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Trump slams Harvard as funding fight heads to court

Trump slams Harvard as funding fight heads to court
US President Donald Trump on Thursday bashed Harvard as an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institution,” as the prestigious university battles his administration’s funding freeze in court. (AFP)
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Updated 25 April 2025

Trump slams Harvard as funding fight heads to court

Trump slams Harvard as funding fight heads to court
  • The latest outburst from Trump comes as his administration cracks down on US universities on several fronts, alleging widespread anti-Semitism, anti-white bias, and the promotion of ‘gender ideology’

WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump on Thursday bashed Harvard as an “Anti-Semitic, Far Left Institution,” as the prestigious university battles his administration’s funding freeze in court.
The latest outburst from Trump comes as his administration cracks down on US universities on several fronts, alleging widespread anti-Semitism, anti-white bias, and the promotion of “gender ideology” by protecting trans students.
The administration has threatened several top-tier universities with funding freezes and other punishments, prompting concerns over declining academic freedom.
It has also moved to revoke visas and deport foreign students involved in the protests, accusing them of supporting Palestinian militant group Hamas, whose October 7, 2023 attack on Israel provoked the war.
Harvard, which has seen billions in federal funding frozen after it rejected wide-ranging government oversight, filed suit against the Trump administration on Monday.
“The place is a Liberal mess,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform, also complaining that the university has admitted students “from all over the World that want to rip our Country apart.”
His broadside came a day after he issued an executive order targeting higher education, upending how federal authorities decide which universities and colleges can access billions of dollars from certain grants and student loans.
The executive order seeks to clamp down on what Trump brands “unlawful discrimination” — that is any measures that seek to promote the representation of “racial and ethnic minority individuals.”
On Thursday, a federal judge ruled that Trump could not withhold funds from public schools that operate equality and diversity policies which have been a particular target of the president.
The ruling issued in New Hampshire does not apply across the board but instead to the largest US teacher union, the National Education Association (NEA), and the Center for Black Educator Development (CBED) non-profit which promotes the recruitment of Black teachers.
The ruling will apply in schools employing members of the NEA, or contracting with the CBED.
Trump and his White House team have publicly justified their campaign against universities as a reaction to what they say is uncontrolled anti-Semitism and a need to reverse diversity programs aimed at addressing historical oppression of minorities.
The administration claims that protests against Israel’s war in Gaza that swept across US college campuses last year were rife with anti-Semitism.
Several Jewish lawmakers accused Trump on Thursday of weaponizing anti-Semitism to attack universities for his own ends.
“We reject any policies or actions that foment or take advantage of anti-Semitism and pit communities against one another; and we unequivocally condemn the exploitation of our community’s real concerns about anti-Semitism to undermine democratic norms and rights,” the Democratic senators, including Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, wrote in a joint letter.
Many US universities, including Harvard, cracked down on the protests over the allegations at the time, with the Cambridge-based institution placing 23 students on probation and denying degrees to 12 others, according to protest organizers.
Trump’s claims about diversity tap into long-standing conservative complaints that US university campuses are too liberal, shutting out right-wing voices and favoring minorities.
In the case of Harvard, the White House is seeking unprecedented levels of government control over the inner workings of the country’s oldest and wealthiest university — and one of the most respected educational and research institutions in the world.
Professor Kirsten Weld, president of the Harvard chapter of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), told AFP “this is an increasingly autocratic, authoritarian government that is trying to dismantle not just our universities, but the higher education sector as a whole.”


US deports 11 migrants to Ghana despite safety concerns, lawyer says

US deports 11 migrants to Ghana despite safety concerns, lawyer says
Updated 4 sec ago

US deports 11 migrants to Ghana despite safety concerns, lawyer says

US deports 11 migrants to Ghana despite safety concerns, lawyer says
ACCRA: Eleven West African nationals deported by the US to Ghana were sent to their home countries over the weekend despite safety concerns, their lawyer told a court in Ghana on Tuesday.
The US had deported a total of 14 West African immigrants to Ghana under controversial circumstances. Although Ghanaian authorities earlier said they have all been sent home, the deportees and their lawyers later told The Associated Press that 11 of them were still at a military facility in Ghana.
The 11 deportees sued the Ghanaian government last week, seeking their release. Eight of them had told the local court that they had legal protections from being deported to their home countries “due to the risk of torture, persecution or inhumane treatment.”
“We have to inform the court that the persons whose human rights we are seeking to enforce were all deported over the weekend,” their lawyer, Oliver Barker-Vormawo, told the court Tuesday at a virtual hearing, adding that the suit had become irrelevant.
“This is precisely the injury we were trying to prevent,” he said of the safety concerns of the deportees.
The Trump administration’s deportation program has faced widespread criticism from human rights experts who cite international protections for asylum-seekers and question whether immigrants will be appropriately screened before being deported.
The administration has been seeking ways to deter immigrants from entering the US illegally and remove those who already have done so, especially those accused of crimes and including those who cannot easily be deported to their home countries.
Faced with court decisions that migrants can’t be sent back to their home countries, the Trump administration has increasingly been trying to send them to third countries under agreements with those governments.
Ghana has joined Eswatini, Rwanda and South Sudan as African countries that have received migrants from third countries who were deported from the US

