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L’Allemagne dénonce le “jeu” de Poutine après de nouvelles frappes en Ukraine

Turquie: arrestation du maire d’Istanbul, principal opposant à Erdogan

Le maire d’Istanbul Ekrem Imamoglu, principal opposant au président turc Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a été interpellé mercredi matin ainsi que plusieurs dizaines de ses collaborateurs, d’élus et membres de son parti, accusés de “corruption”, selon le procureur de la ville.L’agence étatique Anadolu évoque également des accusations de “terrorisme” et “d’aide au PKK”, le Parti des Travailleurs du Kurdistan (interdit), à l’encontre de sept suspects dont M. Imamoglu.Selon un de ses proches collaborateurs, le maire, pressenti par son parti pour être son candidat à la prochaine élection présidentielle, a été emmené dans les locaux de la police.Dans une vidéo postée sur X, l’édile de 53 ans, en train de s’habiller et de nouer sa cravate, dénonce la fouille de son domicile: “Des centaines de policiers sont arrivés à ma porte. La police fait irruption chez moi et frappe à ma porte. Je m’en remets à ma nation”, indique-t-il.Selon le communiqué du bureau du procureur d’Istanbul, M. Imamoglu est accusé de corruption et d’extorsion, le désignant comme le chef d’une “organisation criminelle à but lucratif”.Tous les rassemblement et manifestations ont été interdits jusqu’à dimanche par le gouverneur d’Istanbul et, selon la chaine de télévision privée NTV, la station de métro de l’emblématique place Taksim au centre d’Istanbul, est fermée.Avant son interpellation, M. Imamoglu avait prévu de rassembler mercredi ses partisans sur la rive asiatique d’Istanbul.En outre, l’accès aux réseaux sociaux est ralenti.- Harcèlement judiciaire-Le président du parti CHP (Parti républicain du peuple, social-démocrate) de M. Imamgoglu, Özgur Özel, a dénoncé “un coup de force pour entraver la volonté du peuple” et “contre le prochain président” de la Turquie.M. Imamoglu est seul en lice pour représenter son parti à la prochaine présidentielle prévue en 2028 et devait être officiellement désigné dimanche au cours d’une primaire au sein du CHP.L’université d’Istanbul avait annulé mardi son diplôme, ajoutant un obstacle supplémentaire à son éventuelle candidature.L’édile avait dénoncé une décision “illégale” et annoncé son intention de la contester en justice, estimant que le conseil d’administration de l’université stambouliote n’était pas habilité à agir ainsi.En vertu de la Constitution, un diplôme de l’enseignement supérieur est exigé pour toute candidature aux fonctions de chef de l’Etat.”Les droits acquis de chacun dans ce pays sont menacés”, avait-il accusé.Figure du CHP, principal parti d’opposition parlementaire, Ekrem Imamoglu est visé par cinq autres procédures judiciaires, dont deux ont été ouvertes en janvier.En 2023, M. Imamoglu avait déjà été empêché de facto de se présenter à la présidence, en raison d’une condamnation en suspens pour “insulte” à des responsables du comité électoral turc.Opposant véhément au président Erdogan, M. Imamoglu a dénoncé fin janvier le “harcèlement” de la justice à son encontre. Il sortait alors d’un tribunal d’Istanbul où il était entendu dans le cadre d’une enquête ouverte après des critiques contre le procureur général de cette ville.

