Page 29 - bon-dia-aruba-20210802

A29
world news Dialuna 2 augustus 2021

UK Windrush victims demand compensation on Emancipation Day

(AP) — Black people Day event, which marked the
whose right to live in the 187th anniversary of the day The Windrush scandal has
U.K. was illegally chal- in 1834 when slaves in the rocked Britain since 2018,
lenged by the government Caribbean and other parts when many of these long-
marked the anniversary of the British Empire were term legal residents were
Sunday of the act that freed. caught up in a crackdown on
freed slaves throughout illegal immigration. Thou-
the British Empire, draw- After the gathering, some sands lost their jobs, homes
ing a direct link between activists traveled to Bucking- and the right to free medical
slavery and the discrimi- ham Palace, hoping to de- care, many because they ar-
nation they suffered. liver a written appeal asking rived as children and couldn’t
Queen Elizabeth II to back produce paperwork proving
Dozens of activists gathered their call for a “Windrush their right to live in the U.K.
in Brixton, a center for the Act″ to pay reparations to Some were detained, and
Black community in south those hurt by the scandal. an unknown number were
London, to back the inter- They were turned away by deported to countries they
national drive for reparations palace guards, who told them barely remembered. “slow start” but said the pro- Parliament’s Public Accounts
for the descendants of en- to send their request through gram had been overhauled to Committee sharply criticized
slaved Africans. They also de- the mail. A program designed to com- make it simpler and faster. the government for failing
manded legislation to com- pensate victims has been the victims of the scandal.
pensate legal U.K. residents The Windrush Generation plagued by complaints that it The agency has paid almost
who were threatened with refers to citizens of the Brit- is too slow, too cumbersome 27 million pounds ($37 mil- Chair Meg Hillier, from the
deportation in what is known ish Empire who traveled to and the payments offered lion) in compensation, up opposition Labour Party, said
as the Windrush Scandal. Britain between 1948 and aren’t high enough to make from less than 3 million it was important to remem-
1973 after the government up for harm done by the Brit- pounds at the time the over- ber how grave the errors
“The Windrush injustice called on its colonies to send ish government. haul was announced in De- have been and that “people’s
would not have happened if workers to help rebuild the cember, it said. Another 7.1 homes, families and liveli-
Africans were not torn from country after World War II. It The Home Office, the gov- million pounds has been of- hoods were interrupted and
the continent of Africa,” said draws its name from the ship ernment department respon- fered to victims. uprooted, some were forced
Kofi Mawuli Klum, orga- that carried the first migrants sible for the program, in De- from the country.”
nizer of the Emancipation from the Caribbean in 1948. cember acknowledged the The rally came just days after

Kim's sister warns S. Korea-US drills will rekindle tensions

(AP) — The powerful sister of an unpleasant story that joint military Washington have been a long-run-
North Korean leader Kim Jong exercises between the South Korean ning source of animosities on the But North Korea later resumed harsh
Un warned Sunday that next army and the U.S. forces could go Korean Peninsula, with North Korea rhetoric against South Korea, telling
month’s annual military drills ahead as scheduled,” Kim Yo Jong calling them an invasion rehearsal it not to meddle in its dealings with
between South Korean and U.S. said. and responding with missile tests. the United States. In June last year,
troops will undermine prospects South Korea and the U.S. have re- Pyongyang also cut off communica-
for better ties between the Ko- “I view this as an undesirable pre- peatedly said their drills are defensive tion lines with Seoul and destroyed
reas, just days after the rivals re- lude which seriously undermines the in nature. an empty, South Korean-built liaison
opened their long-dormant com- will of the top leaders of the North office on its territory. Some experts
munication channels. and the South wishing to see a step In the past few years, South Korea and said Pyongyang shifted the respon-
taken toward restoring mutual trust the U.S. have canceled or downsized sibility for the collapse of the second
Kim Yo Jong’s statement carried by and which further beclouds the way some of their exercises to support Kim-Trump summit to Seoul and
state media targets only South Ko- ahead of the North-South relations,” diplomatic efforts to end the North was frustrated with Seoul’s failure
rea, and this could add credence to she said. Korean nuclear crisis or because of to break away from Washington and
a theory that North Korea’s decision the COVID-19 pandemic. Asked revive stalled joint economic projects
to restore the communication lines She added: “Our government and about prospects for next month’s held back by the sanctions.
is mainly aimed at pushing Seoul to army will closely follow whether the summertime drills, Boo Seung-
convince Washington to make con- South Korean side stages hostile war Chan, a spokesman at South Korea’s After the two Koreas reopened their
cessions while nuclear diplomacy re- exercises in August or makes other Defense Ministry, told a briefing communication channels on Tues-
mains deadlocked. bold decision.” Thursday that Seoul and Washing- day, talk of bigger reconciliation steps
ton were reviewing factors like the like another summit between Kim
“For some days I have been hearing Regular drills between Seoul and pandemic’s current status, efforts to Jong Un and Moon quickly spread in
achieve denuclearization on the Ko- South Korea.
rean Peninsula and their combined
military readiness. But Kim Yo Jong described such sen-
timent as “a premature hasty judg-
The U.S.-led diplomacy aimed at ment.” She said that “hasty specula-
persuading North Korea to aban- tion and groundless interpretation
don its nuclear program in return will only bring despair.”
for economic and political rewards
hasn’t made progress since a second Analyst Cheong Seong-Chang at the
summit between Kim Jong Un and private Sejong Institute in South Ko-
then-President Donald Trump broke rea said Kim Yo Jong’s statement is a
down because of disputes over U.S.- request for the complete cancellation
led sanctions in early 2019. of the U.S-South Korean drills that
South Korea cannot accept.
South Korea’s government led by
President Moon Jae-in, which wants “South Korea has no justification to
greater reconciliations between the persuade the U.S. to suspend the
Koreas, had earlier shuttled be- South Korea-U.S. drills, especially
tween Pyongyang and Washington at a time when North Korea is nega-
to arrange the first summit between tive about the South-North summit,”
Trump and Kim. Cheong said.