Asylum seeker jailed for sex assault on teen that sparked UK protests

Asylum seeker jailed for sex assault on teen that sparked UK protests
Updated 24 sec ago

Asylum seeker jailed for sex assault on teen that sparked UK protests

Asylum seeker jailed for sex assault on teen that sparked UK protests
  • Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was convicted at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court earlier this month of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman
  • Kebatu, who had arrived in Britain on a small boat and only moved to the Bell Hotel about a week before the incident, had denied all the accusations

LONDON: An Ethiopian asylum seeker, whose arrest in July sparked angry protests outside the hotel near London where he and other migrants were being housed, was jailed for 12 months on Tuesday for sexually assaulting a teenage girl and another woman.
The protests outside the Bell Hotel in Epping, about 30km north of the British capital, became a touchpaper for a string of country-wide demonstrations amid rising tensions over immigration.
Hadush Gerberslasie Kebatu was convicted at Chelmsford Magistrates’ Court earlier this month of sexually assaulting a 14-year-old girl and a woman, attempting to sexually assault the girl, inciting her to engage in sexual activity and one count of harassment.
Kebatu had acknowledged that he was aware of the unrest his offending had caused and that other law-abiding asylum seekers had been impacted by it as it drew a response from the public not just in Epping but across the country, Judge Christopher Williams told him.
“It resulted in mass demonstrations and the fear that children in the United Kingdom are not safe,” the judge said.
Immigration has become the dominant political issue in Britain, eclipsing concerns over a faltering economy, as the country faces both a record number of asylum claims and arrivals by migrants in small boats across the Channel.
Kebatu, who had arrived in Britain on a small boat and only moved to the Bell Hotel about a week before the incident, had denied all the accusations, saying he was “not a wild animal.”
Just over 32,000 migrants are housed in hotels across the country, according to figures up to the end of June. The government plans to stop the practice by the next election, due in 2029.


Indonesia, EU sign long-awaited trade deal

Indonesia, EU sign long-awaited trade deal
Updated 12 min 8 sec ago

Indonesia, EU sign long-awaited trade deal

Indonesia, EU sign long-awaited trade deal
  • Indonesia has been in talks with the EU since 2016, but negotiations for a trade deal initially saw little progress
  • The EU is Indonesia’s fifth-largest trading partner with bilateral trade reaching $30.1 billion last year

DENPASAR, Indonesia: Indonesia and the European Union finalized negotiations on a trade agreement Tuesday after nearly a decade of talks, a senior minister said.
The Indonesia-European Union Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) is the third deal Brussels has signed with Southeast Asian countries, after Singapore and Vietnam.
The pact was signed by EU Trade Commissioner Maros Sefcovic and Indonesian Minister of Economic Affairs Airlangga Hartarto in Bali and will open investment in strategic sectors such as electric vehicles, electronics, and pharmaceuticals.
“By finalizing this agreement, the EU and Indonesia are sending a powerful message to the world that we stand united in our commitment to open rules-based and mutually beneficial international trade,” Sefcovic said after the signing.
“In all, EU exporters will save some €600 million ($708 million) a year in duties paid on their goods entering the Indonesian market, and European products will be more affordable and available to Indonesian consumers,” EU President Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement.
Indonesia has been in talks with the EU since 2016, but negotiations for a trade deal initially saw little progress.
Issues such as palm oil and deforestation posed stumbling blocks, but US President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff policy “created the urgency” to expedite an agreement, said Deni Friawan, researcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies.
The trade deal also included a protocol on palm oil, the EU said in a statement, without providing details.
“This is a ten-year journey that has resulted in a milestone that reflects our commitment and the commitment of stakeholders to an open, fair, and sustainable economic assistance,” Airlangga told a news conference.
The agreement is expected to be implemented by 2027, Airlangga added.
Around 80 percent of Indonesian exports to the EU will be tariff-free after the deal comes into force, Airlangga said in June.
Access opens
It is expected to benefit the country’s top shipments to the bloc including palm oil, footwear, textiles and fisheries, he added.
The EU is Indonesia’s fifth-largest trading partner with bilateral trade reaching $30.1 billion last year.
The agreement would further open up EU access to the Indonesian market of around 280 million people, Deni said.
Ties had been frayed by issues including a proposed import ban by Brussels on products linked to deforestation that has angered Indonesia, a major palm oil exporter.
Under the EU deforestation regulation, exports of a vast range of goods – including soy, timber, palm oil, cattle, printing paper and rubber – are prohibited if produced on land deforested after December 2020.
The EU on Tuesday proposed postponing the regulation’s implementation by another year after a backlash.
However, activists are concerned the trade agreement will lead to more deforestation driven by increased demand for Indonesian palm oil.
“The remaining natural forests in palm oil concessions will potentially be cleared in the near future (and) converted into plantations,” said Syahrul Fitra of Greenpeace Indonesia.


