Coimbatore: A 23-year-old woman was arrested on Wednesday for posting on instagram, videos in which she is seen posing with lethal weapons, police said.
Vinodhini alias Tamanna, hailing from Virudhunagar district, is said to be a member of a gang which posts videos on instagram, provoking their rival gangs.
A case was registered against her under the Arms Act and police were on the lookout for the woman, who was on the run after the video had gone viral.
Sensing trouble, Vinodhini posted another video, in which she claimed that she had not posted any video and that she was married and settled down, they said.
Police traced her to Sangagiri in Salem district and brought her to the city. After medical checkup she was produced before a court and remanded to judicial custody, they added.
Vinodhini was arrested in a case relating to possession of ganja two years ago.
Blinken quickly segued into the United States’ “deep concern” that China is considering providing potentially lethal supplies to Russia in their renewed offensive against Ukraine.
“We’ve seen already over these past months the provision of nonlethal assistance that does go directly to aiding and abetting Russia’s war effort. And some further information that we are sharing today, and that I think will be out there soon, that indicates that they are strongly considering providing lethal assistance to Russia,” Blinken said.
Speaking earlier Saturday at the Munich conference in Germany, Vice President Kamala Harris said Russia has committed “crimes against humanity” in Ukraine and is responsible for a “widespread and systematic attack” against Ukraine’s civilian population — citing evidence of execution-style killings, rape, torture and forceful deportations.
Wang, who spoke after Harris at the conference, publicly slammed the U.S. response to the balloon that overflew the country as a “weak” and “near-hysterical” reaction; he also accused the U.S. of warmongering.
On China potentially aiding Russia’s war effort, Blinken said: “We see China considering this; we have not seen them cross that line. So I think it’s important that we make clear, as I did this evening in my meeting with Wang Yi, that this is something that is of deep concern to us. And I made clear the importance of not crossing that line, and the fact that it would have serious consequences in our own relationship, something that we do not need on top of the balloon incident that China’s engaged in.”
Pressed further by Margaret Brennan on CBS News’ “Face The Nation” on what would constitute lethal support to Russia’s war effort, Blinken replied: “Weapons. … Primarily weapons.”
“There’s a whole gamut of things that fit in that category, everything from ammunition to the weapons themselves,” he added.
Blinken said the U.S. has concerns over Chinese companies potentially providing equipment to Russian-backed mercenary groups operating in Ukraine, including the Wagner Group.
“To date, we have seen Chinese companies and of course, in China, there’s really no distinction between private companies and the state. We have seen them provide non-lethal support to Russia for use in Ukraine. The concern that we have now is based on information we have that they’re considering providing lethal support,” he said.
Blinken characterized the U.S. relationship with China as “competitive” and “among the most consequential but also complex relationships that we have,” adding that “we have a strong interest in trying to manage the relationship responsibly, and to make sure, to the best of our ability, that competition doesn’t veer into conflict or into cold war.”
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( With inputs from : www.politico.com )
Peru used “excessive and lethal force” driven by “marked racist bias” against a largely indigenous and campesino population, Amnesty International has concluded, following an investigation into more than two months of anti-government protests which have claimed at least 60 lives.
An Amnesty International fact-finding mission investigated 46 possible cases of human rights violations and documented 12 cases of deaths from the use of firearms – all the victims appeared to have been shot in the chest, torso or head – following visits to the capital Lima and the southern cities of Chincheros, Ayacucho and Andahuaylas.
In a damning report, Erika Guevara-Rosas, the organisation’s Americas director, said the Peruvian authorities had permitted the “excessive and lethal use of force to be the government’s only response for more than two months to the clamour of thousands of communities who today demand dignity and a political system that guarantees their human rights.”
Police officers arrest a woman protesting against the government of Dina Boluarte in Lima, Peru. Photograph: Antonio Melgarejo/EPA
“The grave human rights crisis facing Peru has been fueled by stigmatisation, criminalisation and racism against Indigenous peoples and campesino communities who today take to the streets exercising their rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly, and in response have been violently punished,” she told journalists on Thursday.
The rights group’s visit comes as President Dina Boluarte and her government face widespread accusations of using excessive force against civilian protesters. At least 48 people have been killed by security forces, prompting the UN human rights office to demand an investigation into the deaths and injuries last month.
Peru has been mired in political strife and street violence since early December, when former president Pedro Castillo was accused of staging a coup after attempting to dissolve congress and rule by decree. He was arrested, and Boluarte, his vice-president and former running mate, took office. Protesters, however, have called for her resignation and early elections amid mounting deaths. She has refused to resign while the country’s congress has rejected bills to announce elections.
Amnesty International’s delegation said it presented evidence of excesses by the security forces to Boluarte in a meeting on Wednesday. The investigation found evidence of “marked racist bias” targeting historically marginalised populations as the number of arbitrary deaths was disproportionately concentrated in largely Indigenous regions, the organisation said.
Indigenous populations represent only 13% of Peru’s total population but they account for 80% of the total deaths registered since the crisis began, it found.
“It’s no coincidence that dozens of people told Amnesty International they felt that the authorities treated them like animals and not human beings,” said Guevara-Rosas. “The systemic racism ingrained in Peruvian society and its authorities for decades has been the driving force behind the violence used to punish communities that have raised their voices.”
“I come to demand justice. I come to speak on behalf of all those who were killed by bullets,” said Ruth Bárcena, the widow of Leonardo Hancco, 32, one of 10 citizens killed by soldiers in Ayacucho on December 15 after some protesters tried to storm the airport. “We are not terrorists,” she said.
Protests in Peru have not stopped since Boluarte assumed the presidency in December. Photograph: Carlos Garcia Granthon/ZUMA Press Wire/REX/Shutterstock
“I didn’t think that in the Peruvian state demanding your rights was a crime that deserved having your life taken,” said Bárcena, who leads a group of families left bereft by the violence in the Andean city. “[The dead] have left orphans who will never embrace their parents again. Like my daughter, who asks every day: ‘Why did they kill my father, why did the soldiers shoot my father?’”
A recent investigation by Peruvian journalists at IDL Reporteros retraced the final steps of six of the 10 killed in Ayacucho. It found that one of the victims was helping an injured protester on his doorstep, and two others, including a 15-year-old boy, were walking home and had not taken part in the demonstrations nor been involved in the attempt – by some protesters – to storm the airport.
The organisation said it found photographic and video material which pointed to “excessive and sometimes indiscriminate use of lethal and potentially lethal force by the authorities”. It added some of the cases could constitute extrajudicial killings.
It also found that judicial investigations into the deaths were slow and under-resourced and the “chain of custody of certain evidence had not been preserved, which could undermine the possibility of genuinely impartial and exhaustive investigations”.
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( With inputs from : www.theguardian.com )
