Month: August 2023

The use of artificial intelligence has become a focal point in the Hollywood strikes. Studios say they have offered fair protections and compensation where the new technology is used, but actors and writers have reservations. Genia Dulot has this report.

Give us 5 minutes, and we’ll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.

A brightly flashing “X” sign has been removed from the San Francisco headquarters of the company formerly known as Twitter just days after it was installed. 

The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection said Monday it received 24 complaints about the unpermitted structure over the weekend. Complaints included concerns about its structural safety and illumination. 

The Elon Musk-owned company, which has been rebranded as X, had removed the Twitter sign and iconic blue bird logo from the building last week. That work was temporarily paused because the company did not have the necessary permits. For a time, the “er” at the end of “Twitter” remained up due to the abrupt halt of the sign takedown. 

The city of San Francisco had opened a complaint and launched an investigation into the giant “X” sign, which was installed Friday on top of the downtown building as Musk continues his rebrand of the social media platform. 

 

 

The chaotic rebrand of Twitter’s building signage is similar to the haphazard way in which the Twitter platform is being turned into X. While the X logo has replaced Twitter on many parts of the site and app, remnants of Twitter remain. 

Representatives for X did not immediately respond to a message for comment Monday. 

A brightly flashing “X” sign has been removed from the San Francisco headquarters of the company formerly known as Twitter just days after it was installed. 

The San Francisco Department of Building Inspection said Monday it received 24 complaints about the unpermitted structure over the weekend. Complaints included concerns about its structural safety and illumination. 

The Elon Musk-owned company, which has been rebranded as X, had removed the Twitter sign and iconic blue bird logo from the building last week. That work was temporarily paused because the company did not have the necessary permits. For a time, the “er” at the end of “Twitter” remained up due to the abrupt halt of the sign takedown. 

The city of San Francisco had opened a complaint and launched an investigation into the giant “X” sign, which was installed Friday on top of the downtown building as Musk continues his rebrand of the social media platform. 

 

 

The chaotic rebrand of Twitter’s building signage is similar to the haphazard way in which the Twitter platform is being turned into X. While the X logo has replaced Twitter on many parts of the site and app, remnants of Twitter remain. 

Representatives for X did not immediately respond to a message for comment Monday. 

The United States said Monday that it had urged Afghanistan’s Taliban in the latest round of bilateral talks to reverse policies responsible for the deteriorating human rights situation in the country, particularly for women, girls and vulnerable communities, while praising economic and counternarcotics gains the country has made under the de facto rulers.

The two-day discussions between the former battlefield adversaries occurred in Doha, Qatar, with U.S. special Afghan representative Tom West and Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi leading their respective delegations.

The United States “expressed grave concern regarding detentions, media crackdowns and limits on religious practice” since the Taliban seized power in Kabul, said a post-meeting U.S. statement. The U.S. side backed the Afghan people’s demands for their rights to be respected and for their voices to shape the future of Afghanistan.

The statement said, without elaborating, that the U.S. side “identified areas for confidence building in support of the Afghan people.”

The American delegation also met with leaders from Afghanistan’s central bank, known as Da Afghanistan Bank, or DAB, and finance ministry representatives to discuss the state of the economy and the challenges facing the country’s banking sector.

The U.S. officials noted “recent data indicating declining inflation, growth of merchandise exports and imports in Afghanistan in 2023, and voiced openness to a technical dialogue regarding economic stabilization issues soon.”

Taliban efforts to fulfill security commitments also figured in the discussions, with the U.S. side noting the de facto Afghan leaders’ “continuing commitment” to prevent the use of Afghan territory by anyone to threaten the United States and its allies.

“The American delegation acknowledged that there has been a decrease in large-scale terrorist attacks against Afghan civilians,” the statement said. U.S. officials pressed Taliban delegates for the immediate and unconditional release of detained American citizens, warning that the detentions were a “significant obstacle to positive engagement.”

The U.S. officials voiced “openness” to continue dialogue with the Taliban on counternarcotics and “took note of reporting indicating that the Taliban’s ban on opium poppy cultivation resulted in a significant decrease in cultivation during the most recent growing season.”

Earlier, the Taliban-led Afghan foreign ministry, in a statement, said that Muttaqi and his team had stressed the need for Washington to remove travel restrictions on Taliban leaders, end economic sanctions against the strife-torn country and unfreeze Afghan central bank foreign funds. It added that human rights issues also came under discussion.

