. Another 12 people were killed and 255 injured in neighbouring Nangarhar province, while 58 people were injured in Laghman province.In Wadir village in the hard-hit district of Nurgal, dozens of people joined the effort to pull people from the rubble of destroyed or severely damaged homes more than 12 hours after the initial earthquake, AFP journalists saw.The epicentre was about 27 kilometres (17 miles) from the city of Jalalabad in Nangarhar province, according to the USGS, which said it struck about eight kilometres below the Earth’s surface.Such relatively shallow quakes can cause more damage, especially since the majority of Afghans live in low-rise, mud-brick homes vulnerable to collapse.Some of the most severely impacted villages in remote Kunar provinces “remain inaccessible due to road blockages”, the UN migration agency warned in a statement to AFP.The Taliban authorities and the United Nations mobilised rescue efforts, with the defence ministry saying at least 40 flight sorties had so far been carried out.A member of the agricultural department in Nurgal said people had rushed to clear blocked roads in the hours after the earthquake, but that badly affected areas were remote and had limited telecoms networks. “There is a lot of fear and tension… Children and women were screaming. We had never experienced anything like this in our lives,” Ijaz Ulhaq Yaad told AFP. He said that many living in quake-hit villages were among the more than four million Afghans who have returned to the country from Iran and Pakistan in recent years. “They wanted to build their homes here.” Nangarhar and Kunar provinces border Pakistan, with the Torkham crossing the site of many waves of Afghan returnees deported or forced to leave, often with no work and nowhere to go. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres added his condolences to those shared by the Taliban government and several nations.”I stand in full solidarity with the people of Afghanistan after the devastating earthquake that hit the country earlier today,” he said.In a post shared by the Vatican, Pope Leo XIV said he was “deeply saddened by the significant loss of life caused by the earthquake in the area of eastern Afghanistan”.- Frequent quakes -Afghanistan is frequently hit by earthquakes, especially in the Hindu Kush mountain range, near the junction of the Eurasia and India tectonic plates. Since 1900, there have been 12 earthquakes with magnitudes greater than seven in northeast Afghanistan, according to Brian Baptie, a seismologist at the British Geological Survey.  “This scale of the seismic activity, the potential for multi-hazard events and the construction of structures in the region can combine to create significant loss of life in such events,” he said in a statement.Nangarhar province was also hit by flooding overnight Friday to Saturday, which killed five people and destroyed crops and property, provincial authorities said. In October 2023, western Herat province was devastated by a 6.3-magnitude earthquake, which killed more than 1,500 people and damaged or destroyed more than 63,000 homes.In June 2022, a 5.9-magnitude quake struck the impoverished eastern border province of Paktika, killing more than 1,000 people and leaving tens of thousands homeless.Ravaged by four decades of war, Afghanistan is already contending with a series of humanitarian crises.Since the return of the Taliban, foreign aid to Afghanistan has been slashed, undermining the impoverished nation’s ability to respond to disasters.Around 85 percent of the Afghan population lives on less than one dollar a day, according to the United Nations Development Programme.