Turquie: arrestation du maire d’Istanbul, principal opposant à Erdogan

Turkey police detain Istanbul mayor, Erdogan’s main rival

Turkish police raided the home of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem Imamoglu on Wednesday, detaining him over a corruption probe in a move denounced by the main opposition CHP party as a “coup”.A popular and powerful figure within the CHP, Imamoglu is President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s main political rival, and his detention came days before he was to be named the party’s candidate for the 2028 presidential election. Widely seen as the strongest candidate to challenge Erdogan, Imamoglu’s career has been overshadowed by a string of what critics say are politically motivated legal cases.The police raid occurred just hours after Istanbul University revoked his degree, amid claims it was falsely obtained.The revocation is a high-stakes move as presidential candidates in Turkey need to have a higher education qualification. Imamoglu “was detained and is now at police headquarters”, said a press aide, who asked not to be named as he was not authorised to speak to the press and was unable to say why he had been detained. “Hundreds of police officers have arrived at my door. I entrust myself to the people,” the mayor said in a video posted on X. A statement from the Istanbul public prosecutor’s office cited charges including bribery and extortion, saying that Imamoglu was the leader of a “criminal organisation” and that 100 suspects had been rounded up. The move appeared to be in connection with a probe into alleged “tender rigging” by Imamoglu that was opened in 2023. But local media reports, including from state news agency Anadolu, said his detention was also linked to a separate probe for allegedly aiding the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), saying he was one of seven people who had been detained. – Social media blocked, protests banned -CHP leader Ozgur Ozel condemned what he called a “coup attempt against our next president”. “Making decisions on behalf of the people, using force to replace the will of the people or to obstruct it is a coup,” Ozel said on X. “We will not give in. In the end, the people’s will shall prevail and Turkey will win,” he added.Shortly after the police raid, access to social media platforms was restricted, the Netblocks internet access monitor said. “Live metrics show #Turkey has restricted access to multiple social media platforms including X, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok; the incident comes as Istanbul mayor Ekrem Imamoglu and dozens of others are detained in events described by the opposition as a ‘coup’,” it said. And the Istanbul governor’s office immediately issued a ban on all protests until March 23 — several demonstrations had been announced by the CHP late Tuesday over the revocation of Imamoglu’s degree, which the mayor vowed to contest in court. “We will fight this illegitimate decision in court,” said the 53-year-old mayor, who was resoundingly re-elected as mayor of Turkey’s largest city last year.”We will build a system that will erase injustice from this country’s memory.”Erdogan has repeatedly rejected claims that he himself never graduated from university and was not constitutionally able to hold the office of president.In a statement on X, Istanbul University said the degrees of 28 people, including Imamoglu, would be “withdrawn and cancelled on the grounds of… obvious error”. It did not elaborate further. The mayor’s office had previously published a copy of the business management diploma Imamoglu received from Istanbul University in 1995 after a journalist claimed he did not have one.In recent years, Imamoglu has been named in multiple legal probes, with three new cases opened this year alone. In 2022, he was handed two years and seven months in jail and banned from political activities for “insulting” election officials in Istanbul, in a sentence that he has appealed, the outcome of which is still pending.

Les durées des passages aux urgences ont augmenté en 10 ans

Les durées des passages aux urgences ont nettement augmenté en 10 ans, avec une progression de 45 minutes de la durée médiane des séjours, selon un baromètre de la Drees (direction statistique des ministères sociaux) publié mercredi.La moitié des patients passés par un service d’urgences en 2023 y ont séjourné plus de 3 heures, contre 2 heures et 15 minutes en 2013, selon ce baromètre. L’étude montre par ailleurs une nette augmentation des personnes venant aux urgences faute de rendez-vous ailleurs: 21% des patients ont mentionné ce type de problème pour expliquer leur venue en 2023, contre 13% en 2013.Le baromètre est construit à partir de l’étude d’une journée ordinaire dans les 719 services d’urgences en France (en l’occurrence pour 2023 le mardi 13 juin), de 08h00 le matin à 08h00 le lendemain matin, rapportée à une journée ordinaire dix ans avant.Dans l’ensemble, “la durée de passage aux urgences varie fortement selon les parcours des patients, mais la hausse est générale”, a indiqué la Drees dans un communiqué.Pour les quelque 80% des patients rentrés chez eux à l’issue de leur passage, la durée médiane était de plus de 2 h 30, soit 40 minutes de plus qu’en 2013.Pour les 11% de patients qui sont allés directement des urgences dans un autre service, le temps de passage médian était de 5 heures 20, soit 1 heure et 25 minutes de plus qu’en 2013.Et pour les 5% de patients passés par une unité d’hospitalisation de courte durée rattachée aux Urgences (UHCD), la durée médiane est passée à 14 h 50, soit 2 heures 20 minutes de plus qu’en 2013.Les personnes âgées de plus de 75 ans sont particulièrement concernées par ces temps de passage longs : 36% d’entre elles y sont restées plus de 8 heures, contre 15% pour la population générale.Par ailleurs, “l’hospitalisation à la sortie de urgences a baissé, en nombre et en proportion de patients”, note la Drees.”20% des patients sont passés en UHCD ou ont été hospitalisés dans un autre service en 2023, contre 23% en 2013″, ajoute-t-elle.Cette baisse constatée peut être motivée par plusieurs facteurs, note la Drees, qui évoque “des modifications de pratiques médicales, des différences de l’état de santé des patients, ou la moindre disponibilité de lits à la suite de la baisse continue de la capacité d’hospitalisation complète des établissements de santé”.”En dix ans, le nombre de lits d’hospitalisation complète a en effet décru de 11%, soit 43.000 lits en moins”, rappelle la Drees.