“IEA reiterated that it was crucial for confidence building that blacklists and reward lists be removed and [the central bank] reserves be unfrozen so that Afghans can establish an economy unreliant on foreign aid,” the English-language Taliban statement asserted.

The Taliban calls its male-only government in Kabul the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, or IEA. The group waged a deadly insurgency for almost 20 years against U.S.-led NATO troops and the now-defunct Afghan government before seizing power in August 2021.

Bounties on dozen-plus

More than a dozen key Taliban leaders remain on a U.S. list of most-wanted men and carry millions of dollars of bounties on their heads for their roles in directing attacks against American troops.

The U.S. and other Western nations collectively froze more than $9 billion in Afghan central bank foreign reserves immediately after the Taliban takeover to block their access to the funds. They also imposed financial and banking sector sanctions on the country.

Washington has since transferred half of the $7 billion in frozen resources held in the U.S. to a trust fund in Switzerland to be used strictly for Afghan humanitarian efforts.

The Taliban have rejected the fund, demanding the entire amount be returned to the DAB. The U.S. has since eased some of the banking sector curbs to support humanitarian operations in war-ravaged Afghanistan and enable private citizens to receive salaries to support their families.

“Removal of most of the restrictions on Afghan banks leading to easy transactions was considered a positive development,” the Taliban statement said Monday.

The fundamentalist leaders have imposed their strict interpretation of Islamic law, or Sharia, to govern impoverished Afghanistan, banning women and girls from education beyond about a sixth-grade level. They have barred women from most employment and visiting public places such as parks, gyms and bathhouses.

The U.N. and other aid agencies also have been banned from hiring female Afghan staff, undermining humanitarian operations in a country where more than 28 million people need food aid.

No foreign government has recognized the Taliban administration over human rights concerns.

Washington and the world have denounced restrictions on Afghan women, demanding the Taliban reverse them if they want their government to be formally recognized and sanctions be lifted.

The Organization for Islamic Cooperation urged its member nations Monday to take action against countries that permit public burning or desecration of the Quran, including the recalling of ambassadors.

The Saudi Arabia-based group made the call in a statement following an emergency online meeting of its foreign ministers to discuss recent incidents in which the Islamic holy book was burned or otherwise defaced at officially permitted protests in Sweden and Denmark.

The organization’s 57 member countries should “consider taking any necessary decisions and actions that they deem appropriate in their relations” with Sweden, Denmark and other countries that allow such incidents, including recalling their ambassadors, the statement said.

It encouraged civil society organizations in the member states to work with counterparts in countries where the Quran has been burned or desecrated to file local lawsuits “before taking their cases to international judicial bodies, where applicable.” 

It also called for more efforts at outreach to combat Islamophobia, praising Kuwait for commissioning the printing of 100,000 copies of the Quran translated into Swedish for distribution in Sweden.

Many of the points in the final statement echoed recommendations made by Iraq’s Foreign Minister Fouad Hussein, who also called on the United Nations to “take measures to prevent these incidents.”

Ahead of the meeting, two men who had previously burned a copy of the Quran in Sweden did so once again, in front of a crowd of a few dozen onlookers and about 20 counterprotesters.

In both Sweden and Denmark, there is no law against blasphemy, and freedom of expression is generally held in high regard.

But as the recent Quran burnings have sparked angry demonstrations and diplomatic backlash in Muslim countries, officials in the Scandinavian countries have begun to consider whether there should be curbs on public defacement of holy books or other religious symbols.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said Sunday in an interview with Danish public broadcaster DR that the government is seeking a “legal tool” to prohibit such inflammatory acts without compromising freedom of expression.

In Sweden, Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson said Sunday on Instagram that his government is analyzing the legal situation regarding desecration of the Quran and other holy books, given the animosity such acts are stirring up against Sweden. 

Before Monday’s meeting, the OIC had already suspended the status of Sweden’s special envoy over the Quran burnings.

Sweden’s Foreign Minister Tobias Billström said in a statement that he spoke in recent days with counterparts in OIC countries to explain how Sweden’s freedom of expression works and that police make independent decisions on protest applications. He added that “the government is very clear in its distance from the Islamophobic acts carried out by individuals at demonstrations in Sweden.”

The Danish foreign minister said his “government condemned and denounced the insult” to the Quran and “that it is studying this issue with great interest.”

Give us 5 minutes, and we’ll give you the world. Around the clock, Voice of America keeps you in touch with the latest news. We bring you reports from our correspondents and interviews with newsmakers from across the world.