WHO says evidence ‘inconsistent’ of link between autism and paracetemol use in pregnancy

WHO says evidence ‘inconsistent’ of link between autism and paracetemol use in pregnancy
Updated 49 min 36 sec ago

WHO says evidence ‘inconsistent’ of link between autism and paracetemol use in pregnancy

WHO says evidence ‘inconsistent’ of link between autism and paracetemol use in pregnancy
  • US President Trump linked autism to childhood vaccine use and the taking of popular pain medication Tylenol by women when pregnant

GENEVA: A World Health Organization spokesperson said on Tuesday that evidence of a link between the use of paracetemol during pregnancy and autism remained inconsistent and that the value of life-saving vaccines should not be questioned.
US President Donald Trump on Monday linked autism to childhood vaccine use and the taking of popular pain medication Tylenol by women when pregnant, elevating claims not backed by scientific evidence to the forefront of US health policy.
“The evidence remains inconsistent,” WHO spokesperson Tarik Jašarević told a Geneva press briefing when asked about a possible link between paracetemol use in pregnancy and autism.
“We know that vaccines do not cause autism. Vaccines, as I said, save countless lives. So this is something that science has proven, and these things should not be really questioned,” he added.


East Timor to become ASEAN bloc’s 11th member in October

East Timor to become ASEAN bloc’s 11th member in October
Updated 23 September 2025

East Timor to become ASEAN bloc’s 11th member in October

East Timor to become ASEAN bloc’s 11th member in October
  • The accession will be formalized at a gathering of world leaders in Kuala Lumpur
  • East Timor is the youngest country in the region, having gained independence from Indonesia in 2002

DILI, East Timor: East Timor is slated to become the 11th member of the ASEAN regional bloc in October, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said Tuesday during a visit to the Southeast Asian nation.
The accession will be formalized at a gathering of world leaders in Kuala Lumpur, confirmed Anwar, whose country currently chairs the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
East Timor is the youngest country in the region, having gained independence from Indonesia in 2002 after 24 years of occupation.
“The accession of Timor-Leste to ASEAN will be of immense benefit to us all,” Anwar told a press conference after a meeting with East Timor’s president, Ramos-Horta, in the country’s capital, Dili.
“We will certainly have a big celebration for your accession to ASEAN in October 2025,” he said.
Anwar said the two leaders also discussed trade, investments, tourism, education and defense during the bilateral talks.
He is also scheduled to meet with East Timor Prime Minister Xanana Gusmao during his visit.
President Jose Ramos-Horta has long campaigned for ASEAN membership, and an application was first submitted in 2011.
“Our discussions have been a warm, constructive focus on the future as we prepare for our historic accession to ASEAN in October in Kuala Lumpur,” Horta said.
“We are committed to working closely with Malaysia and all ASEAN members to fulfil their remaining milestones on our path to full membership.”
East Timor continues to grapple with high inequality, malnutrition, and unemployment.
Its economy remains heavily reliant on its oil reserves.
Earlier this month, thousands of protesters, led by students, rallied against a multi-million dollar plan to purchase Toyota Prado SUVs for each of the country’s 65 members of parliament and lifetime pensions for former MPs.
Demonstrators and police clashed for two days in a row. Following the protests, the country’s parliament unanimously adopted a resolution to cancel the new vehicle procurement. The parliament bowed to public pressure on the pensions matter as well.
ASEAN began as a five-member bloc in 1967 and has gradually expanded, with Cambodia the most recent addition in 1999.
US President Donald Trump has confirmed he will attend the ASEAN summit in Kuala Lumpur next month.