Supreme Court chief rebukes Trump over call for judge’s impeachment

Donald Trump’s rumbling conflict with the judiciary burst into open confrontation on Tuesday as Supreme Court Justice John Roberts issued a rare public rebuke of a US president over his call for the impeachment of a federal judge.”For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts said in a brief statement. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”Roberts’s extraordinary rebuke of the president came after Trump called for the impeachment of District Judge James Boasberg, who ordered the suspension over the weekend of deportation flights of alleged illegal migrants.The White House has been sharply critical of district courts that have blocked some of the president’s executive actions.However, this was the first time Trump has personally called for a judge’s impeachment since he took office in January, saying that Boasberg was a “Radical Left Lunatic of a Judge, a troublemaker and agitator who was sadly appointed by Barack Hussein Obama.” “This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED!!!” he said in a Truth Social post earlier Tuesday.Hours later, Brandon Gill, a Republican lawmaker from Texas, announced on social media platform X that he had introduced articles of impeachment in the House against Boasberg, whom he described as a “radical activist judge.”Following Roberts’s rare statement, Trump said in another post: “If a President doesn’t have the right to throw murderers, and other criminals, out of our Country because a Radical Left Lunatic Judge wants to assume the role of President, then our Country is in very big trouble, and destined to fail!”Federal judges are nominated by the president for life and can only be removed by being impeached by the House of Representatives for “high crimes or misdemeanors” and convicted by the Senate.Impeachment of federal judges is exceedingly rare and the last time a judge was removed by Congress was in 2010.Trump, the first convicted felon to serve in the White House, has a history of attacking the judges who presided over his civil and criminal cases.Carl Tobias, a University of Richmond law professor, described Roberts’s intervention as “extremely rare” and recalled that the chief justice made similar remarks after Trump criticized the rulings of federal judges during his first term.Roberts was compelled to respond at the time by saying the federal bench “does not have Obama judges or Trump judges, Bush judges, or Clinton judges,” Tobias said.- Court hearing -Boasberg ordered a suspension on Saturday to the deportation flights taking alleged members of the Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua to El Salvador, where they were put in prison.The White House invoked little-used wartime legislation known as the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 as legal justification for the move.However, no evidence has been made public to confirm the deportees were gang members or even in the country illegally.Boasberg held a hearing on Monday on whether the White House had deliberately ignored his orders by carrying out the flights.Justice Department lawyers told the judge the more than 200 Venezuelan migrants had already left the United States when he issued a written order barring their departure.Boasberg no longer had jurisdiction once the planes had left US airspace, they claimed.The Justice Department had previously filed a motion with an appeals court seeking to have the judge removed from the case for allegedly interfering with the president’s lawful “conduct of foreign policy.”- ‘I WON’ -Trump, in his Truth Social post earlier Tuesday, said Boasberg “was not elected President.””I WON FOR MANY REASONS, IN AN OVERWHELMING MANDATE, BUT FIGHTING ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION MAY HAVE BEEN THE NUMBER ONE REASON FOR THIS HISTORIC VICTORY,” he wrote.The Yale-educated Boasberg, 62, was appointed to the DC Superior Court by president George W. Bush, a Republican, and later named a district court judge by Obama, a Democrat.The White House has repeatedly lashed out following court rulings it disagrees with, such as the rejection of Trump’s attempt to end birthright citizenship.Trump’s bid to amass power in the executive has increasingly raised fears he will openly defy the judiciary, triggering a constitutional crisis.

L’Equateur réduit ses exportations de pétrole après une grave fuite d’hydrocarbures

La compagnie pétrolière publique équatorienne Petroecuador a déclaré mardi en situation d’urgence son principal oléoduc et a réduit ses exportations de brut en raison d’une fuite qui a gravement pollué plusieurs rivières et privé d’eau potable des dizaines de milliers d’habitants du nord-ouest du pays.Petroecuador a annoncé qu’elle suspendait ses exportations de brut de la variété Oriente (l’une des deux que produit le pays avec la variété de moindre qualité Napo) pour cas de force majeure, une cause qui devrait lui éviter de se voir infliger des pénalités par ses clients pour violation de contrat.La déclaration d’urgence “ne dépassera pas 60 jours et vise (…) à allouer toutes les ressources nécessaires pour minimiser l’impact de ce cas de force majeure sur l’exploration, l’exploitation, le transport et la commercialisation des hydrocarbures”, a déclaré la compagnie dans un communiqué.Provoquée le 13 mars par un glissement de terrain, la fuite a libéré dans la nature des dizaines de milliers de barils de pétrole brut qui ont pollué au moins cinq cours d’eau, dont le fleuve Esmeraldas, et la côte de l’océan Pacifique.”Nous parlons de 500.000 personnes affectées”, a déclaré à la télévision Teleamazonas Vicko Villacis, le maire d’Esmeraldas, capitale de la province du même nom. Il a estimé la quantité de pétrole déversée à environ 200.000 barils.Petroecuador, de son côté, n’a pas fourni d’estimation.- Mélange de pétrole et d’eau -En raison de la pollution, “il n’y a pas de formes de vie dans l’eau” des rivières Caple et Viche où “circule un mélange de pétrole et d’eau”, a indiqué le biologiste marin Eduardo Rebolledo, de l’Université catholique d’Esmeraldas, à la chaîne de télévision Ecuavisa.Or dans cette zone où “le service d’eau potable est limité, les gens dépendent beaucoup des rivières”, souligne-t-il. Des milliers d’habitants vivent notamment de la pêche. Amarrés, certains bateaux de pêche et leurs filets étaient couverts de pétrole, a constaté l’AFP.”Si cela continue ainsi, on ne pourra plus pêcher”, s’inquiète Luis Cabezas, un habitant de Rocafuerte.Les autorités ont déclaré dimanche l’état d’urgence environnementale dans toute la province et notamment dans une zone protégée abritant plus de 250 espèces animales, en particulier des loutres, des singes hurleurs, des tatous, des frégates et des pélicans.L’entreprise publique Petroecuador, responsable de l’oléoduc, a recours à des camions-citernes pour récupérer le pétrole déversé dans la localité de Quinindé.Trois navires transportant de l’eau potable sont attendus au port d’Esmeraldas, selon la société.Vendredi, Petroecuador avait annoncé l’activation d’un plan pour contrôler la fuite sur l’oléoduc endommagé, qui fait partie du réseau transéquatorien (SOTE) acheminant l’or noir dans le pays depuis l’Amazonie.L’Equateur produit quelque 475.000 barils de pétrole par jour, l’un de ses principaux produits d’exportation qui lui ont rapporté 8,6 milliards de dollars en 2024.

L’Equateur réduit ses exportations de pétrole après une grave fuite d’hydrocarbures

Mondiaux de bosses: St. Moritz, ultime étape d’une saison de reprise réussie pour Laffont

New generation of Afghan women shift from burqa

Young, urban women in Afghanistan are increasingly ditching the all-enveloping blue burqa with a face mesh that has become a symbol of the Taliban’s oppression of women.Since their return to power in 2021, the Taliban have imposed an ultra-strict vision of Islamic law, modelled on their previous rule from 1996 to 2001.But while women must still have their bodies and faces covered, restrictions from the feared religious police do not specifically mention the burqa.So young women are instead following fashions seen in many Gulf nations.Many prefer a flowing abaya robe, worn with a hijab headscarf and often a face covering as well — sometimes a medical mask, or a Saudi-style cloth niqab veil that exposes only the eyes.”The new generation would never accept wearing a burqa, because of the design and colour,” said 23-year-old Tahmina Adel in the capital Kabul.With social media, “everybody follows the trends”, Adel added, who was forced to quit her economics degree because of the Taliban government’s ban on women’s education.”I prefer wearing an abaya because I am comfortable in that,” she said.Young women in Kabul and the northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif said that abayas and headscarves offer more freedom of expression than burqas, with a variation in colour, material and pattern.”Only elders wear a burqa,” said Razia Khaliq, as she embroidered one at a workshop in Mazar-i-Sharif.Khaliq began wearing the billowing head-to-toe burqa aged 13, like her mother and grandmother before her.But her daughter, in her 20s, prefers the abaya.”Young people wear the abaya because it is more comfortable,” Khaliq said.- ‘Stifling’ -The burqa has long roots in Afghanistan.It was strictly enforced during the first Taliban government rule of Afghanistan, when women were lashed for failing to wear one in public.But the abaya and hijab headscarf combination grew in popularity during the time of the foreign-backed government.When the Taliban recaptured Kabul in 2021, they had promised to be more flexible than during their first rule, when women were deprived of almost all their rights.They have gradually erased Afghan women from public space, imposing what the United Nations has called a “gender apartheid”.They outlawed the loose headscarves commonly worn by urban women.Billboards were erected ordering women to once again wear the burqa — or an abaya, headscarf and a face covering.A law in August confirmed restrictions imposed on men and women by the religious police.It stipulates that, while women can go out “in case of necessity”, they must cover up.”Whether a burqa or hijab, there is no difference,” said Saif ul Islam Khyber, spokesman for the morality police, known officially as the Ministry for the Propagation of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice.Nasima, in her 40s, insisted that “showing your face is a sin”.But she admitted to sometimes wearing an abaya and headscarf to free her nose and mouth from the “stifling” burqa.- ‘Very strange’ -Niha, 22, said she was reprimanded for not wearing a burqa in public buildings, which are guarded by the Taliban authority’s security forces.It is common to be asked to readjust the headscarf, or ordered to add a medical mask.”As soon as we enter offices, we are mistreated,” said Niha, who did not give her surname.Hayatullah Rafiqi, a specialist in Pashtun culture, said the burqa was “strictly imposed” under the first Taliban government — when some women were “whipped if they did not wear it” — but that “today it is worn less.”Burqas vary only in colour according to province, from blue to light brown, and green to pink.Gul Mohammad has been selling burqas in Kabul for 40 years, and said many now come from China — made of nylon rather than cotton, making them cheaper and stronger but less breathable.”The Chinese burqa is very cold in winter, and it is like fire in summer,” said Gul. “This makes the women sweat.”For Sabrina, 23, from the Taliban’s spiritual cradle of Kandahar, life under a burqa is fraught with pitfalls.She is regularly lectured if she does not wear it.The first time she wore it was after the Taliban government seized back control in 2021, and it was not her choice.”I couldn’t see my way, I didn’t know if I was going right or left,” she said. “It was very strange.”